Category Archives: Australia
Dutch Super-Trawler Arrives in Tasmania
[ABC Radio National - Background Briefing] Tasmania’s fishers are up in arms over the arrival of a Dutch super trawler, the FV Margiris. These boats are blamed around the world for overfishing and Tasmania’s anglers are convinced the super trawler will deplete local populations of fish and in doing so drive away the prized blue-fin […]
Mabo: 20 Years Later
At least the South Africans acknowledged the ownership of 400,000 square miles of South Africa by the original native inhabitants. We would regard [Ian Smith, the then Prime Minister of Rhodesia] as going entirely berserk in Rhodesia if he acknowledged no native land rights at all. But the position in Australia is that we acknowledge […]
Barbaro sentenced to life in jail
The drugs were found packed in more than 3,000 tomato tins in a shipping container.(Australian Customs) [ABC] It can now be revealed that drug king-pin Pasquale Barbaro, of Griffith, in New South Wales, is serving a life sentence for importing the world’s biggest ecstasy haul into Australia. A suppression order on the sentence was lifted […]
Residents vs McDonald’s | RN
Background Briefing (Radio National) A group of residents in Adelaide have opened a new front against the fast food giant. They’re trying to stop a McDonald’s restaurant opening opposite a school, arguing it will raise childhood obesity rates in the area. This may be the first time an urban planning court in Australia has looked […]
Background Briefing: Opting Out and Staying Home
[Radio National- Background Briefing] As the new school year begins more than 50,000 Australian children will be kept at home, to be taught by their parents. The home-schooling movement is growing rapidly but the majority of the arrangements are illegal, because the parents refuse to register with education departments. The authorities appear reluctant to prosecute […]
Bess Price: welcome to my world
[Radio National - Background Briefing] Warlpiri woman Bess Nungarrayi Price gives a personal account of the way violence has ripped apart her family, and others, in Aboriginal communities of Central Australia. Bess and her white husband, Dave, argue passionately for the right of people in these communities to live without the fear of violence, and for children in remote […]
V8 driver Jason Richards dies
[ABC/AAP] V8 Supercar driver Jason Richards has died after a 14-month battle with cancer. V8 Supercar officials and Holden confirmed the 35-year-old from New Zealand died on Thursday night at his home in Melbourne. He had been fighting a rare and aggressive form of cancer called adrenocortical carcinoma. Richards was a three-time Bathurst 1000 runner-up, […]
School For Killers | ABC
[Jeff Thompson, ABC News Online Investigative Unit] More than 35 violent deaths in Australia have been linked to men who attended the same, often brutal, boys’ home when they were teenagers, an ABC investigation has confirmed. Keith Kelly, Bob Connare, Lloyd George and Bob McCluland talk about their degrading experiences at the Institution for Boys […]
Julian Assange Poster Campaign, Victoria, Australia
[justice4assange] Australians: how to take practical Action to support Julian Assange. 12 December 2011: Attorney General Robert McClelland is replaced by Nicola Roxon. Please write a letter to the new Attorney General: she has the power to change the handling of the Assange matter. She can break with McClelland’s legacy. Copy in your local MP and PM Gillard (see […]
Another Facebook scam .. Free JB Hi-Fi voucher
[zdnet - Emil Protilinski] Facebook scammers are once again exploiting ignorant victims with claims of a free voucher giveaway on the social network. You cannot get a free voucher to the Australian electronics chain JB Hi-Fi; the story is false. This version says something along the lines of “Happy Christmas! Free $200 Jb Hi Fi […]
Occupy: a global moment or a movement? | ABC
[Radio National - Background Briefing] It started with a bang in Wall Street and spread to over a hundred cities worldwide. But, as the novelty wears off, the tent city occupations are facing their own crunch time with the weather, the police and internal disagreements threatening their survival. Reporter, Hagar Cohen… | play mp3 | Check […]
Australian Exceptionalism
[MeFi] Australian Exceptionalism ”Let that phrase roll off your tongue… now stop laughing if you can.” We’ll often laugh at the cognitive dissonance displayed by our American cousins when they start banging on about American Exceptionalism – waxing lyrical about the assumed ascendency of their national exploits while they’re forced to take out a second mortgage to […]
Ned Kelly’s last wish to be granted
[Herald Sun] Ned Kelly’s final wish has been granted almost 131 years after his execution, paving the way for him to be buried near his mother, brothers and sisters in a simple grave. Kelly’s family is now considering a public memorial to farewell the nation’s most notorious son. The Herald Sun can reveal Attorney-General Robert Clark yesterday agreed […]
Police powers: your rights in Victoria
Victoria Legal Aid has released a guide to your legal rights when dealing with Police in Victoria. It includes information for young people under the age of 18 and people with mental impairment. It has information about: when you can remain silent when you have to give your name and address to the police getting […]
The 2011 Shonky Awards
CHOICE‘s Shonky Awards name and shame the shonkiest rip-offs and and shoddiest products being sold in Australia. The winners The insurance industry Smurfs’ Village (Beeline Interactive, Inc.) SensaSlim (and friends) Blinged-up babies via the internet Peachy Pink The Chery J1 Go4Green EnergySmart Quail Kingdom The event is now in its 6th year and while you’d think most companies […]
