Oceania
Australian unions praise Labor’s new “Fair Work” laws
By Terry Cook, July 16, 2009
Deputy Prime Minister Julia Gillard and ACTU president Sharon Burrow embraced to celebrate the July 1 commencement of Labor’s “Fair Work” industrial relations regime.
Full-time job losses accelerate in Australia
By Mike Head, July 14, 2009
The destruction of full-time jobs gathered pace in June, hitting male manufacturing and young workers in particular.
Australia: Indian students boycott Victorian Labor government’s “Walk for Harmony”
By Patrick O’Connor, July 13, 2009
Indian students boycotted yesterday’s “Walk for Harmony” in central Melbourne after the Victorian Labor government of Premier John Brumby refused to allow them to address the rally.
Australia: Victorian government attempts to pre-empt findings of bushfire investigation
By Margaret Rees, July 11, 2009
In an extraordinary political manoeuvre, Victorian premier John Brumby has moved to pre-empt potentially damaging findings by the state’s royal commission into the February 7 “Black Saturday” bu...
Australia: Former Labor PM Keating denounces Rudd government’s “isolationist” stance on China
By Patrick O’Connor, July 10, 2009
Former Labor prime minister Paul Keating delivered a speech on July 2 in which he criticised the government’s recently released defence policy “White Paper” for implying that Australia could fin...
Australia: The Victorian government’s “Walk for Harmony”: a cynical exercise in damage control
By Robert Morgan, July 10, 2009
The “Walk for Harmony” being led by Victorian Labor premier John Brumby this Sunday is a part of cynical public relations exercise to shore up revenues from the lucrative international student mar...
Australia: League tables and democratic rights—a reply to News Ltd
By Laura Tiernan, July 8, 2009
Behind the moral outcry is a definite political agenda. Murdoch’s columnists and lead-writers are helping the Rudd Labor government push through education reforms opposed by virtually the entire tea...
Australia: Jury acquits truck driver over rail crossing disaster
By Will Marshall, July 7, 2009
A Victorian jury last month acquitted a truck driver of 19 criminal charges—11 counts of culpable driving and 8 of negligently causing serious injury—relating to a railway level crossing crash tha...
Australian governments downplay mounting swine flu cases
By Frank Gaglioti, July 6, 2009
The confirmed swine flu cases in Australia climbed above 3,500 this week, with more than 150 patients hospitalised. By July 1, nine people had died due to complications after contracting the infection...
Australia: West Gate Bridge construction workers charged with criminal offences
By Patrick O’Connor, July 4, 2009
Twelve construction workers have been charged with serious criminal offences relating to industrial action and picketing in April at Melbourne’s West Gate Bridge project.
Australia: Global institutions tell Rudd government to cut spending
By Mike Head, July 2, 2009
Warning of continuing “weak” and “fragile” conditions in the Australian and world economy, global financial institutions have insisted that the Rudd government must make deep spending cuts in ...
Australia: Coroner attacks as a “disgrace” Aboriginal man’s death in prison van
By Joe Lopez, June 29, 2009
A coroner has described as a “disgrace” the treatment of a 46-year-old Aboriginal elder who died of heatstroke in the back of a prison van in sweltering heat with no functioning air conditioning.
