Australia: Social devastation looms over Latrobe Valley

Michelle Stevens

A social crisis exists in Australia’s Latrobe Valley, 150 kilometres east of Melbourne. The conditions echo those of the “rust belt” of the United States. The region was once the largest producer of electricity in Australia through the open-cut mining of brown coal, which fuelled the valley’s thermal power stations. Dairy farming, logging, timber milling and paper manufacture were also key industries.

Today’s widespread poverty, unemployment and social problems are the result of decades of job destruction imposed by successive state and federal Labor and Liberal-National governments, particularly bound up with the privatisation of the electricity industry from the 1990s. This devastation has been made possible only through bitter betrayals by the trade unions, which enforced waves of job losses and the erosion of basic conditions.

Latrobe Valley workers have a history of militant industrial struggles. This year marks the 40th anniversary of the August to October 1977 power workers’ strike, in which 2,300 maintenance workers walked off the job for nearly three months to fight for better pay and conditions. The strikers were eventually pushed back to work, without their demands being met, by the leaders of the trade union movement, notably Bob Hawke, then the president of the Australian Council of Trade Unions, and John Halfpenny, a leader of the Stalinist Communist Party of Australia.

The Hazelwood power plant

This March, the French multinational ENGIE closed the Hazelwood power station, ending 52 years of operations and destroying 450 permanent positions, along with 300 casual and contracting jobs. That left three power stations—Loy Yang A, Loy Yang B and Yallourn—but Loy Yang B has been up for sale and Yallourn is reportedly earmarked for closure.

Once again, the Labor Party and the unions sold out the workers. The Victorian state Labor government of Daniel Andrews and the Construction Forestry Mining and Energy Union (CFMEU) both accepted and enforced the closure.

Two regional timber plants also shut down this year. In March, Australian Sustainable Hardwoods said it was closing its Heyfield facility, which employed about 250 workers. In May, the Australian and New Zealand-based timber producer Carter Holt Harvey (CHH) announced it would close its 35-year-old plant at Morwell in August and eliminate 160 jobs. A major paper mill at Maryvale, near Morwell, employing some 900 workers, is threatened with closure.

The social crisis is revealed already in the health and economic indices for the 125,000 people in the region, of whom about 75,000 people live within four centres—Moe, Morwell, Churchill and Traralgon. The unemployment rate is among Victoria’s highest at 11.2 percent, with youth unemployment as high as 19.7 percent.

A Gippsland Primary Health Network report released last year showed that low income, welfare dependent families with children made up 13.6 percent of the population, and 21.8 percent of children aged under 15 years of age were in jobless families. Rental stress was reported by 29 percent of households, and 7.2 percent reported food insecurity.

The 2016 census reported that the personal median income for the Latrobe Valley was $544 a week, 17.8 percent lower than the national figure of $662. Median weekly household income for the Latrobe Valley was $1,077, some 25 percent lower than the national level of $1,438.

Residents seeking to re-locate in search of employment are essentially locked out of the housing and rental markets in Melbourne. The median house price for the Latrobe Valley was only $234,000 in 2014. By contrast, house prices in inner Melbourne soared to a median price of $1,405,000 in 2016. In metropolitan Melbourne, the median house price increased to a record high of $770,000. Likewise, median weekly rent is $200 for the Latrobe Valley, compared to median rent nationally of $335.

Unemployment, socio-economic disadvantage, and remoteness have been recognised as major contributors to suicides, mental health problems and substance use. With 10.1 percent of Latrobe Valley’s population aged between 16-64 years receiving a Disability Support Pension, the leading cause of disability is a mental disorder.

A boarded-up shop in Moe, a poverty-stricken town in the Latrobe Valley

The Latrobe Valley has one of Australia’s highest opioid dispensing rates and the second highest rate of fatal drug overdoses in regional Victoria. With no residential rehabilitation and withdrawal centres throughout the surrounding Gippsland region, the outpatient alcohol and drug treatment rate was more than double that of the rest of the state, with 12.2 per 1,000 of the population accessing related services, compared to 5.8 per 1,000 across Victoria.

The impact of the social crisis on psychological well being is further expressed in the episodes of hospital treatment for intentional self-harm. The Department of Health and Human Services reported that the rate for Gippsland from 2010-11 to 2014-15 was almost double that of the rest of the state for both men and women. The Victorian rate per 100,000 of the population was 43.0 for men and 82.8 for women. For Gippsland, the rate was 77.9 for men and 148.3 for women.

The physical health of Latrobe Valley’s people is heavily impacted also by exposure to pollution from the open cut mines and thermal power stations, especially given the close proximity of towns to the mines. In the Latrobe Valley, the leading cause of death is cancer, which is ranked fifth nationally.

Life expectancy, as reported by the Department of Health 2012, at birth for males was significantly lower compared to both national and state figures, at 76.9 years for males, compared to the state figure of 80.3 years. For females life expectancy was 82.2 years, compared to the state figure of 84.4 years.

Of babies, 8.5 percent are of low birth rate (under 2,500 grams) compared to the state figure of 6.6 percent. At school entry, 15.7 percent of children are developmentally delayed on two or more domains, compared to the state figure of 9.5 percent.

