Naarm/Melbourne

While the increasing censorship of art made headlines with the police raid and confiscation of Bill Henson’s work in Sydney, this is far from a stand-alone case of political interference in art.

Abortion is the second most commonly performed surgical procedure for women in Victoria and, according to the World Health Organisation, one of the safest in the world. However it is singled out to be the only medical procedure in the Victorian Crimes Act, making it a criminal offence.

For the last four weeks, Muslim students at the city campus of RMIT have been protesting the university administration’s decision to convert the newly built Muslim prayer room into another multi-faith centre. Muslim students have held their Friday prayers in congregation in an open public space, to demonstrate their need for a dedicated Muslim prayer facility.

Angry at the raw deal they received in Treasurer Wayne Swan’s budget, up to 300 pensioners blockaded one of Melbourne’s busiest intersections on May 16.Angry at the raw deal they received in Treasurer Wayne Swan's budget, up to 300 pensioners blockaded one of Melbourne's busiest intersections on May 16. Traffic was blocked for up to an hour before police moved the crowd onto the footpath; and some of the protesters stripped off to express their frustration.

On May 5, Victorian Premier John Brumby and education minister Bronwyn Pike announced that they had struck a deal with the Victorian Australian Education Union (AEU) over teachers’ pay. While there are several aspects of the agreement to be finalised, the government decided to go public and claimed that Victorian teachers are now the highest-paid teachers in Australia.

After a four-hour community blockade on April 9, Melbourne Chef agreed to pay out sacked National Union of Workers (NUW) member Abdelwahab Bekhaled and negotiate a collective agreement at the site. However, the company reneged on the agreement, sparking a month-long union campaign. Bekhaled has finally received a payout that included long-service leave and all his entitlements.

Thirty people participated in a media stunt outside the office of federal resource minister Martin Ferguson on May 7 to demand that he and the ALP keep their election promise to repeal the Commonwealth Radioactive Management Act of 2005 and its 2006 amendment. The protest was organised by Friends of the Earth.

In presenting the state budget on May 6, Premier John Brumby announced that “doing business in Victoria will become even easier”. The ALP government’s pro-corporate measures will cut almost $1.5 billion from taxes and costs for the big end of town.

On May 5, the night before the Victorian budget was released, it was revealed that Premier John Brumby’s government is proposing to pay households with solar power$0.60 per kilowatt hour for electricity that they feed into the grid. However, this $0.60 will only be paid if households are exporting more energy than they are taking from the grid.

Taxi drivers staged a spontaneous and ultimately successful protest on April 29-30, shutting down the major intersection of Flinders and Swanston Streets for more than 22 hours, after the near fatal stabbing of a young driver.

Victorian public school teachers are close to reaching a settlement with the state Labor government on a new pay and conditions agreement. Their previous enterprise bargaining agreement (EBA) expired in August, and they have not had a pay rise since October 2006.

A three-week dispute that stopped production at Port Melbourne-based Boeing subsidiary Hawker de Havilland (HdH), closing sections of the Triple Seven aeroplane assembly line in the US due to a lack of parts, ended on April 27. At a mass meeting outside the gates of the Boeing plant the 700 workers voted overwhelmingly to return to work.