This document is part of an archive of postings by John Ray on Australian Politics, a blog hosted by Blogspot who are in turn owned by Google. The index to the archive is available here or here. Indexes to my other blogs can be located here or here. Archives do accompany my original postings but, given the animus towards conservative writing on Google and other internet institutions, their permanence is uncertain. These alternative archives help ensure a more permanent record of what I have written
This is a backup copy of the original blog
31 January, 2023
Violent reality of Alice Springs revealed in shocking new videos
When dreamy Leftist laws make prosecution impossible, this is what you get
Warning: Graphic. Confronting video posted by an Alice Springs resident shows a town under siege by out of control youths.
Shocking footage of everyday street violence in Alice Springs has emerged revealing a town under siege by out-of-control youths and a police force that is all but powerless to stop them.
The confronting videos, posted by an Alice Springs resident who wished only to be known by the name Rachel, were revealed after a harrowing interview with Ben Fordham on 2GB Tuesday morning.
A former nurse and single mother, Rachel said she had to film “because no one was capturing what was happening,” adding that the Prime Minister Anthony Albanese had only provided an “easy answer” with last week’s announcement of temporary grog bans.
“It was back to back, all night long,” she said of the videos which she took from the upper story of a hotel in Alice Springs and posted Saturday night.
Rachel also said that many nights the violence is worse, adding that Alice Springs residents were regularly suffering home invasions at the hands of youths armed with machetes and businesses were unable to trade because customers were being bashed.
“There were hundreds of kids outside,” said Rachel, who said she feared for her life when the hotel was under siege.
“The hatred for anyone other than in their pack was so disturbing … all you hear is you’re a white this, you white bitch, that’s all you hear day in and day out.”
In the series of videos, Aboriginal youths can be seen brawling with makeshift weapons, taunting pub-goers, attacking hotel security and fighting with anyone who crossed their path.
In one video, the youths can be seen attacking a man who confronted them after they allegedly tried to steal items from his ute while he was in it.
In others, police appear to drive by but do not intervene in the situation.
Speaking to 2GB, Rachel was also highly critical of government responses to the deteriorating situation in Alice Springs.
“They just banned alcohol for a few days and moved on to the next thing … it was an easy answer for (the PM),” she said.
“These kids are being raped at home and the domestic violence is horrific.”
While Rachel said she was sympathetic to the victims of domestic violence and sexual abuse, it did not excuse their behaviour. “When someone is waving a machete in your face I don’t care about your past trauma,” she said.
“You cannot unsee the things we have seen.”
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Need for projects to plug looming gas supply shortage to test Australia’s climate goals
Urgent investment is needed in new gas fields to avoid looming shortages in NSW and Victoria, setting up a clash with the Albanese government’s new climate targets.
The Australian Competition and Consumer Commission’s (ACCC) latest report on the east coast gas market, released on Friday, said current sources of domestic supply were running out and shortages would hit by at least 2027 and potentially sooner unless new gas fields were opened up.
The Bass Strait gas field has traditionally supplied up to half the demand on the east coast, but its reserves are rapidly depleting and uncertainty over production will continue to put pressure on gas prices, despite the federal government’s intervention to cap wholesale prices this year.
The federal government could redirect exports into the local market under the Australian Domestic Gas Security Mechanism, known as the gas trigger, but that would mean disrupting crucial energy supplies to major trade and defence partners in Japan, China, Singapore and Korea.
The commission urged federal and state governments to cut the red tape gas companies face in getting big projects up and running.
“Forecast production is insufficient to meet forecast demand in the east coast from 2027,” the ACCC report said.
“Although the need for investment in new sources of supply and associated infrastructure is clear, only a limited number of relatively small domestic supply projects that could come online between 2023 and 2027 have been approved for development.”
However, approvals for more gas fields could stumble at hurdles raised when Climate Change and Energy Minister Chris Bowen introduces binding pollution caps for the nation’s 215 biggest industrial polluters from July 1 under the safeguard mechanism.
The mandatory pollution caps will be a major driver to hitting Labor’s legally binding target to cut emissions by 2030.
When asked if there would be room under the 2030 climate target for new gas fields, acting federal Resources Minister Catherine King said the safeguard mechanism would guide companies through the voluntary emissions reduction commitments they had already made.
“Reforms to the safeguard mechanism provide well-overdue certainty, and is in line with the over 70 per cent of safeguard facilities that already have corporate commitments to net zero by 2050,” she said.
Opposition resources spokeswoman Susan McDonald said the federal government’s reform agenda was being rushed and had reduced industry confidence in new projects.
“Labor is implementing policies that sound good but don’t work. Legislation has been rushed and
rammed through with virtually no consultation.”
ACCC chair Gina Cass-Gottlieb warned that gas would be needed for some time to back up supply in the grid. “There will continue to be calls upon gas power generation for the purposes of firmed supply at times when renewables are not able to generate and stored power is not available and in addition, there are some commercial industrial users for whom their manufacturing and production processes are dependent upon gas.”
New gas projects are typically large enough to trigger the government’s incoming pollution caps, which have a threshold of 100,000 tonnes of annual carbon emissions.
Any new project would likely be forced to fit within the existing emissions budget that applies to the nation’s gas industry and comply with new regulations including meeting world’s “best practice” emissions efficiency standards.
Santos says it wants its Narrabri gas field in northern NSW to start production in 2025, supplying up to half the state’s demand. But the company is facing yet another legal challenge, with traditional owners last week appealing to the Federal Court.
Cooper Energy said this week it had to review plans for an offshore gas project in Victoria’s Otway Basin, which was set to supply utilities giant AGL with up to 10 petajoules of gas a year from 2025.
Cass-Gottlieb said it was possible that shortfalls of around 12 per cent of annual demand could hit the east coast this year unless the Queensland exporters of liquefied natural gas (LNG) honoured their promise, under the heads of agreement struck last year with the federal government, to ensure the east coast market was fully supplied.
The ACCC last week threatened the exporters with $50 million fines if they failed to deliver. One company, Shell, has offered 8 petajoules to the market but so far no deals have been announced.
LNG exporters processing facilities are among the biggest emitters captured by the safeguard mechanism and they will be needed to develop new supply, with the ACCC reporting that they control more than 90 per cent of the east coast’s peak gas reserves.
LNG producers halted new offers for wholesale gas supply in December, when the federal government imposed $12 a gigajoule price cap on wholesale contracts, in a bid to halt runaway prices amid an international energy crisis.
The Australian Petroleum Production and Exploration Association (APPEA) claims the price caps create uncertainty for producers and deter investment in new gas projects and on Friday said
“The ACCC has underscored the importance of gas for Australia’s energy transition and the need to reduce the barriers faced by gas producers in bringing new gas supply to market,” APPEA chief executive Samantha McCulloch said.
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Court win for Christian foster care applicants is a victory for common sense and a fair go
In 2017, West Australian couple Byron and Keira Hordyk were rejected as ‘unsafe’ by fostering agency, Wanslea Family Services, to provide foster care to vulnerable infants and toddlers in the child protection system. Their application was rejected because of their traditional Christian views on marriage and sex.
Five years later, the Hordyks have won their legal case against Wanslea and been awarded damages. The WA State Administrative Tribunal found that Wanslea had treated the Hordyks unfairly on the basis of their religious beliefs.
This decision is good for all Australians. The Hordyk decision is a victory for common sense and provides an antidote to the polarised public discourse in Australian culture.
While the Hordyks are deservedly vindicated by this decision, the real losers in this case are vulnerable children who were robbed of the opportunity to be placed in a loving, caring, and stable home.
This landmark case demonstrates how societal hostility to religion – and especially Christianity – is increasing and is a threat to common sense pluralism. Christians who established, grew, and then gave to Western cultures their key social institutions such as hospitals, universities, aged care facilities, and foster care agencies are now facing increasing exclusion from those very institutions.
In its decision, the Tribunal firmly rebuffed Wanslea’s assertions that their rejection of the Hordyks had nothing to do with their religious beliefs.
The evidence showed that Wanslea takes a flexible approach to approving carers who are smokers and can’t foster babies, carers with disabilities, or unique home circumstances that made them unsuitable for certain types of children. However, when Wanslea was faced with conservative Christians, it changed the rules.
The Hordyks hold to the views of their Church on sex and morality.
Wanslea considered the Hordyks’ views unacceptable and rejected their fostering application – not because they were unsuitable to provide a temporary home for vulnerable toddlers, but because they held unacceptable religious views now out of step with the prevailing Australian cultural norms. This is increasingly common with many Australian institutions.
The Tribunal found that key Wanslea evidence on this point was ‘avoidant, defensive and crafted to cast events in the most favourable light for Wansela’. There was religious discrimination which they attempted to cover up as ‘business as usual’.
The Hordyks are not alone in falling afoul of such ideological purity tests. In 2022, Andrew Thorburn at the Essendon AFL club was forced to resign because he held the wrong views. In 2021, the Australian Christian Lobby had venue bookings cancelled by the WA government because their Christian beliefs were inconsistent with ‘diversity, equality, and inclusion’. In 2020, the WA government refused to give Pastor Margaret Court’s Perth charity the funding needed for a freezer truck to distribute food to the needy because of her publicly stated views on marriage.
This increasing animosity to religion can be attributed to a variety of potential factors: the increasing secularisation of Australian society generally, the simplistic and sensational reporting of religious issues in the media, the ascendancy and triumph of LGBTQ+ advocacy in Australian culture, the hard fusion in popular discourse of Christianity with the evils of colonialism or the fragmentation and polarisation of cultural dialogue in a social media age.
Whatever the causes, these cultural trends should be of concern to all Australians. While Christians are the target today, there is no reason why this cultural trajectory will not progress to declare other social and political convictions as anathema and beyond the pale, both religious and irreligious.
The recent Essendon public apology to Andrew Thorburn and the Hordyk decision are a welcome dose of balance and common sense in an otherwise febrile cultural environment.
The tenacity of the Hordyks in seeking vindication through a gruelling 5-year process demonstrates that there is value in pushing matters to Courts past the loud cultural voices that have captured many of Australia’s institutions and which have declared Christianity anathema and unsafe.
These voices seek to impose a narrow secular vision of Australia rather than a pluralistic multicultural vision of Australia.
For Australia to flourish, it requires the participation of a variety of people with diverse and conflicting religious beliefs, political convictions, and personal opinions. The friction lines between competing views will often be difficult to adjudicate, but the Courts have shown that, regardless of the prevailing ideological fashions of the day, religious and even heteronormative Christian Australians must be given a fair go.
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The truth about Australia’s education system: bullying, indoctrination, and intimidation
Recently, I interviewed an 18-year-old New South Wales University student named Tallesha. My goal was to get a first-hand glimpse of what is really going on in the education system.
It was incredibly insightful to speak with Tallesha. While high school is still vivid in her mind, she is now undertaking the transition into the university lifestyle. She recently completed a bridging course consisting of sociology, business, media, and writing; and will now study political science. She has the ambition of becoming a political journalist.
Drawing on her experiences, Tallesha summed up her thoughts by saying, ‘I believe a lot of the political issues we’re facing at the moment stem from the information and behaviours being taught in schools and universities.’
She went on to say, ‘What is currently being assumed about the education system is definitely not an overreaction, a large extent of genuine indoctrination is happening and it’s definitely getting worse.’
Expanding on those comments, Tallesha drew on her own specific experiences. ‘It’s very hard to openly disagree with the lecturers because your marks could suffer,’ she explained. ‘In my bridging course I did sociology and that was obviously very far left. So, in assignments, that would be based on Marxist theory. You had to accept their way as truth. If you debated that, you wouldn’t get the marks, because you would be seen as incorrect.’
She backed up her comments by providing an example.
‘A question on one of my tests was, “Is gender fixed?” And the correct answer was “false”, because it is supposed to be fluid. If you disagreed with that, you would lose that mark.’
Identifying as a Christian conservative, Tallesha obviously had an issue with this answer, but she can see no way of bypassing having to go along with the Marxist ideology that oppose her own beliefs. She appears to be in the tiny minority, however, as according to Tallesha, 95 per cent of her fellow students lean openly left.
This prompted me to ask Tallesha if she feels comfortable expressing her views in her classes. ‘No,’ she replied. ‘You pretty much can’t.’
From the moment her lecturers enter, there is clear ideology expressed. She told me that without fail, every lecturer introduces themselves with their pronouns. Is it little surprise that the students also follow suit, as Tallesha told me, ‘I had my graduation recently, and any speaker that got up, all announced their pronouns.’
With such a dominant lean towards leftist ideology, I asked Tallesha if any of her fellow students ever acknowledge that things should be more balanced. ‘No,’ she replied. ‘A lot of them don’t think they lean that far left. They think, “This is mainstream. Every young person should share our views. If you don’t then there’s something wrong with you.”’
Tallesha was then able to provide more context of how the peer pressure is applied.
‘In sociology, the way the other side was depicted is uneducated and misinformed. So, they make it seem like if you are part of the other side, it would be embarrassing,’ Tallesha recounted. ‘It was almost like bullying. My lecturer would always make jokes about conservative views, constantly.’
With the peer pressure in place, then comes the indoctrination.
Of the subjects she studied in her bridging course, Tallesha found business to be the most centrist, but her writing course contained clear left bias. ‘It was a uni prep course, so it teaches you all the skills you need to succeed in uni,’ she explained. ‘But each skill was taught in a context, and all the context they were taught in were some sort of left subject. Climate change was used. The freedom movement, the anti-vaccine moment was used.’
I find it hard to understand how anyone can paint ‘freedom’ in a negative light, but Tallesha was quick to inform me that ‘white supremacy’ is linked to the freedom movement. ‘They make lots of links that just don’t make sense,’ she said.
This prompted me to ask if any figures of the right are ridiculed. ‘Trump was definitely brought up a few times,’ she replied. ‘Even the Liberal Party, even though they’re not very conservative, the Liberal Party is attacked as well.’
I then asked if there is any politician that her lecturers adore. Her response was interesting. ‘No, I don’t think there are any specific ones.’
It seems if you attack your enemies constantly, then there is no need to defend your side.
My final question to Tallesha was, ‘What needs to happen to reform the education system?’
‘Honestly, I don’t really know. It’s pretty much that far gone. Because everyone in it and within it, is all left. Maybe ten years ago it could be saved, but now it’s all left. It’s too far infiltrated. You can’t get conservatives in there. If you aren’t left and you’re a lecturer, you’re not going to get a job. And if you are a conservative student, you’re very likely to be kicked out if you say the wrong thing.’
‘It’s almost bullying.’ Tallesha added, speaking of the peer pressure that is placed upon students. ‘All of them are so eager to fit in. The conservative side is being portrayed as embarrassing to be a part of and you’ll be made fun of if you’re part of that side. So, everyone is swaying away from that. It sways anyone that is not sure on their political views to the left pretty quickly, because they want to fit in.’
Interviewing Tallesha did not fill me with much hope. After all, this is our youth. This is our future. If Tallesha is correct and 95 per cent of students are left-leaning, then the other side of politics is faced with a big problem.
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30 January, 2023
Could hiring more neurodivergent people help fix Australia's skills shortage?
This article is a stepchange. We neurodivergent people are usually reminded of our problems. To be reminded of our strengths is most unusual. But it is true that we often have eerie abiities. My ability is one of the strangest: An ability to write publishable academic journal articles very rapidly.
That promptly got me a university teaching job but did not do me much other good at the time. But stuff I wrote as far back as 1970 and 1971 is still being referred to by other academics so that could be regarded as worthwhile. At any road, the point made below, that we often have useful talents, is well made. Our divergences can be worth putting up with.
I probably should add the point that we are not all total social misfits. I have had some ups and downs but I have overall had a great time with the ladies over the years -- including 4 marriages. Now in my 80th year, I still have 4 ladies in my life. And I am still in touch with my first girlfriend of 60 years ago. It is divergent but in a good way
Jacinta Reynolds was told she was autistic as a young teenager.
"When I was first diagnosed, it was made very clear to me by the person who diagnosed me that I was a burden on society and that it would be better if my family just hid me away," she told ABC News.
But Ms Reynolds went on to complete high school and graduate with an astrophysics degree.
"Then the real problem was, OK, now I have a piece of paper, a very expensive piece of paper, what am I going to do with this?"
Ms Reynolds now works with Idoba, a mining technology services firm in Perth, not as an astrophysicist, but as a marketing officer.
"I do love telling stories, I love getting into the details and creating a sense of wonder and excitement."
She said her autism gives her unique storytelling skills.
"Being able to pick patterns in the way people are writing and telling stories at the time, what's in fashion, what's not in fashion anymore, what's coming into fashion, because it fluctuates and changes, what people want to talk about and how people want to talk about it, what words are just super popular at the moment and what words people don't really think about and so that all fits nicely into it with a scientific background."
A quarter of her colleagues at the company are neurodivergent.
"We run a very inclusive environment," explained Idoba's chief technology officer Matt Schneider.
"One of the things that we've realised on our journey is that if we're focused around traditional thinking, you get traditional results.
"We're very much focused around what and how do you do that differently, how do you think differently?
"In order to do that, we actually have been very active in the market to create a neurodivergent workforce and about 25 per cent [of us] are neurodivergent, be that autistic, ADHD, dyslexia."
Mr Schneider is also neurodivergent and recalled a time when the workplace was making him uncomfortable.
"We used to have a building that had brickwork and that used to drive me nuts in the meeting and I just couldn't cope," he recalled.
"I said to the neurotypical people in the room, 'I can't be in this meeting' and they said, 'but it's really nice', and I said, 'it is for you, not for me'."
Mr Schneider said being aware of how workspaces can impact neurodivergent people and making small changes can ensure businesses are more welcoming.
"It's that awareness and understanding, and certainly being able to advocate for what makes safe environments is really important," he explained.
"We've put a huge amount of energy and effort into engineering this business to be inclusive for everybody. That's really important, if you don't set up the work environment to support a workforce that's divergent, you won't be able to make it happen."
People with autism under represented in the workforce
The most recent data on neurodivergent people in the workforce was collected by the Australian Bureau of Statistics (ABS) in 2018.
It showed the unemployment rate for people with autism at the time was 34.1 per cent, more than three times the overall rate for people with a disability which was 10.3 per cent.
Participation in the labour force in 2018, that is people with a job or actively looking for work, among people with autism was 38 per cent, compared to 53.4 per cent for all people with a disability and 84.1 per cent for those without a disability.
While those numbers have likely changed in the years since the data was collected, at a time when Australia has a historically low unemployment rate and nationwide skills shortage, advocates say businesses could benefit from hiring neurodivergent workers.
"Many neurodivergent people have amazing skill sets in the maths and sciences field," explained Alex Jenkins, director of the WA Data Science Innovation Hub in Perth.
"They're capable of really deep concentration and really focusing on original ideas, and it's an incredible opportunity for these people to come and solve real-world business problems."
Mr Jenkins works with businesses to help them understand the changes to recruitment processes, office spaces or workflows to make workplaces more accessible.
He said expanding a workforce makes good business sense.
"To be able to employ neurodivergent people is a chance to be more competitive and to get ahead of the game."
His peer, Professor Tele Tan, director at the Autism Academy for Software Quality Assurance, agrees.
"Most often, neurodiverse individuals have brilliant minds for memory, pattern recognition and mathematics, which is perfectly suited for data engineering, modelling and data analysis," he said.
"It is an untapped potential and untapped talent pool," Mr Jenkins added.
"You just need to understand that perhaps there might be different interview processes, different selection processes, and some minor accommodations that need to be made in the workplace to get the best out of these amazingly talented people."
An 'untapped resource'
Federal government agency Services Australia hopes to hire 70 neurodivergent staff next year.
In 2020, it launched a program aimed at recruiting autistic people and, so far, 38 people have started work with the agency through its Aurora Program.
"The program is unique in that it looks at engaging neurodiverse job seekers into specialist roles within the agency," said Services Australia's director of inclusion and diversity, Clayton Trevilyan.
"We look at moving candidates into a variety of roles, not just the traditional ICT [Information, Communications and Technology] roles, but other roles such as program management, data analyst positions and project managers."
Candidates are not assessed on how well they do in front of an interview panel, but in on-the-job and skills assessments over four weeks.
Hael Smith, who lives with autism and ADHD, recently started her job with the agency in fraud detection. "I get to be a detective from a desk, which is, honestly, as cool as it sounds."
Ms Smith explained her autism and ADHD make her great for the job. "Things like spotting patterns, that's been one of the really useful skills [I have]," she said.
"It's not something as far as I know, that people can do very easily, but it's looking at some information or some data and going there's something not quite right about that."
She added that her high level of integrity is also an asset.
"A lot of people that I know who are on the spectrum tend to, we don't really do lying, or fabricating up stories and stuff; it's almost like, we don't see the point. Having that integrity is really helpful," she said.
"I've got a really fast brain. Usually, my brain gets me in trouble, because it's faster than I can actually get words out.
"But that actually really comes in handy in investigations, because I can go 'Oh, yeah, that connects to that, alright, cool,' and I've got an instant decision to follow this particular piece of information or find this piece of information."
After years of short stints in hospitality and retail jobs that did not fulfil her, Ms Smith recently told her new bosses she is never quitting, and they will have to "drag her out by her feet" if they ever want her to leave.
"We are literally an untapped resource, but because of the way the recruitment process is set up we will very much struggle with getting employment because it is so much about that social, about how you present yourself, when it should be, as it should be everywhere, about the work you can do and what value you can actually bring to the job," she said.
"Employing people with autism isn't an arduous thing to do, in fact, it's the right thing to do," added Mr Trevilyan, who has a son with autism.
"We want to represent the community that we serve, and it's important to provide people with those long-term meaningful job prospects and for them to be able to have the dignity of employment just like everybody else."
https://www.abc.net.au/news/2023-01-27/neurodivergent-workers-help-fill-skills-gap/101707088
****************************************************Leftist racism again: Producers of a play about black women and Kylie Jenner banned white critics from reviewing it
An ugly row has erupted in theatre circles after producers of a 'woke' new play tried to ban white critics from reviewing it.
The Australian producers of the internationally acclaimed Seven Methods of Killing Kylie Jenner demanded that all reviewers be 'people of colour', but The Age newspaper's arts editor refused to comply before lashing out in a fiery column.
Elizabeth Flux accused Amylia Harris and Leila Enright of 'tokenism' arguing that being forced to select a person of colour for the task was 'offensive' and 'undermines' the health of the critical landscape.
The play Written by British playwright Jasmine Lee-Jones, is about two young black women reacting to the claim that the Keeping up with the Kardashians reality star is the world's 'youngest self-made billionaire'.
Ms Flux's column was also accompanied by a controversial satirical cartoon depicting the stage show's two lead actors, Iolanthe and Chika Ikogwe.
Theatre community group Stage a Change called the caricature of the two black actors 'abhorrent' and 'absolutely disgusting' in a Facebook post on Sunday. 'Frankly speaking, this article is dipped in, spackled with, and power washed down with so much fragility,' it said. 'Fragility that has missed the point and self-aggrandized so epically.'
On social media another person described the image as a 'racist caricature' and called on Ms Flux to resign for allowing it. 'She chose not to caricature the white producers. Instead, she caricatured the black actors who are just doing their job and had nothing to do with this. Resign.'
Ms Flux's article explained to its readers why the publication carried no review of Seven Methods of Killing Kylie Jenner.
'It's not because we didn't want to cover it – it's because the producers refused to 'accommodate' any reviewers who weren't people of colour (PoC).'
Ms Flux wrote that she agreed with a goal to increase diversity among critics, but that the show's request was 'a misguided move'. '[It] promotes tokenism, undermines the health of the critical landscape, and does a disservice to critics, creatives and audiences alike.'
But her column went further to explain its decision. 'To actively seek someone out to review this production based on them being a PoC would have been offensive,' Ms Flux wrote.
She also added that it was 'ridiculous and potentially dangerous' that critics would have to disclose their race to do a job.
Ms Flux, who described herself as 'a Hong-Kong-born Eurasian who was raised in Australia', also pointed out neither of the two producers behind the decision was a person of colour.
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Jacinta Nampijinpa Price and John Anderson unite to co-ordinate 'No' vote in Voice to Parliament referendum
A group of high-profile Indigenous Australians has banded together with a former deputy prime minister to co-ordinate the No campaign in this year's Voice referendum, running on the slogan "Recognise a Better Way".
It comes as Opposition Leader Peter Dutton accepts an invitation to attend this week's Referendum Working Group meeting for a briefing on the proposal to enshrine an Indigenous Voice in the constitution.
Mr Dutton — who will attend via video-link from Sydney where he will be attending Cardinal George Pell's funeral — has been demanding more detail from the Albanese government on the Voice before the Liberal Party settles on a formal position.
While Mr Dutton is torn between members of his party who want to back the Voice and those who are vehemently opposed, the grassroots campaigns are starting to take shape.
The Yes group, led by "Australians for Indigenous Constitutional Recognition", will formally launch its campaign with a "week of action" in late February.
Calling itself the "No Case Committee", the first formal No group has emerged with members including firebrand Northern Territory senator Jacinta Nampijinpa Price, former ALP president turned Liberal candidate Warren Mundine, former federal Labor MP Gary Johns and former deputy prime minister John Anderson.
The six-member committee will broadly support constitutional recognition of Indigenous Australians while opposing the Voice, arguing it is divisive and will do nothing to improve the lives of First Nations people.
In a sign the group could be eyeing migrant communities, Mr Mundine said he believed constitutional recognition should be broadened to include "the migrants and refugees" who had "contributed to this country".
This is despite the Federation of Ethnic Communities' Councils of Australia (FECCA) firmly backing a "First Nations Voice" in the constitution.
When that position was put to him, Mr Mundine said: "I think all Australians should be recognised for their contribution to this country."
Mr Anderson, who chaired a Recognition review panel in 2014, said the No Case Committee would be "mounting the case for No, from an Aboriginal perspective" and he did not expect any "formal linkage" with right-wing groups such as Advance Australia which were also campaigning against the Voice.
"We are supporting four significant Aboriginal figures who do not believe this is right," he said, referring to Senator Price, Mr Mundine, Bob Liddle and Ian Conway.
Mr Anderson said he had "reluctantly" formed the same view and was becoming increasingly concerned by attempts to "shame people who dare to ask questions". "I genuinely believe these ill-defined proposals are not a good idea," he said. "I believe they'll tend towards division and resentment."
The federal government has confirmed no public funding will be provided to either side of the campaign ahead of the referendum, which is set to be held in the second half of this year.
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War of words erupts between Opus Dei schools and the ABC
Old-fashioned Biblical ideas -- like no sex before marriage -- are taught there. How disgraceful! No wonder the Leftist ABC is up in arms!
NSW’s powerful education authority is investigating Sydney schools linked to Opus Dei amid a war of words between the ultra-conservative Catholic group and the public broadcaster.
The ABC’s Four Corners is planning to air a program on Monday night titled Purity: An Education in Opus Dei, alleging “disturbing practices” by the controversial organisation in several schools and exploring its influence in the NSW Liberal Party.
Premier Dominic Perrottet attended Redfield College, one of the schools featured in the ABC expose, while Finance Minister Damien Tudehope also has links to the schools. Labor’s upper house MLC Greg Donnelly is described as an “Old Dad of Redfield”.
Redfield, Tangara School for Girls, Wollemi College and Montgrove College are operated by the Parents for Education Foundation (Pared). The schools are independent and not part of the Catholic diocese.
In a letter sent to parents this week co-signed by the principals of the four schools, the Pared Foundation claimed Monday’s episode “seems to be an attack on the Catholic faith” and an “attempt at damaging the political career” of Perrottet ahead of the March 25 state election.
That claim has been rejected by the ABC, which said the episode by reporter Louise Milligan “investigates serious allegations that are clearly in the public’s interest to be informed about, including opposing consent education, encouraging students to make decisions contrary to medical advice, harm to students as a result of their education, homophobia and recruitment of students under the guise of pastoral care”.
“There is nothing in the program that is an attack on the Catholic faith,” a spokesperson said.
“It is purely about Opus Dei and its affiliated educational institutions. The timing of the story is not connected to the NSW election and in fact it is being broadcast as far out from the election as it could be.”
The premier’s office declined to comment.
In the episode, Milligan - who has a long history covering the Catholic Church including issues surrounding Cardinal George Pell - reveals “in some cases the schools are not following state curriculum and are accused of persistent attempts to recruit teenagers to Opus Dei and have taught misinformation about sexual health, including discouraging girls from getting the human papillomavirus cervical cancer vaccine”.
A spokesperson for the NSW Education Standards Authority (NESA) told the Herald the agency was investigating the schools after allegations made by the ABC.
Pared confirmed NESA had contacted the group “to clarify how we address” concerns about the health and personal development curriculum.
The letter sent to parents from the principals lists multiple questions they claim were put to the schools by the ABC. It said the foundation would never discourage students from following medical advice but acknowledged it had changed how it addressed some issues, including the HPV vaccine.
“Prior to 2020, when the HPV vaccine was relatively new, and in response to many queries from concerned parents, Tangara issued some letters to parents with some reference material on the HPV vaccination program. Letters such as these were not sent after that period,” the letter said.
Redfield’s headmaster Matthew Aldous told the Herald: “Whenever specific concerns are brought to our attention they are dealt with immediately and professionally. It’s ludicrous to suggest that anything short of that would be done in this day and age.”
Opus Dei, a highly conservative and private Catholic prelature, was founded in the 1920s and given approval within the Catholic Church in 1950. Tangara and Redfield were founded by Pared in 1982 and each have school chaplains that are Opus Dei priests.
Dallas McInerney, the chief executive officer of Catholic Schools NSW, said the four schools investigated by the ABC are “good local schools”.
“Any targeted media attention by the ABC risks collateral damage for the children who are current students and who are returning to school. They shouldn’t be caught up in a wider agenda by the ABC,” McInerney, a senior Liberal in the party’s right-wing faction, said.
“They are not insular schools. These are good schools, doing good work on behalf of their students and families.”
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29 January, 2023
Who killed Australia Day?
Terry Barnes, below, claims that "Australians" killed Australia day. That is mindlessly inclusive. It was only a small Leftist minority that did it. Australia day became the latest victim of the never-ending Leftist search for things to hate. We should not bow down to them.
Most Australians this year did not. There were maybe some thousands who "protested" but millions just had family BBQs and the like.
I celebrated by replacing the Gadsden flag I usually have up outside my house with the Australian flag. And I took my girlfriend out for lunch, after which we had a very nice snooze together
And respect for the day can probably be found in surprising places. During the day, one of my tenants spoke to me and said: "Long live the Empire". He was referring to the British Empire and noting that Australia Day marks the successful completion of a great Imperial project. His own heritage is Greek but he is a great student of history
But it is sad that some Australians seem to have drunk the Leftist Koo-Aid about the matter. There were once many cars on the street on the day with Austalian flags flying from them. I saw few of those this year. Let us not be bullied out of a very well-justified and enjoyable celebration by the eternal malcontents of the Left
Australia Day was once a big deal Down Under, but in recent years the annual celebration has been somewhat muted. Take the Australian Open, currently running in Melbourne. The organisers have dedicated days throughout the tournament for a range of causes: there has been a Pride day and a day celebrating indigenous art and culture. But although the semi-finals are being played today, on Australia Day itself, there will be no recognition of the country’s national day. ‘We are mindful there are differing views, and at the Australian Open we are inclusive and respectful of all,’ Tennis Australia said in a statement.
Tennis fans aren’t the only ones missing out: Victoria’s state government has quietly axed Melbourne’s Australia Day parade. ‘We recognise Australia Day represents a day of mourning and reflection for some Victorians and is a challenging time for First Peoples,’ a government spokesperson said.
The recently-elected federal Labor party government is also doing its bit to water down the festivities: civil servants and parliamentary staff are being allowed to work through Australia Day, and take a day off in lieu when it suits them.
Protest-by-working is sweeping corporate Australia. Vicki Brady, the chief executive of Australia’s largest telecommunications company, Telstra, announced ostentatiously that she would work through the holiday’
‘I’ll be choosing to work and will take a different day of leave with my family, because that feels right for me. For many First Nations peoples, Australia Day… marks a turning point that saw lives lost, culture devalued and connections between people and places destroyed,’ she wrote on LinkedIn, stating the protest case in a nutshell.
Only three decades ago, Australia Day was a day of national unity and pride
Brady’s look-at-me declaration reflects a fault line that’s tearing through Australian society. The row over Australia Day is more than a culture war between left and right. The controversy exposes a nation which doubts itself; its angst about its past reveals a collective lack of confidence about our country’s future. We Australians are no longer the laconic, easy-going, ‘she’ll be right’ people of national mythology. Rather, we’re the world’s teenagers, questioning our identity and parentage and rebelling against the western values and heritage – including British culture, institutions and the rule of law – that for so long made Australia the envy of the world. Anti-colonial, anti-British culture warriors and grievance merchants are now setting the national agenda. But we, as an uncertain nation, are allowing them to.
Australia’s treatment of its original inhabitants after the First Fleet landed at Sydney Cove in 1788 was far from perfect. But this shouldn’t detract from celebrating the outstanding success of the country’s national story, or accepting 26 January 1788 as the day that marks the intersection of our continent’s ancient past with its future.
Aborigines, who make up just 3 per cent of Australia’s population, very much share in the country’s progress and prosperity; their culture and heritage enriches Australia. Australia Day, however, is doomed. Many Aussie millennials accept the anti-colonial, anti-western narrative as received wisdom. Perhaps it’s no surprise that the downgrading of the holiday has unfolded quickly.
Thirty-five years ago today, Australia celebrated the arrival of Britain’s First Fleet – with its motley cargo of 1,400 seamen, soldiers and convicts – with a year-long ‘celebration of a nation’, as it was officially billed. On the 200th anniversary itself, huge crowds lined the shores of Sydney Harbour under a brilliant blue sky while thousands of pleasure boats were on the water to greet a second First Fleet. This was a commercially-sponsored flotilla of sailing vessels that sailed from Portsmouth to Sydney, recreating the original journey.
Foremost among the crowd was the then Prince and Princes of Wales and Australia’s then prime minister, Labor’s Bob Hawke. Most Australians recognised that the 1988 anniversary was not universally embraced by descendants of the Aborigines who saw the tall ships come in 1788. But it did not overshadow the day, nor the year’s programme of bicentenary events that highlighted the diversity of Australians old and new and celebrated how we, as a country, were proud of who we are and the nation we had become.
Australia Day 1988 was a fabulous day, never to be forgotten – and destined never to be repeated.
Only three decades ago, Australia Day was a day of national unity and pride. It reflected a view that European settlement, blended with indigenous heritage, was overwhelmingly a good thing. Now, however, a significant and growing number of influential Australians are demanding it be moved to another date, because for some it is painful and shameful – and for many it is contentious.
A national day that divides rather than unites is pointless: it may be a vocal minority that brings it down, but unlike that wonderful Australia Day in 1988, a national day that is an official orphan in its own country is no national day at all. Better, like Britain, to not have one.
https://www.spectator.com.au/2023/01/who-killed-australia-day/
**********************************************************Activism as a performance, a hideous theatre of the absurd
"Protestor" Thorpe
Activists’ sound and fury signify that the world is being overrun by posturing idiots.
By CHRIS KENNY
The idea that the world is a stage upon which we mortals act out our lives is an ancient one, popularised by Shakespeare. In the digital age, we seem to have flipped this, so that instead of attempting to solve even the world’s most complex problems, we turn them into endless pantomimes and sideshows, just for entertainment and self-aggrandisement.
Those who claim there is an existential threat to life on this planet bely their own alarm by expressing it through confected theatre sports. Stunts and memes have replaced rational debate; slacktivism has usurped real commitment and practical efforts.
Imagine, for instance, that an inspired satirist might attempt to mock the global elite and their climate fearmongering. Could you conceive of a better spoof than sending an Al Gore impersonator to the climate-controlled luxury of the World Economic Forum’s annual talkfest in the Swiss alpine village of Davos, where billionaires and politicians turn up in private jets to lecture the world on what sacrifices others must make.
You could just see this impersonator of the multi-millionaire former US vice-president (a man with a vast carbon footprint whose alarmist predictions have stubbornly failed to materialise) portraying him getting ever angrier and more hysterical. He might have Gore equating our carbon emissions to “600,000 Hiroshima-class atomic bombs exploding every single day on earth” and ranting about “boiling the oceans, creating these atmospheric rivers, and the rain bombs, and sucking the moisture out of the land, and creating the droughts, and melting the ice and raising the sea level and causing these waves of climate refugees predicted to reach one billion in this century”.
Apart from having your audience falling in the aisles, this act would expose the hypocrisy and hysteria of the self-appointed climate elites. But I guess you know where this is going – yes, that is exactly what the real Gore did, and said, last week.
These people are beyond parody.
Greta Thunberg, the teenage activist who passed out of her teens earlier this month, turned up at Davos just days after being arrested at a coalmine protest in Germany, where she posed, smiled, and joked with the arresting officers while the media got their pictures. Theatre.
At Davos, Thunberg rattled off all the well-worn socialist cliches that might have been uttered by her parents in the 1960s or 70s: “self-greed”, “corporate greed”, “short-term profits”, and “profits before people”. Thunberg said the people at Davos were the same ones “fuelling the destruction of the planet”.
Sitting there, as she was, in the Swiss ski village, Thunberg noted that “the people who we really should be listening to are not here”. You can say that again.
Pantomime.
Closer to home, the whole country has had the longstanding and recently escalated social and criminal traumas endemic in Alice Springs’ Indigenous communities brought to their attention. In the Alice, and in dozens of other regional towns and remote communities, this blight of violent crimes, substance addiction, abused women and children and wasted lives is nothing new.
It is our greatest national shame, all too often ignored, stemming from complex issues of culture, dependency, discrimination and a lack of agency. But instead of visiting these communities, or offering solutions to this horror, the Greens spokesperson on First Nations people, Senator Lidia Thorpe, addressed a protest in Melbourne on Australia Day. “This is a war,” Thorpe screamed, “a war that was declared on our people over 200 years ago. That war has never ever ended in this country against my people, they are still killing us.”
