Month: November 2010

Poem: Black Deaths In Custody

Black Deaths In Custody
339 reccomendations
a royal commission
into the silent deaths
of incarcerated Aboriginal prisioners
victims of systamatic racism
jailed mostly for petty crimes
young lives cut shorrt
spirits yearning
fo the Dreamtime
a place they can rest and connect
with Ancestors past
no longer victims
of weistmeister class
reccomendations
discrimination
incarceration
sub-standard police stations
implementations
inhumane regulation
death is white hating
bullymen police
weilding baton for bacon
lock up blackfulla
for drinking and wailing
force him in dogbox
and lock him away
his anger and dispair
give his life away
339 reccomendations
to justify
racism
discrimination
a royal commission
of systamatic
racism
— Nicole Clevens

Nicole Clevens recited this poem at Queens Park on 13th November 2010.… Go to Article

Enough to make you WEEP

There are now two reports on Detention conditions – Amnesty and the Australian Human Rights Commission – both very instructive.

Remember when you read them that what was seen- as horrendous as it is – is the best that DIAC (Immigration Department) and Serco (contractor) could offer.… Go to Article

“Seeking asylum in the region”

LaRRC Postgraduate Seminar Series: Issues in Refugee Research
Thursday 18th November
12:30—2:00 pm
Martin Building room 488 (La Trobe University, Melbourne)

Dr Savitri Taylor (Senior Lecturer, School of Law, La Trobe University) joins us to discuss “Seeking asylum in the region”

Australia, as one of only three developed countries in the Asia Pacific region, seems to have become the ultimate destination of increasing numbers of irregularly moving asylum seekers.… Go to Article

Last Days on the Trams

“They lie, the men who tell us, for reasons of their own,
That want is here a stranger, and that misery’s unknown;
For where the nearest suburb and the city proper meet
My windowsill is level with the faces in the street”

— ‘Faces In The Street’ by Henry Lawson

In 1969, Labor Mayor of Brisbane, Clem Jones, declared that the Brisbane City Council (BCC) was going to shut down the trams.… Go to Article