UNITE is organising an emergency action in Melbourne to support the 500 locked out supermarket workers in New Zealand. The workers are employed by Progressive, a company which is owned by Woolworths Australia. The details are: 4-6pm Wednesday September 13th outside the Safeway / Big W entrance corner of Lonsdale and Swanston Streets City. See below for the text of UNITE’s leaflet. (more…)

The Socialist Party has argued consistently for greater resources into alternative energy sources such as wind power, wave, solar, biomass, hydrogen fuel cells and geothermal. A socialist society, controlling the wealth currently wasted by the capitalism, would be able to finance the necessary investment. (more…)

There are two ways to deal with the attack on WA building workers employed at the $1.6 billion Perth to Mandurah rail project. 107 individual workers are facing fines up to $28,000 each for striking against the sacking of their elected onsite union and health and safety representatives. This is first time since Work Choices was introduced that the ruling class have moved to attack individual workers and not a union and its officials. (more…)

John Howard is starting to show signs of not being the invincible politician he is often made out to be. John Howard’s longevity as a politician is often portrayed by various political pundits as an indication that he has an uncanny ability to link up with and understand “middle Australia” and the “Aussie Battler”. Recent events are beginning to show that it is more the case of his extraordinary luck as far as the economy and various political events is concerned that are the key to his longevity. (more…)

‘Solidarity – Scotland’s Socialist Movement’, was launched at a packed rally on Sunday 3 September, in Glasgow. Every seat was taken and every piece of wall supported a comrade. More crammed into the side entrances to listen and catch a glimpse of the speakers. There must have been well in excess of 500 people attending, perhaps nearer 600, including members of the media, both press and television. The meeting voted overwhelmingly to launch a new socialist party in Scotland.
Statement by International Socialists, CWI Scotland (more…)

After much wrangling, a United Nations (UN) force has been assembled to act as a ‘buffer’ in the 20-mile corridor between the Israel-Lebanon border and the Litani River. Most people will probably breathe a sigh of relief that the carnage which has been inflicted in Lebanon seems to have ended. The hope is that now the prospect of war between Israel and Lebanon will be banished, and the catastrophe of a wider Middle East war avoided.
By Peter Taaffe, General Secretary - Socialist Party England & Wales (more…)

Thousands of angry protestors torching buildings linked to a British coal mining firm in northern Bangladesh, last Monday morning. This follows the fatal shooting of at least five people protesting against an open-pit mine in the region. The demonstrators set fire to the house of an official employed by the London-based ‘Asia Energy PLC’, which is developing a coal deposit north of the capital and plans to invest $1.4 billion in the project. The angry crowds also set fire to four other buildings in the town of Phulbari, 350 kilometers north of Dhaka.
By Khalid Bhatti, CWI, Pakistan (more…)