Analysis

On August 12, ALP federal Attorney-General Robert McClelland announced a discussion paper that foreshadowed a new raft of draconian “anti-terror” laws. The proposed new laws would give police the power to enter premises without a warrant and create new “terrorist” offences.
The 40th Pacific Islands Forum (PIF) took place in Cairns on August 5 and 6.
The following statement was released by the Australia-Venezuela Solidarity Network on August 12. Visit www.venezuelasolidarity.org.
Pemba Dorje Sherpa is the world record holder for the fastest climb of Mount Everest. He toured Australia from August 11 to 17 to raise awareness about the drastic impacts of climate change on the Himalayas.
Two equal love activists were bundled off the stage at a Christian right breakfast held in Parliament House on August 13.
On August 4, theatrical pre-dawn raids in Melbourne by more than 400 Victorian, NSW and federal police and ASIO agents — including paramilitary units armed with sub-machineguns — launched Australia’s latest terrorism scare.
The largest demonstrations for same-sex marriage in Australia’s history took place on August 1. A 3000-strong rally marched on the national ALP conference in Sydney. Four thousand took to the streets in Melbourne. Record crowds mobilised in other cities.
On August 4, the Australian Bureau of Statistics (ABS) released figures that showed housing prices across Australia’s capital cities rose by 4.2% over the three months ending in June. The rapid increase has worried the Reserve Bank of Australia (RBA) enough for it to warn of a threat of a housing bubble.
The Australian and US government’s have proposed carbon trading schemes as a response to the threat of climate change. How to respond has been hotly debated in the climate action movements of both countries. Green Left Weekly has campaigned strongly for the Rudd government’s carbon trading scheme to be rejected as a false response to the climate emergency. Below, Ilan Salbe puts an alternative view.
We face a climate crisis and something needs to change. The world’s resources are finite, as is the amount of destruction humans can do to this planet if we are to survive. As such, there is a debate in the environment movement about whether or not curbing population is an essential part of the solution.
In the state that claims to have the greenest energy on the Australian mainland, South Australia’s climate camp will confront two of the country’s dirtiest power stations. The Northern and Playford B plants, fuelled by cheap but low-grade brown coal, are just outside Port Augusta, a four-hour drive north of Adelaide.
Aboriginal elders and families from Ampilatwatja have set up a permanent protest camp outside their government-controlled community in protest against policies that have neglected their needs and desires.