The Guardian • Anna Pha
Issue #2042
GREEN NOTES
One of the biggest con jobs foisted on the Australian public and the planet is Chevron’s $81 billion Gorgon “clean gas” project in WA. It...
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Issue #2020
Our Members Be Unlimited – Sam Wallman
If the trade union movement is to have a future, then it is in today’s youth. There is not a great deal of material written...
Read moreAfghanistan: what’s next?
Little was said about the horrendous consequences of the US-led invasion of Afghanistan and the tens of thousands of Afghan lives that were lost, and the wreckage and chaos that was left behind following the hasty withdrawal by US and allied troops.
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Issue #2036
Commodification of health care
Since its introduction in 1984, Australia’s national health insurance scheme, Medicare, has been under constant attack from the privateers. Medicare is an anathema to their...
Read moreCasuals Con
The centrepiece of the Coalition government’s industrial relations Omnibus bill is the schedule on casual employees.
Read moreDeath knell for fossil fuels
On the 12th of November, the Coalition released its long-awaited plan to achieve net zero greenhouse gas emissions by 2050.
Read moreHealth care a right, not a privilege
The Liberal-National Coalition has never supported Medicare, constantly undermining it since its introduction.
Read moreUN IPCC Report: Australia’s role
Australia has already warmed by an alarming 1.4°C since 1910.
Read moreNo tax cuts for the rich!
Labor leader Anthony Albanese and Shadow Treasurer Jim Chalmers shocked many in their own ranks when they announced that Labor would support the Coalition’s tax cuts which overwhelmingly benefit the wealthy.
Read moreIgnoring workers: the government’s “recovery” is grim
The underemployed need more hours of work. Low and middle-income workers need a wage rise, job security, and affordable public housing.
Read moreUN IPCC Report
“Climate change is already affecting every inhabited region across the globe with human influence contributing to many observed changes in weather and climate extremes.”
Read moreLegislating bigotry
It has taken three years and two previously aborted bills for the latest incarnation of the Coalition’s highly controversial Religious Discrimination Bill to appear.
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Issue #2052
GREEN NOTES
Anna Pha If you think the transition to renewables and following what the climate science dictates means phasing out fossil fuels, that’s not what the...
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Issue #2037
The great carbon fraud
Earlier this month Climate Change and Energy Minister Chris Bowen released a consultation paper proposing a carbon credit scheme for Australia’s largest greenhouse gas emitters...
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Issue #2025
Diversity – sustainability – socialism
Cuba is one of the world’s most sustainable economies despite the six decades’ long illegal and economically crippling US blockade. Since the 1960s, the Cuban...
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Issue #1958
May Day: Fight for the right to strike
May Day 2021 is a time to take the struggle to the streets; to show the full strength and might of the working class; and take back the losses of recent decades.
Read moreAustralia fails the Pacific islands
The small, low-lying Pacific islands are often described as “the canary in the coalmine.” The very existence and lives of their people are threatened by climate change.
Read moreGreenwashing dirty investments
Is there a company that doesn’t claim to support the Paris Agreement on climate change? The agreement was signed in 2015 and since then the...
Read moreDirect assault on wages and conditions
While the Coalition’s industrial relations omnibus bill looks very different to the Howard government’s notorious WorkChoices, in effect, it has the same aims.
Read moreBUDGET RAZOR GANG
Despite everything that the Morrison government says about not pursuing “budget repair”, that is exactly what it is doing.
Read moreClimate change: Capitalism killing the earth
“The cumulative scientific evidence is unequivocal: Climate change is a threat to human well-being and planetary health.”
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Issue #2032
A peace & peoples’ budget
Annual budgets are a mirror held up to the class divide. The income and expenditure sides of the budget come down to priorities. The budget...
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Issue #2018
Listen to the science! State of the environment report
During the 2019-2020 bushfires thirty-three lives were lost, more than seven million hectares were burnt, more than 3,000 home destroyed. In the most recent floods,...
Read morePro-business – Anti-worker
Women, aged care, and jobs were to be the focus of the 2021-22 federal budget – or so we were led to believe, prior to its release.
Read moreShelter a basic human right
Australia is facing a massive housing crisis. As it becomes increasingly more difficult to find affordable rental accommodation, governments are turning their backs on renters...
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Issue #2036
Build the fightback
Decades of privatisations, job cuts and wage suppression and more recently the cuts masked by measures taken during the COVID-19 pandemic, have taken a huge...
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Issue #2048
GREEN NOTES
Anna Pha The horrendous spectacle of a carpet of millions of dead fish floating on the Darling River at Menindee is yet another wake-up call...
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Issue #1951
A New Accord?
