Socialist Alliance Western Australia

Serco lies again - day one at Leonora

2012-01-28T01:37:00.001+08:00

Almost 40 refugee activists travelled the twelve hour journey from Perth to Leonora to visit refugees and protest mandatory detention at the Leonora Detention Centre on the ``Australia Day'' weekend.

Prior to departure, activists were informed that their booking at the local caravan park had been cancelled because the proprietors didn't want to lose business from their Serco and Immigration Department clients. That decision would have been in violation of the anti-discrimination act.

Instead, activists camped at a town oval with support of the local shire.

Upon arrival at the Detention Centre gates, an advance delegation was informed that the detention centre administrators had held a ``community'' meeting of the 140 unaccompanied minors in the centre. According to representatives of Serco – the private company that runs the prison – there was not one single refugee inside who was interested in meeting with the refugee activists.

This was despite activists bringing MP3 players and art supplies as gifts.

As soon as the main body of activists arrived at the gate and Serco management reiterated that no visits would be facilitated, chants of “free the refugees'' and ``Freedom, Azadi'' attracted a lot of interest from the refugees inside.

They came and waved at protesters from behind fences in the distance. They explicitly indicated that they wanted to see the visiting activists.

Serco guards tried unsuccessfully to drive the refugees back from the internal fence. When that failed, they arranged for a large bus to be driven and parked between activists and one of the groups of refugees. Other vehicles were already stationed in front of the second group of young detainees.

Protesters outside wrote a letter to the refugees explaining that they support refugees and oppose mandatory detention. Despite being explicitly told that Serco would allow a letter to be delivered, police and centre security initially refused to pass the letter on. A sympathetic staff member (who was not a security guard) helped make sure the letter was delivered.

The refugees responded by sending out a balloon with the messages ``go, go, go'' and ``happy Australia Day''.

By the end of the day, Serco management could no longer maintain the fiction that the refugees did not want to speak to the activists and agreed to facilitate visits the next day.

Organisers from the Refugee Rights Action Network have a lot of experience visiting refugees in detention and organising convergences. They regard it as routine that Serco regularly puts in place petty obstructions and outright lies to try to prevent activists from communicating with refugees unfairly held in refugee prisons.

This is all part of the policy of isolating refugees in detention from the broader community. For instance, while Serco considers clinical depression and hunger strikes of less than 24 hours to be ``minor'' incidents, unauthorised access by journalists to detention centres is considered to be a ``major'' issue.

Video snippet from day one

Photos below by Zeb Parkes

Help launch the Fremantle Activist Centre

2012-01-24T16:58:00.005+08:00

We're writing to invite you to come along to the opening of the new Fremantle Activist Centre.

Like the Perth Activist Centre, the new Fremantle Centre promises to be a valuable asset for both the socialist and broader progressive movements.

We'd love you to drop in for a few drinks and nibbles to help celebrate the big day:

Saturday 4 February
5-6:30pm, Fremantle Activist Centre
5 / 195 High Street Fremantle

Attend on Facebook.

Watch a video introducing the new centre here or here.

P.S. It costs money to establish a centre like this one. If you're able to contribute to the running costs we'd much appreciate it. Find out here how you can help.

Map to Fremantle Activist Centre:

View Larger Map

Perth Voice reports Free Speech fight

2012-01-20T13:45:00.000+08:00

The Perth Voice has reported on the campaign by activist groups to defend free speech rights in the Murray St Mall and other parts of Perth City under the headline: "See you in court".

The issue involves opposition to the $625 worth of fines the Perth City Council is trying to impose over their unsuccessful attempt to close down the speak-out in support of Bradley Manning in December.

Socialist Alliance member Alex Bainbridge explained to the Voice that if the council took measures that, in practice, prevent campaign groups from setting up tables and speaking out on important social issues, then that is a violation of free speech rights.

The Council CEO, Frank Edwards, told the paper that it cost $140 per day to set up an authorised stall in the Murray Street Mall on top of a $60 application fee. Edwards confirmed that the application fee is non-refundable (that is, even if the application is denied). However said that council officers tried to give groups an idea about whether or not an application would be successful prior to the application being made.

Edwards also told the Voice that the Council is "considering its options" in view of the decision by Bainbridge not to pay the fines but to have them instead dealt with by the court.

Save the Charles Riley Reserve Trees

2012-01-20T12:58:00.000+08:00

[Information below from Save the Trees activists.]

Public Meeting Under the Trees
(opposite the North Beach Primary School)

Next Saturday: 21 January 2012

11.30 to 12.30pm
BYO signs !!!

Did you know? The City of Stirling is planning to remove nearly all of our lovely big shade trees from the Charles Riley Reserve (47 trees), mainly opposite the North Beach Primary School. This is to enlarge the second football oval to AFL size and because the cricket club want to relocate from the southern end. All up they are spending $3 million of rate payer’s money on this project.

Scandalously, public consultation period was poorly advertise and in December while we were all distracted with preparations and events around the festive season and holidays. Plus they didn’t emphasise the trees going in their wording or diagrams adequately.

The dark green trees in the diagram to the left are the mature trees earmarked to go. The light green ones are new trees to be planted and the mid green ones will stay. This diagram is very deceptive because it shows the new trees at the size they will be in over 20 years. For many years the whole area will look more like this photo below:

What about the rest of the community?

Recreation users such as walkers and joggers?
Parents with Children visiting the park?
Kids Playing?
Other sporting club spectators?
What about the abundant bird life that live in these trees? These trees provide a link for wildlife, between Star Swamp and the Trigg Bushland.
Future subdivisions in the area will see hundreds of private trees lost, plus many local trees are dying, we need these public trees.
Seniors will not benefit from these saplings in 30 years time!

(see pages 221 to 240 of the Council Minutes from 22 November 2011, on the City of Stirling website for more details) or phone Leisha on 0448 534742

This isn’t just about the trees in this particular reserve, this is about supporting tree protection all over the City of Stirling and the wider Perth metropolitan area. If the City of Stirling can see we are serious about tree protection, it will help with the future tree policy development going forward.

We want the City of Stirling to:

Go back to the drawing board and come up with plans for this reserve that will retain the mature trees and accommodate the wishes and needs of the majority of community stakeholders, not just wishes of some members of the football club and the cricket club.
Amend their Public Consultation Procedures. We want proposed plans better advertised and we want them to clearly identify in the wording and in their diagrams any trees that would be removed should a project go ahead. Having public consultation periods in December and final decisions in February are not fair or acceptable, as people are distracted or away due to the festive season and holidays. These public consultation demands apply to all City of Stirling proposed plans involving the removal of public trees and significant green infrastructure going forward. We will be demanding an extra 10 days public consultation extension on these plans.
Acknowledge that small staked saplings cannot provide the benefits of large mature trees. A seniors who have been paying rates for years, will never see the benefits and will have their lovely shady green park area taken from them. Today’s young children who play or do sport there will not benefit from these saplings in their youth either.

$625 fine for speaking out in Perth! WTF?

2012-01-18T21:10:00.000+08:00

Readers are aware that on December 17, the Perth City Council and police attempted (unsuccessfully) to close down a Bradley Manning speak-out in the Murray Street Mall.

Then on January 6, one of the participants in the action - Alex Bainbridge - received $625 worth of fines levied by the Perth City Council. The fines were for: setting up a table without a permit ($400); causing an obstruction (i.e. the table again) ($125); and failing to obey the directions of an authorised person ($100).

Bainbridge immediately elected to have the matters dealt with in court instead of paying the fines.

"The issue is one of freedom of speech," Bainbridge said. "Activist groups should be able to set up campaign tables and hold speak-outs in the Perth CBD unhindered by by-laws and council rangers."

On January 9, the Perth City Council returned the materials that were seized at the December action. The video below details precisely what was seized by the council.

Activists responded by holding a free speech campaign stall on January 12. The council was notified about the stall - which was similar to the original speakout in concept, just at a smaller scale - by phone and email. One council ranger attended but took no action to close down the stall. This was considered a victory by the activists involved.

Help launch the Fremantle Activist Centre - Sat 4 Feb

2012-01-15T13:22:00.001+08:00

We are really pleased to report that we have taken the initiative to establish a new office and organising space in Fremantle - the Fremantle Activist Centre - at 5/195 High St Fremantle.

Like the Perth Activist Centre in Aberdeen St, this will be a base for Socialist Alliance, distribution centre for Green Left Weekly and meeting place for both our own organisation and other activist groups. This is a great step forward for our movement and we'll be celebrating with a few drinks at the new centre 5:00-6:30pm on Saturday 4th February. You're all welcome to drop by, have a look and say hello.

The most important asset of our organisation is the time, effort and creativity that you contribute. But in a capitalist world we also need money, and we're not likely to get any big donations from the corporations like most political parties do. Our special appeals, raffles and events all generate important income.

But the bedrock of our finances is the regular contributions made by ordinary people like you who support what we do. If you think you can help out in this way with a regular weekly, fortnightly or monthly contribution please let us know. Payments should be made to Perth Activist Centre, BSB 066003 Account 10253459.

In solidarity,

Sam Wainwright
Co-convenor, Socialist Alliance WA

Note: Unfortunately the Fremantle Activist Centre is not wheelchair accessible. We were simply unable to find affordable ground floor office space in Fremantle. In the future we hope to get a more accessible space and of course continue to support all the campaigns to make buildings and other facilities accessible to all.

Video and photos from the action in solidarity with three Australians held on board a Japanese whaling ship

2012-01-10T07:26:00.000+08:00

On Monday 9 January 2011, people protested outside the Japanese embassy in West Perth. Three West Australian members of Forest Rescue boarded the Japanese security ship that has been tailing Sea Sheperd's Steve Irwin. Australian police enforced the embassy's desire that nobody, not even a small delegation, be allowed to approach the embassy.

Video and photos by Zeb Parkes

Obama signs law supporting indefinite detention without trial

2012-01-05T22:51:00.000+08:00

"President Barack Obama rang in the New Year by signing the NDAA law with its provision allowing him to indefinitely detain citizens. It was a symbolic moment to say the least. With Americans distracted with drinking and celebrating, Obama signed one of the greatest rollbacks of civil liberties in the history of [the United States]..." - US progressive lawyer Jonathan Turley

Read more.

Council and Police try to close down Bradley Manning support action

2011-12-17T17:48:00.001+08:00

On Saturday December 17, activists gathered in Perth’s city centre for a speakout as part of an international day of action for accused Wikileaks' whistleblower Bradley Manning.

In May 2010, 24 year old Bradley Manning was arrested over suspicion of leaking secret US military and government documents to Wikileaks.

These leaks included evidence of the torture and killing of countless individuals, the illegal bombing of Yemen and extent of the drone attacks on Pakistan.

Since his arrest Manning has faced imprisonment in conditions described as "degrading" by some of the US’s top law professors. They stated that it violates the Eighth Amendment (outlawing cruel and unusual punishment) and the Fifth Amendment (prohibiting punishment without trial).

This included being held in solitary confinement for 23 hours a day for 10 months, exercising only by walking around in a room in circles and being made to stand naked and to attention every morning after he was charged on March 2 2011.

The International Day of Action was called in response to the beginning of Manning’s Article 32 hearing
which will rule on whether there is enough evidence for a general court martial Manning’s defence team attempted to call 32 witnesses to the stand but all bar two were refused.

They have called this measure unfair and also stated that the unusual action of letting the media report on the case may also jeopardise their chances.

Manning has been charged with multiple criminal charges including "aiding the enemy" and sharing state secrets which could leave him facing life imprisonment after the US government said they would not seek the death penalty.

The 25 protesters stood up to intimidation from Perth City Council rangers from the beginning of the action. Rangers wanted the banners and tables removed from the public space.

Activists took some steps to allay concerns of the rangers, however, the rangers called police in order to enforce their will. Police asked the protesters to remove the tables and banner and said that the action could continue unhindered if that happened. However, before police had finished explaining this, council rangers had already begun seizing tables, a megaphone and other materials.

Rangers seized letters that participants and passers by had written to the prime minister and other politicians calling for justice for Bradley Manning.

By this time, a crowd of up to 100 people had gathered to watch the events. Two protesters were given move on notices for nothing more than talking to police.

Despite interruptions from the police, the activists continued raising the issue of support for Bradley Manning and WikiLeaks as well as raising the issues of free speech locally. "Democracy is under attack, what do we do? Stand up, fight back" was chanted by the protesters.

Activists are now discussing the next steps in the campaign.

[Article by Kate Massam. Photos by Leela Cheary. Live stream video from Karum Cowper/Occupy Perth.]

GLW end of year BBQ

2011-12-07T13:20:00.001+08:00

Celebrate a year of SOLIDARITY and STRUGGLE

Green Left Weekly end-of-year BBQ

4pm Sun 18 December

21a Jarvis St, O'Connor
Ph 9218 9608, 0413 976 638.

Includes GLW raffle draw (7pm).

(It's not too late to buy or sell raffle tickets - please phone numbers above or email: wacontact@greenleft.org.au to help support Australia's best progressive newspaper. This raffle is a critical part of Green Left's annual fundraising push.)

Occupy Perth Corporate Scumbags Tour

2011-12-07T07:00:00.000+08:00

Occupy Perth Weekend of activities

Sat 10 December
During the Day: Market stall with arts and crafts
10am - Children's Activities (incl face painting)
12noon - Friends of the Forrest rally outside PICA
1pm - Corporate Scumbags Tour
3pm - Public meeting/forum
5pm - Community Music (bring an instrument)
6:30pm - Community Dinner (bring a plate)
7:30pm - Full length film documentary (tbc)

Overnight Occupation

Sun 11 December
10am - Laughter Yoga
11am - General Assembly
1pm - Poems and Music

All at (or beginning at) Perth Cultural Centre

Corporate Scumbag Tour details:

We will be marching to each of the following corporations head offices with speak-outs exposing their abuse of power at the expense of the 99%.

Serco has run Australia’s disastrous and increasingly unstable refugee detention centres since 2009, owns two Australian super-prisons and took over Western Australia’s court security and custodial services. Serco has contracts with no obligation to be independently audited and must not allow the media any access to information or facilities.

Toro Energy Ltd, proponent of the First Uranium mine in WA -at Lake Way- they have been bullying Tradi Toro Energy Ltd, proponent of the First Uranium mine in WA -at Lake Way- they have been bullying Traditional Owners in Wiluna, have not completed Aboriginal Heritage Survey’s or a management plan and still trying to get people to sign off on the mine - they have released an ERMP with huge gaps and are dodging public scrutiny, make claims that Fukushima has done no harm to human health, are of the school of thought that radiation is not only safe but is good for you....they want to be the biggest uranium miner in Australia.

BHP Billiton - Olympic Dam Uranium mine in South Australia a recent example- 260 million litres of water a day, exemptions from Freedom of Information, the mining Act, Aboriginal heritage Act, and the Environment Act, receiving more in Diesel subsidies than they’re paying in royalties.

NAB, one of the "big four" banks — Westpac, ANZ, Commonwealth and NAB — in Australia recently exposed by Greenpeace Australia as investing billions of dollars in Australia’s dirty coal boom. NAB has invested $382 million in coal-fired power and $633 million in coal mining. Meanwhile, Westpac (which includes St George Bank) threw in $454 million for coal-fired power, $354 million for coal mining and put $220 million into coal ports. This while recently posting record $5.5 billion record profit.

Chevron Australia Pty Ltd, currently the target of a campaign by WA unions concerned about foreign workers taking jobs away from local people. Earlier this year fined in Equador for 20 billion gallons of polluted water, oil and toxic waste released between 1972 and 1990 by oil company Texaco (now a part of Chevron) into the ecosystem in eastern Ecuador. The pollution has caused thousands of deaths, cancers, birth defects and incalculable environmental damage — poisoning animals, plants and the water table — as well as huge economic loss.

Barrick Gold- Canadian Gold miner who operates the Lake Cowal Gold Mine in NSW the Lake is the Sacred Heartland of the Wiradjuri Nation, and there has been 10 years of court battles between Barrick and the Traditional Owners- the Mooka Kalara United Families - they also operate a Gold mine in Tanzania which has had workers strikes, water contamination and more.... they also operate the Porgera Gold mine in Papua New Guinea – which employs mercenaries to protest the mine from local villagers who try and fossick for gold to pay their way because the mine has completely fucked the environment there so people struggle to live the subsistence life they’re used to... The Mercenaries have regularly raped young women and killed local men, and Barrick get away with it- threatening local land owners when they travel to speak out.

Fortescue Metal Group - Andrew "Twiggy" Forest's company - responsible for the exploitation and manipulation of the Yindibandi people brought to light through video footage of one of the Native Title meetings. Aboriginal leader and campaigner for jobs with justice Barbara Shaw said on October 27: “The way Generation One (FMG) are carrying on is disgusting, a real slap in the face. They come through town with a fancy road-show while hardworking Aboriginal people are being thrown out of work by the intervention or are now working for the Basics Card. Is this the future for the next generation in ‘proscribed areas’?

More info:
OccupyPerth.org
www.Facebook.com/OccupyPerth

ALP National Conference protests

2011-12-06T11:38:00.002+08:00

Over the weekend of the 3rd and 4th of december there was a national convergence of activists on sydney to protest the ALP National Conference, that included members of perth socialist alliance.

Two of the main issues highlighted were equal marriage and refugee rights.

Equal Marriage

Refugee Rights

Fighting for women's liberation today

2011-11-29T19:26:00.000+08:00

According to the Australian Institute of Criminology there were 19,781 recorded sexual assaults in 2007. Although it is estimated that only 15% of victims report their assaults to police. Most rape's are experienced by females aged 15-19 and are perpetrated by people well known to the victim.

Women are raped because of the actions of the rapist NOT because they wear revealing clothes, NOT because they get too drunk and NOT because they “ask for it”.

Women in Australia are not safe from rape but they should be.

This Socialist Alliance and Resistance meeting will discuss: the nature of women's oppression today; the fight against sexual violence; and strategies for women's liberation.