Some in the crowd seemed to be cheering these words as Thorpe added “they are stealing our babies” and “killing our men” and “raping our women”.
No facts, no conciliation, and no co-operation. Just a grotesque theatre of the absurd.
None of this can achieve anything. It is not designed for outcomes – it is purely performative.
We are such a wonderfully diverse and inclusive country that every year there is an increasing focus on Indigenous place names and recognition of country, and more celebration of Diwali, Eid, and the Lunar New Year. The only occasions we try to stifle seem to be Christmas (which highlights the Christian ethos that encourages tolerance) and the celebration of Australia Day (recognising a nation that fosters diversity).
One Nation Chief of Staff James Ashby says Greens Senator Lidia Thorpe does not stand for “every Aboriginal in this country”. “You can’t take… the stupidity of one woman and make out that she stands for every Aboriginal in this country,” he told Sky News host Cory Bernadi. “I believe More
That tennis tournament in Melbourne wants more Australian tax dollars, and thrives on Australian patronage as it celebrates gay pride and Indigenous culture, and it calls itself the Australian Open. But it rejects the very mention of Australia Day. Farcical.
Now we are seeing complaints, apparently, about the staging of the musical Miss Saigon, because actors might play roles that differ from their heritage (yes acting, remember, is pretence) and because the musical objectifies women by telling the story of sexual and romantic relationships between US soldiers and Vietnamese women. Madama Butterfly will be next, and My Fair Lady and West Side Story.
Don’t even think about Love Story and Last Tango in Paris – all lust and romance soon will be cancelled except for Brokeback Mountain. We are eradicating real theatre and film at the same time we are turning the serious issues into theatre sports.
Think about how we have no idea what our favourite sports teams or organisations think about communism, freedom of expression, the global scourges of malaria and tuberculosis, women’s rights in Muslim theocracies, or the critical role of cheap, reliable energy in lifting people out of poverty. But we all know they support climate posturing and changing the date of Australia Day.
Like Seinfeld’s Kramer being attacked for joining the AIDS march without wearing a ribbon, it does not seem to matter what you do, the new public square is only interested in what you display, whether you run with the crowd.
This is the essence of virtue-signalling.
Logic counts for zero. The same organisations that endorse Earth Hour, where they switch off electrical lights in a global-warming gesture, support Vivid, a blaze of electric lights for fun.
The same sporting organisations that trumpet climate concerns and net-zero goals use gas-fired flame effects and fireworks at their games. They seem to emulate Gore, right down to the blatant hypocrisy.
This week there was a dramatic pivot in the national conversation towards the social problems in the Red Centre that some of us have been discussing with Jacinta Nampijinpa Price and others for years. Just seven or eight months ago, Price was warning that the scrapping of alcohol bans and the cashless welfare card would exacerbate existing problems.
Nothing happened. But this week the Prime Minister and his team flew in, stage left, and were gone, stage right, within hours. Some changes were made.
But the reforms were the bare minimum in addressing a current escalation in generational problems. The long-term solutions do not make great theatre, they require hard, sustained and co-operative work.
You have to wonder whether we, as a nation, are capable of handling such challenges. Do we have the attention span to go beyond a couple of acts?
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Energy chaos: the shape of things to come
Australian governments have made energy policies focused on achieving higher shares of renewable energy that they claim is the cheapest source of power. The Commonwealth government is planning for renewables to reach 82 per cent of supply by 2030, while the Liberal Party’s plan is for 85 per cent by 2050 and 61 per cent by 2030. State governments have additional plans. In pursuit of these goals, governments around Australia are being sucked into a vortex requiring ever-increasing controls, while seeing mounting cost increases.
Subsidies that amount to $6.9 billion per year have propelled wind and solar, which had virtually no market presence 20 years ago, to their current market share of 27 per cent. The CSIRO and other bodies claim that these are the cheapest forms of electricity, but the absurdity of this is demonstrable – the market shares of wind and solar would be negligible without these subsidies. And the subsidies themselves amount to over one-third of what electricity generation would cost if renewable requirements did not push up prices.
A recent study from the UK identifies a similar magnitude of costs to support renewables (which now provide 36 per cent of the nation’s electricity). The hidden subsidies to renewables amounted to 13 billion pounds ($24 billion) in 2021, a little over three times Australia’s $6.9 billion cost for a population two and a half times greater. Among major countries only Germany, which has gone even further down the renewables path, has higher energy prices
As in Australia, the UK’s growth in subsidised renewables has brought an accelerating increase in prices. That process in both countries predated the Ukraine War. This contradicts Mr Albanese’s response, ‘News Flash!!! There has been a war in Europe that has had a global impact!’ to a question from Chris Kenny on why electricity prices had failed to meet the ALP’s projected price fall $275 of per household, but instead had risen by that magnitude.
In fact, European gas and coal prices, though still much higher than a year ago, have fallen (in the case of gas to a quarter of their June-October 2022 levels). That is in spite of a very strong increase in stored reserves. Reasons for this included customer demand response and supply response of non-Russian sources (and Russian sea-borne sources), to high prices, a mild winter and shift from gas to electricity (including coal-generated electricity).
Australia’s ballooning energy costs are entirely self-inflicted. They are caused by years of bowing to green ideology by:
increasing taxes on coal and gas;
discrimination against coal and gas by requiring increasing quantities be incorporated in consumers’ supplies, this month amplified by obligating an additional 30 per cent cut in emissions from the 215 firms that account for some 28 per cent of electricity demand;
governmental legislative and policy impediments on new mines for coal and gas (as well as the embargo in nuclear) and by government appointed judges’ rulings on new mine proposals;
government electricity purchasing that excludes supplies generated by coal or gas.
Australia, like many other countries, is dreaming up new restraints on the use of hydrocarbons. Among these are bans proposed (and already legislated in South Australia) on gas ovens. The rationale for these bans is that, though gas has lower CO2 emissions than coal, an electricity supply comprising solar/wind generation is claimed to have no emissions.
Governments, panicked by the failure of their interventionist energy policies to bring about the low costs they and their advisers confidently projected, have now introduced price caps on coal and gas. With no sense of irony, the objective is to maintain hydrocarbon generators that are being driven out of business by governments’ discriminatory energy policies.
The measures exemplify a Hayekian ‘road-to-serfdom’ process, whereby interventions require consequential additional measures. Having seen policies preventing hydrocarbon developments bring shortages and ballooning prices, the Commonwealth implemented price caps. Predictably, the price caps cause supply shortages from an industry that has been prevented from developing new supplies by government embargoes that have been in place for over a decade. So, governments move on to further control involving specifying levels of production that they think are attainable.
Unsurprisingly, governments working with ‘high-level’ policy advisers are even botching price cap and associated domestic reserve process.
Companies are unable to interpret the Commonwealth regulations delegated to the ACCC.
New South Wales, working with the Albanese government, is seeking to reserve 22 million tonnes of coal for local consumption. This ex post facto imposition of reserve tonnage requirements will have damaging effects on the reputation of Australia for political certainty and by causing investors to place a premium on future costs, will lower future income levels.
Moreover, much of the planned coal to be reserved for domestic use is of a more valuable quality than that used in domestic power stations. Redirecting it to domestic uses would be wasteful in itself. This would be compounded since burning this higher quality coal in domestic power stations would likely cause damage unless other costs were incurred.
In addition, planning 22 million tonnes of coal to be redirected from exports is evidence of incompetence since even with the Liddell power station open (it is supposed to close in April) only 15 million tonnes were used last year. And if Liddell’s output is replaced by that of the remaining four power stations (Bayswater, Vales Point, Eraring, and Mount Piper) their greater efficiency would mean even less coal required.
Imprisoned by the green policies they have set in train, instead of abandoning the embargoes and taxes favouring their preferred renewable sources, governments are doubling down on the restrictions. Yet, each new layer of interventions proves to be inadequate and the mirage of low-cost reliable wind/solar electricity constantly recedes to the horizon.
https://www.spectator.com.au/2023/01/energy-chaos-the-shape-of-things-to-come/
*************************************************Unions put in driver’s seat: transport operators to pay
Anthony Albanese is preparing to revive Labor’s controversial road safety remuneration tribunal powers and set up a fight with 35,000 owner-driver truckies under a new industrial relations crackdown enabling the Fair Work Commission to “set minimum standards” for road transport workers.
The Department of Employment and Workplace Relations has launched consultation with key stakeholders on the government’s plan to introduce a safety net of entitlements and protections for those in “employee-like forms of work” and independent contractors.
A leaked government document reveals Labor’s second phase of IR reforms will resurrect RSRT-like powers demanded by the Transport Workers Union and NSW Labor senator Tony Sheldon, a former TWU national secretary and right-faction powerbroker. Despite a fierce backlash from owner-driver truckies who led protest convoys to Canberra, the Gillard government established the RSRT in 2012 to set pay and conditions for drivers.
The tribunal, which Labor and the TWU claimed would improve driver conditions, lower injuries and combat drug use, was abolished by the Coalition in 2016 over concerns it was discriminating against non-unionised businesses and forcing out mum-and-dad operators.
The Australian can reveal the Albanese government is accelerating its Jobs and Skills Summit pledge to “consider allowing the Fair Work Commission to set fair minimum standards to ensure the road transport industry is safe, sustainable and viable”.
According to a department brief, the government’s objective is that “all workers, regardless of their working arrangement, have access to a safety net of fair minimum entitlements and protections, while all businesses have the opportunity to compete fairly”.
Flagged measures include allowing the Fair Work Commission to set “minimum standards for workers in the road transport industry”, reviewing the definition of ‘employee’ under the Fair Work Act and providing “protections for independent contractors, including the capacity to challenge unfair contract terms”.
Workplace Relations Minister Tony Burke – who is leading a separate push to deliver Labor’s Same Job, Same Pay labour hire reforms – said there would be “extensive consultation on these measures before we introduce legislation later in the year”.
“We made commitments at both the election and at the Jobs and Skills Summit for workers who currently have no minimum standards,” Mr Burke told The Australian.
Speaking to union delegates in August, Mr Burke credited TWU national secretary Michael Kaine with helping develop the “idea of giving a flexible power to the Commission”.
On closing gaps in the IR system to create a fairer framework for gig economy and road transport workers, Mr Burke told the TWU conference if “you’re like an employee in the work that you do, the Fair Work Commission will be able to determine the appropriate minimum pay and conditions for work”.
A Small Business Ombudsman inquiry into the effects of the RSRT, ordered by the Turnbull government in 2016, found that payment orders made long-distance and supermarket distribution owner-drivers uncompetitive, contributed to some drivers taking their own lives and created a legal minefield for family-run businesses.
Opposition workplace relations spokeswoman Michaelia Cash, who led the abolishment of the RSRT in 2016, on Thursday accused the government of “putting the interests of its union paymasters above the interests of small and family businesses”.
“It is clear that the Albanese government is planning to effectively reintroduce the flawed Road Safety Remuneration Tribunal, putting the livelihoods of 35,000 small-business owner-truck drivers at risk,” she told The Australian. “This is all part of Labor’s attack on flexible employment arrangements which suit both businesses and employees. It is an attack on how thousands of businesses operate and will lead to job losses and business closures.
“It will be bad for the economy, just like the radical industrial relations laws Labor rushed through the parliament.”
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27 January, 2023
Outrage after Novak Djokovic's dad posed with fans wearing Putin's 'Z' symbol and allegedly said 'long live the Russians' in Serbian
Some background is needed to understand this. There has long been a big-brother/little-brother feeling between Russians and Serbians. Russia once started a world war in defence of Serbia. And that feeling is not going to be cancelled by Putin's great folly.
And whence free speech if that feeling is not allowed to be expressed? I have always admired the enduring Russians, even while deploring the Soviets. I also have a patriotic Serbian girlfriend so may be a bit biased because of that
Srdjan Djokovic was seen on video posing with fans waving Russian flags emblazoned with President Vladimir Putin's face on the steps of Rod Laver Arena.
He was standing next to one fan wearing a t-shirt with the Z symbol of the Russian military and appears to tell him in Serbian: 'Long live the Russians.'
The star's father was warned over his conduct by Tennis Australia bosses, but Ukraine's ambassador to Australia Vasyl Myroshnychenko has demanded he be banned from attending the Open and branded the incident 'such a disgrace.'
He wants Djokovic's father kicked out of the tournament, and at least the player's box, with an apology from his grand slam legend son.
He said allowing Djokovic's father to sit in the high-profile player's box for Friday night's semi-final against Tommy Paul would send the world the wrong message.
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It takes the Left to transform a relaxed celebration into an outpouring of hate
They are good at organizing demonstrations. As you can plainly see it is whites, not Aborigines, making all the fuss
Protesters took to the streets in marches organised in every state and territory on Thursday as many are choosing not to mark the national holiday and are protesting January 26 as Australia's national day of celebration.
In Melbourne, Greens Senator Lidia Thorpe addressed cheering crowds at the Victorian Parliament around midday under scorching heat.
Ms Thorpe, who is an Indigenous woman and the star of Melbourne's treaty movement, declared war, in her latest example of overheated rhetoric.
'(It was) a war that was declared on our people more than 200 years ago,' Senator Thorpe said in an extraordinary speech, in which she said black women were still being raped by 'them'.
'This is a war. They are still killing us. They are still killing our babies. What do we have to celebrate in our country?' Ms Thorpe said.
The crowd responded to Ms Thorpe's comments with loud shouts of 'shame' as she addressed the massive crowd.
The Greens Senator labelled the federal parliament a 'poisoned chalice' while calling on protestors to help rid the country of racism.
The rally in Sydney was countered by pro-Australia Day demonstrators - wielding 'I Support Australia Day' signs - who were quickly moved on from Invasion Day protesters.
Police also intervened and asked the group to disperse and said they would be issued with a direction, if they didn't obey the request.
Speakers in Sydney made calls for Indigenous sovereignty and criticised the referendum for an Indigenous Voice to Parliament.
'We have a voice, those bastards in Parliament haven't been listening. What we want is justice, what we want is self determination and sovereignty.
*************************************************
The hate continues
A divorce lawyer and prominent TikToker has been targeted by vicious trolls just for telling her 131,000 followers about a restaurant's Australia Day deal.
Fidan Shevket - who posts as Fidan_tok - recorded a paid restaurant review on the social media platform and revealed its free prawn cocktail deal for Australia Day.
She says in the video: 'This Australia Day, January 26, if you book a table at Kickin' Inn restaurants, any of them, you will get a free shrimp martini on the house.
'I have to inform you of that as it's part of the collab-thing - full disclosure.'
Thirty seconds later in the video, she shows the starter and adds: 'This is the shrimp martini. Look at the size of this f***ing thing! 'You get one of these for free if you book for Australia Day, okay?'
But that was the trigger for a brutal hate campaign where she was branded a racist and personally attacked, and her law firm targeted with hateful one-star reviews.
'I am not a racist and my casual comments have been taken out of context,' the Sydney mother of twins told Daily Mail Australia on Thursday.
But just the mention of Australia Day and promoting the free deal at the Crows Nest Kickin' Inn cajun restaurant on Sydney's north shore sparked a furious backlash.
'You fat ignorant COWWWWWW!!!! Get your ass back on Tiktok and APOLOGISE! You w** looking s**t,' one told her.
She then recorded a second video to try to explain she was simply using the name of the holiday that's on the calendar...but that fired up even more furore.
'I didn't come up with the day Australia Day, okay?' she said in the now-deleted video. 'It is Australia Day on the calendar. I didn't make it up. That's just what it's called.
'Now, it's not called Invasion Day on the calendar. It's called Australia Day. So I'm allowed to call it that.
'Secondly, it's a public holiday. I'm allowed to celebrate a public holiday. I'm all for the public holiday. I love my public holidays, and it's a family day.
'So I will spend the day with my family and have a good day.'
Her Fox and Staniland law firm was then targeted by the trolls with a rash of one star reviews on Google where the lawyer was again personally attacked.
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Most Australians enjoyed their holiday in the traditional way
Revellers have let their hair down and celebrated Australia Day in style by getting out and soaking up some of the gorgeous sun, sand and surf the country has to offer.
Despite endless debate surrounding keeping January 26 as our national day and rowdy Invasion Day demonstrations attracting thousands in all capital cities, millions opted for parties not protests - taking the public holiday as a chance to relax and enjoy some picture-perfect weather.
Partygoers on the Gold Coast weren't going to miss the opportunity to have a little fun on Thursday as they caught up with friends and celebrated what makes us The Lucky Country.
Photos show Aussies enjoying the scorching 32C weather on the Gold Coast in their beach gear - most capital cities were in the high 20s except nearby Brisbane which also had a scorcher.
Peaceful beachside barbecues, boat rides and even out-of-vogue Aussie flags were in abundance.
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26 January, 2023
The Left turns on Australian of the Year, Taryn Brumfitt
It's rare that I agree with Mike Carlton but I do this time. As he did, I first said "who"? in response to hearing of the award. Although I am something of a news hound, I had never heard of her. And her name sounds like it might be a spoof so that's what I intially thought it was. The whole thing would seem to be some sort of feminist infiltration into an otherwise more reasonable awards committee
As to her claim about the inevitability of women getting fat as they get older, it is true that there is such a tendency but my partner is 74 and is still slim. But she works on it. She watches her diet and does daily exercise. Picture of her from this month below
Left wing journalist Mike Carlton has been slammed for his 'ignorance' after tweeting his low opinion of body image campaigner Taryn Brumfitt being made the 2023 Australian of the Year.
In a tweet posted after the announcement of Ms Brumfitt as the winner of the top Australia Day gong in Canberra on Wednesday night, Mr Carlton made his view of the decision known on his account with nearly 194,000 followers.
'My Australian of the Year would be a doctor or nurse working nights in intensive care or the ED, dealing with COVID and daily death. Real, compassionate work. For very little money. NOT someone who makes a buck out of saying it’s ok to be a bit fat. Good night.'
His tweet was supported by left-wing male television reporter, Paul Bongiorno, who tweeted 'Indeed' underneath Mr Carlton's post.
Brumfitt has revealed how she regularly walks around naked in front of her two sons - Oliver, 11, and Cruz, 9 - and daughter Mikaela, 8.
The former bodybuilder turned activist believes it's vital for them to know how a woman's body changes with age and insists they are all comfortable with her nudity.
'It's something I do mainly for my daughter's benefit,' she says. 'I know that, as a girl, it's especially important she sees me unclothed — it facilitates an ongoing dialogue between us about the female body, and the way it changes throughout the course of a woman's life. 'In fact, I believe that every little girl should grow up seeing her mother naked on a regular basis.'
Carlton also tweeted 'Who ? ? ?' when news of Ms Brumfitt's award first broke on Wednesday night.
But the tweets were met with a fierce response from women.
Sharna Bremner, the founder and director of End Rape on Campus Australia, tweeted in response: 'Eating disorders are the third most common illness among young women in Australia & have the highest mortality rate of all psychiatric disorders,' she posted.
'These two should be ashamed of their ignorance & s****y remarks.'
***********************************************
Calls for every Australian to get a VOTE on whether to keep Australia Day
This "controversy" over Australia day is just a Leftist stir with a few white "Aborigines" roped in. The day has been very popular until quite recently. I have our distinguished flag flying proudly from the tall flagpole out the front of my house
Pressure is mounting to give Aussies the chance to vote on whether to change the date of Australia Day, as the national holiday becomes synonymous with an endless toxic debate - though it's unlikely to stop millions enjoying the sunshine today.
A rapidly rising number of Australians - particularly young generations - now view January 26, commemorating the arrival of the First Fleet and the beginning of British colonial rule in 1788, as a day that should not be celebrated.
Wild protests now mar the occasion every year, with hundreds of thousands again set to turn up on Thursday in every major city across the country demanding to 'change the date'.
But with sunny skies over most of Australia's major cities, with highs of 31C in Sydney, 33C in Brisbane and 32C in Perth, the controversy will seem far detached from millions of Australians happy to spend the day off work with their families.
Under pressure by critics, some large companies have given staff the option to work on the public holiday if they feel uncomfortable and formally stated it's not a day for patriotism.
Smaller businesses and more and more of pubs have also followed suit putting a stop to the flag-waving, beer-drinking celebrations of years gone by.
Greens Senator Lidia Thorpe has even led a charge for homeowners to pay First Nation's People and annual 'rent' tax as reparations.
But Nationals MP Matt Canavan wants to end the controversy 'delegitimising' the national holiday once and for all - saying the decision should be put in the hands of the people, rather than 'woke' and virtue-signalling companies.
The staunch conservative has called on the federal government to introduce a plebiscite at the same time citizens vote on the Indigenous Voice to Parliament later this year.
'Why don't we, when we have the voice referendum later this year, add a question (such as) "do you want to keep Australia Day on January 26?"' he said on Sky News.
'I'm happy to be guided and listen to the Australian people, so rather than the corporate world trying to impose their woke ideology on the rest of us, why don't (we) listen to the people?
'Here's a voice. Here's a chance to have a voice of the Australian people and let them decide when the date should be.'
Crowds are expected to descend on major landmarks across the country to enjoy spectacular displays of national pride, including thrilling harbour boat shows in Sydney and a 21-gun salute in Melbourne.
These family-friendly events will be a marked contrast from protests being held across the nation.
Mr Canvan's call for a plebiscite comes after Senator Thorpe called for Australia to get rid of 'everything racist' in the constitution and become a 'Blak Republic'.
The outspoken Indigenous Senator has also thrown her support behind the 'Pay the Rent' model under which Australian homeowners would be forced to shell out a weekly land tax that would fund Indigenous social services.
What's the problem with Australia Day?
Australia Day has become increasingly contentious, with many campaigning for the holiday to be abolished entirely or the date changed.
The public holiday commemorates the landing of the First Fleet at Sydney Harbour, with Governor Arthur Philip raising the British flag to mark the founding of New South Wales on January 26, 1788.
However, since 1938, Indigenous and First Nations people have observed the public holiday as a day of mourning and instead have named it 'Invasion Day'.
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The 'disgraceful and absurd' claim by Indigenous Australians minister Linda Burney on the ABC that's led to calls for her to lose her job
Indigenous Australians Minister Linda Burney has been called out for her 'outright lie' after making the extraordinary claim on the ABC that the Voice to Parliament would have prevented Alice Springs' crime wave.
Prime Minister Anthony Albanese was forced to fly to the troubled Outback town and introduce an alcohol sales ban after heavy criticism from the Opposition and locals about a a 300 per cent surge in crime since Labor dropped alcohol sales bans in remote communities
Ms Burney told ABC Radio National's Patricia Karvelas that if a Voice to Parliament had been established earlier 'the situation in Alice Springs wouldn't be what it is'.
When Karvelas then pressed Ms Burney on whether she or the PM had been tough enough on alcohol bans in the Northern Territory, the minister said of their flying visit: 'The most important thing is we made enormous gains yesterday.
'I've been thinking about this very deeply and it was expressed yesterday, that if the Voice to Parliament had been established previously, I don't think we would be where we are in terms of where Alice Springs is at the moment,' she said.
However, 2GB host Ben Fordham slammed Ms Burney comments as not only 'disgraceful' but an 'outright lie'.
'Linda Burney has had a shocker. She is living in fantasy land,' Fordham said, 'I hope you’re not using using what's happening in Alice Springs to build a case for the Voice, because it sure sounds like it.
'Really I mean Linda, you don't believe that. You're either telling fibs or living in cuckoo land.'
He also gave Ms Burney a massive spray for her reasoning why this would be so when she said, 'because we would have been getting practical advice from people who are representative of the community in relation to these social issues'
Fordham: 'Minister you've already had that. The people of Alice Springs have been banging down the door pleading for your help'.
National Party Senator Matt Canavan also weighed in on Ms Burney's comments and said she should quit her job. 'It shows how out of touch these people are. We have a whole department here in Canberra focussed on indigenous affairs issues.
'If they could not see what was going on in Alice Springs and report it back to their own minister what hope has 25 odd people in the Indigenous Voice to do the same
'This is a minister clearly out of her depth. She should go. How could she not know what was going on in Alice Springs. It's not another planet.'
He also said the question of Australia Day's date could be added to The Voice referendum and it would 'cost nothing'.
Fordham quoted from a parliamentary inquiry last month into the July 2022 sunsetting of the Stronger Futures legislation, which lifted decade-long alcohol bans in the Northern territory's more than 40 indigenous town camps.
Stephen Gourley, Director of Emergency Medicine at Alice Springs Hospital, told the hearing that since bans were lifted 'the level of injuries we've seen is horrific, it's mostly women being beaten'.
At the same inquiry, Alice Springs GP Dr John Boffa urged for grog bans to return, because 'we need to keep extra protections and extra measures until we can see evidence the trauma in children is reducing'.
Last October, the Central Desert Regional Council reported on the immediate impact of lifting the grog ban as 'a spike in alcohol-fuelled violence'.
And in June 2022, on the eve of the ban lifting, eight local indigenous groups and Central Australia Aboriginal Congress chief Donna Ah Chee warned Ms Burney in a letter that 'to permit more access to alcohol will undoubtedly add fuel to this fire'.
Alice Springs Federal MP Marion Scrymgour had also warned, 'you can't just suddenly pull the pin without any protection or plan for the vulnerable women and children'.
Fordham said 'everyone ... knows it was pressure from this radio station that forced her and the Prime Minister into action and even then (they) didn't listen, because all they've done is support grog bans on Mondays and Tuesdays,
'And they've done nothing about the kids as young as five who are roaming the streets at night. There's no point giving people a Voice if you've got your ears blocked.
'To suggest a voice in the constitution would have made a difference is both disgraceful and laughable. It's an outright lie'
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Protesters defy Mt Warning ban with summit climb
Protesters have defied a climbing ban to scale the summit of Mt Warning in a pointed shot at the NSW government over the controversial handling of the Australian tourism icon.
Mt Warning, or Wollumbin, has been off limits to climbers since a series of “temporary” closures were introduced stretching back to the early days of the coronavirus pandemic in 2020.
Late last year, the NSW government released a bombshell report featuring recommendations from an outfit known as the Wollumbin Consultative Group to ban the public from the mountain forever due to its sacred place in local Indigenous culture.
But a group of protesters have defied the ban with an early morning ascent of the mountain on Australia Day.
In a statement, a group spokesman said they had been given the blessing of local Indigenous custodian Elizabeth Davis Boyd from the Ngarkwal people, who made headlines earlier this month when she broke down in tears at a public rally sharing her pain at the ongoing drama surrounding access to the beloved site.
Adrian Hoffman of the Reopen Mount Warning lobby group told climbers they would continue to fight for the trail to be reopened to the public.
“Sitting on top of this stunningly beautiful and sacred site we have just witnessed the first sunrays to strike our Australian mainland and feel very humbled and blessed,” he said.
“But we are not here for self-satisfaction or thrills but to strongly protest against the permanent closure of the Mt Warning summit track. We are friends of Mt Warning and seek to preserve this natural wonder for future generations.”
He also said the group’s ascent of the mountain made a mockery of claims by NSW National Parks and Wildlife Service that one of the main reasons for the continued “temporary” closure of the trail was because it was unsafe.
“Within our group is a 71-year-old who underwent a full hip replacement just five months ago and he managed to limp up here in the dark,” he said.
The NSW government has insisted the current ban is not permanent, with the mountain’s future still up in the air.
However, it is understood the future would be guided by the mysterious Wollumbin Consultative Group which is staunchly opposed to allowing public access to the summit trail and surrounds.
A working group featuring key stakeholders from both sides of the debate has held one meeting with a view to reach a compromise. Limiting visitor numbers and the introduction of fees or permits are some of the options which have been discussed.
Climbing enthusiasts have also called for an independent public inquiry into the controversy.
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25 January, 2023
Today co-host has a dig at the Prime Minister over Australia Day
Why should we change the date to suit a small minority?
The new co-host of The Today Show has warned the Prime Minister “can’t please everyone” as debate once again rages over the date Australia Day is held.
Sarah Abo was hosting a segment on the popular Nine morning program on Wednesday with Education Minister Jason Clare and 4BC political contributor and former Queensland Liberal MP Scott Emerson.
The trio were discussing accusations from the Coalition that the Labor government were trying to change the date of the national public holiday “by stealth”, by encouraging businesses to allow employees to work on January 26 if they take issue with what the holiday represents.
Mr Clare denied the allegation, telling Ms Abo the Prime Minister had “made it clear” Australia Day would remain on January 26, but that Australians were welcome to mark it in whichever way they wanted.
“You can have this debate if you want to, you can celebrate if you want to, you can protest if you want to, you can go to work tomorrow if you want to, or you can have a few beers with your mates if you want to,” he said.
Mr Emerson said Prime Minister Anthony Albanese was being “weak” and “half-hearted” in his response to calls to change the date of Australia Day to respect the Aboriginal community, who view the date as the start of a regime of oppression and genocide against First Nations people.
“The reality is, the Government should come out and say, ‘Yes, we are celebrating on January the 26th, and we’re keeping that day there’,” said Mr Emerson.
Ms Abo, 37, then said “Well, this is the problem, though, isn’t it? I mean, it’s about pleasing everyone, and you simply can’t anymore,” before turning the conversation back to Mr Emerson.
Mr Clare appeared perplexed at the suggestion, as Mr Emerson agreed with Ms Abo’s opinion, going on to accuse the Prime Minister of “trying to have a bet each way.”
But Mr Clare was denied the chance to respond, with Ms Abo then turning the conversation towards the issue of the Coalition calling for rapper Kanye West to be denied entry into Australia.
Viewers appeared to be split on the issue.
One Twitter user commented on the segment: “This is Labor agenda to force a date change of our national day. A sneaky way of doing it. It’s very disrespectful to be working on Australia Day.”
But another said “No pride in genocide,” taking the opposite stance on the matter.
“Let’s have a referendum and see what Australia wants, rather than pockets of voices blasting what we should have!” said a third viewer, believing the decision should be left up to the majority.
Sarah Abo was made co-host of Today earlier in January, alongside host Karl Stefanovic, after on-and-off stints as fill-in co-host during 2022.
She was previously a reporter for 60 Minutes, and replaces former Today co-host Allison Langdon, who replaces Tracy Grimshaw on A Current Affair.
Federal public servants, as well as employees of Woolworths, Telstra, Channel 10, and Unilever have all been given the option to work January 26 instead of observing the public holiday.
Contemporary Australia Day celebrations only took off after bicentennial celebrations in 1988.
A celebration for some has been a day of pain for Aboriginal groups, who see January 26 as the beginning of European settlement that brought acts of brutality and genocide.
Demonstrations are now regularly held on January 26, with the date marked as “Invasion Day.”
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‘Playing politics’: Qld MPs outraged over Australia Day ban
Discrimination against State politicians
Labor has been accused of “playing politics” with local Australia Day citizenship ceremonies after Immigration Minister Andrew Giles refused to grant authority to state MPs to preside over local events.
A number of Queensland state MPs have presided over the local ceremonies for years including LNP Deputy Leader Jarrod Bleijie, who has taken up the gig for the past 12 years after being granted the authority by the relevant federal minister each year.
Letters seen by The Courier-Mail reveal Mr Bleijie’s local Rotary Club in Mooloolaba had been attempting to confirm the authorisation for months in the lead up to Thursday’s Australia Day citizenship ceremony.
But just a week out, the club and Mr Bleijie were informed Mr Giles had rejected the request – with other state MPs also rejected.
“The Hon. Andrew Giles MP, Minister for Immigration, Citizenship and Multicultural Affairs considered the request for your one-off authorisation and similar requests made by state MPs for the same purpose, and has not agreed to these requests,” a letter from the Department of Home Affairs reads.
“The Department has advised the Rotary Club of Mooloolaba of the Minister’s decision.
The letter is dated January 20 – just six days before the ceremony, despite the request being put forward several months earlier – with the acknowledgment the “timing of the notification of this decision is not ideal”.
“However, the department will continue to work with the club to ensure that a presiding officer is available for the ceremony on Australia Day 2023.”
Mr Bleijie said such ceremonies should “not be political”.
“Australia Day citizenship ceremonies should be about the new citizens becoming Australians and enjoying everything there is to enjoy being an Australian,” he said.
“Unfortunately, the new Federal Labor government have chosen to play politics and now deny state MPs the ability to preside over citizenship ceremonies, which we have been doing on behalf of our communities for years on end.”
Minister for Immigration Andrew Giles referred questions on the matter to the Department of Home Affairs.
“Local Federal MPs or certain local government council representatives are authorised as presiding officers, and should be afforded this opportunity at citizenship ceremonies,” a spokesperson told The Courier-Mail.
“This doesn’t preclude others from having a prominent role in the official proceedings, for example, by being invited to make an address at the event.
“Many council-hosted ceremonies include an address by a local state MP, for instance.”
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Back to the future: One year teaching qualification to be revived
Two-year post-graduate teaching degrees would be scrapped and replaced with a one-year course under a major overhaul to attract aspiring teachers into classrooms as schools battle chronic staff shortages, particularly in maths and science.
The proposal will be rolled out if the NSW Coalition government is reelected in March. It follows the NSW Productivity Commission releasing data that reveals the shift to the longer qualification has deterred more than 9000 would-be teachers from entering the profession.
NSW Premier Dominic Perrottet said the reform was part of a push to modernise education and make a teaching career a reality sooner for those already in the workforce.
“People at all stages of their lives have the potential to be great teachers, for those who already have an undergraduate degree we want a more streamlined approach for them to start a teaching career,” Perrottet said.
Under a NSW Coalition government, those with an undergraduate degree will be able to complete a one-year full-time postgraduate degree to become a secondary school teacher from 2024, and streamlined postgraduate courses for primary school teachers would be available by 2026.
NSW Productivity Commissioner Peter Achterstraat said evidence shows longer courses have created significant hurdles for those looking to retrain as teachers, and there were unintended costs to students and teachers with the shift to a two-year postgraduate degree.
“There are potentially 9400 aspiring teachers who would have completed under the old one-year course and that’s enough to staff 140 high schools,” Achterstraat said.
In 2013, a national approach to the accreditation of education degrees was phased in, requiring university graduates to undertake a two-year master’s degree to enter the profession. Previously, a one-year graduate diploma was sufficient.
“Would-be teachers are deterred from joining the profession because of the extra cost, the extra year of training, and the fact they are going miss out on salary,” Achterstraat said.
“You might have a maths degree and be perfect for teaching, but if you have a family and a mortgage, taking two years off work to do the training is probably not viable,” he said.
The Commission examined the economic impacts of longer postgraduate initial teacher education, and found that since NSW doubled the length of postgraduate initial teacher education, the number of students completing degrees has trended down.
It found the move to a two-year master’s is a disincentive for mid-career professionals wanting to retrain as teachers, and has cost around $3 billion in lost welfare over the past seven years.
“These costs comprise loss of teacher earnings, additional student debt for teachers, and loss of lifetime income for students. Had initial teacher education (ITE) remained as a one-year graduate diploma, we could expect more than 9000 additional ITE completions over the 2015 to 2022 period,” the report said.
The shortfall in teaching graduates with specialised skills on out-of-field teaching – where students are being taught by someone without expertise in their subject – is “concerning”, the report said. The Commission estimates that the poorer outcomes from additional out-of-field teaching costs around 95,000 students $25,000 each in lost lifetime earnings.
“These additional teachers might have alleviated the current growing shortage of qualified teachers which is well documented,” the report said.
There is scarce evidence that longer training pathways result in a better quality of teaching and many high-achieving education systems overseas such as Singapore (ranked second worldwide in PISA results) offer one-year postgraduate teaching qualifications, the report said.
“Based on a review of empirical evidence, the Commission estimates that teachers with an additional year of ITE have a negligible impact on student achievement. On the other hand, the literature consistently points to additional years of on-the-job teaching experience having a positive impact, especially for early-career teachers.”
Teacher shortages are biting across Australia – especially in maths, design and technology and science – while data reported by the Herald last year showed more than 100,000 students in NSW are taught by someone without expertise in their subject.
“While extending the initial teacher education to two years was likely done to improve teacher quality, we now know that it has not achieved that outcome. We are confident that returning to a one-year initial teacher qualification will not lower teaching standards,” Achterstraat said.
Minister for Education and Early Learning Sarah Mitchell said the current two-year master’s degree requirement was a disincentive for aspiring teachers, particularly mid-career professionals, and didn’t have a clear enough impact on student outcomes.
“This decision [to move to a one-year pathway] is backed by strong research which shows that the best way for teachers to hit the ground running is to spend more time in schools.”
The government said it will work with universities and the profession “to ensure these new courses are high-quality and prepare trainee teachers for the classroom”, and will push for it to be on the national agenda at next month’s education ministers meeting.
A policy paper released last year by conservative think tank the Centre for Independent Studies (CIS) argued mandating a two-year requirement for postgraduate teaching was crippling teacher supply. The one-year graduate diploma of education is currently held by about 60,000 teachers nationally.
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Green superannuation funds are 2022’s underperformers
A bad year for super fund returns has spelt a serious setback for “green” funds as coal and oil stocks soared and clean tech shares dropped sharply.
Overall returns in super were down nearly 5 per cent – but returns were regularly twice as bad at green funds which completely missed the energy sector rebound. The average balanced fund – where most investors have most of their money – dropped by 4.8 per cent last year, the fourth negative year recorded by such funds since 2000, according to the SuperRatings group.
Top-rated green funds such as Australian Ethical had nowhere to turn when the tech sell-off accelerated in the second half of 2022. The Australian Ethical balanced fund was down 9 per cent over the year.
Australian Ethical has been the fastest growing super fund in the market in terms of member accumulation over the last five years, according to KPMG.
Some of the worst performers were new funds that target younger investors with green products: Spaceship Super, a fund which has a focus on global technology, reported a minus 15 per cent return on its growth fund.
Younger investors have clearly been attracted to the Spaceship fund – its annual report said it had an 80 per cent growth in membership last year.