“Governments create the environment that enables business to prosper and create new jobs,” said Anthony Albanese in a speech to Queensland TAFE earlier this month.
Read moreWhat value has the country’s keeper of our history?
It says a lot about the values and priorities of the Morrison government when the body responsible for protecting Australia’s historical records is forced to go to the public with a begging bowl to save hundreds of thousands of important historical records.
Read moreCOP26: Colonial plunder
As the COP26 climate change meeting entered its second week, the divide between developing and developed countries and their colonial history has been laid bare.
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Issue #2050
GREEN NOTES
Anna Pha Australians spend more than $570 and consume around 500 litres per person on bottled water per annum – second only to Singapore. The...
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Issue #2028
Bed block
“We are not excelling, we are drowning.” This is the headline of the NSW branch of the Australian Paramedics Association’s (APA) submission to the NSW...
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Issue #2040
GREEN NOTES
Anna Pha Welcome to Green Notes, a fortnightly column which will cover climate change, environmental issues and biodiversity and their impact on humanity including indigenous...
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Issue #1999
Climate change – ACT NOW!
Prime Minister Scott Morrison described the floods along the east coast of Australia as a “one-in-a-100-year event”; NSW Premier Dominic Perrottet called them a “one-in-1000-year...
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Issue #2017
State of the Environment report
“Overall, the state and trend of the environment of Australia are poor and deteriorating as a result of increasing pressures from climate change, habitat loss,...
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Issue #1977
Truckies in fight of their lives
Seven thousand Toll drivers are in a battle to save their jobs and working conditions.
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Issue #2033
Time for a centralised bargaining system
Prior to the adoption of the Accord in 1983 between the Labor government and the Australian Council of Trade Unions, Australia had a highly centralised...
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Issue #2021
Profiteering & neglect: the aged care crisis
The aged care sector is in crisis. The failings are systemic and require fundamental structural changes. Aged care has been commodified by corporate and church...
Read moreAustralia’s own goal
US President Joe Biden, British Prime Minister Boris Johnson, and Australia’s PM Scott Morrison lined up like three stooges in a stage-managed virtual presentation to announce the formation of yet another military alliance
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Issue #2035
Hear her voice
This article contains references to examples of experiences of First Nations peoples, and language that is disrespectful and offensive to their culture, history, people and...
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Issue #2046
GREEN NOTES
Anna Pha Humanity faces two major existential threats: climate change and nuclear war. The doomsday clock is ticking on both these threats. Ironically, the US...
Read moreThe destruction of Medicare by stealth
Without warning, the government announced changes to more than 900 Medicare rebates, mostly in private hospitals, to commence 1st July.
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Issue #2007
Who rules Australia?
One of the striking features of federal elections is their increasingly undemocratic nature and Americanisation. Much of the electioneering by major parties has been short...
Read moreDomestic violence and its systemic perpetration
At least one child is killed by a parent every month; one woman is murdered every week by a partner or former partner; another hospitalised every three hours.
Read moreIncome support during post-test isolation
Unions NSW have had a breakthrough for workers, winning a $320 COVID Test and Isolate support payment from the NSW Coalition government to cover obligatory stay-at-home time following a COVID test. Victoria has a similar $450 Coronavirus Test Isolation Payment.
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Issue #2016
Fund public health
Hospitals and their staff are at breaking point as the wave of BA.4/BA.5 COVID-19 sub-strains and flu send hospitalisations to breaking point. GPs across Australia...
Read moreCOVID-19
The pandemic is ravaging India with more than one million new cases every three days – a figure which is undoubtedly a gross underestimate.
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Issue #2006
Toothless tiger in the capitalist jungle
The question of the integrity of government has emerged as a major issue in the lead-up to the May 21st federal elections as Prime Minister...
Read moreGovt white-ants super yet again
On 17th June, the government rushed through both Houses legislation on superannuation.
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Issue #2024
“Put children before profit”
Tens of thousands of early childhood educators walked off the job across the country to take part in rallies and marches on 7th September. More...
Read moreJOBS NOT WAR!
The AUKUS alliance between Australia, the UK and the US turns the meaning of security on its head.
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Issue #2027
Data harvesters
The Privacy Act makes it unlawful for many companies in Australia to buy or exchange consumers’ personal data for profiling or targeting purposes. It applies...
Read moreBring back Jobkeeper!
Thousands of workers face a substantial loss of income with the extension of lockdowns in Victoria and NSW and a new one in South Australia.
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Issue #2028
Health care is a human right
Reports of emergency patients waiting up to thirty-six hours or more to be off-loaded from ambulances at public hospital emergency departments (EDs) are indicative of...
