Last week US religious figure Troy Newman, who campaigns against abortions, was denied entry into Australia on the grounds that he would be a danger to the community. Some are hailing his banning a victory for women's rights. But was it?
Newman is the president of Operation Rescue, a right-wing misogynist organisation in the US dedicated to stopping women having abortions and doctors from performing them.
Gadigal/Sydney
The New South Wales government is preparing a fire sale of state-owned properties around the Sydney Harbour foreshore, on the pretext of funding an upgrade of the Circular Quay ferry wharves.
Premier Mike Baird announced on September 28 that government-owned hotels and office buildings would be sold to raise $200 million for the renovation project.
A group of 20 refugee supporters staged a sit-in at the Department of Immigration and Border Protection on October 7. They were protesting the ongoing rapes and assaults against refugees on Nauru.
The protesters occupied the office for about 90 minutes before police arrived. According to one of the demonstrators, the activists entered the building at about 10.30am and started chanting.
The staff closed the reception area and called security, who filmed the demonstrators and told them to leave. When the activists refused to leave, the police were called.
I was asked to speak today about my perspective on abortion law reform in NSW as a medical student.
I realised that my perspective on this — even though it’s fairly well informed — actually can’t be separated at all from my perspective as a young woman in NSW, especially a young woman who, dare I say it, has sex.
Greens MLC and spokesperson for women Mehreen Faruqi launched her bill to remove abortion from the NSW Crimes Act on September 28, International Day of Action for Access to Safe and Legal Abortion. Faruqi said that there needed to be a campaign to “bust the myths surrounding abortion”.
Disciples of Fred Nile and his Christian Democrat Party (CDP) gathered in Belmore Park in Sydney on September 20 to convince each other that their anti-marriage equality stance is right. They were supported by police, who facilitated their bigoted ranting and kept marriage equality protestors as far away as possible.
A resolution of the long-running dispute between the Maritime Union of Australia (MUA) and Hutchison Ports is reported to be near, as the community assemblies continue at the terminals at Port Botany and the Port of Brisbane.
A further hearing in Fair Work Australia is due in the week beginning September 21.
The dispute began on August 6, with the midnight sacking by text and email of 97 waterside workers at the two ports.
Following a Federal Court injunction, the sacked workers are back on the payroll, but are not being rostered on to work.
Left-wing Greens have been sidelined in a re-allocation of the party’s portfolios announced on September 15. Critics say the moves are part of new leader Richard di Natale’s expressed desire to make the party more “mainstream”.
It appears that the portfolio reshuffle took place without consultation, and became public on the party's website on September 15 when an updated contact list was sent to the corporate media.
A community assembly is holding firm outside the Hutchison terminal at Port Botany, with 24-hour attendance and regular gatherings of maritime workers from Hutchison and the other operators, Patricks and DP World. There is a similar assembly at the Port of Brisbane.
The assemblies were established after the provocative sacking of 97 waterfront workers at the two ports at midnight on August 6 and have been maintained as "solidarity camps" ever since. The sackings, imposed via text and email messages, shocked workers in the maritime industry and throughout the whole union movement.
Community groups from across Sydney have condemned the NSW government's announcement that the community consultation period for the Environmental Impact Statement (EIS) for the M4 East section of the huge WestConnex tollway will be limited to 45 days.
NSW Planning Minister Rob Stokes released the Environmental Impact Statement on September 9.
NSW Greens spokesperson for WestConnex and MP for Newtown Jenny Leong said: “This is the largest, most complex road building project in Australia’s history.
PM Tony Abbott's desire to sign Australia up to the “coalition of the killing”, currently dropping bombs over northern Syria, is a gamble that current levels of fear and Islamophobia will indemnify his government.
But there is significant opposition to war and racism to challenge the racism and fear, and a coalition of groups, unions and political parties are organising a rally in Sydney on September 19 to highlight that.
Hundreds of people from across NSW gathered outside AGL's HQ on September 2 to mark the 100th week of a protest first initiated by Camden residents angry that AGL is allowed to frack near their homes. AGL first started fracking in Camden, south west Sydney, in 2001.
Speakers included Jennifer Schoelpple; Anne Thompson, an original Knitting Nanna from the Northern Rivers; Greens MP Jeremy Buckingham; and Julie Lyford, president of Groundswell Gloucester.
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