In the 2010 Victorian elections the Greens scored about 30% of the vote in each of the Labor-held inner-city seats of Brunswick, Richmond and Melbourne.
They are campaigning hard to break into the Legislative Assembly in all three in the November 29 election. A poll reported in the November 7 Age predicted Greens wins in Richmond and Melbourne, but was not conducted in Brunswick.
Tim Read, a medical doctor and researcher, is the Greens candidate for Brunswick. He believes that parliament should stand up to big business.
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Stephen Jolly, the Socialist Party candidate for Richmond, is a high profile activist with electoral runs on the board.
He came to prominence with the campaign to reopen Richmond Secondary College in the early 1990s, and has been on the frontlines of many campaigns in Melbourne鈥檚 inner north since, including recent efforts to stop the East West Link and to defend public housing.
Kyol Blakeney was elected President of the Student Representative Council (SRC) at the University of Sydney last month and the makeup of the new council promises a fresh approach to student politics.
Blakeney鈥檚 election win marks the first Grassroots and non-Labor candidate to run the SRC in 14 years. One of his main aims as president next year is to create more affordable living circumstances for students.
Labor and Coalition candidates avoided participating in a climate change election forum held on November 12 in the marginal Labor/Greens seat of Northcote.
Last week local climate group, Darebin Climate Action Now (DCAN) held a mock climate forum outside Northcote Town Hall, with empty chairs for Labor and Liberal candidates. DCAN members held a banner: 鈥淲ho is dodging climate debate?鈥
As one Liberal Party insider Sunday Age recently: 鈥淭he last thing the Coalition wants to do is to draw attention to environment policy, because there isn鈥檛 one."
Next year will see the 800th anniversary of Magna Carta, the charter of rights that the barons of old England forced King John to sign when they cornered him at Runnymede-on-Thames in 1215.
While we may doubt that the barons intended that the rights they sought should apply to ordinary folk, Magna Carta nevertheless effectively introduced the legal concept of the presumption of innocence 鈥 the principle that an accused person is innocent until found guilty beyond reasonable doubt by a jury.
The Victorian Coalition government looks set to go down in an ignominious defeat at the November 29 state election.
Several recent polls have given Labor a healthy lead of about 56% to 44% in two-party preferred terms.
The Coalition was narrowly elected 鈥 to everyone鈥檚 surprise (including their own) 鈥 in 2010, and thus look like being the first one-term government in Victoria since 1955.
Supporters of women's reproductive rights gathered outside NSW Parliament on November 13. The push to amend the NSW Crimes Act to grant a foetus personhood rights is likely to collapse after a controversial Private Member鈥檚 Bill failed to be debated in the Legislative Council.
This statement was released on November 12 by Socialist Alliance candidate for Pascoe Vale, Sean Brocklehurst, and Socialist Alliance candidate for Geelong, Sarah Hathway, in the November 29 Victorian elections.
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Ford, General Motors Holden and Toyota all plan to close their vehicle manufacturing operations in Australia over the next two or three years. Tens of thousands of workers will lose their jobs in car factories and in factories making car components.
In February, an immigration database containing the identities of almost 10,000 asylum seekers was mistakenly published on the department鈥檚 website.
An investigation by another government office found the immigration department 鈥渂reached the Privacy Act by failing to put in place reasonable security safeguards to protect the personal information it held against loss, unauthorised access, use, modification or disclosure and against other misuse鈥.
The Asylum Seeker Resource Centre released the statement below on November 12 in response to the commissioner鈥檚 findings.
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About 2000 people gathered at Roma St Forum in Brisbane for the Peoples' March against the G20 Summit on November 15.
The Tony Abbott government has refused to establish a Royal Commission into the Commonwealth Bank, despite the clear recommendation of a landmark Senate inquiry into financial planning scandals at the CBA.
"The inquiry, which spanned 12 months and attracted a record number of submissions, scrutinised the performance of the corporate regulator [the Australian Securities and Investments Commission (ASIC)] in the wake of revelations by a whistleblower of misconduct and fraud in CBA's financial planning arm," the October 24 Sydney Morning Herald reported.
Pride
Directed by Matthew Warchus
Written by Stephen Beresford
Starring Bill Nighy, Imelda Staunton, Dominic West & Ben Schnetzer
In Australian cinemas now
If you haven't seen the recently released Pride yet, you need to get to a cinema. It'll moisten your eyes, swell your heart, make you tap your feet and inspire you to join the next pride parade.
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