Social Justice

We look at how the building of new coal fired power stations can qualify for carbon credits under the UN’s Clean Development Mechanism. And where does Australia stand five years on from the passing of the UN Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples.

We focus on international agreements on the environment and climate change. One, the Montreal Protocol, has been in place for 25 years and has been pretty successful. You might remember that little issue of that the Montreal Protocol was drawn up to deal with: the hole in the ozone layer. Are there lessons there for the Kyoto Protocol? And we discuss another agreement which doesn’t exist yet - for people displaced by climate change.

In Conversation with Nick Chesterfield from West Papua Media. In West Papua, massive gold mines dump toxic sludge into river systems, an independence movement is aggressively crushed by Indonesian soldiers and political leaders are assassinated – and only rarely do we hear about it. In response to an Indonesian media blackout in the region, a variety of people inside and outside West Papua formed West Papua Media, an organization which attempts to bring independent news about West Papua to the rest of the world.

We look at the complex issue of violence as an occupational hazard for Journalists in Latin America, why the latest plan to save the Murray Darling River has been called ‘laughable’ by the Wentworth Group of Concerned Scientists, and we’ll hear how a community responds to Dart Energy beginning construction on the company’s first coal seam gas pilot production wells in the state.

A look at media in the Democratic Republic of the Congo. With Mbuyi Tshielantende and Patrice Nyembo of the Congolese Community of Australia and their plans for an online platform based on the West Papua Media website. We also talk to Journalist Shant Fabricatorian who was in DRC last year.

This week we’re talking incarceration in our criminal justice system. We look at the living and working conditions for inmates, why it's so extraordinary that the community in Grafton blockaded the gaol to keep the prisoners in and the gaol open, and it’s a year on from the mass hunger strikes at Pelican Bay prison in California.

We hear about gas bubbling up through the Condamine River, near Chinchilla in Queensland, we question Australia's involvement in carbon offset forestry programs in Indonesia, and discuss the Federal Government's cuts to green building incentives

The Third Degree travelled to the 'Defending Indigenous Rights: Land, Law and Culture' gathering from the 6th to the 9th of July 2010 in Mparntwe -Alice Springs. These specials feature audio recorded at the conference.

Orica’s troubled Kooragang Island plant is closed for maintenance, and with nowhere to store 3000 tonnes of explosive ammonium nitrate - Orica boarded it onto a cargo ship and sent it out to sea. And in Malaysia, Australian mining company Lynas Corp planning to operate a controversial rare earths processing plant in Kuantan, is suing a local campaign group and an alternative news website for defamation. And unlike Australian law, Malaysian law has no cap on damages that can be awarded for defamation.

There were delays in notifying workers of asbestos at the Barangaroo site in Inner Sydney, and hazardous chemicals found on the Pacific Highway during upgrade works. The latest draft for the Murray Darling Basin Plan is hotly contested by the South Australian Government, Environment groups and scientists saying it's not 'best science', and has attracted calls that it flouts Aboriginal Sovereignty over the water.

After years of working alongside Libby King, Tessa Dowdell and Hannah Walters, Third Degree producer Jess Minshall looks around 2ser’s newsroom and studios with the realisation that these amazing women have moved on. She sets off to track down their voices for this International Womens Day Special.