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Section: Australia

  • AUSTRALIA

    Why it's futile to beg for refugees' human rights

    • Andrew Hamilton
    • 26 June 2019
    13 Comments

    In Boochani's experience, Australians were homogenous and unreflective parts of a machine designed to dehumanise, cow and corrupt the people who sought protection. This report and the departmental response suggest that in on-shore detention the human destruction is not directly intended. It is seen simply as irrelevant.

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  • AUSTRALIA

    Winner-take-all election narrative doesn't wash

    • John Warhurst
    • 25 June 2019
    14 Comments

    We are expected to believe that all those perceived Labor failures, plus the massive anti-Labor Clive Palmer campaign and the attraction of some positive Coalition policies, only shifted a little over one Australian in every hundred, though more in some states like Queensland and some individual seats. That analysis can't be right.

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  • AUSTRALIA

    Dictators, democrats, and Egypt after Morsi

    • Irfan Yusuf
    • 24 June 2019
    2 Comments

    Egypt's first and thus far only democratically elected President Mohamed Morsi died in court while being tried for espionage following a lengthy period in prison. He is described as an 'Islamist' but never as a democrat. It's as if the two are necessarily mutually exclusive. Must they be? Was he any less democratic than his predecessors?

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  • AUSTRALIA

    Devils in the details of 'optimistic' jobs report

    • Kate Galloway
    • 21 June 2019
    4 Comments

    Inevitably, employers will use the report to counter calls by casual employees for more secure work. It is a shame therefore that the report does not pay greater attention to identifying the gaps in work security and the risk that this poses not only to individuals, but to society more broadly.

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  • AUSTRALIA

    Aboriginal Ministers maintain the status quo

    • Celeste Liddle
    • 19 June 2019
    8 Comments

    It's long fascinated me that it tends to be the conservative side of politics that has delivered many of our Indigenous political firsts. Perhaps it's simply because Indigenous conservatives are, by virtue of their politics, no real threat to the status quo. Our Minister for Indigenous Australians Ken Wyatt is a case in point.

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  • AUSTRALIA

    Voters are awake to politics' game of yawns

    • Alana Schetzer
    • 14 June 2019
    6 Comments

    It's obvious — so clearly obvious — when politicians are avoiding being genuine and simply don't want to answer a question. It's tiresome. It's boring. And people are tired of politicians assuming they can't tell the difference between an honest answer and a slogan or 'blame game'.

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  • AUSTRALIA

    Local solutions to global refugee malaise

    • Andrew Hamilton
    • 13 June 2019
    5 Comments

    This year many people will celebrate Refugee Week as a wake. During the recent election the hopes of many people seeking protection and supporting them in different ways were raised by the prospect of a change of government. For those of us who share their pain it is time to reflect more broadly on the situation we now face.

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  • AUSTRALIA

    Support men as equal parenting partners

    • Nicola Heath
    • 12 June 2019
    9 Comments

    Employer-led change is happening. But if we want men to take on a greater role in caregiving, what we need is structural change: universal, use-it-or-lose-it parental leave offered to both parents instead of the old primary/secondary caregiver model that entrenches existing gender roles.

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  • AUSTRALIA

    Separating refugee policy from politics

    • Carolina Gottardo and Nishadh Rego
    • 06 June 2019
    17 Comments

    The recent federal election showed us that refugees and people seeking asylum do not need to be instrumentalised for votes. Perhaps refugee policymaking could be separated from politics. Perhaps it could be evidence-based and humane. Alas, the prevailing frames and politics of border protection quickly came to the fore post-election.

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  • AUSTRALIA

    All men have a stake in the ills of the patriarchy

    • Catherine Marshall
    • 03 June 2019
    25 Comments

    When Melburnian Courtney Herron was murdered, the topic of male violence started trending. In one of the most incisive comments on what is an all-too-frequent occurrence, Victoria's Police Commissioner Luke Cornelius said it was time for men to start taking responsibility for the violence. Men — not all men, but many — took umbrage.

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  • AUSTRALIA

    Youth justice blueprint is in front of our noses

    • Julie Edwards
    • 28 May 2019
    6 Comments

    Almost two years have passed since the youth justice royal commission prompted by the abuses at Darwin's Don Dale youth detention facility. Yet many of its recommendations remain unrealised, largely due to a lack of federal funding support. In the meantime, youth justice has remained at the crossroads in many parts of Australia.

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  • AUSTRALIA

    Resist 'brutal retail politics'

    • Esther Anatolitis
    • 24 May 2019
    2 Comments

    There's a lot of work to be done to ensure the Australian government has the best guidance it needs to prepare the policies and deliver the services Australians urgently need. To strengthen ourselves into making that contribution, let's begin by rejecting 'brutal retail politics' and instead champion generous community expertise.

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