For more information call 9218 9608 or 0468 375 321.

6:30pm Wed 7 December
Perth Activist Centre, 15/5 Aberdeen Street,
(next to McIver train station) Ph 9218 9608

Stop "Bulldozer Barnett" - Sat 10 December

2011-11-29T17:53:00.002+08:00

STOP “BULLDOZER BARNETT”

12 noon, Sat 10 December

Perth Cultural Centre

We are tired of pleading with and lobbying the Barnett Government over environmental

issues. Their total disregard for the environment and sustainability is unacceptable.

They are only concerned with the interests of big business and pollutacrates.

No Environment = No Economy

· We want our bushland, forests and wild life protected

· we want our marine life protected

· we want green sustainable planning

· we want renewable energy

We want a future for our children

1pm

Occupy Perth Rally

See: Occupy Everywhere: Michael Moore, Naomi Klein on Next Steps for the Movement Against Corporate Greed

Union Rally - Tues 29 Nov

2011-11-28T15:11:00.001+08:00

Unions including the MUA, AMWU, CEPU & CFMEU will mobilise 12 noon on Tues 29 November as part of a campaign to secure local jobs from the mining boom

12 noon, Tues 29 November
Perth Esplanade (marching to Chevron)

Socialist Alliance will be joining the rally and in support of:
* Stop the exploitation of migrant workers: Permanent residency not 457 visas!
* Restore compulsory apprenticeship ratios
* Guarantees on local content AND social objectives
* The right to strike is a human right

Perth Council in sign fine fight

2011-11-22T19:34:00.001+08:00

The latest issue (19-11-11) of the Perth Voice has a front page report about the threat by Perth City Council to prosecute Socialist Alliance member Alex Bainbridge for displaying a sign in the lead up to the Chogm Protest.

The article also takes up the cases of Sean Gransch (a Forest Rescue activist and professional rigger who was placed on the CHOGM exclusion list and then subsequently arrested for going to work) and Lewis Todman & Alex Salmon (who have been arrested, held overnight in jail and then had their phones seized for allegedly putting up posters).

All three cases were taken up at a solidarity action outside court on 22 November 2011 when Gransch had the opportunity to make his "not guilty" plea. Gransch will return to court for trial on 24 January 2012 unless the prosecution sees sense and dismisses the charges before then.

Photos from the November 22 action

Occupy perth weekend 18-20 november

2011-11-21T14:32:00.002+08:00

Over the weekend Occupy Perth set up in the cultural centre and and ran a variety of activities from discussions to marching into forest place and rallying to demand an end to the Australian - American military alliance and in opposition to Brookfield, the company that "owns" zuccotti park and has eing trying to evict occupy wall street.

What does the financial crisis in Europe mean?

2011-11-17T11:04:00.001+08:00

Socialist Alliance and Resistance meeting with:

Dick Nichols
(former national convenor of Socialist Alliance and current European Bureau of SA - via Skype)

6:30pm, Wed 23 November

Perth Activist Centre
15/5 Aberdeen St, Perth (next to McIver station)

www.Socialist-Alliance.org * www.Resistance.org.au

Attend on Facebook:
www.facebook.com/events/277763475602384/

Occupy Perth plans this week

2011-11-17T02:32:00.000+08:00

This week @ Occupy Perth...

Thursday 17th November 6.30pm - General Assembly @ Forrest Place

The GA on 5/11/11 decided to have weekly GA's on Thursday evenings 6.30pm at Forrest Place for the foreseeable future. Agenda for this GA to be determined on the evening. Forward your suggestions to occupyperth@gmail.com. For minutes of 10/11/11 GA clickhere.

Friday 18-20th November OCCUPY PERTH!!

Full programme of events for this weekend, come down and get involved!! See facebook link and/or flyer following for details.

http://www.facebook.com/event.php?eid=245153538872798 (to RSVP also)

#occupyperth, a non-violent uprising against corporate control of government and the extent to which the wealthiest 1% own your life.

Friday 5.30pm - Gather
Friday 7.30pm - Q&A Style Public Forum - hosted by Tony Serve
OCCUPY!
Saturday 1pm - Flash Mob Action - Protest Brookfield Property Group
Saturday 7pm - Viewing of Doco ‘The Corporation’
OCCUPY!
Sunday 3pm - Speakers Corner
Sunday 6pm - Bands
OCCUPY?

Occupy Perth is planning to stage an Occupation of the Perth Cultural Centre this weekend, in solidarity with Occupy Wall Street, which was evicted by police on Tuesday.

“We condemn the brutal eviction of Occupy camps in Portland, Oakland, Philidelphia, Denver and of course, Wall Street,” said Colleen Bolger, one of the spokespeople for Occupy Perth. “It is important that when the Occupy movement is under attack, we show we will not be intimidated by the use of force against peaceful protest,” she continued.

Tonight’s General Assembly will consider a proposal to stage an action against Brookfield, the company that owns Zucotti Park and issued the eviction order on spurious sanitation grounds.

Organisers of Occupy Perth also want to highlight issues relevant to Australians.
As one Occupy organiser, Karun Cowper explained, “While Australians are not facing the same rate of housing evictions and unemployment as those occupying in the United States, issues such as inequality and corporate greed are pertinent here also. For example, CEOs earn almost one hundred times the average wage. Furthermore, while mining companies steal and exploit Indigenous land and make super profits, the life expectancy of Indigenous people remains 17 years less than non-Indigenous.’

Occupy Perth calls on people to gather outside the State Library at 5.30pm on Friday to begin claiming the space for the occupation. Throughout the weekend, the group is planning to host workshops, show documentaries and stage a Q & A style Public Forum.

Supporters are encouraged to bring sleeping bags, or if not camping to come down and participate anytime on Saturday and Sunday.

Video from latest boycott Apartheid Israel, Boycot Seacret action

2011-11-16T16:43:00.000+08:00

More than 40 people joined a BDS campaign action at the Seacret stall in the Carousel shopping centre in Perth, WA.

Seacret is an Israeli cosmetics company that illegally sources its product from the Dead Sea in Occupied Palestine.

Borrowing a song from a successful Brisbane BDS action, the Friends of Palestine activists created a musical message against Israeli Apartheid in the shopping centre's food court. When Centre security tried to move them on, they proceeded to the Seacret stall chanting "Free, free Palestine, Occupation is a crime" where the protest continued for some time.

The actions by the shopping centre security force - colluding with police to try to close down a democratic protest for human rights - were largely ineffective. The protest achieved exactly what was set out to be achieved: to raise the issue of Israeli Apartheid and the illegal actions of the Seacret company.

Friends of Palestine is encourages people to write to Carousel Shopping Centre to protest about the ongoing lease to Seacret. Click here for contact details.

The next Seacret action organised by Friends of Palestine - don't buy Israeli Apartheid for Christmas - will be on Thursday 8 December 2011. Contact Friends of Palestine WA for more information.

Solidarity Protest: Drop the Charges

2011-11-16T10:45:00.000+08:00

Resist the attacks on democratic rights from CHOGM

The CHOGM Special Powers Legislation took to new extremes the attacks on democratic rights contained in the recent spate of one-off police powers legislation for "special events". Even though CHOGM is now gone, the attacks on civil liberties haven't gone away. The three cases below are all examples of trivial and/or laughable "offences" related to CHOGM that are still being pursued by authorities. In every single case, the charges should be dropped.

Please join the solidarity protest on Tuesday 22 November to show your support for democratic rights.

* Sean Gransch – arbitrarily put on the CHOGM "excluded list", then arrested for going to work in a CHOGM security area (Sean was employed as a professional rigger by CHOGM (!) to assemble and disassemble the stage for a CHOGM event.)
* Lewis Todman & Alex Salmon – arrested, held over night and phones seized for putting up posters
* Alex Bainbridge – prosecuted by City of Perth for displaying a Chogm Protest sign in the lead-up to the Chogm Protest

9am, Tues 22 November
Perth Magistrates Court, (501 Hay St, Perth)

Attend on FaceBook:
www.facebook.com/event.php?eid=307192565959269

The West Australian lies about Iran threat again

2011-11-14T17:25:00.000+08:00

[The following letter was sent by Socialist Alliance member Leisha Jack to The West Australian newspaper on 14 November 2011.]

I refer to the statement in your article, in today’s West Australian (14th November 2011, page 23), that “The prospects of a nuclear-armed Iran terrify its neighbours.....”.

This is completely untrue.

According to Noam Chomsky, extensive Arab polls by the Brookings Institute recently, show that an overwhelming majority of the Arab population actually see Israel as the biggest threat to their region (80%) and the second biggest threat being the US (77%).

Many Arabs (57%) feel that it would have a positive effect on the region if Iran had nuclear weapons! Only 10% see Iran as a threat. Your comments are dangerously misleading to the West Australian public and must be immediately amended.

(See for reference the video below or Democracy Now.)

What you are writing looks a lot like the sort of propaganda used by western governments and the media, as an excuse to invade other middle eastern countries like Iraq and Afghanistan, with the “Weapons of Mass Destruction” and the “The War on Terror” etc.?

Please advise me on whether you intend to withdraw or amend this comment?

I will leave you with this quote by Nazi Officer Hermann Goering:

“The people don't want war, but they can always be brought to the bidding of the leaders. This is easy. All you have to do is tell them they are being attacked, and denounce the pacifists for lack of patriotism and for exposing the country to danger. It works the same in every country.”

Leisha Jack
Karrinyup

Time to put Qantas back in public hands

2011-11-07T12:51:00.001+08:00

If you speak out against the widening gap between wages and CEOs’ salaries, the corporate media will accuse you of stoking the “politics of envy”. Workers who dare take industrial action to get a few more crumbs from the bosses’ table are cast as class war dinosaurs.

The Occupy protesters? We’re told they are naive rebels without a clue. But the Qantas lock-out proves otherwise.

Along with lots of guff about how Labor’s “Fair Work” laws “swung the balance too far” in workers’ favour, the corporate elite have been falling over themselves to sympathise with poor Qantas CEO Alan Joyce who, with a $2 million pay rise in his back pocket, had “no choice” but to lock out his entire workforce.

The pilots had worn special neckties, the engineers imposed work bans, and ground staff struck for just eight hours in eight months. Pretty mild stuff.

If that’s going too far then you get a pretty clear picture of just how much bargaining power these employers think you deserve: zero.

The richest 1% and their puppets in government and the corporate media have never stopped waging the class war, and they’ve mostly been winning. It’s not just Australia’s increasingly unequal income distribution that bears this out, but the laws that have made it possible.

Former Coalition prime minister John Howard began his reign with the 1996 Workplace Relations Act. When workers protested outside Parliament House, Labor politicians huffed and puffed. But just like the GST, Labor now supports it. If you ask why, you’ll get some bullshit answer about how it’s all too hard to “unscramble the egg”.

After being elected on the back of the Your Rights at Work campaign, Labor left most of Howard’s Work Choices industrial laws in place. Labor has never repealed all of a previous conservative government’s attacks on workers rights. We’re always going three steps back, one step forward and three steps back again.

Most frustrating is how most of the union officialdom go along with this dance, promoting blind loyalty to Labor because the Liberals are worse — as if the members are too stupid to be told the truth.

After Kevin Rudd was elected in late 2007, they put the Your Rights at Work campaign into mothballs, just when it should have gone up a notch.

When pressed, union leaders agreed that Labor hadn’t delivered. Just wait until their second term to get the rest of what we were owed, they said. We’re still waiting.

The employers are using the current disputes at Qantas, on the waterfront and elsewhere to bang on about their desire to scrap the few improvements delivered by the Fair Work laws, and to convince Tony Abbott to confront his Work Choices bogeyman. The bosses are not afraid to unscramble eggs.

But consider how difficult it is for workers to legally strike, how many hoops they and their unions have to jump through. In contrast, an employer can take the most drastic form of industrial action without any penalty at all.

We have to remind Australians that without the ability to withdraw their labour they have no bargaining power at all. The right to strike is an inalienable human right, like free speech or freedom of religion. No law can change or modify that fact.

Time too to ask some questions about the place of Qantas in our economic and social life. It was only in 1993 that the Keating Labor government sold it off. If the grounding of its fleet represents such a threat to our so-called national interest, shouldn’t it be returned to public ownership? Shouldn’t it function as a public service for the public good?

If you suggest this, then the pro-corporate politicians and media will look at you like you just stepped off a spaceship. It’s one of those sacred eggs you can’t unscramble.

Interestingly though, an October 24 Essential Media Communications survey said 43% of Australians supported the government taking Qantas back into public hands. Just 34% opposed the idea.

How can we have a meaningful democracy when the decisions made in key sectors of the economy that profoundly shape our lives, society and environment are made not in the parliament but the unelected boardrooms?

Sectors of the economy like banking, transport, mining and telecommunications are not a festival of free enterprise, they are highly monopolised. If they are not brought under public ownership we will never be able to harness the human and material resources capable of halting the ecological and social crises besetting planet earth.

[Socialist Alliance member of the Fremantle Council, Sam Wainwright wrote this comment piece for Green Left Weekly #902. See also: Workplace laws gave Qantas what it wanted.]

Don't agonise, organise

2011-11-07T10:56:00.000+08:00

[This talk by Peter Boyle was presented to a workshop by Socialist Alliance at Occupy Perth camp in Forrest Place on October 30, 2011.]

This quote that has become a bumper sticker, a popular slogan in the feminist movement, the title of many a speech, conference and newsletter is credited to the Afro-American woman civil rights activist Florence Rae Kennedy. She was quoted by Gloria Steinem in Ms magazine in 1973 and since then this powerful slogan has circumnavigated the world many times and being used by many, many activists and movements.

And why do you think this has happened?

It is because this is a slogan that reasonates very strongly with the condition of the oppressed, exploited and persecuted.

On one hand, we are weighed down with the pain of the suffering and indignities inflicted as a matter of everyday business by powerful oppressors. On the other, we are challenged as to what we do in response.

The answer for Kennedy was a single word: “Organise.”

But in reality, for many people it is not that simple a choice. Agonising, the much easier option, is always a big temptation.

Agonising can take many forms. One can just whinge and do nothing. And one can rationalise it with the argument that nothing we can do can make a difference. Nothing is going to change, whatever we do, etc.

Now one can do this rationalising in a simple way like this or dress it up as a fancy theory of some sort. It could be a theory that rejects organisation on principle or it could be a theory that says that “now is not the right time” to organise, that we have to wait till the situation develops further.

But in the end it comes to the same effective conclusion: Don't get organised now. Just keep doing what you can as an individual.

Or there is a variation on this. Organise but only organise as movements around particular issues like workers' wages and conditions, climate change, racism, sexism, homophobia or war. Don't organise to change the system, to break the tyranny of the rich and powerful. Don't organise to build a new system based on sharing and sustainable practices, call it “socialism” or whatever you want.

Experienced activists have always recognised that there is a deep connection between organising the movements around particular issues and organising for fundamental social change. If an organisation purportedly for the second broader objective is not fully enmeshed in the struggles, movements and organisations for specific changes (or “reforms” as they are sometimes called) then it ceases to be what it claims to be and degenerates into a political sect. A political sect invents and obsesses on theoretical differences that justify taking a course that works against building the movements for specific changes.

On the other hand, experienced activists also know that movements around particular issues rise and subside. Sometimes they subside after a victory, if only partial. Sometimes it subsides after a defeat. In both phases, the critical value of organisations and institutions that continue to accumulate and develop activists, that keeps alive the accumulated lessons of the various struggles and seeks to generalise those lessons. Less would survive from each struggle, and new struggles would find it harder and take longer to start up without experienced activists. On a personal level, it takes organisation to keep morale in the phase when a movement subsides.

Human beings have produced many elaborate justifications for many things, but inventing a justification for inaction – for not organising – is a common phenomenon. It's possible to lend such a justification ostensibly “Marxist” flavouring because Marx and Engels – and others who followed in the tradition of modern socialist thought that they initiated – said that no system can be superseded until the existing system has exhausted all its avenues for social progress.

Until such time, system change from capitalism or socialism will remain just a wish, a hope, a dream.

So one argument is that we haven't got to that stage yet under capitalism. Revolution is just an idea, a dream.

But no sooner have I said this than it becomes clear than this is definitely untrue. We live in an age of revolution. What has been sweeping the Arab world this year? Revolutions driven by millions of people who have taken to the streets – often putting their lives on the line.

And this is not the first time. There was another wave of revolutions that preceded this at the beginning of this century in Latin America, revolutions that ridiculed the capitalist triumphalism of the 1990s. And before that there was the wave of revolutions that ended the 1970s. Before that there was the 1968 revolutions. And we can go back all the way to 1917.

Indeed the history of the last 100 years of capitalism has been a history of wars and revolution. How can we look back on this and say that we do not live in an age of revolution?

But you don't have to know your history to work out where capitalism has got us to today. You just need to think about the consequences of living in a world where the richest 1% already owns 43% of the world’s wealth but effectively control almost all the wealth and with this wealth they have bought and corrupted governments and enslaved billions of people. Permanent war has been inflicted on numerous nations and economic misery on many more.

At the heart of this exciting “Occupy” movement is a broad realisation that the world is being unbearably distorted, and risks being destroyed, because our societies are being twisted to make the world’s richest 1% even richer.

No moral or environmental boundaries are respected by this 1%.

Half of the world’s population is forced to try and survive by sharing 1% of the world’s wealth!

So what are we, the 99%, doing about it? Are we just going to sit back and let our common future be ruined?

Imagine you were observing a children's playground with ten children in it. One child was given four out of ten toys available and half the children were forced to share one toy.

All bloody hell would break loose wouldn't it?

So look at the world today within its ridiculous imbalance of wealth and power, of the constant wars and recurring revolutionary upheavals and ask yourself if we live in revolutionary times?

