BY ALEX BAINBRIDGE
HOBART — Green Left Weekly volunteers have vowed to defy attempts by Hobart City Council to prevent the paper being distributed in the Elizabeth Street Mall. Council officers directed two Green Left Weekly distributors to leave the mall on February 1 citing a by-law that prevents the "sale or offer for sale" of items without a permit. The following day, council officers called police, who threatened to arrest one of the volunteers if he did not leave the mall.
The right to distribute Green Left Weekly is an expression of working people's right to free speech. Green Left is not a "product" but a campaigning newspaper that exposes the injustices of capitalist society. To restrict its distribution is a restriction on the right of people who hold such views to express them.
Green Left Weekly is not published to make a profit but to allow views excluded by the capitalist press to gain a hearing. The cover price goes part of the way in covering the cost of its production. Distributors often sell the paper for less than the cover price if a buyer cannot afford it, but it is necessary to ask most buyers to pay the cover price if the paper is to continue to come out.
Green Left Weekly has been distributed in the mall consistently since the paper was first published in 1991 and the relevant by-laws were amended in 1997. Council officers could give no reason to explain the apparent change of policy.