These social disparities are a damning indictment on a system driven by corporate profit that views the lives of the working class contemptuously, as an expendable resource to be exploited.

Workers, young people and children of the Latrobe Valley have been abandoned and betrayed by consecutive Labor and Liberal-National Coalition governments and the trade unions, which feign concern but demonstrate a callous disregard for the social conditions they have policed.

Australian government orders police raids on union offices

Mike Head

In two highly-publicised raids, scores of Australian Federal Police (AFP) officers suddenly arrived at the Sydney and Melbourne offices of the Australian Workers Union (AWU) on Tuesday afternoon, executed search warrants, and carted away documents.

Australia increasingly resembles a police state, with stage-managed raids conducted for blatant political purposes. The pretext for the police operation was political donations made a decade ago, and officially recorded at the time, but allegedly not properly noted in AWU minutes.

Efforts are being made, at the highest levels of the state, to criminalise regular political activities such as making donations. The internal affairs of trade unions and political organisations are being subjected to massive surveillance and control.

As has become customary with police raids, including “counter-terrorism” operations, media outlets were alerted by the government, so television cameras were on hand to broadcast the images far and wide.

Employment Minister Michaelia Cash is now facing calls to resign, after falsely telling a Senate estimates committee last night on five occasions that neither she, nor her office, tipped off the media. “Quite frankly, I am offended on behalf of my staff as to those allegations,” Cash said at one point.

Cash even insisted she was not aware of Tuesday’s raid until she saw it on television. Later, after journalists exposed her claims, she recanted her testimony and announced that her senior media adviser, David De Garis, had resigned after admitting alerting journalists. De Garis has been made a fall guy for an affair that is now intensifying the crisis of the Liberal-National Coalition government.

A total of 32 police were involved in the raids, which came just three days before the High Court is due to decide tomorrow whether to disqualify seven members of parliament, including Deputy Prime Minister Barnaby Joyce.

Plainclothes AFP officers, some wheeling large cases, arrived at the AWU’s national ­office in Sydney at about 4.30pm and sealed off the 10th-floor headquarters in a search for documents. Uniformed armed police stood guard outside the office.

Simultaneously, plainclothes officers, some holding AFP folders and wearing police badges, arrived in an unmarked car at the AWU’s Victorian state office in West Melbourne. AFP officers remained in the building for more than four hours, leaving at 9pm.

The raids were requested by the Turnbull government’s recently-created Registered Organisations Commission (ROC), a body with vast powers to pry into trade union affairs, including to conduct forced questioning of members, officials or anyone else.

In parliament yesterday, Prime Minister Malcolm Turnbull condemned suggestions that the government was using the police for political purposes, saying that was an attack on “the integrity of the Australian Federal Police.” But clearly the orders came from the government itself.

The raids were conducted just days after Cash referred the AWU to the ROC, following accusations splashed throughout the Murdoch media that, in 2005, the union gave $100,000 to the lobby group GetUp! without the donation being authorised under union rules.

Murdoch’s Australian published similar allegations that the AWU, then led by Labor Party leader Bill Shorten, also gave money to his parliamentary election campaign and that of two other Labor candidates in 2007 without due authorisation.

The ROC claimed to have received a phone call that gave it “reasonable grounds” to suspect that relevant documents were “being concealed or destroyed.” Instead of ordering the AWU to produce the documents, using one of the commission’s many coercive powers, the ROC sent in the police.

The ROC raised the spectre of criminal charges. It said it was an offence for a person to engage in conduct “that results in the concealment, destruction or alteration of a document” relating to a ROC investigation. That offence is punishable by up to two years’ jail.

The raids set an anti-democratic precedent. Regardless of the right-wing and pro-capitalist character of the AWU and the Labor Party, and GetUp! as well, the making of political donations is a basic democratic right that must be free of interference by the capitalist state apparatus.

Accusations of financial or organisational irregularities can become vehicles for far-reaching state intervention into political groups and parties, not just trade unions. If a union or any other group is allegedly breaching its rules, that is a matter for its members to deal with, not the police and government watchdogs.

Increasingly, official Australian politics has descended into mud-slinging and intrigue, backed by police operations, as both traditional ruling parties, Labor and the Coalition, pursue an agenda of slashing public services, intensifying war preparations and decimating working class jobs and conditions.

For more than three decades, successive governments have presided over widening social inequality, destruction of full-time jobs, worsening health, education and other key social services, and a lurch toward war as part of an ever-closer alignment with Washington. As a result, unprecedented social discontent and political disaffection has developed.

A growing pattern has emerged of governments orchestrating police investigations for political purposes. Last year, Turnbull’s government called in the AFP to investigate Labor Party election text messages about the Medicare health insurance scheme. Leaks to the media about the disastrous performance of the National Broadband Network led to raids on Labor Party parliamentary offices.

From new military call-out provisions to the constant barrage of measures to boost the powers of the police and intelligence agencies, the government is desperately resorting to authoritarian methods amid a deepening political crisis of the entire parliamentary establishment.

By targeting Shorten, Turnbull’s government, which faces being thrown from office when the next election is held, is stepping up the use of political smears to try to undermine its parliamentary opposition.