There is a variation of the argument, that says that while the world in a state of revolution, we in Australia happen to live in a rich global suburb, a rich, “gated” global suburb. Just any of those folk from the poor part of the world try and get in and we'll lock them up indefinitely or deport them. Adults and children alike sentenced to indefinite jail without trial. That's a “gated” suburb!

Together with these physical barriers there is the racism that justifies the privileged conditions of the few who are allowed inside. This serves to discourage these people from solidarising with the rest of the exploited and oppressed outside the barriers and to encourage them to think they have more common interest with the richest 1%.

So do the special conditions within these few gated wealthy neighbourhoods in the global village mean that the time is not yet ripe to organise around the objective of revolutionary change?

However, we live in an increasingly globalised world. In fact, the richest 1% accelerated the process of globalisation (in a distorted capitalist way) to help get itself out of the last major global economic crisis capitalism brought upon itself in the mid-1970s.

The plan was simple, use the threat of global labour competition to force working people all around the world to work harder, live with more insecurity and to sacrifice hard-won rights and public services. And to a degree they succeeded but only to bring another even bigger profit greed-driven global crisis.

Since the global “Occupy” movement has spread to 2,220 cities (at last count) some of the politicians of the richest 1% now want to assure us that this is not a global problem. It's just a US problem, said Labor Minister for Social Inclusion (what a joke) Tanya Plibersek on the Q & A program last Monday. Everyone one is happy here on Australia.

But people are not fools. The 1% can't have it both ways all the time. They can't convince Qantas workers that it is fine for their CEO to give himself a 71% pay rise (to a total remuneration of $5.1 million) while deny baggage handlers and other workers basic cost of living adjustments in their much more modest pay packets, threatening them with outsourcing more jobs to countries with lower wages and poorer working conditions.

The deeply political global discussion about the 1% and the 99% is smashing all the justifications the 1% and their political agents for decades of crimes against the 99%. How laughable is their argument that this is a movement with no clear message!

When thousands of people even in the richest countries in the world are now organising occupations around this message, it really makes no sense to argue that there is no need to organise around the objective of system change.

* * *

I first became a political activist in this city, Perth, in 1971 (though I would hardly call it a “city” then – it was more like a big country town with all the narrow provincial culture that comes with it).

But even then provincial Perth was touched by radicalisation of youth that was sweeping much of the world at the time. People took to the streets in their thousands against the war on Vietnam, even as the local police and politicians insisted that it was a crime to march on the streets. They also warned about dangerous “Eastern states activists” bring trouble over to the peaceful West. (I noticed an echo of this in some of the local newspaper coverage of the Occupy Perth/CHOGM protests last week.)

Anyway I was a student in what was then called Leederville Technical College. As a fresh-off-the-boat migrant from Asia, I was trying to get my matriculation so I could go to Uni. One day, a group of banner-carrying, long-haired activists swept up to the Tech and urged them to join in an anti-war march. I took up their offer and have been a political activist since.

The following year I started studying at the University of WA. The first day I turned up, Orientation Day, I saw an dramatic example of the wave of radicalism that was still sweeping campuses. The Army Reserve had tried to bring a van onto campus but it was quickly surrounded by hundreds of angry students, some of whom deflated the tires on the van. The Reservists were forced to beat a hasty retreat – leaving their deflated van behind.

Later that year there was a mass gathering on the lawn in front of the library to witness the burning of draft notices (notices sent to youth randomly selected to be conscripted to boost the Australian armed forces which were then in Vietnam, alongside US and other allies fighting the Vietnamese liberation forces). Thousands of us students were gathered, waiting expectantly for the students who were to burn their draft cards to show up. On the periphery of the crowd were some students with “walkie-talkies” – ready to warn of the approach of the police. Suddenly with a roar a couple of motorbikes drove on to the lawn and red-shorted lads hopped off the pillions, burned their draft cards, punched the air with their fists and were then off again on the roaring bikes.

Later that year, the Whitlam Labor government was elected, Australian troops were withdrawn from Vietnam and tertiary education was made free. A year later, the campuses in WA quietened down rapidly. Political meetings and rallies became smaller and less regular. Some once-were radicals traded their their red-shirts for suits, opting to pursue careers in the Labor Party and other grubby professions.

The number of activists consistently trying to organise on that campus shrunk to a handful, a couple of whom I am glad to say have survived as activists until today.

Until then I was an activist who had not joined any left political party (except the Labor Party briefly). Most of my fellow activists on UWA were the same. There was was no serious organising by left groups that we saw. The CPA had a branch here but we never saw much evidence of activity from it.

I only got to meet the “organised left” in Australia when I visited Melbourne in August 1973 to attend a student conference. It was an eye-opening visit for me. First, the scale of the protests was much bigger and the stronger and more militant labour movement much more in evidence. And then there was the smorgasbord of far left groups: from Maoists (then with clearly the most young, mainly student, members) to the Trotskyists. Even the CPA was more noticeable and there was also the Labor Left. The groups were in their full, competitive glory at the conferences of the Australian Union of Students. This competition sometimes involved fisticuffs (especially from the Maoists).

My own experience as an individual activist had taught me the dire need for organisation. So I was looking for a left party to join. I had read some Marxism on my own and got the general idea of modern socialism but I wanted to organise seriously with others who shared the socialist objective. But how to choose from the range of socialist parties?

I'll confess that the fine theoretical differences – or differences on historical interpretation – between the various left groups, who shared basically the same socialist theory was not what convinced me. What I was looking for was the group that was most seriously organising. And the organisation I decided to join was the one that I thought was both the most engaged in building the movements, the most organised in doing this and in getting out socialist ideas and the message of struggle.

That was what I was looking for. That was what I had worked out, through the experience of individual activism was needed.

I had figured out the following three things, which I want to look at in the context of the discussions about organisation that are taking place in the “Occupy” movement:

1. Collective action is stronger than individual action. That wasn't hard to figure out and a couple of months sharing infantile fantasies with a couple of anarchist friends about what we could do to hurt ruling class, soon confirmed this. I won't tell you all the sorry details of this but let's say there were some similarities with certain charges against a Perth man in relation to wrecking the “duco” of a few luxury cars...

But what about losing my individual freedom to the collectivity of the party? Was that a problem? Not if the collective action was to further agreed aims and was decided democratically, following a free debate.

Indeed, any study of how the richest 1% manage to enslave the 99% reveals two important things: First, that a prerequesite to getting the 99% to be the wage slaves of the 1% is the systematic dispossession of the 99% of the means to make a living independent of the capitalists. Second, that all means had to be used to keep the 99% as divided as possible because independent collective political action by the 99% would be fatal to the rule of the 1%, especially when everything produced and every service provided had to be done with the labour of that same 99%.

Collective political action is the key to the 99% turning their immense potential power into actual power that can end the tyranny of the 1%.

2. We need serious organisation to get things done. A slapdash struggle against the 1% with its paid professional enforcers, con-merchants and divide-and-rule experts cannot succeed. When the rising capitalist class in Europe challenged the old feudal ruling class, it already had come to own much of the resources and assets. But today the 1% have the greatest share of society's wealth a ruling elite has every had in human history. The 1% have their money but our strength is in our numbers, our unity and our organisation.

This is obvious and the movement learns this through painful experience. To organise seriously we need serious commitment, including commitment to acting effectively, efficiently, democratically, inclusively. We need commitment to raising serious fighting funds for the struggle. We need commitment to sharing the skills needed for effective collective activism. And we need to learn from our collective experience by constantly accumulating and keeping alive the traditions and history of collective struggle.

3. In political organisation the only alternative to elected leadership is unelected leadership. This is something the “Occupy” movement has yet to get clear about. There is a lot of talk about a “leaderless” movement. And I won't mince my words. This is a delusion and a dangerous delusion.

The first time in modern history that the working people took political power in their own right – for just three months in 1871 in the Paris Commune – they figured out this much that all leadership had to be democratically elected, collective, recallable and accountable. And, further that real democracy could not be just representative but had also to be participatory (direct democracy).

If you don't have democratically elected, collective, recallable and accountable leadership then you have de facto unelected, non-collective, unrecallable and unaccountable leaderships (or more likely misleaderships) emerging and operating. We have seen some of this already in this new movement and I am confident the movement will soon wise up on this score.

It is not hard to understand the deep suspicion of leaders when we have come through a period of massive betrayals of working people around the world by the leaderships of trade unions and supposedly working class parties. Indeed, the widespread loss anger against the 1% is enmeshed with an anger at “leaderships” that purported to represent the interests of the 99% but who have done the dirty work for the 1%.

While we can see where the suspicion of “leaders” is coming from our only protection from the betrayal of such misleaders is to organise to entrench democratic selection, accountability, right of recall and build institutions of participatory democracy. If we don't do this, then the movement of the 99% will be more vulnerable to the sort of leadership betrayals that working people's movements have experienced around the world over the last century.

* * *

When a new movement of the oppressed and exploited arises it is always conditioned by the specific mass experiences that forced it into existence. Experienced activists should seek to understand the roots of the movement and be sensitive to its specific characteristics.

This “Occupy” movement today, like the “21st Century socialism” mass movement in Latin America is very much shaped by the betrayals of the working class movement in the 20th century. The emphasis is on building a thoroughly democratic movement. New technologies and broader access to education in many countries are powerful assets for these new movements. We need to recognise this and make full use of these assets.

In addition, the new movements determination to be thoroughly democratic will mean that it will go through a process of working out exactly what democratic forms are best. There will be long discussions and the role of experienced activists should be dive into these discussions and patiently explain the lessons of past experience while listening to and welcoming all new ideas that help the movement organise democratically and effectively. They will be prepared to test things out, to allow the process of trial and error at times, to allow the movement to develop on the basis of its own collective experiences.

Our objective as socialists is the total democratisation of society – not just the bourgeois democracy that leaves most of the major social and economic decisions to the boards of directors of the richest 1%. Our objective is the end to the tyranny of super-rich minority and its replacement by true people's power that can begin the big task of refashioning the world on the basis of democracy, justice and ecological sustainability.

Fremantle Road to Rail campaign forum

2011-11-03T10:26:00.000+08:00

From the Wheatbelt to the Port: Rail is the Way! Trucks: No Way!

The wheat harvest has begun. About 12 million tonnes will be transported. Transport Minister Troy Buswell has been playing games with promises to keep rail lines open. Pushing grain from rail to truck will choke country and metro roads.

PUBLIC MEETING
Fremantle Council Chamber, (entrance via rear steps Town Hall)

Thursday November 10, 6:30 pm

Chair:
Brad Pettitt – Mayor of Fremantle

Speakers:
Jane Fuchsbichler – Wheatbelt Railway Retention Alliance
Sam Wainwright – Fremantle Councillor
Barry Healy – Fremantle Road to Rail Campaign

Organised by Fremantle Road to Rail campaign.

Why should Fremantle care about grain on rail?

The Wheatbelt Railway Retention Alliance (WRRA) has an important story to tell, and Fremantle residents deserve to hear it.

On July 1 three regional grain lines (known as tier 3 lines) were closed.

On September 1 Minister Troy Buswell announced a possible one year extension to these three Tier 3 lines, but money needed to make this promise reality has failed to appear in time for work to be completed for the commencement of harvest.

Shifting millions of tonnes of grain by truck will make regional WA roads dangerous and it will funnel more truck movements through the metro area.

Up to ninety-eight per cent of the harvest in the Kwinana zone is currently rail freighted to port.

The sheer scale of what Troy Buswell intends is of serious concern: tens of thousands of road train movements destroying roads and communities, creating diesel particulate pollution.

The Wheatbelt’s situation is similar to Fremantle’s, the overwhelming majority of people want the obvious solution to the freight task: rail.

Fremantle residents can be proud of the role our Council is playing by joining the WRRA.

Fremantle people can join our regional counterparts to stop the government’s view that trucks are the only freight solution.

The real answer is to move as much freight as possible onto rail.

Occupy Perth rally Saturday 5 November

2011-11-01T12:49:00.001+08:00

The remaining occupiers at #OccupyPerth in Forrest Place were evicted by Perth City Council last night (Monday 31 October). Strictly speaking, police came to enforce a council order that all equipment including gazebo, sleeping bags and mats, etc be removed from the occupation site or it would be seized by police. Some people decided to stay the night regardless.

Tonight there will be a general assembly to discuss the next steps in this campaign including the Occupy Perth rally on Saturday.

The #Occupy movement is important for engendering hope and some initial steps to bring an end to corporate rule. That's why it would be good to see as many as possible at tonight's (Tuesday 1 Nov) general assembly and the rally on Saturday.

Rally details:
1pm, Sat 5 November
Occupy Perth site @ Forrest Place, Perth city.

Publicity material can be downloaded from here.

Lessons of the Occupy Movement: Wed 2 Nov

2011-10-31T17:39:00.000+08:00

Lessons of the #Occupy Movement

With Peter Boyle,
National Convenor of Socialist Alliance

Wed 2 Nov

6:30pm, Perth Activist Centre
15/5 Aberdeen St, Perth
next to McIver Station
Ph 9218 9608, 0413976 638

Socialist Alliance and Resistance meeting

>Tahrir > Wall Street > Here - Another World is Possible

2011-10-27T14:43:00.000+08:00

Starting from the important developments in the "Arab Spring" and the #OccupyWall Street movement which is spreading around the world, this seminar will discuss how activists today can best work to bring about a better world.

Guest speaker:
Peter Boyle (national convenor, Socialist Alliance)

1pm Sunday 30 October

Venue: Perth Activist Centre (15/5 Aberdeen St, Perth - next to McIver station) or the Perth Occupation (Forrest Place)

Ph 0413 976 638 or 0415 922 740 for details.

Protest outside the chogm business forum

2011-10-26T17:20:00.002+08:00

On the 25 October, Julia Gillard along with the head of Woodside addressed the Gala ball at the chogm business forum. A forum that is a meeting of the 1% which is basically figuring out ways to exploit poor people more so the rich get richer.

Socialist Alliance and Resistance members were amongst Chogm action network and occupy perth activists protesting outside it.

CHOGM week protest calendar

2011-10-24T07:21:00.001+08:00

6pm, Mon 24 October
Preparation meeting for rally marshals
Venue: Perth Activist Centre, 15/5 Aberdeen St, Perth.

6pm, Tues 25 October
Protest the opening of the Commonwealth Business Forum
Gather: near roundabout, Bolton Ave, Burswood Convention Centre. Organised by Chogm Action Network

6pm, Wed 26 October
Socialist Alliance and Resistance meeting
Venue: Perth Activist Centre, 15/5 Aberdeen St, Perth (next to McIver station).

6pm, Thurs 27 October
Meet and greet anti-uranium walkers
BBQ dinner, music, public meeting. Share experiences from 10-week, 1250km walk from Wiluna to Perth. Stay over night if you wish (bring your own sleeping equipment).
Venue: City Farm, 1 City Farm Place, East Perth. More info

6:30pm, Thurs 27 October
Final Chogm Action Network planning meeting
Venue: Perth Activist Centre, 15/5 Aberdeen St, Perth.

7pm, Thurs 27 October
Bersih 2.0 Solidarity Night
With Dr Wong Chin Huat
Venue: Willeton Sports Club, The Blue Room, 58 Burrendah Boulevard, Willeton.

8:30am, Fri 28 October
Final leg of the anti-uranium walk
Join the walkers for the last leg of their 10-week walk from City Farm, City Farm
Place, Perth into Forrest Place, Murray Street Perth for the Chogm Protest

10am, Friday 28 October
Main Chogm Protest
For justice and climate action NOT racism and war
March to the Perth Convention Centre.
Venue: Forrest Place, Perth city. Organised by Chogm Action Network.
Followed by People's Occupation

5pm, Fri 28 October
Reclaim the Night - in an empire of violence, women strike back
March, speakers, band.
Venue: Perth Cultural Centre. More info and poster here.

8pm, Fri 28 October
God Save The Queen – unofficial CHOGM 2011 welcome party!
Venue: The Den (Civic Hotel), Inglewood. More info here.

11am, Sat 29 October
Reading of Open Letter to Commonwealth on Climate Change
Venue: Wedlands Stage, Perth Cultural Centre. Organised by Oxfam and AYCC. More info here

2pm, Sat 29 October
End Mandatory Detention protest
Venue: Perth Immigration Detention Centre, Baker Rd, Domestic Airport. Organised by Refugee Rights Action Network.

1pm Sun 30 October
From Tahrir to Wall Street to here - Another world is possible
Socialist Alliance and Resistance seminar featuring SA national secretary Peter Boyle.
Venue: Perth Activist Centre, 15/5 Aberdeen St, Perth (next to McIver station) OR at the People's Occupation.

Socialist Alliance condemns violent police attacks on Melbourne and Sydney occupations

2011-10-23T10:29:00.000+08:00

[This statement was released by Socialist Alliance on October 23, 2011.]

Socialist Alliance condemns the violent police dispersal of peaceful protesters at Occupy Melbourne (October 21) and Occupy Sydney (dawn, October 23) and pledges its full support for the re-establishment of these occupations against the tyranny of the world's richest 1%.

The experience around the world has been whenever one of these Occupy movement camps has been attacked, even more people have rallied to support them in response. We are confident the same will happen here.

We call on all people who share the Occupy movement's rejection of the gross injustices and global ecological vandalism being carried out around the world to make the richest 1% even richer to join the occupations and lend all possible solidarity and assistance to their re-establishment.

Occupy Melbourne and Occupy Sydney will be back stronger because the 1% and their enforcers cannot arrest the truth. They cannot handcuff ideas. They cannot beat the people's spirit of resistance or throw it into a paddy wagon.

We call on all progressive trade unionists, community leaders, church leaders, state and federal MPs, local councillors and mayors, to publicly condemn the violent attacks on Occupy Sydney and Occupy Melbourne.

We urge anyone who supports the re-establishment of the Melbourne and Sydney occupations to attend the emergency general assemblies of Occupy Sydney at University of Technology Sydney on Sunday October 23, 5pm and Occupy Melbourne at the State Library Tuesday October 25, 6pm.

