Australian News

By Hamish Chitts

When the visit of US President Barack Obama was announced last month, an official White House statement said he “is looking forward to commemorating the 70th anniversary of Australia-US relations”. Far from being a cause of celebration, the anniversary represents 70 years of cooperation in attacks, invasions and occupations in the pursuit of economic dominance and profit for a handful of obscenely rich people in both countries — a 70-year axis of evil pitting working people from Australia and the US against working people resisting imperialist exploitation.

By Kathy Newnam

Rallies will be held across the country this month for same sex marriage rights — the first in a series of protests being organised by the Equal Love campaign as part of a national year of action for the campaign, now in its sixth year. The campaign has been growing since the federal government introduced a ban on same-sex marriage in 2004. In the last 12 months the campaign has mobilised supporters of same-sex marriage rights in a series of protests, including the largest ever national mobilisations against the government’s ban, held in August 2009.

[For five months, 254 Sri Lankan Tamil asylum seekers have refused to disembark the rickety cargo boat Jaya Lestari 5 which was towed into the Indonesian port Merak, after being intercepted by the Indonesian navy at the request of Australian Prime Minister Kevin Rudd. One pregnant woman onboard is due in early March. Her daughter has chicken pox and the rest of the 31 children on the boat are at risk of the disease. On February 12, the asylum seekers on the boat issued “A call for urgent action by the Indonesian and Australian governments”, which is reprinted below. The statement calls for a “just solution” for the stranded Tamil asylum seekers.]

By James Crafti

On January 26 (“Australia Day”), two members of the Revolutionary Socialist Party (RSP), Sam King and Van Rudd, demonstrated outside of the Australian Open Tennis Championships at Melbourne’s Rod Laver Arena to highlight Australia’s racism. The protest involved the pair dressing up in Klux Klux Klan outfits with the “Australian Made” logo and the slogan “racism made in Australia”.

By Jorge Jorquera

The Revolutionary Socialist Party will be running Van Rudd against Julia Gillard in the Melbourne seat of Lalor for the next federal election. Van Rudd’s campaign will take a stand against the failure of both state and federal governments to defend Indian students against racist attacks.

By Ian Jamieson

Amid howls of protests by employers, their representatives, the media and politicians, Maritime Union of Australia (MUA) members employed in the offshore gas and oil industry are concluding protracted negotiations for an enterprise agreement that will substantially improve wages and conditions.

By Kathy Newnam

Hundreds of people gathered on February 14 for the launch of a “protest house” established by the Alyawarr people at the protest camp at Honeymoon Bore — 350 kilometres north east of Alice Springs. The camp was set up in July 2009 when Alyawarr elders led a walk-off from the Ampilatwatja community in protest against the federal government’s racist treatment of the community.

By Jon Lamb

The East Timorese government is standing firm against pressure to sign a natural gas downstream processing deal for the Greater Sunrise field in the Timor Sea. Australian-based mining and exploration giant Woodside Petroleum, aided by the Northern Territory government, is pushing for the gas to be piped to and processed in Darwin, refusing to accept Dili’s preferred option of piping it to the southern coast of East Timor.

By Owen Richards

A significant blow against the Australian public school system was delivered on January 29 when the Rudd Labor government launched a website providing data on the performance of schools across the country — the much heralded “MySchool” website, hosted by the Australian Curriculum, Assessment and Reporting Authority. It will dramatically deepen inequality in the education system.

By Nick Everett

On January 28, 2010, singer, songwriter and socialist Alistair Hulett died from cancer at just 58 years old. I recall first seeing Hulett perform at the Sandringham Hotel, in Newtown, Sydney, in 1989. His band, Roaring Jack, which performed regularly at the “Sando”, had become legendary as one of the best left-wing political bands on the Australian pub scene in the 1980s, fusing folk and punk culture in a chorus of rebellion.