Future Super, which focuses on “climate conscious super”, reported an 11 per cent drop in its balanced fund while the group’s more specialised funds did even worse: The group’s Renewables Plus Growth fund fell by 13 per cent over the year.
Cruelty Free Super, the super fund which is a “happy supporter of the vegan community”, did a little better, though its returns were still below average at minus 7.25 per cent. The fund also managed to get hit with a fine from the Australian Securities and Investments Commission this month, which was concerned over “what may have been false and misleading statements”.
“It has been a tough period for all funds, but particularly funds where ESG (environment, social and governance) settings may have meant a concentration on technology investments,” says Kirby Rappell of SuperRatings.
Major funds that managed to navigate the parallel boom in fossil fuel stocks and a ferocious sell- off in technology stocks included Hostplus, the best performing fund in the local market over the longer term. Hostplus managed to hold negative returns at minus 2.5 per cent – around half the average return of its peers.
Industry funds dominate the top performers in the market, but it was a retail fund – Perpetual’s Wealthfocus – that topped the 12 month tables with a positive return of 1.7 per cent.
Perpetual was joined by First Super’s balanced fund as the only other fund with a positive return – the First Super balanced fund managed a very slender positive return of 0.1 per cent
The Australian Retirement Trust (created through the merger of Q Super and SunSuper) ranked seventh with a minus 2.6 per cent return.
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24 January, 2023
Clive Palmer’s UAP to host controversial Covid sceptic
Clive Palmer’s United Australia Party will host a series of coronavirus vaccine conferences next month headlined by controversial American cardiologist Doctor Peter McCullough
Nations across the globe have “completely de-emphasised and almost obfuscated” effective coronavirus treatments in their public health approach to the pandemic, says professor of medicine Dr Peter McCullough.
Doctor Peter McCullough has been heavily criticised for controversial views on the coronavirus, with calls from some quarters for Australian immigration officials to deny him a visa to enter the country.
Numerous health officials and websites have criticised Dr McCullough, who gained widespread attention after an appearance on the podcast of American personality Joe Rogan where he made a series of provocative claims, including that the pandemic was planned as part of a conspiracy.
Several health industry websites have devoted sections to debunking Dr McCullough’s claims, which include statements that masks were useless against Covid and that test subjects in an Australian vaccination trial contracted HIV.
However, speaking on the Gold Coast on Tuesday, Mr Palmer said it was time to hear different points of view on the pandemic and vaccines and he expected conferences on the Gold Coast and Sunshine Coast to sell out. He said Dr McCullough was a “well respected” cardiologist with “impeccable” credentials.
Mr Palmer, a high-profile opponent of coronavirus vaccines, said he was told he “had six hours to live” at one point during his own Covid health battle, but was treated with alternative therapies in hospital.
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Australia’s education crisis of ‘dumbed-down twaddle’
As a year 12 student, school has been a common denominator in every aspect of my life for almost as long as I can recall. From my very first day of prep, my enthusiasm to learn only ever grew, as my thirst for contestable knowledge flourished through the nurture of the critical thinkers whom I was privileged to be surrounded by.
As the years progressed, and the curriculum proved to be intellectually baseless – void of engaging research opportunities and lacking any trace of wholesome substance – I came to the realisation that learning, flourishing, and developing into an exceptional human was a practically impossible task to complete in a school system designed to remove individuality from students.
The impersonalisation of the classroom has ultimately led to the disengagement of many students. Unfortunately, such disengagement has extended from the classroom to the very essence of the acquisition of knowledge, resulting in consistent and substantial decreases in academic achievements across most grades in NSW and the nation.
Last week I had the privilege of interviewing two exceptional secondary teachers, Kon Bouzikos, president of the Australian Classical Education Society, and Sarah Flynn O’Dea, founder of Logos Australis, on my podcast The Next Candidate. With knowledge gleaned from frontline classroom experiences, both Kon and Sarah claim to have found the solution to our current education crisis in the classical mode of education.
In 2022 almost 13 per cent of boys in year nine did not meet the minimum reading standard assessed through NAPLAN exams in NSW. With schools not only readily accessible but also mandatory in Australia, such statistics ought to horrify every reasonable citizen, regardless of their parental status.
The statistics are not mere numbers, they are Australia’s future. They are real boys- and girls who are on the verge of graduating secondary school without the ability to read a basic novel. I have personally interacted with several stage 6 students who attend both public and independent schools, yet are not capable of reading a standard news article due to a lack of focus and vocabulary.
The statistics, in themselves, prove the issue lies within the very structure of the education system rather than the providential ability for one to attend school.
Reflecting on the disengagement in the classroom, Sarah referenced esteemed 20th-century education reformist, Charlotte Mason, who spent her career advocating for students to read rich literary works rather than textbooks, or what she referred to as ‘dumbed-down twaddle’.
‘She (Charlotte Mason) spoke about a great table that is laid out with a fine feast, and that as teachers and parents as well, are to lay before our children a fine feast of the very best ideas that have been produced throughout human history and let the children develop a storehouse of ideas’.
In doing so, Sarah claims that students naturally grow an interest in the subject matter being learnt, which subsequently results in heightened academic achievements. She also claims that the obsessive focus on the academic results achieved by students misplaces the priorities of the educator.
‘Academic achievement is a byproduct of education, it shouldn’t be the primary goal’.
The gravity of the misplacement of priorities by the system is felt by every student regardless of age. From the first day of kindergarten we are taught that As are good, everything else is bad. Excluding parental encouragement, the methodology to achieve such results is scarcely noted. I admit to getting close to full marks on assessments in which I knew very little of the unit content. We have reached a point in our education system where the ability to regurgitate mundane facts (which are becoming increasingly opinion-orientated), in a rubric-accepted structure, is all that is required to be considered an academic high-achiever. The acquisition and application of knowledge is rarely, if ever, the focus of our practised school system, doing students, and subsequently Australia’s future, no favours.
The classroom is not a place to learn, it is not a place to flourish. From the first day of school to the very last, the emphasis on achieving a good HSC result and getting a boxed job is repeated until the point in which most students subconsciously accept it as their fate, toe the line and fuse their thirst to learn. I have been tempted to do so countless times. The mental energy required to push against the grain to allow oneself the human experience of critical thought, is often exhausting, but the cost of not doing so is greater. To concede defeat and fall into line is certain to erode a student’s spirit until they become nothing more than a mere tax-paying statistic. The fact our school system has forced countless students onto this path is nothing short of a national disgrace.
During the interview, Sarah reflected on a poem recited to her as a child by her year one teacher, Square and Brown Inside. In recalling its attached innuendo, she explained that she supposed that ‘it was my teacher’s way of communicating to us that the classroom is not the place to flourish’.
In reflecting on the contrast of being the teacher herself, she explained that:
‘There are all these mixed messages in the system that we should be fulfilling our potential in the school system … telling our young people to dream and believe and hope, yet the system doesn’t produce the knowledge or skill set to do that.’
Controversies have frequently arisen regarding the recent trend of pushing LGBTQ+ ideologies, climate narratives, Critical Race Theory, gender identity theory, and other forms of politically motivated activism in classrooms, promoted by state-implemented curriculums.
Many Australian parents, teachers, and organisations have lobbied against the move, promoting the right to education rather than indoctrination. As a student, I can attest to the fact that every subject is infused with countless political activism, ranging from unquestionable ‘equality’ stances, based on mere human opinion, to apparent ‘climate science’ which assures us that we have a short, miserable life ahead of us if we don’t convert to the cult of Marxist-environmentalism. To have the audacity question such narratives would often see a student shunned as a ‘phobe’ or ‘ist’ of sorts in accordance to the syllabus and its related ‘learning resources’.
Sarah explains how reintroducing the classical mode of thought, both in the classroom and in greater society, could result in disagreements being settled with cognitive discussions rather than childish taunts.
‘What we are looking for is to reconstitute the concept, and the practices of civil discourse, which is what our civilisations and great prosperity have been founded on. (…) What we are faced with in the highly political (form of education) is a kind of foe intellectualism, to me it is quite superficial.’
When considering the uniformed, stringently enforced social justice approaches, Sarah, claims that, ‘We can’t look at the layers or the nuance of individual experience, we are looking at this very reduced kind of black or white, us or them kind of (mentality). To me it is not academic, it is not intellectual, we don’t want to deny that there is a place, especially as Christians, for social justice but I think it is time to reclaim some of that territory and re-frame it from a deeper place’.
https://www.spectator.com.au/2023/01/australias-education-crisis-of-dumbed-down-twaddle
**********************************************************The minister for net zero and dystopian hellscapes
‘Australians, you shall decarbonise. Electricity bills shall go up, energy security shall go down, and damage to the environment shall be ignored – a cabal of global elites has made this decision for you. As Net Zero Minister, I declare that state cooperation is assured; debt has no consequence; spending has no limit; markets have no meaning. Your opinions are irrelevant and participation is mandatory. The Minister has spoken; you shall comply.’
Imagine if Chris Bowen, Australia’s Energy Minister, delivered such a dystopian speech… In reality, we are not far off, because these words accurately describe the Australian government’s stance on emissions reduction. Would the speech win any votes? Unfortunately, it would. Thanks to a decades-long propaganda mission, there are many people convinced that our total dependence on fossil fuels will bring about the end of the world. Combined with the comfort and security of a largely peaceful and prosperous West, senses are dulled and comfort breeds weakness.
But is the world ending? Certainly not in a physical sense. The world is greening; whales and polar bears are flourishing; the Great Barrier Reef is expanding; and we grow so much food we can afford to waste a good proportion of it. What does appear to be ending is political stability. Elon Musk, new owner of the planet’s digital town square – Twitter – acknowledged that all the conspiracy theories about Twitter are true. He released damning evidence of US government agencies censoring debate on social media platforms, deliberately manipulating information on the key topics of election integrity and Covid vaccines. It raises the question – how often is the renewables and climate change debate similarly censored and manipulated by agenda-riddled technocrats?
In roughly equal measures, people are moving diametrically away from the political centre. As Dilbert cartoonist Scott Adams said recently, there are two movies showing on the same screen. He’s observing that people are seeing the same information and coming to completely different conclusions. Ironically, that’s something on which most people would agree.
Destroying successful economies is no easy feat. However, historical records show that top-down ideology, centralised bureaucratic control, higher taxes, and curtailing production are quite effective. Markets will not voluntarily create the massive oversupply of wind and solar required to meet arbitrary targets, so Western economies are being swamped by bureaucracies intent on increasing market regulation and intervention. Energy security – once sought after, even if not assured – is slipping away without any policy or commentary from the media to arrest it.
Most big businesses are encouraging the end of reliable low-cost electricity, yet lobby groups – such as the Business Council of Australia, who ‘represents Australia’s largest employers’ – align perfectly with government narratives on emissions reduction. Corporations are lining up to buy power purchase agreements to avoid being punished by the government’s safeguard mechanism – a tool used to add costs to our largest industries, soon to be weaponised to reduce the output of many more businesses.
Politicians, dancing to the tune of their activist advisers, foster the rot. As the ‘deplorables’ of New South Wales ponder more electricity rate rises, their energy minister announced nation-leading emissions reduction targets just days after the state’s Premier promised a Venezuela-like intervention in the coal sector. However, arbitrary price caps on coal and gas have almost no ability to reduce the cost of electricity.
In the final weeks of 2022, a raft of interventionist energy policies were announced around the country. A state government electricity bureau and the world’s largest battery storage targets in Victoria; the world’s largest pumped hydro scheme, plus SuperGrid, in Queensland; an 82 per cent federal renewable energy target; and this is on top of electric vehicle incentives, hydrogen subsidies, and state renewable targets.
Beyond the Godzilla-like demolition of markets, state and federal governments are colluding to kill resource investments with taxes and reservations. Queensland’s rejigged coal tax now whips 40 per cent off the top tier of coal profits, causing Japanese and Korean diplomats to express concern, Glencore and BHP to halt new developments, and Senex to pause their billion-dollar domestic gas project in Queensland. Looming over the horizon are Tanya Plibersek’s promised changes to the EPBC Act, guaranteed to further reduce Australia’s attractiveness as an investment destination.
Politicians of all flavours, but particularly Greens and Teals, are openly cheering any anti-human de-growth outcome that slows resource investment; while simultaneously screeching for more taxes, higher targets, and ironically cheaper resources. We find ourselves watching idealist amateurs attempting to appease the United Nations, but only succeeding in eroding wealth and security, and reducing living standards for generations to come. What is required to tip the balance the other way? I don’t believe Musk’s ongoing social media exposé will move the dial far enough – people are too willing to buy into the emissions reduction narrative without testing or even seeking the evidence. Their minds are made up.
Despite the grim scene, I hold out hope that the enormous cost of the renewables paradigm – a cost borne financially and environmentally – will soon become so obvious that politicians will find some courage, constructing policies based on logic, and improving human prosperity. In other words, do their job. It can’t come quickly enough.
https://www.spectator.com.au/2023/01/the-minister-for-net-zero-and-dystopian-hellscapes/
****************************************************The ABC Massacres History Yet Again
John Henningham
The ABC seems to have invented a genocide by English colonists in the Caribbean. A story on Barbados’ cruel history as a slave island reported that slaver descendants, such as actor Benedict Cumberbatch, could be pursued for compensation and included an assertion that the indigenous population was slaughtered by the English:
This horrific claim is not supported by any evidence. According to historians the original population was depleted in the previous century by Spanish slave raids, with the remaining people fleeing to other islands to avoid being pressed into slavery. The island was effectively uninhabited when the English claimed it in 1625. Two years later, some 80 colonists and 10 slaves took up permanent residence.
Anyone reading the ABC story who turned to Wikipedia for more information would have found the following in the entry on Barbados: “In 1627, when English colonisers arrived in Barbados, they slaughtered the local indigenous inhabitants and claimed the island for themselves.”
These are the words of the ABC story! The ABC did not take the quote from Wikipedia — it was the reverse. The source for the assertion in Wikipedia was, astonishingly, the ABC news story about Cumberbatch. Someone (a Wikipedia contributor screen-named Afa86) added the ABC “revelation” to the crowd-sourced encyclopedia in a textbook example of how false news spreads and becomes part of received history.
Barbados was occupied from about 1600BC by different Amerindian groups. For a thousand years until the 1500s the Arawak, and then the Carib, lived on the island. The Britannica’s entry on Barbados, written by University of the West Indies professor of history Woodville Marshall and two fellow contributors, makes clear the fate of the original population:
The island was depopulated because of repeated slave raids by the Spanish in the 16th century; it is believed that those Indigenous people who avoided enslavement migrated to elsewhere in the region. By the mid-16th century — largely because of the island’s small size, remoteness, and depopulation — European explorers had practically abandoned their claims to it, and Barbados remained effectively without a population.
Fortunately the assertion of indigenous slaughter was removed from Wikipedia a day after publication by a sharp-eyed American veteran editor of Caribbean heritage with the screen name CaribDigita. In justifying deletion the editor commented: “You need a reputable reference that talks about a ‘slaughtering’ in Barbados.”
CaribDigita’s bio says: “In more recent times I’ve been been seeking to calm down conspiracy theories and ‘fake news’ being added to Wikipedia by showing relevant parallels or add references to their sources to help keep this tool from becoming like the National Enquirer.”
The story was amended yesterday (January 22), possibly in response to my request to the author, Recbecca Armitage, via Twitter for evidence of annihilation of the native population by English colonists. The amendment concedes that the population was largely depleted before the arrival of the English, but continues the unsubstantiated claim of genocide: “They slaughtered the remaining inhabitants and claimed the island for themselves.”
Perhaps the ABC needs to employ CaribDigita as a fact-checker.
https://quadrant.org.au/opinion/media/2023/01/the-abc-massacres-history-yet-again/
************************************23 January, 2023
Why are property investors quitting a market where rents are rising 25 per cent?
One answer: Government. As one intance, Queensland landlords are not allowed to ban pets from their property. But pet smell is a huge issue at the time of re-letting. It may make a landlord spend thousands on carpet replacement. That eats up most of the income from a pet-loving tenant. It's too big a risk. So rather than wear such losses many landlords will sell up
In every city across Australia the rent crisis is hitting hard. Anyone who needs to rent finds out very quickly there is very little on offer and prices are rising rapidly.
For property owners, however, it’s a red-hot market. The single biggest risk for private investors in property investment – the risk of missing rental income – has effectively been removed.
But private investors are quitting this lucrative market in droves; As Hayden Groves, the president of the Real Estate Institute of Australia puts it, “investors have been running for the hills”.
Why are investors giving up when capital city asking rents are rising by 25 per cent a year?
The reality is that vacancy rates – the key measure in judging the rental market – sit near 1.8 per cent in Sydney and Melbourne and less than 1 per cent in some other cities. To take the city of Perth as an example there is a vacancy rate of 0.5 per cent.
If you ask property owner groups such as the REIA or the Australian Landlords Association why are private owners quitting? They generally point to the same thing – excess regulation.
This is a state by state issue but it is clear that tenant rights are reaching something of a high water mark in Victoria. While in Queensland a particularly controversial effort to pull in money from property owners beyond the state if they also had property in Queensland shows how far state bureaucracies will go to tax property investors. (The idea has since been canned by Queensland Treasurer Cameron Dick.)
It is also clear that some investors who held property through the pandemic – and its associated emergency rulings such as the moratorium on evictions – were sufficiently troubled by changing regulations that when the chance came to take profits in 2022, they moved fast.
However, most investors can look though such issues if the investing terms are attractive. Moreover, it’s not all bad news from state administrations. In NSW the Perrottet government has introduced an alternative to stamp duty where land tax is paid progressively – the measure is currently aimed at first home buyers.
Will it work? You bet it will.
The early statistics show that any way a buyer can avoid stamp duty, they will do so. It is estimated that more than half of the projected annual level of applications to the NSW scheme were received in its first week of operation.
At best the Perrottet government’s move may spell the beginning of the end for a notoriously regressive property tax.
It could also be a key factor in an eventual turnaround in property prices in NSW. Some analysts expect this could happen by the end of this year, largely on the basis that the state had recorded the sharpest falls to date.
Socially, the existence of a super low rental vacancy rate is bad news – it triggers homelessness at the bottom end of the market and considerable stress across the entire housing system.
Some might not like the fact that private property owners control the market but they do — and that is not going to change anytime soon. Indeed encouraging investors to return to the market should be welcomed. Though searching for encouragement in this area will most likely be futile.
Instead the investors who move earlier may well be the ones that get the biggest rewards and even if they have to wait longer for a turnaround, rental income will certainly not be a problem.
In this market you can literally rent anything.
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Australian Manuka honey producers score legal win over New Zealand producers in Europe, UK
It is said that they sell 10 times as much Manuka honey as they gather these days so I am glad that I have some of it from way back. I have used it with apparently positive results
Australian manuka honey producers have scored a win over their trans-Tasman rivals after New Zealand producers backed out of legal action aimed at preventing them from using the descriptive word.
A group of New Zealand manuka honey producers have been attempting to block their Australian counterparts from using the word "manuka" in export markets around the world since 2016.
Manuka honey from both countries is sold for hundreds of dollars a kilogram, and is included in a range of medicinal products because of its anti-viral, anti-bacterial, and anti-inflammatory properties.
Australian manuka honey is used in lozenges, throat sprays, and eczema creams, as well as cosmetic products.
The New Zealand Manuka Honey Appellation Society recently backed out of an appeal before the United Kingdom's High Court, as well as similar legal action in the European Union, meaning Australian producers were free to call their product "manuka honey" in those valuable markets.
The UK Intellectual Property Office had previously ruled in favour of Australia.
Both parties are still waiting to hear the outcome of a hearing held in 2021 before the Intellectual Property Office of New Zealand.
The NZ Manuka Honey Appellation Society argues manuka is a M?ori word, and has attempted to trademark it in their home country, as well as the USA, UK, EU, and China.
It was seeking exclusive use of the word via a trademark, a move that's been rejected in the USA previously.
The plant that produces the pollen used by bees to make manuka honey, Leptospermum scoparium, grows natively on both sides of the Tasman.
The Australian Manuka Honey Association, which has appointed two M?ori board members, has demonstrated the word has been used in Australia to describe the plant and the honey produced from its pollen since the 1930s.
It has also abstained from using a macron over the "a" in its branding.
Association president Paul Callander said the legal victory would have significant benefits in the sizeable UK and EU markets.
"This victory provides our industry with a noble precedent against some in New Zealand who are attempting to monopolise the term manuka honey for their own commercial gain," Mr Callandar said in a statement.
"Australian growers have every right to use the word to describe their produce as upheld by the UK Courts."
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Price of devon a stark illustration of cost-of-living pressures on families
I ate a lot of it as a kid. We called it "Windsor" sausage. It was OK with mustard pickles
It has many alter egos — devon, fritz, polony — but there’s always been one constant with the humble manufactured meat roll: it was cheap as chips.
Now, in an unsavoury — and perhaps the most telling — example of cost-of-living pressures gone mad, the price of the classic school lunch box staple has hit nearly $10 per kilo, just as parents are stocking up on supplies for the new school year.
At Woolworths this week, sliced Hans devon is being advertised at $9.85/kg, and it is $9.60/kg at Coles.
It’s a far cry from the luncheon meat’s heyday. In the ’70s and ’80s it was snapped up by budget-conscious shoppers for just $99c a kilo, and often slapped on to a white bread sanger with a dash of tomato sauce for the kids’ school lunch.
The current sky-high price of the perennial product sparked outrage on the “Meanwhile in Australia” Facebook page this week, as families felt the pinch of price rises across the board.
Krisi, from Lake Macquarie, wrote: “My kids love devon. I remember buying $2 worth and it being a huge pile.”
For Davina, it was the perfect cheap eat in a time of need: “Back in the early ’90s my husband and I lived on that for three days as we were saving for our first home and had no money until payday.”
Queenslander Sandra remembered buying devon and tomato sauce rolls at tuckshop for threepence, while fellow Queenslander Courtney labelled it “the bogan sandwich”.
“I used to get sent to the corner store for 20 cents worth of devon. Enough slices for the whole family (four kids) sandwiches for several days,” said Melbourne resident Susan.
Not everyone’s a fan, with many on the site likening it to dog food, even “floor scrapings”, but one Sydney manufacturer says it doesn’t always deserve the bad rap.
Pendle Hill Ham and Bacon business manager Sunny Singh said high-quality devon was manufactured on site, and sold in slices at the associated meat market.
“The price of products like devon are increasing and that’s because most other costs are rising — labour costs, the price of ingredients, even the clips we hang products with are more expensive,” he said.
“However, as manufacturers our products are a lot cheaper than elsewhere — at the moment we’re selling devon for $6.99 a kilo.
“Most people want sliced devon, not the whole roll, but it’s not as popular as it once was.”
The Australian Bureau of Statistics revealed last week that Australia’s inflation rate was 7.3 per cent, and that food and non-alcoholic beverages increased 9.4 per cent in the 12 months from November 2021.
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Calls for Victoria to join other states to outlaw duck hunting
Hunting is one of humanity's oldest food gathering acts. It is basically human. So it is popular
Victoria’s government has been hit with fresh calls to completely outlaw duck shooting in a move that would bring it in line with other states.
The practice is illegal in Queensland, NSW and in Western Australia, where recreational duck shooting was banned more than 30 years ago.
Animal Justice Party MP Georgie Purcell argued Victoria’s current rules leaves the state leaps and bounds behind its counterparts.
“I think duck shooting is one of Victoria’s greatest shames,” she told NCA NewsWire.
“We like to call ourselves the progressive state in Victoria, but we are left behind Queensland, Western Australia and New South Wales in terms of getting the start here.”
The duck shooting season in 2022 allowed a daily bag limit of four birds and went for 90 days from last March.
Ms Purcell said the practice can often be forgotten by metropolitan Victorians as it largely takes place in remote areas.
“I think it’s one of the most obvious and blatant forms of animal cruelty that legally exists in the state,” she said.
“I think in a way that because it happens in regional and remote parts of Victoria ... every person doesn’t get to see what they do to these birds.”
There is believed to be a divide in opinion among senior government MPs about what to do about the practice with Premier Daniel Andrews hesitant to make any changes.
“As an issue, there is a genuine split within the caucus and there are senior ministers who want it stopped. There is momentum there for a change,” one insider told Herald Sun.
“However, the premier has been reluctant to go ahead with a ban in the past and it is likely to come down to his call.”
A state government spokeswoman said decisions on the topic were get to be made and all discussions remained ongoing.
“A decision will be made on this year’s duck season after thorough consideration,” she said.
An RSPCA survey from 2022 revealed nine in of ten Victorians said they would never shoot a duck.
There were a total of 23,000 hunters licensed in Victoria last year, according to the Game Management Authority.
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22 January, 2023
Fatal heart attacks have surged in Australia. Here’s why
The pandemic has caused a surge of fatal cardiac arrests in Australia, as delayed care and COVID’s damaging effect on the heart drives a major uptick in serious heart issues.
More than 10,200 Australians died of ischemic heart disease in the first eight months of 2022 – that is about 17 per cent higher than would be expected in a normal year.
According to an analysis of mortality data by the Actuaries Institute, about 2300 deaths from ischemic heart disease over 2021 and 2022 are considered excess, which means they fall outside the expected natural range.
“Deaths with ischemic heart disease really involve blockages of the blood vessels. And when you have blockages in the blood vessels you then damage heart muscle, and your heart fails, and it can go into cardiac arrest, which means that it essentially stops,” said Professor Steve Nicholls, director of the Victorian Heart Hospital.
Leading heart disease experts say the death statistics are concerning but not surprising. For years, cardiac deaths have been the leading cause of death in Australia. The pandemic has only increased the risk factors.
“It’s kind of the last straw,” said Professor Tom Marwick, director of the Baker Heart and Diabetes Institute.
“The camel’s back was straining under the burden of risk factors, and then we have an infectious disease on top with a bunch of inflammation, hey presto we get an increase of cardiovascular events.”
Coronavirus has been implicated in an increased risk of cardiovascular problems, with a study published in the prestigious science journal Nature finding that rates of heart attacks and stroke were substantially higher in military veterans who had recovered from COVID-19, compared to those who hadn’t had the disease.
A recent Australian study also found hospitalisations from myocarditis (inflammation of the heart muscle) and pericarditis (swelling of the membrane surrounding the heart), pulmonary embolism, heart attack and stroke were significantly more frequent after COVID?19.
While rare cases of myocarditis and pericarditis have been linked to COVID vaccines, the Therapeutic Goods Administration says most people get better within a few days. Experts say vaccination is considered especially crucial for those with risk factors for cardiovascular disease.
The number of excess deaths in Australia surged to 15,400 in the first part of 2022.
While the majority of these deaths were from COVID-19, the nation is also seeing significantly elevated rates of deaths from diabetes, strokes and ischemic heart disease.
Cardiologists believe the increased deaths from ischemic heart disease are likely linked to the damaging effects of COVID, but also delayed diagnoses, prevention and treatment through the pandemic.
‘The camel’s back was straining under the burden of risk factors, and then we have an infectious disease on top ... hey presto we get an increase of cardiovascular events.’
Nicholls, a cardiologist, said the heart wards in public hospitals were very busy.
“So it’s not just that a lot of people are dying, but we’re seeing a lot of people at a whole range of different stages of [heart] disease,” he said. “One of our concerns early on in COVID was that we were going to miss people early [in heart disease] and then people would tend to present later.”
Nicholls said everyone should talk to their GP about getting a heart health check.
“We know the major risk factors for heart disease. We know that’s high blood pressure, it’s high cholesterol, it’s diabetes, it’s smoking, it’s obesity, and it’s a family history. You can’t do anything about your family history, but you can do something about everything else.”
Dr Amanda Buttery, the Heart Foundation’s clinical evidence manager, said there had been a reassuring surge in 2022 in the number of Australians getting heart checks, following marked decreases through lockdowns and the first Omicron wave.
November 2022 saw a record number of heart health checks claimed.
However, Buttery said the foundation remained quite concerned about mounting international evidence of a connection between long COVID and cardiovascular disease.
“COVID-19 infection worsens pre-existing heart conditions, and increases the risk of developing more than 20 heart conditions including heart attack, blood clots, heart failure and stroke,” she said.
“COVID infection in Australia grew substantially in 2022. We are yet to see the full impact of this in health data.”
The Actuaries Institute, the body that represents the actuarial profession in Australia and which evaluates and manages the financial risks faced by businesses, has also cited delays in emergency care caused by pressure on hospital systems as a possible factor in the country’s excess deaths. In Victoria, at least 33 people died from emergencies that were linked to delays in answering triple-zero calls or lengthy ambulance waits between December 2020 and May 2022.
However, Professor Tom Marwick said data he had seen on heart attack mortality suggested that may not be as big a factor as expected.
“Surprisingly, it shows that the mortality is just the same as pre-COVID. In other words, for people that got to the hospital, the outcomes are the same. The issue is, of course, the people that didn’t get to the hospital and the people who missed care and are presenting with more progressive disease now.”
Marwick said he remains very concerned that many of those most at risk of a heart attack don’t have a regular GP. He said Melbourne’s west, which has been disproportionately battered by COVID-19 outbreaks, was also one of the hotspots for heart attack. The area has fewer GPs per person.
At least 17,717 Australians have died of COVID. There have been 14 deaths linked to COVID vaccines from more than 64 million doses administered in Australia. One of those was a fatal case of myocarditis in a young woman where an expert vaccine safety group concluded a COVID vaccine was likely related, alongside several other factors.
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Solar panels are leading an energy revolution, but recycling them isn't easy
Almost every day, Anthony Vippond's solar recycling plant in Melbourne's north receives dozens of used solar panels.
In the car park, multiple tilting towers of the devices, held together by tie-downs, take up the spaces.
Right now, a lot of them come from schools as the state government upgrades or replaces about 500 solar panel systems.
Others come from businesses, homes or solar farms from rural Victoria.
Some have large holes shot through the middle, others are smashed, but most have no damage at all and have been cast aside because they are not as efficient as they once were.
All those used panels have to go somewhere, and it cannot be landfill; Victoria, South Australia and the ACT have banned solar panels ending up in landfill — they have to be taken to e-waste drop off points to be recycled.
It was a move made to stop heavy metals in the panels from leaching into the earth, and — with roughly 26,000 tonnes of solar panels predicted to be thrown away every year in Victoria from 2035 — to force industry to innovate.
But recycling solar panels is not straightforward. "They are laminate, they're stuck together, they're glued," Mr Polhill says.
To be reused, solar panels need to be broken down so each component — including glass, aluminium, copper, plastic and silicon — can be separated. And that takes a lot of heavy machinery to achieve.
Some of those materials can then be sold and used in new products.
Various companies in Victoria and South Australia are trialling different methods of breaking down solar panels from using chemicals and heat, to dry processes and computerised mechanical systems.
They each say their process is better than the one next door. But all have admitted one thing: the margins are not great.
Most solar recyclers strip and sell the aluminium from the frame, try to extract as many valuable metals as possible, then stockpile the rest.
Mr Polhill says at the moment, "it would be cheaper to put them into landfill than to recover them".
"Over the last few years companies have started to invest in recovering other materials but that is in its infancy and those materials have a very small market," he says.
But, there is one part of a solar panel that could change that: nano silicon. Silicon is found within the black and grey panels that capture sunlight.
And when refined into its purest form, nano silicon, it can sell for about $64,000 per kilogram. It is a ubiquitous substance used in everything from mobile phones and concrete to rubber, plastic, and computer chips.
Until now it has been tricky to reduce silicon down into its nano particles without using harmful chemicals like hydrochloric acid and nitric acid.
But researchers from Deakin University in Geelong say they have figured out a way to do it that is cheap, effective and safe for the environment. Researchers at the university started investigating their theory in 2019 and have repeatedly tested and reviewed the process to prove it can work and be scaled up for commercial use.
"Compared to other processes around the world, my process is really environmentally friendly," Deakin senior research fellow Mokhlesur Rahman says.
Dr Rahman says he's also discovered a way to combine nano silicon with graphite to create longer-lasting lithium-ion batteries for use in products like electric cars.
It is a breakthrough that could make recycling solar panels a far more viable industry.
Back at his recycling plant, Mr Vippond has been trying to create new products like sleepers and furniture from solar panel products, but says a way to easily and cheaply extract and sell nano silicon would be a game changer.
"Getting the best recovery out of the solar panel is probably more paramount than any other product just in relation to that [environmentally conscious] category that it comes from," he says. "Some of the work like Deakin University and others are doing in their research is quite incredible."
But Mr Polhill is sceptical. "How do we take that research and create a business model — that's the real nut to crack in this," he says.
"Recycling solar panels in Australia is in its infancy. So it needs continuous investment from both industry and from government to support this developing market and some of the technologies as well."
https://www.abc.net.au/news/2023-01-22/solar-panel-recycling-nano-silicon-extraction/101865624
*****************************************************Qld school mask mandates gone, but concerns over lasting effects of learning from home
This year promises to be the first uninterrupted 40-week state schooling schedule in three years, but concerns are mounting that some students may have emotional and behavioural control issues in the classroom post-pandemic.
Experts have flagged suspicions that remote learning has impacted children, particularly those who began their schooling in 2020 and became used to periods of being educated at home and mask wearing.
“One factor massively missed in the Covid space is those self-regulation skills,” Australian Catholic University early education expert Kate Highfield said.
It comes after major Covid-19 disruptions, mask rules and remote learning plagued the 2020 and 2021, with the first two weeks of term 1 2022 only for the supervision of vulnerable students and children of essential workers, to avoid pupils returning to school at the peak of a wave.
All students didn’t return until February 7 and the school year was not extended.
Dr Highfield said emotional and behavioural control issues could arise as a result of the lack of consistent in-class experience.
“It’s the child being able to work out what they need to focus on when their teacher is talking and there’s other distractions” she said.
“Children went from a 25 to 30-person classroom, to being at home with a parent, so they haven’t been practising self-regulation or behavioural adaptation.
“It also ties in with emotional wellbeing – can the child articulate if they are stressed or anxious? So we have these extra waves of social and emotional needs.”
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Australia Day time to see our country through new migrants’ eyes
Peta Credlin
To make the most of this new year, I reckon all of us should collectively make two resolutions: first, to count our blessings more; and second, to be less negative about our magnificent country.
Where I holiday, on the bay, just south of Geelong, there are lots of migrant families. Over summer, they were on the beach, usually three generations, and the one thing you almost never heard was whinging about Australia.
In fact, when you think about it, you hardly hear any of the usual complaints – that Australia is basically a racist, sexist and homophobic country – from anyone who’s a recent migrant. I guess that’s because they only came here because they could tell that the good far outweighed the bad. Certainly, there was enough good in this country, compared to their place of birth, to justify all the disruption involved in making a new life in a far way land.
Isn’t that worth thinking about as we prepare to celebrate another Australia Day: that a country with a quarter of its people born overseas – a higher percentage than any other – must have so much going for it when so many people are voting with their feet to get here?
No one has to come here. The fact that so many do, and are so glad to have won the lottery of life when they make it, should make all of us proud; even as we do our best to make a great country even better.
As usual, in the build-up to this Australia Day, there’s been the usual complaints about the date. We can’t celebrate Australia Day on January 26, it’s said, because that’s insensitive to the Aboriginal people who were here first.
Lots of woke public companies have told their staff that they can take-off a different day if they don’t regard January 26 as a day to celebrate. Others, like Kmart, have now banned the sale of Australia Day merchandise adorned with our national flag.
And while polling this week showed that more than twice as many Australians regard January 26 as Australia Day rather than “invasion day”, more people under 30 saw it as a day of shame, doubtless because of politically correct brainwashing in our schools.
Can you imagine Americans running the Fourth of July down like this?
For a long time, we celebrated Australia Day as a long weekend, not the actual day itself. But in 1994, all states and territories came together (quite rightly) to mark Australia Day on January 26 because, it was then thought, pride in our country demanded no less. How is it that only a couple of decades after reaffirming the importance of this day to our nation, we’ve got activists and elites pushing their agenda of shame rather than unity?
It’s true that British settlement ultimately meant doom for a hunter-gatherer way of life. And that there was violence on the frontier of settlement. And that many of the settlers looked down on Aboriginal people. This was the case with colonial settlements – French, British, Dutch, Belgian and others at this time – across the globe. Yet it’s also undeniable that Governor Phillip’s official instructions from London were to “live in amity” with the original inhabitants and that white men were hanged for the murder of black people as early as 1838, after the notorious Myall Creek massacre, showing that justice was colourblind under our imported rule of law.
We can rethink history but we can’t change it. We certainly can’t undo the British settlement and the subsequent development of Australia; so the best way forward – surely – is to make the most of it, especially given that the country that’s evolved here is a magnet to people from all over the world.
When Governor Phillip raised the flag and toasted the king on January 26, 1788, it didn’t just mark the beginning of the dispossession of the original inhabitants as the haters would have us believe. It marked the arrival on this continent of a civilisation even then distinguished, however imperfectly, by the rule of law, respect for individual rights and the demand for representative government.
It was the beginning of a country that has so far transcended the racism and systemic brutality of those times that people identifying as Aboriginal have a greater representation in our parliament than they do in the population; and have been elected because their fellow Australians have regarded them as suitable, regardless of race. It’s another sign of how little race is held against anyone in modern Australia.
So whatever might be in need of improvement, let’s stop running down our country for something it’s not. And let’s stop quibbling about the date for celebrating our country, keep it on the day that modern Australia began and, if you ever need reminding about how good it is here, ask a new migrant.
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20 January, 2023
A racist medical regulator?
Rubbish! It is easy to cry "racism" when a minority person suffers harm but the facts in the case below mainly suggest a communication breakdown and the doctor concerned was unfairly treated.
The authorities in the matter of Aboriginal Miss Dhu were not negligent. Seeing that she was ill, they took her to hospital several times. The doctors however had difficulty finding what was wrong, not because of ill-will but because of the characteristic difficulty Aborigines have in communicating with whites.
