Outback Work-for-the-Dole Scheme Discriminates Against Indigenous Communities
The federal government’s outback work-for-the-dole scheme is wreaking havoc in remote Indigenous communities. Introduced on July 1 2015, the Community Development Program (CDP) has been labelled an overly punitive scheme that may breach the Racial Discrimination Act. The program currently...
Silencing Dissent: Myanmar Authorities Arrest Journalists
At around 3.30pm on June 26, a group of seven people were arrested by Myanmar authorities at a military checkpoint in the country’s conflict-ridden northern Shan state. Three local journalists were among the group who were detained in Namhsan township...
Australian Transgender Laws Are a Violation of Human Rights
On March 17, the United Nations Committee on Human Rights in Geneva ruled Australian laws that require married transgender people to get a divorce if they want to change the sex on their birth certificates are in violation of international human...
Driver Who Collided with Cyclists Appeals Sentence
On 16 March 2014, Thomas Kerr was travelling in his black 4-wheel drive northbound along Southern Cross Drive in Eastlakes, when he ran into the back of seven cyclists from the Eastern Suburbs Cycling Club. It was a dry day,...
Curbing Homelessness: An Interview with Senator Lee Rhiannon
On June 24, City of Sydney rangers moved in to shut down Sydney’s 24-7 Street Kitchen and Safe Space, which had been operating in the CBD since December. The operation had been providing free meals for the city’s needy, and...
Crimes Against Humanity: The British Empire
It was the largest empire ever to have existed. And as the saying used to go, the sun never sets on the British Empire. At its height in 1922, the colonial power was lording it over a fifth of the world’s...
NSW Police Given Power to Kill with Impunity
The Berejiklian government has continued on in the Coalition’s tradition over recent years of enacting laws that increase police powers, whilst whittling away at civil liberties, all in the name of a perceived terrorist threat. On June 21, the Terrorism Legislation Amendment...
Stop the Intervention: An Interview with Indigenous Social Justice Association’s Ken Canning
Ten years ago, the Howard government sent the army into 73 remote Aboriginal communities in the Northern Territory. It was a move many described as an act of war. Officially known as the ‘Northern Territory National Emergency Response’, the intervention...
Police Arrest Patient For Possessing Medicinal Cannabis: An Interview with MCUA’s Deb Lynch
On June 19, Queensland police arrested Deb Lynch, secretary of the Medicinal Cannabis Users Association of Australia (MCUA), on charges of possessing a dangerous drug. Several officers were at her Cornubia residence on a different matter, when they noticed her...
A Victory for the Street Kitchen and Safe Space, As Government Provides Housing
In an unprecedented move, Housing NSW has “throw out the rule book” and offered housing to the rough sleepers who’ve been staying overnight at Sydney’s 24-7 Street Kitchen and Safe Space. On Saturday, City of Sydney council workers and NSW...
