The nationwide outage of Australia’s second-largest telecommunications companies should prompt a reconsideration of bringing these essential services under public ownership, argues Isaac Nellist.
Nationalisation
From misappropriating JobKeeper funds, to illegally sacking thousands of workers, to Alan Joyce’s enormous “pay” rises, the scandals associated with Qantas are piling up. Mary Merkenich argues it should be renationalised.
Chilean president Gabriel Boric has announced his plan to nationalise the country’s lithium industry to boost the economy and protect the environment, reports People's Dispatch.
At the United Nations General Assembly, Bolivian President Luis Arce outlined his ambitious vision for changing the global capitalist system. Ben Norton reports.
The scale and scope of government measures to deal with the COVID-19 crisis have shattered long-held neoliberal dogmas, writes Dave Holmes.
As public transport usage collapses, the private operators of Melbourne’s public transport system are seeking a “rescue package”, reports Chris Slee.
Jim McIlroy reports unions are angry that Qantas has been handed a hefty bail-out while workers have been left on the scrap heap.
The electricity industry crisis has reached new heights, with the federal government pressuring giant energy company AGL to keep the ageing Liddell coal-fired power station open for a further five years after 2022, its due date for closure.
Liddell, in the Hunter Valley region of NSW, is a coal-burning dinosaur. The reality is neither the government’s policy of defending Big Coal, nor its reliance on the so-called “energy market”, will solve the problem of skyrocketing electricity prices for consumers or the looming environmental crisis.
Independent Member for Cairns Rob Pyne has called on the Queensland state government to establish a state-owned insurance office to ease the increasingly unaffordable home insurance premiums in Queensland.
The public debate over the problems of electricity supply displays a curious disconnect. On the one hand, there is virtually universal agreement that the system is in crisis. After 25 years, the promised outcomes of reform in the electricity industry — cheaper and more reliable electricity, competitive markets and rational investment decisions — are further away than ever.
The socialisation of essential services is fast becoming a formidable policy in the “contestable marketplace of ideas”. Nowhere is this more so than with railways and bus services; an everyday service all social demographics touch daily.
British Labour leader Jeremy Corbyn believes nationalisation and socialisation will save millions of pounds a year, get community members back to work, augment sustainable transport and retool British industries.
Australia's Big Four banks — the Commonwealth, NAB, ANZ and Westpac — are the most concentrated and profitable set of banks in the world. These mega-banks are cutting their workforces, while paying their executives huge salaries and bonuses. They should be placed in public hands.
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