Analysis

The Building and Construction Industry Improvement Amendment (Transition to Fair Work) Bill 2009 is scheduled for Senate debate on October 26. The bill would change the Building and Construction Industry Improvement Act 2005 (BCII Act). This would affect the building and construction industry’s watchdog, the Australian Building and Construction Commission (ABCC).
It is a pattern that is being repeated over and over worldwide. Security agencies conduct secret surveillance of suspects, record their conversations, then convict them under anti-terrorism laws so broad that expressions of opinion and radical talk are sufficient to define a terrorist.
In early September, most abortions performed in Queensland health facilities came to a halt. The Royal Australian and New Zealand College of Obstetricians and Gynaecologists had passed on a legal opinion to their members that said doctors were still at risk of prosecution while abortion remained in the criminal code.
In May last year, federal Treasurer Wayne Swan announced the formation of the Australia’s Future Tax System Review, to be run by Treasury secretary Ken Henry. When the Henry review reports to government in December, its recommendations are likely to leave the wealthy smiling and the rest of us grinding our teeth.
The Greens released a set of 22 amendments to the Rudd Labor government’s proposed Carbon Pollution Reduction Scheme (CPRS) on October 12.
An open letter to the Australian Conservation Foundation (ACF) and Labor MP Kelvin Thomson
Wake up Australia. Do not trivialise the racist attitudes coming from various sectors of our society.
What do a Jewish congregation in the Alaskan town of Fairbanks, the Browniz coffee shop in the port city of Salalah, Oman and a Shanghai primary school have in common?
The eighth anniversary of the war in Afghanistan has come and gone. As Prime Minister Kevin Rudd considers yet another troop surge, for most Australians this milestone represents just another statistic, another number to skip over in the morning papers.
The 350.org campaign has already made an important impact worldwide. The recent spike in official 350.org actions — now well above 2000 — suggests the number of people who support stabilising atmospheric CO2 at under 350 parts per million (ppm) has grown phenomenally in the past few months.
I am part of Critical Climate, an Adelaide activist group advocating a “sustained mass civil disobedience” response to the climate emergency.
Lewis Carroll once wrote about a fictitious map that was so topographically accurate, it was as large as the country it was mapping.