Author Archives: vintagereds

Don Dwyer’s May 2017 Calendar

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Bringing you Don’s plugged-in guide to what is happening around Canberra…
May

Tues. 16 May: 4.30-5.45 p.m. Humanities Research Centre, Seminar Rm 1, 3rd floor, Sir Roland Wilson Building, ANU, seminar with Assoc. Prof. Elena Isayev, University of Exeter, UK: “Between Hospitality and Asylum: Stranger as victim and agent, suppliant and guest”.  http://hrc.anu.edu.au/events/seminar-between-hospitality-and-asylum-stranger-victim-and-agent-%E2%80%93-suppliant-and-guest.

Tues. 16 to Sun. 28 May: Palace cinema, “American Essentials” film festival. Includes The Graduate (1967) and Annie Hall (1977).

Wed. 17 & Thurs. 18 May: 7.30, Llewellyn Hall, ANU. Canberra Symphony Orchestra with Umberto Clerici, Cello. Pre-concert talk, 6.45 p.m. Tickets in three price ranges from $51 (under 30) up to $91.80 (adult).

Sat. 20 May: 7.30 p.m., Llewellyn Hall, ANU, the Llewellyn Choir & Sinfonia present Verdi’s Requiem. Rowan Harvey-Martin, conductor. With Sonia Anfiloff (sop.), Christina Wilson (mezzo), Christopher Lincoln Bogg (tenor) and Jeremy Tatchell (bass). Tickets $45 (adult); $40 (pensioners and students); youth and family tickets available.

Wed. 24 May: 6 p.m., National Library of Australia Theatre, “Who Shafted Les Darcy?“, lecture by Roger Ley. Free. Bookings 6262 1111.

Wed. 24 May: 6 p.m., National Film & Sound Archive, Arc Cinema, The Killing Fields (1984, R18+) & The Odd Angry Shot (1979, M). $20 double feature.

Fri. 26 May: 6 p.m., National Film & Sound Archive, Arc Cinema, Don’s Party (1976, R) & The Club (1980, PG). $20 double feature.

Wed. 31 May: 6 p.m., National Library Conference Room, book launch by Frank Bongiorno of Australian Lives: An intimate history, by Anisa Puri and Alistair Thomson. Free; refreshments; book signing. Bookings: nla.gov.au/bookings or 6262 1424.

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International Workers Memorial Day 2017

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International Workers’ Memorial Day was observed on 28 April 2017 at the National Workers Memorial by the lake.

Three to four people died at work every week across Australia in 2016. Most of these tragic deaths were preventable.

ACT Work Safety Minister Rachel Stephen-Smith and CFMEU National Secretary Michael O’Connor were among those who spoke at the commemoration.

“Mourn the dead. Fight like hell for the living.”

April 2017 Guest Speaker, Matthew Stocks

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Dr Matthew Stocks, from the ANU’s Energy Change Institute, spoke to the meeting about Australia’s 100% renewable energy future, focusing on pumped hydro. Together with photovoltaic cells and wind generators, a stable and affordable electricity grid is readily achievable.

Matthew’s presentation added a lot of context and clarity to a series of slides illustrating pumped hydro energy storage, which can be found on the Energy Change Institute’s website.

Dr Matthew Stocks with a slide on water consumption.

 

March 2017 Guest Speaker, Michael Moore

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Michael Moore displays his new Vintage Reds mug.

Michael Moore, CEO of the Public Health Association (PHA), and current president of the World Federation of Public Health Associations, began his talk by acknowledging the Ngunnawal people on whose land we meet, and especially Auntie Agnes Shea (a tireless worker for health).

Public health begins with clean water and sanitation. We heard about Dr John Snow and the Broad Street pump in 1854. Cholera was a scourge in unsewered London, but the medical world believed that the disease spread through the air. After one outbreak Snow mapped the cases and found that the outbreak centred on a public water pump in Soho.

Politics moves slowly and a catalyst is needed to make things happen. In London this was the 1858 “great stink”, when the growing problem of untreated sewerage and industrial waste, running straight into the Thames, became so bad that an engineer was brought in to find a solution.

The PHA has a number of policies that it focuses on, renewed every 3 years. Plain packaging for cigarettes was one: the catalyst for this was the Health minister Nicola Roxon’s father’s early death from cancer. Continue reading →

Nuclear weapons ban negotiations begin

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ICAN_logo.pngThe International Campaign to Abolish Nuclear Weapons (ICAN) held a rally this morning outside Parliament House in Canberra to mark the start of negotiations towards a treaty to ban nuclear weapons. The rally deplored the fact that the Australian government, incredibly, is boycotting the negotiations and has not sent a delegate. There are over 110 countries participating; we are the only country in our region to refuse.

We have, however, got someone representing us: Sue Coleman-Haseldine, a Kokatha elder from near Ceduna, who spoke very movingly today at the UN in New York about her family’s experience of the nuclear bomb tests in South Australia in 1956. What was beautiful country is now not safe to live in.