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Issue #2031
Class war budget
The budget, delivered on 25th October, is set in the context of a looming global recession, ongoing wars, rocketing prices, extreme weather events, famine, and...
Read moreClimate Summit: “THE WORLD IS ON RED ALERT”
The growing recognition of the urgency by world leaders was reflected at the virtual climate summit called by US President Joe Biden from 22nd to 23rd April.
Read moreBudget alternative: For peace and genuine security
As the cost of living soars the number of working poor is on the rise and more and more families are turning to charities for...
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Issue #2033
Time to break the shackles
Labor’s Secure Jobs, Better Pay bill gives lie to its title. It fails to provide trade unions and the working class with the unfettered right...
Read moreWealth gap widens
The latest national income figures showing economic growth barely above zero are suggestive of a sluggish economy, struggling to avoid recession. The economy is hardly...
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Issue #2044
GREEN NOTES
Anna Pha Last month Labor’s minister for environmental destruction, Tanya Plibersek, quietly granted Santos a licence to open 116 new coal seam gas wells in...
Read moreCOVID: It is a race!
As the Victorian state government continued to grapple with the more virulent Delta variant of COVID-19, the federal government failed to recognise the seriousness of the situation.
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Issue #1982
Beware fake unions!
They claim they are a cheaper and “independent alternative” to registered trade unions.
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Issue #2008
Fight for change
“We want change,” was the message to the major parties. The Liberals copped a routing as millions of people sought change. Most of the Murdoch...
Read moreVaccination the only way out
The delta strain of COVID-19 had spread to all states on the eastern seaboard and to South Australia and border closures are in place at the time of writing.
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Issue #2029
Australia: The big polluter
Australia is the world’s largest gas and coal exporter. There are currently 114 new or expanded fossil fuel projects awaiting approval. In 2021-22, governments in...
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Issue #2030
Medicare under attack
An investigation by the ABC, and the Nine newspapers Sydney Morning Herald and The Age, claims that $8 billion (approximately thirty per cent) of Medicare’s...
Read moreRespect at work: sexual harassment not on!
Sex Discrimination Commissioner Kate Jenkins released the Commission’s Respect@Work report on sexual harassment in the workplace more than twelve months ago.
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Issue #2002
Budget 2022-23 – CLASS WAR
The budget announced by Treasurer Josh Frydenberg is a pre-election, last ditch, vote-buying exercise from the Morrison government. Voters struggling with rising prices and falling...
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Issue #2034
Climate change wreaks havoc
Lives have been lost and thousands of homes have been flooded and destroyed as the floods continue to hit eastern Australia. People have lost their...
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Issue #2023
Jobs and Skills Summit: dangerous illusions for workers
Workers and their families are looking for real change – real wage rises, secure jobs, safe working conditions, with adequately funded and staffed health and...
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Issue #2048
NSW: Coalition booted out
The message from NSW voters on 25th March was loud and clear. The Perrottet Coalition government took a hit, losing twelve of its 47 seats...
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Issue #2025
Good planets are hard to find
La Niña event is under way for the third year in a row according to the Bureau of Meteorology. The Pacific, including Australia, can expect...
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Issue #2009
Feet on the ground
After nine years of corrupt, anti-people, climate deniers in office, the newly elected Albanese Labor government faces many challenges. Expectations of real change are high,...
Read moreHARD SHUT DOWN NOW!
The situation in NSW is extremely serious. The Delta strain is far more infectious and deadly than earlier strains. Almost ten per cent of those who tested positive have been hospitalised.
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Issue #2011
Abolish the ABCC
The Australian Building and Construction Commission (ABCC) has used the courts to hit building and construction unions with fines of $15.262 million since 2nd December...
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Issue #2013
Big win for gig workers
Gig workers had a ground-breaking win last month when the Personal Injury Commission (PIC) awarded the family of Xiaonjun Chen $834,000 in workers’ compensation after...
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Issue #2014
Time for a wage rise
The cost-of-living crisis has not abated as households face further economic pressures with interest rates and inflation on the rise. Trade union militancy is on...
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Issue #2015
Policy-induced violence
At least one child is killed by a parent every month; one woman is murdered every week by a partner or former partner; another hospitalised...
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Issue #2004
Boot the Coalition out!
The Coalition government has comprehensive plans to destroy militant trade unions and give employers arbitrary powers and unfettered rights over workers in the workplace. The...
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Issue #2022
The aged care crisis
How does a non-profit charitable organisation that is sixty-nine per cent funded by government, and claims to operate at a loss, find $1.4 billion to...