The targeting of GetUp! also points to deeply anti-democratic processes. The lobby group had previously acknowledged receipt of a donation of $100,000 in 2005 from the AWU. GetUp! is a self-styled “independent” and “progressive” movement that seeks to put a participatory gloss on the existing political set-up and channel support to Labor and the Greens. As a result, it is coming under constant attack from the backers of the Liberal and National parties.

The Australian Electoral Commission (AEC), under pressure from the government, recently announced that it was once again investigating whether GetUp! should be categorised as an “associated entity” of the Labor Party under the federal electoral legislation. This would bring the organisation within the intrusive and extremely complex framework of reporting and monitoring imposed on political parties, and force it to lodge financial disclosure returns about donations it receives.

Both the AEC and ROC are like giant government octopuses, with tentacles covering every aspect of political and union organisations’ affairs, right down to their constitutions, minutes books, membership lists and donation records. The ROC has powers to require people to answer questions behind-closed-doors, seize or force the handover of documents, and enter and search premises.

Any office-bearer of an organisation convicted of even “recklessly” failing to “exercise their duties in good faith in the best interests of the organisation or for a proper purpose” can be fined 2,000 penalty units (currently $360,000) and/or jailed for five years.

The ROC began operations in May following last year’s double dissolution election of all members of both houses of parliament. Turnbull’s attempt to strengthen the position of the government backfired, leaving it with only a one-seat majority in the lower house and only 29 seats in the 76-member Senate.

However, after the election, backed by some of the right-wing populists elected to the Senate, the government pushed through parliament the two previously-blocked bills it had selected as the triggers for the election. One was to restore the Australian Building and Construction Commission (ABCC), which specialises in outlawing and punishing industrial action by construction workers. The other was to establish the ROC, with even more draconian powers.

Quebec “clarifies” application of anti-Muslim law

Keith Jones

Quebec Justice Minister Stéphanie Vallée announced Tuesday several purported “clarifications” to the provincial Liberal government’s newly-enacted law denying public services, including health care and education, to women wearing Muslim face-coverings.

Last week, as Bill 62 was being adopted by the National Assembly, Vallée explicitly stated that Muslim women who wear the niqab or burka would have to have their “face uncovered” from the beginning to the end of their municipal bus ride, library visit, or use of any other public service.

On Tuesday, she claimed that she had been misinterpreted: those wearing a Muslim face-covering who want to use a municipal bus will be forced to show their faces, for “identification” and “security” purposes, only when they embark or if asked to do so by transit police.

Quebec’s Justice Minister also “clarified” that veiled women will not be denied emergency medical services. Those accessing hospital services in other circumstances “will have to have their face uncovered,” said Vallée, “when they are in direct contact with an employee. But when they return for example to the waiting room, they will not be obliged to have their face uncovered.”

Vallée expressed dismay that the Liberals’ actions have provoked an outcry across Canada, including within Quebec. Immigrant and civil rights groups, and large numbers of ordinary people, have rightly condemned Bill 62 as a bigoted attack on Muslim women, an especially marginalized and vulnerable minority.

Vallée and Quebec Premier Philippe Couillard have shamelessly lied about the aims of Bill 62. The Liberals’ ban on public services being given or received by persons with “face covered” manifestly targets devout Muslim women and them alone. But the Liberals have sought to hide the law’s anti-democratic and chauvinist intent behind spurious claims that it is motivated by concerns over security, social harmony, and even inclusion and women’s rights.

Vallée’s expressions of dismay at her Tuesday press conference were not feigned, however. The government has been taken back by the hostile reaction to its stigmatizing of veiled Muslim women and is now trying to limit the damage to its longstanding efforts to cast itself and Canadian federalism as a tolerant, liberal alternative to its more stridently Quebec nationalist and anti-immigrant opponents in the pro-Quebec independence Parti Québécois (PQ) and the “autonomist” Coalition Avenir Québec (CAQ—Coalition for Quebec’s Future).

Vallee’s “clarifications,” of course, change absolutely nothing about the deeply reactionary, bigoted character of Bill 62.

It is a calculated attempt to incite prejudice, so as to divert mounting social anger over socioeconomic insecurity, including the social devastation wrought by the Liberals’ brutal austerity drive, into reactionary channels and split the working class.

By enshrining in law that essential public services must be denied veiled women, the government is effectively summoning shopkeepers and restaurant owners to ban them from their premises and the public to shun them. A spike in harassment and physical attacks on Muslims will undoubtedly follow, as was the case during 2013-14, when the then PQ government of Pauline Marois brought forward its chauvinist “Charter of Quebec Values.”

Bill 62 is titled an “ Act to foster adherence to State religious neutrality.” But in keeping with its chauvinist aims , it give s the Roman Catholic faith a privileged status in Quebec, in the name of preserving Quebec’s “cultural heritage.” The Liberals ’ two-faced position on religion was highlighted again on Tuesday, when its legislators voted down a proposal to debate removing the crucifix that hangs over the Quebec National Assembly.

