The statement published below is an initial response from individuals, social movements and non-governmental organisations in support of a transitional program for radical economic transformation.
Analysis
Former federal court chief justice Murray Wilcox has been commissioned by deputy PM Julia Gillard to prepare a review of the powers of the Australian Building and Construction Commission (ABCC) and its integration as a specialist division into Labor’s proposed industrial relations umbrella, Fair Work Australia (FWA), in 2010.
“This strategy is designed to help pensioners, carers and families, and first home buyers”, declared Australia’s Labor Prime Minister Kevin Rudd in his October 14 address to the nation. Rudd was announcing a $10.4 billion “economic security strategy” in response to the global financial crisis.
Our addiction to coal is not only killing our planet but also those who mine it, burn it and live around it, a Perth climate activist has claimed.
There has been intense media speculation on the fate of New South Wales infrastructure plans following the “discovery” of a supposed $20 billion dollar “black hole” in the NSW budget, announced by departing treasurer Michael Costa on September 5.
The campaign against the jailing of tramways union leader Clarrie O’Shea, in Melbourne in May 1969, for refusing to pay fines imposed under the infamous anti-union penal powers of the time is rich with lessons for today’s campaign against the Australian Building and Construction Commission’s (ABCC) witch hunt of construction unionists.
The Reserve Bank (RBA) of Australia announced on October 7 that they would cut the official interest rate by 1% — the largest single cut since 1992 — in response to the US financial crisis.
Millions of tonnes of the potent greenhouse gas methane have apparently begun leaking from the seabed beneath wide areas of the Arctic Ocean, the British Independent reported on September 23.
The Catholic Archbishop of Melbourne, Denis Hart, has threatened that Catholic hospitals could be forced to close emergency and maternity wards if a proposed bill to decriminalise abortion is passed.
To lobby or not to lobby? Fortunately for the Australian union movement our forebears in the union leaderships didnt spend much time trying to answer this question. Campaigns were more direct and more successful than todays so-called strategies of boxing smart and keeping your powder dry.
The Australian Building and Construction Commission (ABCC) had egg on its face when all criminal charges against Construction, Forestry, Mining and Energy Union (CFMEU) member Brian Shearer were officially withdrawn by the Department of Public Prosecution on September 22.
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