A landmark Federal Court hearing for 96 Western Australian construction workers that begins on October 24 is the most dramatic demonstration yet of the impact of the Howard governments draconian IR laws.
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More than 400 people participated in around 65 workshops and 10 plenary sessions to discuss a myriad of national and international campaigns against imperialism and neoliberalism at the Latin America and Asia Pacific International Solidarity Forum held at Victorian Trades Hall and the RMIT on October 11-14. The participants included 33 activists and leaders from peoples movements and political parties in 20 countries, the most diverse left gathering hosted in Australia for years.
@body intro = My name is Ayi Layah Mon and I am a member of the Mon Youth Group.
On October 16, events in more than 150 countries marked World Food Day, which commemorates the founding of the UNs Food and Agriculture Organisation, with the theme of the right to food.
The Socialist Alliance’s anti-war campaign coordinator, Pip Hinman, has offered her condolences to the family of trooper David Pearce, recently killed by a roadside bomb in Afghanistan’s Oruzgan province.
According to an October 8 report from Venezuelas Presidential Press Office report, a new poll conducted by polling company Seijas has revealed that only 3.4% of Venezuelans think capitalism is the best system of government; 22.6% said it was preferable to socialism and 62.7% said they preferred socialism to capitalism.
The Howard governments changes to electoral legislation, passed last year, will mean a large portion of young people who are of voting age will be left off the electoral roll for the November 24 federal election. This legislation an obvious move to bar certain voters from the political process affects mainly those who are statistically more likely to vote against the government, such as the young, homeless people, house-renters and those who speak English as a second language.
Fractures have emerged in Respect the Unity Coalition, a group formed in January 2004 by an alliance that drew together expelled Labour MP George Galloway (now Respects sole MP), the Socialist Workers Party (SWP) and anti-war activists. On August 23, Galloway issued a letter to Respects National Council titled It was the best of times, it was the worst of times criticising the groups lack of organisation and custom of anathematisation in the organisation which is deeply unhealthy and has been the ruin of many a left-wing group before us.
Victorian state sector nurses are being threatened with having their pay docked for at least four hours for each day they participate in industrial action over wages and conditions, which began following a mass meeting of more than 3500 Australian Nursing Federation (ANF) members on October 16.
US President George Bush has opposed US Senate legislation to fund health care for the nuclear-test-affected Marshallese. Sixty-seven US nuclear bombs were detonated in the Marshall Islands between 1946 and 1958.
Tasmanian high school, college and university students are planning to walk out of class on November 1 to protest federal environment minister Malcom Turnbull’s approval of the Gunns’ pulp mill.
On October 12, PM John Howard announced his plan to hold a referendum to alter the preamble to the Australian constitution to include an acknowledgment of the original inhabitants of Australia. This is a departure from Howard’s historic position against “symbolic” gestures of reconciliation — a position that in the past has earned him the ire of Indigenous groups, who in 2000 literally turned their backs on Howard when he refused to apologise for previous governments’ complicity in the horrendous policies that led to the Stolen Generations.
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