🇦🇺 🇲🇾

weareonourown

[Peter Lyndon-James @PeterPerthWA]

AUSTRALIA, REMEMBER THIS NAME: MARYKA GROENEWALD

One week before polling day, she was wheeled into emergency surgery. Appendicitis. Doctors said four to six weeks' recovery.

She was back on the phones the next week. And she won.

You might not know her yet. You will.

Maryka Groenewald sits on the crossbench in the WA Legislative Council. One seat. No major party behind her. And she's outworking half that chamber.

Born in Johannesburg. Came to WA at 13 with her family and her faith. Studied Community Development and Politics at Murdoch, then spent years in the places most politicians never set foot, foster care, prisons, running restorative justice programs, coordinating the Angel Tree project so kids with a parent locked up still got a Christmas present, advocating for women escaping trafficking. She didn't read about broken communities in a briefing paper. She worked in them.

Then she ran for office. And lost. Federal 2016. State 2017. State 2021. Federal 2022. Four straight defeats over nine years. Most people walk away. She didn't.

In 2025 she won, the first Australian Christians member ever elected to any parliament in the country.

And from day one she's gone after one thing: accountability.

Her biggest fight: the gender clinic at Perth Children's Hospital. For months she pushed the Cook government to release its clinical Model of Care. They stonewalled. She used the one crossbench motion she gets a year to force it into the open — and the documents landed.

What she put on the parliamentary record, straight from the government's own answers:

202 minors referred to the clinic in a single year. 69 on puberty blockers or cross-sex hormones. The youngest referred was 11. The youngest ever treated was 10. A service costing, $2.5 million a year whose own model runs from blockers, to hormones, to mastectomy referrals for teenagers.

When the government refused her permission to table the evidence, including the UK's Cass Review — she used standing order 59(2) to force it onto the table anyway.

And here's the part that matters: even the Greens leader, no ally of hers, said on the record he understood her concerns about transparency. She got an opponent to back the principle.

She doesn't care what colour jersey you wear. If you're failing the people of this state, she'll say it to your face in Parliament — and back it with the government's own numbers.

She also introduced the Born Equal Care and Protection Bill, the first of its kind in WA, so a baby born alive after a termination gets the same care as any other newborn.

But she doesn't want to be known only as a fighter. In her first speech to Parliament she said she wants to be "a bridge builder", to bring "hope, truth and joy, with some grit and courage of course" into how she does politics.

I've done the research on this woman. She's not a career politician who fell into a safe seat. She came up through the trenches, and she brought every bit of it into Parliament with her.

Her motto: "Walk the walk, do the work."

One seat. No machine. Making more noise than parties with ten times the resources.

If we had thirty more like her, this country would look different.

Share this if you reckon we need politicians who actually stand for something. And if your local member's gone missing, tag them and ask where they've been.

What's your thoughts…?

Peter Lyndon-James 🇦🇺

[🇦🇺 🇲🇾 @mazmanar]

@AlboMP Historians will look back at this current Labor party and say this is the point where billionaires, multinationals and a minority group of fascists became more important than humanity, corruption, transparency and the common Australian - Labor has well and truly lost its way

[susan abulhawa | سوزان ابو الهوى @susanabulhawa]

Here's what really happened on October 7th...

1. 07 OCTOBER 2022.
Israeli forces opened fire on a group of Palestinian children near the Apartheid wall in Qalqiliya, killing a 14-year-old boy with live ammunition (UN OCHA report)

2. 07 OCTOBER 2021.
Israeli settlers from the Telem settlement cut down more than 100 olive seedlings on Palestinian-owned land in Turqumiya, Hebron, belonging to 'Aziz Jamil Ja'afrah — the same land where settlers had uprooted trees the year before. (PCHR, 7–13 Oct 2021)

Israeli forces raided at least nine homes overnight and arrested eleven people, including a father and son together (Wadi al-Far'a, Tubas) and a 16-year-old (Adham Abu Srour, Dawha), without charge. A 55-year-old activist was separately arrested without charge at the Al-Aqsa Mosque compound.

Israeli forces demolished two residential structures in Bab al-Shams village (East Jerusalem area) belonging to two brothers — the third demolition of their homes within a single year.

