ANU Young Labor Left

Protest the Illegal Detention of Aung San Suu Kyi

By Ben | May 16, 2009

Rally in solidarity with Aung San Suu Kyi and the Burmese community.
12pm Monday 18th May
Burmese Embassy, 22 Arkana Street, Yarralumla

(Catch the #2 bus from Civic at 11:30)

Contact Ben on 0404 206 781 or Evan on 0431 251 273 for more information.

http://www.aucampaignforburma.org/AnnouncementRetrieve.aspx?ID=23414

http://www.facebook.com/home.php?#/event.php?eid=84162523306

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What’s Left; ANU Labor Left’s Weekly Wrap

By Ben | March 16, 2009

Comrades,
Welcome to the first edition of What’s Left, ANU Labor Left’s weekly wrap of left wing and progressive issues from around the country and the world. This is your update and it can only get better if you contribute! So please email any articles or local events that you think are interesting to yll.convenor@gmail.com and they will appear in the next edition.
Solidarity,
Ben

AUSTRALIA

The Bradley Review of Higher Education has been out since December. It is essential reading for people concerned about the future of Higher Education in Australia.
http://www.deewr.gov.au/HigherEducation/Review/Pages/default.aspx

The debate between emissions trading and a carbon tax has renewed. Iain MacGill and Regina Betz argue the need for a diverse policy response to mee the challenge of Climate Change.
http://inside.org.au/broadening-australias-response-to-climate-change/

University of Queensland economist John Quiggin questions the need for the Rudd Government’s ‘razor gang’
http://johnquiggin.com/index.php/archives/2009/03/13/wrong-time-for-the-razor-gang/

The Community and Public Sector Union are currently running a campaign against further Public Service job cuts in the next budget. You can find out more by visiting the CPSU website http://www.cpsu.org.au

WORLD

Fiona Osler writing for the UK’s Red Pepper magazine asks the question Do we still need an International Women’s Day?
http://www.redpepper.org.uk/Do-we-still-need-an-International

Robert Kuttner, one of the founders and editors of American Prospect, believes that now is the time to thoroughy remake the US economy. This may influence the way the Rudd government tackles the challenges of the Global Financial Crisis and Climate Chnage here at home.
http://www.prospect.org/cs/articles?article=time_to_think_big

From In These Times, Christopher Weber discusses the new concept of ‘Green Collar’ jobs and explores whether these new jobs and industries will help to lead to a fairer deal for workers in the United States.
http://www.inthesetimes.com/article/4194/green_jobs_for_whom/

ELECTIONS

Queensland State Election:

Anna4Qld: The official campaign website of the Queensland ALP
http://www.anna4qld.com.au

ABC Election coverage
http://www.abc.net.au/elections

Pineapple Party Time: Crikey’s coverage of the Queensland election
http://blogs.crikey.com.au/pollytics/2009/02/25/pineapple-party-time

South Africa:

South Africa have an election coming up on April 22, to follow the lead up to the election check out some of these sites:

Mail and Guardian Online
http://elections.mg.co.za

The Star
http://www.thestar.co.za

Independent Online
http://www.iol.co.za

El Salvador:

Leftist Funes declares himself El-Salvador’s President-Elect
http://www.abc.net.au/news/stories/2009/03/16/2517502.htm

In These Times has a couple of articles discussing the prospects of the left in El Salvador’s elections:

El Salvador’s Left Turn?
http://www.inthesetimes.com/article/4277/el_salvadors_left_turn

El Salvador’s New Left
http://www.inthesetimes.com/article/4067/el_salvadors_new_left

VIDEO OF THE WEEK

Jon Stewart attacks irresponsible business journalists for their lack of foresight whilst interviewing market forecaster and CNBC host Jim Cramer
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wWn7_ih9jew

EVENTS

Quarterly Essay 33
Guy Pearse
Quarry Vision: Coal, Climate Change and the End of the Resources Boom

Join Guy Pearse to discuss his Quarterly Essay Quarry Vision

Date: Wednesday 1 April
Time: 6pm-7.30pm
Venue: Coombs Lecture Theatre, Building 8a, Fellows Rd, ANU
Tickets: Free event, all welcome. Please register attendance for this lecture at www.anu.edu.au/climatechange
Crunchtime;
Australia’s Policy Future
A conference of Australia’s leading progressive thinktanks.
April 22 - 23, Trades Hall Auditorium Sydney
http://www.crunchtime.org.au/

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No to vouchers, no to neoliberalism, no to student politicians!

