Justice, not jail—stop black deaths in custody
On June 20, coinciding with national mobilisations against the NT Intervention, more than 1000 people marched in Perth demanding justice for Mr Ward, an Aboriginal leader from the remote...
Macklin moves to take over Alice Springs town camps
“In communities GBM’s houses get put up in a matter of days, but we’re still waiting for houses and schools”: PAPA (Prescribed Area People’s Alliance) statement June 2009.
The...
Racist paternalism is widening the gap
A Productivity Commission report into Indigenous disadvantage was released in July. Examining the period 2000 – 2008, it demonstrates the horrific human toll of Howard’s assault on Aboriginal self-determination....
Billions for coal expansion in NSW
Rudd's CPRS has sent the message that big polluting companies can continue business as usual well into the future. The consequences are on display in NSW.
In its recent budget...
A Power Shift: from the grassroots to the government
Lack of political clarity has held back the climate movement’s ability to galvanise opposition to Rudd’s climate policies and mount an effective challenge to the government. Power Shift, a...
Climate activists build links with Hazelwood workers
Environment activists at the recent Students of Sustainability conference made a solidarity trip to visit workers on strike at the Hazelwood power station in Victoria.
As Dave Kerin, of the...
A Plan B for emissions reductions?
Plan B, a program for immediate action to reduce emissions across all sectors of the Australian economy, was recently released by a coalition of environment groups, including Environment Victoria,...
Sober reality behind economic recovery hype
The government is now arguing that the recession will not be as bad for Australia’s workers as first thought. We are told there is evidence of “green shoots” of...
Workers pay the price to save General Motors
General Motors, a company previously thought to epitomise the success of American capitalism, has collapsed, filed for bankruptcy, and been taken-over by the US government. While Obama has committed...
Still fighting for abortion rights in Qld
The campaign to drop the abortion charges against a young Cairns couple continues. In April 2009, Tegan Leach, 19, and her partner Sergie Brennen, 21, were charged under the...
Indian students boycott Harmony Day
State and Federal politicians are finding it difficult to ignore the continuing attacks against Indian students because of the impact they have had on international student visas, university enrolments...
Rudd’s anti-people smuggling hysteria is risking asylum seekers’ lives
The dramatic events surrounding a boat of Afghan asylum seekers at risk of sinking off the Indonesian island of Sumbawa has revealed how Rudd’s demonisation of people smugglers is...
Garrett approves new uranium mine
Labor’s environment minister Peter Garrett has given approval for the opening of a new uranium mine in South Australia, the “Beverly Four Mile” project.
Garrett founded the Nuclear Disarmament Party...
Uighur oppression behind clashes in China
Hundreds of people were killed, with hundreds of others injured and arrested, during protests by the Muslim Uighur people in the Xianging region in the west of China recently....
Obama’s drones spread the Af-Pak war
The war in Afghanistan is rapidly spreading into Pakistan to create what is becoming known as the Af-Pak war. The US has undertaken about 48 drone air strikes in...
Afghan MP: ‘Our government is one of the most corrupt in the world’
Malalai Joya visited Australia recently to promote her new book, which tells the story of how civil war and foreign intervention have ripped Afghanistan apart, and why the government...
Mass protests oppose military coup in Honduras
A coup against Honduran president Manuel Zelaya has provoked protests throughout the country.
The response of the armed forces, which have taken control, was the imposition of a curfew and...
Iranian discontent simmers amidst repression
Pro-democracy protests in Iran have continued despite a bloody crackdown by the authorities.
Tens of thousands gathered at Teheran University on July 17 to hear former prime minister Rafsanjani...
Iran 1979: How people power toppled a dictator
Iran’s revolution in 1979 ended up replacing one dictatorship with another. But the outcome could have been very different, writes Ernest Price
The mass people power protests in Iran...
Labor and the depression: The great coal lockout of 1929
Carl Taylor takes a look back at a strike where workers took on a Labor government
“The most dramatic industrial clash that has ever shocked Australia”: that was how Sydney’s...
Brisbane Casino: The union officials and the strike that never happened
It was so close. There were just eight votes in the decision at Brisbane’s Treasury Casino to accept the company deal (see story p 22). There are two main...
Union leaders ‘neutrality’ at Casino sells a rotten deal
Anger and resentment is running high among workers at Brisbane’s Treasury Casino. Eight months of bargaining and two cancelled strikes have left us with a sub-standard agreement. The Casino...
Thiess in bid to sack union members and slash workers’ conditions
IN EARLY June Thiess Services sacked four union members for pushing a union collective agreement with the company.
The CFMEU construction union is calling on the company to reinstate the...
Bligh puts Queensland up for sale
Anna Bligh’s Labor government is well and truly on the nose following its decision to privatise $15 billion worth of public assets.
According to a Galaxy poll, Labor’s primary...
Unions to launch campaign to defend public services in NSW
The gap between unions and the NSW state Labor government continues to widen. At the end of June Unions NSW unveiled its new response to the privatisation offensive at...
Confronting the myths used to justify dispossession
Review: Possession
By Bain Atwood, Melbourne University Press, $54.99
The introduction to Possession argues, “the principle challenge to the Australian nation’s sense of itself as morally good has lain in the...
Bruno: A homophobic and tedious failure of a film
Review: Bruno
Directed by Larry Charles, in cinemas now
Dressed up as irony, this caricature of “gayness” is a boost for the bigots.
Bruno, Sacha Baron Cohen’s latest comic persona, is an...
The bloody history Stalin tried to hide
Review: Katyn,
Directed by Andrzej Wadja
The revolutionary Victor Serge called the period of Hitler and Stalin “midnight of the century”. Hope for a better future, for peace and democracy...
Walk off protest challenges intervention
Echoing the dramatic land rights struggle of the 1960s and 70s, elders at the Ampilatwatja community, 300 kms north-east of Alice Springs, have walked off their community demanding an end...