For instance, it is a reflexive custom for Aborigines to say what they think their questioner wants to hear. So a question such as "Are you OK now?" would get a Yes reply even if such a reply were inaccurate.
And it does appear that her repeated unsuccessful visits to hospital had made the guards impatient and suspicious, which is why they were a bit rough with her towards the end but which is also an understandable response in the circumstances.
Clearly, nobody was aware of the difficulties that communication with Aborigines can pose. So if there are any lessons to be learned it is to improve that understanding, either by employing experienced Aboriginal intermediaries or by having all staff trained by people who really know Aborigines and their culture well. It really is an art.
I note that the doctor who saw her was from India. That could well have amplified the communication difficulties. One often hears of problems arising from a "communication breakdown" but this would appear to be a particularly unfortunate example of it
The doctor who declared a young Indigenous woman fit for police custody shortly before her death was almost cleared of professional misconduct by the national healthcare regulator, in what insiders say is one example of systemic racism within the organisation.
Noongar woman Hannah McGlade, a former board member at the Australian Health Practitioner Regulation Agency (AHPRA), is one of those concerned about the case and said she was speaking out to draw attention to “double standards” in the way Indigenous patients and practitioners were treated.
Former AHPRA board member Hannah McGlade has accused the national healthcare regulator of racism.
Former AHPRA board member Hannah McGlade has accused the national healthcare regulator of racism. Credit:Tony McDonough
McGlade resigned from AHPRA about five months ago after an unsatisfactory response when she raised concerns internally. She is now calling for reform, including the implementation of a separate investigation process for medical complaints involving Indigenous people.
“Aboriginal people are dying in this country because of racism in healthcare,” McGlade said. “AHPRA has a long way to go in addressing its own culture of racism.”
The allegations come after The Age and The Sydney Morning Herald revealed this week that AHPRA is grappling with ongoing claims of bullying, a “toxic” workplace culture and pressure to work through a backlog of complaints that investigators fear is putting the public at risk.
AHPRA chiefs declined an interview on Tuesday, but a spokesman said the organisation was half-way through implementing a strategy to improve the system for Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people.
McGlade was the only Indigenous representative on AHPRA’s national medical board during the regulator’s investigation into the medical treatment of Dhu, a 22-year-old Indigenous woman who died in police custody in South Hedland, Western Australia, in 2014.
The death of Dhu, whose first name has been withheld for cultural reasons, triggered national protests and debate around institutionalised racism.
After being arrested and detained for unpaid fines, Dhu complained about pain and was taken to the hospital where her symptoms were dismissed as exaggerated or faked.
One treating doctor involved in assessing her, Vafa Naderi, failed to check her vitals or order an X-ray but instead noted “behavioural issues” and declared her fit for police custody.
The 2016 coronial inquiry would later find an early prescription of antibiotics to treat her broken rib, which had become infected, could have saved her life, and the doctors had made judgments based on preconceived ideas about Indigenous people.
However, when AHPRA conducted its own investigation into Naderi, an independent expert found while his conduct was unprofessional, it did not constitute professional misconduct, according to McGlade. There was disagreement between AHPRA boards about how to proceed. A legal firm was prepared to accept the expert’s advice, and pursue lighter disciplinary action, until McGlade intervened.
“I was the only member of the medical board who said: ‘This is not right. His conduct was so serious, it contributed to the death of a young woman. This is professional misconduct’,” McGlade said in rare public comments on AHPRA’s board deliberations.
McGlade had challenged the board and AHPRA’s commitment to reconciliation and had been asked to leave the room, accused of having a conflict of interest because she was Aboriginal, she said. But McGlade persisted and eventually persuaded the board to push for harsher action.
“It took the only Aboriginal person with a backbone to say – is that fair? Is that the right decision?” she said.
AHPRA ultimately referred Naderi to the WA State Administrative Tribunal and in June last year, Naderi was fined $30,000 – the highest penalty available under the law.
But he was not deregistered, nor were the nurses involved in Dhu’s treatment, who similarly failed to take her concerns seriously.
“That doctor got a slap on the wrist and he was still working,” said Dhu’s grandmother, Carol Roe, who gave permission for Dhu’s image to be used.
“My granddaughter was in agony. They should have looked after her, treated her with respect.”
A spokesman for AHPRA did not respond to questions about McGlade’s comments or penalties for the nurses who treated Dhu, but said her death “demonstrates the serious and tragic consequences of racism in our health and justice system”, and highlighted the regulator’s work to penalise Naderi.
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‘Queensland is so big, daylight saving just doesn’t work’
I don't want anybody messing around with my clocks nor do most Queenslanders. We have already voted on it
Daylight saving. Introduce these two words into conversation and, just like that, you have a lively spar of opinion. It’s the great Queensland debate. Are you for daylight saving or are you not?
Long a vexed issue, those for and against are mostly divided between the state’s more populated southeast corner and the state’s vast west and north.
An incredible array of pros and cons come into play – from annual time zone anarchy at the Coolangatta-Tweed Heads border and the reported billions of dollars in lost business revenue, to health and lifestyle factors.
Depending what research you are looking at, or who you are talking to, daylight saving gets people out playing with their kids, away from the TV and spending money at local businesses; or it isolates farmers who work until dark regardless of the time on the clock.
It is good for energy consumption because we turn our indoor lights on later but does this mean we use air conditioners more?
It has been attributed to an increase in heart attacks and sleep disturbances and causes anarchy when putting young children to bed. Conversely, it may also lower obesity rates, result in fewer car crashes and animal strikes and less crime.
It is also a simple matter of geography. Young children (and consequently their parents) are up with the birds that start chirping and squawking at a sunrise that hits Brisbane in December from 4.44am (with an uncivilised pre-dawn glow from 4.18am); while Mount Isa in the state’s north west corner doesn’t see sunrise at the same time of year until almost 6am.
Simply, daylight saving gives us a better quality of life or a worse one. It is to be welcomed; or avoided at all costs.
Whatever your view, this contentious and ongoing debate rears its head almost every summer when the rest of Australia’s east coast winds forward their clocks by one hour. Can the Sunshine State ever find its way to a resolution?
Daylight saving was first used in Australia in 1917 during World War I as an energy-saving measure, and again during World War II.
Tasmania introduced daylight saving in 1967, and in the Australian Capital Territory and all states (except Western and South Australia), it was trialled from October 1971 to February 1972.
All states – except Queensland, WA and the Northern Territory – then adopted it, with three time zones becoming five from the first Sunday in October to the first Sunday in April.
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Ashamed of Australia Day? Then don’t take the extra day off
Federal Labor has joined academia and enlightened corporates to tell bureaucrats they can opt to “work” Australia Day if the occasion triggers them, and claim a day in lieu when airfares are on sale.
While Albo claims it’s “fine to have some flexibility”, Australia Day has now been cheapened to an extra day off for academics, corporates and bureaucrats, guilt-tripped into a mythical misnomer of what the day represents, righteous about an erroneous view completely out of historical context.
We should acknowledge a terrible, suppressed history, but should not commit the counter-crime of forgetting the truth of the man behind it, whose remarkable tenacity birthed a free nation.
Thursday is not, as some activists will tell you, the day when Captain Cook invaded Botany Bay, but the anniversary of Governor Arthur Phillip’s landing, who, enlightened beyond his contemporaries, actively sought Indigenous advisers, trade and enforced law for convicts and Indigenous people to live harmoniously.
Australia Day is not, as some activists claim, a day that has been only celebrated since 1994 but has been marked every year since Phillip arrived with convicts and a garrison to guard them, woefully under-resourced.
As far back as 1818, government labourers were given a day off and “one pound of fresh meat” “as a “just tribute to the memory of that highly respected and meritorious officer”.
For an “invader,” Phillip chose Indigenous confidantes to translate and dine with, named land after them — including Manly and Bennelong — and even as the slave trade boomed globally, ensured the local population here did not meet the same fate.
When a man speared him through the shoulder at Manly, his order was: “No reprisals; it was due to misunderstanding”.
He was dismayed when his convict entourage at Parramatta were “so unthinking, or so depraved, as wantonly to destroy a canoe belonging to a fine young man”, noting it ended any chance of commerce between them.
He hung his countrymen for the crime — which seems counterintuitive if he was an invader. Phillip believed the Indigenous to be British citizens protected by law — in stark contrast to colonists enslaving native populations across the rest of the world.
Most surprising is that the colony survived famine in such dire straits that convicts were hung from trees for stealing when the alternative was starving.
As the rhetoric builds each Australia Day, we risk forgetting why we have it at all.
As far back as 1818, it was to celebrate a man who navigated uncharted seas with a fleet of prison ships of poor convicts into an unfamiliar land, afforded little help from Britain to build a penal colony that has evolved into the free nation we have today.
He built houses and roads, raised crops and stock, all with unskilled convict labour who didn’t know how to farm or want to be here, and soldiers who endlessly complained about the temperature (42C in the shade), sun, mosquitoes and lack of food, fought with each other and allowed convicts to abscond.
We don’t execute hungry flour thieves as we did in 1798 any more, but judging Phillip’s executions then with the eyes of today would be like judging Indigenous men documented in the same period for killing their wives with blunt force trauma, treating them as possessions, not people, under the tribal conditions of the same time.
It would be an outrage to say that their descendants today are in line with the culture of then. So why do that to Governor Phillip and the unfortunate souls on the First Fleet?
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Labor’s new tax on those that wear hi-vis to work
In the past week Greta Thunberg was “arrested” for trying to stop the expansion of a coal mine that would bulldoze the abandoned German town of Luetzerath. While a German Greens Government is desperately trying to increase the supply of reliable energy, even against the wishes of St Greta, our Labor-Greens government announced a $15 billion tax hit on our energy producing and consuming businesses.
The Labor Party does not call it a tax, instead preferring the Orwellian moniker of a “safeguard mechanism”. The safeguard mechanism would make 215 Australian businesses reduce their carbon emissions by 5 per cent a year. They will have to pay a capped price of $75 per tonne to do this.
Over the next 7 years until 2030 these businesses will have to reduce their emissions by 205 million tonnes. At $75 a tonne, which is three times the cost of Gillard’s carbon tax, this amounts to a $15 billion new tax to do business in Australia. (The $75 capped price will probably prevail because in Europe carbon credits trade at over $100 per tonne and in New Zealand the price is already at $70 a tonne.)
Former Labor MP, Joel Fitzgibbon, admitted that Labor’s policy was a carbon tax. Like all carbon taxes it will increase the cost of living. Airlines will be made to pay the tax. You will be made to tick the green box on your plane ticket under Labor.
But this new carbon tax will be paid mostly by the mines and factories in regional Australia. The tax will hit 63 coal mines, 22 iron ore mines, 35 gas production facilities and what is left of our manufacturing of steel, aluminium and fertilisers. It is not a good idea to tax the industries that make our nation prosperous.
Over 84 per cent of the carbon emissions covered by Labor’s carbon tax come from businesses in the regions even though only 30 per cent of Australians live in the regions.
Labor’s new carbon tax is a tax on those that wear hi-vis to work.
Queensland is hit hard by Labor’s new carbon tax. A third of the 215 businesses are in Queensland despite the fact we only have 20 per cent of Australia’s population. Queensland businesses are set to pay an extra $4 billion in tax, a much higher burden than the just $700 million that will be paid by Victorian businesses.
It is Queensland’s mining industry that is keeping our nation afloat. Coal is once again Australia’s largest export but the thanks it gets is to pay more tax to prop up a bloated Canberra bureaucracy.
Meanwhile, Labor’s policy lets the banks off scot-free. Banks are large emitters themselves due to the energy use of their data centres.
However, under Labor’s policy, emissions from the use of electricity is inexplicably ignored. If Labor had included emissions from electricity use, three of the four big banks would have carbon emissions over the 100,000-tonne threshold and have to pay the tax.
So Labor’s climate policy taxes the jobs in the hi-vis industries of mining and manufacturing, while turning a blind eye to the emissions created by jobs in suits.
And those hi-vis industries, guess who they will have to buy the carbon credits from? That’s right, the banks. No wonder the banking industry is one of the loudest supporters of Labor’s climate plan.
Labor has tried to claim that this new tax will not hurt business or jobs because other countries want us to reduce carbon emissions and if we do not we will lose their custom. However, this argument is completely undermined by Labor’s own suggestion that we will now need to introduce carbon tariffs on imported products to offset the costs of their carbon tax on Australian businesses.
If Labor’s new carbon tax actually helps Australian businesses sell products to climate conscious customers, why would we need a tariff to provide them protection against low cost goods from countries that do not impose a carbon tax?
This just proves that this new tax is another blow to Australia’s manufacturing industries. The biggest winner of Labor’s carbon tax will be China, who will take more of our manufacturing jobs as they continue to build coal fired power plants like they are going out of fashion.
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19 January, 2023
Low-rent behaviour by greedy landlords is feeding the rental crisis
I guess I am wasting my time commenting on the screed by the Leftist Jenna Price below but I would like to point out a few things anyhow. The key to her plaint is in the very title of her article: "Low rent".
It is absolutely true that low rent properties are often of a poor standard. Landlords who keep their propetties at a high standard CANNOT AFFORD to charge low rents.
Let me give an example: In my days when I had 6 properties to rent out, I kept them all at a standard that I would myself be happy to live with. And I always brought them up to a high standard before I put them into the hands of agents
My reward for that? In one YEAR my income from one 5 bedroom house after all repairs and maintenance had been paid for was $500. And I had many thousands invested in that house. I sold it. It was an impossible investment.
It's an extreme example but costs are a big problem for a landlord and emptyheads like Jenna Price have no idea of them. So the idea that landlording is a lucrative racket is way off. Do I sound "greedy"? It's just Leftist hate-speech below.
So "you pays your money and you takes your choice". If you are ready or able to pay only low rent, you will get a property that the landlord cannot afford to keep up to a high standard. He would do his dough if he did. The rent is low BECAUSE the property is undesirable
"Forcing" the landlord to upgrade the property would almost certainly lead him to increase the rent he asks -- so he can get a return on his investment -- and that might be exactly what poor people do NOT want. It would REDUCE their options. Government "protection" can easily worsen rather than help the situation. But in her Leftist mental straitjacket, Jenna Price has not thought of that
My mother’s advice was that I should buy a house. That was 1983. That advice is no longer fine or even possible for most, Bank of Mum and Dad notwithstanding. Many mums and dads are now still paying off their own mortgages.
We were desperate to avoid increasingly rapacious landlords or their proxies, otherwise known as real estate agents. Toilets only flushed by bucket. Floorboards on the verge of perishing. Terrifyingly unpredictable electrical faults. Forty years on, stories from some renters are the same as my own.
I’ve watched generations deal with some rentals barely fit for human habitation. How long will it be before a renter sues a landlord for the harms caused by black mould or because the ceiling has fallen in because of unrelenting rain? Many landlords and agents have no interest in spending money to maintain the properties which generate their wealth. There is hardship for those who inhabit these cash castles and too many distressing cases for our collective good conscience.
Landlordism has gone wild in this country, enabled by real estate agents. The state government ignores the problem. It’s been in power since, what, 2011 and finally “outlawed” unsolicited rental bidding in November. That stops the agent from explicitly soliciting but doesn’t prevent accepting higher bids from prospective tenants.
What governments should do is ban “no grounds” evictions (code for we are getting rid of you because you can’t afford our rent increase). That’s at least a NSW Labor election promise (and one Victorian Labor has – more or less – legislated). Is the NSW government planning on anything at all after a decade? It’s like pulling teeth trying to get a commitment.
“These laws are currently under review and an announcement is expected shortly,” a spokesperson for Fair Trading tells me. Every time governments introduce the prospect of reform, vested interests go ballistic. “It will force landlords out of the market,” they may cry. “It will discourage property investors.” None of that’s happened.
We have a terrible rental crisis in this country, worsened by the slow rate of construction completions during COVID. But the real problem is this – owning investment property is a sure way to turn a profit. Landlords don’t recognise their responsibility in providing a basic human right – the right to have somewhere safe to live. Here’s the bigger problem. Most tenants only have relationships with real estate agents who rarely act in the tenants’ best interests. Their responsibility is to the landlord. No one has the best interests of tenants at heart.
An exaggeration? In August last year, one real estate agency bragged about its biggest rent increase of the week. It later apologised because it was sprung for bad behaviour. In October, another agency urged landlords to consider raising rents by more than 20 per cent.
Ask around for rental stories: homes which can’t be locked, gas leaks, water leaks from baths, showers, toilets, broken windows, mould, faulty wiring, ovens which never work, not even on day one, no insulation. Comedian Mark Humphries tweeted he was in his second-straight rental property where the owner refused to bear the cost of connecting to the NBN. A reminder that improvements to the property remain with the property, owned by the landlord.
Then we’ve got the behaviour of the agents. Readers have supplied horrific examples of rudeness, of refusal to respond to urgent requests and, creepily, of agents wandering around the rental property taking photos willy-nilly. Contracts professor at the University of Melbourne Katy Barnett says renters have a right to be worried.
“I doubt agents are even considering privacy concerns,” she says. Sure, you can ask how the photos are stored and how long they’ll be kept for but if someone can’t get back to you about your broken toilet, doubt you’ll be getting a response on privacy breaches.
One in three Australians rent. The rules which surround renting are wafty as. It should be a scandal but states and territories are clearly beholden to Big Landlord (and federal governments are sadly cowed by the “negative gearing is my wealth right” crew).
Michael Fotheringham, managing director of the Australian Housing and Urban Research Institute, says rental vacancies are the lowest they’ve been in 20 years. A three per cent vacancy rate is healthy. Right now, it’s about one and a bit. Queues at opens are right out the door.
Complaints to the NSW Tenants Union have doubled in 12 months. Complaints to Fair Trading have increased by 10 per cent in 12 months. But complaint numbers mean little – most tenants are too terrified to complain in case they get booted. As NSW Tenants Union CEO Leo Patterson Ross says, consumers can’t do the enforcement themselves. That should be an independent third party (also promised by NSW Labor but let’s see if it can stand up to Big Landlord).
Landlords are addicted to profits and not to a sustainable housing model. OK, #notalllandlords but too many to mention. They don’t get to face the heartbreak of the people who make their money for them. Landlords didn’t get into the business to provide a basic human right, they did it to make money. And that’s our problem right there.
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NSW loves coal
NSW will introduce a domestic coal reservation policy to keep the lights on and ease an energy crisis gripping the east coast, in a move expected to open a new battle with major coal miners.
The Australian understands NSW Treasurer Matt Kean will issue orders requiring the majority of the state’s thermal coal miners to reserve up to 10 per cent of their output for NSW power stations by the end of the month, under a new clampdown designed to head off potential supply shortfalls this year.
The orders represent an expansion of rules introduced in December requiring only some coal miners to reserve production for the domestic market, included alongside a $125-a-tonne cap on the price of coal sold to local power providers. They could draw in major producers such as BHP, Whitehaven Coal and Yancoal.
The reservation scheme will aim to dodge a gas strike by energy producers and retailers, frustrated by a lack of clarity after the Prime Minister imposed a price cap and code of conduct on the industry. However, the move could split the NSW coal industry, with those companies already subject to domestic reservation orders likely to welcome the move. Those not affected by current orders are likely to be outraged by the decision.
“This coal cap scheme will see NSW doing our part at the request of the Albanese government to contribute to the national solution of this national problem,” Mr Kean said.
“I know those currently providing coal for the local market will appreciate that companies enjoying super profits on the back of the war in Ukraine will now do their part for the domestic market. Of course they should provide Australian production for Australian consumers.
“These new arrangements will help even the playing field among coal producers.”
The NSW government is consulting with the additional companies. The new orders are likely to require them to contribute about 7-10 per cent of their production to the domestic market. Coal still provides up to 60 per cent of generation needs in the state even as NSW looks to phase out the fossil fuel and replace it with renewable energy supplies.
The Australian understands NSW estimates its generators will need about 22 million tonnes of coal to keep operating through 2023. About 18 million tonnes of that total is already contracted in long-term supply contracts with a small group of miners, including Glencore, Peabody, New Hope Corporation and Centennial.
Under orders issued in late December those producers were required to offer at least 18.6 million tonnes of coal into the domestic market at a maximum price of $125 a tonne for coal with a calorific value of 5500 a kilogram. That is the equivalent of $136.40 for high-grade coal exported to international markets from NSW mines, which generally grades 6000 calories per kilogram.
Mr Kean, who is also the Energy Minister, has decided to widen the domestic reservation policy to meet a potential supply shortfall, after complaints the December orders put an unfair burden on a small group of producers.
The Australian understands Mr Kean now intends to require all NSW thermal coal producers to supply into the domestic market – effectively establishing a domestic coal reservation policy for the state.
The move is likely to draw in major producers such as BHP, Whitehaven Coal and Yancoal, who are not currently required to supply NSW power stations beyond any existing contracts.
Mr Kean’s move is not necessarily a permanent impost on the state’s coal industry, as coal-supply requirements will slowly diminish over the next decade as the state phases out its reliance on coal-fired generation.
It is believed sections of the coal industry have argued that coal is ultimately a state-owned resource, and the burden of supplying NSW power stations should be shared more evenly among the state’s miners.
Most of the mines supplying into long-term contracts with NSW power stations do so as a requirement of deals to privatise state-owned operations in the 1980s and 2000s. Private companies that invested in greenfield operations did so with export markets in mind, and are unlikely to welcome any impost on the price they could receive on international markets.
BHP’s Mt Arthur mine is expected to produce 13 million to 15 million tonnes of coal in the current financial year. Yancoal’s NSW mines produced about 23 million tonnes of coal in 2021.
The Australian understands the new orders will not require miners to break existing export agreements if their mine production is fully contracted, and coking coal mines such as South32’s Illawarra operations and Sanjeev Gupta’s Tahmoor mine are not affected by the new rules. AGL Energy’s Liddell coal plant is due to close in April, with Origin Energy’s Eraring station to shut as early as August 2025.
The final NSW coal power plant will be shut by 2040 at the latest after EnergyAustralia’s decision to bring forward the closure date of its Mt Piper facility by at least two years in a bid to hit new green climate targets.
Coal facilities are increasingly having to switch off during daytime hours when high solar supplies undercut them on price.
Mr Kean has been warning the state’s coal plants will exit early as the fossil fuel struggles to compete.
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Fears as crackdown on regional alcohol sales rejected
"Regional" my foot! It's a ban on sales of booze to Aborigines that they are talking about. Bans have been tried before but simply lead to "sly grogging", which reduces money for food
A plea for severe alcohol restrictions across Australia’s northwest has been rejected by the West Australian liquor umpire, allowing the McGowan Labor government to persevere with a banned drinkers register that was independently assessed as a failure in September last year.
Former WA police commissioner Chris Dawson, who is now the state’s Governor, began pushing for an unprecedented crackdown on alcohol sales in the north in 2019.
To support his case, he supplied evidence about alcohol-fuelled violence and testimonials from frontline workers and an opinion from the state’s chief medical officer, Andy Robertson, who recommended the government consider either barring or restricting the sale of mid- and full-strength alcohol across the state’s north.
The decision by the new WA director of liquor licensing, Lanie Chopping, to allow bottle shops to continue to sell full-strength takeaway alcohol in far north Kimberley and Pilbara towns follows an almost four-year dispute over the best response to alarming rates of alcohol-related violence and dysfunction in those regions.
WA Liquor Minister Reece Whitby said Ms Chopping was independent and made her decision after “a very thorough process and consultation”.
“There is no easy fix. This is a longstanding, complex issue and the banned drinkers register trial is one of a number of initiatives the McGowan government is using to address alcohol abuse,” Mr Whitby said.
“We’ve listened to the feedback from all stakeholders – including licensees, police and community services – to help strike the right balance that will be accepted by the broader community.”
The McGowan government is now attempting to fix the banned drinkers register which it began trialling in 2020, possibly by making it more closely resemble the one in place in the Northern Territory.
In the NT, there is also a floor price on alcohol.
According to an interim assessment of the banned drinkers register by the University of WA published in September last year, there had been no discernible reduction in crime almost two years after the rollout began in the Pilbara. The report found there were too few people on the register. By last week, there were still just 90 people banned in the Kimberley, which has a population of 38,000, and just 92 people banned in the Pilbara, which has a population of 63,000.
The report found those who were banned could easily get friends to buy for them or go to a bottle shop that did not participate in the trial. Another problem was that bottle shops could decide if they wished to even check whether a customer was banned before serving them.
Kalgoorlie-Boulder Mayor John Bowler backed the banned drinkers register when the McGowan government began trialling it in the WA goldfields in March last year, but he has been disappointed with the outcome.
“In its current form, it is totally ineffective,” he told The Australian on Tuesday. “The one thing that was working – the cashless debit card – they took away.”
In the Kimberley, Ms Chopping has endorsed pandemic-era purchase limits for all towns.
For example, a person can buy a maximum of three bottles of wine, one carton of full-strength beer or a bottle of spirits per day, or a combination such as a bottle of wine and half a carton of beer.
Police can still impose temporary bottle shop bans in response to a particular event or crisis, as they have done in the Kimberley.
Aboriginal elder Ian Trust, who runs the Wunan Foundation in Kununurra, said he initially backed blanket bottle shop bans in the Kimberley. “The biggest losers in towns and communities where alcohol is a problem are children and old people who come from families who are caught up in a cycle which they cannot get out of,” Mr Trust said.
“If blanket alcohol bans are not imposed, it makes sense to make sure the banned drinkers register does work – especially in cases where the safety of children is involved or the individual has been found guilty of multiple cases of domestic violence.
“If we want to get serious about addressing the social issues … alcohol management will need to be front and centre of our strategies along with housing and employment opportunities.”
Broome shire president Harold Tracey said a broader banned drinkers register and scanning to stop individuals from purchasing their daily limit at multiple bottle shops would help address the region’s alcohol issues. “The next thing is about getting funding into rehabilitation centres and sober-up centres,” he said.
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Bankstown MP Tania Mihailuk moves from Labor to One Nation
A NSW politician has blamed “woke” Labor for her decision to defect to One Nation just weeks out from the state election.
Former renegade NSW Labor MP Tania Mihailuk has announced she will defect to One Nation just weeks out from the NSW election.
Ms Mihailuk, the member for Bankstown, says the Labor Party has “lost its way to the left wing extremists and property developer mafia”.
“Chris Minns as Premier and a Labor Government will see NSW go both woke and broke,” Ms Mihailuk said.
“I know the true agenda of the people sitting currently sitting on Chris Minns’ front bench - they are from the extreme left. We simply cannot afford to have Labor controlling both Chambers of parliament.”
Ms Mihailuk has been sitting as an independent in parliament since quitting the Labor Party in last October.
On Tuesday, she announced she is seeking preselection in Mark Latham’s party for an upper house seat.
In a statement, former the Bankstown Mayor highlighted NSW Labor’s stance on a number of issues as the reason behind her shock move, including claims that some Labor MPs “want drug legalisation and gender fluidity teaching in schools”.
“I totally oppose these policies and will do everything that I can to stop their agenda from passing the Upper House,” she said.
In a speech in parliament when she resigned from the party, Ms Mihailuk accused the party of corruption, claiming Canterbury-Bankstown Mayor Khal Asfour was linked to corrupt former Minister Eddie Obeid.
A report by Canterbury-Bankstown Council found that Mr Asfour had no relevant relationship with Eddie Obeid or his son Paul.
Ms Mihailuk also said One Nation was the “only party” focused on the cost of living crisis and energy bills, claiming the major parties were creating an “unnecessary scare campaign against coal and nuclear energy”.
“NSW is rich in natural resources, but Labor wants to ban coal and forestry and this will send electricity prices and the cost of building materials to record highs.”
The self-described “proud Christian” said freedom of religion was another reason for her move to One Nation.
“South West Sydney communities like those in Bankstown have the highest observance in faith, be it Christianity, Buddhism or Islam, but freedom of religion is a toxic notion to the inner-west left wing hipsters that set Labor Party agenda on social policy.”
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18 January, 2023
Youth crime crisis has led to soaring crime rates in Alice Springs
Alice springs has a large Aboriginal settlement nearby and young Aborigines often show little respect for the law. Crime for them is often a form of entertainment. Under Leftist pressure, police are required to go easy on them
A local in Alice Springs has penned a heartbreaking letter begging authorities to 'fix all this criminality' as a youth-led crime crisis sees local jails hit breaking point.
In a letter to the outback town's paper, Alex Morelli wrote that he believes the time has come for locals to fight for their safety after crime rates exploded.
'When will someone do something to fix all this criminality?' he pleaded.
'Last night, I called the police, because a woman was screaming, shouting and throwing rocks in the Eastside.
'Tonight, while I was driving along the main road (McDonald Street) a bunch of kids threw rocks at my car.'
He told Daily Mail Australia the intention of people throwing rocks was 'not like fun'.
'The way they do it, it intends to injure someone.'
Mr Morelli said Australians from other cities have no idea how dangerous Alice Springs feels.
'I lived in Brisbane, then on the Sunshine Coast, and then moved to Alice Springs. I always found Australia such a safe country, but here I am not feeling safe at all.
'When I tell people in other parts of Australia what's happening here they don't believe me.'
Alice Springs is the only Australian town in the 20 most crime-affected locations on earth, coming 17th according to surveys collected by Numbeo.
The other towns to make the top 100 were Rockhampton at 36th, Cairns at 69th, Darwin at 79th and Townsville at 96th.
In 2022 government statistics showed Alice Springs has triple the national average for recorded assaults, 2556 per 100,000 people, compared to 790 for the whole of Australia.
Alice Spring's rates of assault represented a 36 per cent jump on the previous year.
Domestic violence assaults went up 45 per cent, alcohol-related assaults up 46 per cent, property damage was up 54 per cent, car thefts 37 per cent and house break-ins up 24 per cent.
Leader of the Northern Territory opposition, Lia Finocchiaro said in a speech last month that Alice Springs businesses are closing with staff too afraid to go to work.
'Behind the eye-watering crime statistics are families living in fear and business owners are being pushed to the brink.'
'They are 'at breaking point because the financial, physical and emotional costs are just too much to bear.'
As of January 2023 the outback town's only prison is stretched beyond capacity and police are forced to house convicted criminals in police stations.
The Alice Springs Correctional Centre, which has reached its capacity of 650 inmates, is being expanded to add another 80 beds by the end of 2023.
'It is now evident that with the annual trend, more and more prisoners are being held within the watch house,' the jail's general manager Bill Carroll wrote in an email to staff.
Last month the ABC reported a youth crime crisis was engulfing Alice Springs.
Some of the shocking behaviour included youths driving 'head first' at police patrols in order to coax them into high-speed pursuits, the ABC reported.
Some of the young offenders were treating police interaction as a good social media content by livestreaming pursuits for their social media accounts.
In late 2020, NT Police Assistant Commissioner Martin Dole, compared the cat-and-mouse antics of Alice Spring teens to a the classic violent game Grand Theft Auto.
'It’s one-upmanship type behaviour, it’s very much a dangerous game,' he said.
'It needs to be stopped, and it needs to be stamped out.'
Mr Morelli believes it's time for Alice Springs locals to hit the streets to make a point publicly about the safety issues they face.
'It's time to protest and demonstrate against this current situation!' Mr Morelli said.
'Lots of people are leaving for that reason, and the town is become even more unliveable.'
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Mainstream media now totally woke
We are living through arguably one of the greatest divides the Western world has ever experienced and on the night of December 2, 2022, this divide went nuclear, courtesy of Elon Musk. It’s the great Mainstream Media (MSM) divide and it consists of a disconnect between those who consume news from MSM exclusively and those who consume news from both mainstream and so-called ‘alternative’ news sources.
Those who consume MSM exclusively remain oblivious to a plethora of important news stories; at the tip of the iceberg are the Hunter Biden Laptop scandal in America and the Rotherham grooming scandal in the UK. This lack of knowledge of these two stories alone is appalling and indeed unprecedented in living memory.
Speak to an average Australian who consumes only MSM news and they will not have heard of Rotherham. Nor would they be remotely aware that Hunter Biden has a long history of business dealings in Ukraine. Rotherham and Hunter Biden are vital news stories Australians have a right to be made aware of as they navigate child safety and the cost-of-living crises – the latter being widely attributed to the war in Ukraine.
Knowledge is power; if your only source of information is from MSM in 2022, you are disempowering yourself and your family, essentially voting in an information void. A revolution is currently taking place in the Fourth Estate and to their detriment, the majority of people are unaware of it.
In his address at the Claremont Institute on October 13, 2020, Tom Klingenstein argued that the Democratic Party had been taken over by its radical wing and that ‘Republicans are not doing a good job explaining the stakes’.
Given MSM openly flaunts its left-wing bias and Woke ideology, it is impossible for Republicans (or any similar Conservative party) to explain anything at all to the public through that source. Klingenstein’s speech itself was not widely heard by Republicans, let alone swing voters or the many Democrat party members who had become frustrated with the current radical left trend of their party. One had to be on the ever-moving Twitter, following the right accounts at specific moments in time, to catch a glimpse of a speech that deserved a worldwide audience. This is virtually impossible for the average person to do.
Klingenstein and others of that year created political and cultural waves – but these waves could only be felt online. The real world and MSM remained untouched. What should have been a tsunami petered out in the MSM world of ‘do not amplify’.
Investigative journalism, meaning the facts, has been erased Soviet-style by MSM, resulting in Westerners living in a society of haves-and-have-nots regarding what is happening in the world. This divide can be seen between party members, family members, and friends alike, throwing people into parallel world views, dictated by whether or not they consume news via MSM exclusively. At least when they built the Berlin wall we had the physical evidence in front of our eyes that we were divided. Nowadays, it would be Photoshopped out.
Traditionally in the West, we have placed an almost sacred trust in the Fourth Estate – that it will unbiasedly report to the public news they need to know in order to hold their governments accountable. Due to this long-held trust in the Fourth Estate and reliance on MSM, large portions of the public don’t even have the advantage Donald Rumsfeld described in 2002 of being aware that there are ‘… unknown unknowns-the ones we don’t know we don’t know’.
And so it goes, seemingly forever, an almost pointless void between people on the MSM/alternative news parallels, and like all parallel lines in Euclidean geometry, never the two shall meet. It feels like a big bang, in the same metaphor, with the MSM and alternate news sources growing further apart. Fortunately, it’s the latter that seems to be expanding at a faster rate.
On December 2, 2022, Musk decided to give the voting public a hint of what they don’t know they don’t know, if you follow my drift. Laura Ingraham summarised: ‘Musk had bought Twitter not realising he was in fact buying the largest Democratic Party Super Pac.’ Once he did realise this, he decided to share this revelation with the world, tweeting American journalist Matt Taibbi’s expose of the Democratic Party’s communications with Twitter staff in 2020 regarding censoring the New York Post’s story on Hunter Biden’s laptop. In doing so, Musk exposed the chasm between MSM and alternate news reporting, the former’s sins of omission particularly.
Westerners are accustomed to journalists using MSM as their credentials. However in 2022, the credentials are found in the content of the news itself. Primary sources are king, and indeed king makers amongst the new breed of citizen journalists, Andy Ngo being the perfect example of this.
Edmund Burke first coined the phrase ‘Fourth Estate’ in 1787 to highlight the power journalists and news media held.
Thomas Carlyle quotes Burke in stating there were ‘three estates in Parliament; but, in the Reporter’s Gallery yonder, there sits a Fourth Estate more important far than they all’. Power corrupts and as Musk has shown the world, the MSM that has for decades dominated the Fourth Estate has no interest in serving anything but its masters. Journalism, as formerly understood, ceased to be. There is not even the pretence of impartiality anymore in the MSM. As it stands, the Second and Fourth Estates are in collusion to such a degree that authoritarian regimes and their tactics come to mind, actually, throw in the First and Third Estates as well.
Ignorance is currently bliss, but the longer this media exclusion zone with its selective censorship continues, the worse the clean-up will be. If not addressed, this chasm will drive a potentially insurmountable wedge through society and dictate geopolitics for the next decade. It has the potential to be as, if not, more dangerous than Woke ideology
Forget occupying Mars, Musk needs to occupy the Fourth Estate with citizen journalists who will challenge the stranglehold the elites have over the media, by bringing them to a mainstream audience. The digital world can provide a printing press for anyone. Citizen journalists can challenge the status quo, we just need to tune our antennas in their direction and accept that the MSM is gone with the wind.
https://www.spectator.com.au/2023/01/msm-gone-with-the-wind/
****************************************************PM is told 'you're losing people' on the Voice to Parliament
He's trying to pull a swifty: Get people to vote on something that can be twisted into extreme policies after the event
Anthony Albanese has compared the Indigenous Voice to Parliament to the Sydney Harbour Bridge in a combative radio interview.
The prime minister was questioned about the details of the proposed advisory body at least six months ahead of a referendum on its creation.
For 21 minutes he tried explain that the gritty detail of how the Voice would function was yet to be determined, and the referendum would ask a simple question.
Opponents of the Voice fear the referendum could become a 'bait-and-switch' in which the public gives approval only to find out later what that means in practice.
Mr Albanese tried to allay those concerns by using the bridge analogy first made by indigenous leader Noel Pearson about the difference between the vote and subsequent detail-laden legislation.
He said the referendum was like deciding whether or not to build the Sydney Harbour Bridge without getting lost in arguments over how many lanes it would have or what the tolls should be.
Radio 2GB host Ben Fordham insisted Australians were entitled to see details of the planned 'bridge' before they made a decision on whether or not to proceed.
Mr Albanese said a detailed report by Professors Marcia Langton and Tom Calma released in July 2021 put forward potential models for the Indigenous Voice.
The report goes into great detail about how it would work, both at a local and national level, and the PM previously said the Voice would be based on it.
'Go have a look at the report, it is 260 pages long. it goes through [detail about] the national and regional Voice,' he told Fordham.
Fordham said Australians should not be required to read 260-page report of proposals in order to know what they were being asked to vote on.
Mr Albanese said he would answer if he could get a word in between the questions. 'It (the report) envisages two people from each state and territory and a group of people specifically representing remote communities,' he said.
