In a document released on November 25, the Construction, Forestry, Mining and Energy Union (CFMEU) calls on the Australian government to ratify the Kyoto treaty, as part of a strategy to combat climate change.
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On November 14, Philippines special state prosecutor Deana Perez denied the motion of the lawyers of 49 individuals charged with rebellion to dismiss the preliminary investigation on the grounds that there was no valid complaint-affidavits. The 49 were alleged to have taken part in the coup attempt last February 24.
There are six socialist candidates standing in the November 25 Victorian state election, and we call for your support for all of them.
We all stand for socialism, a society that is run by and for the vast working-class majority, a society in which the needs of the mass of people come first, not the greed of a handful of mega-millionaires.
A society based on satisfying human need is totally realistic. Imagine what could be done with the tremendous wealth in Australia if workers, pensioners and small farmers had the real power.
A 550-strong lecture sponsored by the Australian Lawyers Alliance on November 13 heard David HicksÂ’ US military lawyer, Major Michael Mori, slam the Bush administrationÂ’s new military commission law, which will be used to try Guantanamo Bay detainees. Hicks is one of approximately 400 prisoners at Guantanamo Bay being held without charge.
On November 14, the federal court ordered the reinstatement of two National Union of Workers (NUW) delegates after their employer, Saint-Gobain Abrasives, was unable to prove that its decision to dismiss them was unrelated to their involvement with the union.
The new student organisation at the University of New South Wales, established as a result of the Howard government’s “voluntary student unionism” (VSU) law, is forcing staff earning $40,000 or more per year onto individual contracts (AWAs — Australian Workplace Agreements).
The Democratic Socialist Perspective will be holding its biennial educational conference at Sydney University on January 4-7, 2007. The conference theme — “Ideas to change the world” — is inspired by Karl Marx’s 11th Thesis on Feuerbach (1845): “Philosophers have hitherto only interpreted the world in various ways; the point, however, is to change it.”
Australians have joined the international campaign calling on U2’s Bono — who has appealed to the world for peace and poverty reduction — to apply those same values to block the manufacture and distribution of a video game that promotes the invasion and destruction of Venezuela.
Three to four thousand people joined a rally and march against the G20 meeting on November 18. The rally opposed the neoliberal and militarist agenda of the meeting, which brought together finance ministers from the G8 group of rich nations, Australia, the European Union and 10 economically significant Third World nations, as well as the heads of the World Bank and International Monetary Fund.
Protest actions were held around Australia on November 17 as part of the “Chavez not Bush!” international week of solidarity with Venezuela. The actions called opposed US interference in Venezuela’s December 3 presidential election. In Sydney (pictured), 40 people picketing the US consulate were addressed by Keysar Trad from the Islamic Friendship Association, and Kiraz Janicke and Marce Cameron from the Australia-Venezuela Solidarity Network. Trad spoke strongly in favour of Venezuela’s right to self-determination and pointed to Iraq and Afghanistan as disastrous examples of the US government’s failure to respect this principle.
At a joint November 17 press conference with his New Zealand counterpart Helen Clark, Australian Prime Minister John Howard announced that a “joint Australian-New Zealand force of both military personnel and police will, in response to a request from the government of Tonga, go to Tonga tomorrow morning”.
On November 16, 45 people rallied outside the Philippines consulate in the CBD to demand an end to the killings and harassment of political and trade union activists in the Philippines.
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