Socialist Alliance supports the #OccupyPerth call for a rally, march then people's occupation on Friday October 28, 10am at Forrest Place, Perth.

Socialist Alliance also supports the October 29 global day of action widely endorsed by the Occupy movement in support of a "Robin Hood" tax on global financial transactions.

For further comment: Peter Boyle (national convenor) 0401 760 577

Speeches from the Public Forum on the Wall Street Occupation

2011-10-21T10:46:00.003+08:00

This is a recording of a Skype interview with US Socialist Doug Singsen about Occupy Wall Street. Singsen is a member of the International Socialist Organisation in New York.

Kamala Emanuel from Socialist Alliance, Is this the beginning of the end of corporate rule?

These talks were presented to the Socialist Alliance and Resistance forum in Perth on October 19.

Public forum on the Wall Street Occupation

2011-10-17T17:50:00.001+08:00

Is this the beginning of the end of Corporate Rule?

"We are the 99%!"

This is the cry of the Wall Street Occupiers who have sparked an important worldwide movement in opposition to the corporate rulers.

This forum will discuss the dynamics of the movement, how we can give solidarity, and more importantly, what next steps we can take here to end political rule by the corporate rich.

Wed 19 October
6 for 6:30pm, Perth Activist Centre,
15/5 Aberdeen St, Perth (next to McIver station)

Speakers
Wall Street Occupier - via Skype (tbc)
Karun Cowper - Occupy Perth
Kamala Emanuel - Socialist Alliance

Ph 9218 9608, 0413 976 638.

Attend on Facebook here.

Hosted by Socialist Alliance and Resistance.

Videos from #OccupyPerth action Sat 15 October

2011-10-17T10:45:00.000+08:00

Proposal to set up ongoing Occupation after Chogm Protest (4 mins)

People's Microphone at Occupy Perth action, 15 Oct 2011 (24 mins)

Milling before the event

More October 15 happenings

Occupy Perth - supporting Occupy Chogm (30 secs)

Occupy Perth - Agent Orange (3 mins)

Occupy Perth action: Sat 15 October

2011-10-13T13:17:00.000+08:00

This coming Saturday, there will be a first "Occupy Perth" action:

Inspired by the dramatic Wall Street Occupation, a number of people have begun a movement to #OccupyPerth. The idea behind this movement is that government is being run for and by the top 1% of the population and the rest of us – the 99% – need to meet and organise if we are to change things.

The first action in Perth in support of this movement will be on:
Saturday 15 October
1pm, Forrest Place/Murray St mall

Attend on Facebook

This day will be part of an international day of action in solidarity with the Wall Street Occupation with over 1300 meet-ups around the world!

Become a solidarity subscriber to Green Left today

2011-10-13T10:50:00.002+08:00

Help spread the word!

By Chris Williams, Green Left Weekly

Green Left Weekly faces a constant financial struggle to stay afloat. We can't afford to take it for granted. It's become more than just a newspaper; it’s an important part of a movement for social change as can be seen from its efforts to promote the OCCUPY Wall Street movement against corporate greed that is currently sweeping the rich countries.

Green Left Weekly not only provides information and analysis, it actively builds campaigns for social justice, human rights and the environment. It reaches beyond our borders to an international audience too – particularly our website. In today's Murdocracy of media monopoly, Green Left Weekly is a refreshing beacon of journalistic integrity.

We do all this, and have become the best and most widely circulated alternative paper in Australia without any large financial backers. For 20 years Green Left Weekly has survived by relying on contributions from our subscribers and supporters. The struggle to stay afloat is well worth it!

To help us maintain our independence from the billionaires and media moguls, and to continue to provide a progressive alternative to the mainstream media, we need to encourage more people to subscribe at the solidarity rate of $240 a year. Subscriptions – particularly solidarity subscriptions – toGreen Left Weekly are our most reliable source of income. Subscribers are the back bone of our financial viability. Today we have around 200 solidarity subscribers. Pushing this up to 250 would be a huge boost to the stability of our national budget. It would mean we could more confidently make political projections, knowing we have the resources to carry them out.

If you don't already, please consider taking out a solidarity subscription today (or when you next renew your subscription). Click here for a solidarity subscription form.

If you are already a solidarity subscriber, try to convince others to take up the option with the knowledge that they too will be playing a crucial role in helping to keep Green Left Weekly rolling off the press!

Farooq Tariq on links between India and Pakistan

2011-10-09T10:14:00.002+08:00

This video is from the Q&A after Farooq Tariq's talk in Perth on 5 October 2011. He was asked about the links between Pakistan and India. He also talked about the daily "hate ceremony" on each side of the border.

Farooq is the secretary of the Labour Party Pakistan. His Perth forum was hosted by Socialist Alliance and Resistance.

Pakistan, the Commonwealth & the war on terror

2011-10-03T11:32:00.000+08:00

Leading Pakistan socialist Farooq Tariq will be speaking in Perth on Wednesday 5 October.

Wed 5 October
6 for 6:30pm
Perth Activist Centre, 15 / 5 Aberdeen St, Perth (next to McIver station)

Farooq is a spokesperson and central leader of Labour Party Pakistan - the leading socialist party in Pakistan.

Political developments in Pakistan are of interest because it has become a major, if largely covert, theatre in the "war on terror" being pursued today by Barak Obama and Julia Gillard. Recent flooding in Pakistan - the worst in Pakistan's history - reveals the importance of climate change as a current issue as well. (See here for more on the LPP's role in this campaign.)

Pakistan is also a member of the Commonwealth which should make this forum especially interesting in the lead up to next month's CHOGM summit and protest.

This forum is hosted by Socialist Alliance and Resistance. Ph 9218 9608, 0413 976 638.

Live streaming of Climate Change Social Change conference

2011-10-01T09:10:00.002+08:00

I thought it would be worth mentioning that it has become possible to organise live streaming of some of the feature sessions from the Climate Change Social Change conference that is happening now.

Live streaming can be access here.

The agenda for the conference (in Melbourne time - that is 2 hours ahead today and 3 hours ahead from tomorrow when daylight saving comes in) can be found here.

Please note, there have been some technical problems that are being resolved. Some conference sessions that have already happened can be viewed at the above site also.

UPDATE: Photos from the conference

Miko Peled the General's Son: Thurs 29 Sept

2011-09-27T23:23:00.000+08:00

Why the son of an Israeli general is speaking out for Palestine

A public forum with MIKO PELED

Miko Peled is an Israeli peace activist and writer living in the US. Born and raised in Jerusalem, his grandfather was an original signatory on the Israeli Declaration of Independence. His father was an Israeli soldier in 1948 and a general during the 1967 war. In 1997 his niece was the victim of a suicide bombing.

In this forum he explains why he is speaking out against Israel’s Apartheid policies and for justice for Palestine.

Thurs 29 September
6 for 6:30pm
Alexander Lecture Theatre, (ALEX 106:157) – Ground Floor (Arts Building) UWA

Organised by Friends of Palestine * www.fopwa.org * 0449 028 894

Fremantle herald reports on students campaigning to get serco off murdoch campus

2011-09-23T13:37:00.003+08:00

The Fremantle Herald has reported on the camping at Murdoch university to get Serco off campus. Serco has recently signed a lease agreement to have offices on campus. Most likely it is part of their privatisation of Fiona Stanley hospital, which is next to Murdoch university.

The Fremantle Herald reported:

"Zeb Parkes from the left-wing Resistance group can't believe the university has allowed a company that "[makes] money out of destroying people's lives" to have a presence on campus"

and

"Fremantle councillor Sam Wainwright - A high profile member of the Socialist Alliance - noted serco's engagement to manage Fiona Stanley coincided with the Barnett's governments decision to axe social service funding by 300 million this year

"Consequently the privatisation of ancillary services at Fiona Stanley hospital is just the first sage of the state governments plans to cut cut costs and wiggle out of it's obligations to provide vital community services" he said.

"it's a massive exercise in cost shifting as they try to shift these services across to local governments, charities and families."

The full article can be read on page 16 of the Fremantle Herald here

On thursday the 22nd of September the Resistance club on campus hosted a forum on the crimes of Serco.

About 15 people turned up. Even with the Murdoch management having posters adverting the forum and protesting against serco ripped down within a couple of hours of them going up.

Colin Penter from serco watch gave a detailed talk many reasons why we need to fight against serco privatising public services, especially those which are for some of the most vulnerable people in society.

Sam Wainwright from Socialist Alliance talked about the dangers of privatising public services and how this is another step in the assault on the working class.

Students at Murdoch University will continue the campaign to get serco off campus.

Crimes of Serco: Murdoch Resistance Club Forum

2011-09-21T15:19:00.002+08:00

Murdoch university has recently leased an office to the huge corporation SERCO, a company that runs all Australian Immigration Detention Centres. It is also the largest owner of privatised prisons and juvenile detention centres across the UK. Come and here about why we should not allow SERCO on campus.

Time: 12:30pm Thursday 22nd september

Venue: room ss 1.035 (a few doors down from uni credit)

Guest Speakers:

Colin Penter - member of SERCO watch and researcher of the role of private corporations who will be speaking about the many malpractices of SERCO.

Sam Wainwright - Fremantle Councillor on the consequences of privatising essential services

Perth rally against Israeli Apartheid

2011-09-20T17:51:00.000+08:00

Around 80 people marched through the streets of Perth to protest against Israeli Apartheid on September 17. The protest was organised by Friends of Palestine WA and targeted businesses in the CBD area that have links with Apartheid Israel or who profit from the illegal occupation of Israel.

Businesses targeted included Veolia, The Body Shop and Caterpillar. Veolia is building a light rail project to service illegal settlements in the occupied West Bank and whose subsidiary runs some bus services in Perth. The Body Shop is owned by L'Oreal which has deep and extensive business links with Israel. Caterpillar produces military bulldozers specifically designed to be used in war zones and which have killed people defending Palestinian houses from demolition. Several shops in the CBD sell Caterpillar branded merchandise.

The rally attracted a counter-protest of supporters of Apartheid Israel which demonstrates that the international BDS (boycott, divestment and sanctions) campaign is having major impact. The rally called for an end to the illegal occupation of Palestine and for Israel to comply with international law.

Photo above by Jason Murphy above and by Zeb Parkes below.

Rooftop Protest in Solidarity with Refugees

2011-09-13T19:13:00.002+08:00

Five activists from the refugee rights action network staged a rooftop protest in solidarity with refugees protests in detention centre, whilst others protested on the lawn.

The action was demanding an end to Mandatory detention and for Australia to process all refugees in Australia.

Socialist Alliance and Resistance members were a part of the protest.

Boycott Apartheid Israel rally

2011-09-12T12:38:00.000+08:00

Friends of Palestine WA has called a major rally to support the international BDS (boycott, divestment & sanctions) campaign against Apartheid Israel. As the Victorian government is pushing a major crackdown on Palestine rights activists in Melbourne, it is important that we have a maximum showing here in Perth.

BOYCOTT APARTHEID ISRAEL

Date: Sat 17 September

Time: 1pm

Place: Murray Street Mall (Perth City)

What is BDS?
In 2005, Palestinian civil society issued a call for a campaign of boycotts, divestment and sanctions (BDS) against Israel until it complies with international law and Palestinian human rights.

Why “Apartheid”?
Israel’s regime over the Palestinian people amounts to apartheid because it displays many of the main features of the crime (including racial discrimination) as defined by international law.

Join us
Help expose some of the companies in Perth that profit from or support Israel’s violent, military occupation of Palestine.

Please come along and bring your friends. Publicity material can be downloaded below.

Attend on Facebook:
www.facebook.com/event.php?eid=231270066909625

DOWNLOAD: A4 Poster Colour (PDF)

DOWNLOAD: A4 Poster B&W (PDF)

DOWNLOAD: A5 Flyers Colour (PDF)

DOWNLOAD: A5 Flyers B&W (PDF)

Also forthcoming:

Why the son of an Israeli general is speaking out for Palestine

A public forum with MIKO PELED

Miko Peled is an Israeli peace activist and writer living in the US. Born and raised in Jerusalem, his grandfather was an original signatory on the Israeli Declaration of Independence. His father was an Israeli soldier in 1948 and a general during the 1967 war. In 1997 his niece was the victim of a suicide bombing.

In this forum he explains why he is speaking out against Israel’s Apartheid policies and for justice for Palestine.

Thurs 29 September
6 for 6:30pm
Alexander Lecture Theatre,(ALEX 106:157) – Ground Floor (Arts Building) UWA

Organised by Friends of Palestine * www.fopwa.org * 0449 028 894

Tell Buswell: Wrong Way Go Back

2011-09-12T11:02:00.002+08:00

Say: "WRONG WAY: GO BACK"
to Troy Buswell’s truck plans!

End the Road Building Madness !
Freight on Rail for a Sustainable Future!

Rally Kings Square, Fremantle

Saturday 17 Sept, 1pm

Speakers:
Brad Pettitt - Mayor of Fremantle
Lynn MacLaren – Greens Transport Spokesperson
Sue Ellery – South Metropolitan MLC
Peter Newman – Curtin Uni Sustainability Project
Annolies Truman - Fremantle Road to Rail

Freoroad2rail@gmail.com

Stop Lynas' toxic exports

2011-08-30T15:40:00.001+08:00

STOP LYNAS!

Come and hear community from Malaysia campaigning against Lynas Corporation. Learn about this Australian rare earth mining company’s plan to impose their Lynas Advanced Materials Plant - a toxic and radioactive rare earth processing plant - on their lives and livelihoods.

6pm, Monday 5 September
Ross Memorial Church, William St, Perth
Supported by the Conservation Council WA

6pm, Thursday 8 September
MUA Hall, 2-4 Kwong Alley, North Fremantle

12 noon, Friday 9 September
Outside Lynas Office, Level 1, 7 Tully Road, East Perth

For more information contact Lee Tan:
0417 082 294 stoplynasnow@gmail.com

Join the ‘Save Malaysia! Stop Lynas!’ delegation at their stalls outside Fremantle Markets, Sat 3 and Sun 4 September between 9AM-4PM.

www.stoplynas.org
www.savemalaysia.org
www.badarstoplynas.com

Free the Refugees protest at perth detention centre

2011-08-29T11:15:00.003+08:00

On the 27 of August, 10 years on from Tampa day, refugee activists in Perth, including Socialist Alliance and Resistance members. About 80 people came to the action and chanted azadi, freedom in farsi at the fence. The refugees could hear the chanting and chanted back, even with serco guards pushing them away from windows and the fence whilst police stood between activists and the fence.

The rally was demanding the end of mandatory dentition, the freedom of refugees and stopping the Malaysian "solution".

Here are some photos from the day

Rally for the Cuban Five

2011-08-24T13:01:00.000+08:00

RALLY FOR JUSTICE & FREEDOM

The Australia-Cuba Friendship Society invites you to this rally to mark the 13th anniversary of the imprisonment in the United States of five anti-terrorist fighters from Cuba.

Sunday 11 September
12 noon, Kings Square, Fremantle (cnr Adelaide & William Sts, next to Fremantle Town Hall)

The rally will be demanding:
* that the US releases the Five Cuban heroes incarcerated since 1998 in different US prisons.

We call on your support to fight this unjustice.

We want freedom for the Five and Visitation Rights

We want Justice, bring your placards, flags and have your say.

For more information contact ACFS: acfsperth@gmail.com

Protest against mandatory detention and the Malaysian Solution

2011-08-24T12:20:00.000+08:00

Two actions for refugee rights this week

1 Speakout for refugee rights - Fri 26 Aug
5pm Murray Street Mall

2 Tampa Day rally - Sat 27 August
2pm, Perth Immigration Detention Centre
Baker Rd, Perth Domestic Airport

Over several days in August of 2001 the Tampa incident marked a turning point in how Australia engaged with the refugee issue. John Howard used the SAS to prevent the freighter Tampa from landing asylum seekers on Christmas Island that it had rescued at sea, rescued at Australia's request no less.

Ten years later Australia continues to be the only country practicing mandatory detention of asylum seekers, and continues to violate the Refugee Convention by refusing the right to seek asylum. The Malaysian Solution is that latest disgraceful chapter in a long series of violations of the Refugee Convention, breaches of international law and even Australian domestic law.

Join us to voice our opposition to these policies. Let the refugees in Perth detention centre know that we know what is being done to them is wrong.

Stop Trading in Vulnerable Lives
No Malaysian Solution
End mandatory detention
Free the refugees

Transport available from East Perth Transport Centre, departing 1.30 PM near the footbridge.

Save Beeliar Wetlands rally

2011-08-20T23:05:00.000+08:00

Hundreds of people protested against the extension of the Roe Highway ("the road to nowhere") at a rally called by Save Beeliar Wetlands on August 20, 2011.

Three ways to help save the Kimberley this week

2011-08-16T20:01:00.000+08:00

There are three actions in Perth this week to help save the Kimberley.

1 Wednesday at Woodside (Tomorrow)

New Woodside CEO Peter Coleman will be fronting the media to present the company's half year results on August 17. We will be there too: presenting our own half year report on Woodside's performance on the environment and community relations. Result: FAILED!

Woodside Headquarters, 240 St Georges Tce (cnr Milligan St), Perth. Wed 17 August, 8:30am (tomorrow). Organised by The Wilderness Society.

2 Renewables not Gas: Speakout on Friday

Safe Climate speakout for 100% renewables by 2020 calling for:
* Protect the Kimberley
* Stop Fracking in WA
* Phase out Coal

Murray St Mall, Perth. Friday 19 August, 4:30pm. Organised by Safe Climate Perth (For more info: Zeb 0405 179 113)

3 Bike to Broome: Send off on Sunday

Bike To Broome is a 5-day, around-the-clock, tandem bike ride event from Perth to Broome, to raise awareness and to oppose the building of Woodside Petroleum’s proposed gas processing plant at James Price Point, 40 kilometres north of Broome. Six pairs of riders, riding in shifts, will attempt to reach Broome within five and a half days - covering 2,368 kilometres...So come to the send off.