When Mr Fordham interrupted to ask how they would be chosen, Mr Albanese accused him of 'not being interested in the answer'.
Eventually Mr Albanese explained that, in NSW as an example, there was already work being done to establish a local Voice with members elected by indigenous people in that state.
Members of the national Voice would be chosen from those representatives, along with those of other states and territories.
The prime minister did not rule out legislating the Voice into existence even if the referendum failed, as the vote was specifically on whether the body should be enshrined in the constitution, not on whether it exists at all. 'If Australians say no, there will be no constitutional change,' he said
The radio host asked several specific questions, including whether Voice members would be paid and if it would have an office in Canberra.
Mr Albanese insisted 'the question before the Australian people is a really simple one'. 'Our constitution doesn't go to whether there is an office somewhere or not, it doesn't even have the office of prime minister in it,' he said.
'He said all of the 'serious detail' will be included in legislation that would be voted on in the House of Representatives and Senate.
The PM accused Mr Fordham of already knowing this but seeking to mislead listeners. 'You could come up with 50 theoretical questions about a whole range of issues to undermine what is a very simple principle,' he said.
'And the second is Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people asked us to have a process, and what they wanted that process to come up with is the Uluru Statement of the Heart in 2017... which is asking for a Voice.'
Mr Fordham insisted he was posing the questions that many Australians had about the referendum. 'Please don't tell me what I know and don't know... I'm genuinely asking these questions,' he said.
Mr Albanese also refuted claims members of the Voice or others could take the government to court for not acting on its advice, or if they were not consulted on particular legislation.
The PM in November said the referendum would be held in the second half of this year, with analysts tipping October as the most likely month.
That gives the government nine months to make its case and draw up plans for the Voice that voters could use to make their decision.
Mr Albanese said there would be a parliamentary inquiry into what words would be added to the constitution, which voters could make submissions to.
Parliament would then make a final decision through legislation in the lead-up to the referendum being called.
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The green mining boom is as gritty and dirty as every other boom
Chris Bowen’s ambition to turn Australia into a renewable energy export powerhouse stalled last week when the giant Sun Cable Australia-Asia PowerLink entered voluntary liquidation.
It seems that exporting rays of sunlight to Singapore is as difficult as it sounds. Writing a convincing business plan to install millions of solar panels in the Northern Territory, capturing their intermittent output in giant batteries and sending this through thousands of kilometres of underwater cables is a formidable challenge, even if it’s backed by two renewable energy devotees with very deep pockets.
Australia’s best hope of cashing in on the global clean-energy boom stems not from the thought bubble of a hirsute software entrepreneur, but from the sweat and genius of its mining engineers. Kalgoorlie is at the centre of the so-called green mining boom. It is fast becoming the Dallas of clean energy by doing what it does best: digging up dirt, extracting minerals and sending them to market. The WA outback is to lithium-ion batteries what Texas is to oil. It is rich in deposits of lithium, cobalt, nickel and rare earth elements for which global demand is insatiable.
Finding the half tonne of minerals contained in a Tesla battery requires digging up 250 tonnes of dirt, which is good news for a town that makes its money that way. Global car manufacturers have been competing to secure deals with Australian lithium miners. Last July, for example, Ford Motor Co bought up a third of Liontown Resources’ production and threw in a $300m loan facility to expand Kathleen Valley mine, 350km north of Kalgoorlie.
The love for electric vehicles, however, like the love of sausages, is severely tested by seeing how the object of one’s affection is made. The green mining boom is as gritty and dirty as every other boom that has graced the WA goldfields region since the discovery of gold in 1893. Surrounding roads are lined with road trains hauling ore, giant earth movers, chemicals and explosives. Massive new creators are transforming the natural landscape, but this time the wilderness campaigners don’t seem particularly bothered.
The new green job opportunities we have been frequently promised are as dirty and sweaty as the old ones. Ardea Resources plans to employ 500 people over the 25-year life of its Kalgoorlie Nickel Project’s integrated nickel manganese cobalt battery material refinery hub, assisted by $119m in investment by the former federal Coalition government. They will be driving a fleet of 120-tonne excavators and 90-tonne trucks at 13 open-cut sites at Goongarrie Hill, 80km from Kalgoorlie. They will process ore in high-pressure acid-leached autoclaves. The resulting discharge will be filtered and the solids dry-stacked.
This energy-intensive, chemical-thirsty and land-hungry process adds to the substantial carbon debt that is attached to every electric vehicle. If the unrefined ingredients of a single EV battery were to be transported by train to Esperance, they would fill at least four wagons. Figures produced by car manufacturers show an electric vehicle must be driven for approximately 100,000km before its overall emissions are lower than an equivalent diesel or petrol vehicle.
These material realities of the imagined transition to a green economy are discounted by the renewable energy lobby. As US policy analyst Mark P. Mills bluntly points out, no energy system is actually “renewable” since all machines require the continual mining and processing of millions of tonnes of primary materials and the disposal of hardware that inevitably wears out.
Mills estimates that compared with hydrocarbons, the machines to produce renewable energy require a 10-fold increase in the quantities of materials extracted and processed to produce the same amount of energy.
Mills calculates that by 2050 the quantity of worn-out solar panels will constitute double the tonnage of all today’s global plastic waste together with more than three million tonnes a year of un-recyclable plastics from worn-out wind turbine blades. By 2030, more than 10 million tonnes per year of batteries will become garbage.
The failure to offset the costs against the supposed environmental benefits of renewable energy is part of the dodgy accounting clean-energy advocates would like us to ignore. They turn a blind eye to the 8000 tonnes of steel required to generate a terawatt of electricity with solar panels. They look the other way while 8000 tonnes of concrete are delivered by a conga-line of trucks and poured into the ground to support wind turbines with the same capacity. Coal, gas and nuclear require something less than a tenth of those basic raw materials to generate the same amount of power.
The truth seldom acknowledged by advocates of renewable energy is that reducing dependence on hydrocarbons by shifting to wind, solar and batteries alone will dramatically increase our dependence on minerals. The assumed benefits of decarbonising the electricity grid must be offset against corresponding increases in mining and processing.
In 2005, the mining sector produced 9 per cent of Australia’s greenhouse gas emissions. In 2020 it was 20 per cent. While the sector has been making considerable strides in reducing emissions, there is no scalable technology available to achieve the massive gains a target of net zero by 2050 requires.
The task will be even harder if we want to bring more of the processing onshore, as we must if we are to avoid increasing our energy dependence on China, currently by far the world’s biggest processor of lithium and other critical minerals.
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17 January, 2023
Immigration is not the answer to our troubles
Immigration has been in the news lately as various submissions are released to the government-commissioned review, A Migration System for Australia’s Future. Unsurprisingly, most of them simply talk the book of the sponsoring body.
The submission of the Business Council of Australia, for example, calls for an even higher migrant intake (from 195,000 to 220,000) with future intakes set as a percentage of the population.
The Australian Chamber of Commerce and Industry wants streamlined pathways for temporary migrants to secure permanent residency.
The most depressing aspect of the submissions is the narrow perspective they take. In particular, there is a glaring failure to acknowledge that there are both costs and benefits associated with immigration and that not all the costs and benefits are economic or calculable.
It’s worth returning to first principles when thinking about an optimal immigration policy. The first is to recognise that a higher migrant intake will make the economy bigger but will not necessarily result in higher per capita income. In other words, being bigger is no guarantee of being wealthier. There is no convincing evidence that migration has boosted productivity.
The second important principle is that there are winners and losers when it comes to immigration. The biggest winners are the migrants themselves, a point demonstrated by the Productivity Commission. But owners of capital and workers with skills that are complementary to migrants are also beneficiaries. Workers whose skills are substitutes with migrant workers will often lose out.
Third, the supposed effect of immigration on the demographic profile of the population is very marginal, in part because migrants age themselves.
Those who advocate for higher migrant intakes because migration slows the ageing of the population also overlook the visa categories that permit the entry of older migrants such as the Parent and Investor Visa programs.
Fourth, it is only skilled migrants who generate estimated positive fiscal impacts, with family and humanitarian entrants associated with large budgetary drains. The idea that more migrants are needed so we can pay less tax is highly misleading because this depends critically on the migrants who are approved and what they do. The reality is that it is simply not possible to run a skilled migration program without a family stream; permanent migrants will always seek to be reunited with their family.
We also have to be careful about the definition of skill. Just because an applicant has a university qualification, even one obtained from an Australian institution, does not make that person skilled. Indeed, there is evidence, including from the work of demographer Bob Birrell, indicating that many independent skilled migrants do not work in skilled occupations.
Finally, many of the benefits and costs of migration are not captured by normal economic data. This is particularly the case with costs, which include congestion, crowded schools and hospitals and loss of cultural cohesion and urban amenity.
The notion that these costs can be completely offset by better infrastructure planning and implementation is naive and unrealistic. There is also the issue of the current spate of extreme cost overruns and the delayed completions of many infrastructure projects that would not have been required had the population been allowed to grow more slowly.
It’s worth outlining what has happened to immigration over the past several years. Needless to say, the pandemic significantly impacted both inflows and outflows of migrants for a period of time. Prior to that, net overseas migration (the difference between long-term inflows and outflows, both permanent and temporary) had been running at around 250,000 per year, making up some two-thirds of population growth. Most migrants headed to Melbourne, Sydney and the southeast corner of Queensland.
It is estimated that Australia’s population could be lower by close to one million because of the interruption of the pandemic. But here’s the thing: survey after survey has demonstrated that the majority of people do not support high migrant intakes and would be very happy with slower population growth. Neither the Coalition or Labor has shown any tendency to take into account public opinion on this matter.
Now the border restrictions have all been lifted, the surge in migration is gathering pace. There is a possibility that net overseas migration could reach 300,000 this year. The number of student visas being issued is at record levels, with students from India dominating the intake.
We know from research that a clear majority of students from India intend to stay in Australia. (Students from China are less likely to stay although the duration of their residence in Australia can often be close to a decade.)
In the meantime, international students form a significant part of the unskilled and semi-skilled workforce, particularly given the lifting of restrictions on their work rights. There is no doubt that the hospitality and retail sectors, in particular, welcome the return of this source of labour, easing the pressures many employers were under to lift wages.
More generally, the tight labour market, with unemployment at about 3.5 per cent, appears to support the case for a higher migrant intake, at least in the short term. Bear in mind that unemployment is a lagging indicator and it’s likely that the labour market will soften in the coming months as the impact of higher interest rates is felt. Note also the cripplingly tight rental housing market that underscores the poor timing of allowing in more migrants.
There is no doubt the current configuration of visa categories and the attached conditions is difficult to understand and carries high compliance costs, for applicants and employers. There have been unacceptable delays in the processing of visa applications, although this situation is improving.
The lists of skilled occupations that qualify should be ditched, in part because individual commissions and omissions make no sense but also because of the scope for gaming. The requirement for labour market testing – employers are required to see whether a position can be filled by a local – is also gamed. A cleaner approach is to insist on a minimum pay for temporary skilled migrants, in particular. Care needs to be taken, however, that employers don’t simply deduct inflated accommodation costs and other expenses to get around this requirement.
The bottom line is that the government should not lock in the current higher migrant intake, let alone increase it further. There is actually a strong case for returning to a lower figure – it was 160,000 under the Coalition – given the public’s preferences and the clear costs of immigration, including the current poor timing. Agreeing to the demands of employers and other beneficiaries (think universities and property developers, in particular) while ignoring the broader population who bear the external costs is not governing in the national interest.
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Lawyers warn of ‘unintended consequences’ in birth certificate reforms
A Queensland plan making it easier for people to change sex on their birth certificates, or list none at all, could cause problems for courts and government departments, lawyers warn.
Transgender rights reforms from the Palaszczuck Labor government – certain to pass on the anticipated votes of ALP and Greens MPs – will drop reassignment surgery requirements for adults and children wanting to change the sex recorded on their birth certificates.
Parents will also have the option not to list any gender on their newborn’s documentation.
The Queensland Law Society broadly supports the policy, but has called for an audit of all state legislation and policies referring to “sex” or “gender”, to clarify rules.
In her submission to the bill, law society president Kara Thompson said people with no gender on their birth certificates could pose identification problems for courts and government departments.
“We seek further clarification on how verification of identity processes are to be managed in the absence of a sex descriptor appearing on a person’s birth certificate, where current procedures refer to ‘gender’,” she wrote.
Ms Thomson said police would also need clear guidance on rules requiring body searches, in cases where a person being searched has changed their birth certificate but “retains the anatomical capacity of a male”.
“Without further consideration of the distinction between the two concepts (sex and gender), especially as applied across the current Queensland statute book, there may be unintended consequences that flow from the implementation of the bill in its current form,” she said.
Tasmania became the first state to make gender optional on birth certificates in 2019.
NSW will soon be the only jurisdiction requiring people to undergo reassignment surgery before they can change birth certificates, after Queensland and Western Australia announced changes last month.
NSW Labor has not committed to law changes if it wins the March state election and the Liberal government did not respond to request for comment.
Reassignment surgery is not covered by Medicare, and can cost about $80,000.
In Queensland, children older than 16 will be able to legally self-identify as another sex, without parental consent, as long as they have a supporting statement from an adult who has known them for at least a year.
Those aged 12 to 15 will require their parents’ permission to change their birth certificate, but can apply to the courts if their parents do not support an application.
Queensland will not require a medical statement from a doctor or psychologist, which will be required in Western Australia and is already adopted in South Australia, the ACT and Northern Territory.
Sally Goldner, spokeswoman for LGBTIQ lobby group Just Equal, said reforms would reduce invasion of privacy and stress.
“NSW must introduce similar reforms as a matter of priority not only for the sake of better national consistency, but also for the benefit of many trans and gender-diverse people across NSW who are currently denied access to identity documentation which reflects who they are,” Ms Goldner said.
“The reform makes life fairer and easier for trans and gender- diverse people and reduces invasion of privacy and stress due not having to constantly ‘tell your story’ to total strangers.”
Critics say self-identification would impede on the right to privacy in female-only spaces such as toilets, change rooms and prisons. The Australian Christian Lobby says the bill is: “out-of-step with community expectations for parental rights and the safety of women”.
“This situation does not pass the ‘pub test’ and is viewed by many in the community as controversial and dangerous,” the lobby’s Queensland political director, Rob Norman, wrote in a submission.
“Queenslanders have every right to question the granting of access for biological males to female-only spaces, this is neither transphobic nor irrational.”
Ms Goldner said trans women accessed female spaces and services every day across Australia and had done so for many years. “I don’t understand why this is suddenly controversial,” she said.
“It has been almost a decade since the first jurisdiction in Australia removed the requirement for trans and gender-diverse people to have surgery to access updated birth certificates, with numerous other protections prior, and the sky hasn’t fallen in.”
Queensland Attorney-General Shannon Fentiman criticised groups who “will try to cloak their transphobia in the guise of women’s safety – making claims about trans women accessing women’s spaces, including change rooms or even domestic violence shelters”. “I want to be clear: there is no evidence, domestically or internationally, to support these outrageous claims,” she said.
“I note the Australian Psychological Society has warned against casting undue suspicion on an individual’s motives for stating a particular sex.”
Reforms were launched in a number of countries – including The Netherlands, Denmark, Belgium and Ireland – after a 2015 Council of Europe report called for easier procedures for birth certificate and passport changes.
By mid-year New Zealanders will be able to make a statutory declaration to change their birth certificates.
The UK government scrapped its own plans to change gender recognition laws in 2020, but Scotland last month introduced a self-identification model.
Transgender people in Scotland may need to apply to be legally recognised in England and Wales after the UK’s equalities minister announced a review of the list of countries whose gender certificates are recognised.
About half of US states do not require people to have reassignment surgery before amending their birth certificate.
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The date of Australia Day would be protected by law, similar to Anzac Day or the design of the Australian flag, a Queensland MP says
The date of Australia Day would be protected by law, similar to Anzac Day or the design of the Australian flag, under a proposed private member’s Bill to be pushed this year.
First-term Queensland LNP MP Henry Pike has drafted the legislation, which would enshrine January 26 as the date of Australia Day and rule that it could only be changed by a national plebiscite.
Under the proposal, the plebiscite would also have to offer a choice for voters between January 26 and an alternative date.
Debate on Australia Day has heated up in recent years and Mr Pike said he wanted to prevent the date being changed because it was “fashionable”.
Advocates of changing the date say that celebration on January 26 is disrespectful to First Nations’ Australians, for whom the day represents disruption and dispossession of their culture, and call for a date all Australians can support.
The date of Anzac Day is protected in state legislation, the Anzac Day Act of 1995, and the Australian flag via the Flags Act of 1953.
Mr Pike said he was concerned the current or a future government could change the date of the Australia Day public holiday without public consultation because “it’s the fashionable thing to do”.
“Australia’s flag and Anzac Day are both protected in federal legislation, but Australia’s national day can be changed at the whim of the government of the day,” Mr Pike said.
“The current laws guarantee that our flag can’t be changed unless the people of Australia agree. We should have the same protection for our national day.
“It’s unhelpful having the same debate every 12 months.”
He said January 26 was the date “this continent was changed forever”. “We should look at what we’ve achieved since then and assess it for the good, the bad and the ugly,” Mr Pike said.
Anthony Albanese has repeatedly rejected calls to change Australia Day and said his government had no plans to change the date.
The Prime Minister has said the Voice to Parliament would be his big focus this year, with a referendum to be held later this year.
Mr Pike said it should be possible to debate both issues and intends to raise his private member’s Bill with the Coalition partyroom when parliament resumes next month.
He said he intended to introduce his proposed Bill to the House of Representatives later this year, but was realistic about its chance of success.
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Anything but Christianity! (Or mum and dad)
News that ‘Christmas and Easter will not be celebrated in some childcare centres under new inclusion guidelines’ is, quite extraordinary.
While the silly season is all but done, the decision by the Community Child Care Association is in full swing and would be laughable if it wasn’t so ridiculous.
It has been a slow train coming. But it has now arrived.
While it seeks to sideline Christmas, the same Association requests child care centres support other cultural or religious celebrations such as Ramadan, Diwali – and yes – Pride, which has become a religion of its own, it would seem.
Ramadan is the ninth month of the Islamic calendar and is a holy time of prayer and fasting. Diwali is a five-day festival of light celebrated by Indians and the faiths of Hinduism, Jainism, and Sikhism.
Pride – well – that’s celebrated every day of the week and ensconced into every aspect of modern society, including favourable employment laws and social inclusion policies.
The Executive Director of Community Child Care Association of Victoria, Julie Price, is quoted in the Herald Sun on December 21, 2022, as saying: ‘If you have families who don’t celebrate Christmas, then maybe focusing on other celebrations is more inclusive.’
How is it that Ramadan is inclusive while Christmas is not? Or Diwali? The Association appears to be inferring that it is okay to celebrate any religious festival except those relating to Christianity.
Easter and Christmas are celebrations of the Christian faith, the faith that has born this modern nation and swaddled it into a first-world country. The cancel culture proponents clearly see Western Civilisation and Christianity as obstacles to their revisionist agenda.
One can only assume then, that staff at these childcare centres will not be taking a ‘Christmas’ break or an ‘Easter’ long weekend. It stands to reason that they will also not accept the double and triple penalty pay arrangements for working these Christian-based holidays, or Christmas gifts from parents.
Similarly, the Australia Day holiday should be disregarded by staff. One wonders why anyone would want to come to this apparently disrespectful country.
The inclusivity gurus at Community Child Care Association go further.
Not satisfied with dismantling and displacing the centrepiece cultural and religious celebrations of our nation, they also want to disrupt the core family structure.
They want communications to parents to be addressed ‘to families’, ‘guardians’, or ‘adults’. It’s in with generic terms – out with mum, dad, mothers, and fathers. In the hustle to disenfranchise the family, the clock must surely be ticking for the terms ‘brothers’ and ‘sisters’ and ‘grandmothers’ and ‘grandfathers’
The Community Child Care Association wants Father’s and Mother’s Days to be Special Person’s days.
It is all in the name of protecting or embracing the rights and circumstances of those children who may have only one parent, queer parents, non-English speaking parents, or no parents at all.
But even one parent is either a mother or a father. Queer parents are still mums and dads, or mums and mums, or dads and dads. Even a dad one day and a mother the next if their fluidity desires are valid.
And as for parents having to declare a pronoun for their child – is there no end to this nonsense?
In truth, these contortions of titles, language, and gender have nothing to do with the children.
At age two, three, four, or five, children don’t (or should not have to) even think about these things: there are holes to be dug, buckets to fill, and kites to fly. This is the stuff of a carefree childhood and of robust beginnings to life.
Childhoods should not be squashed by the unintelligible babble of adults about non-gendered or non-Christian motivations.
Yet the inversion of reality is in full flight: the noisy few control the mob while the socially silent become the playthings of a political agenda.
The fight against the family structure ignores the role that evolution has forged through the millennia, placing the family unit as a key component of survival and success.
During the Victorian state election, Premier Andrews promised many things, including the construction of 50 government kindergartens. Will these also conform to the anti-Christian and contorted name agenda criteria of the cancel culture Woke brigade?
Such diktats are done in the name of inclusivity. But it is exclusivity that they champion. They divide, not unite. They point out difference instead of saying ‘we’re all in this together’.
Struggle is not a story for one community alone to be used for the purchase of social benefits and manipulation, even the indoctrination of others.
The bulk of Australians are fair. They are caring. They don’t look for division. They value individuals without reference to Woke titles.
The slow woke train has definitely pulled up at the station, all huffy and puffy and horns tooting.
My suggestion is you hop off, change platforms, and catch the next one back home – if we’re allowed to call it that.
Perhaps a communal dwelling site would be a better term!
https://www.spectator.com.au/2023/01/anything-but-christianity-or-mum-and-dad/
************************************16 January, 2023
Push for more male teachers fails to increase numbers
False accusations against male teachers by female students have been badly handled in the past and few potential male teachers would be unaware of that. Being a male teacher is simply risky. Feminist demands to "believe the woman" are a part of that problem.
And it's a pity. My son had male mathematics teachers in his private High School and it inspired him to major in mathematics for his B.Sc.
Indemnifying male teachers against all the costs of false accusations might help
There has been no increase in the number of male teachers in public school classrooms, despite a push by the NSW Department of Education targeting them for recruitment into the profession more than four years ago.
Education experts said boys and girls benefit from more male teachers in schools because they were less likely to have stereotypical views about traditional gender roles, but recruiting men into a female-dominated field where teacher pay tops out after about 10 years is difficult.
The proportion of males employed in the public school system remained stagnant over the past four years, falling slightly from 23 per cent in 2018 to 22 per cent last year, according to the latest Department of Education data.
Numbers were steady despite the department’s diversity and inclusion strategy 2018-2022 which included an “obligation to address the gender imbalance in our teaching population, attracting and retaining more male teachers”.
The department’s latest move to draw more men into the profession was to use male teachers in social media advertisements and deploy them at careers fairs.
“High school careers advisers are also encouraged to promote work experience placements in government schools to male students,” a department spokesman said.
Data from the Universities Admissions Centre shows just 210 graduating year 12 schoolboys put primary school teaching as their first preference for university study this year.
That figure, which does not include students who applied directly to universities, is a 24 per cent decrease on the year before and is the lowest number recorded in the past seven years.
Schools across all sectors are grappling with chronic teacher shortages, with the federal government projecting a shortage of more than 4000 secondary school teachers by 2025. A national plan to address the shortage was released last month.
Independent researcher Dr Kevin McGrath, who has investigated the gender composition of the teaching workforce in Australia, said the pandemic and a workforce shortage had made it harder to attract and retain male teachers.
“Men benefit from a broad range of occupational choice in Australia which provides opportunities to avoid particular types of work and to seek out employment that provides more flexibility,” McGrath said.
Salaries for NSW teachers start at $73,737, and hit a maximum of $117,060 if they are accredited as a “highly accomplished” or “lead” teacher. Pay jumps to $126,528 if they take on more responsibilities and become an assistant principal.
“Male teachers face a greater opportunity cost for choosing a female-dominated profession, compounded by potential negative perceptions or ridicule for doing work performed predominantly by women,” McGrath said.
Research indicated that in schools with fewer male teachers, students tended to hold more stereotypical views of gender than in schools where male and female teachers were equally represented, he said.
University of Tasmania school of education lecturer Dr Vaughan Cruickshank said male teachers worked in a predominantly female environment and could struggle to find common interests with their female peers. He also said salary, low professional status, as well as fear and uncertainty about physical contact put men off becoming teachers.
A breakdown of the proportion of male teachers in primary and secondary schools for 2022 is not yet available, but last year men constituted 18 per cent of primary school teachers and 40 per cent of the teaching workforce in high school.
Private schools fare no better when it comes to attracting men, where male teachers made up 20 per cent of primary school teachers and 40 per cent of secondary school teachers.
“The percentage of male teachers in NSW independent schools has not changed significantly in recent years,” Association of Independent Schools of NSW chief executive Margery Evans said.
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"Humane" jail is a failure: Violent
The Alexander Maconochie Centre is one of Australia's newest major adult jails and was built to accommodate prisoners from the nation's capital who previously went to NSW jails.
It is located next to a highway about 10 minutes drive from Canberra airport with the dozen or so buildings double-fenced beside a highway in an otherwise windswept open-grassed area.
Named after a prominent 19th century prison reformer, the Centre can lay claim to being 'Australia's wokest prison', the sort of jail Scandinavian countries famously design to break cycles of incarceration rather than punish.
The new jail is the brainchild of former Labor ACT Chief Minister Jon Stanhope, who was forced to defend the cost of the $130million facility which didn't accept its first prisoners until 2009 despite being opened six months earlier in 2008.
Mr Stanhope described the Centre as 'the most human rights-compliant, rehabilitation-focused prison in the world'.
The jail is the first in Australia purpose-built to meet human rights obligations and is also environmentally sustainable using recycled water, solar power and energy efficient insulation.
With such noble aims can come a hefty price tag, in early 2010 it was reported the cost of housing an inmate at the centre was $504 per day, which was twice the amount NSW was charging the ACT to take prisoners.
Sadly the days of rosy hope have largely given way to disappointment, especially for Mr Stanhope who has become one of the jail's harshest critics calling it 'an appalling failure' and 'an embarrassment', which he blames on successive governments.
In 2019 Mr Stanhope lamented that the Productivity Commission had found that the over the last two years the Centre had 'established a reputation as the most violent prison in Australia'.
The more recent Health Prisons Report into the Centre found little evidence of improvement.
'We heard several anecdotal reports of sexual coercion and violence in the AMC,' the report said. 'We have been told that sexual coercion and violence happens but is rarely reported.'
Perhaps most galling for a jail that has the express purpose of rehabilitation are the high rates of reoffending, causing some to label it a 'revolving door' prison with the same cohort of inmates repeatedly entering and leaving.
This is especially so for Indigenous prisoners, which the jail was set up to be culturally appropriate for, with 94 per cent of released Aboriginal detainees ending up back in the cells, according to a recent report.
Mr Powsey said the prison reflects what happens in the comparatively small community of Canberra.
'In the ACT, there are relatively low crimes rates but relatively higher recidivism rates. This means that a significant proportion of the offending occurs within a smaller cohort of people,' he said.
A major failing at the jail, according to the Healthy Prisons Report, was boredom with many inmates having largely unstructured days and sometimes not getting out of bed until lunchtime.
The report was also critical of a lack of meaningful employment activities within the prison.
Almost since its beginning, the prison has been plagued by negative stories including earlier this year when a newly admitted prisoner hanged himself in a supposedly safe cell.
Senior Director Accommodation Jim Taylor-Dayus, who has a 37-year career working in UK, New Zealand and Australian prisons, said incidents were to be expected in a jail environment.
'You've potentially got 400 people who don't want to be here and they need the officers to get things, and sometimes the officer can't do it straight away or they may not be entitled to it – so, of course that causes a frustration,' he said.
'As long as you are able to sit down and say there's a reason you can't have this, whatever it is, most people accept that reason - eventually.
Both CO Veal and Mr Taylor-Dayus worked during the riot in November where 27 detainees refused to go back to their cells, leading to standoff where fires were lit and considerable damage was caused. 'It was intense, we were here for 18 hours,' CO Veal said.
Eventually the situation was resolved through negotiation.
The prevalence of drugs and other contraband, such as mobile phones, has also been an issue highlighted by official reports.
Because of the jail's relative approachability, people have been filmed throwing banned substances over the fences and deliveries have been attempted by drones.
The centre staff admitted that the coming ban on smoking inside, which complies with ACT law, would be a particular challenge.
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Dawn Fraser: Dump school swim program, give money to parents
Olympic swimming legend Dawn Fraser has slammed the Queensland Government’s swimming education program, insisting the $3.7 million annual funding should instead be transformed into a subsidy to help parents pay for private lessons for their child.
The four-time Olympic gold medallist is heavily involved in her local school’s swimming program and said if some principals cannot be trusted to use the funding properly, it should go to parents to help them afford lessons through a provider of their choice.
The state government maintains swimming lessons are compulsory in all state primary schools through its Water Safety and Swimming Education program established in 2018, which recommends at least five lessons per child.
However, parents claim the rollout is confusing and inconsistent because it is being left up to individual schools and principals to implement.
Some students are reportedly only getting lessons in certain year levels, while other parents are being asked to pay extra for lessons, and it is becoming an increasingly tougher task for students in rural towns to travel to local pools to teach water safety.
Ms Fraser has seen the difference swimming lessons can make at her local Good Shepherd Lutheran College in Noosaville.
“There are a lot of principals who don’t believe in teaching children to swim,” she said. “I don’t think the state government understands the magnitude of the issue, we must teach children to swim from six months on.
“If principals aren’t going to use the money, then the government must have a good look into it, and give the money to the parents for them to use for their child learning to swim.”
In the past five years, the state government has opened 21 new schools, but none have their own pool. Statewide, only about 200 of the roughly 1200 public schools have their own pool.
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Gladstone Public Hospital’s dire situation has gone on too long
Every state government endures controversies in the health portfolio. Many are largely unavoidable – for instance, the pressure on emergency departments, ambulances and hospital capacity during the pandemic.
But what is happening with Gladstone Hospital is a complete failure to react appropriately to what is a genuine crisis.
Today, The Sunday Mail reveals that healthy, expectant mums from the Gladstone region are so fearful of travelling to Rockhampton to give birth they are demanding elective C-sections.
Because maternity services at the hospital are on bypass, many mothers are being transported to Rockhampton via ambulance to give birth.
This is a town of more than 60,000 people – a town that has pumped millions into the economy over the years as a result of the resources boom.
Yet, women cannot give birth there and instead face a more than one-hour trip to Rockhampton when they go into labour.
It is unacceptable. C-sections come with risks – it is major abdominal surgery, after all.
The situation in Gladstone is now being described as a “national disgrace”, and it is hard to argue against that.
“The time for talking has passed and urgent action is needed to repair what has become a medical emergency and must surely be a source of great embarrassment to the premier and health minister of this state,” Prof Pecoraro said.
We agree. Ms D’Ath must explain how she is going to fix this situation before this crisis gets any worse.
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15 January, 2023
Are private school fees worth it?
The discussion below is fairly reasonable but omits a lot and is too generalized.
What it omits are the SOCIAL as distinct from the educational advantages of a private schooling. Pupils tend to form lasting friendships from their school days and the friends from private school are often VERY advantageous.
And while private schooling may not greatly help every pupil it can be very advantageous as an escape hatch from a bad government school. The latter point is mentioned but needs emphasis
The experience of overseas travel, a new family car or 12 months’ tuition at a top Sydney school?
Private school fees breaking through the $45,000 a year barrier, as reported by this masthead last week, will leave some parents weighing up what is the tangible value of an elite education if it means trade-offs in other areas.
University of New England lecturer in education Sally Larsen said the difference in academic performance of students at public and private schools was negligible.
“There’s no difference in primary school, and it’s just a segregation effect in high school, where kids from more wealthy families are being funnelled into private schools,” she said.
Glenn Fahey, director of the education program at the Centre for Independent Studies, said there was little overall value added from a non-government education once students’ backgrounds, including socioeconomic status, were accounted for.
“What the data tells us is that students’ backgrounds, largely parental education and employment status, make a big difference,” he said.
But Melbourne Institute of Applied Economic and Social Research associate professor Greg Marks said there were some tangible benefits in terms of ATAR scores for students who attend a private school.
“There is an incremental benefit, beyond that of socioeconomic status, of going to a private school, to an independent school, followed by Catholic schools, followed by government schools,” he said. “Top ATAR students often come from private schools, and they tend to get into university more, which makes a big difference to employment and lifetime income.”
Marks’ research in Victoria found that students who went to a private school achieved an ATAR rank five or six points higher than those who went to a public school.
He attributed this discrepancy to standards of teaching, discipline and a subculture of strong academic performance.
“I think in private schools, they teach at a higher standard and pitch the lessons at a higher standard so that kids are expected to reach them and therefore do,” he said. “There’s probably more of a subculture of doing well at school, and if kids are causing problems, they can get expelled.”
Marks said while the data was sparse, private school students tended to experience less unemployment, earn higher incomes and hold higher status jobs. But he also said it largely stemmed from the benefits of getting a university degree, and that paying a premium for a private school education would not benefit students of different abilities in the same way.
“Ability is quite stable, so if your kid is a top performer or isn’t going to do very well, sending them to a private school won’t make much of a difference and probably will not be worth $45,000,” he said. “For kids in the middle to top of the class, it might give them a bit of a boost to their ATAR to go to a private or selective school, which would make a difference getting into a prestigious course at university.”
While there are some international studies that show private schools can also benefit students in terms of a “peer effect”, Larsen said that impact was probably “smaller than people think,” and that the cost of private school wasn’t worth its benefits.
“The school sector that kids go into is one factor among many that help to explain where they get academically and socially,” she said. “Personally, I don’t think the benefits justify the costs.”
Marks said that eschewing a private school education and investing the money elsewhere could be better for some people, but rejected the idea of spending it on things such as overseas trips.
“There’s a reasonable argument to put the money that you would have used in the bank and get a return on that,” he said. “But taking them on trips overseas to give them ‘life training’ doesn’t make sense.”
In a Centre for Independent Studies survey of more than 1000 parents, those who chose a government school were more likely to indicate that they would have made a different choice (43 per cent) if it weren’t for the cost than parents who chose a Catholic school (30 per cent).
Redfern resident Maria Vlezko saw an immediate improvement when she moved her daughter from a public school to the International Grammar School in Glebe two years ago.
“I was highly dissatisfied with her old school,” she said. “Kids weren’t receiving as much attention in class, they got teased by other children if they did well and my daughter became very uninterested in school.”
Vlezko said the extracurricular offerings and multicultural component of Anastasia’s school were important factors in her decision to move towards private schooling.
“There’s music, drama, chess, coding, and there are kids from lots of different backgrounds, which aligns with my values and how I want my kids to grow up,” she said. “It’s an investment in our children’s future, and we only have one chance.”
Despite cost of living pressures, Vlezko said the fees of nearly $30,000 a year were worth it for 11-year-old Anastasia.
“There was massive progress straight away,” she said. “Teachers were easy to reach, they identified Anastasia’s strengths and areas for improvement straight away, and she made lots of friends with the same interests who help each other with lessons. It’s worth the sacrifice for us.”
https://www.brisbanetimes.com.au/national/are-private-school-fees-worth-it-20230111-p5cbuc.html
************************************************************Democratic follies
Recent years have seen a strengthening dominance of politics over individual and commercial decision-making. This is readily evident in the growth of regulations and government spending increasing from under 20 per cent of the economy a century ago to around (and over) 50 per cent today.
Within democracies, these developments are due to electorates demanding income redistributions and tolerating increased national debt – oblivious to the adverse effects on their own future living standards. There are very few political leaders of stature like Singapore’s Lee Kuan Yew, Margaret Thatcher, or Donald Trump who seek to persuade voters of the folly of such demands. Most opt for policies that reflect popular opinion.
Hence, established political parties increasingly promise ‘free’ goods and services, while new parties have emerged, normally offering even more favours than the established parties.
Preventing what many people have been led to accept as catastrophic climate change from burning fossil fuels has become a leading proffered favour. The popularity of these policies derives from the weight of misleading information on the dangers of human-induced climate change together with soothing claims that weather-dependent renewables are cheaper than fossil (and nuclear) fuels. Those claims fail the test of, ‘Why then do wind and solar need subsidies?’ And, ‘Why has their growth coincided with price rises?’ In Australia, two decades of subsidies to wind and solar have resulted in their share of electricity supply rising from zero to 20 per cent and electricity prices rising more than twice as fast as overall prices.
Popular acceptance of impending climate disaster and of the tolerable costs of avoiding it by a forced replacement of fossil fuel energy has radically re-centred the political pendulum. Over the past 20 years, Australia’s Coalition parties and the ALP have shifted from a policy that first sought impartiality in energy supply, to one requiring ‘2 per cent of additional’ electricity supply to be derived from wind and solar, to a ‘Net Zero’ target that expunges coal and gas from energy supply.
Yesterday the government announced it will require the nation’s 215 largest facilities to cut their emissions by 30 per cent by 2030. According to Minister Chris Bowen, this new imposition on Australia’s largest firms was ‘carefully calibrated to deliver the policy certainty and support Australian industry needs through decarbonisation’.
The latest announcement is a substantiation that popular sentiment favours an even faster purging of fossil fuels, a sentiment that has turbocharged support for the Greens and their supposedly conservative counterparts, the Teals. In the latest Commonwealth election, six affluent and stylish middle-aged Teals sirens won formerly safe Liberal Party seats. Indeed, only 12 per cent of the electorate supported the ‘freedom parties’ like One Nation that opposed further measures to force the ‘transition to renewables’.
‘Dark Money’ from politicised foundations and renewable supply vested interests has played a role in this. But more significant is the thousands of foot soldiers supporting the campaigns of Greens and Teals and the favourable reception these campaigns have on the electorate – both in directly garnering votes and in indirectly forcing established political parties to modify their programs.
