“The system here in Victoria for delivering quality training to both domestic students and international students is working very, very well”, Jacinta Allan, Victorian skills and workplace participation minister told ABC Stateline on July 24 in response to criticisms of Australia’s international education market.
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To win the battle to stop climate change, climate activists in Queensland have an important part to play. The Queensland ALP government is a strong backer of Australia’s biggest polluters.
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If the rhetoric of the National Health and Hospitals Reform Commission’s report on Australia’s health system is taken at face value, health care in Australia will get an impressive overhaul courtesy of the federal government.
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We’ve heard it all before — especially those of us who can remember the rhetoric of the Hawke and Keating governments. A little pain now and everything will be much better for everyone in the long run.
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The national ALP Conference was held in Sydney from July 30 to August 1. Prime Minister Kevin Rudd’s speech on the opening day of the conference was full of congratulatory remarks about the greatness of his party and the way the ALP federal government had handled the economic crisis.
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I met Eddie Spearritt in the Philharmonic pub, overlooking Liverpool. It was a few years after 96 Liverpool football fans were crushed to death at Hillsborough Stadium, Sheffield, on April 15, 1989. Eddie’s 14-year-old son, Adam, died in his arms.
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A national campaign calling for same-sex marriage called Equal Love has been running for five years and has attracted growing support. Its focus is to shift public attitudes to gay and lesbian relationships through a campaign involving education and direct action protests.
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On July 15, elders left the remote Aboriginal community of Ampilatwatja for more remote ancestral lands. They were protesting a dire lack of basic services in their community, despite repeated government promises to “close the gap” and end Aboriginal disadvantage.
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International students are big business in Australia. Enrolments peaked at a record 543,898 and generated $15.5 billion in export income in 2008.
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Anger at Premier Anna Bligh’s planned privatisation of $15 billion of public assets is growing, after the July 22 appointment of Rothschild, Merrill Lynch and the Royal Bank of Scotland to advise on the asset sale.
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The heroic act of resisting an order to serve in a war that is wrong has shaped the political views of many people. I remember the powerful impression draft resisters made on me as a young student during the tail-end of Australia's military involvement in the war on Vietnam.
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For Pacific Islanders, climate change is not a threat looming somewhere in the future. Rising sea levels and unpredictable weather are having devastating effects right now. Climate change has already forced some communities to leave their traditional homes.