Australia

Brad Chilcott is the director of Welcome to Australia, a community organisation that, according to its Facebook page, is “dedicated to giving asylum seekers, refugees, new arrivals and long-term migrant residents of Australia a warm, dignified and positive Welcome to Australia”. An article by Chilcott entitled Possibility before Protest has appeared on Chifley.org, a website for ALP members and supporters. The article does not clarify Chilcott’s relationship with the ALP.

On June 21, thousands of people rallied in Melbourne against the Australian government's ongoing cruelty to refugees, especially highlighting abuses against children in detention. Mohammad Ali Baqiri, a refugee who was locked up on Nauru as a child in 2001 said: "Having experienced the horror of Nauru, no one should be locked up there." Vivian Malo and Robert Thorpe from First Nations Liberation condemned the racist government and offered First Nations passports for refugees. A coffin was brought to the rally to symbolise the death of human rights in Australia.

Author Carla Gorton at the Cairns launch of the book and associated film project. Photo: Jobsforwomenfilm.com. Women of Steel: Gender, jobs & justice at BHP Carla Gorton & Pat Brewer Resistance Books, Sydney $10 paperback, 73 pages www.resistancebooks.com

A rally for justice for Eddie Murray, a 21-year-old Aboriginal man who was killed by "persons unknown" while detained in Wee Waa police station in north-western NSW on June 12, 1981, was held in Sydney on the anniversary of his death. Anna Murray, Eddie's younger sister recalled answering the door to the police who had come to arrest her brother 34 years ago. At 16, she was the last member of the family to see Eddie alive. She said that there had never been a protest in Wee Waa over her brother's death and she proposed that one be held there this time next year.

The racist United Patriot Front (UPF) have used German industrial metal band Rammstein in a new video to promote a racist march on July 17. The UPF are a splinter group from a Reclaim Australia that seek to harass Muslims and promote Islamophobia and violence.

The crowdfunding campaign to make a dramatic feature film about the historic Jobs for Women campaign at the Port Kembla steelworks reached its fundraising target of $25,000 with a week to spare. Four days from the end of the campaign, $26,898 had been contributed toward the making of the film, over a 6-week period.

Early this month the federal government transferred its first infant back Nauru. The five-month-old baby girl known as “Asha” (not her real name), her mother and father were forcibly transported from Melbourne's detention centre to Darwin detention centre and then to Nauru. Refugee activist Siobhan Marren has been campaigning for Asha and her family’s return. She told Green Left Weekly: “Asha is the first baby to be transferred back to offshore detention since the amendment to the Migration Act last December.

Opposition leader Bill Shorten’s persistent response to media questions about allegations raised in the unions’ Royal Commission concerning his former union, the Australian Workers Union (AWU), has been to refuse to provide a “running commentary”. After being requested by the commission to appear before it last week, he is now reported as saying: “I welcome the opportunity to talk about my 21-year record of standing up for workers”.

A rally for justice for Eddie Murray, a young Aboriginal man who was killed by "persons unknown" while detained in Wee Waa police station in north-western NSW on June 12, 1981. Anna Murray, Eddie's younger sister recalled answering the door to the police who came to arrest her brother 34 years ago. She was the last member of the family to see Eddie alive. She added that there had never been a protest in Wee Waa over her brother's death and she proposed that one be held there this time next year.

Funding to provide legal services to the Tasmanian Aboriginal community has been denied to the 42-year-old Aboriginal Legal Service run by the Tasmanian Aboriginal Centre (TAC), and granted instead to the Victorian Aboriginal Legal Service. The threat means the loss of $11.7 million over five years, and 15 jobs, many of them filled by Tasmanian Aboriginal people.

A small symbolic protest in the rain was held outside the Commonwealth government offices in Bligh St, Sydney on June 16. The action marked the submission of a petition to the Senate with 65,000 signatures calling for the immediate closure of Manus Island and Nauru asylum seeker detention centres. These Australian offshore asylum seeker detention centres were disasters that could not be fixed, Nicole Judge, a whistleblower and former worker at both centres, told the protest which was organised by the Sydney Refugee Action Coalition.

Cleaners held rallies around Australia on June 15 to celebrate International Justice for Cleaners Day. In Canberra, angry Parliament House cleaners went on strike for the day. At a rally outside Parliament House, they awarded federal treasurer Joe Hockey a giant golden toilet brush. Yahoo news reported: "The cleaners have walked off the job for 24 hours from 6.30am on Monday, protesting a federal government decision to abolish Commonwealth Cleaning Services guidelines.