In any event, it is very rare that success of policies like that of products and services is attributable to successful marketing – overwhelmingly, particular products and services prevail in open markets because they best meet the needs of consumers.
John Howard had a great faith in democracy, maintaining that ‘the voters generally get it right’ (even when not electing his party). Yet in Australia and other Western democracies, voters are pressing for policies that take their nations to the edge of the economic precipice.
Rather than clever marketing, this is due to the general success of Woke themes with the leftish ‘march through the institutions’ of learning, media, and government.
In former times, the radical objection to market capitalism was that it has passed its use-by date and socialism would offer greater efficiency and fairness. Despite the Fall of the Wall puncturing that ideal, we have seen a broader objection to current societal outcomes and a jettisoning of time-honoured views. These have ranged beyond disparaging market capitalism’s role in creating present living standards to include a rejection of physical definitions of men and women, and concocting race and sex discrimination even to the degree that this is claimed to invalidate some long-authenticated scientific laws.
Joel Kotkin makes a persuasive case that the multitudinous forms of Wokeness in media and culture are now being rejected by the movie-goers and TV watchers. Perhaps, but if so, it has been a long time coming and it’s hard to see political, educational, and governmental structures imploding.
The problem we face is in the arrogation of roles to political leaders that they are incapable of fulfilling. The gold standard of governance is the American Constitution. Far from envisaging an active role for government, this focussed on protections of individual liberty and property and restraining the powers of government to prevent tyranny (including tyranny of the majority). Democracy was not even mentioned by the US founders who were well-educated on the role of a surfeit of populism in undermining ancient Greek city-states.
Politics forces voters to think ‘holistically’ and while thousands of individual decisions of the same voters as consumers operating in commercial markets have driven modern prosperity, they cannot do so in political markets. That would require assessing complex information on unknowable costs against supposedly shared benefits that are highly uncertain. Moreover, to effect it, would entail selecting political representatives as commercial actors. This is as unworkable in energy as it would be in food supply, housing, or health care.
Our problem is how to disengage government from its increasingly activist commercial role.
https://spectator.com.au/2023/01/dark-money
**************************************************************Australia's very recent descent into Fascism
It is sometimes said the past is another country. The attitudes, mores and dress conventions accepted in former times seem awkward, offensive or ugly in what we assume is a more enlightened present day.
In the past, housebound women wore corsets, men thought only they could do science, and dragons ruled uncharted waters. People made comedy about Hitler as damaged generations used humour to process World War II trauma and stamp on the evil dictator. Through the inverted telescope of time, all these things become immensely far away and unfamiliar.
But it is not just the distant past we struggle to remember and understand. Our ragged attention spans are poorly equipped to grapple with very recent history.
Think about this: it is only a year since tennis player Novak Djokovic was expelled from Australia for arriving unvaccinated. Not a decade, though COVID years surely deserve a special measure, but a year. Just 52 weeks since our world was so very different.
In January 2022, the Omicron variant was dominating Australian news. We still had daily case number reports. More than 92 per cent of Australians over the age of 16 had received two doses of COVID vaccine, but the high incidence of mild infections kept a population still scarred by lockdown in a state of high anxiety.
For a couple of years people had been banned from popping in to Australia for fun. In fact, Australians weren’t even sure we did “fun” any more – it seemed risky. Then some people dropped by for something as frivolous as a game and the Australian Open became a focal point of COVID dread.
Djokovic, a 34-year-old athlete fit enough to contest an international tennis tournament, was among them. The player had chosen not to get the COVID-19 vaccine. He had an exemption, based on having recently contracted and recovered from the virus, although there was controversy over the timing of the beginning and end of his illness. But it wasn’t his health that was at issue. Australians had adopted a zealous vaccination stance to get to where we were, and the real question was whether we were ready to let go.
Other tennis players participating in the Open were angry that he might be granted a way around the jab rules when they had complied – worrying, that it made “fools” of the vaccinated.
But that was nothing compared with the concerns of the Australian public, whose collective self-concept hung in the balance. In the race to get everyone vaccinated, vaccination had been turned into a moral issue: something you did for the common good.
And when something has become a matter of morality, heresy quickly becomes grounds for hate.
The fury at Djokovic’s heresy was immense, with seven in 10 Australians saying he should be expelled from the country. And from anger at the Serbian tennis player’s medical decision emerged a desire to find everything about the man fundamentally flawed.
The Serbian Council of Australia reports that this included his race. In a report on the matter, it says that during this time there was an increase in comments that were derogatory towards Australians of Serbian heritage. A survey it conducted of Serbian community members found that more than 85 per cent of respondents believed “anti-Serb sentiment has risen in Australia directly as a result of the Novak Djokovic saga”. Respondents reported being told to “pack up your bags and go”, being labelled as “arrogant”, and being told that “everyone hates Serbian people”.
An anonymous letter received by one member of the community said “all you serbians who are here should also be ashamed, embarrassed and feel guilty of yourselves”. It is an astonishing case study of the taboos people will break to smear someone who has broken a new taboo.
As it became one of the most internationally Googled affairs of 2022 – before January was even over – I wrote about the civil liberties implications of governments making and breaking rules on the run. I quipped that the last time a Serbian had triggered this much international angst was in 1914, and for a nation of less than seven million, “Serbs have an outsized knack for causing international strife”. To my regret, Serbs in Australia took my careless generalisation as an attack on them. In fact, I was trying to illustrate the way we as a culture say we celebrate rebels – but only really do so when they conform (very rebelliously) to the prevailing fashion. The famous Serbian inventor Nikola Tesla may have known something of this, as would the creator of a company called Tesla, who now owns Twitter. Non-conformist rebels of all kinds attract hate.
Today the coverage of Djokovic and the Australian Open makes it seem like none of this ever happened, or as though it happened a long time ago to different people. But it didn’t: all of this was us. We are only one year older, possibly no wiser. And the hurt and division created is not yet healed.
While Djokovic remains unvaccinated and has been allowed to enter Australia and play without controversy, many people are mourning friendships lost in the febrile atmosphere.
Neighbours reported on neighbours perceived to be breaching COVID rules; heavy-handed policing of protesters was cheered on by masked (online) mobs. Some people fell out over whether to vaccinate or not to vaccinate, and regret it now they can see both sides were driven by fear. And in the context of a tennis game, one man’s vaccination status became a reason to be hateful towards strangers.
As we embark on other discussions which are necessary to our country, including the one about the form of words with which to enshrine an Indigenous Voice to parliament, it is vital that the attempt to remedy racial division doesn’t result in entrenching hate. The past may seem like another country, but we should still be able to recognise ourselves.
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A big backlash against political correcness
Prize money for greyhound racing in NSW has close to doubled in the five years since the state government tried to ban the industry, as online gambling markets drive record income from punters who have never watched a race.
Betting agency fees – known as “race field information use fees” – paid to Greyhound Racing NSW increased from $24.5 million in the 2017-18 financial year to $68.8 million in 2021-22, the organisation’s annual reports show, while its sponsorship and rights income increased from zero to $10 million.
Ads for online betting services, such as Ladbrokes and Sportsbet, blanket Greyhound Racing NSW’s livestreaming website, thedogs.com.au.
The presence of the gambling industry extends to dogs in each race wearing “rugs” colour-coded to match eight gambling websites, following a sponsorship deal brokered last year.
Greyhound Racing NSW’s overall income increased from $67 million to $121.5 million during the same period, in a financial performance described by CEO Robert Macaulay as its best on record. The sport’s prize money rose from $26.4 million to $46.3 million in a third successive year of record profits.
“The sport of greyhound racing is thriving in NSW and this has filtered through as an economic benefit to the regional and rural communities of NSW,” Macaulay said, noting 75 per cent of participants lived outside metropolitan areas.
“The reality is that greyhound racing would not exist without the massive amounts of money wagered by punters online.”
Joanne Lee, Coalition for the Protection of Greyhounds
But greyhound welfare advocates told The Sun-Herald it was shameful that the local industry was thriving off gambling cash when countries abroad had shunned the sport.
Australian races are already attracting gamblers in overseas markets such as in the US and Asia, where the practice has been largely outlawed, with Sydney fixtures featured on betting websites abroad.
Joanne Lee from the Coalition for the Protection of Greyhounds said arguments that greyhound racing was a community sport seemed weak when so much of its income came from people who only viewed races as lists of odds on betting websites.
“The reality is that greyhound racing would not exist without the massive amounts of money wagered by punters online who will never attend a race. Given the dramatic reduction in racetrack attendance, there is virtually no money made through community engagement,” she said.
NSW recorded its first greyhound racing fatality of 2023 last week: a dog racing at Wentworth Park, in Glebe, was euthanised after colliding with other animals on the track on Thursday. Eight dogs died at the track in 2022, in addition to two at Richmond and one at Potts Park, in Yagoona.
“The rest of the world has seen the writing on the wall and is rapidly moving away from greyhound racing — the grubby greyhound gambling industry in NSW is lapping up the profits as a result,” said state Greens member Abigail Boyd.
“In recent years, we have seen the NSW greyhound racing industry change race times to suit people betting in real time overseas, regardless of the inconvenience caused to participants and race officials and the additional risks it adds from an animal welfare perspective.”
Asked if running races earlier in the morning was influenced by international markets, Macaulay said the organisation was “considering its options” to engage viewers overseas but the bulk of its revenue was from Australia.
Greyhound racing was set to be outlawed in NSW from July 1, 2017 due to animal welfare concerns, but former Liberal premier Mike Baird overturned the decision just three months after it was passed, instead promising to clean up the industry.
However, critics say state government interventions to improve safety and regulation, as well as taxes on gambling, have contributed to greyhound racing’s wealth.
The state government invested $30 million into track safety upgrades in 2021, a cost which opponents say saved expenses for the racing industry.
In 2018, NSW established an independent regulator, the Greyhounds Welfare Integrity Commission (GWIC). Before the 2021-22 financial year, the regulator was funded by Greyhounds Racing NSW, which critics said compromised its independence. It is now funded mostly by the state government’s 10 per cent point of consumption tax on online wagering (while racing’s share of money gathered from that tax has also increased).
“The greyhound racing industry is funded by the gambling industry and state governments. Without these two revenue streams, the industry would be unviable,” said Lee.
In a statement, NSW Minister for Hospitality and Racing Kevin Anderson said “animal welfare is at the heart of the NSW government’s support for the greyhound industry”, declining to answer questions about whether it had facilitated an increase in Greyhound Racing NSW’s income.
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13 January, 2023
Attempt to censor vaccine skeptic
Dr Peter McCullough, a widely recognised and prominent commentator regarding the danger of Covid vaccines, has been invited to speak in Australia alongside United Australia Party Senator Ralph Babet and the former member for Hughes Craig Kelly.
‘Activists’ are campaigning against his entrance into Australia, petitioning the Minister for Immigration Andrew Giles. They want him to deny McCullough’s visa on the grounds that McCullough is ‘spreading misinformation’.
Interestingly, these activists have no interest in addressing the misinformation dished out by the government, vaccine manufacturers, the TGA, or the AMA.
Their insecurity about the safety of the vaccine, which they have no doubt taken, is being expressed in some rabid desire to silence scientific inquiry.
Reignite Democracy Australia tweeted:
‘Andrew Giles, let Peter McCullough in. He’s a world-renowned doctor who is simply sharing studies that are reputable and rational. Don’t let Australia become the type of country that denies visas to law-abiding people! In the name of free speech, don’t set a dangerous precedent.’
Craig Kelly from the United Australia Party also tweeted:
‘What a bunch of nut job, lefty hypocrites. Crazy Lefties trash Free Speech and tarnish Australia’s international standing by trying to block Dr Peter McCullough’s visit. Free speech saves lives. Censorship kills. True Aussies value free speech.’
And:
‘He’s been invited by an Australian Senator, but anti-free speech leftists, neo-fascists, and Big Pharma shills are attempting to block De Peter McCullough’s visit to Australia.’
Whether Dr Peter McCullough is right or wrong is irrelevant. The idea that Covid vaccines are so flimsy that his presence in Australia would be considered ‘dangerous’ is beyond laughable, especially with this invention called ‘the internet’ allowing Australians to listen to his point of view whenever they want.
In what way could these activists make the argument for ‘danger’? It is not as though McCullough is encouraging people to inject themselves multiple times with a rushed drug that has a history of causing heart failure and strokes.
Andrew Giles would have a difficult time justifying any denial of visa, given our former ‘dangerous anti-vaxxer number one’ Novak is not only back in the country winning tournaments, Tennis Australia has confirmed that Covid-positive players (never mind their vaccination status) are allowed to compete.
If the virus isn’t dangerous enough to stop people playing, it’s pretty hard to mount a campaign against McCullough.
Below is the email penned by Reignite Democracy sent to Andrew Giles.
Hi Andrew.
I don’t know you personally but I hope you care about this country and that’s why you became a Member of Parliament in the first place.
Even if you disagree with Dr. Peter McCullough’s data findings and talking points, please don’t make Australia the type of country that blocks visas just because you, or others, don’t agree with that person. I disagree with a LOT of people who come here to host events, but I would NEVER advocate for you to block their entry…it’s really just basic freedom of speech principles.
It will set a dangerous precedent. One that I’m sure you don’t want your children and grandchildren to have to live with in the future.
You have an opportunity to uphold freedom of speech by simply allowing a law-abiding foreigner into the country because that should be his right. Deep down, you know that to be true.
Just to clarify, Dr. Peter McCullough isn’t even ‘anti-vax’ by the way. He advocated for the COVID vaccines when the rollout began and has advocated for vaccines in the past. However, after the data started coming out about the MRNA COVID vaccines, he was brave enough to speak out against the mainstream narrative. He’s been vilified and demonised enough for simply sharing data, don’t let Australia be another bully to a man who doesn’t deserve it.
https://spectator.com.au/2023/01/dr-peter-mccullough-the-next-djokovic/
**************************************************Fossil fuel energy the foundation for thriving human life
Five children died from heatstroke after being admitted to the Adelaide Children’s Hospital at the height of the January 1939 heatwave. Staff draped wet sheets over beds to relieve the suffering of 19 more children, seven of whom were in a serious condition.
Hydrocarbons came to the rescue. The hospital took up an offer from Kelvinator Australia Ltd to install an electric airconditioner for free. Five hours later, cool air was pumping through Rose Ward. “The authorities reported that the machine noticeably benefited the children when it began to operate at 11.50pm,” The Advertiser reported.
This snatch of history serves as a corrective to the catastrophist narrative that frames most of our discussion about climate and energy. The consequences of burning fossil fuel are not all bad. Thanks to its benefits, we can spend less time worrying about the fickleness of nature and more time enjoying fulfilling lives. Before airconditioning, deaths from prostration or sunstroke were common. In the sweaty, un-airconditioned first four decades of the last century, the death rate from extreme heat was 1.3 per 100,000. From 1940-99 it was 0.2. We are safer from the extremities of climate than we ever were.
Far from making the world “unliveable”, as the eco-pessimists fear, ultra-cost-effective fossil fuel energy has transformed a harsh, unyielding and sometimes dangerous continent into an unnaturally liveable place. No other source of energy, with the exception of nuclear, is anywhere close to competing with low-cost, on-demand versatile scalable hydrocarbons. Energy from fossil fuels has empowered humans to heat and cool their homes. Industrial processes and free trade have made warm clothes so cheap our ancestors would be astounded. They would look with envy at our food.
That’s the argument put by US philosopher Alex Epstein in Fossil Future: Why Global Human Flourishing Requires More Oil, Coal, and Natural Gas –Not Less. He argues the surest path to human catastrophe would be to follow the advice of climate catastrophists by switching suddenly to renewable energy. No one has come close to finding a cost-effective way of powering a modern economy using sunlight, wind and biomass alone. Not only are they inherently dilute and intermittent, but it is difficult to locate them at any scale close to centres of population and industry. Renewable energy infrastructure requires enormous amounts of mining and takes up vast amounts of space that could otherwise be farmed or dedicated to wildlife. To state wind and solar are at a competitive disadvantage to fossil fuels is to put it mildly. Despite two decades of generous subsidies and mandates, renewable energy only provides 3 per cent of global energy; fossil fuels deliver 80 per cent and use is growing faster than renewables in absolute terms.
In Epstein’s view, “a total ‘green’ replacement of fossil fuels should be viewed as a total crackpot idea until definitively proved otherwise”. He confronts the engineering challenge of eliminating fossil fuels from modern life and concludes it is impossible to reduce emissions to net zero by 2050 without a catastrophic loss of life and a sharp decline in prosperity. We have nothing in our kitbag to replace the energy-dense, transportable, available and reliable resource of solid, liquid and gaseous carbon upon which modernity was built.
In the unlikely event we succeed in creating an emission-free electricity network in that time frame, we will have solved only a small part of the problem. Transport and agriculture are more challenging still. There is no viable replacement source of energy for the production of industrial fertiliser, without which we would lose our capacity to produce half the world’s food. Nuclear technology is the only other source of naturally stored, concentrated and abundant energy capable of generating relatively low-cost, extremely reliable electricity. What’s more, it emits no air pollution or CO2 and has the best safety track record of any form of energy. The outright hostility to nuclear of influential eco-advocates leads Epstein to question their true motives. He concludes today’s ecological movement is no longer content to reduce waste and pollution but is opposed to human flourishing full stop. It is opposed not just to human activity that damages the environment but any human activity. Influential US climate advocate Bill McKibben, for example, advocates a “humbler world, one where we have less impact on our environment and human happiness would be of secondary importance”.
A liveable planet in their thinking in not one that is safer and kinder to human beings but an un-impacted planet closer to the natural paradise they wrongly imagine existed before humans came along. The myth has become so deeply embedded in modern thinking that the threat to the existence of an obscure earthworm or insect can be enough to block a new mine or industrial plant that would empower and enrich human beings.
Such thinking is at odds with our history. Indigenous Australians unempowered by almost any form of energy beyond human muscle were forced to devote much of their time to protecting themselves from the dangerous forces of nature and procuring mediocre nourishment. The timing of European settlement coincided with the transition from the era of organic energy to mineral energy, which led to rapid human flourishing in Australia as it has almost everywhere in the world. The laborious, unpredictable and low-yielding farming of the early days of settlement evolved into the high-yield, efficient agriculture of the modern era using the power unleashed by fossil fuels. Czech-Canadian scientist Vaclav Smil calculates the amount of human labour needed to produce a kilogram of grain has been reduced from 10 minutes to less than two seconds in the last 200 years.
Epstein concludes: “Without fossil fuels or their equivalent, food production would collapse and today’s ‘unnaturally’ large population could not possibly survive. With more fossil fuels or their equivalent, billions more people can have the opportunity to acquire the nourishment they need in small amounts of time instead of devoting huge portions of their lives to procuring mediocre nourishment.”
Wise decisions about energy, like any other area of policy, are impossible without a proper understanding of benefits as well as costs.
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Neo-Nazi junk mail in some affluent suburbs
I did a study of neo-Nazis many years ago and at that time they got off by shocking people. But it was all bluff. It seems that they are still succeeding
Residents in two of Australia’s most affluent suburbs got a shock when checking their letterboxes recently, as a nasty Nazi flyer made the rounds.
The flyer, which notifies residents that their homes have been visited by members of the National Socialist Network (NSN), has been left in letterboxes over the last two days.
The Anti-Defamation Commission has shared its disappointment in the a pro-Nazi flyer circulating around Paddington in NSW and Auchenflower in Queensland.
According to the Commission, the NSN is led by convicted criminal Thomas Sewell, who recently made news for punching a Channel 9 security guard.
The “terrified” residents reported receiving the flyers, which feature the Nazi swastika, to the commission.
NSW Police are aware of the flyers and are investigating. Queensland Police is also looking into the incident.
In a statement, Anti-Defamation Commission chair Dvir Abramovich said the “unthinkable” act showed neo-Nazis were openly threatening and intimidating residents.
“This can’t stand,” Dr Abramovich said.
“Who could have imagined that in 2023, hardcore white supremacists would be walking our streets, without fear of consequence, actively promoting their genocidal world view in NSW and Queensland through this well-orchestrated blitz of hate that has invaded people’s homes.
“Imagine the immense pain a Holocaust survivor or his children would feel upon seeing such vile flyers.”
Dr Abramovich said this was a wake-up call that anti-Semitism was on the rise and disaffected young people were being recruited.
“Where extremists gather, promising a racial war, physical violence is usually not far behind, and each one of us is a potential target,” he said.
“We do not need a Christchurch massacre in Sydney or Brisbane to take this ticking bomb issue seriously.
“I have no doubt that the people of NSW and Queensland share our revulsion at this kind of disturbing activity, and the worst thing we can do is to downplay the clear and present danger these groups pose to our collective way of life and safety.”
https://www.couriermail.com.au/news/queensland/unthinkable-neonazi-act-in-ritzy-nsw-qld-suburbs/news-story/d79e552d8177182ba024cced1e8c5ab5 ?
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Australia does better on economic mobility than many other countries
Australians are still more likely than people in many other developed nations to be able move upwards from the position they were born into
Treasury researchers looked at the income data of 1 million people born in the late 1970s to the early 80s and found Australians born into the lowest fifth of family incomes were much more likely to reach the top fifth of incomes than people in other developed economies, such as the United States.
Of the Australians born into the bottom fifth of incomes, 12.3 per cent end up in the top fifth of incomes, compared to 7.5 per cent in the US.
But who your parents are is still a major determinant of where you are likely to end up. More than 90 per cent of the Australians counted in the research lived in the same state they grew up in, and 70 per cent in the same local labour market as their parents.
And researchers found there was a clear persistence in wealth across generations — and that trend was more entrenched among the nation's richest and poorest.
But compared to parents born in Australia, the children of migrants to Australia were more likely to be able to improve their economic standing, which researchers said reflected their strong educational aspirations.
Researchers also found who a person's friends were also had an influence on their likely economic outcomes, being about a fifth as influential in determining future wealth as a person's parents.
The report said one of the best predictors of upward mobility was whether people had more high- or low-income connections among their Facebook friends — an indicator of where they might have grown up, or the people they were exposed to during school, for example.
Warnings of economic mobility being dampened in future
The report also warned of economic headwinds denting Australia's relative economic mobility.
It noted that Treasury researchers only assessed the data of Australians born within a small window, but data over longer periods of time showed the percentage of Australians earning more than their parents was falling.
How housing has impacted wealth inequality
High home prices are boosting inheritances, meaning your position in society increasingly owes more to which family you're born into than to talent or hard work. But there are solutions.
Two-thirds of Australians in their early 30s earn more in real terms than their parents at the same age, but that figure has fallen from 80 per cent for baby boomers.
Treasurer Jim Chalmers said the research was an opportunity to see how Australia was faring, and where it needed to improve.
"Every parent wants a better future for their kids and we all want to pass on a better deal for the next generation," Mr Chalmers said.
"We don't want Australians' prospects determined solely by where they're born or who their parents are. That's why mobility is important — for more life chances in our communities and more dynamism in our economy. "We're doing well but we can do better."
https://www.abc.net.au/news/2023-01-13/australia-economic-mobility-good-but-weakening/101849820
************************************12 January, 2023
Education Department pushing for number of schools teaching First Nations languages to exceed 100
What a waste of effort! What does it achieve? Very undesirable if it derails students from learning a European language such as German, French and Italian. That would cut them off from vast cultural heritage. I have gained hugely from my studies of German and Italian
The Department of Education is pushing to increase the number of Queensland state schools teaching Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander languages and more than a hundred state schools are primed to jump on-board in the coming years.
According to the most recent department data, current as of February 2022, only five state schools teach First Nations languages – Mabel Park State High School in Logan, Mossman State School in the Far North, and Tagai State College’s three campuses in the Torres Strait.
However, in early 2022, the Department of Education launched a dedicated program to help schools with extra resourcing in co-designing and delivering First Nations languages.
“In 2022, 44 state schools have reported that they are working collaboratively with Language Owners to teach 26 different Aboriginal language or Torres Strait Islander language in their schools,” a Department of Education spokesman said.
“Demand for teaching an Aboriginal language or Torres Strait Islander language is increasing. Currently, a further 113 state schools are in the early stages of developing a program to teach an Aboriginal language or Torres Strait Islander language.”
University of Queensland Associate Professor Marnee Shay has done extensive research on Indigenous education in her role as an academic. She is an Aboriginal woman with connections to Wagiman Country in the Northern Territory and Indigenous communities in South East Queensland.
“Many Indigenous leaders and education advocates have been championing the inclusion of Indigenous language and culture in the curriculum for many years now. It has been slow, but we finally see change and commitment at a policy level,” she said.
“As an Aboriginal person who was denied the opportunity to speak my language, I think it is excellent that the Department has made a policy commitment to increasing the number of schools teaching First Nations languages.
“Having Indigenous language as part of the curriculum at their school is identity-affirming for Indigenous students. “For non-indigenous students, it is an opportunity to learn not only the language, but the history and culture of the people who have been here for tens of thousands of years.”
However, Professor Shay said there are not enough First Nations language teachers. “We have Elders and community people that might have the knowledge and skills to teach language, but this is not always recognised by the system, which often requires people to hold university degrees,” she said.
“Indigenous people must be involved in the teaching of our own languages. You can’t teach language without culture – Indigenous people are the best people to be teaching this.
“Expanding the number [of schools teaching First Nations languages] is important, but not at the expense of process and cultural protocol – which can take time.”
All state schools are required to teach a language from at least Years 5 to 8. The four dominant languages in state schools are Japanese, French, Chinese and German.
The Department of Education spokesman said schools looking to teach Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander languages are advised to gain permission from local community elders first, and work closely with them in designing the program.
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My last phone call with George Pell
Andrew Bolt
I sure won’t forget the last time Cardinal George Pell rang me. Not now that I’ll never speak again to this holy man. He called me one night from Rome with an anxious question: Had I finally answered Christ’s call?
He’d even sent me an unimpressive book by Antony Flew to hasten the conversion he felt was imminent, so I was embarrassed to disappoint him and admit I was still agnostic.
Here’s why his call will stay with me now that he’s died in hospital of a heart attack, just as he was chatting to an anaesthetist about his hip operation.
It underlined something Pell’s critics never understood about him. To them, Pell was a schemer. A cold politician who rose to be the Vatican’s treasurer, third in line from the Pope, by putting his church above people. And, they wickedly added near the end of his life, he was a paedophile.
For decades, the media pumped out this hatred of Australia’s most senior Catholic, a conservative who opposed their global warming religion.
Just last Friday, browsing in a second-hand bookshop I found a copy of The Prince, a purported portrait of Pell by one of his nastiest critics, former ABC presenter David Marr.
The publisher’s blurb sums up the ABC gospel on Pell that did so much to destroy his reputation. Marr’s book was “a portrait of hypocrisy and ambition” of “a cleric at ease with power”.
But the Pell I knew was a man of God, who couldn’t even in his last days shake his concern for my soul. That real Pell is also there in his inspiring Prison Journal, written while in jail for 404 days for a crime he couldn’t possibly have committed.
The last paragraph says it all, with Pell, the son of a Ballarat publican, writing of the “man-God, whom I love and serve, whom I have followed for all my life”.
Oops. Sorry about all this God talk. It puts a lot of people off these days, and that was the problem with George Pell. No churchman here was firmer in defending his faith, and for that he was crucified.
Where did it all go so wrong? Many critics will point to May 1993, when Pell accompanied Australia’s worst paedophile priest, Father Gerald Ridsdale, to a court hearing. The media went berserk. Myths grew that Pell defended Ridsdale in court and tried to hide his crimes (both false). Even Pell was badgered years later into admitting he’d made a “mistake”.
It was a mistake only because few people now understand Christianity. Pell was trying again to follow Christ, who preached to prostitutes, tax collectors and the despised, telling them even the worst sinner need only repent to be forgiven.
But who understands that message today, when the woke forgive no one? Look at the jeering on Twitter at Pell’s death – “rot in hell”, “mongrel”, and “need to know if George Pell felt any pain before he died like a cockroach”.
Pell, a Christian, would never have been so pitiless. This is the great moral chasm – Christians vs barbarians – into which he fell.
But you’ll want me to say something bad about Pell, even if just to show he wasn’t perfect and I haven’t guzzled the altar wine. Well, Pell didn’t help himself by seeming aloof, cool and a little arrogant.
I once castigated him for using the birth of the beloved daughter of a friend of mine to preach against the IVF techniques which conceived her. Pell sometimes lacked a sensitivity that could have spared him.
Yet what was done to him was more damning than anything he did. For instance, Pell was accused by the witch-hunting Royal Commission into Institutional Responses to Child Sexual Abuse of helping the Bishop of Ballarat move Ridsdale from parish to parish, knowing he was raping boys.
Pell denied it, and the commission had no evidence he was lying. In fact, it bizarrely claimed Pell was at a meeting of consulters where the bishop said Ridsdale was a paedophile, yet it accepted another consulter there didn’t know this until a decade later.
No, Pell had to be the fall guy for his guilty church, and Victoria’s police made sure of it.
Pell had long been hated by the Left, even since he became Archbishop of Melbourne and insisted priests and Catholic schools follow the church’s teachings and not their Left-wing own.
He also set up the first compensation scheme anywhere for victims of child-sex abuse, and put in reforms – almost entirely successful – to guard against paedophile priests, but that didn’t save him.
In 2015, Victoria Police advertised for complaints against Pell, asking “victims” to come forward. They then charged him with 26 complaints of child sex abuse against nine “victims”.
The charges were so far-fetched that all collapsed, but not before Pell spent more than a year in jail after being convicted of somehow raping two teenage boys at once in the open sacristy of his Cathedral, in the bustle just after Mass.
In fact, the evidence was clear: Pell was at the front of the Cathedral, talking to worshippers, at the only time the sacristy was free, and his accuser must have been outside, walking back with the choir. Neither the raped nor the alleged rapist could have been at the scene of the crime.
One of the two “victims” even told his parents there was no rape, and the High Court decided, seven judges to nil, Pell was innocent.
Pell always suspected senior Vatican clerics planted or supported these bizarre allegation to stop him investigating them for corruption. One of his enemies is now on trial.
Yet to this day, thousands of Australians still prefer this lie of Pell the paedophile, and the ABC has never apologised for pushing it. Like Nero, they’d rather crucify an innocent Christian than hear the truth.
In that respect, Pell follows the Christ he adored. Let Catholics remember him as a man, flawed but holy, martyred by pagans to pay for their sins.
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Solar project gobbling up cash at a fatal rate
Another Greenie fantasy
A fall out between two of the nation’s richest men has led to the abrupt implosion of the $30bn Sun Cable project, one of the world’s biggest solar and battery projects which had aimed to turbocharge Australia into a major international clean energy exporter.
Sun Cable was placed into administration on Wednesday after a dramatic scrap between its two high-profile backers – Mike Cannon-Brookes and Andrew Forrest.
It sets the scene for the businessmen to compete for control of the development, known as the Australia-Asia PowerLink.
The two billionaires clashed over different views on the optimal funding package and strategic vision for the project based in the Northern Territory, which would have sent power from Darwin to Singapore with a 4200km cable.
FTI Consulting were formally appointed as voluntary administrators on Wednesday.
“The appointment followed the absence of alignment with the objectives of all shareholders. Whilst funding proposals were provided, consensus on the future direction and funding structure of the company could not be achieved,” a statement from Sun Cable said.
The fallout threatens to sink one of Australia’s biggest energy projects, pitched as a vision for how the nation could move away from fossil fuels and become a major renewable energy exporter.
Sun Cable in March 2022 raised $210m of new funding to push ahead with its signature clean energy scheme – the $30bn Australia-Asia PowerLink development – with fresh funds ploughed in by the Atlassian co-founder, also the chairman of Sun Cable, and the Fortescue Metals chairman.
However, Dr Forrest’s Squadron Energy recently raised concern that Sun Cable failed to meet its Series B funding milestones and was spending cash at unsustainable rates. The project is running up to 12 months behind schedule, partly due to delays with Indonesian environmental approvals.
Squadron also raised issues with Sun Cable’s management team and may have ultimately wanted to install its own executives in place to run the huge renewable project, sources said.
Documents filed with the corporate regulator show that John Hartman, the chief executive of Dr Forrest’s private Tattarang investment group, quit the Sun Cable board in late November.
As part of ongoing funding needs for the development, Mr Cannon-Brookes’ Grok Ventures was planning to invest an extra $60m into Sun Cable, but that proposal was not agreed to by Squadron, sources said. Squadron, for its part, held concerns over a clause within Grok’s funding proposal that would have seen the company sold or put on the market if there were further failures to meet its funding milestones.
Squadron put forward a funding proposal for a similar amount prior to Christmas but it was not accepted by the rest of the board. Both Grok and Squadron held veto rights which effectively cancelled each other’s funding deals.
It had widespread backing from the federal government and received support from Scott Morrison with Indonesia approving the route of the power project through its territorial waters.
Grok said there was little other choice for the company than the move into administration, while underlining its ongoing interest in the scheme. “In the circumstances, including where all but one shareholder agreed with the company’s funding strategy – the Board was left with no other option, but to enter into voluntary administration,” it said in a statement. “Grok remains a strong supporter of Sun Cable delivering the world’s largest solar energy infrastructure network and the Australia-Asia Power Link. We are confident Sun Cable will be an attractive investment proposition and remain at the forefront of Australia’s energy transition.”
“Voluntary administration provides the best opportunity for the company to access appropriate funding sources.”
Documents filed with the Australian Securities and Investments Commission on Monday show that Sun Cable received a $28m cash injection on December 24. Both Squadron and Mr Cannon-Brookes’ private investment company CBC Co were involved, along with Xero founder Craig Winkler, Craig Scroggie – the chief executive of NextDC – and Eytan Lenko, the chief executive of Beyond Zero Emissions.
The same group kicked in another $26m in mid-September, the documents show, with Squadron and CBC also paying $6.2m for new shares in late October.
All of the share issues are believed to be cash calls from the $210m capital raising announced by Sun Cable in March 2022.
The solar project in the NT, which is estimated to deliver carbon emissions abatement of 8.6 million tonnes per year, will help power Darwin and Singapore.
It includes the world’s largest battery and a 4200km high-voltage cable from Darwin to Singapore, the longest in the world.
Sun Cable still needs to raise more than $30bn in debt and equity by the end of 2023 to back its plans, with the company last year appointing Macquarie, Moelis & Company and MA Financial Group as its financial advisers for the massive task.
The Australia-Asia PowerLink project will create more than 1500 jobs during construction, 350 operational jobs and 12,000 indirect jobs. It will start supplying energy to Darwin in 2026. The venture aims to send 20 gigawatts of power from the world’s largest solar farm near Tennant Creek to Darwin and would also feature a giant battery as part of the project.
Sun Cable chief executive David Griffin said the project remains “well placed” for completion. “As we have progressed our work, the demand for delivering reliable, dispatchable 24/7 renewable energy in the Northern Territory and the region has risen materially,” Mr Griffin said in a statement issued on Wednesday.
“Sun Cable looks forward to developing and operating the projects to meet this demand.”
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Climate lockdowns: a never-ending story of misery and control
Here is a harsh truth we must be cognisant of: the same power-hungry control freaks who wanted to lock down the whole world to keep us ‘safe’ from Covid are also wanting to lock down the whole world to keep us safe from ‘climate change’.
And they have told us this. A conspiracy theory is an unsubstantiated and unlikely claim. A conspiracy truth is when the folks involved tell us openly and plainly what they want to do. The Great Reset mob have made it perfectly clear what they have in mind in relation to climate lockdowns after Covid lockdowns were so easily and quickly implemented with the approval of the masses.
The World Economic Forum has published plenty of articles and run a variety of talkfests promoting Covid as a means to enshrine globalisation as a form of centralised government. This would mean the end of a free West. They have switched to promoting climate change fear as an extension to this program. A simple look at their website is all you need to confirm which way Klaus Schwab wishes to drag the world.
Consider one recent article titled, From Davos 2022 to Davos 2023: The six themes then that have set the agenda now. Here is a short part of it:
Theme #2: Three interconnected crises – climate, food, energy.
The climate crisis has long been a key component of the Davos agenda. But with rising emissions, rising energy prices and rising food prices – inextricably linked and exacerbated by the geopolitical crisis in Ukraine – climate conversations took a graver tone at Davos 2022 as world leaders discussed the need for immediate action…
Countries must drastically scale up efforts: ‘It isn’t just about words anymore – it is about action,’ said Xie Zhenhua, China’s Special Envoy for Climate Change. ‘Climate action, now, is critical.’
Hmm, ‘climate, food, energy’. Don’t we already see that being ‘dealt with’ by our elites? Whether it is Bill Gates buying up huge amounts of arable farmland in America, Holland confiscating 3,000 farms to meet the climate dictates of the EU, or energy crises throughout Europe caused by alarmist climate action policies, we know where this story is headed.
Also note how China is called upon as a sort of spiritual leader! For a large amount of critical data and detail on why we do not want to follow China, please get a hold of Michael Senger’s vital 2021 volume, Snake Oil: How Xi Jinping Shut Down the World.
It seems that there is never a shortage of fools and/or power-hungry tyrants waiting to get in on the action. For example, UK activists are moving full steam ahead with this:
Oxford, England will be enforcing six ‘traffic filter’ locations restricting car travel in 2024 as part of an effort to ‘help tackle climate change’. During a trial run of at least six months, only buses, taxis, cyclists, pedestrians, and workers with special exemptions will be able to pass through the ‘filter’ access points at all times without being fined, the Oxfordshire County Council and Oxford City Council explained.
Residents of Oxford and ‘some surrounding villages’ can apply for a permit to drive through the filters for up to 100 days a year, and residents of Oxfordshire County may apply for a permit to pass through the filters up to 25 days a year.
As another site puts it:
Apparently, not enough people are catching buses or riding bikes. But instead of making that more appealing, the totalitarians will force it through tracking and fines. Oxfordshire has just approved on November 29, the ‘traffic filters’ trial which will turn the city into a ‘fifteen-minute city’. The Trial will start in Jan 2024.
