Tens of thousands of people gathered at vigils around Australia over the weekend of February 22 to 23 to protest the brutal killing of asylum seeker Reza Berati inside the Manus Island detention camp in Papua New Guinea.
Energy
Socialist Alliance Victoria statement on the fire in the Hazelwood coal mine
Another round of United Nations climate talks were being negotiated in Warsaw, Poland, this week when the strongest typhoon recorded to hit land swept across the Philippines before moving on to Vietnam.
The Socialist Alliance says: Bring the mining industry, the big banks and the energy companies under public/community ownership and control, so that they can be run in a way that respects Aboriginal rights, the environment and social justice.
Socialist Alliance will run three candidates in the March 9 elections in Western Australia. The main message of the campaign is that the state government should take steps to bring the big mining companies operating in the state into public ownership.
Where to start with an analysis of the mining boom in Australia? Perhaps ironically, with the Independent Commission Against Corruption.
The mining industry in Australia has boomed from about 4% of GDP in 2004 to about 9% today. Mining exports in the year to March last year were worth $155 billion, or 53% of Australia's total exports.