Sorry you took offence Julia.
And you are right, most of my blog posts appear on weekdays because my articles relate to work and most people read my articles on the way to work, at work or have their empoyers take out corproate subscriptions. I wish I did not have to spend my non-employment time writing the articles. One day, I may be able to make a living from writing.
I appreciate your effort in commenting. I hope we agree of the big things related to weork.

Thanks for your reply and acknowledgement of the time and effort that goes into organising these efforts – and given such, we of course want there to be good numbers at our events. Why would we organise an event knowing few would attend? As far as i know, people coming to our Memorial Day events don’t seem to mind if the service is moved to a weekday, if Memorial Day falls on a weekend. I’ve never had anyone complain. I don’t think they feel that we are commemorating their loved ones any less **or that we care less**; they know we are there for them and have been, ever since their love one died. The fifth paragraph of your blog is respectfully, just not on point, and i have taken offense.
A memorial day service is sometimes the only real public recognition families get for the injustice of a workplace fatality. I don’t speak for the whole union movement that organises these events, so i don’t know what media strategies we have or not have for these events. Media exposure is probably a bonus. At any rate, our campaigning on the issues to prevent workplace fatalities simply can’t be put down the success and media uptake of one event on one day of the year – there is much being done that isn’t necessarily broadcast and i’m proud to be part of a team that thinks about worker safety in all that we do, on many levels. I think you can see yourself that some things are best suited to the weekdays; indeed your blog post on this topic came out the Monday 29th morning – and rightly so, as more people would read it! Which is what we can all agree on – exposure and awareness leading to the ulimate goal – prevention. Thank you.

Julia, thnaks for your perspective.
I am not sure that your point about the “media coverage cycle” holds up, at least in relation to the mainstream media. I hve been toild that only Channel 7 in Victoria covered the April 29 ceremony in Melbourne. None of the local, state or federasl newspapers mentioned it as far as my my media subscriptions allow. Victoria’s Herald-Sun mentioned the day in passing on Sunday as a footnote to a story about sunscreen!!, supported by a commercial OHS document provider.
International Memorial Day has always struggled for media coverage due to its proximity to ANZAC Day. The current protests about domestic murders further reduced the media’s interst in a ceremony that changes very little from year to year. It continues to hold a lot of significance for many of us who have attended these events for decades and, in Melbourne, was attended by many influential policy makers, but this is communicating to the usual crowd and is doing little to raise the awareness of work-related deaths in the broader community, or perhaps most importantly to the employers.
I know what is involved with organising such events and I do not think I criticised those committed (usually) volunteers.

Jason, the date is not being moved. My article was bout organistions who commemorate the day on days OTHER than April 28. Sorry if Iw asn’t clear enough.

The MSM media always amazes me…..”what is important” seems relative to what narrative they are wanting to show/print.
Yes you are right about pledge to action…today will be interesting to see what is said and what is pledged by leaders.

Mike, this year in particular in Australia, this Memorial Day has been crowded out by days of large protests over domestic violence and the murder of women. Numbers = media attention and worker’s memorials are never going to match this unless a speaker makes an extremely controversial statement or there is a catastrophe at an event or a scandal. That is the nature of the media.

However, what I look for each year is any pledge to action. I know the idea is to remember the dead but the unions remind us that this remembrance should also be a (re-)motivation for action. It rarely is.

The other thing I find strange is why the main news networks don’t cover the event in their news bulletins