Frontline workers
Disrespected and in despair
September 8, 2021
My office receives hundreds of emails and letters each and every day from frontline workers in education, health, construction, retail and elsewhere. The virtually unanimous sentiment from the senders of these letters is that their rights and freedoms have been discarded and their views have been disrespected. Worse still, they are forced with the choice of being coerced into taking a vaccine they do not want or economic hardship from their jobs being taken away from them.
The NSW Government have advised that employers in Health must be vaccinated by September 17 and those in Education must be fully vaccinated by November 8.
My staff have selected three of the letters that have impacted them the most, please read the excerpts below (names have been changed for privacy):
Danielle: I am a passionate teacher and I adore the children I influence and teach. I am incapacitated by the looming mandates that deem me a ‘health risk’ to the children and staff I spend time with. I literally can’t breathe deeply or I cry. My beautiful little family is suffering the burden of this, the dreams that we have worked so hard for may never come to fruition.
Both my husband and I are at risk of losing everything we have worked to earn. Our precious children are now facing threats to their healthy systems that we have fought so hard to protect. As a breastfeeding mother, with a tainted medical history related to blood clotting disorders, I can’t obtain a medical exemption. How? How can anyone tell me that I must put my baby’s health and my life on the line?
Alisha: It has been an extremely stressful time for myself and my family with recent announcements that jabs are being made mandatory for teachers, and without agreeing to be vaccinated with an experimental vaccine, that I will lose my job.
I have been employed by the same company for over two decades and am devastated that they will place me on unpaid leave if I don’t agree to the jab. This will not only affect me and my family, but also the vulnerable children and families that I support in my role. Many teachers, as a result of refusing the mandatory jab, will leave the industry in disarray which will have long reaching effects on all children for many years to come.
Margaret: Only this year I had finished my 4.5 year teaching degree to be told I cannot teach without a vaccine. I am left with no hope, no choice, no work. I now have a HECS debt that I cannot pay off. I also now have a degree that I cannot use.
I don’t know where my life is going anymore. The only thing I’ve ever wanted to be was a teacher and that has been unlawfully taken away from me.
This is only a very small sample of what we have received.
The Christian Democratic Party remains a firm friend of vaccination but since 1977 we have maintained a consistent stance of voluntary vaccination. We have long believed that Australians are responsible people and should have the right to determine their own medical treatment without being forced or coerced.
We need to hear what is going on in your world. If you are set to lose your employment due to your refusal to take a Covid-19 vaccine please send my Office an email via:
Your voice makes a difference.
Yours faithfully,
Rev Hon Fred Nile MLC
CDP Parliamentary Leader
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02 9230 2478