By admin | December 29, 2008

By Newcastle activist Jonathon Moylan

Universities have long been the testing ground for experiments in neoliberal economic ideas. A classic example is the introduction of Higher Education Workplace Relations Requirements (HEWRRs), which was introduced in universities a year before WorkChoices was introduced. Its intent was to break the influence of the National Tertiary Education Union (NTEU), one of the more progressive organising unions in the country. Although the attempt to break the NTEU failed, the reform seemed successful enough for the government to roll out the Beta-version WorkChoices one year later.

Regional universities like Newcastle are at the highest risk from such reforms. Successive ALP and Coalition governments have aimed to defund regional universities or get them to specialise. The Dawkins reforms, HECS, user-pays, pay-per-student, DUFF and commercialisation all took a heavy toll on the University of Newcastle, which, starved of regional university funding due to government definitions of “regional”, suffered a severe funding crisis in 2005. A quarter of all staff (including both academic and administrative staff, covered by the CPSU) were forced into “voluntary” redundancy packages, and heavy course cuts were made, particularly in the humanities. This funding crisis occurred during the same year as the introduction of the HEWRRS and VSU, which had a severe impact on student unions and led to partially student-controlled services being replaced with corporations.
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Their Targets; Our Future

By Ben | December 11, 2008

A message from the youth climate coalition:

“As many of you would have heard on Monday Penny Wong will be releasing her white paper and the Australian Youth Climate Coalition anticipates carbon reduction targets of only 15%. This breaks a key promise of the Rudd Government that got elected in Australia’s first Climate Change election and shows that they are more committed to the next election then they are to the next generation.

“So let’s show them what breaking a promise to Australia’s young people means. Join us on Monday the 15th of December at the National Press Club at 11 am so we can tell Penny Wong and Kevin Rudd that they need to aim higher with their targets because our future is in their hands. So in other words:

Time: 11am
Where: National Press Club
Why: Because we need real action on climate change.

RSVP on Facebook.

Visit the Australian Youth Climate Coalition.

For more information please contact sara at sara@youthclimatecoalition.org and call 0423060587 or Jess at jess.willis@youthclimatecoalition.org or 0416 612 025

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Killing off Campus Dissent

By Ben | December 9, 2008

Peter Quiddington | Peer Review

Student activists – and perhaps anyone with a dissenting voice on Australian campuses – face a new order of administrative resistance. Decimated by VSU legislation student groups are now more likely to face disciplinary action when they speak out against their own institutions. It is becoming common practice for university administrations to use misconduct rules to intimidate students, even when this means trampling upon conventions of free speech.

The row at Murdoch University, reported in the The Australian,
between the student guild and the Chancellor, Terry Budge, is only one case where the administration has used a heavy hand to control the course of campus politics. In this instance the university made it clear that the guild would have it funds cut unless it toned down its public criticisms of the institution. When this became more generally known Mr Budge – the former CEO of BankWest – retreated from his position, conceding that he had been ‘letting off steam’. Interestingly, Budge is one of Australia’s new breed of ‘Corporate Chancellors’ who are more at home dealing with boardroom battles than the conventions of campus politics.

PeerReview observed first hand a classic case of institutional bullying at the University of New England in September when students there began organising a protest rally to coincide with the University’s Open Day, to protest the continued presence of Chancellor, John Cassidy. The idea was to draw public attention to the fact that the university community, staff and students, had all called on Cassidy to resign. Cassidy has become the most infamous of corporate chancellors, having lost the confidence of staff by wading into the everyday management of the institution, while thoroughly neglecting his ceremonial duties.

Not long after planning began the message began filtering through to the organizers that their protest was not a good idea, as it could threaten enrolments. Initially, this came from other students, employed part time in the marketing section. Union officials then joined in, suggesting that the protest could trigger disciplinary action under the university’s recently revised misconduct rules. The organizers remained steadfast in their plans, though some became nervous after being warned directly not to take part as this could have serious consequences, relating to their academic status. For instance, one student was warned by a residential manager that their scholarship donor might be ‘very disappointed’ if they were to take part. As Open Day approached, the protest was becoming much less about the corporate antics of the Chancellor, and more about systematic intimidation of students and their right to free expression.

For many, this only increased their resolve, as they continued to call for a ‘Real Open Day’. By this time, upper management realised that their premier marketing day could turn very ugly. At that point, the main organizers were called into the Chancellery and told that there had clearly been some ‘miscommunication’. Of course they had the university’s full support to hold a rally, as long as it was not disruptive.