The PQ and CAQ have opposed Bill 62 from the right, arguing it does not go far enough. Yesterday, PQ leader Jean-François Lisée said his party favours making it illegal to wear a Muslim face-covering in public and that it would use the “notwithstanding clause” in Canada’s Constitution, which allows governments to violate basic rights guaranteed under the Charter of Rights and Freedom, so as to ensure such a blanket ban could not be overturned through a court challenge.

As for Québec Solidaire—the pseudo-left, Quebec indépendantiste party that has three legislators in the National Assembly—it has played a pivotal role in legitimizing the efforts of the Quebec and Canadian elite to make immigrants, and Muslims in particular, scapegoats for the capitalist crisis.

It haggled with the PQ over the details of the latter’s chauvinist Charter and has insisted that the decade-long debate over the “reasonable accommodation” of ethnic and religious minorities is rooted in legitimate concerns. In fact, this debate was a reactionary canard from the outset—a furor whipped up by the right-wing tabloid press of media tycoon and prominent PQ supporter Pierre-Karl Péladeau and by Mario Dumont and the right-wing populist ADQ (a precursor of the CAQ)

Last January after a young person influenced by the ultra-right and the bigoted anti-Muslim discourse of Quebec politics massacred six people at a Quebec City mosque, QS legislator Amir Khadir attributed the attack to a “malaise” in Quebec society. This, he said, needed to be addressed by all four parties in the National Assembly joining forces to quickly adopt Bill 62, if the government would only amend the legislation to ban judges and other “members of the state exercising coercive powers” from wearing religious symbols.

Whilst Québec Solidaire ultimately voted against Bill 62, it has pointedly refused to denounce it as a chauvinist attack on Muslims and an egregious violation of democratic rights. Instead QS, like the PQ, mocks the “absurdities” of the new law.

The federal Liberal government and the Ontario and Alberta governments have all criticized Bill 62 so as to posture as champions of democratic rights. All these governments have imposed austerity and are complicit in the criminalization of social opposition.

The entire Canadian establishment has invoked the phony “war on terror,” which has always been closely associated with the promotion of Islamophobia, to justify Canada’s participation in US-led imperialist wars in Central Asia, the Middle East and Africa, as well as a vast expansion of the powers and reach of Canada’s national-security apparatus.

Whilst there is genuine anger and outrage among working people in English Canada over the anti-democratic actions of the Quebec government, the opposition of the federalist political establishment is imbued with Canadian nationalism, which is falsely depicted as “progressive” and of a different kind, than the “insular, retrograde” Quebecois variety.

In fact, Canadian nationalism is increasingly serving as a rallying crying for imperialist war and social reaction. The Conservatives have repeatedly incited anti-immigrant and anti-Muslim prejudice. As for Trudeau, he has maintained a conspicuous silence on Trump’s travel bans targeting predominantly Muslim countries, and while claiming to be pro-refugee, his government is threatening to deport those seeking refuge from Trump’s anti-immigrant policies.

Bill 62 is patterned after chauvinist laws adopted by several European countries, notably France, where it is now illegal to wear the hijab (Muslim headscarf) in public schools and Muslim face-coverings have been outlawed in all public spaces.

In Canada as in Europe, the ruling elite has no answer to the breakdown of capitalism other than to intensify the assault on the working class and to brawl over markets, resources and profits through great-power geopolitics and war. It is within this context and with the aim of dividing the working class that the Quebec and Canadian establishment are turning to social reaction, eviscerating democratic rights, and promoting nationalism and anti-Muslim chauvinism—as exemplified by Bill 62.

US Senate votes to protect financial giants from consumer lawsuits

Patrick Martin 

The US Senate voted Tuesday night to repeal a rule issued by the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau that barred financial institutions from using arbitration clauses to stop consumers from filing class action lawsuits if they have been swindled or otherwise harmed by the banks.

The 51-50 vote came with Vice President Mike Pence breaking a tie. Two Republicans, Lindsey Graham of South Carolina and John N. Kennedy of Louisiana, joined all 48 Democrats to oppose the bill. The 50 Republicans who backed the legislation included all three of the senators who have made vociferous criticisms of President Donald Trump in the past week: John McCain and Jeff Flake of Arizona, and Bob Corker of Tennessee.

The vote was taken under provisions of the Congressional Review Act, which allows a majority of both houses of Congress to overturn a regulation issued by an executive branch agency within 60 legislative days of its adoption.

The CFPB, which is headed by Obama appointee Richard Cordray, issued the rule July 20, and the House of Representatives voted five days later, by 231-190, to overturn it. Senate action was delayed repeatedly as the Republican leadership scrambled to prevent more than two defections, thus allowing Pence to cast the tiebreaking vote. The repeal now goes to President Trump for his promised signature.

The legislation is a green light for financial swindlers. In the wake of the 2008 Wall Street Crash, and the flood of consumer lawsuits it provoked over various forms of misrepresentation and fraud by banks and other financial institutions, the corporations used clauses inserted in the fine print of contracts for credit cards, auto, payday and student loans, and other financial products, to force consumers into arbitration rather than going to court.

