Hundreds of people donned as much green as they could find on March 10 and crammed into the Irish Murphy’s pub in Brisbane to start their celebrations for St. Patrick’s Day a week early. But on the opposite street corner, about 80 women and their supporters gathered in recognition of the many injustices still faced by women in Australia and around the world today.
Ana Borges from Women’s House opened the International Women's Day rally with a powerful statement that recognised the world of contradictions women live in, where their every move is subject to criticism by the status quo.
Australia
The Beyond Nuclear Initiative released the statement below on March 13. * * * The Beyond Nuclear Initiative (BNI) says radioactive waste management legislation passed this afternoon in the Senate is deeply flawed and will not slow down the campaign against the proposed Muckaty radioactive waste dump in the Northern Territory.
As a tropical downpour loomed, about 400 people stayed put to spell out "SOS" next to a huge banner that read "Reef in Danger" on the city’s Esplanade on March 11.
The rally marked the visit to the city of a United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO) commission, which looked at the possible impacts of the dramatic rise in shipping through the Great Barrier Reef expected over the next decade.
UNESCO has responsibility for the World Heritage listing for the reef.
The Darwin Asylum Seeker Support and Advocacy Network released the statement below on March 7.
* * *
The Darwin Asylum Seeker Support and Advocacy Network (DASSAN) has been informed by asylum seekers inside the Northern Immigration Detention Centre (NIDC) that two Iranian asylum seekers attempted suicide this morning.
The 2012 International Women's Day (IWD) march in Sydney, Australia, took place on March 10. Protesters marched from Town Hall to First Fleet Park near Circular Quay, where they held a IWD picnic.
Photos by Peter Boyle
More than 500 women and their supporters marched through Sydney's CBD on March 10 for an International Women's Day protest.
Despite the NSW government's promise to rule out sensitive areas to coal seam gas (CSG) activity, the long-awaited Strategic Regional Land Use Plan and Aquifer Interference Policy means “every part of NSW is still up for grabs”, Jess Moore from Stop CSG Illawarra said on March 6. Liberal premier Barry O’Farrell’s government policy is “a disaster and a broken election promise”. Moore said “no areas are off limits to CSG”.
Workers and their unions need strong labour law reforms. Two of many changes I urge can be adopted by the Independent Inquiry into Insecure Work in Australia and the federal government’s Fair Work Act Review are:
1. Amend the Fair Work Act to repeal the penal powers and have an effective right to strike.
2. Amend the Fair Work Act to restrict casual and other forms of precarious work to a limited period. Then require employment contracts for ongoing, more permanent work. Fair Work Australia should have the power to order the transition to more secure employment contracts.
A new media watchdog to regulate big media corporations — but also smaller, independent and online media operations — was the key recommendation of Ray Finkelstein’s sweeping report on Australian media released on February 28.
Mike Crook, the Socialist Alliance candidate for Sandgate in the March 24 Queensland state elections, is a former ALP member, who radicalised when working on construction and mining projects over many years. Mike is active in community and environmental campaigns in the Sandgate area, including the Transition Towns movement.
Media watchers should be forgiven for a degree of confusion over statements by federal treasurer and deputy prime minister Wayne Swan in the past two weeks.
He began the month with a Press Club address, published in The Monthly’s March edition titled “The 0.01%” where he attacked “the rising power of vested interests” — naming mining magnates Clive Palmer, Andrew Forrest and Gina Rinehart — for “undermining our equality and threatening our democracy”.
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