It’s a crowded area, Oxfordshire, and no one likes traffic congestion, but in a free world the problem is self-limiting as drivers get fed up with delays and exorbitant parking costs, and they car-pool or choose to catch the bus or ride a bike. But in Big Nanny State the local rulers start making rules about who can and can’t visit and how often, and they want your car registered on their own special list with cameras to track you and fines to punish you. They offer exemptions of course, but then you have to apply for them and get permission.
The WEF have printed plenty of articles telling us what a great idea this is. A brief quote from one of them reads: ‘As climate change and global conflict cause shocks and stresses at faster intervals and increasing severity, the 15-minute city will become even more critical.’
If you think this is moon-battery from far, far away, please reconsider. Here in Melbourne the powers that be are looking into exactly the same thing:
Plan Melbourne is guided by the principle of 20-minute neighbourhoods.
The 20-minute neighbourhood is all about ‘living locally’ – giving people the ability to meet most of their daily needs within a 20-minute walk from home, with safe cycling and local transport options. The current Municipal Strategic Planning Project is a joint DELWP and local government project to create better planning for Neighbourhood Activity Centres to deliver 20-minute neighbourhoods.
Banyule, Darebin, Maroondah, Moonee Valley and Whittlesea City Councils are testing draft guidance to support activity centre network planning based on their local needs and priorities. The outcomes of the project will inform future guidance developed to ensure it is robust and fit-for-purpose.
Oh dear – Melbourne, one of the most locked down cities on the planet, just can’t get enough of this stuff. We can look forward to more lockdowns – this time to save the planet. Yeah, right… Can’t wait for that. How about first looking carefully at our Covid lockdowns and determining if they actually did any good, or if they caused far more harm instead, before signing up to more?
I have featured numerous experts on this site over the past three years documenting the massive harms of lockdown mania. Yet our elites and ‘experts’ think they were just peachy and we need to have even more of them. In addition to all the evidence we have about the harms caused by lockdowns, let me finish by noting a new article by the author I mentioned above.
In Fifty Questions to Which We Demand Answers, Michael Senger gives us plenty to think about. He looks at government responses to Covid, including the lockdowns. Let me offer his final 20 questions – all of which deserve immediate and thorough answers:
How many people were killed by the WHO’s initial guidance on mechanical ventilators based on Chinese journal articles advising ventilators as the ‘first choice’ for those hospitalised with Covid?
The initial guidance from the WHO advised using mechanical ventilators not necessarily for the patient’s benefit, but to control the spread of the virus. Why was the WHO advising doctors to violate the Hippocratic Oath?
Why were numerous, credible predictions regarding famine, human rights disasters, and economic collapse as a result of lockdowns ignored?
Why was natural immunity ignored?
Why were initial seroprevalence studies downplayed?
Why were beaches and other outdoor spaces closed?
Why was the public kept in the dark about low early estimates of Covid’s actual infection fatality rate?
What was the source of the guidance to move patients who were still sick into nursing homes?
Why has there been so little public discussion of China’s influence on the global response to Covid, despite FBI Director Christopher Wray’s disclosure that Chinese officials were ‘aggressively urging support for China’s handling of the Covid crisis?’
Why was the UK government so deferential to Neil Ferguson and Imperial College London during the response to Covid despite Imperial’s close relationship with China?
Why has the editor-in-chief of the Lancet been publicly deferential to China?
Why did Bill Gates express admiration for China’s response to Covid?
Why did the German government privately disseminate a list of authoritarian measures provided in part by China lobbyists?
How did a 40-year member of the British Communist Party with no background in epidemiology become a leading advisor to the UK government, and why was she recently promoted to lead the WHO’s nudge unit?
Why did leading economists assume that a short, sharp lockdown would ‘eliminate the resurgence risk’ when the policy had no precedent?
Why did the Federal Reserve and its international counterparts disregard inflation?
Why did the Supreme Court and its international counterparts step aside while lockdowns were being implemented?
Why did the judiciary acquiesce to an indefinite state of legal emergency?
Why did Western politicians and public health officials demonstrate so little concern for following their own Covid rules?
If the virus was deadly enough to kill millions and justify an indefinite state of emergency, why has so little effort been expended to hold China accountable for its initial coverup of that virus?
Good questions indeed. But don’t expect any answers to be forthcoming from our global leaders – they are much too busy planning our next lockdowns.
https://spectator.com.au/2023/01/climate-lockdowns-a-never-ending-story-of-misery-and-control/
************************************11 January, 2023
Migration increase should be directly tied to population growth, business says
Immigration is in principle beneficial but both the quality of the immmigrant and the readiness of the economy to receive him/her is a big question in deciding if there is in fact a net benefit from it.
Allowing immigration of parasitical Muslim "refugees" is a clear mistake and failing to build sufficient housing for the new arrivals is also limiting. The proposals below glide over such issues
Permanent migration into Australia should automatically rise each year as a percentage of the nation’s population, with the current cap boosted from 195,000 to 220,000 for the next two years, business argues.
The Business Council of Australia is also calling for employers to be allowed to bring in any skilled worker from overseas for jobs with an annual salary above the average wage, currently $92,000 a year, and to make it easier for temporary visa holders to gain permanent residency.
In its submission to the federal government’s migration review, the BCA is urging a post-pandemic “reset” to migration policy, warning that without major reform Australia risks missing out in the global fight for talent.
“Australia should aim for a reset on migration that not only attracts migrants back to our shores and tackles workforce shortages, but also helps set the country up as a high productivity, high-skill and high-wage frontier economy,” the submission says.
“The system as it stands is highly complex and has become increasingly unattractive for skilled migrants and their employers.
“Short-term two-year temporary skills shortage visas with no pathway to permanent residency do not encourage experienced workers and their families,” it says. “And eligibility for skilled migration is restricted by outdated and inflexible occupational lists.”
The BCA highlights the significant impact migration can have on the economic fortunes of the country, saying the net loss of around 450,000 temporary and permanent immigrants to Australia during the pandemic is projected to cost the economy $55bn a year in economic output and $17bn in government revenues.
It proposes a significant increase in migration, arguing more new migrants will be a social and economic boon as they help fill the current significant skills gap, offset the ageing population and bring in expertise in industries of the future.
“To give certainty for long-term planning, the government should consider setting Australia’s permanent migration intake at a percentage of the total population over the long term,” the submission says. “This government should also provide a four-year ‘look ahead’ for permanent migration numbers, in line with typical government budget cycles.”
The BCA also reiterates its call at Anthony Albanese’s jobs and skills summit last September for an uplift to permanent migration in the next two financial years to 220,000 from the current 195,000, recommending that 70 per cent of the places be allocated to the skilled migrant stream. The submission notes Canada’s migration policy aims to take just over one per cent of its population across the next three years. Australia’s current 195,000 a year is about 0.75 per cent.
“Australia faces stiff competition as a migrant destination from other advanced economies that are also experiencing severe skills and labour shortages,” it says.
The size of the permanent migration program is determined by the federal government each year. It was reduced by the previous Coalition government from around 190,000 in the years prior to 2016-17 to 160,000, citing population pressures in the big cities, and hit a record low in the first pandemic year when 140,000 permanent migrants were accepted.
The Albanese government bolstered the 2022-23 intake to 195,000 to alleviate skills shortages in areas like healthcare and technology.
“Migration is an easy scapegoat for lack of infrastructure delivery and poor planning, but it is too important for us to continue down this path,” the BCA says.
Home Affairs Minister Clare O’Neil announced the review of the migration system in November, saying it would “focus on enhancing Australia’s productivity and providing businesses with the skilled workers they need, while assisting migrants to build new and prosperous lives in Australia”.
“The review will also address some of the challenges facing Australia, including our ageing population, climate change and emerging technology,” she said.
After the release of the federal government’s population statement last week, which found Australia’s is likely to be around one million fewer than expected by 2030 as a result of the pandemic, Jim Chalmers said increased migration was just one of a number of tools available to fix the nation’s significant workforce shortages.
“Migration has been a secret to our success as a country, making us more dynamic and more lively, strengthening our society and economy,” the Treasurer said.
“(But) lifting the migration cap alone won’t fix the challenges we face in the long term. We need to invest in our people and the productive capacity of our economy.”
BCA chief executive officer Jennifer Westacott told The Australian reforming the skills and migration systems in Australia had “never been more important”.
“A properly functioning migration system will be critical to attracting the skills we need to build new industries, develop new ideas, innovate across the economy and deliver a new wave of prosperity for Australians,” he said. “The right workers with the right skills get key projects and investments off the ground. You can’t employ hundreds of Australians on a construction job if you don’t have a surveyor and you can’t deliver an infrastructure pipeline without engineers.”
The BCA submission calls for the current requirement for both temporary and permanent employer-sponsored visas to match a skilled occupation list to be removed and replaced with open eligibility for jobs with a salary above average earnings, currently $92,000 a year.
It also proposes “streamlining” the current labour market testing that is required of employers before they sponsor a skilled migrant, saying there should still be “an onus on businesses that benefits from skilled migrants to demonstrate they are giving the first opportunity to suitably qualified Australian workers”.
“Skilled migration must remain a complement, not a substitute, for training and hiring Australians,” it says.
The submission proposes smoother pathways to permanent residency for temporary migrants on work visas, such as cutting the time period for sponsored employment.
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Cardinal Pell has passed away
An intellectual and a most distinguished Austalian churchman. His passing is a real loss
After 11 years at the helm of the Aquinas college in Ballarat and five years editing Light, the Ballarat diocesan newspaper, Pell left his home city in 1984 to take up the post of rector of Corpus Christi seminary in Melbourne – the training ground for the future priests of not only Melbourne but of regional Victoria and Tasmania. It was there, for the first time, that he ran into ecclesial controversy. His efforts to instil greater discipline, including attendance at morning Mass and better study habits, drew hostility from students and staff who preferred a less structured, less formal regime. A couple of the senior students, however, later became some of his closest lifelong friends.
The ever-increasing chasm between the traditional and liberal factions in the Catholic Church was becoming evident. Pell had the toughness and determination to prevail in what he called “a few small changes’’. It was clear to him, however, that more extensive seminary reform could only come from the bishops who had ultimate responsibility for priests’ training. That opportunity was later to come his way.
After three years running the seminary, Pell was consecrated a bishop, at the young age of 45, in St Patrick’s Cathedral on May 21 1987, a promotion that took his career, literally, out into the world, in unforeseen directions. Shortly after his consecration, Pell was elected by his fellow bishops to chair Australian Catholic Relief – the church’s overseas aid agency. For nine years, that position took up at least a day a week. It also involved frequent trips to the world’s trouble spots and poorest areas. His diaries from those trips made compelling reading, covering three visits to India, including one after the 1993 earthquake 400km southeast of Mumbai in which as many as 60,000 people perished. He wrote in his diary: “Wondered how God allowed earthquakes (perhaps God not all powerful, even cosmologically) … May God help victims and my weak faith’’.
As archbishop, Pell emerged as an outspoken, controversial figure in the national conversation. A “political agnostic’’ – in his time he voted Liberal, National and Labor – he waded into debate on issues relevant to the church. He was an outspoken critic of Pauline Hanson’s One Nation, which he condemned in 1998 for “racist policies’’ that “are a recipe for strife and misery’’ and for setting “groups of Australians against one another’’. He was a forceful critic of the Kennett government’s encouragement of gambling in Victoria. Recognising the sharp delineation between church and state, however, he infuriated the Left in 1998 arguing that John Howard’s proposed Goods and Services Tax was not an issue on which the Church could or should present a single viewpoint. Pell’s support for an Australian republic was a personal rather than a Catholic view.
Pell was also the main target of the contentious “Rainbow Sash’’ protests, refusing to distribute holy communion in his Cathedral to homosexual activists and their families and supporters wearing rainbow sashes. The issue attracted widespread adverse publicity, and defined Pell, in many minds, as an ultraconservative. But the issue was less divisive in Catholic ranks. Other church leaders of the time attested they would and did take the same stand.
In October 2003, Pell was promoted to cardinal by John Paul II. He celebrated the honour with 50 friends and family who travelled to Rome from Australia, the US, Canada, England and Ireland. It was, he recalled afterwards in his weekly Sunday Telegraph column, an exceptionally happy week of partying, perhaps “a slight taste of Heaven’’. Pell was a prodigious writer, of journal articles, columns and sermons; his works were collated into several books including “Be Not Afraid”, “Test Everything” and “God and Caesar”.
Despite the cardinal’s long history of heart disease, for which he received a pacemaker in Rome more than a decade ago, his death, from a cardiac arrest after a hip replacement operation in the Salvator Mundi hospital, was a shock. He had recently been working in Rome, meeting groups of students from Australia and seminarians from the US, and only days before had attended the funeral of his treasured friend Emeritus Pope Benedict XVI. In the lead up to the late Pope’s funeral he was also in demand for interviews from US, British and Australian media and was busy networking with brother cardinals who travelled to Rome for Benedict’s funeral. He was the author of the obituary for Benedict published in this newspaper.
Close friends said he was in the best fom they had seen him for years, after he emerged from 13 months imprisonment, mainly in solitary confinement, in Victorian jails, on historic sex abuse charges dating back to his first few months as Archbishop of Melbourne, in 1996.
The Cardinal was released from jail in the lead-up to Easter in 2020 after the High Court, by a 7-nil margin, quashed the five convictions, which were made, originally, on the testimony of a single complainant. The full story of what was behind the charges, and others that were subsequently dropped by the Victorian legal system, is yet to emerge. His three, candid prison diaries, written during his ordeal, are a testament to his sense of justice, his strength and his faith. Throughout the ordeal, he never lost heart but worked with his legal teams to clear his name
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Religious intolerance is alive and well
As the festive season goodwill fades, we can but hope that 2023 will be a better year for Christianity after a bad 2022… A recent court case involving Wanslea, a West Australian foster care agency, has once more brought the problem of anti-Christian discrimination to light when a married couple, members of the Free Reform Christian Church, were allegedly denied an adoption because of their religion. At least the WA Administrative Tribunal confirmed the complaint and awarded compensation to the couple.
As reported by the ABC:
A Western Australian tribunal has found a Christian couple were discriminated against when their application to foster a child was rejected over their view that homosexuality is a sin.
The experience of Andrew Thorburn at Essendon Football Club confirmed how much attitudes in general, and to religion in particular, have changed over 50 years. Having seen Prime Minister Morrison abused in the press for his Christianity and Andrew Thorburn ejected from his role, this change has gone too far to the point that it is undermining our society.
Even more disturbing is the commentary from the Victorian Premier and the state’s Human Rights Commissioner. Being sacked for having certain views, views unrelated to the job, is no longer considered unacceptable in the eyes of our leaders.
Another disturbing intrusion in Victoria came from the Liberal Party, where an election candidate was banned from the party room because of her ‘extreme’ Christian views on gender and abortion; no mention has been made of equivalent views held by Muslim candidates. This was another self-inflicted injury to the party’s election prospects, adding to the predictable resulting loss.
As a young boy, I grew up in post-war London, a place both physically and psychologically recovering from the onslaught. The war had taken its toll, with morale maintained by Winston Churchill, Christian belief, and copious cups of tea. There were bomb sites, some containing unexploded ordinance, being used as playgrounds. Despite this adversity, people were happy to still be alive, as many weren’t. The church provided succour and there was little need for counselling.
All boys in this era were required to go to Sunday School and sing in the choir; I achieved a brief moment of success as a chorister in Westminster Abbey, then adolescence struck and my voice permanently changed. My subsequent religious exposure was minimal; I had, by this stage, become a medical student and found the non-evidence-based leap of faith difficult to achieve.
There is no doubt that the Christian ethos has provided the basis of our Western society, but this source of good is steadily being undermined by modernity. The 2021 Australian census statistics showed a rapid decline in those who identify as Christian falling from 68 per cent in 2003, to 52 per cent in 2016, and 44 per cent in 2021. 30 per cent now identify as having no religion. Christian faith is seemingly replaced by alternative pseudo-religions such as Extinction Rebellion and Black Lives Matter. Taking the knee has been given a new meaning; I was taught that there were only three reasons to take the knee – to pray in church, to propose marriage, and when being knighted by the Monarch! It now seems an obligatory gesture for many sporting events, the most recent being on the cricket pitch.
Although not religious, I find the increasing intolerance of those who are difficult to fathom. We are reminded that, in past centuries, wars were regularly fought under the Christian banner – although producing nothing like the loss of life that ensued in more recent times from communism, fascism, or the numerous Islamic caliphates.
The vicious nature of social media commentary fails to recognise the good Christianity has done; it has fed the poor, supported women, abolished slavery, and provided the moral backbone of our society. To condemn it for the past sins of a few paedophiles is disproportionate; Cardinal Pell was, fortunately only temporarily, convicted for the sins of others, rather than his own.
Other religions do not stack up well in their treatment of the oppressed. In countries like China, Saudi Arabia, Indonesia, Pakistan, and India, having a religion, the wrong religion, or leaving a religion, can result in a death sentence either by the law or from the mob. The fact that many of these countries sit on the committee of the United Nations Human Rights Commission adds to hypocrisy at the highest levels. The egregious example of the UN, refusing to even debate its own report on China’s persecution of Uighur Muslim ethnic minorities, demonstrated a new low.
Activists in Australia country continue to persecute Christianity whilst ignoring the attitudes of Islam to women’s rights and homosexuality. Why the discrepancy of criticising one religion and not the other?
Their attempts at undermining Christmas traditions exemplify their agenda. As seen in 2022, it is increasingly problematic to allow nativity scenes and the singing of carols without individuals or local councils worrying about offence being taken. Salman Rushdie, author of The Satanic Verses, remains under a fatwa (threat of death). He tellingly stated, ‘Freedom of speech is freedom to offend.’ His attempted assassination revealed the less than benign aspect of that religion.
As a now retired doctor, I have lived and worked in many countries and have witnessed all the main religions of Buddhism, Hinduism, Judaism, Islam, and Christianity. I have even dealt with medical problems caused by Animism and Voodoo. Outside the Western-orientated countries, I found an oasis (pardon the pun) of religious tolerance in the United Arab Emirates. Having lived in several countries in Arabia, I found that Dubai and Sharjah had Christian churches tolerated, although hidden away. That accommodation between two monotheistic religions was even more apparent in the Lebanon of yesteryear, until the Sunni/Shia Islamic fundamentalism divided the country with civil war. It is not that long ago that the ‘people of the book’ recognised their common ground, that view has been undermined in recent years by the attempts of an extreme form of Islam to establish dominance.
At Christmas, when Australian activists berate those who follow their faith, it is difficult to retain the spirit of goodwill the Bible eschews; local councils, such as Mosman, ban nativity scenes, and attempt to turn the holiday, (holy day) into a multicultural event. In the UK, even the definition of the holiday has been changed by some institutions; phrases such as ‘happy winter closure’ and ‘joyful holiday break’, have been substituted. In December, a British woman was arrested by police for silently praying outside an abortion clinic in Birmingham, the charge being ‘protesting and engaging in an act that is intimidating to service users’; this in clear contravention of European freedom of speech and freedom of assembly legislation.
Goodwill is far more evident in Dubai, with the shopkeepers happy to supply presents for the Christmas festival and carols playing in the shopping malls. In one year, the fixed festivals of Hindu Diwali in October/November and Christmas in December, were neatly intersected by the moving date of Ramadan, which, in the ninth month of the Islamic calendar, was in November that year; all the gifts were pragmatically repurposed if not sold! Conversely, other countries, such as Pakistan and Nigeria actively threaten Christians.
When I lived in Germany the giving of presents, Christmas trees, decorations, and lighting all followed the customs of the past. The non-Christian influx in many European countries has produced an opportunity for the extreme Left to undermine that tradition based on its potential to offend immigrants; Germany’s Islamic population has exploded to over 5 million, with nearly 3,000 mosques. Mono-cultural Scandinavian countries have the highest level of happiness in the world because their traditions have been retained rather than cancelled. Even the mention of the word Christmas has come under increasing threat; in the interest of inclusion, (as opposed to exclusion), the European Union banned its use in its official documents (later forced to withdraw from the position after complaints).
The 2021 census confirmed the dramatic decline in religious observance, with an associated decline in church weddings, from a historical 95 per cent, to now 20 per cent. As marriage is in decline and divorce increasing, 16 per cent of families are now, to their children’s detriment, single parents. Many children have little knowledge of the significance of Christmas, looking on the event solely as a time for family gatherings and presents. To even claim to be a Christian often encourages abuse. How can it be that we have a Human Rights Commission, but no action is taken when, as with Andrew Thorburn, a job is lost because of religious belief?
During nine years of Coalition government, religious freedom legislation was one of the many ‘too difficult’ challenges it failed to promote. Initially raised by Phillip Ruddock’s expert panel in 2018, it took until February 2022 before attempts were made to address the issue, with religious protection legislation possible in 2023. Western society is abrogating its history, Christianity is being persecuted and is bizarrely seen as some sort of moral turpitude, and marriage is under siege; what will be left to keep our society together, will climate change or some other high moral activist agenda become a poor substitute? Unless changes are made, the days of traditional celebration of Christmas may be soon gone.
https://spectator.com.au/2023/01/religious-intolerance-is-alive-and-well/
**********************************************Chasing our tails on wages is a real risk under Labor’s plan
When the Secure Jobs, Better Pay bill passed parliament late last year, Employment and Workplace Relations Minister Tony Burke declared that “today we get wages moving”. It’s an easy political sell, particularly as cost-of-living pressures are affecting many households. But achieving this outcome is very different from simply announcing it.
Let’s be clear on what the aim is or at least should be: sustainable real wage increases that don’t lead to inflationary pressures or loss of jobs. There’s no point in achieving high nominal wage rises if the outcome is simply higher inflation – the classic dog chasing its tail – or workers lose their jobs.
Anthony Albanese’s assertion that anyone who opposed the rushed bill is against higher real wages is complete nonsense. The real issue is whether the new laws will actually achieve sustainable real wage increases. And if they do not, what will be the costs relative to the benefits of some workers (and the trade unions) doing well out of the new deal?
During the course of the year, various official indicators of wage growth will be released. We will need to watch out for the potentially misleading conflation of these figures with the impact of the legislation, something Burke may attempt to do. It was already evident last year that wages had started to move, at least in the private sector. A tight labour market has this effect, even if it was a long time coming.
By the same token, it’s also clear that ongoing government pay caps are affecting wage growth in the public sector. Finance Minister Katy Gallagher regards wage rises of 3 per cent a year as acceptable for federal public servants even though this will likely lead to quite steep falls in real wages for the affected workers. It’s also telling that the federal government is seeking to delay the pay rises for aged-care workers awarded by the Fair Work Commission last year.
Fiscal pressures on all levels of government will mean that wage growth in the public sector is likely to remain relatively subdued notwithstanding the occasional concession made to particular groups of workers.
What are the mechanisms that Burke is relying on to ensure that wages get moving? They are mainly focused on enterprise bargaining, although the government will be assuming that the Fair Work Commission will award a relatively generous increase in the national minimum wage and aligned wages in keeping with its practice last year. This will be assisted by the strong support of the government in its formal submission.
Recall here that last year the FWC granted increases of between 4.6 per cent and 5.2 per cent to those on award rates of pay. Given that about one-quarter of workers are paid award wages, increases of this magnitude can shift the dial when it comes to measured wage growth.
Across the past decade or so, there was a noticeable decline in the uptake of enterprise bargaining as the approach of the Fair Work Commission made the certification of agreements increasingly difficult. Think here the complex and convoluted interpretation of the better-off-overall test as well as pernickety procedural requirements.
It is estimated only 15 per cent of workers are now employed under current enterprise agreements. Indeed, most workers covered by enterprise agreements are now on expired agreements. It’s clearly a system on its knees.
But also bear in mind that enterprise agreements are essentially the domain of trade unions. Nearly three-quarters of all enterprise agreements are union-related, with these agreements covering 93 per cent of all employees on a current agreement. In other words, only union agreements with relatively large employers have lasted.
One principal aim of Labor’s legislation is to kickstart enterprise bargaining across a much wider spectrum of firms and industries, both single enterprise and multi-employer. The government’s expectation is that the vast majority of these agreements will be union-related and will contain wage increases and improvements to working conditions that have not been achievable.
A central feature of the legislative amendments is the incentive it gives for employers to quickly conclude enterprise agreements lest they be dragged into multi-employer bargaining. Both the minister and ACTU secretary Sally McManus have said as much. The scope for multi-employer bargaining doesn’t come into effect until the middle of this year.
Some unions already are taking advantage of a wrinkle in the new laws to restart enterprise bargaining where agreements have lapsed. There is no need to seek the permission of workers and unions will use the backdrop of end-point arbitration to push for large wage increases. A recent example is the unions requesting that Coles enter into bargaining given that the current agreement lapsed three years ago.
In other cases, unions will wait for multi-employer bargaining to begin and use the easy device of roping in employers who meet the comparability test. This will avoid the resource-intensive slog of bargaining on an enterprise-by-enterprise basis.
Burke’s confidence that wages will get moving, at least in a sustainable sense, incorporates an implicit assumption that there are currently “economic rents” within firms that can be costlessly reallocated to workers in the form of higher wages. That is, higher wages are possible without adverse effects on employment and absent any productivity trade-offs.
Whether there really are these economic rents in competitive industries that can be redistributed to workers is a moot point. Are there really large numbers of private sector firms currently earning supernormal profits, leaving aside mining where wages are already very high? Do the profit margins in retail or hospitality indicate that the owners of these firms are so flush with funds, particularly in the context of rising energy bills, that paying higher wages without any productivity or efficiency offsets can occur without any adverse commercial effects?
It is obvious why the unions are so keen on multi-employer bargaining because it will be much easier for wage increases to be passed on to higher prices as competitor firms are roped into the same pay and conditions for their workers. Technically speaking, the demand for labour is less elastic (responsive to changes in wages) at the industry level relative to the firm level.
The danger is that some firms will be forced out of business and inflation will accelerate.
For those who understand how labour markets work and the role that business plays, claiming better wage outcomes are possible without some trade-offs is simply naive. Until there is a focus on productivity, sustainable real wage gains will continue to elude us.
While it is possible that enterprise agreements can foster productivity growth, there are many examples of the reverse – restrictions on the right of managers to manage, the use of certain types of workers and compulsory consultation with unions. The recent NSW rail dispute is a perfect example of the potentially chilling impact of bargaining on the introduction of new technology.
In the meantime, the Reserve Bank will be watching carefully what happens to wages. Any signs that nominal wages are growing at a pace inconsistent with the bank’s inflation target will likely be met with tighter monetary policy.
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10 January, 2023
Pacific islander workers set to be joined by families in 2023-24
Pacific islanders are generally not a great problem to anyone so this is a pretty good idea. Melanesians are a particularly desirable group. I grew up with them around (mostly TIs) and rather liked them.
Polynesians can be more of a problem. Maori are Polynesians and they have a high crime rate. Polynesians such as Tongans and Samoans are however generally very religious so that has a beneficial influence. The crime rate in Tonga is a small fraction of the crime rates in African populations. See here
The Australian government has committed to enabling Pacific Australia Labour Mobility (PALM) scheme workers on one- to four-year placements to bring their families to Australia.
In a statement, the Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade said family accompaniment was "expected to commence with up to 200 families of PALM scheme workers in 2023-24".
"The location of families will depend on the interest from PALM scheme workers and employers participating in the initial phase. This may include several regions across Australia," it said.
But there is a lot to sort out before the first families arrive — Pacific Islands Council of South Australia chief executive Tukini Tavui says there are about 800 long-term PALM workers in the state alone.
He said accommodation was a hot topic during the national stakeholder consultations that ended in November. "As you would imagine, there's a lot of challenges, a lot of restrictions in that space," Mr Tavui said. "So that would obviously be a deciding factor in terms of where [the government] would start a pilot.
"And then, obviously, the family support — how do the secondary [visas work] in terms of health and education?"
The families will not have access to Medicare, meaning employers will need to organise health insurance.
Mr Tavui says Naracoorte near the border of Victoria in the south, where many long-term PALM workers are employed, could be a good place to host the first families.
"Somewhere like Naracoorte looks like it has the capacity, but accommodation would be a challenge," Mr Tavui said.
"That might be the case in a lot of our regional areas, particularly in SA."
Teys Australia employs 137 Pacific workers in Naracoorte and another 1,500 along the east coast of Australia.
The company said in a statement that it was "actively considering how it might support families from the Pacific to settle permanently in Australia".
Alongside affordable housing, schooling and health care, Teys listed welfare support, including community and church groups, as key considerations for the government.
Naracoorte-Lucindale Mayor Patrick Ross said the town would be "totally lost" without its migrant workers.
He said it would be "incredibly difficult" to house the families of workers in any region and that council was looking at strategies.
Mr Ross said schools would welcome new students with "open arms".
Mr Tavui said people had been enquiring about family accompaniment visas since early 2021. "There's clearly more than 60 per cent of workers who are here, with families back home, who'd be interested," he said. "[It] obviously comes with quite a lot of excitement."
Mr Tavui said families would likely be allowed to stay for as long as the term of an applicant's employment.
"I think, from the last conversation, there's definitely an intention to allow a family to stay in the country for the same duration as the primary visa holder, whilst obviously looking at some of the challenges around that in terms of whether the work runs out," he said.
DFAT said consultations about detailed policy design would take place in the first quarter of 2023.
"The Australian government is listening to the views of Pacific and Timor-Leste governments and other key stakeholders to shape the implementation of this policy," it said.
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New South Wales stamp duty schemes will benefit few and could push prices up, experts say
Both the New South Wales government and the opposition say they're determined to get more singles, couples and families into the housing market by altering the rules on when stamp duty is owed.
If elected in March, Labor is promising to expand the current stamp duty exemption for first homebuyers so it applies to properties up to $800,000 and offer a reduced duty on properties up to $1,000,000.
Currently stamp duty can only be waived on properties up to $650,000.
Meanwhile, the Perrottet government's stamp duty reform, which passed parliament last year, allows first homebuyers to choose between paying stamp duty or a smaller annual land tax.
It's for properties up to $1.5 million or vacant land up to $800,000 and officially comes into effect on January 16.
Both parties say their schemes leave New South Wales buyers better off but the experts aren't entirely convinced.
Stamp duty has long been criticised as the most inefficient and unproductive tax which hinders those trying to enter or remain in the property market.
And Sydney is still the most expensive place in Australia to break into the market; although the median price in many suburbs dropped by more than 20 per cent over the last year, according to Domain.
Some analysts have warned that slashing stamp duty could have unintended consequences.
Suddenly putting more money into the hands of buyers, who will in turn be able to make higher bids on houses, could push up property prices, according to policy coordinator Jesse Hermans from independent research institute Prosper Australia.
"If you give buyers more money by cutting their taxes or giving them cash grants, then that's going to up prices and then the vendors are the ones that are actually going to pocket that as an increase in house prices," Mr Hermans said.
"It's like a leaky bucket in that so much of the subsidy is leaking back towards existing property owners."
Property economist Cameron Murray also expects to see property prices climb thanks to a lighter stamp duty burden on buyers, but doesn't believe the increase will be dramatic.
He says this is because of the current decline in property values across Australia — a trend which is expected to continue through 2023 — and the fact fewer first home buyers are looking to enter the market now.
"We've just had this doubling of first home buyers in 2020 and 2021 so we're in the shadow of that and there's a finite pool of potential first home buyers that you can draw from," Mr Murray said.
"Labor's proposed $800,000 cap would also exclude many in a housing market like Sydney so the effect on prices might not be as bad as it could be."
But for many first home buyers, not having the stress of forking out for stamp duty is simply an unequivocal win.
For Noam Okewenwu, it would mean owning a home in Western Sydney six months earlier than anticipated.
He's recently been looking at properties around $400,000-$500,000 in the Canterbury area.
"Stamp duty will cost me about $15,000 dollars up-front. This is a large amount I can do without. It's definitely a no-brainer to me. This will definitely assist me in getting a home," he told the ABC.
Mr Hermans and Mr Murray predict both parties' schemes will speed things up for people like Mr Okewenwu, who are very close to buying, but won't open doors for many other hopeful homeowners.
Nevertheless, the government's First Home Buyer Choice scheme will provide valuable data on people's willingness to choose land tax over stamp duty.
A land tax has only ever been introduced in one other Australian jurisdiction, the ACT, which started its 20 year transition away from stamp duty in 2012.
Mr Murray says giving people a choice between a land tax and stamp duty is the "most minimal policy change I can think of" and believes governments would get more value from investing in more public housing.
"This is why in the 1950s and 1960s the government went and built housing, and let the tenants buy it at a discount and that's one of the ways we got home ownership up ... it increased from 42 per cent before the war to 72 per cent in the 1970s," he said.
But Mr Hermans believes Premier Dominic Perrottet's pet project will be an important test. "We really need to see some pilot projects in terms of these reforms [because] we've been struggling to get any sort of tax reform going in Australia for over a decade."
https://www.abc.net.au/news/2023-01-10/nsw-house-prices-could-rise-with-stamp-duty-changes/101838172
***************************************************A grassroots revival of conservative politics
John Howard and Peter Costello are right to remind the federal government that we are ‘robbing the future to pay for [the] present’. With Treasurer Jim Chalmers’ warning about Australia’s ageing population setting up the scene for an ‘important announcement’ (which will probably mean the stage 3 tax cuts will be removed and taxes will be increased), the time is ripe for the Coalition to put forward what they do best – reforms. Coinciding the reforms required within the party (as set out in the recent review of the party) with a policy platform based on conservative values will provide a clear distinction between Labor and the government-in-waiting. But that alone will not be enough. What is needed is a grassroots revival of conservative politics in Australia.
The green-Left’s long march through our institutions has been facilitated by conservative voices remaining silent. This is the natural disposition for conservatives, but with the green-Left dominating the echo chamber of contemporary politics, this disposition is not sustainable unless we are happy with politics becoming as one-sided as an ABC Q+A panel. But what is conservatism in the Australian context?
Conservatism in its Hobbesian sense is less about a focus on unthinking ‘tradition’ as per Fiddler on the Roof, and more about having a strong government to ensure a stable and free society. Sir Edmund Burke regarded English liberalism as better than the revolution-to-liberty path taken by the Americans and the French to what the English had already achieved through a strong state, the separation of powers, and the Westminster tradition that was stable enough to make daily life predictable, yet flexible enough to allow governments to govern. Until recently, Australia was such a place, where citizens have rights and responsibilities and individuals are rational beings best able to look after their own welfare (as per John Stuart Mill) while tolerating each other’s divergent views (as per John Locke).
This complex intertwining of conservatism and liberalism is at the heart of the Liberal Party’s ideas. Key differences between conservatives and the rest relate to the proper role of government in the economy and society. Limited government, equality of opportunity in healthcare and education, and policies towards an industry that enable profitable businesses are hallmarks of Australian political life. The conservative vision has always been one of facilitating a prosperous, cohesive, and egalitarian society where individuals are free to pursue their own idea of the good life.
However, former Prime Minister Scott Morrison suggested in the election debate that Labor is the party of visionary government. It was rather sad to hear that the Coalition’s vision under Mr Morrison had been relegated to fixing up Labor’s unfunded policy innovations. Morrison’s admission revealed a key weakness in contemporary conservative politics, one that is neither necessary nor historically the case. An economy that incentivises work, entrepreneurial activity, home ownership, and a comfortable existence have been key to conservative visions past that enabled Australians to flourish.
But in the absence of a conservative vision, the green-Left has been advocating communal living in high-density inner-city housing close to cafes and trams, powered by solar and wind, where people ride electric scooters, eat at vegan restaurants where one chooses what to pay, and generally live their lives with all their household needs outsourced to restaurants and other gig economy service providers. To be sure, there is some demand for such lifestyles, and small businesses can and do flourish in such circumstances, but this is hardly the environment to raise children and it is hardly sustainable as people age and their needs change. Yet much of our investment in infrastructure goes to supporting these lifestyles and subsidising government-mandated technologies while ignoring the regions and the primary and tertiary industries that are the true backbone of our economy.
The appeal of trendy inner-city living was lost during the pandemic lockdowns, with a major exodus from the cities to the regions. Many of my younger colleagues realised that living in a small apartment that was effectively a walk-in wardrobe was a horrid existence when there was nowhere else to go. Suddenly, home ownership became an issue and high-density apartments were revealed as little more than gilded cages.
Home ownership is increasingly a luxury for young people, but it was once a conservative-led vision that was achievable for some 70 per cent of the Australian population. While recent statistics show that overall home ownership rates remain relatively unchanged, the proportion of young people owning homes has dropped markedly. Removing obstacles to home ownership such as stamp duty are key to improving home ownership. Mortgage lending policies that restrict the ability of young people to own their first home might also be mitigated by government guarantees or some other such mechanism. But recent policies by conservative governments that remove stamp duty and replace it with land tax are not consistent with conservative values and avoid the hard work of reform we so desperately need.
Australia’s appetite for economic reform has diminished since the end of the Howard era. The goods and services tax (GST) was a major reform that transformed the Australian economy, but two of the political trade-offs are no longer serving us well. First, when the Democrats’ Meg Lees agreed to support the GST, it was not applied to all goods and services. Yet a consumption tax is the fairest way to raise revenue without disincentivising entrepreneurial activity. Earnings are not taxed as highly therefore consumers can choose to moderate their non-essential consumption rather than having their income taxed automatically beforehand. The doom and gloom that was predicted for the GST never happened. In fact, prices generally were reduced, revenue raised was higher than ever, and people were better off than ever before.
Second, the trade-offs with the states were too restrictive and stamp duty and other state-based revenues were not reduced as originally promised. As a result, removing stamp duty and replacing it with a land tax is antithetical to conservative values – how can you own your own home if you have to keep paying for it to the state government? Tax reform is low-hanging fruit for a conservative vision for Australia’s future prosperity and it will challenge Labor’s tired old higher taxes mantra.
