Analysis

Gillard & Abbott are trashing Australia’s obligation to protect refugees

The Refugee Action Collective Victoria released the statement below on June 27. * * * The Refugee Action Collective condemns the Gillard Labor government’s support for the bill moved by Rob Oakeshott that passed through the lower house [on] June 27. RAC condemns the opportunism of both sides of parliament, seeking to gain politically out of two boat disasters in the last week. Offshore processing does not protect lives, but seeks to deter asylum seekers from fleeing to save them.

Offshore processing of asylum seekers is not the solution

The Asylum Seeker Resource Centre released the statement below on June 28. * * * They say a day is a long time in politics. The past week has been a lifetime. The asylum seeker debate has taken a hard shift to the right — the conversation has changed from onshore versus offshore processing to which location to process offshore and how to stop the boats.

Charge police for Briscoe death in custody

The Stop the Intervention Collective Sydney released the statement below on June 28. * * * The Stop the Intervention Collective Sydney (STICS) is calling for charges to be laid against police in the Terrance Briscoe death is custody case, supporting calls from the family. Family spokesperson Patricia Morton-Thomas says that family are confused by the double standard of the legal system. That Police are able to break the law, even captured on CCTV footage, and are still not charged for their offences.

Hunters in NSW’s national parks will put park users in danger

NSW Premier Barry O’Farrell has reneged on a pre-election promise to refuse access for hunters to NSW national parks, a move that will put parks users in danger and potentially set back feral animal eradication programs. The Coalition government is pushing through changes to the NSW electricity sector, seeking to privatise state-owned generators. Without the numbers to push the privatisation bill through the upper house, O’Farrell back-flipped and supported a bill by the Shooters and Fishers Party.

Parents win fight to save Fremantle ‘fun bus’

Local parents have successfully spearheaded a Fremantle community campaign to save a service called “Buster the Fun Bus”. Buster is a van staffed by two community workers from the City of Fremantle. It makes stops at various parks in the Fremantle and Melville area, setting out activity tables and toys for children to enjoy outside. The focus of the service is community building. It brings parents together and gives them relaxed access to community workers.

Stronger Futures laws will cause mourning for all Aboriginal peoples

The Yolngu Nations Assembly and the Alyawaar Nation released the statement below on June 27. * * * Should this Stronger Futures legislation pass through the Senate and become law, it will be a day of mourning for all Aboriginal peoples. This legislation will be the cause of great suffering in our hearts. For those of us living in the Northern Territory the anguish of the past five years of Intervention has been almost unbearable. Many have simply given up hope. We have been burying people who can no longer live with the pain and despair.

Time for a fightback against O’Farrell’s attacks on teachers & public sector workers

The Socialist Alliance NSW released the statement below on June 27. * * * The NSW Teachers Federation is taking action today against the sackings announced on 30 May.

Dole inquiry long overdue

The National Welfare Rights Network released the statement below on June 26. * * * The National Welfare Rights Network welcomes today’s news that the Senate has voted to support an Australian Green’s initiated inquiry into the adequacy of Newstart Allowance and related payments for young people and students.

Letter from a refugee: ‘Every day is the same, boring and hopeless’

The Darwin Asylum Seeker Support and Advocacy Network released the statement below on June 25. * * * A Vietnamese asylum seeker has written an open letter to the Minister for Immigration and Citizenship to mark her and her friends’ 400th day in detention. The woman is part of a group of more than 40 Vietnamese asylum seekers, about 20 of whom are children, who have been detained since their arrival in Australia in March 2011. The youngest of the group is now seven years old, having spent two birthdays locked up in detention.

Abbott pledges to deny human rights for refugees

Opposition leader Tony Abbott announced his vision for a “tougher” refugee policy on June 9. Among the plans are to refuse refugee status for those who have arrived in Australia by boat without documentation. He also said that an Abbott Coalition government would appeal immigration department decisions to grant refugee status to boat arrivals. Abbott said: “What is happening now is that 90% of people who arrive illegally via boat are given successful outcomes.”

The inside story on church's word

Churchgoers all over Sydney heard official statements from their denominations on June 17 with a firm and united message: “Marriage is only for heterosexual couples.” I needed to see this for myself, so I and four gay Christian friends summoned our courage and attended the evening service at St Andrew's Cathedral.

Interview: Australia’s media crisis has never been more serious

Green Left Weekly’s Jay Fletcher spoke to Wendy Bacon, a Walkley award-winning journalist and professor at UTS’s Australian Centre for Investigative Journalism, about the crisis in Australia’s mainstream media * * * The big structural changes announced at Fairfax — 1900 jobs cuts, moving the flagship papers to tabloid, merging the Sydney and Melbourne news rooms — seem to spell the continuing trend toward more corporatism and less journalism. What are the main consequences of Fairfax’s downsizing?