The Supreme Court upheld the use of arbitration clauses to protect companies from class action suits, even in cases of egregious misconduct, in its decisions in AT&T Mobility v. Concepcion (2011) and American Express Co. v. Italian Colors Restaurant (2013). Both decisions saw a narrow five-member conservative majority of Justices Scalia, Alito, Thomas, Roberts and Kennedy backing the financial institutions.

The CFPB, set up in 2010 under terms of the Dodd-Frank bill, conducted a protracted study of the use of arbitration clauses, finding that very few consumers who felt they had been cheated would make use of arbitration, since the process yielded few penalties on the financial flimflam artists.

Of thousands of cases, only 78 arbitration claims resulted in a derisory $400,000 in total relief to consumers, compared to billions in restitution won through more than 400 class action lawsuits or settlements agreed on by the banks in response to the threat of such suits. Attorney fees averaged 18 percent of the money recovered in lawsuits.

“Every group that represents consumers was strongly against the bill,” Paul Bland, a representative of the consumer group Public Justice, told the press. “This was the Wells Fargo immunity act. It’s essentially a bailout for those companies.”

The Trump White House issued a press release hailing the Senate action in terms that can only be called Orwellian, declaring, “Congress is standing up for everyday consumers,” when the direct opposite is the case: Congress is standing up for those who profit from the fleecing of everyday consumers.

Two federal agencies under the control of Trump administration appointees, the Treasury Department and the Office of Comptroller of the Currency, issued reports earlier this week denouncing the action by the CFPB, which is run by Obama administration holdover Cordray, who serves a fixed term until July 2018 and cannot be removed by Trump except for gross misconduct.

“Tonight’s vote is a giant setback for every consumer in this country,” Cordray, said in a statement. “As a result, companies like Wells Fargo and Equifax remain free to break the law without fear of legal blowback from their customers.”

While criticizing the action, Cordray is expected to quit his post at the CFPB soon to seek the Democratic nomination for governor of Ohio in 2018. This will allow Trump to name his successor, which means the effective end to even the current extremely limited enforcement of consumer protection rules.

The congressional action is worth billions, perhaps even tens of billions, to giant Wall Street financial institutions like Wells Fargo, which created tens of thousands of dummy accounts for customers and billed them for it, and Equifax, which exposed the personal and credit information of an estimated 150 million Americans.

H&M Global Change Award (€1 Million Grant) 2018

Application Deadline: 31st October 2017.

Eligible Countries: All

To be taken at (country): Online and Sweden

About the Award: What if we could make a shift from “take-make-waste” to a fashion world where there is no waste? What if we could make fashion circular.

What if everything could be made again. Knowing what we know today, how would we then create the materials we use, design the processes we utilize and construct the businesses that drive fashion? What if fashion could be truly circular? What if we could reinvent it all.

We think there is no better moment to do this than now. And we believe that you have the ideas to make it possible.

Type: Entrepreneurship, contest

Eligibility: 

• Only one entry per participant/group is accepted. Each participant/group can register only once.
• Entry must be the applicant’s own creation.
• Maximum 5 team members, including the team leader.
• For group entries, members must nominate a leader and contact person.

Selection Criteria:  The global public is invited to distribute the €1 million grant between the five innovations through an online vote. The result of the vote is revealed at a grand award ceremony in Stockholm, Sweden on 5th April 2017. This is one of the world’s biggest challenges for early stage innovation and the first such initiative in the fashion industry.

Number of Awardees: Five

Value of Programme: By applying to the Global Change Award you’re competing for:

• A € 1.000.000 grant, shared by five winners. Which will be distributed by the public though an online vote.
• A trip to Stockholm to attend the grand award ceremony in March 2018.
• Access to a one-year Innovation Accelerator provided by H&M Foundation, Accenture and KTH Royal Institute of Technology in Stockholm.

Duration of Program:

• Online Vote: 12th-16th March 2018
• Accelerator: 21st March-20th March 2019

How to Apply: The application form is divided into the following four parts:

• Register for an account and fill in your profile.
• Answer a few basic questions about your idea.
• Give us the details on how your idea will make fashion circular.
• Submit your idea.

Apply here

Visit Programme Webpage for details

Award Provider: H&M Foundation

French Government (Eiffel Excellence) Masters and PhD Scholarships for Developing Countries 2018/2019

Application Deadline: open 12th January, 2018

• Announcement of results: Week of March 26th, 2018

Offered annually? Yes

Eligible Countries: Emerging economies

To be taken at: France

Accepted Subject Areas: Eiffel scholarships are available in three main fields:

• engineering science at master’s level,
• science in the broadest sense at PhD level (engineering science; exact sciences: mathematics, physics, chemistry and life sciences, nano- and biotechnology, earth sciences, sciences of the universe, environmental sciences, information and communication science and technology);
• economics and management;
• law and political sciences.

About the Award: The Eiffel Excellence Scholarship Programme was established by the French Ministry of Foreign Affairs and International Development to enable French higher education establishments to attract top foreign students to enrol in their master’s and PhD courses.

It helps to shape the future foreign decision-makers of the private and public sectors, in priority areas of study, and encourages applications from emerging countries at master’s level, and from emerging and industrialized countries at PhD level.

