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In late May, Kangan TAFE Institute announced that due to budget cuts the Diploma of Auslan was no longer viable and would close in December 2012. The Diploma of Auslan (Australian Sign Language ) is a two-year, full time course and the only one available in Victoria. On completion of this course, most students will undertake the Auslan Interpreter course at RMIT or Macquarie University to become sign language interpreters to the deaf community.
The Gurindji people of Daguragu and Kalkarinji in the Northern Territory . * * * The Gurindji people at Daguragu and Kalkaringi are today calling on the government to get rid of the 鈥淪tronger Futures鈥 laws.
Several hundred workers from the Queensland Department of Communities rallied in Queens Park on June 13 to oppose job cuts in the sector. The unionists condemned the state Liberal-National government's plan to sack about 1300 temporary contract workers employed in the communities area. The state government's special audit team, headed by former Liberal Party federal treasurer Peter Costello, issued its interim report on June 15, claiming the previous Bligh Labor government had financed almost all its infrastructure spending from state debt.
O鈥橣arrell plans to axe 10,000 jobs The June 12 Coalition NSW government budget outlined plans to cut 10,000 public sector jobs, on top of 5000 sackings already announced, and slash more than $1 billion from government programs. But the government refused to say where to job losses will be. The Labor opposition called the cuts a 鈥渂etrayal of firefighters, hospital cleaners and teachers鈥. The budget also projected the leasing of Port Kembla鈥檚 shipping terminal to private interests, adding to existing plans to lease Port Botany.
Aboriginal resistance leaders Tunnerminnerwait and Maulboyheener where executed in Melbourne in 1842. They where sentenced to death for their resistance against the colonial settlers鈥 drive to take over their land. However, today they are not remembered as heroes. Rather, they are hardly remembered at all. Aboriginal rights supporters have organised commemorations for the two men for the past seven years, but a campaign for a permanent public memorial had gone an unanswered, until now.
Journalists and editorial staff at Fairfax media walked off the job for 36 hours on May 30 in response to an outsourcing scheme announced by management. Workers from the Sydney Morning Herald, the Melbourne Age, Newcastle Herald, Illawarra Mercury, Sun Herald, Canberra Times and Australian Financial Review took part in the stoppage. Sixty-six subediting jobs at the Newcastle Herald, Mercury and seven associated community newspapers would be moved to a New Zealand office of Fairfax Media.
The National Tertiary Education Union (NTEU) . * * * The National Tertiary Education Union (NTEU) has condemned today鈥檚 announcement by the ANU Vice-Chancellor Ian Young to savagely cut the School of Music.
The released the statement below on June 15. * * * WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange has lost his final British appeal against extradition and will be sent by force to Sweden within a matter of days. Australians are taking to the streets to demand the Australian government act immediately to prevent the injustice and harm facing Assange. In Sweden, Assange will be held in pre-trial detention indefinitely, incommunicado and in solitary confinement for up to 23 hours a day.
The problem with censorship is

Once again we have seen the spectacle of the Jewish leadership banning dissenting Jews from their annual festival of ideas, Limmud Oz. Organisers of this year鈥檚 conference held last weekend in Melbourne told the co-ordinators of a workshop on a new book, Beyond Tribal Loyalties, that their session would not be included.

Hundreds of people rallied outside the Western Australia parliament on June 13 to protest the planned redevelopment of Perth鈥檚 foreshore. The protest was . A speech given at the rally by campaigner Ken Eastwood appears below. * * * The Colin Barnett government鈥檚 decision to divert thousands of vehicles into our already overstressed road systems defies belief.
Firefighters

About 7000 union and community activists braved heavy rain in Sydney to protest against the NSW government's plans to undermine workers' compensation and entitlements on June 13. They chanted 鈥渟hame, Barry, shame鈥 and 鈥渋njured workers in his sights, taking away our compo rights鈥.

Thousands of workers braved torrential rain to tell Barry O'Farrell and the NSW Government exactly what they think of the proposed attacks on workers compensation.