The National Disability Insurance Scheme, now to be known as DisabilityCare, has become a central theme of Australia’s national debate. This is a tribute to the many thousands of people who have campaigned tirelessly for better support for and inclusion of people with disabilities in society.
Social Justice
As the 2013 federal budget looms, both the Labor government and the Opposition insist on the need to cut social spending.
Australia is a wealthy nation built on stolen Aboriginal land and resources. But Aboriginal people score lowest in health, education, employment and housing.
A Third World country suffering rising violence, rapes, political corruption and plagued by endemic diseases such as cholera and malaria will be the new dumping ground for Australia's refugee arrivals.
“The Gillard government should quit stalling. ALP MPs should vote en bloc for the Greens MP Adam Bandt’s equal marriage rights bill on June 6”, said Peter Boyle, the Socialist Alliance candidate for Sydney.
Australia became one of the first countries in the world to introduce a single mothers’ benefit in 1973. This was extended to single fathers in 1977.
Sam Wainwright is a Socialist Alliance councillor in Fremantle. Below is a talk he gave on the topic of how to achieve social change in Australia.
Where to start with an analysis of the mining boom in Australia? Perhaps ironically, with the Independent Commission Against Corruption.
Federal independent MPs, Tony Windsor and Rob Oakeshott, have put pressure on the Julia Gillard's government to raise the Goods and Services Tax and to slash so called “middle class welfare” entitlements.
Reporting on the release of the mid-year budget update in the Canberra Times on October 22, Peter Martin wrote that “Tax collections from both wages and the GST are running ahead of projections. Dramatically lower company tax collections account for most of the $21 billion write-down.”
Socialist Alliance campaigns for enforceable anti-discrimination legislation to protect lesbians, gay men, bisexuals, people living with HIV and trans and intersex people.
Women who wear the hijab, niqab or burqa are bearing the brunt of the rise of racism against people of Muslim faith or those from a Middle Eastern background since the terrorist attacks in the US on September 1, 2001.