Footy Is Back 🏉

This evening is the return of the AFL season. Unless you’re under a rock you’d already know this fact, and perhaps you have your evening planned ready to cheer on the ‘Tigers’ or ‘Pies’.

In the downtime of the footy season and Covid-19 AWU members who maintain and landscape the sacred grounds of the MCG and Olympic Park really had no downtime of their own. Full Time workers continued on with their roles in keeping the entire precinct (AAMI Park, Olympic Park, MCG, Gosch’s Paddock) at its most pristine, awaiting the return of sports and fans.

Though casuals had to stop work, they were looked after and there has been no bad blood during the pandemic. Speaking with one of our groundsmen members I can report that it was work as usual, and as he put it “no scandals to report, no workplace mistreatment, on whole everyone has been well treated so far”. Employed through the Victorian Government and the Minister of Sport, the jobs were secure and unlike a lot of Victorians they were and are still going to work.

Work hasn’t dried up for this team as demand is still high, one of the employees said “it’s similar to being a farmer, work doesn’t stop, things keep growing and need looking after.”

As footy fans the members who work at the ‘G’ are excited to have footy back, but at the same time are cautious and not 100% ready for it personally due to the seriousness of Covid-19 and its effect on the community, though happy to admit “we all need a bit of light entertainment after what has happened and kind of glad for a bit of normalcy to creep back into daily life.”

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