Health

Aged residents in care are dying at alarming rates from COVID-19, while the Prime Minister wastes precious time trying to convince us that the system is not in crisis.

The new exemptions to Public Health Orders which can force sick workers to work represent a serious attack on workers' rights and their health and safety. Workers and our unions need to draw a line.

These two resolutions lay out Socialist Alliance's position on some of the current issues related to dealing with COVID-19.

It’s obvious that the corporate-profits-first logic is incapable of dealing with the challenge of COVID-19 efficiently or fairly.

Even though different state governments are taking slightly different approaches, the reason for this debate is that governments — state and federal — are making corporate interests a higher priority than people’s health.

The aggressive police operation to “combat” the COVID-19 outbreak in Sydney’s South West is yet another example of politicians’ racist, anti-working class and punitive handling of the pandemic.

Victim blaming helps deflect from a focus on the need for systemic changes. It is intentional on the part of the corporate media and governments that are looking for cover.

Eliminating Covid-19 is a long-term project that requires public support meaning that any lockdowns or restrictions of movement cannot be based on a punitive, a paternalistic or discriminatory approach.

The Victorian lockdown of public housing estates was scapegoating and victimisation of migrants and poor working-class people. It revealed the government’s racist and patronising assumption that these people are incapable of understanding, or complying with, public health messages voluntarily.

Home Affairs Minister Peter Dutton is using the COVID-19 pandemic to push through amendments to security laws that would further erode people’s rights and which are not proportionate to any particular threat.

We are calling on unions to campaign around the following 10-point plan to ensure that any lifting of restrictions protects lives and livelihoods and not just a return to business as usual

Morrison has long made clear that he has no intention of trying to eliminate COVID-19 entirely. He justifies this by saying the economic cost — that is, the cost to corporate profits — is too high.