Read moreOnly solidarity can defeat COVID
Around the globe, COVID-19 in its various mutations continues to spread, with the health systems of many developing nations unable to cope and vaccines in short supply.
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Issue #2049
NO to AUKUS! – YES to Medicare!
Medicare as a public health insurance scheme offering universal access to bulkbilling, and funded through central revenue is becoming a distant memory. GPs are fully...
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Issue #1986
“Code red for humanity”: Glasgow Climate Summit
The rich G20 countries, responsible for more than eighty per cent of human-made emissions.
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Issue #2010
Energy prices explode: capitalism in crisis
Consumers face soaring energy costs as Australia’s gas and thermal coal exporters rake in windfall profits. The incoming Labor government has inherited the legacy of...
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Issue #2027
Optus: data is gold
Millions of angry Optus customers are horrified and concerned that the security of their personal details was breached in a cyberattack on the company. Optus’...
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Issue #2012
The sun will shine, the wind will blow
Australia is on the brink of a total collapse of its domestic energy market amid a crisis that has been decades in the making. If...
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Issue #2040
Chalmers’ oxymoron
Treasurer Jim Chalmers says it is time to “rethink capitalism,” time for a “values-based capitalism” with “efficient markets.” He is critical of the neoliberal responses...
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Issue #2039
Creeping encroachment on press freedom
The Labor government has announced that it will hold a national roundtable with media organisations and “key stake holders” to discuss press freedom reform. The...
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Issue #2040
An unsustainable govt
In the February Monthly Essay, “Capitalism After the Crises”, Treasurer Jim Chalmers refers to “hard decisions” that “will accompany hard times ahead” and “the unsustainable...
Read moreOmnibus bill wounded but not buried
The Coalition’s omnibus industrial relations bill was torn apart in the Senate on Thursday 18th March, leaving only the section on casuals intact. On the same day Parliament passed a bill for the (pre-COVID base rate) unemployment benefit (JobSeeker) to be increased by an insulting and punitive $25 a week – just $3.57 a day extra – when the COVID supplement ceases at the end of March. JobKeeper is being withdrawn at the same time.
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Issue #2038
Blow up the pokies
Australia has the highest per capita gambling losses in the world – more than double those of the USA. These losses come at a huge...
Read moreGovt to hit Women’s super
Last month, Superannuation Minister Jane Hume (also Minister for Women’s Economic Security [sic]) announced that a draft bill would be released soon for superannuation changes, including new compassionate grounds for early access to super for victims of domestic violence. They would be allowed to apply for up to $10,000 “as an important last resort lifeline.”
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Issue #2050
For-profit health in the trolley
In the language of privatisation, Sydney’s public trains call the millions who use the system daily, not commuters, but “customers.” Now, with Woolworths, the giant...
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Issue #2041
Medicare plan – BULK PROFITS
For anyone looking for solutions to the Medicare crisis, the Albanese government’s Strengthening Medicare Taskforce Report raises more questions than it answers. It is full...
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Issue #2053
The facts about wage rises and inflation
There has been no shortage of news headlines, big business and government warnings that a wages breakout will cause inflation: “Teachers’ rise a risk to...
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Issue #2043
Where is super heading?
When the Albanese government released a superannuation consultation paper last month, it brought the usual suspects out of the woodwork. The hysteria was a reminder...
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Issue #2051
Cut-and-paste US world domination
“So today I want to talk to you about how we avert war and maintain peace – and more than that, how we shape a...
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Issue #2052
Not a People’s Budget
Budgets involve a redistribution of wealth reflecting government priorities and serving class interests. The 2023-24 federal budget has clear priorities. The big winners are the...
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Issue #2043
“Wage-price spiral” myth
Reserve Bank of Australia (RBA) Governor Philip Lowe expressed concern that workers would get much higher pay rises in response to inflation, which he claims...
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Issue #2054
Cancel Stage 3 tax cuts!
Over the past two decades the bottom 90 per cent of Australians on average have received only seven per cent of economic growth per person...
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Issue #2044
CRIMINALISING CHILDREN
Australian governments are quick to point the finger at human rights abuses in other countries, but Australia’s record is nothing short of disgraceful when it...
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Issue #2047
“Defuse climate time-bomb”
“This is the earth’s last chance to avoid climate disaster,” warns the Intergovernmental UN Panel on Climate Change (IPCC). The IPCC in its latest report...
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Issue #2050
Fight back!
May Day is just eight days away from the federal budget. All we hear from Treasurer Jim Chalmers are attempts to soften up the electorate...
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Issue #2043
INTEREST RATE TIME BOMB
Two thirds of households face a hit as rising interest rates push up mortgage payments and drive up their rent. At the same time household...
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