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A Day Out With My ‘ABC Cuts’ Placard

Article by Susan Lamont

BMgroupno Marg_IMG_3942_SnapseedI was able to join the ABC protest in Sydney last Tuesday which was great, not great for the ABC but great that I was free and could go. I must say that now that I have retired and am able to be a bit ‘political’ I do enjoy going to select demonstrations. Not that I am a redneck, but it feels great to be among others who feel passionate about the same issues that I do. It felt empowering to be outside the ABC Ultimo Centre, with many other ABC Friends and some prominent ABC staff, knowing that the ABC Board was meeting inside the building, chanting together ‘No ifs, no buts, no ABC cuts’ and waving our placards with passion.

After the demo we Blue Mountains ABC friends had a coffee and a chat in the ABC cafe which was a good re-group. I left the others around 11.30 and thought that I may as well do some other things in the city rather than head straight back home on the train. But this meant that I had to carry my placard around. The placard was on a stick about 140 cm long! I felt it would be quite dangerous to hold the stick horizontally along the crowded city streets as I could have easily but inadvertently poked someone with it, even done permanent damage to someone in the-you know-wheres!! So I decided the safest way was to hold it in a vertical position as if I were, ah, protesting! Oh well, the opportunity for city crowds to see the ABC message I decided would not be a bad thing.

I went to the HCF office in George Street where I had some business to attend, interesting looks from staff and other customers. Then onto a foreign exchange booth at Wynward Station where I had some Canadian dollars to change back into Aussie dollars after my recent trip to Canada. Again some interesting looks but hey, I was spreading the message about the ABC so all was good. I then went to spend some time in the State Library, but I reckoned that they would not be too pleased if I wandered around in there with my ABC Cuts placard so I got the guy on the information desk to look after the placard, which he was only too happy to do!!

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When I left the library, of course with placard again in tow, I discovered that in Macquarie Street there was about to be a farewell parade for Marie Bashir who was finishing her 13 year term as NSW Governor. I think she has done an outstanding job as Governor, I admire her greatly so I was thrilled that I had chanced on the opportunity to witness this piece of NSW history. However the police were quite unsettled about my placard, especially a young female officer who approached me several times, and on the last occasion, maybe in consultation with more senior colleagues, she told me that my placard would have to go! I said that would be quite OK as long as I could get the placard back after the proceedings were over. The officer then spoke to staff from a nearby chemist shop who were happy to ‘mind’ my placard until it was felt appropriate to return it to me.

I really enjoyed the deserved fanfare for our ex-Governor and when it was all over I thankfully retrieved my placard from the shop. Unfortunately we are all acutely aware that our fight to save the ABC is far from over so I know that my placard and I will have another day out at some future point in time.

Susan Lamont