Independents calling the shots is no shift to the left
With independent MPs positioned to determine who forms the next government there has been all sorts of talk about the beginning of a different kind of politics in Canberra....
Election promises expand market agenda for education
The battle over NAPLAN testing and the MySchool website earlier this year indicated Julia Gillard’s vision for the future of education. Market reforms aimed at forcing competition between teachers...
Bligh does nothing as woman goes to trial for abortion
ON OCTOBER 12, 20 year-old Tegan Leach will be the first woman in Queensland legal history to stand trial for procuring an abortion. Leach could go to prison for...
Anti-Intervention campaign builds Greens vote in NT
Large swings to the Greens in the Northern Territory have shown the anger at the NT Intervention and its continuation by Labor. But they are also evidence of the...
Union power could strike Abbott out
IN 2007, the mass union mobilisations through the Your Rights at Work campaign were the central force driving John Howard from office. It beggars belief that only three years...
Building on union openings key for anti-Intervention campaign
Around the country, the campaign against the Intervention needs to step up the fight with a renewed mandate.
Campaigners should draw encouragement from the anti-Intervention vote in the Northern Territory,...
Gillard a clunker, Abbott a denier—we need a climate fight
Abbott told ABC’s Q&A during the election period that the science of climate change is “highly contentious”. Yet Labor’s attempts to play on his climate denial were totally unconvincing—because...
Lessons from success of refugee movement under Howard
AFTER AN election characterised by both Labor and the Liberals using asylum seekers as political footballs, the refugee movement is faced with both opportunities and challenges.
The bi-partisan refugee bashing...
‘Welcome to the Leonara Family Rejection Centre’
On August 13, 22 people set out on a 1600 kilometre return trip from Perth—the Compassion Caravan to Leonora Alternative Place of Detention (Leonora APOD). This is an excerpt...
Afghans languish while High Court hears challenge to offshore processing
BOTH JULIA Gillard and Tony Abbot went to the election with proposals to extend offshore processing—to East Timor (Gillard) or Nauru (Abbott).
Tony Abbott even met Nauru’s Prime Minister. Shadow...
Sustainable population debate is a dogwhistle
THE ISSUE of population took centre stage in the federal election. Gillard and Abbott blamed immigrants for everything from traffic congestion to climate change.
Julia Gillard moved quickly to junk...
French burqa ban sows division
A BILL to ban Muslim women from wearing the burqa and niqab in public went through the lower house of French parliament last month.
The French government dressed up the...
Pakistan’s floods made worse by US terror
IN PAKISTAN, millions of the world’s poorest people are desperately battling to survive the aftermath of torrential rain. Up to 13 million are affected.
Whole villages have been swept away...
All out truck strike: new stage in Greek resistance
FOR A week in July over 33,000 Greek truck drivers staged an industry-wide strike that paralysed much of the Greek economy. It follows six general strikes in six months,...
Massive strikes put South Africa on the brink
OVER ONE million striking South African workers are threatening to bring the government of President Jacob Zuma to its knees. Initial demands for an 8.6 per cent public sector...
Australian meddling part of agenda to dominate Fiji
The Gillard government’s continuation of the old Rudd and Howard policy of meddling in Fiji’s politics saw the Australian High Commissioner to Fiji, Sarah Roberts, expelled from the country...
Labor in power: the lessons of the Accord
Hawke and Keating’s Accord agreement was designed to hold back wages and conditions and weakened union power, argues Feiyi ZhangIN THE 2007 elections, mass opposition to Howard’s neo-liberal agenda...
Hungary 1956: the revolutionary alternative to Stalinism
The workers’ rebellion in the Eastern European state of Hungary in 1956 shows how real socialism is possible, argues SolidaritySINCE THE end of “Communism” in 1989, Hungary has seen...
Spying eyes: ASIO and the Communist Party
Writing a four-generation history of a family intimately linked with the history of the Communist Party of Australia (CPA) is not an easy task, especially if you are a...
Wikileaks exposes cost of Afghan war
The recent leak of over 90,000 secret US military documents on the WikiLeaks website reveals the truth about the war in Afghanistan.
Mounting, unreported, civilian deaths are compounded by an...
Things they say
A worrying outcome for business
Heather Ridout, Australian Industry Group, on the new Greens SenatorsI don’t deal with fools terribly lightly, and I think under any definition the man’s a...