Israeli gunboats fired on a Palestinian fishing boat off Gaza for roughly two and a half hours overnight.

Checkpoints and closures were imposed in Jericho, Bethlehem, Hebron, and Nablus.

3. 07 OCTOBER 2020.
Israeli forces raided Aida refugee camp, Bethlehem, blew open the doors of the camp's People's Committee office, and damaged nearby homes in the process — Palestinians officials called it part of a "terror campaign" against the camp. (PCHR, 1–7 Oct 2020)

Israeli forces raided a boys' school (al-Jamla School) in Jenin, confiscated staff IDs, and copied footage from the school's security camera system.

Multiple home-raid arrests took place in Beita, Yatta, al-Eizariya, al-Hashimia (Jenin), Qusra, and Qabatiya.

Israeli settlers from the Leshem settlement set fire to Palestinian-owned land in Deir Ballut, Salfit, burning 50 olive trees.

Multiple checkpoints/closures reported in Hebron (4), Nablus, and elsewhere, disrupting children's abilities to attend school and commutes to work and cutting off access to medical facilities and family.

4. 07 OCTOBER 2019.
20-year-old Fadi Osama Hejazi, died from sniper wounds sustained months earlier at Great March of Return protests (PCHR, 3–9 Oct 2019)

Israeli forces raided at least nine homes overnight across Bethlehem (al-Duheisha camp, Wad Ma'ali), Ramallah (al-Mazra'ah al-Gharbiyah), Jenin ('Anza village), Tulkarm ('Atil village), and Salfit (Hares village, two homes), arresting at least 12 people.

Israeli forces raided and ransacked the Hanthala Cultural Centre in Safa village (a heritage/youth-skills organization), breaking its main door and confiscating files.

Israeli forces guarding the Apartheid wall shot two Palestinian men near Zeta and Tulkarm while they attempted to cross into Israel for work.

Settlers from the Yitzhar settlement cut down 36 olive trees overnight in Burin village (Nablus). Later that morning, settlers from the same settlement attacked Burin's mixed school under military protection, forcing the administration to evacuate students.

In order to prevent Palestinians from leaving their homes during Jewish holiday, Israel began a full closure of the Tunnel, 300, al-Jeeb, and Hizma checkpoints (separating Jerusalem from Bethlehem and nearby areas) for three days during Yom Kippur, alongside closures of Arab village/neighborhood entrances with iron barriers and cement blocks, preventing anyone from accessing school, work, or medical facilities during that time.

5. 07 OCTOBER 2018.
Israeli forces raided homes in Jenin, Beit Ummer (Hebron), and al-Jalazoun refugee camp (Ramallah), arresting at least eight people; in Jalazoun, soldiers also confiscated 2,500 shekels (~$700) in cash from one household during the raid. (PCHR, 4–10 Oct 2018)

Israeli forces raided homes and a shop in Beit Led (Tulkarm), confiscating surveillance camera recordings, and arrested a 47-year-old man along with his 19-year-old son without charge.

Israeli forces carried out 20 additional home invasions (without arrests) across Hebron, Tulkarm, and Qalqiliya-area villages.

An Israeli drone fired a missile at a group of civilians near al-Shawka village, east of Rafah, Gaza.

Israeli gunboats opened heavy fire on Palestinian fishing boats off Rafah, firing flare bombs and forcing fishermen to flee.

Israeli forces conducted a limited ground invasion into eastern al-Bureij, central Gaza.

6. 07 OCTOBER 2017.

Israeli forces raided three homes overnight — in Ya'bud (Jenin), Wad Rahal (Bethlehem), and Bethlehem city — arresting three people, including two minors, without charge.

Israeli forces arrested without charge a 44-year-old man, Naser al-Jundi, at a checkpoint set up at the entrance to Al Fawwar refugee camp, south of Hebron.

Israeli gunboats twice opened fire on Palestinian fishing boats off Beit Lahia and al-Sudaniya (northern Gaza), chasing them; no injuries or damage reported.

Israeli forces stationed along the Gaza perimeter fence near Umm al-Nasser Bedouin village opened sporadic fire and fired flare bombs into the border area, terrorizing residents.

