Nearly a year ago a 64cm blood clot almost killed my healthy 20 year-old daughter, Elanor, after she was prescribed an old and dangerous drug, Diane-35. Diane-35 is also marketed under the names Brenda-35, Carolyn-35, Chelsea-35, Estelle-35, Ginette-35, Juliet-35, Katie-35, Laila-35 and Dermapil. Since talking publicly of our experience I’ve been deluged with horror stories of life threatening or fatal blood clots by families from across Australia. I’ve researched the issues and met with health regulatory authorities and professional bodies. This drug has never been approved for use in the USA and was actually banned in Europe in 2013 after too many women died from blood clots, and only reintroduced with tough restrictions. Yet it’s routinely prescribed to unknown thousands of Australian women without proper warnings, education or consideration of safer, modern alternatives.

Tasmanian public sector workers deliver opportunity, protection and improve the lives of our whole community. But to have services you can count on, public sector workers need jobs they can count on. Tasmanians, like other Australians, need a decent pay rise. Even the Reserve Bank is encouraging workers to demand higher wages. To do this we are asking the Tasmanian Premier, Will Hodgman, to Scrap the Cap, negotiate in good faith and make sure public sector wages and conditions are provided for in future budgets. Bargaining is how generations of workers have built the jobs, wages and living standards most of us rely on today. This doesn't happen when governments decide wages outcomes before negotiations begin.

The Pacific Solution is a failed policy. Mandatory detention of refugees is a failed policy. Every week brings a new low in Australia's refugee policy. Every day brings fresh heartache and despair for refugees suffering at Australia's hands. And right now, every hour brings thirst, hunger and the risk of death-by-policy to the 600 men on Manus Island left without power, water, food or medical supplies by the closure of the refugee camp without provision for safe settlement of the people detained there for years. Last year thousands of Australians rallied and organised, protested, moved motions in their unions and community organisations and demanded sanctuary for asylum-seekers and refugees in Australia for medical care. At that time, state governments stepped up to offer protection to these vulnerable people. In the same way, the Queensland state government should offer safety, housing and settlement services, both because it is humane and to help break the federal political consensus that there is no limit to the abuse that can be directed at refugees, in the attempt to look "tough." Refugees are not our enemy. It is heartless racism and vilification of the vulnerable that is the biggest threat in this situation. It is time to stop saying "stop the boats" and start to recogise asylum saves lives.

Our group of early childhood educators will be meeting with the Minister for Early Childhood Education, Jenny Mikakos, on the 1st of December. We need to take this opportunity to show Premier Daniel Andrews and Minister Mikakos how important preschool education is to our children’s future. Currently we rank 33 out of the 36 OECD countries for participation in 3-year-old preschool education – this is disgraceful and we need to make a change. Together we can send a strong message to the Andrews Government to make sure they deliver funding for 10 hours of 3-year-old preschool per week, to give all children the best possible start in life. Please sign the petition to tell Premier Andrews and Minister Mikakos that all Victorian children deserve 10 hours of 3-year-old preschool.

Stealing is wrong. Yet every year hundreds of thousands of hospo workers in Australia are robbed. We are victims of wage theft. Wage theft, where companies deliberately underpay workers or refuse to pay superannuation, is also hurting people working in retail, farms and fast food. If workers stole from the till, we could go to jail. But if bosses steal from us, all they have to do is pay it back, if they’re ever caught. How is that fair? The rules are broken. The current laws make wage theft too easy and the punishment is too light. It’s now so common it’s become a business model. Venue owners right now are getting rich by stealing from their staff. WE NEED TO CHANGE THE RULES Prime Minister, if you are serious about upholding the law, make wage theft a criminal offence and introduce much bigger fines. We need to hold companies to account for their theft.

These allegations follow those launched against Harvey Weinstein in the US by numerous women in the entertainment industry, and the #metoo campaign on social media, which highlights the pervasiveness of sexual harassment and assault. For young women in particular, sexualisation, harassment and objectification are all too common. Sexual harassment in the workplace isn't just harmless flirting - it is an issue of fair working conditions. The Wom*n’s Collective stands with women who have experienced harassment and assault, whether at work, at university, on the street, or in the home.

Closing Macquarie University Station will create a public transport nightmare for the University and the broader Macquarie Park area, as there is a high reliance on rail, too few campus parking options and typically a major traffic gridlock on Epping road during peak hours. Don’t let the NSW Government leave us in the dark about the Macquarie University Station closure. Sign the petition today.