Murray Street Mall, Perth City. Sunday 21 August, 11am. Organised by the Wilderness Society.

"Raunch culture", porn and women's liberation: a socialist view

2011-08-14T21:19:00.001+08:00

*** Education Seminar from Socialist Alliance and Resistance ***

"Raunch culture", porn & women's liberation: a socialist view

Speakers:
Abigail Bray (co-editor of Big Porn Inc)
Kamala Emanuel (long term feminist activist)

3pm Sat 20 August
Fremantle Council Reception Room
(enter via stairs at rear of Town Hall, High St, Freo)

Attend on Facebook:
http://www.facebook.com/event.php?eid=176436929094713

Ph 9218 9608, 0413 976 638

www.socialist-alliance.org * www.resistance.org.au

Perth rallies for equal marriage rights

2011-08-14T01:11:00.001+08:00

Hundreds of people turned out to the latest rally for marriage equality in Perth on August 13.

The mood was very vibrant and buoyed by the hope that the ALP will change its policy at their national conference in December in Sydney.

This was also the first major rally for which leaflets and stickers for the "Justice and climate action NOT racism and war" CHOGM protest were available. People were putting stickers all over the place during the twice around the block march through Perth streets.

Speakout for Free speech and a free Palestine

2011-08-10T13:05:00.001+08:00

Friends of Palestine WA has called a speakout this Friday to support the BDS (boycott, divestment & sanctions against Apartheid Israel) campaigners who were arrested in dawn raids on August 9 in Melbourne. The speakout will also be taking up threats by the Victorian government to use trade practices law against the BDS movement. This has implications for all progressive campaigners and is a major free speech issue.

The speakout will be in the Murray Street Mall outside the Perth Underground Station from 4:30pm on Friday 12 August.

Join the protest for free speech and a free Palestine.

The speakout will also be promoting the Boycott Apartheid Israel rally in Perth on September 17.

Equal Love Rally - 13 August 2011

2011-08-09T17:54:00.001+08:00

Rally for Equal Marriage Rights

Saturday 13 August

1-3pm, Forrest Place, Perth city

Gay or straight, come to the National Day of Action for Equal Rights
(on the seventh anniversary of the Liberal-Labor marriage ban)

Organised by Equal Love

No more excuses - Equal Marriage Now

Ten countries and nine jurisdictions in the world have recognised marriage equality since 2001. Many other parts of the world recognise civil unions, registration schemes or same-sex marriages performed outside of the respective country.

Australians are ready to follow suit. Seventy-five percent of Australians expect same-sex marriage to be legalised, said a 2011 Galaxy Poll.

The same research said 62% of Australians support marriage equality. That number is as high as 80% among younger people. The poll also said 78% of Australians believe there should be a conscience vote in parliament on the issue.

MORE

Video and photos from Tony Blair protest

2011-08-01T17:15:00.001+08:00

War criminal Tony Blair was met with a spirited protest of forty people on July 29 when he came to speak at Perth at the Convention Centre.

The protest began in driving rain outside the Esplanade train station handing leaflets about the crimes of Tony Blair to commuters. Then protesters moved to the nearby Convention Centre.

Police quickly moved into position and most doorways were locked. Even participants who had paid the exorbitant fees to attend were made to pass through security checks.

Chants on the night included: "Tony Blair, you can't hide, you're supporting genocide"; "Occupation is a crime, from Iraq to Palestine"; and "Tony Blair, you don't care, you're not welcome anywhere".

After the public meeting had begun and the protest was winding up, it was pointed out that a progressive website in Britain was offering substantial cash payments for attempts to make a citizen's arrest of Tony Blair for war crimes.

Activists then decided to inquire about the price of admission to the event in order to make a citizen's arrest. Venue staff opened the door when activists knocked (check the video below) allowing activists to make their inquiries and then chant loudly through the open door when they were refused admission.

After being pushed back by police, the doors opened on two additional occasions allowing the chanting to repeatedly be heard by the audience inside Blair's meeting.

The protest was organised by the Chogm Action Network and the Friends of Palestine WA.

The convention centre will be the location of the Commonwealth Heads of Government Meeting (CHOGM) which will be held in October. The main CHOGM protest will be held on Friday 28 October at 10am and Forrest Place and will march to the summit.

Video and photos below

Guatemala tour 2011 with Ovidio Orellana

2011-08-01T10:53:00.000+08:00

URNG Representative—Ovidio Orellana

The United National Resistance of Guatemala (URNG)/Maiz faces a huge challenge in the upcoming general elections in Guatemala. Forming a broad front (Frente Amplio) of Left forces, Guatemala follows the path of other successful movements in Latin America for a Peoples Unity Government.

Featuring the film:
When the Mountains Tremble

Followed by Discussion, Nibbles/Drinks & Live Music
by Carlos Castellanos & Ovidio Orellana

Wed 17 August, 6-9pm

Maritime Union of Australia
2-4 Kwong Alley North Fremantle

Organised by Friends of Guatemala
Endorsed by Communist Party of Australia & Socialist Alliance

E: president@cpa.org.au P: 0419 812 872 or 9218 9608

Irish politics today

2011-07-26T21:16:00.000+08:00

Australian socialists Emma Clancy and Phil Chilton who both have experience in Ireland recently will discuss their experiences and views on Irish politics, and strategies for progressive change.

6pm Wed 3 August
Perth Activist Centre (15/5 Aberdeen St – next to McIver station)

Hosted by Socialist Alliance and Resistance * Ph 9218 9608
www.socialist-alliance.org * www.resistance.org.au

Fremantle road to rail campaign launch

2011-07-26T17:06:00.002+08:00

A public campaign is being launched by Fremantle community members in response to the increasing volume of heavy vehicle traffic through our residential areas. We are concerned about greenhouse gases emissions, particulate and other pollution, noise and unsafe road conditions.

We’re calling for freight on rail to keep our roads and community safe.

Speakers:
George Crisp, from Doctors for the Environment, speaking on particulate pollution
Jon Strachan, President of the Fremantle Society, presenting a model of getting freight into rail
Annolies Truman, Road to Rail charter

Panel:
Shadow minister for transport Ken Travers;
Fremantle Green independent MLA Adele Carles;
Greens transport spokesperson Lynn MacLaren;
Fremantle Mayor Brad Pettitt.

5pm Saturday 6 August

Reception Room at the rear of Fremantle Town Hall (Go up rear stairs)

Sign the Charter at freoroad2rail.org

Does your library ban Green Left online?

2011-07-26T07:46:00.001+08:00

When you get a chance, please check your local library computers to see if the Green Left Weekly website has been blocked.

For over one month, Green Left online and several other left wing sites were blocked at all Bayswater City Council libraries.

When we were notified of this, we took it up with the library manager who immediately unblocked the sites in question. It seemed to take a little longer at Maylands library (possibly because they were moving premises).

The blocking occurred because of a piece of internet filtering software called WebMarshal that picked up on some key words on the Green Left site. What were these key words and why were legitimate left wing sites affected? We'd love to know.

Although the matter was quickly resolved when we took it up with the manager, we're concerned that it happened in the first place. We'd also like to you check your local library to see how widespread the problem is.

The Perth Voice were similarly concerned and ran the story on the front page of their July 23 issue. For the time being it still pops up on their front page when you visit the Voice online: http://perthvoice.com/

Make sure you check www.greenleft.org.au and www.socialist-alliance.org and any other left wings sites you love to visit. If you find any sites that are blocked, let the library manager know straight away and also ensure you let us know as well: Ph 9218 9608 or 0413 976 638.

Protest war criminal Tony BLiar

2011-07-23T15:31:00.002+08:00

Protest against war criminal Tony BLiar

Fri 29 July

5:30pm - Speakout and leafletting @ Esplanade Station
6:15pm - Protest @ Convention Centre

Attend on Facebook

Organised by Chogm Action Network and Friends of Palestine

John Pilger: Tony Blair must be prosecuted
August 2010

Tony Blair must be prosecuted, not indulged like his mentor Peter Mandelson. Both have produced self-serving memoirs for which they have been paid fortunes. Blair’s will appear next month and earn him £4.6 million.

Now consider Britain’s Proceeds of Crime Act. Blair conspired in and executed an unprovoked war of aggression against a defenceless country, which the Nuremberg judges in 1946 described as the “paramount war crime”. This has caused, according to scholarly studies, the deaths of more than a million people, a figure that exceeds the Fordham University estimate of deaths in the Rwandan genocide.

In addition, four million Iraqis have been forced to flee their homes and a majority of children have descended into malnutrition and trauma. Cancer rates near the cities of Fallujah, Najaf and Basra (the latter “liberated” by the British) are now revealed as higher than those at Hiroshima.

“UK forces used about 1.9 metric tons of depleted uranium ammunition in the Iraq war in 2003”, the defence secretary Liam Fox told parliament on July 22. A range of toxic “anti-personnel” weapons, such as cluster bombs, was employed by British and US forces.

Such carnage was justified with lies that have been repeatedly exposed. On January 29, 2003, Blair told parliament: “We do know of links between al-Qaeda and Iraq.”

Last month, the former head of the British intelligence service, MI5, Eliza Manningham-Buller, told the Chilcot inquiry into the Iraq war, “There is no credible intelligence to suggest that connection. [It was the invasion] that gave Osama bin Laden his Iraqi jihad.”

Asked to what extent the invasion exacerbated the threat to Britain from terrorism, she replied, “Substantially”.

The bombings in London on July 7, 2005 were a direct consequence of Blair’s actions.

Documents released by the High Court show that Blair allowed British citizens to be abducted and tortured. The then foreign secretary, Jack Straw, decided in January 2002 that Guantanamo was the “best way” to ensure British nationals were “securely held”.

Instead of remorse, Blair has demonstrated a voracious and secretive greed. Since stepping down as prime minister in 2007, he has accumulated an estimated £20 million, much of it as a result of his ties with the Bush administration.

The House of Commons Advisory Committee on Business Appointments, which vets jobs taken by former ministers, was pressured not to make public Blair’s “consultancy” deals with the Kuwaiti royal family and the South Korean oil giant UI Energy Corporation.

He gets £2 million a year “advising” the US investment bank JP Morgan and undisclosed sums from financial services companies. He makes millions from speeches, including reportedly £200,000 for one speech in China.

In his unpaid but expenses-rich role as the West’s “peace envoy” in the Middle East, Blair is, in effect, a voice of Israel, which awarded him a $1 million “peace prize”. In other words, his wealth has grown rapidly since he launched, with George W. Bush, the bloodbath in Iraq.

His collaborators are numerous.

The Cabinet in March 2003 knew a great deal about the conspiracy to attack Iraq. Jack Straw, later appointed “justice secretary”, suppressed the relevant Cabinet minutes in defiance of an order by the Information Commissioner to release them.

Most of those now running for the Labour Party leadership supported Blair’s epic crime, rising as one to salute his final appearance in the Commons.

As foreign secretary, David Miliband, sought to cover Britain’s complicity in torture, and promoted Iran as the next “threat”.

Journalists who once fawned on Blair as “mystical” and amplified his vainglorious bids now pretend they were his critics all along. As for the media’s gulling of the public, only the Observer’s David Rose, to his great credit, has apologised.

The Wikileaks exposes, released with a moral objective of truth with justice, have been bracing for a public force-fed on complicit, lobby journalism.

Verbose celebrity historians like Niall Ferguson, who rejoiced in Blair’s rejuvenation of “enlightened” imperialism, remain silent on the “moral truancy”, as Pankaj Mishra wrote, “of [those] paid to intelligently interpret the contemporary world”.

Is it wishful thinking that Blair will be collared? Just as the Cameron government understands the “threat” of a law that makes Britain a risky stopover for Israeli war criminals, a similar risk awaits Blair in a number of countries and jurisdictions, at least of being apprehended and questioned.

He is now Britain’s Kissinger, who has long planned his travel outside the United States with the care of a fugitive.

Two recent events add weight to this. On June 15, the International Criminal Court made the landmark decision of adding aggression to its list of war crimes to be prosecuted. This is defined as a “crime committed by a political or military leader which by its character, gravity and scale constituted a manifest violation of the [United Nations] Charter”.

International lawyers described this as a “giant leap”. Britain is a signatory to the Rome statute that created the court and is bound by its decisions.

On July 21, Deputy Prime Minister Nick Clegg, standing at the Commons despatch box, declared the invasion of Iraq illegal. For all the later “clarification” that he was speaking personally, he had made “a statement that the international court would be interested in”, said Philippe Sands, professor of international law at University College London.

Tony Blair came from Britain’s upper middle classes who, having rejoiced in his unctuous ascendancy, might now reflect on the principles of right and wrong they require of their own children. The suffering of the children of Iraq will remain a spectre haunting Britain while Blair remains free to profit.

[Reprinted from www.johnpilger.com.]

Action in Fremantle demanding the Freedom of political prisoners in Zimbabwe!

2011-07-21T17:47:00.001+08:00

by Zeb Parkes

On the 18 July 20 activists gathered in Fremantle WA, to respond to calls from Zimbabwe political activist for international solidarity.

Activists singed a giant postcard demanding that charges be dropped against the six Zimbabwe political prisoners with messages expressing international solidarity, specifically in the struggle for free speech and democracy.

This is part of an ongoing struggle that started In February 19 this year when 45 activists in Zimbabwe were arrested for screening a youtube video of protests in Egypt and Tunisia. The footage is similar to what you view on a channel like BBC. This is yet another extreme attack on free speech and public assembly that has become a standard part of the Mugabe regime.

During February and March the 45 activists were held in solitary confinement and charged with treason, which carries the death penalty. Under public pressure, the charges of all but six of the activists got dropped and their charges downgraded to that of subverting the constitutionally elected government which carries a 20 year prison sentence.

On monday 18 July, Munyaradzi Gwisai, Tafadzwa Choto, Hopewell Gumbo, Welcome Zimuto, Tatenda Mombeyara and Edson Chakuma went to court facing this charge and the charge was once again downgraded to inciting public violence which carries a 10 yrs prison sentence. They will face court again on 22 August.

Whilst the downgrading of the charges is a positive step in the right directions, the position still remains the same that no charges should have been laid in the first place and the people of Zimbabwe should have the right to freedom of speech and public assembly.

Sadly, during this time one of the 45 activists arrested in February for showing the video, David Mpatsi a member of the International Socialist Organization (ISO), whose health never recovered after he was held in solitary confinement in February and March died on 14 July. Another victim of the Mugabe regime.

Paul Kaplan for the Zimbabwe Information Centre (WA branch) speaking at the action believes that the downgrading of the charges proved that public pressure was working and showed that the “tide was beginning to turn in Zimbabwe, no longer has Mugabe got total power there.”

He also went on to mention that the frontline African states surrounding Zimbabwe, members of SADC (Souther African Development Community) are now being far less supportive of Mugabe and pushing harder for fair elections and democracy in Zimbabwe since the Egypt and Tunisia uprisings.

SADC has being consistent in the past with saying a lot about having fair elections in Zimbabwe without actually doing much to achieve it. Where in fact their actions have often supported the Mugabe regime. In 2007 newszimbabwe.com reported SADC had asked western governments to end sanctions against Mugabe’s government. International sanctions are a key part of weakening Mugabe’s regime and must continue.

Even in 2008 when SADC put in place the GPA (global political agreement) in response to political violence and rigged elections that came under international criticism as a solution to Zimbabwe's political crisis. The GPA was meant to pave the way to fair elections. This failed miserably for various reasons, key amongst them was it wasn’t being monitored by an independent body and Mugabe ignored it and SADC didn’t try and enforce it.

In October many of the leaders of SADC are coming to Perth as participants of CHOGM (Commonwealth heads of government meeting). Paul Kaplan sees this as an important opportunity for people in WA to pressure SADC members “to show them very clearly that to get a fair and free election happening in Zimbabwe they hold the key.”

SADC must do more than it is currently doing if Zimbabwe is to become a democracy where people can hold screenings of youtube video’s without the threat of being arrested.

Realm of Suppression - art exhibition

2011-07-21T17:45:00.000+08:00

Realm of Suppression
An exhibition by Didotklasta Harimurti
Free Range Gallery
399 Wellington St Perth
July 22-26 July

Didotklasta Harimurti, an Indonesian social activist, visual artist, theatre director and writer, will hold an exhibition of his drawings at the Free Range Gallery in Perth in July.

Titled Realm of Suppression, this will be his first solo exhibition in Australia.

Didotklasta began writing about social issues in senior high school. In the early 1990s he became active as a painter and in establishing theatre groups. He eventually established a radical theatre group, the Yogyakarta Institute of Popular Theatre, which worked with poor communities.

After several years off for therapy, Didoklasta came back in 2000. He began to actively publish his writing, to paint and to facilitate several forums for marginal community empowerment and critical pedagogy theatre.

Today, Didotklasta works as a productive artist and is Director of the Institute of Media for Community Action (KALANGAN).

Green Left Weekly's Rebecca Meckelburg spoke with Didotklasta at his home in Salatiga Central Java.

What factors have influenced and shaped you and your thinking as an artist?

I was born in the very early years of the bloody Suharto dictatorship [which began in 1965]. I grew up in a regime that stifled and suppressed people’s ability to think and express their ideas and aspirations.

I grew up in an era of Indonesian economic and social development that ultimately served the elite few and abandoned the common people.

I entered university and became familiar with the radical anti-dictatorship movement in 1989. I became active as an artist-activist in a range of media from painting to theatre to writing.

From the middle to the end of the 1990s, I had a mental health breakdown that I assume was about my difficulties to deal with my reality both in an individual/private and a social context.

I don’t know where it came from, but since I was very young I had a strong sense and sympathy about others, especially the poor. This sense grew and become a desire to understand, to help and to be in social solidarity.

In some way ― some cases I tend to put myself there, as a part of they who are marginal. Also in some aspects, I am marginal.

This life path has developed my character, it drives my acts as an activist as well as my creativity as an artist.

