Naarm/Melbourne

About 50 supporters of the “Max Brenner 19” — Melbourne Palestine solidarity activists being prosecuted in the wake of a protest in July last year — gathered outside the Melbourne Magistrates’ Court on May 1 to show their support for the defendants at the beginning of their trial. One of the defendants, Jerome Small, read out a statement on behalf of the accused. The statement appears below. * * *

About 350 members of the Health And Community Services Union (HACSU) attended a state-wide meeting and marched to Parliament House on May 2. The event was held in defiance of the state government’s attempt to shut down the union's campaign against government attacks by using legal processes in Fair Work Australia. The HACSU has been campaigning to defend jobs and ratios in the mental health system that will be slashed under proposed government cuts.

Bring Back the Buses Campaign released the statement below on April 30. * * * Epping bus campaigner Helen Said confronted Dysons Bus Company Metropolitan Services Company Manager Greg Deacon today accusing Dysons of putting Melbourne’s northern suburbs school children at risk when it introduced sweeping changes to local bus services on April 22.

Nineteen Palestine solidarity protesters face court on May 1 for their involvement in a protest on July 1 last year in support of Palestine. At the July 1 protest outside a Max Brenner chocolate store, the police ran wild, viciously attacking peaceful protesters. Max Brenner is owned by Israeli conglomerate the Strauss Group, a company that provides “care rations” for the Israeli military forces in occupied Palestine, including the Golani and Givati brigades.

The Victorian government said last year it would introduce its own version of the Australian Building and Construction Commission if the ABCC was weakened. Now, on April 3 Premier Ted Baillieu and finance minister Robert Clark announced the Implementation Guidelines to the Victorian Code of Practice for the Building and Construction Industry. The guidelines focus on ensuring workers aren’t “forced” to join unions, and that employers are forbidden from agreeing to union demands for over-award or site payments.

Local bus services in the City of Whittlesea in Melbourne’s outer north may be thrown into chaos due to the opening of the South Morang rail extension on April 22. Rather than serving the new station and surrounding housing estates with new bus services, the Baillieu Liberal state government intends to re-route most of the existing Epping and Mill Park bus services to South Morang without public consultation and with little information to the public.

Mental health workers have been striking for two hours at a time in rolling stoppages around Victoria since April 10. The campaign is in support of a new enterprise bargaining agreement. Key elements of the claim include a 16% pay rise over three years and improved staffing. After seven months of negotiation, the government has still not budged on its position of capping pay rises at a below-inflation 2.5% a year. The union covering mental health workers, the Health and Community Service Union (HACSU), has negotiated with the employers via Fair Work Australia.

About 240 people attended a forum on “Wikileaks, Assange & defending democracy” on April 19. Presented in partnership with the WikiLeaks Australian Citizens' Alliance (WACA), the forum argued that conversations about WikiLeaks and its editor-in-chief Julian Assange are about much more than the organisation and the individual behind it. They encompass freedom of speech and the press, whistleblower protection, government transparency, the underlying tenets of our democracy and civil rights. 

All I really want to say is “thank you”. And there is plenty I want to thank you for. I want to thank you for not cancelling your April 18 evening conversation with Martin Flanagan at the Melbourne Wheeler Centre to discuss your new book Am I black enough for you? It was a very powerful and moving event to be part of; a reaffirming lesson of the importance of courage, humility and respect. As we all found out, it was no easy decision for you to go ahead with the event.

Two officers identifying themselves as being from “security intelligence” visited my house on April 11 for a chat. If recent headlines are anything to go by (“ASIO eyes green groups” The Age 12/4/12) such surprise visits will become ever more frequent for anti-coal activists like me.

The decision by the organisers of the three-day Marxism 2012 to invite a broader range of international speakers and allow other socialist groups to set up stalls at its three-day Marxism 2012 conference in Melbourne over the Easter long weekend was a welcome and positive step. The conference is organised each year by Socialist Alternative and its sister organisation, the International Socialist Organisation of Aotearoa/New Zealand.