Offered Since: 1999

Type: Masters, PhD

Eligibility

• Only foreign nationals are eligible to apply for a scholarship from the French Government.
• In the case of dual nationality applicants, those with French nationality are ineligible.
• for master’s courses, candidates must be no older than 30 on the date of the selection committee meeting,March 2018; at PhD level, candidates must be no older than 35 on the date of the selection committee meeting, March 2018.
• only applications submitted by French educational establishments are accepted. These establishments undertake to enrol scholarship holders on the course for which they have been selected. Applications submitted by any other means shall not be considered. Furthermore, any candidate nominated by more than one establishment shall be disqualified.
• scholarships are for students wishing to enrol on a master’s course, including at an engineering school, and for PhD students. The Eiffel Programme does not apply to French-run master’s courses abroad, as non-PhD scholarship holders must complete at least 75% of their course in France. It does not apply to training under an apprenticeship contract or a professional training contract either.
• Educational establishments that shortlist non-French speaking applicants must ensure that their level of French is sufficient to enable them to integrate satisfactorily into the anticipated course
• Combination with other scholarships: foreign students who, at the time of application, have already been awarded a French government scholarship under another programme are not eligible, even if the scholarship in question does not include social security cover.
• Eiffel PhD scholarships: Establishments may nominate a candidate who was previously awarded an Eiffel scholarship at master’s level for a scholarship at PhD level. Candidates who have already been awarded an Eiffel scholarship once during their PhD cannot be awarded it for a second time. No application will be accepted for any student who applied previously but was rejected, even if the application is submitted by a different establishment or in another field of study.
• Eiffel master’s scholarships: no application will be accepted for any student who applied previously but was rejected, even if the application is submitted by a different establishment or in another field of study. Students who have already been awarded an Eiffel scholarship at master’s level are not eligible to re-apply at master’s level.
• Language skills: when pre-selecting non-French-speaking candidates, establishments must make sure that their language skills meet the requirements of the relevant course of study.

Number of Scholarships: Not Specified

Selection Criteria: The selection criteria are as follows:

• the excellence of the candidate, as demonstrated by his or her university career so far and the originality of his or her research subject;
• the international policy of the establishment nominating the candidate, its action in the geographical area in question, the excellence of the host department, the establishment’s compatibility with the candidate being nominated, its efforts to publicise the Eiffel Programme and its continued support of scholarship holders, especially through a partnership with France Alumni (https://www.francealumni.fr/en);
• the cooperation and partnership policy of the French Ministry of Foreign Affairs and International Development, and in particular, the priority given to certain countries for this Programme.

The committee marks each candidate for these three criteria and calculates a total score out of 50. It sets a minimum threshold for admissibility and distributes the scholarships as follows, depending on the number available:

• at least 70% of the scholarships are awarded to the highest-scoring candidates;
• the remaining scholarships are distributed among the establishments that have not received one, for candidates who achieved scores above the minimum threshold.

These selected applications represent the definitive list of successful candidates.

Scholarship Amount:

Master’s level:

• The Eiffel scholarship includes a monthly allowance of €1,181 (a maintenance allowance of €1,031 and a monthly stipend of €150).
• In addition, the following expenses are directly covered: – one international return journey; Page 3 of 6 – social security cover; – cultural activities. Scholarship holders may also receive an additional housing allowance, under certain conditions.

PhD level:

• The Eiffel scholarship includes a monthly allowance of €1,400.
• In addition, the following expenses are directly covered: – one international return journey (for students in law or political sciences who may make several trips, only one return journey shall be covered); – social security cover; – cultural activities. Scholarship holders may also receive an additional housing allowance, under certain conditions.

Duration: The scholarship is awarded for:

• a maximum of 12 months for entry at M2 level,
• a maximum of 24 months for entry at M1 level,
• a maximum of 36 months for an engineering degree.

A 2-month preliminary intensive language training course. The total duration of the course undertaken (including compulsory work experience or internships in France or abroad) must be clearly indicated by the educational establishment in the application form. Optional placements are not covered by the grant.

For PhD: The Eiffel scholarship is awarded for a maximum of ten months. For scientific and economic disciplines, no language course is provided for and the scholarship duration cannot be divided up. For law students, the ten-month scholarship can, with the consent of the selection committee, be split into two or three stays in France, of three or four months each. These stays must take place over a maximum of three calendar years. Only law students have the option of taking French lessons alongside their studies. This must be clearly requested in the application.

How to Apply

Visit the Scholarship Webpage for details to apply

Sponsors: The French Ministry of Foreign and European Affairs

University of London & Canon Collins LLM Masters by Distance Learning Scholarships 2018

Application Deadline: 12th January 2018.

Offered annually? Yes

Eligible Countries: Angola, Botswana, Lesotho, Malawi, Mozambique, Namibia, South Africa, Swaziland, Zambia, Zimbabwe

To be taken at (country):  University of London, UK

About the Award: These scholarships allow individuals to study for the Postgraduate Certificate, Postgraduate Diploma and/or the Master of Laws (LLM) by distance learning, at the University of London. Applicants can start at any level, and do not need to complete the whole programme. For example, applicants can start at Postgraduate Certificate level and work their way through to the LLM, or can stop after completing the PG Certificate. Applicants who have completed an undergraduate degree may start at LLM level, skipping the PG Certificate and Diploma.

