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Section: Australia

  • AUSTRALIA

    Child migrant trauma

    • Gillian Bouras
    • 10 August 2011
    3 Comments

    At least adults have a little hope of understanding the pain, and coping with it. Even the most equable of children must find the experience bewildering at best, and agonising at worst. My eldest son had a period of not eating. His migration as a child remains the defining fact of his life.

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  • AUSTRALIA

    The Census and Labor's Catholic vote

    • Brian Lawrence
    • 09 August 2011
    14 Comments

    The Census will play a central role in the planning of the next Federal election. Past results show that while much of Labor's working class base has abandoned it, a solid base of Catholics remains. But many of these supporters are now standing near the door bemused or angry. These figures show that while low income earners have abandoned Labor, a solid base of Catholics have stuck with it.

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  • AUSTRALIA

    Anti-gay laws and the right to privacy

    • Justin Glyn
    • 08 August 2011
    2 Comments

    In 1994 gay-rights activist Nicholas Toonen succesfully challenged Tasmanian laws criminalising homosexual acts. As Australia considers reforming its privacy laws, the case remains a good illustration of the deeper questions about the balance between state power and competing moral claims.

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  • AUSTRALIA

    Elders' wisdom could save us

    • Michael Mullins
    • 08 August 2011
    10 Comments

    We could be facing a new GFC because many decisions on the financial markets are made by financial traders in their 20s who are uninterested in learning from past experiences. Youth may be the future, but there will be no future without the wisdom of our elders.

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  • AUSTRALIA

    ASIO and me

    • John Warhurst
    • 03 August 2011
    1 Comment

    I received the documents in a battered brown suitcase. They were from a time of high drama within the Movement and the Labor Party concerning the Labor Split. In the course of my research, I wrote to several international sources. This brought me to the attention of the CIA and ASIO. 

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  • AUSTRALIA

    Gillard's chaplaincy challenge

    • John Warhurst
    • 02 August 2011
    13 Comments

    In the midst of debates about same sex marriage that will test and probably break relations between the Gillard Government and some Christian communities, the chaplaincy program is seen by both camps as a win-win. A challenge to be considered by the High Court this month could change all that.

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  • AUSTRALIA

    Tony Abbott's FUD factor

    • Neil Ormerod
    • 01 August 2011
    36 Comments

    In the 1980s computer journalists used to refer to the 'FUD factor' and its impact on computer purchases. FUD — Fear, Uncertainty and Doubt. Tony Abbott has become the master of the FUD factor in the debate over climate change and the carbon tax.

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  • AUSTRALIA

    Hinch and other 'hardened criminals'

    • Michael Mullins
    • 01 August 2011
    9 Comments

    Derryn Hinch has been an outstanding social justice advocate, but is also a repeat offender with contempt for the law and no sign of remorse. Because he has a voice, he has managed to avoid social exclusion. Most 'hardened criminals' don't have this advantage.

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  • AUSTRALIA

    Refugee lotto

    • Kerry Murphy
    • 27 July 2011
    3 Comments

    An old legal maxim is 'hard cases make bad law'. Maybe complex cases compromise policy. Refugee law and policy is complex and the Malaysian agreement signed this week is another example of a compromise on human rights principles for political expedience.

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  • AUSTRALIA

    Fearing America's national debt

    • Brian Doyle
    • 27 July 2011
    8 Comments

    America, my country, is teetering on the edge of a dark future. We cannot continue in this fashion, or we will enslave our children and grandchildren to ruinous debt; we will twist their lives in unimaginable ways, because we would not pay our bills or reduce the luxury with which we lived.

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  • AUSTRALIA

    Demystifying famine

    • Ben Coleridge
    • 26 July 2011
    4 Comments

    If one were to believe the news cycle, the current crisis in Somalia would seem to have arisen without warning. But it is part of a pattern we have had plenty of opportunity to observe and recognise. In fact Eastern Africa is historically well acquainted with famine.

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  • AUSTRALIA

    Sex abuse action and the seal of confession

    • Michael Mullins
    • 25 July 2011
    29 Comments

    Senator Nick Xenophon's call to protect children by ending the seal of confession was an affront to freedom of religion. But he speaks for many Australians, whose goodwill is necessary to preserve such religious practices.

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