Israeli forces conducted six additional home invasions without arrests in al-Samou', Bani Na'im, Sa'ir, and al-Jalajel (Hebron) and Bedia and Masha (Salfit).

Temporary military checkpoints were set up at Halhoul and al-Dahiriya (Hebron), four locations around Qalqiliya, and three in Salfit, further restricting Palestinian movement. That night, hundreds of Israeli settlers entered 'Awerta village (Nablus) under military protection to perform religious rituals in Palestinian towns.

7. 07 OCTOBER 2016.
Israeli forces raided homes in Sabastiya (Nablus) and Nour al-Shams refugee camp (Tulkarm) overnight, arresting five people without charge.

Israeli forces entered al-Far'a refugee camp (Tubas); when young men gathered and threw stones, soldiers fired live rounds, hitting three civilians.

Israeli naval forces intercepted a fishing boat at sea, ordered the two fishermen (one a 17-year-old) to strip and swim to the gunboat, then detained them; one was released later that day, the other and the boat remained in custody.

Weekly Friday protests in Bil'in, Ni'lin, al-Nabi Saleh, and Kafr Qaddum were attacked with live fire, rubber bullets, tear gas, and sound bombs; in Bil'in, soldiers assaulted a farmer trying to reach his own field and confiscated his vehicle.

In Gaza, Israeli forces opened fire on young men gathered near the perimeter fence in solidarity with Jerusalem (Shuja'iya and al-Bureij), wounding two with live rounds.

Israeli settlers attacked Palestinian olive pickers from Yasouf village (Salfit) while they worked their land.

Dozens of settlers, escorted by Israeli forces, entered Ta'nak village (Jenin) to pray at a religious site; soldiers closed the village's main street to secure the visit, locking thousands of Palestinians in their homes.

Checkpoints went up on the Tarusah village road (west of Dura) and at Hebron's southern entrance (al-Fahes), further restricting Palestinian movement.

8. 07 OCTOBER 2015.
An Israeli settler shot a Palestinian girl from Sur Baher four times in Jerusalem's Old City; Israeli forces claimed she had stabbed him, an account PCHR notes it could not independently verify.

Hundreds of Bir Zeit University students and other civilians protested near a checkpoint and settlement outside al-Bireh; Israeli forces fired live ammunition, wounding ten (eight by live fire), while undercover Israeli units embedded in the crowd violently kidnapped three students — one shot in the leg, another shot in the head and left in serious condition.

Israeli forces raided homes across Hebron governorate overnight, kidnapping at least 16 people, including a 12-year-old (Amir Abu Romouz) and a 13-year-old (Nasim al-Teiti), in Hebron city, Dura, Halhoul, and Al Fawwar and Al Arroub refugee camps.

Israeli forces raided two homes in Nablus, arresting two men without charge.

Soldiers occupied an uninhabited home in Halhoul, raised an Israeli flag over it, and briefly operated a checkpoint from the site before withdrawing but continuing to occupy the house.

This was the seventh consecutive day Nablus remained under a full Israeli military cordon (imposed since October 1 as collective punishment), with the Huwwara, Jeet, al-Naqoura, and Deir Sharaf checkpoints all tightened, denying and delaying movement for residents.

IT GOES ON LIKE THIS EVERY DAY OF EVERY YEAR AS FAR BACK AS YOU LOOK

[Peter Lyndon-James @PeterPerthWA]

“He leased an Australian port to China, then took $880,000 a year from the buyer.”

ANDREW ROBB / PORT OF DARWIN

A Trade Minister signed off a 99-year lease of an Australian port to a Chinese company. The day before he left politics, that same company put him on $880,000 a year.

This one’s been on the public record for years, and it still stops me cold every time.

In 2015, Andrew Robb was the federal Trade Minister. On his watch, the Port of Darwin was leased to Landbridge Group, controlled by Chinese billionaire Ye Cheng, a member of the CPPCC, an advisory body to the Chinese Communist Party. The lease runs 99 years.

On 1 July 2016, the day before the federal election, with Robb on his way out of Parliament, Landbridge began paying him a consultancy worth $880,000 a year. The terms: $73,000 a month for “strategic advice.” No specified deliverables. Thirty days’ notice to end it.

