A report prepared for the Australian Coal Association titled Impact of Proposed Carbon Tax on Black Coal mining claims that the government’s proposed carbon tax is going to cause eight coal mines to close prematurely and will cost thousands of jobs between now and 2021.
The report claimed 4700 jobs would be lost from existing coalmines due to the carbon price
Australia
Sixty people, representing a broad cross section of the activist left and progressive movement, met on July 5 to discuss the implications of the vicious police assault demonstrators protesting outside Israeli-owned chocolate company Max Brenner on July 1.
The key issue debated was whether to set up a broader civil liberties campaign or whether to keep the focus on the 19 people who had been arrested at an action as part of the boycott, divestment and sanctions (BDS) campaign against Israel.
In opposition to the Baillieu government’s proposed fine for “offensive language or behaviour”, about 1000 people marched on June 25 at the aptly named “Fuckwalk”.
The statement below was released by a coalition of groups that held a protest on July 5, disabling a coal seam gas rig in Pilliga State Forest in NSW.
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Yesterday, in a first for NSW, a coal seam gas rig was the target of a peaceful protest, with a protester scaling 25m into the air and hanging suspended from the rig for almost 16 hours. The rig was working in the Pilliga Forest, near Narrabri in north-west NSW.
The protester, Warrick Jordan was arrested late on Tuesday afternoon, and spent close to five hours being processed by police at the Narrabri police station.
The NSW Nature Conservation Council released the statement below on July 5.
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In a first for NSW, peaceful protesters have this morning stopped a coal seam gas exploration rig in the Pilliga Forest, south of Narrabri. One protester in climbing gear is suspended high above the ground at the top of a 25 metre rig at an Eastern Star Gas operation, with another group of protesters on site.
Workers in the Australian Taxation Office have rejected management's proposed enterprise agreement by 59% to 41% in an all-staff vote. Workers in the Department of Defence voted against their management's proposal by 72.5% to 27.5%.
This follows similar votes by employees at the Department of Agriculture, Fisheries and Forestry and the immigration department.
Feminism is experiencing a revival in Adelaide with the formation of a new activist group, the South Australian Feminist Collective.
The group emerged from a feminist forum jointly hosted by Socialist Alliance and Femment, which followed the recent Adelaide “SlutWalk” march against sexual assault and victim-blaming. The forum explored the politics of this event and the relevance of feminism today.
About 30 people attended the collective’s first meeting on June 25.
The meeting began discussion about how the group would be run, its aims and values.
A small but spirited group of protesters braved driving wind and rain outside Fremantle’s Notre Dame University on the evening of June 30 to express their opposition to the university playing host to British climate change denier Christopher Monckton.
Earlier that day, Perth's daily newspaper The West Australian had obligingly provided free publicity for Monckton’s impending speech in an article occupying most of its front page.
The Socialist Alliance adopted a coal seam gas policy at its June 26 National Council meeting. The policy appears below.
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The gas industry is rapidly increasing its scope in the Australian energy market. Gas is talked up by some as a clean energy source, or as a “transition fuel”, while we develop renewable energies. But gas is a fossil fuel. Burning it creates carbon emissions.
For a safe climate, we need to cut net emissions almost totally within the next decade. In fact, we then have to move below zero net emissions: to draw down more carbon than we produce.
More than 100 Victorian police viciously attacked a peaceful protest in support of Palestine on July 1. People were peacefully protesting outside the 100% Israeli-owned Max Brenner Chocolates store when police charged the demonstration.
The City of Sydney has voted to replace the words “European arrival” in the official record with “invasion”.
The deputy lord mayor, Marcelle Hoff, says it is intellectually dishonest to use any other word in describing how Aboriginal Australia was dispossessed by the British.
“We were invaded,” said Paul Morris, an Aboriginal adviser to the council. “It is the truth and it shouldn’t be watered down. We wouldn’t expect Jewish people to accept a watered-down version of the Holocaust, so why should we?”
Palestine solidarity campaigners in the Sydney suburb of Leichhardt are celebrating raising more than $5000 for kindergartens in the South Hebron Hills at their annual Refugee Week Festival of Friendship on June 18.
Leichhardt Friends of Hebron’s festival attracted several hundred visitors to a photographic exhibition, indoor market, musical performances, a screening of the film Return to Gaza and a panel debate on boycotts, divestment and sanctions against the state of Israel.
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