In the midst of a Federal Election and with the major party leaders equivocating on climate change and a price on carbon, the Zero Carbon Australia Stationary Energy Plan will be launched at a free public forum in Sydney Town Hall on Thursday 12 August at 6.00 pm.
Hosted by the journalist and broadcaster, Quentin Dempster, the speakers will include:
路 Malcolm Turnbull, MP for Wentworth
路 Bob Carr, former NSW State Premier
路 Scott Ludlam, Greens Senator for WA
路 Matthew Wright, Executive Director, Beyond Zero Emissions
路 Allan Jones, Sustainability Expert, City of Sydney
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Sam Watson, Socialist Alliance Senate candidate for Queensland. Longstanding leader of the Aboriginal community of Brisbane, campaigner against Black deaths in custody and for Indigenous rights.
Mortgage rates, we are told, are at historical lows. And yet, according to The experience of Mortgage Distress in Western Sydney report released in June by the University of Western Sydney, some mortgage holders are finding it so hard to pay, they are reduced to eating nothing but rice.
The study sought to investigate the impact of mortgage distress as experienced by individual households. The accepted definition of mortgage stress centres on the borrower being in payment arrears of 90 days or more. The UWS study argues that this definition is not broad enough.
In New South Wales, 96.3% of rail workers have voted in favour of strike action to further their campaign for a new enterprise bargaining agreement. The combined unions campaign committee notified Railcorp this would take the form of a fare-free day involving station staff and transport officers.
Strikes at maintenance depots and workshops are planned at Hornsby, Flemington, Mortdale, Sydenham and Eveleigh for all Rail, Tram and Bus Union members on August 5 from 10am-2pm.
All RTBU office workers at Burwood and Granville will strike the same day from 11am-1pm.
The statement below has been signed by the Australian Socialist Alliance, the Malaysian Socialist Party (PSM) and the Indonesian Working People鈥檚 Association (PRP).
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We, the undersigned organisations, view with serious concern the possibility of military aggression towards the people of Venezuela by the Colombian government, which could be supported by the United States using its seven military bases recently installed in Colombia.
On July 12, six months to the day after January's earthquake, the Haitian government held a ceremony behind the crumbled National Palace.
Before assembled dignitaries from embassies, NGOs, and Haiti鈥檚 elite, President Rene Preval and Prime Minister Jean-Max Bellerive draped medals of honor on prominent figures ranging from CNN celebrity journalist Anderson Cooper and Hollywood actor Sean Penn to retired Colonel Himmler Rebu and retired General Herard Abraham, officers who have enforced dictatorships and participated in coups over the past 30 years.
These poems by Iranian poet Mohsen Soltany Zand mark the chasm that has opened around and within us.
A century ago, the war poems of World War I conveyed the futility and horrors of war. By doing so, they expressed a clinging to life.
For instance, Italian poet Giuseppe Ungaretti wrote 鈥渓ying a whole night/beside a butchered comrade/never have I clung so to life鈥.
This clinging and choosing of life, persisted even when it seemed the nuclear threat of 鈥渕utually assured destruction鈥 was imminent.
The Melbourne International Film Festival (MIFF) apparently screened Iraqi film Son of Babylon against the wishes of the filmmakers 鈥 who object to the sponsorship of the MIFF by the apartheid state of Israel.
Israel faces an international boycott, divestment and sanctions campaign by opponents of its oppression of Palestinians. As with the international campaign against South African apartheid, this includes a call for a cultural boycott.
No one won the so-called Leaders鈥 Debate on July 27 鈥 not even the 鈥渨orms鈥. It was no debate at all, and showed that people and the environment will lose with either the ALP or the Coalition in government.
Coalition leader Tony Abbott hasn鈥檛 convincingly shed his climate change denialism and his promise that Work Choices is 鈥渄ead, buried and cremated鈥 is even less credible.
Prime Minister Julia Gillard presided over Work Choices-lite and shares with Abbott an irresponsible determination to avoid serious action on climate change.
Wander through the labyrinthine lanes from Chippendale to Marrickville, and it will strike you: Sydney has been hit with a tidal wave of new art galleries.
Galleries like MOP in Chippendale, At The Vanishing Point on south King St and First Draft in Surry Hills are among a new generation of art spaces that are strictly not-for-profit, often self-funded and always run by and for artists. They鈥檙e called artist-run initiatives (ARIs), and they鈥檙e blasting a fresh gust of air through the art community.
Canberra鈥檚 bus service, Action, is trying to impose a new enterprise bargaining agreement (EBA) on bus drivers to undermine their rights at work.
Under the current EBA, 40% of Canberra鈥檚 bus drivers are part-time and have to wait four years until they can get full-time work. If the part-time to full-time ratio that Action wants is implemented, workers will have to wait seven to eight years for a full-time job.
鈥淲e鈥檙e fighting to protect bus driving as a profession鈥, one bus driver said.
Early on July 27, Israeli bulldozers, flanked by helicopters and throngs of police, demolished the entire Bedouin village of al Araqib in the northern Negev desert. Despite having land rights cases pending in the court system, hundreds of al Araqib villagers were instantly made homeless a month after Israeli police posted demolition orders.
Eyewitness reports say the police were accompanied by several busloads of right-wing Israeli civilians who cheered during the demolitions.
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