How do you think about and how do you practise your art?

Because my aesthetic and artistic desire develops and grows along with my critical thought, I have always thought of and used art to express things about what it means to be human in my society. For me, the human in my artworks means humanity's problems.

I have been involved in many kinds of art practice, each of which have a different purpose for me personally. But the thoughts or ideas behind all my art are more or less the same ― human problems.

For me, theatre is a tool for change, real-practice change. I see a direct correlation between what we do when we work with communities and how things change.

That is, we are doing theatre with people ― so I prefer to call myself a facilitator or community organiser rather than a director or trainer.

When I write, besides expressing my concern with social issues, I want to share and maybe provoke alternative, critical perspectives in others.

I’m not sure if that can influence social change, I also don’t know how far that influence can go. I just like writing. And I have to write as an activist.

In my visual art, I paint and draw as a “victim”. It becomes therapy to express my inner feelings ― my protest, my sickness and tiredness, my hope, my anxiety.

For me, life in this world is not ok. As a humanist I have to deal with human problems. I believe happiness is the basic nature of humans, but it is not a problem. That is why you will not see happy things in my drawings and paintings.

What is the concept behind your current exhibition?

In its essence, I like the term suppression. This exhibition is a presentation from a creative period where I have become aware that with the activity of drawing, I am expressing those things that I have suppressed.

I make an effort to explore the area and process of psychology ― or maybe just the subconscious and its visual expression.

My artworks in this exhibition do not pamper the eye and it is precisely this that I am trying to convey ― art is not just a matter of beauty or happiness.

What do you hope will happen with this exhibition?

With this newest exhibition, the important thing is I want to gain some certain experiences ― to understand the interaction between an artist and his artwork with a different audience (First World people) and the potential for enrichment for both sides.

For me this is the most significant experience because different cultures and different social-politic-economic backgrounds I believe have different aesthetic paradigms.

I hope this is some kind of small case dialogue between countries ― actually we make a lot of “dialogue” between Indonesia and First World countries or let’s say between the “Third World” and “First World” ― but the daily practice of interaction is not collaborative, but one of domination.

What I mean is, First World people do not watch Indonesian soap operas but we (Indonesians) watch your (First World) films.

Our youth culture is heavily influenced by “developed country culture”, but youth culture in Australia does not seem to be influenced by Third World culture.

I want to give them a perspective in my own way; in general about my people’s life and especially about a version of aesthetic that grows from this kind of life.

Last but not least, I am very sure that all my experiences through this exhibition will be a step forward for me as an artist.

Jail Rupert Murdoch, Free Julian Assange

2011-07-19T21:25:00.000+08:00

Make sure you pick up a copy of this week's Green Left Weekly with fantastic coverage of the crisis facing the Murdoch empire and also analysis of Gillard's carbon price.

This cover article titled "Jail Murdoch not Assange" in particular has attracted a lot of attention. WikiLeaks has tweeted it to its 1 million followers and readers of the article have contributed to a significant spike in Green Left online readership this week.

This issue also includes Mark Steel's hilarious take on the topic and another interesting article by Tony Iltis. It also includes the article on ASIO and the "WikiLeaks amendment".

On the carbon tax, the current issue includes: Gillard's carbon price: not a serious response, Carbon Price - what's in it for renewables, Offsets: the hot air in Gillard's climate plan, and A carbon price reality check.

There's heaps more of interest as well so check it out. Of course you can read it all for free on the web but it is important to pick up the paper version whenever you can to ensure that this valuable resource keeps on coming out. You can also subscribe or make a direct donation to keep the green, left wheels turning.

Councillor Sam speaks out to save refuge

2011-07-19T11:50:00.002+08:00

Councillors Sam Wainwright and Josh Wilson have spoken out in support of the Warrawee Women's refuge in the face of a Barnett government decision to exclude the refuge from a 15% funding increase.

The funding increase was denied to all services run by local government bodies - ostensibly because local governments have the power to raise rates.

In reality, the move is designed to create pressure for privatisation of local government services.

Pictured is the Fremantle Herald article covering the issue.

Sinn Fein - Uniting Ireland

2011-07-18T14:17:00.001+08:00

UPDATE: A video from this talk is available here.

Martin Ferris to speak in Australia on 'Uniting Ireland'

* PERTH: Wednesday July 27, 7.30pm. Irish Club, 61 Townshend Rd, Subiaco. $5 entry - tickets at door.

* SYDNEY: Thursday July 28, 7pm. UTS, Haymarket Campus (Room CM5C.1.31). $5 entry - tickets at door.

* MELBOURNE: Saturday July 30, 7.30pm. Celtic Club, 316-320 Queen Street. Supper and entertainment. $40 entry. Tickets available at door. Ph John 0407 863 291.

Martin Ferris, a TD (MP) from Irish republican party Sinn Féin, is to address audiences in Australia later this month on the ongoing struggle for Irish reunification and independence. Ferris will address audiences in Perth, Melbourne and Sydney on the topic of ‘Uniting Ireland’.

Ferris was part of the Sinn Féin negotiating team in the lead-up to the signing of the Good Friday Agreement in 1998 and will speak on the progress and challenges of the ongoing peace process, and the implementation of the Good Friday Agreement and subsequent international agreements.

Elected to the Dáil (Dublin parliament) in 2002, Ferris is the Sinn Féin spokesperson on workers’ rights. He will outline the economic crisis unfolding across Ireland, which has caused soaring unemployment and emigration, and the mass opposition to the government’s austerity measures and the IMF/EU ‘bailout’.

Ferris will also be discussing the legacy of the 1981 hunger strike in which 10 Irish republican prisoners died in the protest for political status in Long Kesh prison, an event which caused profound and long-lasting changes in Irish politics. This year marks the 30th anniversary of the hunger strike and events are being held all over the world to commemorate their deaths.

Ferris, a former IRA Volunteer and political prisoner who has been active in the Irish republican movement since 1970, said: “For centuries Britain's involvement in Ireland has been the source of conflict; partition, discord and division.

“The Irish peace process has delivered an end to conflict and that is to be welcomed. But the underlying cause of conflict persists – the British government's claim of jurisdiction over a part of Ireland. It is this denial of the Irish people's right to self-determination, freedom and independence that is the core outstanding issue that must be resolved.

“The Irish diaspora and supporters have a very important role to play in the ongoing struggle for Irish reunification and independence. In the construction of the peace process the progress we achieved would not have been possible without that support, especially in Britain, the US, Australia and Canada.

“Sinn Féin has organised a series of conferences and meetings on the topic of Irish unity in Ireland, Britain, the US and Canada over the past two years in order to start a conversation about achieving these goals.

“We are glad to be bringing similar events to Australia this year and hope it lays the basis for future engagement with the Irish community and supporters of Irish self-determination here in Australia.”

* This speaking tour is being organised by Friends of Sinn Féin Australia and the Casement Group Melbourne. For more information phone Emma on 0450 835 189.

[This information is from Friends of Sinn Féin Australia, Director John Little]

Albany rally for Rex Bellotti

2011-07-17T15:11:00.000+08:00

RALLY IN ALBANY IN SUPPORT OF REX BELLOTTI JUNIOR

Saturday, July 23 · 12:00pm - 3:00pm

Local Elders and Politicians as speakers

Background

In March 2009 Rex Bellotti Junior, then 15, was run down by police driving on the wrong side of the road in Albany, Western Australia. Over two years have gone by.

There is conjecture about the police and vehicle involved –did they fail to stop, Why was the vehicle not impounded immediately? Why were they driving on the wrong side of the road? Why had witness statements not even taken by Albany police until after a month later, and only when the story was raised by the Sunday Times newspaper?

There is conjecture about the response of the hospital – why did it take 13 hours for an operation to be performed? The police department has never prosecuted any of the police officers involved.

The incident left the young indigenous man with a broken femur and severe lacerations to his left leg. Even ...now, it is unclear whether the promising young footballer will require his leg to be amputated. By chance an off duty paramedic passerby kept Rex Bellotti Junior from bleeding to death at the roadside.

The family is calling this rally in Albany to allow public debate to find out if a public inquiry into the incident is needed. The family has never received proper legal representation for compensation and assessing the culpability of police. The Bellotti family are appealing to all members of the public to support them in their quest for justice.

Come to the rally and discussion forum in Albany to talk about the issues surrounding this injustice. You may be able to help in some way.

Please come with a warm heart and no violence.

Location: possibly Albany Town Hall

This rally has been organised by the Bellotti family and the Bellotti Support Group. For more details
contact Darryl Kickett 0417 984 581

Stop the James Price Point Gas Hub

2011-07-14T08:24:00.002+08:00

The fight to stop the James Price Point gas hub in the Kimberly in Western Australia's north reached a critical point on July 4 as police arrested dozens of people. The arrests were an attempt to break the spirit of the community protesters who have blockaded the site for a month.

Woodside Petroleum is the lead company in a consortium that is planning to build a $30 billion gas-processing hub that would destroy pristine environment and result in up to 39 million tonnes of greenhouse gas pollution a year.

The campaigners and arrestees include local Aboriginal people defending their country.

This heavy-handed action by police took place in the week of the National Aboriginal and Islander Day of Commemoration. It shows how little regard Woodside and the state government have for Aboriginal rights.

The Save the Kimberley website said police arrived in force before first light, waking 100 people who had camped overnight.

Seven police cars had been held up in the pre-dawn on July 4 but “after some discussion, the police vehicles were allowed through — just like all tourists and local vehicles have been for 30 days” though “without the friendly wave and well wishes that were customary”.

Woodside vehicles by contrast were not allowed through and when police tried to break the blockade, they were held back by a protest that had grown to 200 people.

Save the Kimberley makes the issues in dispute clear: “The protesters had no intention of allowing clearing and drilling workers or machinery through.

“They stood on principle. Protesters were supporting Indigenous Custodians to protect Culture and Country. They were acting to stop the environmental and social nightmare of a polluting gas plant on their doorstep.

“There were also justified concerns expressed about this development being a ‘thin edge of the wedge’ for industrialisation of the Kimberley, one of the world's last great wilderness areas.”

Save the Kimberley said: “Police moved in with clear intentions of making arrests.

“There were tears as three Indigenous women including a grandmother and her granddaughter were forcibly carried away from the protest. This during NAIDOC week.

“Other brave people including mothers and grandmothers were hauled away for their peaceful protest as they refused to move out of the way of bulldozers and drill workers.”

Other key developments in the last week include:

• Protester Shayne Hughes, who locked on to a bulldozer at the beginning of the blockade, was fined on July 4 but had no conviction recorded after the magistrate said he was obviously of good character.

• The Wilderness Society organised a well-attended lunchtime protest outside Woodside's Perth head office on July 5, and

• Broome resident Andrew Dureau has announced that he will complain to police and seek legal advice after he was injured by police and prevented from helping his 76-year old father who tripped in front of a bulldozer at the blockade site.

His father is frail and has a medical condition. He told The West Australian: “I went there to help him get up off the road, out of the way — then all the cops grabbed me and dragged me off ... all I wanted to do was help my father.”

Campaigners argued the effort and expense in breaking the blockade is misplaced.

“This development has no final investment decision, no federal environmental approval and is unnecessary.

“There are other, better, alternatives.

“The compulsory acquisition of land which was the ‘gun to the head’ for those Traditional Owners who have accepted payment to give up land is being challenged in court. A failure to get all required heritage clearances, and a breach of the one they did get, is currently under investigation.”

This campaign can be won and needs support today.

[This article by Alex Bainbridge was first printed in Green Left Weekly #886. Video by Zeb Parkes.]

Gaslands screening - must see film

2011-07-12T18:11:00.001+08:00

SATURDAY 16 JULY
3 for 3:30PM
Gaslands screening

Perth Activist Centre (15/5 Aberdeen St, Perth - next to McIver station)

Presented by Safe Climate Perth
Phone Kamala 0417 319 662 for more information.

About the film:
Part vérité travelogue, part exposé, part mystery, part showdown, GasLand is a compelling and emotional first-person story of discovery and, ultimately, empowerment.

In September 2006, theatre director and part-time banjo player Josh Fox received an unexpected letter in the mail: a natural gas company offering him $100 000 for permission to explore his family’s upstate New York property, in the lush Delaware River Basin area.

Rather than join many of his neighbours in signing on the dotted line, Josh’s curiosity saw him asking questions. He soon discovered that in the race for ‘cleaner’, greener & more efficient energy sources, the largest natural gas drilling boom in history is sweeping the globe, and in the US, the Halliburton-led drilling technology of hydraulic fracturing (or ‘fracking’) has unlocked a “Saudi Arabia of natural gas”.

So Josh picked up his camcorder, and set out on a journey across America’s heartland. His personal concerns quickly uncover global ones, as the citizens of ‘GasLand’ testify to what’s been happening around them. It becomes evident that the multi-million dollar business of fracking has contaminated the water supply, the corporate giants are in cover-up mode, and the PR-spun government has not only turned a blind eye, it has regulated itself out of the picture…

Rough-hewn yet poetic, the film is a desperate plea for scrutiny of a powerful industry that has now turned its eyes on a new, massive and (for now) largely unexplored territory: Australia.

GasLand was awarded the Special Jury Prize for Documentary at the 2010 Sundance Film Festival, and voted the best competition film of any section by indieWIRE’s Sundance Critics Poll. It has recently received a 2011 Academy Award nomination for Best Documentary Feature.

Friends of Palestine presents Miral

2011-07-11T09:13:00.001+08:00

Miral - the film you won't see anywhere else

FTI Cinema
Film and Television Institute
92 Adelaide St, Fremantle

Sunday 7 August 2011
3 for 3:30pm
(note new time and date)

$20 solidarity/$15 waged/$10 concession

Miral is a ground-breaking new film by Academy Award nominee Julian Schnabel. It is based on the true story of a young Palestinian woman who finds her previously sheltered life changing forever.

At age 17 Miral leaves the orphanage she grew up in to teach at a refugee camp. It is here that she first becomes aware of the plight her people face.

Schnabel – the award-winning director of The Butterfly and the Diving Bell – explores the Israel-Palestine conflict from a Palestinian perspective.

Sean Penn and Robert De Niro supported the release of Miral at its premiere in the US, despite the controversy whipped up around the film by pro-Zionist forces.

Now Miral has arrived in Australia, a country where the government and the media are only interested in representing Israel's point of view.

This movie is therefore a must-see for anyone who wants to know the full story behind the conflict in historic Palestine.

Support democracy in Malaysia, oppose crackdown on socialists and oppositionists

2011-07-07T16:36:00.000+08:00

Protest action for democracy in Malaysia

Facebook Event Page: http://www.facebook.com/event.php?eid=193179104064996

Date: July 9, 2011
Venue: Malaysian Consulate-General, 252 Adelaide Terrace, Perth, Australia
Time: 1.30 for 2pm

Altogether, the TheStar.com.my said on June 30 police arrested 101 people nation-wide in a preemptive move against the July 9 "Bersig 2.0" demonstrations, which have been declared illegal. The article said 45 were still detained.Thirty activists from the Socialist Party of Malaysia (PSM) have been charged and kept in jail over planned pro-democracy protests in Malaysia on July 9.

There are reports PSM members have been mistreated in prison. The Malaysia Chronicle said on June 29: "14 of its [PSM's] women members detained in a recent crackdown have been 'kicked on the legs', 'pushed and spat on', told to drink water from the toilet bowl and forced to change clothes in front of male officers."

The PSM released a sttement on July 1 that said "finally after 4 days of pressure, the police finally allowed visitation rights for the family" the previous day".

"During this visitation the detainees informed that they were harrased and mentally tortured."

The statement said forms of abuse suffered by detained PSM members included solitary confinement, denial of legal representation, denial of needed medication, verbal abuse, denial of sufficient drinking water and other basic goods such as soap and toothpaste.

A veteran Filipino socialist, Party of the Labouring Masses deputy general secretary Romy Castillo, who was visiting Malaysia and the PSM, was also arrested and remained in custody as of July 1 (with Malay authorities failing to follow through with plans to deport him).

The PSM is a legal party with two members of parliament. The largest left-wing group in Malaysia, its members are heavily involved in a wide-range of campaigns for democratic rights and for the rights of workers and the poor.

Below is an appeal for solidarity. Details of protests planned protests in solidarity with those arrested across Australia are at the bottom. Malaysians around the world are also planning to stage protests to coincide with the Bersig 2.0 marches, including around Australia. Details can be found here.

* * *

Dear friends and comrades

We have received an urgent appeal for solidarity from the Socialist Party of Malaysia (PSM) following the arrest and detention of 30 of their members including Member of Parliament Dr Jeyakumar Devaraj and several other leading members.

They were arrested while conducting a peaceful nation-wide bus tour calling for the ruling Barisan Nasional government (which has run the country since independence) to retire. For background see Malaysia: Government arrests socialists ahead of Bersih 2.0 pro-democracy rally.

Please publicise this matter and send your messages of solidarity to the PSM to: "International Bureau PSM"int.psm@gmail.com and arul.psm@gmail.com

A copy of a letter of protest I have sent on behalf of the Socialist Alliance can be read here.

Details of solidarity actions in Australia that you can join and promote are here

Thanks
Peter Boyle
National Convenor Socialist Alliance (Australia)

* * *

URGENT APPEAL : 28 JUNE 2011
IMMEDIATE RELEASE

CRACKDOWN ON MALAYSIAN SOCIALISTS:

30 PSM ACTIVISTS CHARGED UNDER ABSURD SECTION 122 – WAGING WAR AGAINST THE KING

30 Activists from Parti Sosialis Malaysia (PSM) including two juveniles have been charged under Section 122 of the Penal Code (waging war against the Monarch and trying to revive the communist ideology ) and are remanded for 7 days for practicing their freedom of expression. If they are charged under this section, then they will be denied bail.

The group were arrested on the 25th June at Kepala Batas, Penang while they were distributing leaflets to inform the public of the Udahlah-Bersaralah ("It is Enough, Time to Retire") national awareness campaign that the PSM recently conducted from 24 to 26 June 2011.