On the day, the protesters were escorted in their march by security guards. When they arrived at the university quadrangle their chanting was drowned out by the thumping sounds of the DJ’s gigantic speakers. And, there were many other non-curricula activities available to distract prospective students, including mechanical bucking machine. What better way is there to keep those inquisitive minds well clear of civil disobedience?

Also in regional NSW, there has been great controversy at the University of Newcastle, where student representative Jonathan Moylan was threatened with disciplinary action for speaking out – albeit in a fairly forthright manner ¬– about the university’s ‘environmental vandalism’ as reported in the The Newcastle Herald.
Moylan sent out an in internal email to colleagues which was later copied and broadcast more generally, landing on the desk of the Vice Chancellor, Nick Saunders. It contained a number of allegations about the university, including the way in which it had allowed academic expertise in the area of environmental management to dissipate.

The comments reflected poorly on Saunders who demanded an apology and an unreserved retraction. Moylan was forthcoming with an apology, as it related to errors of fact, but he did not withdraw his comments unreservedly. Instead, he stuck to his guns on a number of points which he saw as fair comment. He also maintained that he was well within his rights to circulate this kind of information internally.

It was fortunate that sanity prevailed and when the disciplinary committee heard the case, in early December, and concluded that the matter did not amount to misconduct. Whatever dispute existed over matters of fact contained within Moylan’s email correspondence, the substance of the matter was ‘not detrimental to the proper conduct of the university’.

Indeed, it could be argued that the proper conduct of any university is to promote rigorous debate, and to accommodate conflicting views. This is the nature of academic life, yet in each of these cases, and in many other small instances across the country, there has been a trend towards closing down discussion and stifling dissent with the heavy-handed use of regulation.

This is one of the ugly sides of the new corporatism in universities, in that it too easily steps over the line of demarcation between academic democracy and corporate administration. If the idea of the corporate university is to survive, and if the emerging breed of corporate university leaders are to find a place in academe, they may need to learn how to encourage academic dissent in ways that it becomes an asset, rather than being perceived as a liability.

Peter Quiddington

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Whacking the Labor Party

By admin | September 29, 2008

Meredith Burgmann | New Matilda

Development scandals, Underpants Guy and a strong swing towards the Greens: things are looking dire for Labor in NSW. ALP candidate for Lord Mayor of Sydney, Meredith Burgmann, gets the message - and reflects on where to from here

As expected, the Labor Party did extremely badly in the NSW local Government elections on 13 September. They polled particularly poorly in the inner city of Sydney. This area, which comprises five state seats, is socially progressive, yuppy and increasingly prosperous. Solid base Labor voters, public housing tenants and ethnic communities are being squeezed out as gentrification takes over.

The Labor Party lost the majority of its votes to the Greens and left-leaning Independents. However, premature backslapping by the Greens in anticipation of the holy grail of lower house parliamentary seats is still premature.

It is very clear that the educated, informed and picky voters of the inner city make great distinctions when they cast their vote. The voters wanted to whack the Labor Party and they had their baseball bats ready. The council elections were quite clearly a referendum on the performance of the state Labor Government.

There could not have been a worse week for the election to have taken place. The state Government appeared to be in meltdown losing the Premier, Deputy Premier, Treasurer and several senior ministers in lightning succession in the week prior to the election. Then, two days before polling day, it was revealed that the new Police Minister had cavorted in green speedos on a couch in his Parliamentary office.

“Underpants guy”, as he is now known, probably cost the Labor teams that extra percentage that would have got many of them over the line. For instance, in the City of Sydney, the Labor pre-poll vote in the two weeks before election day was 8 per cent higher than its vote on the day itself.

In the City of Sydney, which comprises 22 suburbs, another interesting statistic was that I as the Lord Mayoral candidate polled much stronger than the Labor team as a whole. I outpolled the Green candidate by 15 per cent whereas the Greens as a party outpolled us by a similar amount. Our voters were happy to vote for me as a long-time lefty and anti-developer activist but could not bring themselves to put pen to paper for a team simply shown as “Labor”. This illustrates the electorate’s ability to make distinctions between individuals and the party and does not bode well for future forays by the Greens into Labor heartland.

Choosing good candidates is a problem for the Greens. Although Labor as a brand is on the nose, Labor individuals can still be widely popular and voted for in the inner city. It is an extremely informed electorate, the “chatterati” is in fact a good description.

The individual performance is important and therefore the two state seats most at threat from a Greens or left Independent challenge are unlikely to fall. The two sitting Labor members are widely respected and now very senior in the Labor leadership.

