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Secret plan to hit free speech in Brisbane

By Bill Mason BRISBANE - "Cameras perched on poles monitor the movement of thousands of passers-by. "Speaking your mind here can cost you dearly, as much as a week's wage. "Only the select few can express themselves here, with the

Reviews threaten access to child-care

By Leslie Warne The provision of child-care services across Australia is currently under review by the federal Labor government, and services to children in NSW are being reviewed by the state Liberal government. These reviews, which both aim

The legacy of Chernobyl

By John R. Hallam At 1.46 on the morning of April 26, 1986, the shift supervisor of the Chernobyl-4 reactor — part of the massive reactor complex close to Kiev, capital of the Ukraine — pressed a button in a routine end to what was supposed

Of Maoists and Mozart

Cosi By Louis Nowra Directed by Adam Cook Belvoir Street Theatre, Sydney Reviewed by Tracy Sorensen and Angela Matheson How could you go wrong? Louis Nowra breathes new life into that now thoroughly worked-over period in Australian history -

BP workers exposed to LPG

By Geoff Spencer PERTH - About 100 construction workers were exposed for three hours to a liquefied petroleum gas leak here recently. The workers eventually walked off the job complaining of giddiness, stinging eyes and sore throats, despite

SA to make drivers pay for savings

By Liam Mitchell ADELAIDE - The state government, faced with growing resentment over its plan to reduce public transport in order to save money, has been forced to back down. But its latest proposal aims at making the drivers pay for retaining

Fears after oil fire

By Liam Mitchell ADELAIDE - Fears have been raised that a fire at the Port Stanvac oil refinery in southern Adelaide on April 10 may have emitted toxic gases, polluting surrounding suburbs and residential areas. The Noarlunga City Council,

WA teachers' executive 'shames unionism'

By Cliff Owls PERTH - On April 15 internal struggles within the WA State School Teachers' Union (SSTU) took another poor turn when the state executive sacked general secretary Peter Quinn. The sacking came without warning while Quinn was on

Campaign needed against forced resettlement

By Peggy Hallward In the preparations for the celebrations commemorating the 500th anniversary of Columbus' landing in the Caribbean, over 120,000 people were evicted from their homes in the Dominican Republic. It was an appropriate gesture.

British left counts the cost of Labour's loss

By Sally Low and Peter Annear Most of Britain's relatively large but deeply divided left campaigned hard for a Labour victory in the April 9 election, even though they opposed Neil Kinnock's "consensus politics" and "new realism". The

Why Cuba won't surrender

In 1961, Raul Macias a 16-year-old secondary student from Santiago, Cuba, went to the Sierra Maestra mountains to teach the peasants to read and write. "We were teachers but we were also students learning about life from the peasants, about how

Loose cannons

On the bright side "There are no specific allegations against me of either corruption or illegality and I look forward to carrying on with the job." — Terry Metherell after the announcement of an Independent Commission Against Corruption