Economy

Since March 30, members of the Homeless Persons Union Victoria and other activists have been occupying a property on Bendigo St, Collingwood. The Victorian government purchased properties as part of the now-cancelled the East West Link. On April 26, the occupiers of #2 and #12 Bendigo St signed a land lease agreement with the Kulin Nation Embassy, currently situated at #4 Bendigo St. This agreement formally recognises the Kulin Nation as the sovereign owners of the land on which Bendigo Street stands.

From May 4 to 16 a global wave of mass community direct action will target the world’s most dangerous fossil fuel projects with a clear message: keep them in the ground and speed up the transition to 100% renewable energy.

The Mike Baird Coalition government in New South Wales is keeping its plans for further privatisation of the publicly-owned Sydney Trains network tightly under wraps, after state officials refused to release nearly 100 documents on the issue, declaring them "cabinet in confidence". NSW Treasury bureaucrats rejected a freedom of information request from the Labor opposition, saying the correspondence and emails could have an impact on commercial interests.

Scientists from Brazil and the United States have discovered a huge coral reef in the Amazon river that stretches for more than 600 miles -- a surprising finding due to the fact that such marine structures thrive only in salty ocean and sea waters with access to sunlight. However, scientists have warned the newly discovered reef is threatened by oil drilling in the area. The findings were published in the journal Science Advances on April 22 and revealed that the reef spans from the southern tip of French Guiana to Brazil's Maranhao State.

Whoever cares about an issue can stand up, write a corresponding committee name on a sheet of paper, sit on the square and start discussing the subject with others — and just like that a new committee is born. During the protest on March 31 against France's new labour law, a few protesters handed out leaflets which read Nuit debout (“rising up at night”), echoing Etienne La Boetie's Discourse on Voluntary Servitude: “Tyrants appear great only because we are on our knees”.

It was highly moving to hear British Prime Minister David Cameron explain that the reason he gave misleading answers about benefiting from his father’s offshore tax arrangements exposed by the Panama Papers leaks was because he was angry with comments made about his dad. It makes you realise that, when it comes to tax avoidance, the Camerons are the real victims.

Less than 1% of rental properties are affordable for low-income families in Sydney and the Illawarra, according to a new report launched on April 21 by Anglicare Sydney.

Sarah Eleazar is a Pakistani journalist and member of the socialist Awami Workers Party (AWP). She co-edits Tajdeed, a left research journal in Urdu. Eleazar will be a featured guest at the Socialist for the 21st Century conference in Sydney on May 13-15. She spoke with Green Left Radio on Melbourne community station 3CR in March about the fight for women’s liberation and socialism in Pakistan. The first part of an abridged transcript is below. ***

In a stunning rebuff to the party establishment, delegates to the federal convention of the Canada’s social democratic New Democratic Party, meeting in Edmonton, Alberta April 8-10, voted to reject Thomas Mulcair as their leader. They voted to begin reorienting the party to become a leader in Canada’s climate justice movement.

A new survey commissioned by the NSW Office of Environment and Heritage has found communities across New South Wales are big fans of renewable energy. An overwhelming 91% of the 2000 people surveyed across NSW said they support the use of renewables to generate electricity.

Despite a decisive victory on April 19, providing further confirmation of her likely nomination, in many respects Democratic presidential candidate Hillary Clinton emerged from the New York primary more damaged and her party more divided.

In response to a recent vote in the lower house of Brazil’s parliament in favour of impeaching Workers’ Party (PT) President Dilma Rousseff, Brazil’s two main coalitions of social movements issued the statement below on April 17. Rousseff is under attack over a series of corruption scandals, but the forces allied against her — the political, media and corporate elite — have themselves been implicated in corruption. Many in Brazil, including left opponents of Rousseff’s government, see the impeachment as an institutional coup by the right wing.