The Youth Affairs Council of Victoria (YACV) is calling on the Victorian government to consider lowering the voting age, following the tabling of a report in the ACT parliament recommending 16- and 17-year-olds in the territory be given the vote.
Zoe Kenny
In early September, the NSW carbon trading scheme collapsed. Conspicuously absent from mainstream media coverage of this event, however, was any attempt to analyse the inherent problems of relying on market mechanisms to solve the global problem of climate change.
The federal government announced on September 23 that it has for the first time adopted an actual target for energy generation from clean sources. Under the plan, 15% of Australias electricity would be generated from such sources by 2020, including renewable energy like wind and solar, as well as clean, green nuclear power and clean coal. Prime Minister John Howard heralded the plan as a major cost saving and regulatory breakthrough.
A massive drop in Arctic sea ice during this years northern summer has opened up the Northwest Passage a sea route that passes between the frozen Arctic region and northern Canada that could provide a quicker shipping route between Europe and Asia than previously allowed by either the Suez Canal or the Panama Canal for the first time since satellite recordings began in 1978.
Despite the media fanfare, the Asia Pacific Economic Cooperation summit, held in Sydney on September 8 and 9, achieved next to nothing in combating global warming.
A leaked document outlining PM John Howards climate action plan for the Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation summit to be held in Sydney on September 8 and 9 once again confirms the Coalitions dangerously cavalier approach to global warming.
In a move that blatantly undermines the cause of nuclear weapon non-proliferation, on PM John Howard announced on August 17 that Canberra had reached an in principle agreement with New Delhi to sell uranium to India, one of only three states in the world along with Pakistan and Israel that have not signed the nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT).
Environmentalists around the country are gearing up to protest the worlds biggest climate criminals US President George Bush and PM John Howard who will be pushing their environmentally disastrous agenda at the September 8-9 Asia Pacific Economic Cooperation summit in Sydney.
The Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation summit could be the platform for Howard to announce a joint US/Australia nuclear action plan, Imogen Zethoven, an anti-nuclear campaigner with the Wilderness Society, told a 50-strong public forum on August 15 organised by the Sydney Nuclear Free Coalition.
Twenty years ago, a UN special commission produced a report, Our Common Future, that predicted rising CO2 levels would lead to a mean temperature increase of up to 4.5oC within 50 years, which would cause catastrophic climate change. The report proposed that immediate action be taken to counter global warming through massive investment in renewable energy sources, with the onus upon wealthy industrialised nations to take the lead.
Within a week of the revelation that Australia is planning to join the US-led Global Nuclear Energy Partnership (GNEP) nuclear fuel cartel, foreign minister Alexander Downer publicly proposed that Australia sell uranium to nuclear-armed India, even though India is not a signatory to the international Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT).
Sixty people held a colourful protest on the steps of the Victorian state parliament on July 18, as part of a long-running campaign to have the Tullamarine toxic waste dump closed and the site cleaned up. The dump, which is operated by the Cleanaway corporation, is located adjacent to Tullamarine airport. It is within 1.5 kilometres of the suburb of Westmeadows and is close to other residential areas.
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