The Australian Labor Party鈥檚 (ALP) new higher education policy, announced on September 21, risks being indistinguishable from that of the Coalition under Prime Minister Malcolm Turnbull.
That is because the new Prime Minister has signalled a departure from the bully-boy antics of former education minister Christopher Pyne, who had threatened to introduce his doomed education cuts a third time to the Senate this spring.
Our Common Cause
Ok, who didn鈥檛 cheer when they heard that Tony Abbott might be dumped as Prime Minister? And then before the reality that nothing had really changed sank in, who didn鈥檛 cheer when he actually was dumped?
Yes, you spoil sports out there, I know that we have just switched captains on a leaky boat 鈥 appropriate metaphor don鈥檛 you think 鈥 and the boat hasn鈥檛 actually changed. But you have to admit that seeing Abbott鈥檚 humiliation was enjoyable.
The future of the federal government鈥檚 anti-union, kangaroo court 鈥 the Royal Commission into Trade Union Governance and Corruption 鈥 is in doubt, following media revelations that the commissioner, retired High Court Justice John Dyson Heydon, accepted an invitation 鈥 not once, but twice 鈥 to speak at a Liberal Party fundraiser while serving on the body. The commission first sat on April 9 last year and media reports say Heydon received the invitation to speak via email just one day later, on April 10. He was approached again in March.
The official unemployment rate in Broadmeadows is 23.5% but the real unemployment and underemployment rates are far higher. Youth unemployment is higher than the overall rate. We are very close to the 30% unemployment rate of the Great Depression.
Woolworths has now announced that it intends to close its Hume Distribution Centre and shift it across town to the outer south-eastern suburbs. This would throw about 680 people out of work.
The results of the recent Australian Labor Party (ALP) conference vote on boat turnbacks shows why building a progressive alternative to the left of the ALP in Australia today is urgently needed.
Statement of the Socialist Alliance national executive July 16, 2015:
The Socialist Alliance condemns the effective imposition of colonial status on Greece by the ruling institutions of the European Union (EU), which represent the interests of the big banks whose speculative excesses contributed in great part to the accumulation of the 鈥淕reek debt鈥 they are now seeking to recover.
This is a coup and a brutal assault on democracy.
If you suspect that neoliberal capitalist governments, including the Australian government, act as kleptocracies for the richest 1% and the large corporations, you have good reason to.
Whether you look at their tax system, the various privatisation or part-privatisation schemes they are forcing on the public, the 鈥渦ser-pays鈥 drives or the publicly subsidised private insurance scams, you can see how the public is being forced to subsidise the profits of powerful corporations and the super-rich.
The Tony Abbott government鈥檚 illegal 鈥淭urn Back the Boats鈥 policy is under further scrutiny, following that in late May, Australian customs officials paid $US30,000 to six crew members on a boat carrying 65 asylum seekers from Bangladesh, Sri Lanka and Myanmar, which was heading to New Zealand, from Indonesia.
The campaign against racism and the far right needs a clear understanding of racism and fascism and how to fight these threats.
Racism is not inherent in human beings. It is a product of capitalism. Racist scapegoating is used by the corporate rich because it undermines solidarity among workers, opening the way for conservative policies such as privatisation and cuts to social spending.
Marriage Equality has come to Ireland through a popular referendum. The result was hailed by the May 23 New York Times as placing Ireland 鈥渁t the vanguard of social change鈥.
This will be surprising to many, considering Ireland is a country in which transgender status is not recognised by the state, abortion is illegal, gay couples are denied access to surrogacy, unmarried couples cannot adopt, and homosexuality was decriminalised as recently as 1994.
The toll of Australia's bipartisan anti-refugee policies in death and suffering is rising. In the past fortnight more than 3000 Rohingya refugees from Arakan state in Burma (Myanmar) have turned up on the shores of Thailand, Malaysia and Indonesia, having either swum ashore or been rescued by local fishing boat crews. An estimated 7000 more are trapped on boats that have been described as 鈥渇loating coffins鈥.
Joe Hockey may have been hoping that his spin about a "dull" budget would lull the public into a stupor, but the budget is anything but dull if you're a woman, a parent, pregnant, a student, a pensioner, on welfare, need legal aid or are unemployed.
The government faced significant, organised, public opposition to its 2014 budget measures, many of which failed to pass in the Senate. It was forced to back down on a number of policies, however it is under increasing economic pressure to get its neoliberal agenda through.
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