Elections

Speaking to his supporters in a live web video address on June 17, Democratic presidential candidate Senator Bernie Sanders insisted that despite his campaign failing to defeat Democrat establishment figure Hillary Clinton, the struggle for a political revolution must continue.

Campaigners in Lambeth against LIbrary closures. The area voted overwhelmingly for 'remain'. Socialist Resistance, an English socialist group that is part of Left Unity, released this statement on June 24 on the result of the EU referendum ***

The Benigno Aquino administration is down to its final days till it makes way for the new presidency of Rodrigo Duterte, who was elected in May. You could make the case that we are also seeing the curtain fall on the 30-year-old liberal democratic state that came to existence with the February 1986 EDSA Uprising that overthrew the military dictatorship of Marcos.

MaryBeth Gundrum is a candidate for the Senate in Queensland for the Renewable Energy Party. She spoke to Angela Walker in Cairns. * * * We know you here as a Knitting Nanna active in the campaign against coal seam gas fracking. How did you become involved in the Renewable Energy Party (REP)?

The executive committee of Left Unity, a socialist group in England, issued the following statement on the outcome of Britain's referendum on leaving the European Union. *** Left Unity deplores the Leave outcome of the EU Referendum. This referendum came from pressure from the far right — driven by anti-immigration sentiment, fuelled by racism. This has been the most reactionary national campaign in British political history, resulting in an open emergence of the extreme right.

THERE are calls for referendums on Irish unity and Scottish independence as both the North of Ireland and Scotland look set to be dragged out of the European Union despite voting overwhelmingly to remain. Huge votes in favour of a so-called 'Brexit' in England and Wales gave a final result of 52% voting to leave European community which Britain joined in 1973. In the North almost 56% of citizens voted to remain in the EU. Sinn Féin National Chairperson Declan Kearney MLA says there is now a democratic imperative for a referendum on Irish unity:

Galaxy polling commissioned by the Climate Institute shows support for strong action on climate change is at its highest level since 2008, with uncommitted voters showing the strongest support. Voters were dissatisfied with both Labor and Coalition climate policies, with only 17% saying the Coalition had a credible climate plan and 20% saying Labor did.

On July 2 Australian voters head to the polls — although by that date up to 40% of voters will have voted at early polling centres across the country. Despite a number of minor parties and progressive independents running in lower house seats and the Senate, we know that come July 3 we will be looking at three more years of evil bastards or the lesser of two evils.

Pork-barrel politics and scare tactics have dominated the final weeks of the “longest election campaign ever”. Voters in marginal seats have been warned to “vote carefully”, to not “waste your vote” or “risk a protest vote” which might result in — shock horror “the chaos of a hung parliament”. We have had “tradies” in political ads trying to convince workers that the Liberal National Party (LNP) is their party, and Labor trying to convince the public that they have “rediscovered” labor values.

In the week that brought to light television personality Eddie McGuire's “banter” about sports journalist Caroline Wilson, the voters of Leichhardt, covering an area stretching from Cairns to Cape York and the Torres Strait, have been treated to campaign signs depicting a witch.

Tanya Plibersek, the deputy leader of the Australian Labor Party and MP for Sydney, made a speech on June 15 where she tried to fend off the political pressure Labor is facing from the Greens and other smaller parties to the left.

About 80 people attended a fiery, standing-room only, public forum on unemployment, hosted by Anti-Poverty Network SA on June 18 in Adelaide's northern suburbs. In a twist to the standard election fare, candidates were required to spend the first half of the event listening to the honest, insightful testimony and views of jobseekers, sole parents, aged and disability pensioners, and others with direct, lived experience of being out of work and being poor, before participating in a Q&A.