by Susan Austin, Hobart convener
In writing this report, I was reminded of why we are all probably feeling a bit tired as the year winds to an end. Having a Labor government in power at both federal and state levels has not made the work of Socialist Alliance any easier, except that maybe more people can see that our democracy is failing us on many of the big issues of our time, and as the earth heats up, and social injustice rages, many people are looking for an alternative.
Socialist Alliance (along with Resistance, socialist youth organization) have been playing an active role in the Climate Action Hobart group which has been meeting fortnightly and has been going from strength to strength since being established early this year. Meetings are vibrant, democratic and inclusive and the group has achieved a lot, including a climate emergency rally on parliament house lawns in June, a one day workshop and forum at the Philip Smith Centre to further develop our excellent ten-point plan for climate action, 350.org actions in October, a successful quiz night last week at the Republic bar, a fundraising raffle and, along with four other organizations, yesterday's fantastic Walk Against Warming.
This year's Walk Against Warming was part of an international day of action held in the middle of the Copenhagen climate treaty negotiations. About 40,000 people marched in Melbourne, 15,000 in Sydney and many thousands in the other capital cities around Australia and the world. In southern Tasmania up to 2000 people traveled the 2 hours from Hobart to attend the Walk in the Upper Florentine Valley. The Walk was actually along the newly-bulldozed forestry access road and the stage was set up along it, so protestors could experience listening to speakers about climate change amongst magnificent tall trees destined for the woodchip mill.
We had strong, radical demands including for protecting the world's forests, reducing GHG emissions to below 350ppm, a just transition for workers to a low carbon economy and making Tasmania a renewable energy island. I was appalled that such a significant demonstration didn't even get a mention in the ABC news last night, or today's Mercury newspaper. It reminds me why, now more than ever, we need an alternative news source like Green Left Weekly that can spread information about our campaigns and really get behind the issues that the mainstream media block out, fudge over or misrepresent.
If the future of our planet's ecosystem and the peoples in the third world depended on knowing who Tiger Woods last had sex with, I wouldn't mind it being on the front page of the Mercury instead of the Walk Against Warming. But somehow I think that climate change will have more of a bearing on our future!
Thanks to all those people who have donated money to the 2009 Green Left Weekly fighting fund appeal. We have put on an interesting range of fundraising events this year, including the Premier of the 2 new Che films by Steven Sodenburgh, a fabulous mid-year dinner including a film screening of Tim Anderson's documentary on Cuban doctors, and other film festivals.
It takes a lot of money to keep an alternative newspaper pumping off the press each week and Hobart branch set a Green Left target of $5000 to fundraise this year, and we've made a pretty good attempt to reach that, collecting over $200 at our end-of-year BBQ which means we are only about $600 off.
Socialist Alliance and Resistance members have been involved in the protests happening in Brighton in support of the Tasmanian Aboriginal Centre, who is campaigning to stop the construction of the Brighton bypass. There are very significant cultural artifacts on the proposed site, some as old as 18,000 years. It is also a place where Aboriginal elders have been buried, as well as it being a meeting place for Aboriginals. It is one of the most culturally significant places in Tasmania and also in Australia. TAC has consequently compared the construction of the bypass as the equivalent of bulldozing the pyramids to construct a McDonalds. Our members have been involved in the blockade of the site as the bulldozers went to work in late November. At one protest 18 people from TAC and four from Socialist Alliance were arrested and are due to go to court in February on charges of trespass. We see indigenous rights as a crucial area of work and also participated in the sorry day protests in January and the protest against Rudd over the Northern Territory intervention. This year we have been able to build stronger connections with members of TAC and hope to continue to further this relationship next year.
Our national Socialist Alliance Aboriginal and Torres Straits Islander policy was launched this year, along with a book on the history of indigenous struggle and the socialist and trade union movements, so we may look to launch these publications in Hobart in the first part of next year. Education in our branch has been given a shot of adrenalin with Tim Dobson arriving and taking on the role of organizing interesting socialist discussion groups which have covered wide-ranging books and topics such as Karl Marx's Wage, Labour and Capital, and the Communist Manifesto, Lenin's - Imperialism - The Highest Stage of Capitalism, the French revolution, fascism and more.
We also hosted retired coalminer Graham Brown who gave forums on Green Jobs, Margartia Windisch who spoke about the economic crisis and launched the pamphlet Meltdown and Canadian eco-socialist Ian Angus. In March we launched the Voices from Venezuela book and gave report-backs from the December Venezuela solidarity brigade at the Hobart Bookshop.
Rene and Linda, with the help of other members, have played an important solidarity role with the people of El Salvador, including organizing an El Salvadorian MP and health worker to tour down here, and Rene has made sure that the campaigns to Free the Cuban Five and end the coup in Honduras were given some expression here.
