Governments have to ensure that services and laws are in place that provide for those who do not fit prevailing ideas of sex and gender binaries and by unshackling the community from the need to conform to and enforce those ideas, allow each individual to participate in society as themselves.

Trans people are a diverse group of identities, including transsexual, transgendered, crossdressers, g ...]]> http://www.socialist-alliance.org/page.php?page=896 Adopted at Socialist Alliance's 7th National Conference, January 2010

Intersex people are people born with physiological differences that may be seen as being both male and female at once, not wholly male or female or as neither male nor female.

Intersex people are subjected to discrimination in employment, in housing, in the provision of medical services, and the provision of government services.

There are no laws preventing discrimination against int ...]]> http://www.socialist-alliance.org/page.php?page=895 Adopted at Socialist Alliance's 7th National Conference, January 2010

The Socialist Alliance supports the right to marry regardless of gender or sexual orientation.

In other countries civil unions have been offered to the LGBTI community to placate the movement for equal marriage rights. This is not the situation in Australia, where even civil unions have been suppressed by the federal government because they “mimic marriage”. It is for this reason that the Soc ...]]> http://www.socialist-alliance.org/page.php?page=894 Adopted at Socialist Alliance's 7th National Conference, January 2010

Sex work is still on the criminal code in all states and territories except NSW. Having sex work on the criminal code means increased police harassment for marginalized groups such as Aboriginal street-based sex workers, Asian and migrant sex workers, HIV positive workers, and trans people sex workers.

Criminalizing sex work means significantly lower health and safety standards. Decriminalisa ...]]> http://www.socialist-alliance.org/page.php?page=893 Adopted at Socialist Alliance's 7th National Conference, January 2010

The problem
Since the introduction of modern agriculture, the quality of Australia’s soils has dropped dramatically. Inappropriate agricultural practices and methods have led to ongoing soil loss, salinity and soil structure collapse across the country, threatening the viability of many rural communities, and endanger Australia’s future food security.

In many areas, irrigation wa ...]]> http://www.socialist-alliance.org/page.php?page=892 Adopted at Socialist Alliance's 7th National Conference, January 2010

Scientists are telling us we must phase out coal quickly or risk an uninhabitable planet. Coal burning now accounts for around 36% of Australia’s greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions; mining and handling coal adds even more—all subsidies to the coal industry must end.

Phasing out thermal coal – used for power generation – should begin immediately. With direct government investment in a publicly owne ...]]> http://www.socialist-alliance.org/page.php?page=891 Adopted at Socialist Alliance's 7th National Conference, January 2010

Preamble

For 20 years we have had employer-contributed compulsory superannuation (ECS), currently at the rate of 9% of gross income. This was “sold” as part of the social wage and as an expansion of the provision of enhanced retirement benefits for Australian workers beyond those then limited to public sector and management in the private sector. It is another example of the ALP-ACTU Accord betraya ...]]> http://www.socialist-alliance.org/page.php?page=890

Socialist Alliance 7th National Conference

Kerryn Williams, Sydney
16 January 2010

“It’s been a fantastic, energising experience”, Aboriginal activist and Sydney Socialist Alliance (SA) member Pat Eatock told Green Left Weekly at the seventh SA national conference. Her sentiments were echoed by many of the more than 220 participants in the January 2-5 gathering in Sydney.

Peter Boyle
18 January 2010

The following article is abridged from a speech by Peter Boyle, former national secretary of the Democratic Socialist Perspective, to the January 2 opening of the seventh national conference of the Socialist Alliance. The DSP was the largest affiliate organisation within the Socialist Alliance. ]]>