Type: Masters

Eligibility: In order to be eligible for a scholarship, applicants must be admitted to the Master of Laws by distance learning programme at the University of London.

Applicants for this scholarship must also be:

• a national of, or have refugee status in, one of the following countries: Angola, Botswana, Lesotho, Malawi, Mozambique, Namibia, South Africa, Swaziland, Zambia, Zimbabwe
• normally resident in one of these countries
• in possession of the necessary qualifications required for admission to the programme;
• currently employed in full or part-time work;
• able to commit a minimum of 10 hours to study per week.

Number of Scholarships: 4

Value of Scholarship: These scholarships are made possible by the generosity of the University of London, who will waiver full tuition and examination entry fees of selected candidates. Local examination fees are not included.

Duration of Scholarship: Scholarship recipients have between 1 to 5 years to complete the LLM, and continued registration on the course is dependent upon satisfactory progress and academic reports.

How to Apply

Please read the guidelines carefully, and then apply through this link.

Visit scholarship webpage for details

Sponsors: The University of London and Canon Collins Trust

John S. Knight Journalism Fellowship at Stanford University 2019

Application Deadline: 4th December, 2017

Offered annually? Yes

Eligible Countries: All

To be taken at (country): Stanford University, USA

About the Award: The JSK Journalism Fellowships supports diverse journalists from around the world who are deeply engaged in exploring solutions to the most urgent issues facing journalism. Innovation, entrepreneurship and leadership in journalism are the foundation of our work, which seeks to improve the quality of news and information reaching the public.

From September 2018 to June 2019, the JSK fellows will spend their time on individual and collaborative projects. Although it is not an academic program, they will have the option to sit in on classes, while also participating in special workshops and weekly events, and exploring the abundant resources on campus and throughout Silicon Valley.

Journalists and journalism innovators seeking to transform the industry are invited to apply by proposing journalism projects, framed as questions, that fit within the four themes that are the focus of the program. (The questions below are examples; you should propose an original question):

• Challenging Misinformation and Disinformation — How might journalists use social listening tools to identify and counter misinformation?
• Holding the Powerful Accountable — How might journalists build collaborative networks to better track the financial dealings of political leaders in emerging democracies?
• Eradicating News Deserts and Strengthening Local News — How might news organizations engage neighborhood groups in helping disseminate information people need to fully participate in their communities?
• Fighting Bias, Intolerance and Injustice — How might journalists use artificial intelligence to detect bias in how municipal governments deliver services to local residents?

Type: Fellowship

Eligibility:

• Experience: U.S. applicants for a JSK Fellowship ideally have at least seven years of full-time professional experience; international applicants ideally have at least five years. But we also consider less experienced applicants with outstanding achievements.
• Degree: No college degree is required.
• Professional Background: We consider applicants who fall into one or more of these categories:
  • Journalists employed by a news organization or journalism freelancers
  • Journalism entrepreneurs and innovators
  • Journalism business and management executives

Selection Criteria: The John S. Knight Journalism Fellowship is focused on journalism innovation, entrepreneurship and leadership. We select JSK Fellows who are passionate about finding ways to address challenges facing journalism and journalists. To that end, we ask applicants to identify a challenge they want to pursue and tell us a little bit about it. Those who are selected for a fellowship spend a significant portion of their time here working on that challenge.

Selected fellows identify and articulate a challenge in journalism that they want to work on addressing. We expect them to arrive in the program with more questions than answers and we seek people who are eager to experiment and to change course based on what they learn along the way.

JSK Fellows learn from, and collaborate with, each other. Diversity of background, experience and viewpoints is a fundamental value of our program. We enthusiastically include spouses, partners and families in fellowship life.

There is no single formula for identifying a journalism challenge that will assure you are selected for a JSK Fellowship. The best advice we can give you is this: Identify a challenge that you are passionate about pursuing and that is important to helping journalism.

If you are looking for a sabbatical, this is not the program for you.

Number of Awardees: 20

Value of Fellowship: JSK Fellows receive several benefits, including base stipends of $75,000, health insurance and Stanford tuition, and are provided additional support for fellows with children. Partners and spouses of fellows get to experience some of the same benefits of the program. The total financial support to fellows ranges from $95,000 to $145,000. We also help fellows find housing.

Other benefits of the John S. Knight Journalism Fellowship:

• Access to some of the world’s most innovative thinkers and organizations, from technology giants to hot new startups to Stanford’s 100-plus special institutes and centers.
• Opportunities to join classes taught by top-notch Stanford professors and instructors in a wide range of specialties. It is not uncommon for classes to be taught by people who also are working in the private sector.
• A rich intellectual and cultural campus life, including live theater, music and dance performances and special lectures and events.
• Fellowship social events where everyone can get to know one another. A number of these events also are open to fellows’ children.
• Spouses and partners are eligible to take classes and attend fellowship seminars just as the fellows do. Fellows’ children can attend excellent Palo Alto-area schools and are included in some special fellowship social activities.
• Exposure to the incredible diversity of world views, experiences and cultural traditions that about 20 fellows from all over the world bring to the program.
• New friendships, professional connections and entrepreneurial skills that will continue beyond your 10 months with us.

