Sue Bolton
On June 21, the Democrats agreed to a federal Coalition government initiative to step up attacks on unionists in the building industry.
The Democrats agreed to support government legislation that would:
* Increase the powers of the
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Sam Watson is a well known Aboriginal leader and community activist based in Brisbane. Sam first became politically active as a high school student during the late 1960s, when radical students from across Brisbane used to gather outside the post
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Sam Pillay A multi-million dollar gold mine at Lake Cowal with an estimated yield of $1.2 billion threatens to desecrate a sacred site of the Wiradjuri people of West Wyalong-Parkes. Lake Cowal is the largest inland lake in NSW and the Wiradjuri
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The Socialist Alliance is running in every state and territory in the upcoming federal election. So if you want to vote for a people's representative, who will put working people and the environment before profit, check out who is standing in your
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James Caulfield Tom Frame is the Anglican bishop to the Australian Defence Forces, and was the only Anglican bishop to publicly support the Iraq war and Australia's involvement in it. Frame spoke to Green Left Weekly about how his views have
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A victory for women's rights was won on June 1 in the continuing battle for abortion access in the United States. A federal appeals court in California ruled that the Partial-Birth Abortion Ban Act of 2003 was unconstitutional. This law made a
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Dave Riley "Hi, I'm Guy Russo, CEO and managing director of McDonald's in Australia. I'm pretty sure by now you will have heard of 'That Movie'." Worldwide, McDonald's is reeling from the impact of the new film Supersize Me, in which the main
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Our Common Cause: June 30 is not a handover June 30 is supposed to mark the "return of sovereignty" to the Iraqi people. But the make-up of the new government in Iraq makes it clear nothing will change. The new prime minister has been in the pay
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Rohan Pearce "There is no doubt in my mind that Australia's involvement in the Iraq conflict was consistent with our interests and our values... I believe in the US[-Australia] alliance because it is in our national interest and delivers enormous
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Jon Lamb As the pre-election hype takes off, the issue of the disputed maritime boundary between East Timor and Australia has slipped from the mainstream political spotlight. Nonetheless, the big oil and gas companies with investments in the Timor
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Refugees I What better way to tap into the minds of Big Brother TV fans than to highlight reality living such as refugees in mandatory detention. With World Refugee Day being celebrated on June 20, the timing of this courageous action couldn't have
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Russell Rodenberry The Coalition government has finally released a new advertising campaign targeting violence against women, after abandoning the original "No Respect — No Relationships" campaign last December. This campaign is little more
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Sarah Stephen The seven crew members on two boats that made up the Flotillas of Hope spent 28 days at sea, travelling a distance of 4000 kilometres, only to be threatened with arrest and turned away from Nauru on June 20, World Refugee Day, by six
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A carpenter by trade, Tim is a shop steward for the Construction, Forestry, Mining and Energy Union and also the assistant secretary of the Geelong Trades Hall Council. Tim has a long experience of union struggle. He worked in the public service
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Lisa has been an active socialist for 20 years. She began life as a left activist in the women's liberation movement, helping to establish the Canberra Rape Crisis Centre and Women's Shelter, where she worked for a number of years in the early 1980s.
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Afghan refugee and Free the Refugees Campaign activist Riz Wakil spoke to a 3000-strong rally in Sydney on June 20, World Refugee Day. The following is an abridged version of his speech. This year, the refugee-rights movement in this country has
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Josephine Polak Legal services for Indigenous Australians are about to be destroyed by a dangerous plan driven by the "ideological agenda to mainstream Aboriginal services" and "undermine the right of Indigenous Australians to self-determination",
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Peter Boyle A little while back, Green Left Weekly received an email along these lines: "One question. Will the Left be as outraged by the Paul Johnson beheading pictures yesterday, as [they were by] naked Iraqi prisoners? Put it into perspective
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When the US government, with its British and Australian allies, launched its invasion for Iraq's huge oil resources in March 2003, they claimed it was necessary to stop the Saddam Hussein regime handing over "weapons of mass destruction" to Saudi
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Jenny Long, Sydney NSW teachers are disappointed with their 12% wage increase over two years, half of what they sought, and blame Premier Bob Carr's Labor government for being less than honest with the Industrial Relations Commission (IRC) about
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David is a founder of the Moreland Peace Group and active in the anti-war movement. He is a union delegate with the Media, Entertainment and Arts Alliance and recently led a successful strike. David played a key role in the S11 protests against the
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Chris Slee, Melbourne MELBOURNE - Two activists from Thailand discussed the conditions of Thai workers at a June 22 meeting in the Trades Hall bar. Sompit, currently a clothing worker at a cooperative enterprise, previously worked at the Bed and
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Federico Fuentes This year's national education conference will be held at an important juncture in the struggle to stop universities increasing HECS fees. The conference, which will be held in Sydney between June 30 and July 2, is an annual
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On June 18, Prime Minister John Howard addressed the Australian Strategic Policy Institute, a government-sponsored think tank dedicated to developing Australian foreign policy. Howard outlined his vision of an aggressive militaristic foreign policy
News
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Karen Fredericks, Melbourne A mass meeting of 150 La Trobe University staff gathered on June 24, at two days' notice, to condemn a paltry enterprise bargaining offer from the university, contingent on increased student fees and the Coalition
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Simon Butler, Newcastle After weeks of campaigning to prevent their national officials from abruptly closing the Newcastle office of the Community and Public Sector Union, rank-and-file members of the CPSU in the Hunter have succeeded in forcing a
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Justin Tutty, Darwin The latest instalment in the rapid industrialisation of Darwin is the proposal for a coastal industrial estate at Glyde Point, on the Gunn Point Peninsula — the eastern-most arm of Darwin Harbour. The proposal is vast by
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Pip Hinman, Sydney Plans are underway in Melbourne and Sydney for "End the lies" demonstrations on the Sunday before the federal election. If the election is on August 7, then protests will take place on August 1. Anti-war coalitions across
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Peter Boyle The Greens and the Socialist Alliance have condemned the ALP's support for the Coalition government's reactionary legislation on pharmaceutical benefits, "free trade" and "anti-terrorism". Greens Senator Bob Brown said that it is now
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Pentagon failed to get export permit "Forced nudity, hooding and the use of dogs all were interrogation techniques approved for use in Guantanamo Bay prison — but, top Bush administration lawyers insisted this week, never meant to be applied in
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Politicians grilled about refugee policy CANBERRA — A jam-packed forum on June 22 of 220 people organised by the Refugee Action Committee grilled politicians and activists on their policy and actions towards refugees. ACT MLA Kerrie Tucker
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Nick Everett, Canberra On June 23, the Socialist Alliance launched its election campaign for the ACT federal seat of Fraser. Attended by 25 alliance members and supporters, the meeting was addressed by James Vassilopoulos, the alliance's candidate
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Guantanamo Bay lawyer praises Green Left Weekly SYDNEY — At the first event of its kind in the Bankstown area, 150 people packed out the Bankstown Senior Citizens Centre on June 19 for a Socialist Alliance and Green Left Weekly fundraising
World
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As US President George Bush's plane touched down at Shannon Airport in Ireland's west, more than 10,000 protesters turned out in Dublin on June 25 to protest his visit, and call on their government to stop allowing US war planes to refuel at Shannon.
