Brisbane International Film Festival30 July — 09 AugustVisit www.stgeorgebiff.com.au, phone (07) 3007 3003
Paul Benedek
Anger at Premier Anna Bligh’s planned privatisation of $15 billion of public assets is growing, after the July 22 appointment of Rothschild, Merrill Lynch and the Royal Bank of Scotland to advise on the asset sale.
Activists from the Brisbane-based group Justice for Palestine picketed the office of Prime Minister Kevin Rudd on July 9. The action marked the five-year anniversary of the International Court of Justice decision declaring Israel's apartheid wall “contrary to international law”.
Premier Anna Bligh’s push to privatise Queensland’s public assets is just how former National Party premier Joh Bjelke Petersen ruled Queensland said state secretary of the Electrical Trades Union, Peter Simpson.
Chants of “Hardest working, lowest paid: Bligh and Wilson, be ashamed!” rang out from 4000 teachers at the gates of state parliament on May 19.
One of the most prominent Murri campaigners in Brisbane, longtime social justice activist, Sam Watson, will contest Queensland Premier Anna Blighs seat of South Brisbane at the March 21 state election. Watson is running as the candidate for the Socialist Alliance.
The Electrical Trades Union (ETU) is locked in dispute with rogue electrical contractor company John Goss, which is pushing a non-union agreement that locks in a four-year wage freeze for apprentices, offers only an 8% pay rise over four years to tradespeople, and tears up the 36-hour working week calendar.
Five thousand people, predominately from the Sydney Tamil community, gathered in Martin Place on February 4 to draw attention to the genocide being waged against the Tamil people in northern Sri Lanka. The same day, 150 people from the Tamil community and supporters of Tamil rights marched in Brisbane.
Three hundred people rallied for Aboriginal rights on Invasion Day in Hobart. Protesters pointed out that Aboriginal people remember January 26 as the date that their land was first invaded, their ancestors massacred and their rights trampled.
More than 40 people packed into the Kuril Dhangun room in the State Library on January 29 to hear from Rhonda Brim and Andrew Duffin, residents from the Mona Mona Aboriginal community in Far North Queensland, a community under threat from the Queensland government.
While governments worldwide push neoliberal policies including free markets, free trade (and lately free trillion dollar pay-outs to prop up businesses), new legislation from the Australian federal government indicates it does not want such freedoms for the population when it comes to what they may view on the internet.
The family of Palm Island Aboriginal man Lex Wotton say they are relieved he did not get a life sentence and they will not be mounting an appeal against his six-year jail sentence. However, there has been widespread questioning of the discrepancy in the “justice” received by Wotton and white senior sergeant Chris Hurley.
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