The news of PSM trying to revive communism was based on common t-shirts of left leaders found in the bus carrying the PSM activists.

The news that PSM was trying to revive communism was the major story in all the local mainstream media and is meant to create fear of an imaginary enemy -- a tactic used commonly in the past to crackdown on activists.

Among those arrested are PSM National Deputy Chairperson M.Saraswathy and PSM Member of Parliament Dr. Jeyakumar Devaraj.

The following are the PSM activists arrested.

7 detained at the Penang Police Headquaters are:

1. Dr, Jeyakumar – PSM’s sole Member of Parliament
2. Choo Chon Kai – PSM International Coordinator
3. Selvam (bus driver)
4. Letchumanan- PSM Sg. Siput Branch Secretary
5. M.Sarasvathy – PSM National Deputy Chairperson
6. Chong Moi
7. Soh Sook Hwa – PSM Central Committtee Member

The remaining are being held at Kepala Batas detention centre :

8. M.Sukumaran – PSM Central Committee Member
9. Kamaladevi
10. Indra
11. Saroja
12. Velayutham
13. Santhana
14. Ravindran - PSM Youth Secretary
15. RaveenVeerasenan
16. Thivya Kumar
17. Packialechumy
18. Jody
19. Wong Mei Yong
20. Nalaiyani
21. Deepa
22. Remy - Tanjung Malim Branch Chairperson
23. Saratbabu - PSM Youth Chairperson
24. Gana - Buntong Branch Chairperson
25. Sivoosamy - Bercham Branch Secretary
26. Shanmugam
27. Subramaniam
28. Arokiammangalam
29. Murugan
30. Tanushia
31. Kavitha

The PSM condemns the charges by the government who is trying to implicate PSM in waging a war against the King and reviving the old Malayan Communist Party. This big blatant lie is used on the 30 PSM activists who were involved in the "It is Enough, Time to Retire" national awareness campaign by PSM held from the 24th-26th June 2011. The activists who were supposed to be released unconditionally have been remanded for 7 days under Penal Code Section 122 that is waging a war against the King.

The statement by the police and the accusation by the current government on the PSM activists is baseless, absurd and politically motivated. Thus PSM demands the government to stop all this nonsense, release the detainees and apologise to the PSM on its baseless accusation.

PSM feels it is rather hilarious that the government tries to connect PSM with Communists just by finding a few t-shirts that have communist leader images. These t-shirts are sold very openly and anyone can buy it without any problems.

Moreover the government of Malaysia has political and diplomatic ties with the Communist Party of China, Cuba, Vietnam and many other countries.

Besides that, it must be pointed out that the Malaysian government has signed the peace agreement with the MCP in 1989 and also senior communist leaders like Rashid Maidin, Suriani dan Abdullah CD have had a royal audience with the DYMM Sultan Azlan Shah. Thus, bringing back the communist bogeyman in the post cold war era is a desperate move by the UMNO–BN regime to continue to cling in power while instilling fear among the people and to justify the use of the draconian [Internal security Act] ISA.

PSM is a registered party who is doing legal (above ground) activities and is well known and a popular party. PSM has always acknowledged the contribution of the left parties in the struggle for independence such as PKMM, API, AWAS and the MCP (PKM). This recognition of these left parties by the PSM cannot be narrowly interpreted that the party is trying to revive the MCP.

The media controlled by UMNO-BN has highlighted this accusation to scare people away from the Bersih 2.0 rally scheduled for July 9th. PSM supports the Bersih 2.0 rally, even though the "It is Enough, Time to Retire" BN Campaign has got nothing to do with Bersih 2.0 rally. However police are trying to make a connection between the both so that they can stop the Bersih 2.0 rally.

PSM is aware that the action against the PSM is a systematically planned action by the police to create an imaginary enemy with the intention to create an ”Emergency” environment where the government can justify the use of the ISA as well as do a massive crackdown to stop the Bersih 2.0 rally on 9th of July which is gaining momentum and mass support by the people.

The recent police action on PSM will not stop us from continuing our struggle and fight for the rights of the workers and people.

We seek solidarity locally and Internationally. PSM is currently the sole socialist mass movement in the country and we will continue this great struggle.

Long Live Socialism!
Long Live the PSM!

Released by S.Arutchelvan
National Secretary General
Parti Sosialis Malaysia
http://parti-sosialis.org

What can you do?

Urgent action needed:

Please write protest letters to the government and the police to express your strongest condemnation of the arrests and the crackdown on the PSM activists. Please also demand the Malaysian government to release all the Activists to continue and respect the freedom of expression as stated in Article 10 of Federal Constitution. Please demand the Government to stop the crackdown on PSM and the absurd allegations leveled against it.

SAMPLE LETTER

[Letterhead of your organisation]

1. Dato' Sri Mohd Najib bin Tun Abdul Razak,
Prime Minister of Malaysia,
Prime Minister's Office,
Main Block, Perdana Putra Building,
Federal Government Administrative Centre,
62502 Putrajaya , MALAYSIA
Tel: 603-8888 8000
Fax: 603-8888 3444
E-Mail: ppm@pmo.gov.my

Dear Sir,

Re: Release all those detained and stop on- going crackdown on Malaysian socialists

We are writing to you, to express our outrage and our strongest condemnation over your government's on-going crackdown and the arrest of the 30 PSM Activists.

We are appalled by your government and the police's latest actions and view this as an attempt by your government to intimidate Malaysian citizens from exercising their civil and political rights

We further demand that your government stops the assault on freedom of expression and release all the 30 PSM Activists immediately.

Yours sincerely,

[Name]

Cc To:

1. Inspector-General of Police
Tan Sri Ismail Omar,
Ibu Pejabat Polis Diraja Malaysia,
50560 Bukit Aman,
Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia.
Tel: +603 2262 6015
Fax: +603 2272 5613

2. Tan Sri Hasmy Agam,
Chairman,
Malaysian Human Rights Commission,
Level 11, Menara TH Perdana,
Jalan Sultan Ismail,
50250 Kuala Lumpur.
Tel: 03 26125600
Fax: 03 26125620

3. Mr. Frank La Rue
Special Rapporteur on the promotion and protection of the right to freedom of opinion and expression
Palais des Nations
CH-1211 Geneva 10
Switzerland
Fax: +41 22 917 9006
Email: freedex@ohchr.org

4. Ms. Margaret Sekaggya,
Special Rapporteur on the situation on human rights defenders,
Office of the United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights (OHCHR)
Email: defenders@ohchr.org, urgent-action@ohchr.org

5. Christine Chung,
Human Rights Officer,
Office of the High Commissioner of Human Rights,
Asia Pacific Section, Asia Pacific and Middle East Branch,
Field Operation & Technical Cooperation,
OHCHR- Palais Wilson,
United Nationas Office at Geneva,
CH-1211 Geneva 10,
Switzerland.
Tel: +41 (0) 229289673
Fax: +41 (0) 22928 9018
Email: cchung@ohchr.org

For Further Information
Website: www.parti-sosialis.org
Facebook: Parti Sosialis Malaysia
Twitter: @partisosialis or #udahlah
News websites:
www.malaysiakini.com
www.freemalaysiatoday
www.themalaysianinsider

Protest condemns university’s decision to host climate denier Monckton

2011-07-05T18:51:00.000+08:00

A small but spirited group of protesters braved driving wind and rain outside Fremantle’s Notre Dame University on the evening of June 30 to express their opposition to the University playing host to British climate change denier Christopher Monckton.

Earlier that day, Perth's daily newspaper The West Australian had obligingly provided free publicity for Monckton’s impending speech in an article occupying most of its front page.

In his speech, Monckton reportedly attacked wind farms, a favourite target of the British landed gentry and aristocracy, for whom this clean, safe form of energy is unthinkable because it may interfere with the views from their stately homes.

Prior to his latest visit to our shores, Monckton had likened the Australian government's climate change advisor, Ross Garnaut, to a fascist.

The Australian corporate media and the ABC uncritically allow Monckton to style himself "Lord Monckton" and describe him as a British politician and climate change sceptic.

Almost all elements of these descriptors are misleading, except for the word British. A check on the British House of Lords website confirms he is not a member of that chamber.

A politician is, in everyday language, a member of a legislative body (usually popularly elected). Monckton is not. His only political office of any note is that of deputy leader of the fringe UK Independence Party. 'Sceptic' is a weasel word for denier.

Monckton has no credentials in climate science and his views deserve no more media coverage than those of any other unqualified person.

But it is no accident that media owned and controlled by billionaires have wildly inflated Monckton’s importance and his views while not holding him to account for his multiple deceptions.

Many billionaires stand to lose in the transformation of the economy from fossil fuel dependence to renewable energy, which a safe climate demands. The publicity accorded his views provides just the sort of distractions the polluters need to help sow doubt and confusion over climate change in the public mind.

[This article by R W McKenzie for Green Left Weekly. Photos by Zeb Parkes.]

Protest for democracy as Zimbabwe activists face trial

2011-07-05T16:10:00.000+08:00

For Freedom & Democracy in Zimbabwe

Six Zimbabwean human rights activists are on trial, in danger of 20 year prison sentences, for having shown a video about the democracy struggle in Egypt.

Fremantle Stand Up for Freedom in Zimbabwe

Speaker:
Melissa Parke, MP

Kings Square (next to Fremantle Town Hall)
Monday July 18, 4:00 pm

Organised by: Zimbabwe Information Centre (WA) & Socialist Alliance Fremantle/Walyalup
branch

Supported by: Adele Carles MLA, Melissa Parke MP, Senator Scott Ludlam

Further information, call Paul 0438 949 898, Sam 0412 751 508

Help make the Activist Centre better

2011-07-04T23:23:00.000+08:00

The latest installation at the Perth Activist Centre is this new bank of bookshelves to display the wide variety of books available from the Activist Centre bookshop.

While the books have always been interesting, unfortunately the presentation has had a lot of room for improvement.

The closure of Borders bookstores has given us the opportunity to get these impressive bookshop fittings that there is no way we could have afforded new. The Borders' administrators have not given us these professional book display out of the generosity of their hearts - we've had to pay $1500 for this upgrade.

Can you help defray the costs of this purchase by making a donation to the Perth Activist Centre today? You can donate by transferring or depositing money into our account (BSB: 066 003, Account: 10253459) or writing a cheque or money order to "Perth Activist Centre" and posting to PO Box 204, Northbridge WA 6865.

Alternatively, drop in to the Activist Centre and check out the range of books, t-shirts, badges and other merchandise that is available. If you're interested in environmentalism, feminism, socialism, history, politics or other justice issues, there is bound to be something of interest.

This is not the only improvement we want to make at the Activist Centre. Why not help us out today and make Perth's premier activist resource better?

Ecological Revolution288pp, $30

Marx's Ecology288pp, $30

Cuba How the Workers and Peasants Made the Revolution56pp, $6

The Dispossession of Women 48pp, $5.50

Terrorism A Marxist Analysis36pp, $3.95

An Introduction to Marxist Economic Theory 64pp, $5.95

Above items plus a wide range of left and progressive books, pamphlets, t-shirts, flags, badges, and stubby holders are available online at Resistance Books and at the Perth Activist Centre.

Video from Socialism and Religion

2011-07-04T08:54:00.000+08:00

Thirty people attended the "Socialism and Religion" seminar hosted by Socialist Alliance and Resistance on 2 July 2011. This video shows the presentation by Kamala Emanuel.

Socialism and religion seminar

2011-06-21T14:05:00.002+08:00

Karl Marx famously said that “religion is the opiate of the masses”. Yet this statement is frequently misunderstood.

This seminar will feature presentations from three socialists - Christian, Muslim and atheist - discussing the attitude of socialists to religion and the roles of science and faith in liberation and social change movements.

Presenters:
Kate Massam (Christian)
Syed Dashlooty (Muslim)
Kamala Emanuel (atheist)

3-5pm, Sat 2 July
Perth Activist Centre (15/5 Aberdeen St, Perth - next to McIver station)

Presented by Socialist Alliance and Resistance. All welcome.

Ph 9218 9608 or 0413 976 638 or 0415 922 740 for more info.

Fremantle port used to shift Australian radioactive mining waste to Malaysia

2011-06-17T16:14:00.002+08:00

Public opposition to a plan by an Australian mining company, Lynas, to build a rare earth refinery in Malaysia showed itself in demonstration held outside Australian High Commission in Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia on May 20.

Lynas plans to ship ore from its Mount Weld mine in Western Australia, through the port of Fremantle, to Malaysia to be refined. The refinery will prodiuce some 230,000 tonnes of solid waste per year, containing radioactive thorium and a range of heavy metals and toxic substances. It will be dumped in Malaysia.

Malaysian Socialist Party (Parti Sosialis Malaysia - PSM) MP Dr Jeyakumar Devaraj, told Green Left Weekly that there was strong community opposition to the Lynas rare earth refinery plan:

“This whole Lynas deal has been done in a very non-transparent way. They’ve already made a deal to bring this ore from Australia to refine here in Malaysia, then export the rare earths, then keep the waste here. It has been done without consulting people yet it is almost like a done deal. They have already built the factory and it is quite close to a highly populated residential area.

“The people of Malaysia have made their opposition to this sort of project very clear. About 20 years ago in Bukit Merah, there was a similar refinery set up to process [local] tin mine tailings and refine rare earths from it. The major issue is the Thorium in the residue, which is going to remain radioactive for years. The local people went to court and finally stopped the whole exercise.

“So for Lynas to try and do this now in Pahang, without consulting people and without resolving the who issue of how to keep radioactive waste safely, is not on.

“People are going to mobilise. You can see this is an issue that is getting people very agitated.”

Mitsubishi forced to close previous rare earth refinery

Dr T Jayabalan, an environmental activist and an occupational health and safety consultant working at the National Poison Centre at Universiti Sains Malaysia told GLW that 55,000 signatures were collected for a petition against the Lynas rare earth refinery, precisely because of the earlier experience with a similar project.

“During the course of operations of the previous Mitsuibishi-run rare earths refinery in Bukit Merah (in the state of Perak), the local people suffred many health problems such as miscarriages, leukemias, cancers and lots of other illnesses. People mobilised, were able also to take the case court and ultimately prevailed after a 12 year struggle forcing the factory to close down. Mitsubishi was forced to clean up the whole area which was contaminated.

“Now the same sort of plant is being set up in the state of Pahang, very close to a residential area, using basically the same operation extracting rare earths from ore exported from Australia.

“These rare earth are found in deposits with transuranics such as thorium, with a half-life of 14 billion years, uranium with a shorter life and radium. All these are found intimately bound with these rare earths. In extracting them what they do is get the rare earths and then leaves a residue of concentrated thorium, uranium, radium and a whole lot of other highly toxic material including lead and arsenic.

“The rare earths will be taken by Lynas to be sold and shipped off to other countries. This will be very profitable because 95% of rare earth refinery is done in China. No other country wants to experiment in this sort of process.

“Somehow Lynas was able to sell this idea to Malaysia’s Ministry of International Trade and Industry which wants foreign direct investment at any cost. So they facilitated the setting up of this factory. In fact the company gets a 12-year tax-free status. In other words it doesn’t even have to pay royalties. And they will only create 2-300 jobs.

“Hasn’t the Malaysian government learn anything from what happened in Bukit Merah? We don’t need these few hundred jobs and we don’t need the waste.

“Apart from the radioactive wastes, there are also a lot of other chemicals that are used in the refining process and it uses large volumes of water. Dangerous gases and hazardous chemicals will be released into the land, air and sea. At the end of the day, nobody wil buy our palm oil, nobody will want to come as tourists here, the firshermen will not be able to sell their produce and a whole range of other things will be destroyed just to for a few crooked businessmen who cannot do the same thing in Australia because of tighter safety laws.

“There has been deception and there have been lies. At first this company said that the waste material was not radioactive. It is “zero radioactive, they said. Then they changed their story to it is only radioactive to the workers and that it was just like background radiation.

“So we suggested that they send back the waste to Australia but they say no way can we take the waste back.”

Broader nuclear agenda

“The Socialist Party of Malaysia (PSM) thinks that this campaign feeds into the broader campaign against nuclear energy”, MP Jeyakumar added.

“The Malaysian government has a plan to open two nuclear reactors in the 2020s. They are allocating M$20 billion to do that. So we think this campaign is a precursor to a broader campaign for safe alternatives to coal and gas.”

[Article by Peter Boyle. Picture: Demonstration outside Australian High Commission in Kuala Lumpur on May 20, 2011, over the proposed Lynas rare earth refinery in Gebeng, Pahang. Photo by Bawani/PSM. Both Dr Jayabalan and Dr Jeyakumar would like an opportunity to address Australian communities and groups about this issue.]

Socialist Alliance and Resistance discuss #SpanishRevolution

2011-06-14T13:22:00.002+08:00

For weeks, the central plazas of big cities and towns across Spain have been the site of the camps of the “outraged” (los indiganados) of the M-15 movement — so-called after the large May 15 national protests that sparked the movement.

This meeting will give an outline of events in Spain and an examination of their causes. It will also discuss the potential for such demonstrations to spread and the solidarity we can give from Australia.

Featuring a presentation by:
Helen Reichelt (Resistance)
and participation and insights from Javier Tierno (Spanish activist)

6pm, Wed 15 June 2011
Perth Activist Centre
15 / 5 Aberdeen St, Perth (next to McIver station)

Organised by Socialist Alliance and Resistance
www.socialist-alliance.org and Resistance.

Ph 9218 9608 or Alex (0413 976 638) or Chris (0415 922 740).

Justice for Rex Bellotti Jr

2011-06-11T10:59:00.001+08:00

Since March 2009 it has been unclear whether promising footballer Rex Bellotti Junior will need to have his leg amputated after he was run over by a police four wheel drive in Albany, Western Australia.