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Ghali Hassan "Today you are free. The torture chambers and rape rooms have been shut down" — US Secretary of State Colin Powell, told Iraqi women on March 8, International Women's Day. In one of the most secular countries in the Arab world,
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Alison Dellit In the first week of June, the German cabinet decided to equip the army with "riot control agents" when abroad. Article 1 of the Chemical Weapons Convention explicitly prohibits the use of "riot control agents as a method of warfare".
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David Bacon In a Service Employees Union hall in Boston, a hospital worker raises her hand. "If Saddam Hussein was such a bad guy", she asks, "why is the US enforcing his law banning unions in Iraq?" Since January, workers like this orderly have
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Robyn Waite, Dili The Asia Pacific Coalition for East Timor (APCET) is a coalition of Asian human rights groups and East Timor solidarity networks that was founded at a conference in Manila in 1994 with the aim of galvanising solidarity with East
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Doug Lorimer "Occupation ends", "Iraqis now in control". These will undoubtedly be the sort of headlines that the corporate press carries on July 1, following the nominal handover of "sovereignty" in Iraq at midnight on June 30 from Coalition
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Vivienne Porzoltz, a founding member of Jews Against the Occupation, and a member of the Australian Socialist Alliance, recently travelled to Palestine to take part in an international women's march for peace and justice. She spoke to Green Left
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Alison Dellit On June 16, the British government made a mockery of any claim of avowing its colonial exploitation, with a decision to reject the right of return of thousands of Mauritians forced out of their homes 30 years ago. The story goes
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Doug Lorimer On June 22, for the second time in three days, US F16 warplanes fired missiles into Fallujah, a Sunni Muslim holy city of 250,000 residents located 50 kilometres west of Baghdad, that had been freed from the presence of US occupation
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Max Lane Former general Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono appears to be the front-runner in Indonesia's presidential election, to be held on July 5. Some political analysts say he will win more than 50% of the vote, meaning there would be no need for a
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Norman Brewer A poll conducted last week by left-leaning German TV magazine Panorama revealed that more than a third of Germans would consider voting for a new left party, made up of expelled and resigned Social-Democrats (SPD) and disappointed
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Esther Anderson "The scale of the tragedy in Darfur would be difficult to believe if it were not for the terrible fact that it is a reality. More than 1 million Sudanese from Darfur are existing — barely — in desperate circumstances ... This
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Eva Cheng Quoting the China Real Estate Association and the state-controlled China Securities News, the March 5, 2003, Washington Post reported that nearly 20% of China's housing stock stood empty (measuring about 130 million square metres of
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On June 24, Durban, East London, Cape Town and Johannesburg each hosted hundreds-strong protests demanding that US President George Bush spend money on health care over warfare. The protests were organised by the Treatment Action Campaign, which
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Barry Sheppard, San Francisco Independent presidential candidate Ralph Nader named long-time activist Peter Miguel Camejo as his vice-presidential running mate at a press conference in Washington, DC on June 21. The announcement was covered by
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ZIMBABWE: 78 women arrested at rally An attempt to protest on World Refugee Day in Bulawayo was met by fierce repression on June 19 as participants and bystanders were arrested for "holding an illegal gathering". Women of Zimbabwe Arise (Woza) said
Culture
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You can keep your camera's lens cap on but turn your tape recorder off.We'll tell you when you've heard enough. Inmates expect to be treated rough,shade your eyes, don't try to bluff. We'll tell you when you've seen enough.Don't talk to them they'll
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Tents have given way to bricks and mortar,but refugees they remain.The years of waiting and neglecthave given way to a grim determinationto hold on against all the odds.For memories persistof that ancient and beloved land.Songs and stories have kept
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Like many of the tracks on Warnography, MC Lynx's "Bullet in the Chamber" vents the anger and outrage that many young people feel when they look out at today's world.
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REVIEW BY PHIL SHANNON The Betrayal of Dissent: Beyond Orwell, Hitchens and the New American CenturyBy Scott LucasPluto Press, 2004324 pages, $33.95 (pb) In 1949, George Orwell, a celebrated foe of "Big Brother", supplied a list of 38 names of