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United States: Left-wing labour conference attacked

Union members and labour activists attending the Labor Notes conference dinner on April 12 were attacked by bus loads of staff and members of the Service Employees Industrial Union (SEIU) — wearing purple SEIU t-shirts — who forced their way into the conference venue in Dearborn, Michigan. In the ensuing melee a number of people were injured.

RBA governor: Green energy? Workers should pay

Glenn Stevens, the governor of the Reserve Bank of Australia, has argued that working people should be forced to absorb the cost of higher power bills when a carbon emissions trading scheme is introduced in 2010. Speaking to the April 5 Sydney Morning Herald, Stevens argued that “the policy would need to be well explained to consumers to head off calls for higher wages”.

Venezuelan steel workers: 'A triumph of the revolutionary people'

“Now, to producing Venezuelan steel at the service of the revolution and socialism!”, proclaimed Jose Melendez, referring to the victory obtained after 15 months of struggle at the steel factory Sidor, located in the heartland of Venezuela’s basic industry in Guayana.

Labor\'s new IR laws: flexible for whom?

The detail of the federal Labor government’s plan for its new industrial relations system, to come into force in January 2010, is beginning to come to light. On April 9, the Australian Financial Review reported that it had obtained a copy of a letter sent by workplace relations minister Julia Gillard to a range of unions and businesses. It canvassed their opinion on issues including the scope of allowable content in workplace agreements, the scope of individual “flexibility” clauses to be mandatory in all awards and enterprise agreements and regulation of industrial action during a bargaining period for a new enterprise bargaining agreement (EBA).

Behind the US war on Venezuela

Bush vs Chavez — Washington’s war on Venezuela
By Eva Golinger
Monthly Review Press, 2008
$26.00 (pb), available at <http://www.resistancebooks.com>

Stop the sell-off! Protest May 3!

It’s time to apply our pressure against theirs. All the forces in favour of the electricity privatisation, proposed by NSW premier Morris Iemma and treasurer Michael Costa, have been heavying the delegates to the NSW ALP conference as well as state Labor MPs.

\'Unite to fight climate change\'

Green Left Weekly caught up with some of the Climate Change — Social Change conference participants. Here’s what they had to say.

Teachers demand recognition

Teachers around the country are in protracted disputes over wages and conditions with their ALP government bosses. Federal education minister Julia Gillard has come out in opposition to teachers’ unions’ proposal to place bans on administrating national literacy and numeracy testing in pursuit of claims for real wage increases and to demand an improvement of working conditions.

On the box

Black Soldier Blues — Black GIs from the US during WWII were initially turned away from Australia due to the racist White Australia Policy. SBS, Friday, April 25, 12.55am. True Stories — Looks at an exhibition of Aboriginal art from the East

Zimbabwe: Mass mobilisation can defeat Mugabe

Below is abridged from an April 11 statement by the Zimbabwean International Socialist Organization (ISO). A much longer version can be read at http://links.org.au.

Capitalism versus the planet

John Bellamy Foster, author of Marx’s Ecology: Materialism and Nature and an editor of the prestigious US-based socialist journal Monthly Review (), was a featured speaker at Green Left Weekly’s April 11-13 Climate Change — Social Change conference in Sydney. He spoke to GLW’s Renfrey Clarke.

The Patricks battle 10 years on

This April is the 10th anniversary of the mass sacking of hundreds of waterside workers around Australia by the giant Patrick Stevedores. The drama surrounding this event stirred fierce passions, generated mass protests and polarised society on a scale seldom witnessed.