Analysis

Yes, I am a feminist and I will be joining the Melbourne “SlutWalk” on May 28, and I hope you will too! And, yes, I still cringe every time I mention the infamous word SlutWalk and my desire of wanting to be there, right in the middle of it.

In 2007, it was all about Kevin Rudd. Well … not so much the man, but the campaign slogan. Kevin07 was streamed from the rooftops, plastered on ALP propaganda and adorned the T-shirts of young and old alike. It was a brilliant, fresh campaign. But the joy was not to last. Three years later, the bandwagon that everyone had so merrily jumped upon had lost its wheels, its driver demoted and dejected. The campaign was just that, a campaign. Right for the time, but ultimately short on distance.

The activity of British-based transnational conglomerate Serco in Australia has remained relatively unknown since it began taking government contracts in 1990. That is until the refugees locked up in its detention centres — under a $756 million government contract — started speaking out. Horrific suicides, hunger strikes, self-harm, riotous protests, burning buildings and under-trained staff have finally put Serco in the headlines.

The illegal eavesdropping on famous people by the Rupert Murdoch-owned British tabloid News of the World is said to be Murdoch’s Watergate. But is it the crime by which Murdoch ought to be known? In his native land, Australia, Murdoch controls 70% of the capital city press. Australia is the world’s first “murdochracy”, in which smear by media is power. The most enduring and insidious Murdoch campaign has been against the Aboriginal people, who were dispossessed by the arrival of the British in the late 18th century and have never been allowed to recover.

The Socialist Party of Malaysia (PSM) and the Socialist Alliance issued the joint statement below on May 19. * * The Socialist Party of Malaysia (PSM) and the Socialist Alliance in Australia denounce the recent agreement made between the governments of Malaysia and Australia, whereby Australia will send 800 asylum seekers who have been detained by Australian authorities to Malaysia in exchange for 4000 refugees currently in Malaysia.

In its point-scoring endeavour to restore the budget to a surplus by 2012-13, Julia Gillard’s Labor government has decided to target the most vulnerable and needy in society. Instead of targeting the high end of town and the corporate elite a punitive approach was chosen. The budget deficit for 2011-12 is estimated to be $22.6 billion or 1.5% of gross domestic product. This compares with an estimated $49.4 billion deficit in this financial year, 2010-11. The budget is expected to return to surplus by $3.5 bilion in 2012-13.

Price on carbon crude, wasteful The illusion of the necessity of capital is one of the most difficult to shake. Capital appears to contribute something in the production process so to the worker appears as indispensable. This illusion manifests in such beliefs as workers must not ask for too much or the business will go bust and jobs will be lost, jobs will not be created unless capitalists have a free rein, and that the super-profits of the mining companies can't be touched or the companies will take their capital elsewhere and Australia's prosperity will suffer.

Three Australian activists will take part in the Freedom Flotilla 2, the successor to the first Freedom Flotilla to Gaza in May 2010 that was brutally attacked in international waters by Israeli commandos. Green Left Weekly’s Pip Hinman asked former NSW Greens parliamentarian Sylvia Hale why she has joined the Australian contingent on the flotilla. * * *

Despite some targeted increases in funding in the area of health and disability, the Labor government’s 2011 budget leaves Australians worse off. The increased funding for mental health has been widely welcomed and is a result of a long, concerted public campaign. Over five years, $2.2 billion in mental health spending was identified with a focus on early intervention programs, as well as social and employment participation strategies. Multicultural organisations, however, have criticised the absence of funding for the multicultural community.

Right wing media commentator Andrew Bolt launched his new interview show The Bolt Report on Channel 10 on May 8 with a classic display of the use of phony statistics. Interviewing Afghan refugee Riz Wakil, Bolt claimed that a five-year long survey of Afghan migrants showed “something like 94% are on Centrelink benefits, only 9% actually are employed”.

Below is the transcript of Julian Assange’s acceptance speech of the Sydney Peace Foundation Gold Medal at the Frontline Club in London on May 10. *** Thank you Professor Rees and Mary Kostakidis. I think Professor Rees has stolen all my good lines and Mary’s stolen all my jokes, so I’m not sure that I have much left.

With the federal government blatantly refusing to even utter the words “equal pay”, the need for grassroots initiative and action is vital in achieving these reforms for women workers.