Brisbane’s new West End group is firing up. We held our first public event in May, a screening of radical writer John Pilger’s 2003 Sydney public meeting, in the local Grass Roots Centre (home of the Greens).
A lively discussion afterwards about Pilger’s critique of the war on Iraq led to a discussion about Indonesia’s military offensive in Aceh. This enabled us to involve people in the Socialist Alliance-initiated “Indonesian troops out of Aceh” protest action the following Saturday.
The group has now booked the Grass Roots Centre on the first and third Thursday of each month for branch meetings and events. Our weekly campaigning stalls in the main street are starting to take off too. We are building a healthy profile and have an “audience” of locals who regularly come over to chat about politics. The result is an expanding email list, which we use weekly, along with phone calls, to keep in close touch with members and supporters.
Maybe best of all, we also have a regular column in the local newspaper, the Westender, sharing the space with the Greens, Labor and Democrats. The Westender editor told me recently that he thinks the Socialist Alliance is so great he has linked the SA web page to the Westender site. Click here to visit http://www.westender.com.au to check out our columns.
How did we get this wonderful exposure for our ideas? I just asked for it.
The lesson for all SA branches is – start from the assumption that local newspapers are always looking for ready-made copy and just go in and make a proposal. If it will improve your chances of getting some regular space, maybe an approach to the local Green and/or Labor and/or Democrat branches to also participate in such a column would be worthwhile.