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Terry Barnes, a former adviser to Prime Minister Tony Abbott, is credited with coming up with the bright idea of introducing a $6 payment when people visit their GP.

Police have not responded to a petition Taser victim Sheila Oakley handed to them a week ago. In response, a community assembly was held outside Logan police station on February 22. Oakley was in hospital and could not attend the rally. Paul Butterworth, an Aboriginal elder who had called the assembly, told the crowd: “We will keep coming back until something’s done about this.” He also said harassment of the local community continued, including children in Oakley’s family. Oakley’s brother expressed his thanks for the support they were receiving.

Members of the National Tertiary Education Union (NTEU) on University of Western Sydney campuses took action on February 28 to highlight management's refusal to agree to a fair enterprise agreement. They have been without an agreement for more than a year. On the Bankstown campus of UWS, a number of unionists and students gathered to hear from union activists. They said that after 12 months of meetings with management they felt that little progress had been made. In the meantime, they were having to deal with increased workloads and increases in the cost of living.

Activists have held solidarity actions against right-wing violence in Venezuela in several Australian cities, as part of an international campaign of solidarity with the Bolivarian revolution. About 20 people rallied outside Sydney Town Hall on February 19. Holding banners and placards expressing support for Venezuelan President Nicolas Maduro and the Bolivarian revolution, the protesters handed out leaflets explaining to passersby the need to defend the people of Venezuela and their government against extreme right attacks, backed by the US government.

When refugees are being killed and injured by thugs hired by the Australian government to run its offshore refugee detention camp in Manus Island, PNG; when Australia's foreign minister Julie Bishop pressures Cambodia (one of the poorest countries in the world) to take asylum seekers off Australia (one of the world's richest countries) surely it is time to say: NOT IN OUR NAME! And this is what thousands of people did over the weekend of February 22-23 in more than 750 vigils, called by internet campaigning network GetUp.

All around the country this week there have been angry snap protests against Abbott Liberal-National Coalition government's cruel policies towards asylum seekers. This follows the death of one asylum seeker and several injuries in violence in an Australian offshore immigration detention camp on Manus Island in Papua New Guinea.

On February 21, around 2000 rallied in Melbourne against the government's inhumane treatment of asylum seekers follows the death of one asylum seeker and several injuries in violence in an Australian offshore immigration detention camp on Manus Island in Papua New Guinea. Speakers included Greens MP Adam Brandt; Mohammad Baqiri, a refugee detained on Nauru under John Howard; State Secretary of the Textile Clothing and Footwear Union, Michele O’Neil and Pamela Curr of the Asylum Seeker Resource Centre.

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About 150 people rallied outside the home of Sheila Oakley in the Brisbane suburb of Logan on February 15.

The Tony Abbott government has done something no other government in the world has done before, asking UNESCO to take one of the nation’s unique natural areas off the World Heritage list.

The Wilderness Society released this statement on February 20.

Calls to boycott the Sydney Biennale unless it cuts ties with major sponsor Transfield — which holds government contracts to provide welfare services in immigration detention centres on Nauru and Manus Island — have been gaining momentum. A group of high-profile artists involved in the Biennale have written to the festival’s board of directors, calling on them to withdraw from the funding agreement with Transfield.