This year, International Women’s Day (IWD) coincides with the Labour Day weekend in Victoria and Tasmania. It gives an opportunity to highlight how much women have contributed to fighting for workers’ rights and civil liberties, and how little they have been acknowledged for it.
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Responding to pressure from media, the community and the federal ALP, NSW Labor Premier Kristina Keneally dropped the state’s unpopular “Metro to nowhere” (planned to run from Barangaroo to Rozelle) on February 21.
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Steve Gumerungi Hodder, an Aboriginal broadcaster in Central Australia, has taken legal action against Google to compel them to remove links to a site promoting extreme racism in the guise of humour. On January 27, Green Left Weekly ran an article by Edmund Parker arguing against using legal action in the fight against racist ideas. Hodder responds below.
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The rapid melting of the Arctic sea-ice is one of the most alarming examples of the looming climate change catastrophe. But where most see disaster, some of the world's richest corporations see a business opportunity.
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Prime Minister Kevin Rudd released a new counter-terrorism white paper on February 23 that dramatically increases the powers of Australia's spy agency ASIO, attacks civil liberties and does nothing to improve the safety of Australian citizens.
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It has come to the attention of the Australian Taxation Office (ATO) that more than 40% of large businesses — those with a turnover of $250 million — paid no tax from 2005 to 2008.
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Tony Abbott (and maybe Paul Sheehan) have a hidden talent There was television footage of Tony Abbott at a shopping centre earlier this week. An angry woman complains about Muslims in Australia. His response is that he understands exactly where
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Under the Northern Territory intervention, in the “prescribed areas” the government has taken control of communities, acquired compulsory leases of Aboriginal land and introduced “welfare quarantining” — in which half the income of social security recipients is replaced with a “Basics Card”, which can only be spent at specified shops on specified items.
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Alyawarr elder Richard Downs spoke at the Prescribed Area People’s Alliance (PAPA) meeting in Alice Springs on February 12. Downs is a leader of the walkoff protest against the NT intervention at Ampilatwatja.
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The Sydney Morning Herald-sponsored “Independent Public Inquiry” into Sydney’s public transport released its preliminary report on February 13. The report outlined a 30-year strategy to massively improve Sydney’s public transport infrastructure.
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When the anti-immigration politician Pauline Hanson was asked if she was a xenophobe in a 1996 interview on Sixty Minutes, she famously responded: “please explain”. Now, with the news that she intends to become an immigrant herself, it seems she doesn’t understand the word “hypocrite” either.
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“The law is an ass”, said Mr Bumble, in Charles Dickens’ classic, Oliver Twist. And more than 150 people agreed as they rallied yesterday on the same site, six years to the day, where 17-year old Aboriginal boy, TJ Hickey, was impaled on fence in Waterloo.