Workers in Australia are under an unprecedented and multi-fronted attack, designed to strip away hard-fought wages and conditions, including penalty rates and industrial rights. This attack is part of a drive by Australian capital to shore up profits in the context of a global economic slow down.
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鈥淟abor鈥檚 public transport policy lacks vision. It鈥檚 just more of the same 鈥 and follows the Liberals鈥 privatisation agenda鈥, John Coleman, Socialist Alliance candidate for the Legislative Council said.
鈥淟abor promised $1 billion for a small-scale light rail project to run from Parramatta to Homebush, matching the Liberals鈥 promise. But while any money spent on public transport rather than roads is money well spent, Labor鈥檚 policy doesn鈥檛 address the real problems.
In the past three years, the Australian government has recovered more than $41 million that had been .
These for-profit employment agencies were found to have submitted forged and doctored records and lodged inflated fee claims. One source, a former agency employee, told ABC鈥檚 Four Corners that they had seen 鈥渢housands鈥 of jobseeker records modified by the agency to support suspicious claims against the taxpayer.
Frack Free Tasmania held a public meeting on February 18 at Sustainable Living Tasmania to warn about possible exploration for shale oil and gas in the island state. The current moratorium on fracking in Tasmania is due to end on March 31.
The government put out an issues paper which received 157 submissions, 90% of which were opposed to fracking being allowed in the state. The government responded to the review on February 26 by extending the moratorium until 2020.
The impending execution in Indonesia of two Australian drug couriers 鈥 Myuran Sukumaran and Andrew Chan 鈥 has focused Australian media attention on the horrors of capital punishment. Their lawyers, families and supporters, particularly artist Ben Quilty, have ensured that the two have been humanised.
Tasmania bans fracking for five years The Tasmanian Liberal government will extend the ban on gas fracking until 2020 the minister for primary industries Jeremy Rockliff said on February 26.
More than 1000 people attended a meeting at the Enmore theatre in Newtown on February 23 to hear from the builders of the $12 billion motorway WestConnex.
The WestConnex Delivery Authority organised the meeting as a community consultation to answer what they call 鈥渕isinformation鈥 about the project. But they faced an overwhelmingly hostile reaction from the crowd.
The crowd booed and heckled WestConnex Delivery Authority chief executive Dennis Cliche as he tried to promote the benefits of the motorway.
Resistance: Young Socialist Alliance released this statement on February 25.
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Resistance: Young Socialist Alliance condemns the passing of the Higher Education and Research Amendment Bill, which included fee-deregulation, in the House of Representatives on February 25.
This legislation has passed despite the ongoing opposition from students, the National Tertiary Education Union, economists and progressive political parties.
The Australian Council of Trade Unions says the federal government has cut 8000 public sector jobs since coming to power and plans to slash another 8000 more.
Now the government is making a pay offer to public servants that the Community and Public Sector Union (CPSU) says is, in effect, a pay cut.
The government鈥檚 offer of a 3.25% pay rise over three years to employees in the Department of Human Services (DHS) is below the inflation rate 鈥 1.7% according to .
A second round of talks between US and Cuban diplomats began in Washington on February 27, with the aim of restoring diplomatic relations.
US President Barack Obama announced, in what he termed the most significant Cuba policy shift in more than 50 years, that he will pursue diplomatic relations and urge Congress to dismantle the US blockade of Cuba.
Legal experts have criticised new child protection laws pushed through Northern Territory parliament on February 18 for not including safeguards to protect Aboriginal culture and risking a repeat of the damage done to the Stolen Generations.
The new legislation allows children who are removed from their parents by the Department of Children and Families to be placed on Permanent Care Orders, which would mean that their carers would have control over most decisions to do with the child, free from judicial or DCF review.
Greece鈥檚 new SYRIZA government submitted its list of proposed economic reforms to the Eurogroup (the finance ministers of eurozone nations) on February 23 as a precondition for its international creditors to approve a four-month loan extension. The deal was signed on February 20.
With Greece鈥檚 existing loan arrangement expiring on February 28 and bankruptcy looming, a last-minute deal was finally agreed after three weeks of intense negotiations. The talks had been characterised by daily 鈥 sometimes hourly 鈥 twists and turns, claims and counterclaims, leaks and threats.
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