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Kieran Latty & Susan Price, Sydney The Socialist Alliance will stand three candidates in the March 27 Leichhardt council elections — militant unionist Shane Bentley, Books Not Bombs youth anti-war activist Kylie Moon, and refugees' rights

Evil genius I "Am I the evil genius in the corner that nobody ever sees come out of his hole? It's a nice way to operate, actually." — US Vice-President Dick Cheney, quoted in USA Today, January 19. Evil genius II "In a well-reported piece

Sue Bolton, Melbourne Sixty-five people attended the feature session of the Socialist Party's two-day national summer school on "The great debate — Who would best represent working class people?" at Trades Hall Bar on February 6. Speakers for

Laws are being introduced in Victoria to allow children as young as 10 to be strip-searched in public by police of the opposite sex without the knowledge of the children's parents. The Terrorist (Community Protection) (Amendment) Bill 2005 will be

SYDNEY — On July 12, 100 people picketed John Howard as he arrived to address a meeting in the Blacktown Workers Club. The action, organised by Unions NSW to protest against the Work Choices laws, was attended by members of the Construction,

Australians protested around the country last week in solidarity with the 43 West Papuan refugees who have been detained by the federal government on Christmas Island. The protesters called on the government to immediately release the asylum seekers

SYDNEY — The Department of Corrective Services' decision to reduce family contact with women prisoners, and children seeing their mothers, is "heartless mismanagement that will have disastrous effects on prisoners' rehabilitation" said Kat

Zoe Kenny, Sydney At its annual conference in November, attended by 400 delegates, the NSW branch of Young Labor adopted a policy supporting the reinstatement of a national draft for high-school students. NSW Young Labor will lobby for inclusion of

SYDNEY — Twenty unionists picketed the George Street Optus shop on June 29, to protest the sacking via text messages of 70 Optus technicians. The workers were told in a subsequent meeting that they could reapply for their jobs as individual

Emma Brown, Melbourne On July 18, 65 people who attended a public meeting organised by the Victorian Peace Network heard a firsthand account of recent events in Lebanon and Palestine from Dr Bernard Sabella, a recently elected Fatah member of the

NEWCASTLE — All kinds of drivers tooted their car horns as they drove past the protest outside the Newcastle Spotlight store on June 22. The community action expressed solidarity with Spotlight unionists and condemned Spotlight's attempts to

PERTH — As part of the Australian Council of Trade Unions' Your Rights at Work campaign, Unions WA is undertaking a bus trip, beginning on August 5, through the north-west of Western Australia to build community support for the campaign against the