On Tuesday 24 September, hundreds of elderly pensioners, their families and unionists joined in a lively protest at the Monash Council Chambers in the Melbourne suburb of Glen Waverley.

The rally was the latest successful action in a campaign that began in early July, when the sale of Monash Gardens and Elizabeth Gardens aged care facilities was first floated by council.

Protesters again took their opposition to the proposed sell-off directly to the councillors responsible for the plan. The 400-strong crowd managed to shut down the council meeting and forced councillors to scramble out of the room through a booing and jeering crowd.

Addressing the crowd, Pip Carew, from the Australian Nursing and Midwifery Federation (ANMF), spoke of an increasing trend towards privatisation and funding cuts in aged care. She suggested that government and local councils see older people as an easy target for cost cutting.

But as the rally’s chairperson walked through the crowd with microphone in hand, it became clear that the council is pitting itself against anything but an easy target. Residents, many of them in their 80s, took the microphone and spoke defiantly about their intention to fight the council and their right to access quality aged care facilities.

The Monash Council is expecting to raise at least $15 million by selling these facilities to private operators. The sell-off is a short term cash grab and a wink and nod to developers that Monash City is open for business. Monash and Elizabeth Gardens are not the only facilities that are directly under threat. The Napthine state government has announced that it will be selling off hundreds of aged care beds across several facilities around Melbourne by next year.

Past experience has shown that the privatisation of aged care homes leads to an increased workload for workers, fewer jobs for highly trained staff and an overall reduction in the quality of services for residents. This agenda needs to be fought, and can be stopped.

The campaign to save Monash and Elizabeth Gardens shows us how we should fight and how we can win. When the Monash Council announced the privatisation proposal, it clearly wasn’t anticipating the birth of a grassroots campaign of residents, family members and workers that would challenge its greedy scheming. This sort of campaigning, with direct action as its focus and democratic participation by all those concerned, is exactly the sort of thing that has been able to win in the past and has every chance of winning this time.

Support the campaign:

6:30pm, Tuesday 29 October, Monash City Council Chambers, 293 Springvale Road, Glen Waverley.