Welcome to Eureka Street

back to site

Section: Australia

  • AUSTRALIA

    Four Aboriginal deaths in custody this March

    • Michele Madigan
    • 25 March 2021
    13 Comments

    There are a number of current issues within our present Australian political system, issues we need to remedy brought to light with strong media attention. But in contrast, how much media attention is being paid to this ongoing scandal of First Nations peoples who, while representing just 3.3 per cent of the population, now represent an extraordinary 30 per cent of the nation’s prison population? 

    READ MORE
  • AUSTRALIA

    Locked in and locked out

    • Zaki Haidari
    • 23 March 2021
    9 Comments

    I am a refugee from Afghanistan, and I belong a minority ethnic group, the Hazaras. We have been persecuted for a long time because of our ethnicity, religion and values. In 2012, I was forced to leave Afghanistan. I was 17. Back home, my father was a medical doctor. The Taliban accused him of working with international armed forces in the country at the time. One day the Taliban took him away, and nobody has seen him since.  

    READ MORE
  • AUSTRALIA

    Learning from Timor-Leste’s experience for Victoria’s Yoo-rrook commission

    • Pat Walsh
    • 23 March 2021
    4 Comments

    Victoria’s Yoo-rrook Justice Commission, a truth-telling inquiry that will investigate injustices committed against Aboriginal Victorians since colonisation, rightly looks to similar models in South Africa and Canada. Each of these also had a clear Indigenous focus and addressed the ravaging impact of white settlement on traditional lands, cultures and communities in their respective countries.

    READ MORE
  • AUSTRALIA

    The fight for the future of the NDIS

    • El Gibbs
    • 18 March 2021
    5 Comments

    Right now, there is a fight on for the future of the NDIS. On one side is the Federal Government, determined to have total control over the Scheme, and to change its very fundamentals. On the other side are disabled people across Australia, disability advocacy organisations, allied health workers and disability service providers, urgently telling them to stop.

    READ MORE
  • AUSTRALIA

    Women marched for justice because they deserved better

    • Fernanda Fain-Binda
    • 18 March 2021
    7 Comments

    There were more than 5,000 people at Treasury Gardens. Across Australia, there were 40 marches from Adelaide to Wagga Wagga. All in, 100,000 people were involved either in person or signing a petition demanding change and accountability. It may be the biggest uprising of women that this country has seen, and it happened quickly.

    READ MORE
  • AUSTRALIA

    Men must be part of the solution to gendered violence

    • Matt Tyler
    • 18 March 2021
    35 Comments

    There is not sufficient focus on the underlying drivers of sexual assault, harassment and other types of violence. Instead of people reverting to phrases like ‘boys will be boys’ to explain or excuse a hurtful comment or action, as a society we must do more to understand where these behaviours originate and work to prevent them.

    READ MORE
  • AUSTRALIA

    Aged Care RC falls short on meaningful reform

    • Pat Garcia
    • 16 March 2021
    6 Comments

    After two years of often harrowing evidence from 450 witnesses and 10,000 submissions, the Royal Commission’s multi-page report has fallen short on a clear path to lasting and meaningful reform.

    READ MORE
  • AUSTRALIA

    Focus on human relationships needed for aged and mental health care

    • Andrew Hamilton
    • 11 March 2021
    10 Comments

    The Royal Commission was right to insist on a human rights focus to aged care. It should also be insisted on in care for people who experience mental health issues. For that focus to remain sharp, however, it must be based in attention by people at all levels of responsibility, political and managerial included, to the concrete human relationships of the people whom programs serve.

    READ MORE
  • AUSTRALIA

    Whose rule of law?

    • Cristy Clark
    • 11 March 2021
    34 Comments

    The events of the last few weeks have provided a devastatingly clear illustration of how far we are from upholding a substantive version of the rule of law in Australia.

    READ MORE
  • AUSTRALIA

    Rebuilding trust in aged care

    • Jenneke Foottit and Sue Gledhill
    • 11 March 2021
    2 Comments

    The recently released report of the Royal Commission into Aged Care does not hold back in describing a situation that should be abhorrent to us all. As the report notes, ‘substandard care and abuse pervades the Australian aged care system’.

    READ MORE
  • AUSTRALIA

    JobSeeker needs to provide a reasonable safety net

    • Joshua Lourensz
    • 04 March 2021
    4 Comments

    Many people are still doing it tough. And the many organisations who are tasked with trying to support them share a sense of dismay as we see Federal Government assistance being wound back fast. We need to increase decent work opportunities and ensure a reasonable safety net for those out of work if we want to get through this and still claim the ‘fair go’.

    READ MORE
  • AUSTRALIA

    Dreyfus redivivus

    • Andrew Hamilton
    • 04 March 2021
    18 Comments

    Any government decision can cause hurt to some groups in society. There is a difference, however, between decisions that are only painful and those that are vindictive. The former may be regretted, but vindictiveness implies a satisfaction in causing pain that does not arise out of need. The reason for it must be sought in the minds and hearts and culture of those who devise the policies.

    READ MORE