Staff at the University care deeply about the students they teach and support. But difficult conditions, insecure work (including casual contracts without student consultation hours), excessive workloads and salaries which cut the real pay of staff make it difficult to deliver quality teaching and student experiences. It is not too late. Management can still avoid high-impact industrial action by making positive steps to finalise a single, high-quality staff agreement for all staff. As students, future alumni, and members of the University of Tasmania community, we need your support to show that staff working conditions are student learning conditions.

Centrelink services have already been run into the ground as the Turnbull Government has slashed more than 5,000 permanent jobs from the Department of Human Services. The number of unanswered call has climbed rapidly as the Government has continued cutting, with more than 42 million calls going unanswered just last financial year alone. This deal hatched by the Turnbull Government is an absolute disaster for Centrelink and the thousands of vulnerable Australians who rely on the agency. Serco is a tax-avoiding multinational parasite, plain and simple, that profits from downgrading public services and underpaying the people who provide them. Everything they touch sees services suffer. Centrelink clients need real help, such as that they are given by our members who have permanent jobs in the department and therefore the proper training and experience to actually resolve peoples’ problems. A private call centre that’s designed merely to make the department’s call waiting times look better isn’t going to genuinely help anyone. Serco’s arrival is also yet another attack by the Turnbull Government on hard-working DHS staff. They’ve been under an unrelenting attack through a four-year wage freeze and wholesale cuts, so this is adding insult to injury. It’s telling that the Defence Department is currently taking the reverse approach, bringing work back in-house because it offers higher quality work at a lower cost.

Retail and fast food workers perform a very important role for the community. Very often they live long distances from work across suburbs and have no choice but to drive to work. Traditionally in the majority of cases parking at work has been free for retail and fast food workers. Recently Southland has announced plans charge workers for parking. Southland workers could be forced to fork out up to $1300 a year extra. This is a cost retail and fast food workers cannot afford and do not deserve. There is also a health and safety risk if workers must park a long distance away at night. We call upon the Victorian Government to amend planning laws to require shopping centre owners to provide free and safe parking for retail and fast food workers at their centres. The SDA stands with workers against unfair parking charges.

Edith Creek workers and their families deserve to know whether they will have secure jobs for 2018 before Christmas. While Murray Goulburn is working through what its future looks like, workers at Edith Creek have already been told they are not part of that future. To give Edith Creek workers security and hope going forward it’s important that Murray Goulburn sell the factory site and equipment to a new owner committed to continuing dairy manufacturing and secure jobs in the region.

Dylan Voller suffered horrible torture in NT youth prisons from 11 years of age. Incredibly, he has come out of prison and played an inspiring role advocating for justice and positive alternatives for Aboriginal youth caught in the system. His family, particularly his mother Joanne, and sister Kirra, campaigned prominently for Dylan’s release and have played a continuing, prominent role in the campaign to close youth prisons that has taken place through the NT Royal Commission process. Through all of this, the family has been persecuted by the NT police. They are attacking what the Voller’s represent - resilience and power in the face of extreme state violence and a growing movement for change. On Friday September 29, NT police targeted both Joanne and Dylan for arrest at a peaceful demonstration calling to shut youth prisons and for justice for victims of Aboriginal deaths in custody. This was a provocation that led to further arrests, including of black youth simply participating in the rally. The protesters broke no laws and police were unable to lay criminal charges, instead they issued fines for “disorderly conduct”. This arrest of Dylan is being used by NT Corrections to argue that he has breached his suspended sentence conditions, just three days out from him finishing supervision. He must not be allowed to return to prison as a result of participation in a protest, a basic democratic right. Meanwhile, on three separate occasions over a two week period, large numbers of police have come to Joanne’s house, each time in response to a small fire being used to cook kangaroo tails in the backyard. Joanne has broken no law - this is blatant harassment and intimidation. We the undersigned stand with the Voller family. We call for an end to the persecution of the family by the NT Police and other authorities. We call for all fines resulting from the recent protest to be dropped and for NT Corrections to stop any further action against Dylan. We are extremely concerned that there has been no action taken by the NT government to bring the perpetrators of torture on Aboriginal youth in NT prisons to justice, or make any fundamental changes in the way the system is operating. We will stand with all families suffering as a result of this system and fight for Aboriginal self determination in youth justice issues - build communities not prisons! Supporters can contact the office of NT Justice Minister Natasha Kate Fyles on (08) 8999 6743.