Carmel Tebbutt the Member for Marrickville is the Deputy Premier and Verity Firth the Member for Balmain is the Minister for Education. Both have strong left wing credentials and good local support. Two years is a long time in politics and those issues which were most raised by voters as we doorknocked the city area may well have faded into the background by the time the next state election in March 2011 comes around.

The latest shift against Labor in the inner city began when the Planning Minister Frank Sartor, pushed by Iemma, started to “reform” the planning laws. With no political skills of persuasion or negotiation, Sartor was simply perceived as corrupt by the public and quickly became a whipping boy for the media.

This underlying uneasiness about the ALP and developers was further nurtured in February when the Wollongong scandal hit the headlines. Wollongong Councillors, some of them Labor, were found to have corruptly supported developments which were quite clearly contrary to planning guidelines.

Thus the ever-present inner city fear that if you voted Labor you would get a ten storey block of flats next door now seemed even more real. Lord Mayor Clover Moore and the Greens were adept at pushing this perception helped by an increasingly anti-Labor media.

More subliminal but also important was the view that the blokey “tribal” culture of the Right faction of the Labor Party had got out of hand. The fact that Labor now has a Left wing leadership and many senior women in charge will help in the long run but in the short term it made no difference.

The Greens are beginning to experience the problems that come with a maturing party and an increased number of elected representatives. While they previously took upon themselves the easy role of oppositionists, they are now in the position of having to make decisions. Previously they have shown that they are not immune from making pragmatic deals, even with the Liberals, in order to gain office. The more they act like a political party the more they will be seen as similar to the despised Labor Party.

One of the problems the Greens have had is the inability to attract and preselect quality candidates. There are many occasions when the Labor Party has breathed a sigh of relief upon hearing which candidate has been chosen by the Greens. The Greens work on a strict numbers-based preselection process which as the Labor Party has discovered does not always turn up the best candidate. Those that are good at numbers games are rewarded.

It will be interesting to see if the new Left Rees/Tebbutt leadership can turn around the fortunes of the Labor party and hold the expected swing against a 16-year-old Government to a respectable 4 or 5 per cent. If that can be achieved and Firth and Tebbutt run strong personality-based campaigns, the ALP will keep their inner city seats.

For the Rees/Tebbutt leadership to get the breathing space to make the policy changes to which they are committed, important decisions need to be made by the Party. They must immediately move to ban developer donations to political parties and they must wipe out that blokey tribalistic culture typified by Joe Tripodi and Eddie Obeid.

If this does not happen our longsuffering loyal inner city voters will never return to us.

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Labor Scraps Howard Tampa Laws

By admin | August 1, 2008

In one of its most significant moves yet, the Rudd Labor Government has scrapped the Howard era refugee laws which saw thousands of asylum seekers held in Mandatory Detention. Under the old laws asylum seekers were removed from support and scrutiny, suffering physical and mental health issues in remote detention camps like the razor-wired “Baxter” facility.

The laws were long criticised by human rights groups, government discrimination agencies and refugee groups such as Labor for Refugees.

In announcing the new laws, which will see refugees primarily living under supported care arrangements in the community, Minister Chris Evans said explicitly that Labor was adopting a “more humane approach”. He said Labor hoped the changes would result in people not being held in long-term detention and that Department on Immigration officials would have to “justify” any detention order. As Evans said: “Currently the presumption is that people be detained. We’re reversing the onus of proof if you like, and the Department will have to prove there is a good reason why people should be detained.”

These new processes would see only those who are a security or health risk detained. The changes have been welcomed by Refugee support groups. Dr Graham Thom from Amnesty International said: “This is a very fundamental change because really for the last 15 years Australia has reserved the right to mandatorily detain somebody simply based on their lack of a visa and wanting to keep them in detention for as long as possible.” Dr Thom highlighted how far behind the rest of the world Australia fell in this area under Howard.

“Hopefully these changes will bring Australia in line with other western democracies and into line with our international obligations,” he said. Under the changes asylum seekers denied a visa will be offered legal assistance and efforts will be made to shorten detention periods. The significance of the changes cannot be over-stated. These moves represent the complete repudiation of the Howard “Tampa” laws, and the restoration of respect for international law at the heart of Australia’s refugee program. Under the Howard Government asylum seekers were used as a political weapon, whipping up anti-refugee sentiment in the national security climate of 2001.