Tim Dobson has taken initiative in organizing Tamil solidarity events including a rally, book launch and forum. Tim Douglas, Duncan and Mel have stayed involved with the simmering campaign against the Pulp Mill. We have been out to the Florentine a few times to support the activists fighting old growth logging there and participated in the solidarity arrest-me-too action in town earlier this year.
We should remember to raise our glasses for one of the biggest victories for the people and the environment this year, the Save Ralph's Bay campaign success when the planning body released its draft report finding that the cons majorly outweighed the pros. So this massive canal development is very unlikely to be given the green light needed for construction, and the birds and ecosystem of the area can survive.
Resistance joined lots of people at O'week and played a great role in reviving the environment collective on campus this year.
Other achievements of our branch this year have included pulling off a refugee rights protest outside Duncan Kerr's office and one near the mall, a Palestine vigil, a protest against the war in Afghanistan when Rudd came to town in October, raising the flag for the Western Sahara people, hosting a Get Up forum on a bill of rights, involving lots of members in a successful Sustainable Living Expo stall over 2 days in November, organising a stall at the climate festival in Launceston in March, supporting a protest in solidarity with Ark Tribe and the COAG action when Rudd was in town in April. I'm sure there's also lots more things that I haven't included.
Linda has played a leading role in NTEU campaign, and Jenny and myself have been involved recently in the health professional industrial campaign. Members have traveled interstate to participate in the National Climate Summit, the Latin American Solidarity Conference, the Easter World at a Crossroads conference, Resistance national conference and FMLN meetings.
We have also made a good start on our March 2010 election campaign, with two members stepping forward into the role of candidates to take socialist ideas out to a broader audience. Mel and Jenny are both fantastic representatives of the Alliance and have the full support of our branch. We have a good team in place to help with the campaign, and have already produced and distributed hundreds of leaflets introducing our candidates and explaining our main policy points, as well as begun developing the campaign website, corflutes and policy. Only a small number of people came to our first election forum on December 3, but we will be sure to look for many more opportunities next year for our candidates to speak. Socialist Alliance Hobart is one of the smaller branches in the country, and I think that it is obvious that all those involved put in an enormous amount of work to pull off the range and number of events that we do.
On top of this, we try and stay engaged in the political and activist life of the city by building and attending other progressive organisations' forums and events. We also make a big effort to reach out and engage with the general public by doing regular stalls in the city, at uni, at the Salamanca markets and at rallies and events. No-one in Hobart is paid to do any of this work, it is all purely voluntary. It couldn't be done without members working as a team, and while there are moments of frustration for organizers who feel like they are carrying the can, for the most part I am proud to say that the Hobart branch functions as a very skillful and dynamic team. In small branch it is easy for personality clashes to wreak havoc, or for people to take their frustrations out on each other, but with good democratic processes and a focus on the urgent task of social and environmental change at hand, we manage to cohere a very effective team of activists, with everyone playing an important role, no matter how small or large the time commitment or no matter how trivial or complex the task.
Alby, one of our longer term members, has been an integral part of that team, and we will be very sad to see him go. Brisbane branch are lucky to be getting a ready-made revolutionary activist and team player like Alby coming their way!
We have 7 or so members going to Sydney in January for the 7th national Socialist Alliance conference, which will be a fantastic opportunity to take the Alliance forward in terms of policy development, campaign planning and gearing up for the 2010 federal elections. We hope to gain lots of ideas from other branches, and come away with some clear priorities for campaigning. So, while we will be having a well-earned break for a few weeks over the festive season, we will be gearing up again in mid-January next year for another year of frantic, fast-paced socialist activism. I would like to thanks everyone for their support over the course of this year, and encourage you to join us and get involved in whatever way you can next year. All the campaigns will be continuing as there remains an urgent need to see some real improvement in our governments' climate change strategies and social justice approach.
In the meantime, have a wonderful Christmas and New Year festive season.
In solidarity,Susan
Melanie Barnes is a 26 year old climate change activist who works for an environmental NGO. She has a Bachelor of Arts majoring in Indonesian and political science from the University of Queensland. She has been a leader of Students Against the Pulp Mill protests, Walk Against Warming actions, as well as anti-war, refugee, education and women’s rights campaigns. She is the Hobart organizer of the socialist youth group Resistance. She has also studied in Indonesia and represented Tasmania in an educational solidarity tour of Venezuela.
Jenny Forward has been a long term activist over the past 25 years both here in Tasmania and in Chile, in many areas including women's and human rights. She has also been active in the National Council of Single Mothers and Their Children as she is also a single parent herself of a daughter who is now 17. Jenny and her daughter have been living in Kingston for 3 years now after having lived in Taroona for 9 years. Her family are long time residents of the Huon Valley where they have worked as saw millers, truck drivers and farmers and her mother has worked as a teacher. Jenny became a social worker as a mature age student in 2001. She worked as a child protection worker for 5 years and for the past 2 years she has been working with migrants and refugees.