Liberal PM Tony Abbott can't abolish the truth, but he is trying. Whether it is his new government's attempt to keep refugee boat arrivals secret or the abolition of the Climate Commission, Abbott has moved quickly to keep the public in the dark.
Former Climate Commissioner Tim Flannery warned after the commission was disbanded: "As global action on climate change deepens, propaganda aimed at misinforming the public about climate change, and so blunting any action, increases."
Peter Boyle
Since the election of Tony Abbott’s Coalition government, Green Left Weekly has had a rush of new subscribers and many renewals. These people recognise the critical role Green Left Weekly will play in the trying period ahead.
One regular subscriber bought a subscription for her daughter. "She needs to know what is going on under this terrible man, Tony Abbott," the subscriber said when I took her call.
Her trepidation is shared by many — with good reason.
So Tony Abbott is the new prime minister. The Rudd-Gillard-Rudd Labor governments delivered this outcome with the narrow self-interest of its MPs and mafia-like faction heads and its desperation to prove itself as the best managers of the system for the billionaire class.
Fremantle City Councillor Sam Wainwright, who is standing in the seat of Fremantle for the Socialist Alliance, said at a meet-the-candidates meeting that after the election on September 7, Australia will have a government that is "either bad or worse".
Peter Boyle is the Socialist Alliance candidate for Sydney. He gave this speech to a rally for single parents rights in Redfern on August 24.
***
Together with Dianne Hiles, the Greens candidate in the same electorate who just spoke, I am campaigning against the cruel cuts to single parent entitlements by the former Julia Gillard Labor government and campaigning for a break from major party rule, from conservative major party policies and from the corrupted, old politics those parties stand for.
Kep Enderby, former attorney-general in the last year of the Whitlam Labor government, has declared publicly that he's decided not to vote for the Labor Party because of the ALP government's terrible treatment of asylum seekers.
He declared this in a short letter published in The Australian on August 2, repeated it to Linda Mottram on ABC Sydney Radio 702 and confirmed this directly to Green Left Weekly.
“I've decided not to vote Labor even though I've voted Labor all my life and I was a member of the Whitlam government,” he told GLW.
The ancient Athenian democracy that emerged in the 6th century BC is often cited as a model for more modern democracies.
In some ways, it had some features that were superior to the once-in-three-year vote we get in the parliamentary democracy we have in Australia today. It was based on regular assemblies where the citizens exercised direct, rather than just representative, democracy.
But ancient Athenian democracy was democracy only for slave-owners. The majority of the population were slaves, and they, along with women and foreign residents, were excluded.
Tony Abbott has promised a 1.5% cut in the company tax rate if the Liberal-National Coalition wins the September 7 election. It will cost about $2.5 billion a year and it is exactly the opposite of what Australian society needs.
Big business needs to pay more, not less, tax.
The Koori community and supporters rallied on the historic Redfern Block in on August 3 to show their solidarity with Trayvon Martin, the young black man who was followed and shot by a neighbourhood watch volunteer in Florida, and to oppose racism and racial profiling anywhere in the world.
The action was organised by Koori community activists Chris Bonney and Dan Munro. Bonney told Green Left WeeklyIt is 2013 and I don't want my children to grow up experiencing the racism all us Kooris experience today. It is not right in the United States and it is not right in Australia."
Recent polls say the refugee rights movement is in the minority on the issue. An Essential Report shows 61% of Australians support the “PNG solution”, which proposes to expel all refugees that arrive by boat to Papua New Guinea.
But we can win people over on this question because we have truth and justice on our side.
I am old enough to have taken part in the movement against the Vietnam War. I remember that at the start about only 30% of the public was against that war. But the anti-war movement went on to decisively win the battle through a persistent campaign out in the streets.
It was a powerful moment of solidarity as more than 200 Green Left Weekly supporters who had filled Balmain Town Hall for this publication's annual Sydney fundraising dinner held up Bradley Manning masks.
Looking down from the stage it was an amazing sight. The guests at the dinner included tables of freedom fighters from all around the world: from Latin America to Asia.
About 2000 people joined the second march and rally in Sydney on July 28 against prime minister Kevin Rudd's plan to send refugees who arrive in Australia by boat to Papua New Guinea.
This was significantly bigger than the previous weekend's protest. Another rally and march will be held on August 4, 2pm at Sydney Town Hall Square.
Photos by Pip Hinman and Peter Boyle.
- Previous page
- Page 57
- Next page