Along with Labor’s commitment to abolish the so-called “Pacific Solution” and to end Temporary Protection Visas (TPVs) the changes announced by Minister Evans will significantly improve the conditions of asylum seekers in this country. They write a significant wrong, and provide another reason why the election of a Labor Government was so important in 2007. You can email your support for the change to Minister for Immigration Chris Evans here: senator.evans@aph.gov.au

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Victorian TAFEs matter

By admin | July 30, 2008

The Victorian Government proposes to more than double fees and introduce a learning entitlement “voucher” system without widespread public debate and consultation. We need genuine community debate on this important issue.

By increasing fees for TAFE students, the Victorian Government is breaking an election promise it made at the 2006 election to: “ensure TAFE entry costs are not a barrier to participation by students from disadvantaged groups”.

The proposed introduction of a “learning entitlement” system is really just an education voucher under a different name. Education vouchers will lead to the effective privatisation of the TAFE system, as the government provides funding to profit-seeking private operators instead of underfunded public TAFEs. Vouchers will also increase costs for students once they have used up all of their “entitlements” and be required to pay full-fees - more than $2000 in some cases.

The Victorian Government is using the skills shortage as an excuse to change the TAFE funding structure. The Victorian Government has not explained how increasing fees would encourage more students to enter TAFE, or its impact on low-income families. It has not explained how it would avoid job losses. It has not explained how standards and quality would be maintained under a privatised system.

Students of all persuasions should get involved in this campaign. Click the banner above to find out more.

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A values statement

By Young Labor Left | April 16, 2008

This is the preamble for the 2008 Compass Conference. So much is happening in the UK Left at the moment with a lot of new ideas being framed and debated publicly. Anyone interested in the future direction of the Left should pay keen attention to the UK. www.compassonline.org.uk

Why EQUALITY MATTERS - Born Free and Equal

Equality runs through everything Compass believes in and touches upon every issue - from housing, to workers rights, from poverty to life chances, from education to health: the solution and answer to every major domestic policy challenge we face should be whether or not the solution creates a more equal and fairer society.

Creating a more equal society is therefore the greatest challenge the Left faces - Britain is a hideously unequal society and is getting more so by the day. The poor are not treading water but sinking beneath the rising tide of the rich and the middle classes are struggling too. Working harder to keep up on the treadmill of the learn-to-earn consumer society is driving a social recession and deepening inequalities. If the Daily Mail can campaign against the greed and distorting affects of private equity houses then why can’t Labour?

The fundamental goal of social democracy is equality, not because we value equality for its own sake, but because inequality limits life chances and life expectancy. It is not good enough to slow down the rate at which the gap between the rich and the poor is growing. The trend towards greater inequality has to be halted and reversed. After a decade in power the Labour government has made progress in some areas, but it has not delivered anywhere near enough or fast enough.

The purpose of this year’s Compass National Conference will be to make the case for a more equal society and help change the terms of debate towards greater radicalism in delivering greater equality for all across a broad range of domestic policy areas. We believe everyone in life should be Born Free Equal.

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The Camp for Climate Action

By admin | April 15, 2008

climate camp

When: 10 - 15 July 2008

Where: Newcastle, NSW

When the laws are unjust or are destroying our future, people of conscience have a responsibility to act. It’s just as true now as it was in the 1700’s when Irish politician Edmund Burke said “The only thing necessary for the triumph of evil is for good people to do nothing.”

Climate change is already resulting in more extreme weather events, and, if it reaches the tipping point that many scientists fear, we will be living in a very different world from the one our parents grew up in. Runaway global warming will be violent. Rising sea levels, acidified oceans, drought and extreme weather are violent disruptions that scientists predict will result in mass extinctions and massive displacement of people. It’s serious, and we have a rapidly closing window to make deep cuts in greenhouse emissions.

At this point, we don’t just need a 20% renewable energy target. We don’t need people just to buy energy efficient light bulbs. We need a radical and urgent transition plan to a green economy. We need to ban new coal fired power stations and coal mines. The transition away from destructive industries and their replacement with efficient, sustainable alternatives needs to be the basis of the next industrial revolution.

And what do we have? We have our Governments taking us in exactly the opposite direction. We have both major political parties supporting a massive expansion of the coal industry, with a doubling of the export capacity of the World’s largest coal port in Newcastle. Coal is the dirtiest fossil fuel, to state the obvious we cannot stop climate change and expand the coal industry. The disconnection between the reality of climate change and our political leadership is stark. We’ve sat through twenty years of blah blah blah - making submissions to government processes, endlessly providing evidence and arguing the science. We need action, and we need it now.

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