A mother's climate change lament and other paintings

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Find the article on my art exhibition on now at the ACT Legislative Assembly

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South Africa: The end of the rainbow nation?

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The Canberra Times, May 24, 2008 It shouldn't surprise us that South Africa's townships are embroiled in fresh violence. Apartheid was South Africa's Berlin Wall. It was the great divider. With its passing, poor black South Africans, accustomed to prejudice but more disaffected, have turned on those they think are robbing them of better lives. This past week dozens of foreigners, other Africans, have been killed by South Africa's poor. Tens of thousands more have fled into refugee shelters since the violence began earlier this month in the Johannesburg township of Alexandra. Locals with the support of trade unions and some sections of the media accuse outsiders of stealing jobs and fueling a spate of crime. The tensions have been there for years. But what is surprising is the intensity and rapidity of the violence. Opportunistic mobs have raped women and burnt former neighbours to death. The xenophobic violence has spread from poor areas of Johannesburg to Cape
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A reflection on life and death

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A friend died this week. He was 27. Pete Veness had a rare kind of cancer. He told us he was a no one special but we all knew he was. His funeral drew the Prime Minister and priests, authors and artists. He graduated from the journalism school I attended - but a generation later. Tributes flowed for him. Many spoke of his wit and wisdom, his fearlessness and profundity. Pete was angry he could not live into his old age but he was not angry with his God. He railed against things outside of himself; complacency, poverty, triviality and to ask God for the strength to keep going to assist others without expectation. Fellow parishioners at St John's Anglican Church in Canberra where he worshipped commented on how he was a rock to them; how he helped put their troubles in perspective. Pete was hard headed. He was certainly stubborn and doggedly pursued truth - about things of this earth and heaven. He frightened the odd politician at doorstops on the hill but he could have
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Chocolate: still tainted by child labour

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What is your New Year resolution? To get fitter and eat less sugar, including chocolate? There’s plenty of other reasons to re-think our love affair with chocolate. It will come as a surprise to many that hazardous child labour persists in the mainstream production of cocoa. For 20 years global brands that produce chocolate have promised to tackle what has been the biggest single human rights issue in the sector. A  recent report  from the University of Chicago shows they have a long way to go. In 2001, popular brands including brands Nestlé, Mars and Hershey and cocoa industry representatives adopted the voluntary  Harkin Engel Protocol  and then the  Framework of Action to Support Implementation of the protocol , signed with the governments of Ghana and Côte d’Ivoire where two-thirds of the world’s cocoa comes from. Not only would child labour be eliminated, but the sector would become 100% certified. Disturbingly, hazardous child labour has increased and  remains widespread  in supp
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