The ministerial standards say a former minister should wait eighteen months before cashing in on their portfolio. Robb waited zero days. He took roughly $2 million from Landbridge before quitting the arrangement in 2019, just ahead of the new foreign-influence register that would have required him to declare it.

I’m not alleging a crime. No crime has been found, and I’m not a court. What I’m pointing at is the structure: the decision in office, the beneficiary, the destination after office, the timing. Lease the port, leave the Parliament, bank the money. All legal. That’s exactly what should worry you.

This is what “legal corruption” looks like in Australia. Not envelopes of cash. A consultancy contract, signed on the way out the door, from the company you just did the favour for.

Cold hard facts. Sourced. Corrected when wrong.

Peter Lyndon-James 🇦🇺

Sources — check it yourself
- Michael West Media: https://t.co/HMT5Zyqz7H
- The Canberra Times (leaked contract, judge’s assessment): https://t.co/LDXPh2DYpI
- Originally: ABC Four Corners + Fairfax/SMH, June 2017 (Nick McKenzie reporting)

[Peter Lyndon-James @PeterPerthWA]

THE REVOLVING DOOR: WHERE YOUR MINISTERS ACTUALLY END UP.

You elect them to serve you. Watch where they go when they're done. I've verified all 29 names, many more not listed. Every one on the public record.

Prime Ministers & Premiers
- Scott Morrison — signed AUKUS as PM, now advises DYNE Maritime, which invests in AUKUS-linked tech.

- Anna Bligh — Labor Premier, CEO of the banks' lobby.

- Gladys Berejiklian — NSW Premier, Optus executive.

- Mike Baird — NSW Premier, NAB, $2.29 million in one year.

- Barry O'Farrell — NSW Premier, CEO of Racing Australia.

- Nick Greiner — NSW Premier, coal lobbyist.

Treasury — the banks

- Josh Frydenberg — Treasurer, Goldman Sachs.

- Peter Costello — Treasurer, chairman of Nine for eight years. The bloke who ran the country's money ended up running a quarter of its newspapers.

- Joe Hockey — Treasurer, founded a Washington advisory firm riding AUKUS.

- Simon Birmingham — Finance Minister, ANZ, then CEO of the banking lobby. Left the Senate and landed at a bank, the same month.

Defence — defence money
- Christopher Pyne — Defence Minister, advising EY on defence within weeks.

- Peter Reith — Defence Minister, Tenix, a contractor that won work while he was minister.

Trade & Foreign Affairs
- Andrew Robb — Trade Minister, $880,000 a year, with Landbridge, holder of the Darwin Port lease. Quit just before the foreign interference laws kicked in.

- Julie Bishop, aid contractor Palladium.

- Marise Payne, lobbying firm.

- Alexander Downer → registered lobbyist, clients included Woodside.

- Craig Emerson — Labor, consultant for Santos.

Resources — mining and gas
- Ian Macfarlane — Resources Minister, CEO of the mining lobby, within weeks.

- Martin Ferguson — Labor's Resources Minister, oil and gas lobby, six months, after leaving. The cooling-off rule says eighteen. Nothing happened.

- Mark Vaile — Deputy PM, chairman of Whitehaven Coal.

- John Anderson — Deputy PM → chairman of Eastern Star Gas.

- Greg Combet — Labor Climate Minister, consultant to AGL and Santos.

Gambling
- Stephen Conroy — Labor Communications Minister, the online bookies' lobby, two months, after leaving.

- Mark Arbib — Labor senator, Crown.

- Karl Bitar — Labor national secretary, Packer's lobbyist.

And the production line:
- Nick Minchin, Michael Wooldridge, Richard Alston, all into lobbying.
- Bruce Billson, took the Franchise Council's money, while still sitting in Parliament. Censured. Kept the job.

Both parties. Every portfolio with money in it. Grattan counted it: 1 in 4 ministers end up working for the industries they regulated.

Penalties ever handed out: zero. They're not leaving politics. They're cashing it in.

None of it is illegal. That's the problem.

Cold hard facts. Sourced. Corrected when wrong.

What's your Thoughts…?

Peter Lyndon-James 🇦🇺

Sources:
- Register of Lobbyists; Grattan Institute; Senate ministerial standards inquiry; company and lobby group records.

