Bruce Cornwall
Bruce Cornwall born 1950, is an Australian activist. Cornwall was educated by the Christian Brothers and in 1967 enrolled in engineering at Melbourne University where he became involved in radical politics. In 1970, while in the heyday of his numerous radical activities, he refused to register and was taken to court and sentenced. He case came up while he was already in gaol for his other activities. Bruce had several stints in prison and has much to say about it. He passed through the Draft Resisters Union and SDS and became a “Maoist” engaged in many political activities, and continued his work in the peace movement for many decades. He has taken on responsible positions in the Communist Party of Australia (Marxist-Leninist) and is a strong worker for reform within the Health Services Union.[1]
Walk Against the War Coalition split
After trying for months to split the Walk Against the War Coalition (WAWC), the ALP finally managed to get its way on August 18. 2003 At a special meeting of the coalition, attended by close to 100 people, the ALP mustered the numbers to force it to wind up.
The vote was 56 in favour of closing down the WAWC and dispersing its funds, with 31 voting for it to continue. The NSW Greens and the Australia-East Timor Association abstained.
The special general meeting was called after WAWC co-convener Nick Everett alerted the 70 WAWC affiliates of the move by the two other co-convenors, Bruce Childs (former ALP senator) and Hannah Middleton (leader of the Communist Party of Australia), to dissolve the WAWC without consultation.
Childs and Middleton, with others, had formed a new organisation — the Sydney Peace and Justice Coalition (SPJC) — in secret. They believed that this gave them grounds to disband the WAWC. As Childs put it at the August 18 meeting: "We [the ALP] run the show".
Everett, local peace groups and a number of other WAWC affiliates were neither notified of, nor invited to SPJC meetings. They made it clear they had no argument with the right of affiliates to set up whatever organisation they wished, but that this did not make the WAWC redundant, especially given the ongoing war of occupation in Iraq.
Childs argued there was a need for "a change in the arrangements", and that Everett had been offered a "principled settlement" to close WAWC down.
In July, Everett and Luke Deer from the International Socialist Organisation and the Sydney Network for Peace, had refused a third of WAWC's funds offered by Peter Murphy of the SEARCH Foundation. They argued that neither he, nor anyone else, had the right to disperse funds collected from the movement for the coalition.
Childs and others made out that the WAWC had been racked with insoluble divisions. Yet, as others pointed out, it was the most successful anti-war coalition in the history of the movement, mobilising the biggest numbers ever in Sydney before a war had even started.
Middleton seconded the motion to disperse two-thirds of WAWC's funds to SPJC. "We're now in a different stage", she said, later arguing that the movement had to refocus from the occupation of Iraq to the US threat to other countries, and domestic issues.
Everett's unity motion, seconded by Deer, received strong support from unionists and activists from local peace and solidarity groups. They argued the need to campaign against Australia's role in the occupation, and to build support for Iraqi self-determination.
"If we're to win, we need more unity", Everett said, adding that the three groups that originally came together to form WAWC were "only a small nucleus" of the movement. He said that the coalition's funds should not be dispersed, and that the "Socialist Alliance -No War group", which had been nominated by Childs and Middleton to receive a third of the funds, did not exist.
Deer reminded people that the unity established in 2002 between the different peace groups — the Palm Sunday Committee, the Sydney Network for Peace and NoWar — had resulted in a diversity that had become its strength. Splitting the coalition would damage the movement, he said.
In the ensuing discussion, in which nine spoke for the split and nine against, some revealing comments were made.
Martha Ansara, for the SEARCH Foundation, spoke of a secret meeting of a handful of people at the Wayside Chapel in 2001, discussing reviving the Palm Sunday Committee. She said that the group "just couldn't work with the NoWar group". (The Palm Sunday committee refused to allow a number of radicals to join, including Nick Everett and Pip Hinman, who were twice ejected.) Ansara said the decision last year to work with the other peace groups was made under sufferance. "It just hasn't worked", she claimed.
Tim Ayres, president of the Australian Manufacturing Workers Union, criticised the WAWC for its reliance on "sloganeering" and "peace haiku". He also accused "Socialist Alliance-No War" members of "attacking our delegates on the job".
Anna York from the National Union of Students blamed Books not Bombs for demoralising the student anti-war networks on campus which, she said, were getting smaller and smaller.
Peter Murphy of the SEARCH Foundation , said that "to oppose motion [to close down WAWC] was to slow down the movement". He said the debate was "not about left versus right, but about how to work with the ALP and the labour movement". "We will have to co-operate", he conceded, "but at arm's length".
Lindy Nolan, representing the NSW Teachers Federation, said those calling for unity were not "self-critical". Bruce Cornwall, representing the Communist Party of Australia (Marxist-Leninist), said that the split would allow the SPJC "to get on with the job of building the peace movement".[2]
China visit
A delegation from the Communist Party of Australia (Marxist-Leninist), visited China in early 1990. CPA (M-L) chair Bruce Cornwall, and vice- chair Maureen Davies were warmly received by representatives of the Chinese Communist Party.[3]
National Left Fight Back Conference
National Left Fight Back Conference Easter 1987 Melbourne.
Conference chair George Georges.
Speakers and Forum leaders: Nic Abbey, Irene Bolger, Polly Brennan, Pat Brewer, Bruce Cornwall, Joan Coxsedge, George Crawford, Maureen Davies, Nigel De Souza, Steve Gibson, Bronwynn Halfpenny, Bill Hartley, Marianne Heynemann, Ted Hill, Shane Houston, Andrew Irving, Sue Jackson, David Kerin, Malcolm McDonald, Neal McLean, Frances Magill, Ken Mansell, Steve Marrantonis, Beryl Miller, Robyn Murphy, Dick Nicholls, Peter O'Dea, Jim Percy, George Petersen, Anna Pha, Theo Sidiropoulus, Chris Spindler, Adrian Stevens, Peter Symon, Harry Van Moorst, Ian Ward, Ted Wheelwright.