As the ALP鈥檚 electoral fortunes lift with each new poll, unionists want to know exactly how a federal Labor government would carry out its promise to 鈥渢ear up鈥 the Coalition鈥檚 anti-worker Work Choices laws.
704
The University of Western Sydney decided to sell off 鈥渢he Swamp鈥 and student residences at Kingswood and Werrington South campuses. A mass of degrees were merged into the Bachelor of Business and Commerce. Half the majors for the Bachelor of Economics were axed. These are just some of the many changes that happened to UWS in the first few weeks of semester.
#147;In the US, we are living on borrowed time in terms of a nuclear accident聰, Kevin Kamps from the US-based non-government Nuclear Information and Resource Service (NIRS) told a March 21 public forum organised by The Wilderness Society.
Midnight on March 26 is the deadline for a power-sharing executive to be formed from the newly elected Northern Ireland Assembly so that devolution of power from Britain to the Belfast-based assembly can proceed. In the Stormont assembly elections, held on March 7, Ian Paisley聮s ultra-loyalist Democratic Unionist Party (DUP) won 36 of the assembly聮s 108 seats and Sinn Fein won 28. The traditionally dominant Ulster Unionist Party won only 18 seats and the Social Democratic Labour Party won 16. Voter turnout was approximately 63%, out of a total population of 1.7 million.
Lawyers acting for 12 of the 聯Melbourne 13聰, a group of Muslim men who have been held in Barwon聮s Maximum Security Prison for more than a year, argued on March 20 that the possibility of a fair trial had been jeopardised and applied for a stay in proceedings.
The Zimbabwe Congress of Trade Unions has declared it will go ahead with an April 3-4 鈥渟tay away鈥 by workers despite the wave of repression suffered by opponents of President Robert Mugabe鈥檚 regime and authorities鈥 threats to crush the ZCTU strike. Already ZCTU members have been arrested, their offices raided and material relating to the stay away confiscated.
There was something very sad about the debate in federal parliament around the Labor opposition鈥檚 grand plan to bring Australia up to speed on internet broadband. Behind the noise and smoke of the furious jousting was the sobering fact that both sides of the House embrace the corrupt logic of privatisation.
On March 8, Greenpeace announced that a community campaign had stopped the construction of Mighty River Power聮s Marsden B coal-fired power station, which would have been the first coal-fired power station to be built in New Zealand in 30 years. The campaign, launched in 2004, involved the local community, indigenous people and environmental organisations.
If the Howard government thought that it鈥檚 battery of anti-unions laws had completely intimidated workers not to take so-called 鈥渋llegal鈥 industrial action then they must be disappointed. For the first time in more than a decade all work on the nation鈥檚 waterfront came to a halt on March 23 when more than 11,000 wharfies walked off the job. The stop work coincided with the Melbourne funeral of Bobby Cumberlidge, who died in an industrial accident at Toll鈥檚 Westernport wharf on March 16.
The most important elections for many years in the Victorian branch of the Australian Manufacturing Workers Union (AMWU) are set for mid-April. This election will be a showdown between the incumbent unified Victorian branch leadership and the conservative vehicle division of the union and its supporters.
Below is an abridged account by Tim Davis-Frank of the police raid on his home and his arrest in Sydney on March 14. His 鈥渃rime鈥 was to take part in the protests outside the G20 meeting in Melbourne last November. Davis-Frank is the University of Sydney student representative council鈥檚 global solidarity officer. Four G20 protesters from Sydney went to court on March 19, and will face court again in Melbourne on May 11.
Jewish Voices I
I am an activist of Jewish descent and read with interest the interview in GLW #703 with Antony Loewenstein on the setting up of Independent Australian Jewish Voices. The IAJV statement follows a similar initiative from British
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