[🇦🇺 🇲🇾 @mazmanar]

@noplaceforsheep @AlboMP Real life consequences? but-but-but….that would be anti-Semitic, no?

[🇦🇺 🇲🇾 @mazmanar]

@MrRexPatrick It’s the upside down shape of justice in the Western World today - “justice” can be bought with money and power

[🇦🇺 🇲🇾 @mazmanar]

@JasonClareMP @AustralianLabor agreed there is no place - but the fact you favor a certain minority with hundreds of millions of tax payers money while other minorities and First Nations don’t get similar proportion of support speaks volumes about your hypocrisy

[Secretary Dead Parrot Society @MyFirstCousin]

That 300 infants with their hands tied behind their backs were found in shallow graves in Gaza after being buried alive is not making a headline on any Australian newspaper, any media news and not be risen in parliament by any politican has shown how low the country has descended

[Sony Thăng @nxt888]

What has Iran really done that is so unforgivable?

Did it invade continents?

Colonize half the earth?

Drop atomic bombs on civilians?

Build military bases around the globe?

Topple governments by the dozen?

Starve nations with sanctions and call it diplomacy?

No.

Its unforgivable act was simpler.

It refused to become manageable.

And for some rulers in the Muslim world, that refusal is more offensive than any Western crime, because it threatens the very terms of their own survival.

[🇦🇺 🇲🇾 @mazmanar]

@blakandblack Two hyphens?

[💧Mary Kostakidis @MaryKostakidis]

‘For decades, settler militias – backed by Israeli soldiers – have beaten up Palestinians, shot them, poisoned their wells, chopped down their olive groves, torched their homes, all in an attempt to ethnically cleanse them from their historic homeland.
The relentless expansion of these illegal settlements has left any hope of a two-state solution in tatters. The West Bank is now an archipelago of Palestinian villages and towns isolated from one another by marauding violent settlers, apartheid roads only for Jews, steel and concrete barriers, and army checkpoints.
… Israel’s explicit goal in expanding its settlements: to eviscerate the two-state solution the West says it craves as the only way to bring peace to the region.
The fact is Europe, Britain and the US have no interest in the two-state solution. If they did, they would have used the ICJ ruling in 2004 as grounds to ban settlement products, give that ban real teeth, and threaten Israel with a loss of all preferential trade with the West until it abided by international law and removed all obstacles to Palestinian statehood, including the settlements.
They did none of this because that was never their intention.
Their only concern is keeping Israel – their pit bull in the Middle East – fed and watered.’
Jonathan Cook: The West won't punish the settlements. Its two-state solution was always a sham
For decades, the EU has devised ever more convoluted ways to avoid penalising Israel's illegal settlements, even as they devour a two-state solution it claims is the only path to regional peace

https://t.co/PLJYY1Gqkc

[🇦🇺 🇲🇾 @mazmanar]

@noplaceforsheep @DavidCrisafulli when a genocide doesn’t bother you then why would anything else???

[🇦🇺 🇲🇾 @mazmanar]

@4mambo in his view he’s getting these appointments so right…make no mistake about that

[Rex Patrick @MrRexPatrick]

Every SA voter should read this exposé of @PMalinauskasMP and @theTiser in bed together, with taxpayers paying for the silk sheets and pillow cases. Oh, and some other very big corps are paying for the mattress and quilt. #SleezyAffair #saparli #auspol https://t.co/XwokgzFiWi

[🇦🇺 🇲🇾 @mazmanar]

@PollyWi92611992 @Kangaroo_Court 💯

[🇦🇺 🇲🇾 @mazmanar]

@Kangaroo_Court he’s having the run he 100% wants….everyone needs to understand that

[🇦🇺 🇲🇾 @mazmanar]

@ClareONeilMP yeah no confusion whatsoever

[David Milner @DaveMilbo]

To accuse the ABC of anti-Israel bias you would have to be untethered from material reality, drowning in your own victim complex, and compulsively gaslighting. The ABC's pro-genocide bias has been overt and disgusting.

[🇦🇺 🇲🇾 @mazmanar]

@SenatorWong @AlboMP https://t.co/rbFYpk53fP - when do you think you’ll celebrate the recognised state of Palestine Independence Day?