Alex Bainbridge

  • Nurses win major victory

    HOBART — After a two-year struggle, the Australian Nurses Federation (ANF) has successfully forced the Tasmanian state government to pay a postgraduate allowance to all qualified nurses. On May 1, the Federal Court ordered

  • ALP 'Left' moves against Harry Quick

    HOBART — Factional opposition to outspoken anti-war parliamentarian Harry Quick was publicly revealed on March 1. The Saturday Mercury reported that the ALP "Left" faction was trying to replace Quick — who is not aligned with

  • Students answer education ministers

    HOBART — Tasmanian education minister Paula Wriedt and federal education minister Brendan Nelson have publicly chastised secondary students planning to join the March 5 national student strike against the war on Iraq. Student

  • Unions Tasmania opposes unilateral US war

    HOBART — The Unions Tasmania Council, the peak union body in the state, issued a statement from its meeting on February 13 opposing a unilateral US war on Iraq. However, the statement supports UN calls on Iraq to "surrender

  • Labor overrides tribunal to build dam

    HOBART — The state Labor government of Premier Jim Bacon decided on February 3 to introduce new laws to allow the $30 million Meander Dam project to go ahead. Previously, the Resource Management and Planning Appeals Tribunal

  • Cygnet Folk Festival supports refugees

    CYGNET — The Cygnet Folk Festival — held in Tasmania on January 10-12 — has become “one of the most progressive festivals in Australia today” according to one of the festival organisers, Geoff Francis. Notable progressive

  • Wharf protest first of many

    HOBART — The state Labor government has ignored the January 1 deadline — imposed on it by the Tasmania Together consultation process — for ending clear-felling in some forests classified as "high conservation value". Many

  • Gay law reform: 'a big investment for a big return'

    Gay rights activist Rodney Croome believes that the Tasmanian government's proposed changes to relationships laws will give Tasmania one of the best set of lesbian and gay human rights laws in the world. As evidence of this,

  • Christmas parade floats cause a stir

    HOBART — Two floats in the November 30 Launceston Christmas parade have sparked a string of letters in the Examiner, the town's daily tabloid. The Peace on Earth float was entered by a coalition of No War on Iraq,

  • Tasmania to get 'best gay and lesbian laws in the world'

    HOBART — The Tasmanian Labor government announced plans in early November to allow gay and lesbian couples to adopt children and to register their relationships (although not marriages) with the Office of Births, Deaths and

  • Qantas censors forest billboard

    HOBART — Environmentalists paid $20,000 for an airport advertising campaign that was terminated in less than 24 hours amid allegations of political censorship. On November 1, the Wilderness Society, supported by

  • Thousands oppose war on Iraq

    HOBART — In the largest of several anti-war protests held around the country, 2000 people marched through the Tasmanian state capital on November 2. Green triangles, Socialist Alliance “No war on Iraq” placards, union