Yet more evidence that the British multinational Serco, running Australia’s detention centres, simply aren’t up to the task. But don’t expect the government to do anything about it any time soon. They need somebody, anybody, to take the blame for its dysfunctional refugee policies (via The Age): The multinational company that runs Australia’s immigration detention…
Showing all posts tagged privatisation
Lessons of Keystone XL for #Occupy
How to mobilise people power against corporate power is a key task of the 21st century, as disaster capitalists attempt to swarm around energy resources. Interesting piece by Jane Mayer in the New Yorker: Last spring, months before Wall Street was Occupied, civil disobedience of the kind sweeping the Arab world was hard to imagine…
Hello terror, we can make money from you
Post 9/11, countless companies saw an opportunity to make a killing on the desperate desire of both democracies and repressive states to monitor citizens. And when the US government, supposedly the freest nation on Earth, brazenly spied on people in the name of “security”, the path was set. The Wall Street Journal reports: Documents obtained…
Occupy movement has demands (and rejects disaster capitalists making a buck)
While Arundhati Roy addressed Washington Square Park in New York, held at Judson Memorial Church this week: I like her vision: We want to put a lid on this system that manufactures inequality. We want to put a cap on the unfettered accumulation of wealth and property by individuals as well as corporations. As “cap-ists”…
Private prisons leeches on society
Correction Corporation of America’s Stewart facility in Lumpkin, Georgia is the largest private detention center in the nation. Stewart currently profits close to $50 million a year. As if that weren’t enough, CCA often cuts costs by denying basic services to its inmates and by limiting access to their family members. CCA charges inmates close…
What 9/11 has allowed America to become
Sigh: What happens when a government builds a massive, unaccountable police apparatus to thwart infiltration by a foreign menace, only to see the society it’s supposed to protect take to the streets for entirely different reasons? It looks as though we may be about to find out. The Occupy protests have been mostly peaceful, with…
Hands up who wants to make money from the downtrodden?
How our capitalist system is increasingly ordered (and sold to the highest bidder): Late last month, a national backlash forced Bank of America to abandon its plan to charge customers $5 a month to use their debit cards. But Huffington Post reports that the corporation has quietly been mining other sources of fees, preying on…
Fightback against privatisation grows
One (via the Guardian): The first private company to take over an NHS hospital has admitted in a document seen by the Observer that patient care could suffer under its plans to expand its empire and seek profit from the health service. Circle Health is already feeling a strain on resources due to its aggressive…
Government rules; how the Australian immigration department treats us with contempt
Following last week’s exclusive in New Matilda publishing the British multinational Serco immigration detention contract with the Australian government, the Immigration Department was asked a range of questions. This is how they responded (thanks to Marni Cordell and Paul Farrell): We asked DIAC for comment on their contract with Serco and how it serves the…
Never expect Serco to treat staff well (it’s in the contract)
What a surprise: Security guards working at the Pontville detention centre [in Tasmania] say they have been sacked in a shock move by operator Serco. Devastated security staff contacted the Mercury yesterday, saying they had been told their services were no longer required because Serco would rely on security cameras for external surveillance. Therese Mitchell…