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A high-speed rail network powered by 100% renewables would eliminate greenhouse gas emissions produced by long-distance air travel in eastern Australia. Based on a rapid implementation of the French TGV system, Matthew Wright from Beyond Zero Emissions, wants Adelaide, Melbourne, Canberra, Sydney and Brisbane to be linked in this visionary project.
The National Emissions Trading Taskforce is due to present some sort of design scheme for an Australian national emissions trading scheme in the second half of 2007, and PM John Howard has announced a task group to look at how Australia could participate in the global market.
Ali Humanyun, a Pakistani queer refugee seeking asylum in Australia, has been incarcerated inside the Villawood detention centre for two years and four months. He was refused a Protection (Class XA) Visa in May 2006 and rejected by the Refugee Review Tribunal (RRT) in October. Humanyun was not granted legal aid for a Federal Magistrates Court appearance, and so the RRT’s decision was upheld on February 19.
The Construction, Forestry, Mining and Energy Union (CFMEU) will be holding a trivia competition at 7pm on June 1 at its Lidcombe offices (12 Railway Street) to raise funds in support of sacked union delegate Barry Hemsworth.
The proposed Anvil Hill coalmine in NSW is rapidly becoming a central battleground in the fight against climate change.
The Socialist Alliance condemns the arrest of two Australian Tamil activists, Aruran Vinayagamoorthy and Sivarajah Yathavan, under the “anti-terror” laws. This is another example of the use of such laws to repress political activity of which the government disapproves.
Two blockades halted logging in high conservation value native forests two hours east of Melbourne on May 8, Friends of the Earth reported.
The proposed Anvil Hill coalmine in NSW is rapidly becoming a central battleground in the fight against climate change.
An industrial relations forum on May 8, hosted by the Socialist Alliance, brought together trade union and political activists to discuss their responses to the ALP’s recently released IR policy and the campaign against Work Choices.
From the end of May to July 2, the largest military training exercise in Australian history will take place, involving 14,000 US and 12,000 Australian military personnel. The Talisman Sabre ’07 war games will be held at joint US-Australian “training facilities” — Shoalwater Bay in Queensland and Bradshaw and Delamere Range in the Northern Territory.
On May 5, the UN Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) released its final working group report, the third in a series, as a part of its Fourth Assessment Report (AR4), aimed at evaluating global warming. The IPCC published its first assessment report in 1990, a supplementary report in 1992, a second assessment report in 1995, and a third in 2001.
On May 10, 60 people attended a public meeting opposing the closure of the humanities department of the Queensland University of Technology. The meeting was held at QUT’s Kelvin Grove campus.