On December 19, the NSW Industrial Relations Commission (IRC) granted public and private sector teachers a 5.5% interim pay rise.
Two days earlier, the IRC had granted public hospital nurses a 3.5% pay rise from January 1. As part of its "What's a
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Dieter Kursietis, Seoul
A demonstration by more than 100 members and supporters of the Equality Trade Union Migrants Branch (ETU-MB), South Korea's only migrant workers' trade union, was held on December 31 at the Mok-dong immigration office. The
On December 26, the city of Bam in south-eastern Iran was hit by a massive earthquake, destroying around 80% of the city's buildings. By January 2, Iranian authorities had estimated that the quake had claimed the lives of 26,500 people — a quarter
BY PETER BOYLE
At its 21st Congress, held December 27-30, the Democratic Socialist Party changed its name to the "Democratic Socialist Perspective" and reorganised itself as a political tendency in the Socialist Alliance. Only Socialist Alliance
Tressell: The Real Story of the Ragged Trousered PhilanthropistsBy Dave HarkerZed Books, 2003282 pages, $33.95 (pb)
REVIEW BY PHIL SHANNON
"It made me cry and made me bitter", recalled a socialist who read The Ragged Trousered Philanthropists as
Rohan Pearce
On January 6, the US Army's news service reported that the defence department intended to extend its "stop loss" orders covering active-duty soldiers deployed in Iraq and Afghanistan, preventing some 7000 soldiers from either retiring
Jeff Shantz, Toronto
On December 11, tens of thousands of workers across Quebec province took direct action against the newly elected government of Premier Jean Charest. Charest's Liberal Party government is taking its cue from other neoliberal
John Percy & Graham Matthews
Dot Tumney, a long-term member of the Democratic Socialist Party (DSP), passed away on December 25. She had been diagnosed with terminal cancer a few weeks earlier.
Dot was a committed activist and Marxist
Tim Stewart
Family, friends and East Timor solidarity activists were shocked to hear of the sudden death of Andrew McNaughtan, at the age of 49, on December 22.
A tireless campaigner for human rights and justice in East Timor, the scope of
Grant Brookes, Wellington
"The Alliance is a broad inclusive party of the Left with policies based on socialist principles: democracy, equality and social ownership." This is the opening statement of a working manifesto adopted by around 70 party
Perry Brown, Newcastle
Refugee rights activist Steve Georgopoulos is organising a flotilla of yachts to sail to the Pacific island state of Nauru as a gesture of solidarity with the remaining asylum seekers imprisoned there by the Howard
Cast AwayDirected by Robert ZemeckisWith Tom Hanks and Helen HuntWritten by William Broyles JuniorReleased on Universal Pictures DVD
REVIEW BY LOUIS PROYECT
Director Robert Zemeckis' Cast Away, made in 2000 and starring Tom Hanks as an air-crash
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