No signs of global crisis in Australia

Governments across Europe tremble as angry people take to the streets

In pictures: credit crunch protests in Europe

Arcellor Mittal workers demonstrate during a protest march in Marseille. Photograph: Jean-paul Pelissier/Reuters

France paralysed by a wave of strike action, the boulevards of Paris resembling a debris-strewn battlefield. The Hungarian currency sinks to its lowest level ever against the euro, as the unemployment figure rises. Greek farmers block the road into Bulgaria in protest at low prices for their produce. New figures from the biggest bank in the Baltic show that the three post-Soviet states there face the biggest recessions in Europe.

It's a snapshot of a single day – yesterday – in a Europe sinking into the bleakest of times. But while the outlook may be dark in the big wealthy democracies of western Europe, it is in the young, poor, vulnerable states of central and eastern Europe that the trauma of crash, slump and meltdown looks graver. ...more

Mediators called in as wildcat strikes spread across UK

The government called in mediators from Acas last night in an urgent attempt to end the dispute over the exclusion of British workers from construction contracts which led to a wave of wildcat strikes across the country yesterday. ... more

Greg's Comment:

Here, in Australia, there are no really visible signs of the global crisis.

• So, we have all lost money in superannuation or shares - well at least on paper.
  
• Those of us retiring right now have taken a hit but it is only in the order of 10% and there is the safety net of the age pension.
  
• Few of us know people who have lost their homes and, in fact, with interest rates tumbling, many may feel better off.

It seems our systems of financial governance, since the dollar was floated by Paul Keeting, have indeed placed us in a better position than most other countries.