Speakers at the rally this morning included Vintage Red member Katherine Kelly, as well as Senator Scott Ludlum (Greens, WA), Senator Lisa Singh (Labor, Tas.), and Bishop Pat Power.

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Don Dwyer’s Calendar of Events

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March

27 March to 2nd April: Ladies in Black, from the novel The Women in Black by Madeleine St John, music by Tim Finn. Canberra Theatre.

Tuesday 28 March: 6 p.m., National Library, “Utopia — the future of Australia“. Paul Barclay, Peter Singer, Aexis Wright, etc. RSVP 6262-1111; $15

Wednesday 29 March: 6 p.m., National Library, “Looking for Rose Paterson (mother of Banjo)”, by Jennifer Gall. Free. RSVP 6262-1111.

Thursday 30 March: 6 p.m., National Library, “Only: A singular memoir“, by Caroline Baum. $20. RSVP 6262-1111, $20.

Friday 31 March: 7 p.m., National Film & Sound Archive, “Red Hollywood“, a dark chapter of US blacklists etc.

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Don’s guide to Canberra in autumn

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After a much too long break, we bring you Don’s recommendations for your leisure time.

March

4 to 18 March: “Cold Light” at the Street Theatre. Adapted by Alana Valentine from the Frank Moorhouse novel. “How far can a woman of vision go?” Tickets $39-$55.

9 March to 4 April: French Film Festival at the Palace Cinema, where you can find your little booklet of films; also available to download or peruse online.

Wed. 15 March: Martha Wainwright at the Canberra Theatre. “Oh Pep” are the support act, Melbourne duo Olivia Hally and Pepita Emmerichs. Worth listening to.

Sat. 18 March: Vince Jones & the Astral Orchestra present the music of Van Morrison, at the Playhouse, 8 p.m.

20 to 26 March: Canberra Comedy Festival. Find them at the Canberra Theatre Centre, Street Theatre, and the Uni Pub: “weird, absurd and wonderful”. And there are even events at the Novotel and the Civic Pub (8 Lonsdale St).

27 March to 2 April: “Ladies in Black”, from Madeleine St John’s fabulous novel, tunes by Tim Finn, a Queensland Theatre Production. The Melbourne Age says: “The best Aussie musical since Priscilla went global.” Canberra Theatre, tickets $89-$99.

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February 2017 Guest Speaker, Diana Abdul-Rahman

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2017-2-20_Abdul-Rahman_ed.jpgDiana Abdul-Rahman OAM treated us to a very welcome and clarifying exposition on Islam. Diana is a Sunni Muslim, like the vast majority of Muslims worldwide (85% to 90%).   [Photo: Jude Dodd]

The word Islam is connected to “salaam“, peace; it implies submission to the will of God. Islam, like Judaism and Christianity, recognises Abraham as its first prophet. Jesus (“peace be upon him”) is also seen as a prophet, like Mohamed. There is a whole chapter in the Koran called “Mariam” (“peace be upon her”), the mother of Jesus. Islam and Christianity share some expressions, such as “thanks be to god”. Islam is not named for a prophet, unlike Christianity and Buddhism.

The English word “religion” doesn’t translate well into Arabic; the approximate equivalent, “deen“, means “way of life” [ed. note: “religion” in English has no agreed etymology and the various explanations do not converge on a single theme. Current usage, though, relates to worship of the sacred]. Continue reading →

November 2016 Guest Speaker, Penny Lockwood

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November’s guest speaker was Vintage Red member Penny Lockwood.lockwood.jpg

Penny spoke about her father Rupert Lockwood (1908-97), a respected journalist who became prominent during the Cold War at the time of the Petrov affair in the mid-1950s.

[Photo by Jack Hickson: Rupert Lockwood at the Royal Commission on  Espionage, 1955. Mitchell Library, NSW]

Lockwood came from a Chartist family, and his father ran the West Wimmera Mail. He moved to Melbourne, working on the Herald (a Murdoch paper, like the Wimmera paper in later years), which sent him to Spain in 1937, and then called him back to a job in the Canberra press gallery. After he called Robert Menzies “Pig Iron Bob” in 1938, during the dispute between Menzies and waterside workers who objected to being forced to load iron to be shipped to Japan, he was recalled to Melbourne to administrative work. Continue reading →

Public forum on ACT water prices

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Members of the public are urged to come along next Tuesday evening, 6 December 2016, to a Public Forum on proposed significant increases to the cost of water in Canberra.

The public forum will be held at 5:00 p.m. at the Waldorf on London, 2 Akuna Street, Canberra City, and will include a presentation by the Independent Competition and Regulatory Commission, followed by a question and answer session.

Icon Water, an ACT government-owned corporation which has a monopoly on providing water to the ACT, currently sets a higher price per kilolitre for higher water usage. But since we are apparently no longer trying to send a message of water-saving to consumers (now that the drought is over and we have more water available in dams which are almost full), and since some higher water usage customers have turned to cheaper alternative sources, Icon has fewer customers and wants to charge them all much more.

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