Duration of Fellowship: 10 months (September to June)

How to Apply: Apply here

Visit Fellowship Webpage for details

Award Provider:  John S. Knight Journalism Fellowship Program

Mälardalen University Scholarship Programme for Masters Students 2018/2019: Sweden

Application Timeline: 1st February, 2018

Notification of scholarships granted are sent by email 10th April 2018. Mälardalen University will use the same email address as used on University Admissions.

Offered annually? Yes

Eligible Countries: The scholarship is aimed at especially qualified students coming from countries outside of EU/EEA/Switzerland and who are required to pay tuition fees. The scholarship is NOT open for students from the twelve countries with which Sweden has long-term development cooperation (Bangladesh, Bolivia, Burkina Faso, Cambodia, Ethiopia, Kenya, Mali, Mozambique, Rwanda, Tanzania, Uganda and Zambia). Students from these countries should instead apply for the Swedish Institute Study Scholarship (application opening soon)

To be taken at (country): Sweden

Eligible Field of Study: All

Type: Masters

Selection Criteria: The selection process is based on applicant’s CV and qualifications that will be evaluated in connection with the application for a KI study programme. Scholarship awardees will be notified via email.

Number of Awardees: Not specified

Value of Scholarship: The scholarship will cover 100% of the tuition fee of the programme as long as you follow the normal study plan (minimum 22.5 credits/semester, minimum 45 credits/academic year). The scholarship does not cover living expenses. If your status from being a fee-paying student to a non-paying student is changed during the study period of the programme you will no longer be granted the scholarship.

Duration of Scholarship: Complete programme duration

How to Apply: Fill out the Scholarship form and submit the application together with your other documents to University Admissions Sweden, FE 20102, SE-839 87 Östersund, Sweden or upload them at their website.

Apply with this application form

Visit Scholarship Webpage for details

Award Provider: Mälardalen University

Important Notes: If your application for scholarship is to be considered you must have applied for the programme at Mälardalen University as your first choice and submitted supporting documentation within deadlines published on www.universityadmissions.se. In addition the application fee must have been paid in time.

Oxford-Thatcher Graduate Scholarships (Fully-funded) for MENA Countries 2018/2019

Application Deadline: 8th or 19th January 2018, depending on your course

Offered annually? Yes

Eligible Countries: Algeria, Bahrain, Egypt, Iraq, Jordan, Kuwait, Lebanon, Libya, Morocco, Oman, Palestine, Qatar, Saudi Arabia, Sudan, Syria, Tunisia, United Arab Emirates, Yemen.

To be taken at (country):  Oxford University

Eligible Fields of Study: You must be applying to start a new full- or part-time course in one of the following departments: Faculty of English Language and Literature, Department of Engineering Science, Faculty of Law.

About the Award: The scholarships for postgraduates will be known as the Oxford-Qatar-Thatcher Graduate Scholarship and the Oxford-Thatcher Graduate Scholarships. The Oxford-Qatar-Thatcher Graduate Scholarship has been created as a result of a £3 million donation by the Qatar Development Fund, which supports international education, health and economic development causes. This will create at least four scholarships at both undergraduate and postgraduate level, the first of which is expected to be awarded in 2018/19 to a postgraduate student.

This scholarship is part of the Oxford Graduate Scholarships, which were established through a ground-breaking new matched funding initiative to enable the creation of fully-funded scholarships for graduate students of the highest calibre from across the world. The University contributes 40% of the funds for these scholarships, together with 60% from generous donations provided by supporters of Somerville College.

The scholarship is only tenable at Somerville College. All eligible applicants will be considered for this scholarship, regardless of which college (if any) you state as your preference on the graduate application form. However, successful applicants will be transferred to Somerville College in order to take up the scholarship.

The aims of the Thatcher Scholarships are to foster academic excellence, to support individuals who have a determination to succeed and to equip them to excel in their chosen field.

Type: Masters, PhD

Eligibility: 

• To be eligible for consideration for this scholarship, applicants must be successful in being offered a place on their course after consideration of applications received by the relevant January deadline for the course.
• Scholarships will be awarded on the basis of academic merit.
• Applicants who hold deferred offers to start in 2017-18 are not eligible to be considered for these scholarships.

Number of Awardees: 3

Value of Scholarship: The Oxford-Thatcher scholarship will cover 100% of University and college fees and a grant for living costs of at least £14,296.

Duration of Scholarship: Awards are made for the full duration of your fee liability for the agreed course.

How to Apply: In order to be considered for this scholarship, you must submit your application for graduate study by the relevant January deadline for your course (6 January or 20 January 2017.

Visit Scholarship Webpage for details

Award Provider: Qatar Development Fund, Oxford University

Important Notes: Decisions are expected to be made by April 2017. If you have not heard from Oxford-Thatcher scholarship board by this time, then please assume that your application has been unsuccessful. Due to the volume of applications we receive, we regret that we are unable to contact unsuccessful applicants individually or provide feedback on applications.