The Indigenous boy, then 15, was leaving a wake when the police vehicle, driving on the wrong side of the road, struck him with sufficient force to drag him under the van, breaking his right femur and inflicting lacerations to his legs.

Though severe, Bellotti Jr’s injuries did not compel the officers involved to stop and assist. They instead left the boy in the care of family and passersby. Fortunately, among them was an off-duty medic who gave him immediate attention.

Thirteen hours passed before Bellotti Jr arrived in surgery, in which time irreparable damage to his legs had already been done.

He was then transferred for treatment in Royal Perth Hospital, where he was subjected to a “random” strip search after medications went missing in his shared ward.

His family has since moved to Perth to be close to their son and campaign for justice from the state government and against the racial discrimination that permeates the justice system in Western Australia.

Neither Bellotti Jr nor other key witnesses were even interviewed by police until April 2009, more than a month after the incident — and this only after The Sunday Times had published an article on the whole debacle.

An Albany newspaper article published four days after the incident quoted police officers saying “it appeared the teenager had deliberately walked in front of the ongoing car” which they claimed had “slowed down to 40km/hr”.

For more than a month, local police involved in the incident seemingly saw no need to add further testimonies to their own. But statements taken since from other witnesses have refuted the version of events given by police.

An internal inquiry performed by the Western Australian Police Force in October 2009 concluded that while errors in police handling had occurred, it was “satisfied that every effort had been made by the WA Police to undertake a thorough and transparent investigation into these matters”.

However, the Corruption and Crime Commission (CCC) slammed these “satisfying” conclusions in November 2009. It said: “Given the injuries suffered by Rex Jr, it would be hard to accept that the lack of obtaining statements is merely ‘an oversight’.”

However, the CCC fell short of acknowledging the racist motivations behind this sickening case of injustice.

Rex Bellotti Senior told the National Indigenous Times in June 2009 that no internal inquiry would achieve justice for his son. “Police investigating police again,” he said. “At the end of the day they can exonerate each other … they’ve got each others’ backs.”

Accusations of racial discrimination to Indigenous people are hardly new for the WA police and the justice system.

Other recent scandals include the charging of a then-12-year-old Indigenous boy with receiving a 70 cent chocolate as “stolen property” in November 2009 and the ongoing Deaths in Custody Watch Committee campaign seeking justice for the family of Mr Ward, who died in horrendous circumstances in 2008 in a prison transport van.

Alongside these stands the tragedy inflicted on Rex Bellotti Jr and his family, who have been left until now without counselling services, without compensation and without a formal apology or recognition of guilt on the part of the state government or the WA police.

For Bellotti Sr, there is no doubt about the role institutional racism played in the treatment his son and family had suffered.

He told Green Left Weekly: “If I was driving a four wheel drive, like the one that I own, and ran over a young white child while driving on the wrong side of the road … and you can ask any of our Indigenous people here or in the eastern states as well … we would be considered guilty until proven innocent.

“My son and my family didn’t ask for any of this. We feel like we’ve gotten nowhere yet, but this is only the beginning.”

Supporters of Rex Bellotti Jr have demonstrated outside state parliament twice so far this year in a campaign that is expected to win wider support in the coming months.

[This article by Chris Jenkins was first published in Green Left Weekly #883.]

Carbon tax or genuine climate action?

2011-06-10T13:52:00.000+08:00

[This article by Perth Socialist Alliance member Alex Bainbridge was printed in the Saturday 11 June 2011 issue of the Perth Voice Speaker's Corner.]

Thousands of people attended World Environment Day rallies in Perth and other cities last weekend to “say yes” to climate action.

Unfortunately, the rallies were also saying yes to a “price on pollution” which isn't quite the same thing and is even likely to be a step backwards.

While the Gillard government is determined to give us the carbon price, the action needed to actually reduce carbon emissions is clearly not part of its agenda.

The debate so far has largely been polarised between climate deniers who oppose any action on climate and those who advocate a carbon price as an “essential” step towards reducing emissions.

However, nobody has ever proven that market mechanisms are actually effective in reducing emissions, let alone that they are essential.

In fact, existing carbon markets around the world are in bad shape having suffered a decline last year according to a report released by the World Bank this month. The Guardian newspaper described the decline as an “almost total collapse”.

This was in the same year – 2010 – in which global energy-related emissions were the “highest in history” according to a May 2011 release from the International Energy Agency.

The most “successful” carbon market is the European Union which accounts for 97% of the world trade in pollution. Emissions in the European Union have continued to rise while polluting corporations have made billions of euros from the schemes.

The failure of existing market mechanisms underline the critical importance of developing a third pole in the climate debate: one that rejects an ineffective carbon price in favour of immediate public investment in renewable energy and other measures to reduce emissions.

Why should serious climate activists reject the carbon tax? After all, isn't something better than nothing?

Firstly, for clarity, it should be noted that the carbon “tax” is not really a tax – it is an emissions trading scheme that will operate with a fixed price for the first three to five years. That is, it is a similar mechanism to the “worse than useless” CPRS that the Rudd government tried to introduce in 2009 and similar to the failed schemes in Europe and other places referred to above.

Secondly, the carbon price will increase, not reduce, greenhouse emissions. This is because the biggest beneficiary of the scheme will be the polluting gas industry.

Wayne Swan has revealed that Treasury modelling demonstrates that the carbon price will result in a 150% to 300% increase in gas-fired electricity generation by 2050.

Between gas and renewables, Gillard's carbon price supports gas.

The preference for gas is not accidental, it is government policy. Greg Combet confirmed on Lateline in March that gas (and not renewables) is the government's preferred technology for new baseload electricity production.

At the burning phase, gas produces less emissions than coal. However, when the whole greenhouse “footprint” of gas is considered (including the extraction, processing and transportation stages), gas turns out to be as dirty if not dirtier than coal over a 20 year time frame – which is the relevant time frame for preventing runaway global warming.

Thus, there is no reason to assume that Gillard's carbon price is even a small step forward. More likely it will be a step backwards.

Even worse, is that the whole process of debating the mechanism of a carbon price represents an unforgivable delay in the adoption of measures that genuinely can reduce emissions.

The real alternative to coal and gas is renewable energy. The Victorian-based Beyond Zero Emissions have demonstrated convincingly that Australia could move to 100% renewable energy by 2020 given the appropriate political will. That is, existing commercially available renewable technologies can provide reliable baseload power.

Despite their rhetoric about tackling climate change, the Labor government is still surely in bed with the fossil fuel industries. This is revealed most clearly in the $10 billion per year that is handed out for free to polluting industries in government subsidies of various kinds while renewable energy initiatives receive a paltry drop in the bucket by comparison.

The first and simplest measure that any government would take to tackle the climate crisis is to reverse that situation. Yet there are no indications in the recent budget or anywhere else that Labor is even considering measures like that.

The conclusion from this is that the current government still needs to feel the full weight of public pressure if we are to see measures that will genuinely reduce emissions.

Demanding a better policy than the carbon price, instead of implying that a carbon price will achieve more than it can, is the best way to exert that pressure.

World Refugee Day rally - Sun June 19

2011-06-09T10:28:00.002+08:00

Keys for refugees

12:30pm Sunday 19 June
Wesley Church corner
cnr William & Hay Sts, Perth

On Sunday, June 19, 2011 join refugee support groups from around Perth as they come together to support the rights of refugees. Demand an end to mandatory detention and defend the legal right of people escaping persecution to seek asylum in Australia.

Bring a picnic lunch and any spare keys to contribute to an art piece that will be assembled on the day.

Assemble at Wesley Church for a solidarity walk to Stirling Gardens where the main event will take place.

Supported by: Refugee Rights Action Network, Amnesty, CARAD, Curtin Uni Centre for Human Rights.

Also supported by Socialist Alliance and others.

Also: Speak out against Labor's "Malaysia solution"
4pm, Friday 10 June
Murray St Mall, Perth City (outside Perth Underground Station)

Carbon price is not real climate action

2011-06-06T10:27:00.001+08:00

The worst thing about the Labor government’s proposed carbon price scheme is that it’s a diversion from real action on climate change.

Few of its supporters say it will deliver significant renewable energy or emissions cuts any more — only that it will “start the process” and complement other measures.

It won’t really make the big polluters pay, but it will give them millions, if not billions, in compensation handouts.

It is designed to become an emissions trading scheme, which has not brought emissions down anywhere.

The Labor government has said repeatedly that it wants the carbon price to drive a boom in natural gas. But taken over its full life cycle, using gas for energy is as bad as burning coal.

Labor Treasurer Wayne Swan told parliament on May 25 that the carbon price would help the coal industry too. He said: “I am so optimistic about the future of our coal industry because we have some of the cleanest coal in the world.”

This hasn’t reassured the Liberal Party and the fossil fuel lobby. Their campaign against the carbon price has made headway.

They have made countless absurd claims: the carbon price will supposedly shut down industries, destroy regional towns, throw tens of thousands out of work, add thousands of dollars to annual grocery bills and cause rolling power blackouts.

For them, facts just get in the way. Their real messages is that any action on climate will always hurt working people and the climate problem is exaggerated, if it exists at all.

The climate denier crusade has left Labor floundering, but has also had an impact on the big environmental groups and the Greens.

They have moderated their demands and asked for less, pretending the carbon price plan is better than it is in the hope that at least something can be salvaged.

A sign-on statement circulated by Climate Action Network Australia in February said: “Saying yes to a price on pollution means saying yes to investment, innovation, and new jobs based on renewable energy that never runs out.”

But there is no evidence Labor’s carbon price will deliver these things. Supporting the carbon price in this way does nothing to pressure the government to go further — it takes the pressure off.

The federal Greens have made some big policy concessions to Labor in the carbon price negotiations.

In 2010, the Greens agreed to compromise on the emissions cut target for the carbon price, accepting that Labor would not go beyond its tiny 5% reduction by 2020.

On May 25, Greens leader Bob Brown said the party would compromise on the actual price too — abandoning its preferred $40 a tonne for Labor’s $20 price.

And in return, Labor has conceded nothing.

Through this process, the most important climate measures — public investment in renewables, mass transit, energy efficiency and sustainable farming — have been sidelined.

A well-designed carbon price could play a positive role. But market mechanisms cannot be the driving force in the transition we so badly need.

[The above leaflet was handed out by Socialist Alliance and Resistance members at the climate action rally in Perth 5 June 2011. Ph 9218 9608 for more information. Photos from the rally below.] Don't forget the educational seminar on the carbon price at 3pm, Sat 11 June at the Perth Activist Centre.]

Carbon price: good, bad or neutral in achieving climate action?

2011-06-04T15:26:00.003+08:00

An educational seminar presented by Socialist Alliance and Resistance

Carbon Price:
Good, bad or neutral in achieving climate action?

This seminar will discuss the proposed carbon price (really and emissions trading scheme) to be brought in by the Gillard government with support from the Greens.

Speakers include:
Alex Bainbridge (Socialist Alliance WA co-convenor)

3pm, Sat 11 June 2011
Perth Activist Centre
15/5 Aberdeen St, East Perth (next to McIver station)

Presented by Socialist Alliance and Resistance.
Ph 9218 9608, 0413 976 638

Third homeless rights protest

2011-06-04T10:58:00.001+08:00

More than 60 people rallied outside parliament house on June 2 in support of rights for homeless people. This was the largest of three protests organised since the issue was raised in state parliament in April in relation to the upcoming Commonwealth Heads of Government Meeting (CHOGM).

Police minister Rob Johnson said on April 7 that homeless people would have to “sleep somewhere else'', implying they would be swept from the streets during CHOGM.

Later comments by the community services minster indicated that homeless people would be given accommodation during CHOGM and then put back on the streets afterwards. However, it is not clear if even this promise will be fulfilled.

The rally heard from leading homeless organiser Corey Wilkinson, who had chained himself to the offices of housing minister Troy Buswell on the previous Monday. Wilkinson had tried eight times by that point to arrange a meeting with Buswell but the minister had refused to meet.

Wilkinson asked why it was that the state Liberal government of Colin Barnett was able to offer accommodation to homeless people during the three days of CHOGM, but not for the rest of the year.

Greens parliamentarian Alison Xamon and ALP leader Eric Ripper also addressed the rally. Xamon said she was appalled by recent comments made by Johnson disparaging the plight of the homeless and refusal of Buswell and the government to deal with the issue.

Ripper tried to distance himself from the appalling public housing record of previous state ALP governments. However, he made no specific promises on behalf of the ALP.

Alex Bainbridge spoke next on behalf of the CHOGM Action Network (CAN), saying that he would be more impressed if Ripper could stand before the crowd with a specific number of public houses that a future ALP government would build. “I would be even more impressed if he would stand before us and pledge to wipe out homelessness completely,” he said.

“Not one single person should have to live on the streets.'”

Bainbridge also called on the protesters to help make the protest at CHOGM as big as possible.

[This article by Alex Salmon was first published in Green Left Weekly. Video by Zeb Parkes.]

Perth City Council seizes Bradley Manning banner

2011-06-02T17:38:00.000+08:00

One feature of the May 28 Bradley Manning protest was that the Perth City Council seized a Free Bradley Manning banner that had been hung up over the overpass above the Murray Street Mall.

The Perth Voice covered the issue in its June 4 edition.

"When protesters at the Free Bradley Manning rally photographed the ranger pulling the banner down, he reportedly threatened them with prosecution for taking his photograph without permission," the paper reported.

"It is not (yet) a crime in WA to photograph anyone (other than a protected person, such as an ASIO agent or ADF member) in a public place," the paper went on.

If you support WikiLeaks, support Bradley Manning

2011-06-02T17:23:00.001+08:00

[This article by Perth Resistance member Kate Massam was published in the Perth Voice Saturday 4 June 2011 edition.]

For 11 long months one man - Bradley Manning - sat alone in solitary confinement in his jail cell. His crime? Allegedly blowing the whistle on some of America's worst war crimes.

The crimes that he is said to have revealed included the torture and killing of countless civilians, the illegal bombing of Yemen and the extent of the drone attacks on northern Pakistan.

Despite not having been convicted of any crime - nor even having yet faced a trial - Manning is being treated like a criminal as the presumed source of the documents published by online whistleblower publisher WikiLeaks.

He is simply a man who “wanted people to see the truth… regardless of who they are… because without information, you cannot make informed decisions as a public.”
He is a 23 year old gay rights activist who was kicked out of home and once lost his job for being gay.

On May 26, 2010 Manning was arrested in Kuwait on suspicion of leaking military documents from the Afghanistan and Iraq wars, video footage of a military attack that killed a dozen civilians including two Reuter's journalists and 250,000 US state department cables.

Manning was kept in solitary confinement at the Marine Corps Brig, Quantico, Virginia for 23 hours a day without charge or trial for over nine months. He was subjected to inhumane treatment that included inadequate access to sunlight and a strict exercise schedule that only allowed him to exercise by walking around in circles in a separate room to his cell for one hour a day.

During the day he was required to respond in the affirmative to the question “are you OK?” every five minutes and at night he had to respond to the same question every time he turned his back to the cell door or covered his face with his blanket.

After March 2, when he was finally charged with 22 various charges including “sharing state secrets” and “aiding the enemy via indirect means” which carries life imprisonment or the death penalty, he was forced to sleep naked and stand naked, to attention, every morning for inspection.

Many people raise the argument that in being a member of the US military Manning should have known that this would be the result of releasing their classified information however after becoming disillusioned by the realities of the US's war on Iraq and Afghanistan Manning made the conscious decision to not become complicit in those actions but instead to try and effect change to achieve a more peaceful world.

He reportedly hoped that releasing the information would spark “worldwide discussions, debates and reforms”.

In April around 300 of America's top law scholars, including Barack Obama's own constitutional law professor, came forward in a strongly worded open letter to the Obama Administration. They claimed that the conditions of Manning's detention violated the Eighth Amendment (outlawing cruel and unusual punishment) and the Fifth Amendment (prohibiting punishment without trial).

The letter even points out that there is no evidence that Manning's treatment is needed for his own safety or the safety of other inmates so it is highly likely that “this pattern of degrading treatment aims either to deter future whistle-blowers or to force Manning to implicate Wikileaks founder Julian Assange in a conspiracy, or both.”

US State department spokesperson PJ Crowley resigned after speaking out against Manning's conditions saying that this treatment was “ridiculous, counterproductive and stupid”.

Meanwhile Obama has said that the conditions are “appropriate”.

Hundreds of thousands of people around the world disagree and have been standing in support of Bradley Manning. This people power effort recently resulted in a lessening of the torturous conditions he was being held in, including an end to his solitary confinement.

The movement extends to Perth where more than 50 people attended a speakout protest on May 28. “Free Bradley Manning” banners were also hung two days earlier on the one year anniversary of his incarceration.

This issue also raises the need for stronger laws protecting whistleblowers in this country.
It is a sign of the times we live in where war criminals walk the streets freely whereas heroes like Bradley Manning suffer cruel and unusual punishment without even having been convicted of any crime.

However just as a people's power movement succeeded in toppling dictators in Egypt and Tunisia - inspired in part by the WikiLeaks revelations - the international solidarity movement will one day succeed in bringing the architects of the “war on terror” to justice and winning freedom for Bradley Manning.

Rally for homeless people's rights pre CHOGM - Thurs 2 June

2011-06-01T17:08:00.000+08:00

Join the protest on Thurs 2 June
11:30am
Parliament House (Harvest Terrace, West Perth)

Demand
* Justice for homeless people during CHOGM - permanent accommodation, not swept off the streets
* Increase public housing - a right not a privilege
* Increased services and facilities for homeless people (drop-in centres, laudries, safe spaces, etc)
* A full public apology by police minister Rob Johnson and Colin Barnett for their insulting comments in parliament

Speakers include:
Corey Wilkinson (homeless rights protest organiser)
Alex Bainbridge (Chogm Action Network)
Eric Ripper or Mark McGowan (ALP)
Alison Xamon (Greens)
Troy Buswell (Housing Minister) and Premier Colin Barnett have been invited to speak.