For example, GST should be applied to all goods and services with no exceptions and no compensation, and the rate should be raised, for example, to 15 per cent. All state-based taxes such as stamp duty should be abolished and income tax rates should be adjusted to remove bracket creep and to stimulate the economy. This would (a) remove a major obstacle to home ownership, (b) remove disincentives for additional work and entrepreneurial activity, and (c) fit comfortably with conservative values. It would also go a long way to addressing the cost-of-living increases that are running rampant under Labor.
Comprehensive economic reform would also stimulate investment funding to reduce carbon emissions through nuclear energy. Nuclear would enable existing electricity generation sites to be updated and allow the existing workforces to keep their jobs and the existing transmission infrastructure to continue to be used efficiently. Labor claims nuclear is too expensive while at the same time talking up tax increases to ultimately fund, among other things, the cost overruns of Snowy Hydro 2.0 and the Rewiring the Nation policy. A conservative vision that enables technological neutrality in our energy industry while at the same time providing economic reforms that do not stifle private enterprise has all the advantages and none of the downsides of the green-left’s utopian policies.
Nuclear energy is on the cards for the Dutton-led opposition to provide a realistic alternative to the uncosted and socialist vision of our energy future, but there is more to it than just selling the technology. The green-Left’s renewables future leads inevitably to government control over private households’ energy use. Not enough has been done by conservatives to point out this obvious overreach of government power. Unlike the green-Left’s vision of a command economy, a conservative vision can be implemented with costed and adequately funded policies that achieve our social, environmental, and economic goals without reducing our individual liberties.
Saying you’ll be the same horse with a different jockey is non-policy. Simply doing the opposite of what the government of the day is doing is unoriginal. Sometimes it can be difficult to undo the legacies of past policies and it is prudent to be pragmatic rather than attempt to implement party preferences at all costs (as I have written about previously). But the Coalition’s recent electoral defeat provides an opportunity for renewal and to re-establish the conservative brand. A conservative vision should not be utopian, but it should be realistic, measurable, and demonstrably costed and funded. The same criteria can be used to debate Labor’s goals which, as per the party’s ideology, are proving already to be utopian and ultimately unrealistic.
Mr Albanese’s window of opportunity to blame the former government is now firmly shut. Climate Change Minister Chris Bowen’s swiftly sinking energy policy, the rushed jobs and skills ‘pattern bargaining’ legislation, and the obvious hard-left move to socialise industry and the economy provide a unique opportunity for conservatives to present a compelling alternative vision. This vision does not have to be at odds with the general mood of voters or conservative values. But it does require the support of a grassroots movement to counter the green-Left echo-chamber that dominates the news media, academia, big corporates, and the legal profession.
To be sure, Liberals past have tried to protect free speech and academic freedom, but in the absence of a critical mass of conservative voices in the public sphere, winning the hearts and minds of voters is going to require a concerted and sustained effort. Doing so must stem from political leadership and a willingness to defend conservative values and those conservatives who choose to speak out. This is no mean feat with the green-Left’s cohort of gatekeepers ready to shut down anyone who dares question green-Left orthodoxy.
Meanwhile, the left’s utopian policies are already leading us towards a dystopian reality. Only a grassroots revival of conservative politics will facilitate a compelling alternative vision to enable Australians and their families to truly remain one and free.
https://spectator.com.au/2023/01/a-grassroots-revival-of-conservative-politics/ ?
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Jim Chalmers meets with global counterparts to discuss economic coercion, flow-on effects of Russia
Mostly talking about how to deal with China
Treasurer Jim Chalmers has joined his counterparts from the United States, United Kingdom, Canada and New Zealand in calling for co-operation in the face of the “threat and use of economic coercion”.
At a meeting of the Five Finance Ministers, chaired by US Treasury Secretary Janet L. Yellen, perspectives on global economic challenges were swapped.
While the focus of the meeting was around the ongoing economic ramifications of Russia’s illegal war on Ukraine, and the ongoing supply chain constraints caused by China’s Covid-19 management, the group also discussed the threat – and use – of economic coercion.
In a readout, Secretary Yellen said she had “underscored the importance” of close co-operation among partners and allies “to secure our economies”.
“The ministers also discussed the need for co-operation to respond to the threat and use of economic coercion,” the readout said.
“The ministers look forward to future engagements and reaffirmed their commitment to deepen co-operation to further shared priorities in the Indo-Pacific and beyond.”
Discussions of economic coercion have ramped up in recent years, and just last week Japan – as the current head of the G7 – called on the group’s other members to take a co-ordinated approach in cracking down on China’s “economic coercion”.
China’s economic moves in recent years, such as suspending imports of Australian coal and wine, and Taiwanese pineapples, prompted Japan’s Economy Minister Yasutoshi Nishimura to call the actions a “clear and present danger” for global economies.
Secretary Yellen said the group had discussed the need to develop greater resilience against global supply chain disruptions caused by Russia’s war, the ongoing effects of the Covid-19 pandemic, and other factors”.
In his own statement, Dr Chalmers said the meeting was a “really valuable opportunity” to discuss the current state of the international economy, and look to how we can work together to respond to challenges”.
“While each of our nations enters 2023 from our own unique position, we all realise this year is going to be a very tough one for our economies and the global economy more broadly,” he said.
“Co-operation through the Five Finance Ministers group is especially valuable given the uncertain global environment – the insights gleamed from engagements like this one will assist as we continue to prepare for the May Budget over coming months.”
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9 January, 2023
Anthony Albanese fires off a VERY cranky tweet as he's hit with a list of 15 questions he 'must' answer about the Aboriginal Voice to Parliament
Prime Minister Anthony Albanese has slammed Peter Dutton after the Opposition Leader sent the PM a list of questions asking for detail about his proposed Aboriginal Voice to Parliament.
Mr Albanese is hoping the country will support Labor's proposed parliamentary advisory body at a referendum later this year, but the plan has come under fire for lacking an explanation of just how it would work.
On Sunday, Mr Dutton accused the PM was treating Australians 'like mugs' and demanded Labor flesh out its plan by answering 15 questions about the make-up of the proposed Voice and its function.
Mr Albanese issued a furious tweet late on Sunday fuming about how Mr Dutton published his questions in an open letter to the media, when the pair had caught up and privately chatted at the cricket last week.
'So even though I talked with Peter Dutton on Friday at the McGrath Foundation event, he gives a letter to multiple media outlets as 'exclusive' on constitutional recognition and the Ulu?u Statement- a letter I still haven't seen,' Mr Albanese tweeted. 'People are over cheap culture war stunts.'
Mr Dutton hit back several hours later. 'You’ve had 7 months to answer questions. Friday at the McGrath Breast Cancer fundraiser wasn’t the place to discuss. Happy to talk anytime when you have the detail,' he replied.
Mr Dutton said his letter was issued on behalf of millions of Aussies 'who just want the detail'.
He claimed his rival was 'making a catastrophic mistake' by not providing 'accessible, clear and complete' information on the proposed Voice.
Mr Dutton added the government risked losing the referendum should they not let the public know exactly what it was voting for and believed the proposed voice will fail if questions aren't answered.
'People have got reasonable questions. There are many Australians if they had detail in front of them about a particular model, they could support the voice,' Mr Dutton told reporters on Sunday.
'You can't just say to the Australian public as the prime minister, 'you vote at an election ... on a Saturday and we'll give you the detail on the Monday'. It's a very serious decision to change our Constitution.'
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Liberal review heads in the Right direction
After considerable media teasing, the-anticipated report into the Liberal Party’s electoral failure last May has finally been released.
Conducted by former Liberal federal director Brian Loughnane and current federal frontbencher Jane Hume, the report exposes the ugly reality of what the Liberal party has become: a valueless, directionless, rudderless political and ideological ship.
Most of the pre-release commentary focused on the leaked findings: the election was a referendum on Scott Morrison and the Liberals failed to counter Labor and the Broad Left’s defining of him (although, admittedly, on Morrison the Left pretty well got him right); the party is too pale, male, and stale; there are too few women and ‘ethnic’ candidates for preselection and party leadership roles; that state divisions of the party are unfit for purpose and can’t organise a knees-up in a brewery; that targets for greater female representation be set, but not mandatory quotas.
But the really significant recommendations don’t relate to the media fodder.
Instead, they hone in on what is the Liberal Party’s fundamental weakness: it has forgotten what it stands for.
Hume and Loughnane highlight how the Morrison government tossed Liberal values and ideology to the wind in the face of responding to Covid in 2020 and 2021. They stress how important it now is for Liberals to rediscover and return to the party’s intellectual roots – not simply pay lip service to Menzies and his ‘forgotten people’ broadcasts – and once again become a party of the centre-Right. They rightly advocate the Liberals giving Australians a viable and reliable alternative to an increasingly hard-Left Labor.
If anything, however, Hume and Loughnane underestimate the magnitude of the Liberal challenge to resist the Left elite zeitgeist.
The Broad Left – Labor, Greens, Teals, like-minded independents, and loony-Left micro-parties – now constitute a strong and near-permanent electoral majority. That ugly reality is highlighted by Anthony Albanese becoming Prime Minister on a Labor primary vote of 32 per cent. In two-party preferred terms, in the May federal election preferences flowed to Labor two to one, compared to the Coalition. The electoral numbers are stacked against parties of the Right generally.
If the Liberals are ever to be in federal government again, they must do two things above all else. First, they must redefine their traditional liberal-conservative values in a mid-21st century context. Small-c conservative values, notably smaller government, market capitalism, and promoting individual freedoms in exchange for individuals taking personal responsibility for their choices and actions, are timeless and enduring, and remain as relevant now as they were in the time of Burke and Mill. On this, Hume and Loughnane have outlined a path ahead.
Second, and far tougher, is instilling and promoting traditional Liberal values in the generations that will dominate the electoral calculus until mid-century: the Millennials and Generation Z.
Millennials, especially, are the best-educated generation in our history. Until Covid struck, they lives in period of seemingly perpetually prosperity and affluence. They were too young to remember the Keating recession, and near 20 per cent interest rates. They never had it so good, one might say.
Ominously for the Liberals, they are also proving to be the most solidly, and stubbornly, Left generation in our history as well as the best-educated, a contradiction more sensible Boomer minds find hard to fathom.
Instead of growing more conservative as they go through life, as older generations including Boomers have, Millennials are clinging to the Left shibboleths of their youth. On climate change. On trendy social issues like transgenderism. On Big Brother, big taxing, anti-free market government. Demonstrating unabashed admiration for that naïve, Chauncey Gardner-like prophet of doom, Greta Thunberg.
Unless the Liberal party can find a way of translating the traditional and timeless values of the centre-Right into a form that Millennials and later voter generations can embrace, the Liberal goose may well be cooked. This isn’t to say it must accept the Broad Left reality: rather the Liberal challenge is to understand the Millennial mindset, and marry Liberal values to it.
Younger Liberals like new Victorian state MP, Institute of Public Affairs alumnus Evan Mulholland, have put their finger on a possible Millennial touchpoint. Mulholland urges a focus on helping younger voters getting a firm place on the housing ownership ladder, giving them a greater stake in their own lives and their own communities.
But that’s only a start if the Liberal party is to survive long-term as a part of government.
Sunlight is the best disinfectant, and the Hume-Loughnane report is sunlight for the Liberal Party. It is a big step in the right direction, and the Right direction. The risk is, however, that factional warlords, careerists, and blowhards in both the parliamentary party and party organisation do their level best to hang on to their internal influence and shut the window to the sunlight.
They must not be allowed to prosper. If they do, the Broad Left will dominate our politics for a generation or more
https://spectator.com.au/2022/12/liberal-review-heads-in-the-right-direction/
*******************************************************The death of the presumption of innocence
The year 2022 may be behind us but the appalling circumstances surrounding the Brittany Higgins affair remain unresolved. From the moment news of the alleged rape of Ms Higgins became public, the presumption of innocence was sacrificed on the ‘believe-all-women’ altar. That the allegation was announced twelve months out from a federal election, that the alleged rape took place in the Parliament House office of a Liberal party minister and that Ms Higgins and the accused were Liberal staffers, provided a golden opportunity for base political instincts to override any statutory obligation or sense of duty.
No doubt conscious of heightened political and media interest and, seeking maximum publicity, two years after the alleged event occurred, Ms Higgins and her media-savvy boyfriend, David Sharaz, timed an interview with Network 10 broadcaster, Lisa Wilkinson, to coincide with the sitting of federal parliament. They got the response they wanted.
Then shadow attorney-general Mark Dreyfus, now the nation’s chief law officer, was quick to see political mileage. In his adjournment speech, he praised ‘demonstrations across our nation, (where) tens of thousands of women and their supporters marched and spoke for justice’. He referenced some of the placards, saying ‘on one, were the stark words, “Stop raping women,” on another, “Enough is enough”’.
‘It’s very clear the Prime Minister has made looking after Liberal party mates his main focus, – not looking after women…’.
The accused was plainly guilty, a conclusion endorsed by 2021 Australian of the Year, Grace Tame, who declared Brittany Higgins a ‘survivor’.
And if that wasn’t proof enough, former prime minister Scott Morrison, demonstrating his contempt for the presumption of innocence, brought the full authority of his office to bear by offering a fulsome apology to the alleged victim saying, ‘I am sorry. We are sorry. I am sorry to Ms Higgins for the terrible things that took place here’.
Despite the popular ‘guilty’ narrative, the federal police advised the director of public prosecutions there was insufficient evidence to prosecute. DPP Shane Drumgold ignored this advice, arguing, ‘there is too much political interference’. So a trial ensued. Then, with the criminal case in full swing, Lisa Wilkinson felt the need to maintain the lynch-mob rage by using an address at a Logie awards night to praise Brittany Higgins. So contemptuous of the court proceedings was she that ACT Supreme Court Chief Justice Lucy McCallum, ‘regrettably, and with gritted teeth’, postponed the trial by several months saying, ‘What concerns me most… is that the distinction between an allegation and a finding of guilt has been completely obliterated…. The implicit premise of (Wilkinson’s speech) is to celebrate the truthfulness of the story she exposed.’
After the trial was aborted and before the re-trial commenced, Mr Drumgold announced that he would no longer prosecute the case, even though he clung to his belief that there was a reasonable chance of conviction, as he had to weigh the effects of a second trial on Ms Higgins’s poor mental health. Presumably, in forgoing a conviction he took into consideration the risks to other vulnerable women.
And while the DPP judged Ms Higgins not well enough to continue with the prosecution, five days after abandoning the case Higgins declared she was willing to appear as a witness ‘to defend the truth’ in any defamation case brought by the defendant.
This calls DPP Drumgold’s judgement further into question and whether he himself was politically influenced.
In an address to graduates at the University of Canberra in April 2021, he wore his heart on his sleeve when he referred to Aboriginal people as ‘currently amongst the most imprisoned and disadvantaged people on the face of the planet’. Perhaps, given his own underprivileged background, he instinctively aligns with alleged victims regardless of evidence.
And in dropping the case, was he aware that nine days later, the Albanese government, having eschewed proper mediation procedures, would settle Ms Higgins’s claims against the Commonwealth and former ministers Linda Reynolds and Michaelia Cash for a rumoured $3 million?
Incredibly, in consideration for taxpayers meeting their legal expenses, neither former minister attended the mediation, notwithstanding both hotly contest Higgins’s claims of mistreatment while in their employ. And, disregarding taxpayers’ right to know, at Ms Higgins’s request, settlement details remain confidential.
Where is the outrage? The opposition remains conspicuously silent. So too most of the media and the legal profession.
So, while the accuser pockets millions of dollars, the accused remains presumed guilty by the federal parliament and the media and, is denied the opportunity to clear his name in court. What of his future?
To manage political fallout, the ACT government will hold an inquiry which will investigate the conduct of the prosecution, the defence and police, to ‘ensure the ACT justice system was robust and fair after both parties made allegations’.
Meanwhile, the Australian Federal Police Association accuses DPP Drumgold of attempting to ‘smear’ the AFP while the DPP alleges that police engaged in ‘a very clear campaign’ to pressure him not to prosecute. Without the case continuing, we will never know whether the DPP’s initial decision to proceed was sound.
No doubt the inquiry will find that the ACT justice system is fair and robust. The terms of reference will ensure that. But it will shine little light on the true state of justice in the ACT or, for that matter, Australia. Contempt for the constitution and human rights during the pandemic and the trials of Cardinal George Pell are more reliable indicators.
Indeed, the cynical forces behind party and identity politics which captured the Brittany Higgins case, clearly demonstrate that modern day authoritarians, guided by their ideological preferences, are prepared to bastardise the faithful application of objective laws.
Which begs the question, is the political-legal-media class now so captured that it is prepared to idly watch as the application of the rule of law and the pursuit of justice without fear or favour – the cornerstone of democracy – are effectively consigned to the dustbin of history?
As we enter 2023, if silence is any guide, the answer is ‘yes’.
https://spectator.com.au/2023/01/me-too-justice/
***************************************************Australian carbon credit scheme is controversial
An official review of Australia’s $4.5bn carbon credit market has rejected allegations the scheme was a rort, concluding the system was “essentially sound” but needs an overhaul across regulation and transparency to boost public confidence.
Energy Minister Chris Bowen appointed former chief scientist Ian Chubb in July 2022 to carry out a review of Australia’s carbon credit scheme following allegations by whistleblower Andrew Macintosh that a majority of credits issued by the Clean Energy Regulator were flawed.
The Australian Carbon Credit Units scheme has attracted considerable criticism from environmental groups and others associated with the program, who say it is wasting taxpayer funds without cutting carbon emissions.
However, the official Chubb Review released on Monday found the ACCU scheme was essentially sound and it had not found evidence of widespread problems in the sector.
“In recent times, the integrity of the scheme has been called into question – it has been argued that the level of abatement has been overstated, that ACCUs are therefore not what they are meant to be, so that the policy is not effective,” the Review found.
“The Panel does not share this view. While the Panel was provided with some evidence supporting that position, it was also provided with evidence to the contrary.”
The Review found there may be several reasons for the “polar-opposite” views.
“One is likely to be a lack of transparency, meaning that third parties cannot access the relevant data and so different conclusions can be drawn, and all genuinely held.”
Still, the review led by the former chief scientist has suggested breaking up the powers currently managed by the Clean Energy Regulator in order to boost the effectiveness of the scheme with separation of governance, ACCU purchasing and method development functions.
The Australian Government purchasing of ACCUs “should be moved out of the CER and into another Australian Government body to avoid actual or perceived conflicts of interest,” the Review found.
“The multiple roles of the CER, in developing methods, regulating projects and issuing ACCUs, and administering government purchase of ACCUs, results in potential conflicts of interest and risks reduced confidence in scheme arrangements and governance.”
It also called for legislative changes to maximise transparency, data access and data sharing “to support greater public trust and confidence in scheme arrangements.”
Among 16 recommendations made in the Review are for no new project registrations be allowed under the current avoided deforestation method and the Emissions Reduction Assurance Committee should be re-established as the Carbon Abatement Integrity Committee “as soon as practicable” with adjusted terms of reference, membership and functions.
The federal government has accepted in principle all 16 recommendations and said it would consider funding arrangements to implement the changes through the 2023-24 budget.
The Carbon Market Institute said it was critical to “align and escalate public and private investments” in industrial decarbonisation and emission reductions across the economy.
“This is a scheme that has developed and evolved over more than a decade, and investors and the community should be encouraged by the Independent Review Panel’s findings that its framework is sound, and the proposed improvements can also now be embedded to ensure a more transparent, robust system that can be scaled up,” CMI chief executive John Connor said.
The review followed criticisms by Mr Macintosh, an academic at ANU and the ex-head of the government’s Emissions Reduction Assurance Committee. Professor Macintosh has described the carbon market as “largely a sham” and said the majority of carbon credits did not represent real cuts to emissions.
More recent analysis by investment house Allan Gray concluded concerns about the integrity of the ACCU scheme were “valid and warrant further investigation”.
Some 30 per cent of ASX 200 companies use carbon credits to reduce their emissions – almost half specifically note their use of ACCUs, Allan Gray found.
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8 January, 2023
At last: An infuential voice against medical censorship
Dr Kerryn Phelps AM has been a household name in Australia since the 1990s. I remember well her frequent appearances as a guest on television, in her role as the then President of the AMA, the Australian Medical Association. In a career of advocacy that few medical professionals will ever have, the former MP has combined a sharp intellect with a concern for the community and a stage presence where necessary.
On Tuesday, however, she was trending for quite different reasons, following a bombshell article regarding her submission to the federal government’s Long Covid Enquiry. Phelps described the ‘devastating’ experience of her wife, Jackie Stricker-Phelps, who suffered multiple persistent neurological symptoms following her first Pfizer dose. Unfortunately, Phelps went on to suffer a cluster of difficult cardiovascular symptoms with her second dose of the same. Judging by the way her message resonated with large sections of the online community, although some predictably interpreted her honesty as dangerous ‘anti-vaxx’ sentiment, it is clear that Phelps was giving a voice to many whose similar suffering has been compounded by isolation and lack of acknowledgment from doctors. She frankly identifies what could be the root cause of this hesitancy on the part of doctors: ‘Regulators … have censored public discussion about adverse events following immunisation, with threats to doctors.’
The protracted crisis brought about by SARS-CoV-2 has revealed much to everyday Australians about how government and health care interact in Australia. But if our situation is indeed that medical censorship has been impacting on the care of patients, the condition of Australian Medicine is both serious and complex. At AMPS, the Australian Medical Professional Society, we believe that is indeed the case, but it is necessary to dissect back to some core issues and first principles.
With very few exceptions, the doctor has the greater share of knowledge in the doctor-patient relationship. However, this asymmetry is balanced out by the doctor’s fiduciary duty to put the interests of the individual patient first, together with the fact that the patient holds the power to accept or reject any advice. The concept of free informed consent also entails a duty of candour and disclosure on behalf of the doctor, who must therefore be free of any conflict of interest.
As many have clearly identified, a culture of fear has entered into Health Practice in Australia, which directly relates to a Joint Statement from AHPRA [Australian Health Practitioner Regulation Agency] and the National Boards on March 9, 2021. Our thoughts were expressed in a letter to AHPRA CEO, Mr Martin Fletcher, dated April 14, 2022: ‘AHPRA’s gag orders impede professional health advice and patient advocacy based on individual patient risk/benefit assessment by labelling such professional advice “the promotion of anti-vaccination statements”, “health advice which contradicts the best available scientific evidence” or “seeking to undermine the national immunisation campaign”.’
Whether your GP or Specialist, Nurse or Chiropractor, has analysed the Joint Statement is not necessarily relevant: it is impossible for clinicians to be unaware of the dangers posed to them by what Phelps calls ‘threats to doctors’. Compounded by other cultural factors in the pandemic, this becomes the basis for understanding the conflict of interest which has been created in practitioner-patient relationships across this country, which may play out in different ways. For example, if the health practitioner has clinical concerns from a critical appraisal of Covid vaccinations, formulated through his or her knowledge or experience, then that health practitioner risks damaging consequences through regulatory action every time he or she exercises their clear duty of candour, inherent in the practitioner-patient contract. Alternatively, that practitioner may elect to not disclose their concerns, which is potentially breach of their contract.
A further scenario must be discussed also: a clinician who is aware of the dangers to his or her career, may elect to never to engage with any material or discussion in their personal research or interactions with colleagues and patients, if that material or discussion seems to go against the thrust of the national immunisation campaign and related public health goals and directions. This may absolve the clinician superficially. However, it is an outworking of a culture of censorship and a conflict of interest, in which many patients will feel frustrated and undermined in the therapeutic relationship, for example when trying to deal with vaccine adverse events or persistent problems which they attribute to vaccination.
Hence, although many of us believe the Joint Statement of AHPRA and the National Boards to be unlawful, it is at the root of a dangerous shift in Australian Medicine. Furthermore, AMPS believes that Australians need to be aware of changes to the National Law for Health Practitioner Regulation introduced in October in the Queensland Parliament. We believe these changes further supplant the place of the individual in Australian Medicine and distort the clinician-patient relationship. To step up our advocacy in this matter, our members are speaking out on the ‘Stop Medical Censorship’ National Tour.
Public health considerations should always be weighed appropriately, but once a therapeutic relationship is entered into, the individual can never be supplanted by any notion of public health. However strongly this notion is appealed to, it can never outweigh a doctor’s duties of candour, disclosure and informed consent. The doctor-patient relationship cannot lawfully be redefined by any interest or priority that conflicts with the best care of the patient, in that doctor’s best assessment. If conditions producing a serious compromise or conflict of interest become embedded in the long term, then a cultural shift in the Australian Medicine will have taken place, to the detriment of doctor, patient and public alike.
With these things in view, the honesty of Dr Kerryn Phelps, coming as she does from the Medical Establishment of this country, could not be more critically needed. The issues highlighted by her courageous submission, most especially the assertion of medical censorship in Australia, should be afforded the attention of all who care about this country and should transcend the left and right of politics. As difficult as her own journey as a patient must have been, together with the devastating experience of her wife Jackie, given the far-reaching implications of medical censorship, this could prove to be the most significant piece of advocacy of her career.
https://spectator.com.au/2022/12/phelps-breaks-ahpras-culture-of-fear/
*******************************************************Complete Renewable energy is impossible
The replacement of fossil fuels (and nuclear) by wind and solar is said to be a ‘transition’ implying, like that from sail to steam and horse to motor power, that this is being inexorably pushed by consumers adopting a lower cost technology. In fact, the ‘transition’, wherever it is taking place, is due to government subsidies and regulations. Not one significant unit of wind or solar power generation anywhere in the world has been installed without such assistance.
Moreover, a wind/solar-rich electricity system requires expensive features that are naturally present or available at a trivial cost in systems dominated by coal, gas, or nuclear generation. Among these are ‘system strength’ and frequency control, both of which are automatically present in the ‘synchronous’ spinning machines in coal, gas, and nuclear plants but need to be carefully managed and separately arranged for the ‘asynchronous’ wind and solar facilities.
A solar/wind system also requires considerably more transmission – probably at least four times as much as conventional systems – in order to bring electricity from the inescapably less dense solar and wind facilities. Compared to the current value of the national transmission system of $21 billion, the government has stated that $100 billion (an additional ‘$20 billion direct investment unlocking $58 billion of private co-financing’) will be needed to make a renewable rich national transmission system fit for purpose.
But the greatest cost is how to ensure a system based on variable wind and solar energy can operate to the standards required of a contemporary society. The solution is first, to overbuild the variable facilities in the hope that this will offer a geographic spread to iron-out erratic supplies of sunshine and wind, and secondly to arrange for storage through batteries or pumped hydro facilities like the Snowy 2.
For Australia, a ballpark cost estimate is offered by CSIRO’s Chief Energy Economist Paul Graham, who reckons Australia will need to spend $500 billion to convert the current (coal-based) system to renewables. This is half the cost he estimated five years ago.
$500 billion is twice the value of the current system, (offset by coal and gas fuel savings that amount to perhaps 5 per cent of total costs). Even so, the CSIRO appear to have massively understated the cost.
David Wojick examined the estimated costs of batteries for America. Noting that at present Tesla charges $US650,000 per megawatt hour for the batteries themselves and that a ‘fantastically low estimate’ of future costs offered by the US National Renewable Energy Laboratory speculates this may fall to $US143,000 per megawatt hour, the battery costs for the US would be $US150 trillion and $US36 trillion respectively. That is for a $US23 trillion economy.
Batteries have only a ten-year life. Thus, without even counting their progressive deterioration, this means in the US the energy ‘transition’ element of electricity storage alone would cost somewhere between 24 and 60 per cent of GDP per year. On top of this we have the poles and wire costs and the costs of the wind/solar generators themselves.
Such extraordinary estimates should come as no surprise in Australia.
Paul McArdle, head of the highly regarded consultancy WattClarity, showed that even if there was an overbuild resulting in up to 20 per cent of the wind having to be wasted at any one time, with a perfectly planned and operated system 9,000,000 megawatt hours of storage would be needed. This is equivalent to 25 Snowy 2 installations or 70,000 of the original Hornsdale batteries at a price tag of $6.3 trillion or close to three times the Australian GDP. With a ten-year battery life, this would require an impossible annual expenditure on the battery element of supply equivalent to 30 per cent of GDP each year!
This estimate has received corroboration.
ARENA is funding eight batteries costing $2.7 billion and totalling 2,000 megawatts (power output capacity) with 4,200 megawatt hours (energy storage depth). That is just two hours of full output to flatten the batteries. 2,000 megawatts is five per cent of total grid demand in 2030, when AEMO’s forecast maximum demand is 44,000 megawatts.
Most experts believe a seven-day storage depth is the bare minimum to back up a reliable renewables grid. One week of 168 hours and multiplied by maximum demand means 7,392,000 megawatt hours in 2030. Given the announcement’s cost of $2.7 billion per 4,200 megawatt hours of storage, this is $643,000 per megawatt hour. Multiplying this ratio by the total storage required gives an eye-watering cost estimate of $4.7 trillion in 2030 or, with a ten-year battery life, 22 per cent of GDP each year.
Subsidies to wind and solar have resulted in them replacing coal to gain a 20 per cent share of electricity generation. This has already resulted in a trebling of wholesale prices. But the costs of accommodating wind and solar increase exponentially and continuing along this path will cripple the economy.
https://spectator.com.au/2022/12/batteries-not-included/
*************************************************Victimized men
Bettina Arndt
It was 2014 when I first heard from Andrew, a young Queensland dad, who was being denied contact with his two young girls. From then on, he wrote regularly updating me on his eight-year Family Court marathon, where he lost round after round, despite his wife being declared an unfit mother after a court-ordered psychiatric assessment. She very effectively used false violence accusations to get away with moving with the children interstate and endlessly dragging out the legal proceedings.
Two weeks ago, he killed himself. Since I heard the tragic news, I’ve been trawling through his old emails, so sad that this good man had lost all hope.
I also recently learned that last month another of my correspondents took his life. He first wrote to me a few years ago after being shocked by his treatment at an ACT police station when he tried to report an assault by his partner on him and his young daughter. He was told by police, ‘You don’t really want to report it. Go home and sort it out.’ When he tried to talk to his wife, she left with his daughter and took out a violence order against him. ‘You cannot believe the despair that fathers of this country are in,’ he said.
I’ve been haunted by the deaths of these two men, wishing I could have done more. The last message I received from Andrew earlier this year ended this way: ‘Your blogs are a ray of sunshine to me. In a very foreboding, stormy ocean you’re a beacon of hope and of understanding.’
Despite our despair at the overwhelming stormy ocean, we can’t afford to give up. I am more convinced than ever that we need to give men reason to believe that one day things will change. While it’s true there’s no hope of swiftly bringing down the mighty feminist edifice currently making life intolerable for so many men, I have to believe that by exposing the injustice eventually we will win over the huge majority of men and women who care about fair treatment of men and boys.
For now, that means taking solace even in small victories, savouring every sign of the slightest breakthrough. It is critical we get organised, bringing together all the small organisations working to help men, to work together to chip away at the current anti-male prejudice and injustice.
This year, we saw the first sign of a concerted international fightback against the feminist domestic violence industry. DAVIA (Domestic Abuse and Violence International Alliance is a new coalition of organisations promoting domestic violence and abuse policies that are science-based, family-affirming, and sex-inclusive. Launched late 2021, this has expanded from a handful of participant groups to 70 organisations from 24 countries coordinating campaigns to challenge the anti-male bile around domestic violence being promoted by international bodies across the world.
The United Nations is a classic example. This year DAVIA actually managed to block passage of two typically anti-male UN resolutions after issuing a press release which exposed their crazy thinking. Like the claim that ‘women are 14 times more likely to die in a climate catastrophe than men,’ – a nonsense statistic included in a UN resolution allegedly exploring ‘the nexus between the climate crisis, environmental degradation, and related displacement, and violence against women and girls’. Days after the DAVIA issued their worldwide press release highlighting what the UN was up to, the resolution was removed from the agenda.
No big deal? Arguably there’s little cause for concern about the UN’s posturing. As UK journalist James Delingpole writes, ‘The UN is a terrible organisation: a bloated talking shop for technocrats, bureaucrats, kleptocrats, third-world beggars, globalists, socialists, and other overindulged, grasping cry-bullies, meddlers, and no-hopers.’
But Delingpole points out that, despite UN founding articles requiring equal rights for men and women, the organisation persists in ‘picking on men and blaming them for everything that is wrong’.
That matters. These big international organisations are helping create the zeitgeist that pushes lawmakers into passing more and more draconian legislation targeting men, that prevents judges from allowing fathers contact with their children after cooked-up violence allegations, that green lights propaganda into our schools presenting boys as villains and girls as victims and that encourages despairing men to give up hope.
That’s why DAVIA’s work is important. Just last month DAVIA coordinated activities celebrating November 18 as The International Day for the Elimination of Violence Against Men, with activities and media events in Argentina, India, Ireland, Lithuania, Northern Ireland, Peru, Spain, United Kingdom, the United States, and in Australia.
A global Twitter campaign was launched to promote the hashtag, #StopViolenceOnMen with over 36,000 tweets sent out over a four-day period. In India, the #StopViolenceOnMen hashtag trended, ranking in ninth place among all hashtags.
Then there were the women in Argentina who invaded the offices of the Minister for Women protesting for Falsely Accused Day on September 9, another event coordinated internationally by DAVIA. I loved the feisty language – here translated from Spanish – in their letter to the Minister: ‘Even so, you, Madam Minister, together with your cohort of ideologues, officials, and communicators, will surely insist on denying that false complaints exist, that thousands of men are victims of them, and that the infamous judicial industry that feeds this order, is causing unparalleled harm to the rule of law.’
Making this all happen is Ed Bartlett who has been working for many years promoting fair treatment for men. He’s the one who started the ball rolling to put together an international coalition to tell the truth about female violence.
Under Ed’s guidance, DAVIA is currently launching an ambitious project in January to block the expansion of the Istanbul Convention (IC) in Europe, a treaty ostensibly intended to combat violence against women in Europe. You may remember the fuss two years ago when the Hungarian Parliament rejected the ratification of this dreadful treaty declaring that the measure promoted ‘destructive gender ideologies’.
Too right. The IC treaty reeks of feminist ideology, promoting the usual tired dogma about domestic violence being caused by power imbalances that favour men over women. As Stephen Baskerville explains, ‘The Convention has nothing to do with violent crime. It is a political innovation that promotes radical political ideology. Under the guise of protecting crime victims, it institutionalises sexual ideology and transfers dangerous powers to activists engaged in gender warfare against the family, religious freedom, men, and civil liberties.’
Now it looks like the Convention is in trouble. Nine years after the IC came into force in 2014, Bulgaria, Czechia, Hungary, Latvia, Lithuania, and Slovakia have not ratified the treaty, Turkey withdrew in 2021, and Poland has announced its plan to withdraw.
Ed Bartlett has firm plans to ensure this is only the beginning. His recent email announced DAVIA is in communication with the groups in Bulgaria and other Eastern European countries that led the fight to block the Istanbul Convention in their countries. He’s also learned that, in Israel, the powerful Likud Party has agreed to not join the IC.
Not bad, eh? Here’s DAVIA’s latest summary of everything that is wrong with the Istanbul Convention. And if your organisation would like to join forces with DAVIA, you can get more information here: davia@endtodv.org.
If we pull together, there’s much we can do to ensure the New Year brings better times for men
https://www.spectator.com.au/2023/01/the-power-of-many/
***************************************************Chinese ban on Australian coal about to end
China’s state-owned companies have begun reaching out to Australian coal exporters to revive trade within months, as Beijing moves to end its two-year ban amid worries about winter energy shortages and mounting costs on China’s steel industry.
Trade Minister Don Farrell did not comment on the unravelling of China’s coal black-listing – the centrepiece of a $20bn economic coercion campaign against Canberra – which was conveyed to Chinese industry at a private meeting in Beijing and has not been made official.
But industry sources told The Australian that traders had been approached by a small number of Chinese state-owned enterprises in recent weeks, inquiring about the availability and price of cargoes of Australian coal.
Chinese Premier Li Keqiang on Wednesday said “stronger efforts should be made to ensure safe and stable energy supply”, a further sign that President Xi Jinping had greenlit the backflip.
“As the momentum of economic recovery and stable growth continues, energy demand is on the rise,” Mr Li said in comments released after a meeting of the country’s State Council.
China’s National Development and Reform Commission told three central government-backed energy companies and the country’s biggest steelmaker, Baowu, on Tuesday that they would be allowed to resume Australian coal imports, according to separate reports by Bloomberg and Reuters.
The unwinding of the ban – which comes amid reports of power failures in Heilongjiang, in China’s freezing northeast – would be the first backdown in Beijing’s trade coercion campaign against Australia, which spanned coal, timber, lobster, cotton, beef, barley and wine. Most of Beijing’s black-listing was never official.
The Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade said it was aware of reports about lifting of the ban, but indicated it had not received confirmation by Chinese officials.
“It has been the Australian government’s consistent view that the resumption of normal trade across the board between Australia and China would be in both countries’ best interests. That is true also of coal,” a DFAT spokeswoman said. “Meanwhile, the Australian coal industry has been highly successful in finding alternative markets.”
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6 January, 2023
‘Good on her’: Thorpe backs Price over calls for more details on Voice
A Green/conservative axis! Sure death for the referendum
Greens senator Lidia Thorpe has praised Coalition senator and leading No campaigner Jacinta Nampijinpa Price for calling for more transparency around the Voice to parliament as she insisted the party still did not have a final position on whether it will support the referendum.
As the Greens’ spokeswoman on First Nations issues, Thorpe said that while she and Price approached the Voice from “a completely different angle”, they shared a similar scepticism about the need for another advisory body and the Indigenous leaders “handpicked” by the Albanese government to steer the process.
“Both of us in our collective experience have seen numerous advisory bodies try and fix things and fail. She has also seen the hand-picked spokespeople for our people, who she doesn’t agree with, and nor do I,” Thorpe told this masthead.
“I think transparency and accountability through any process that this country wants to take about making a decision on our lives is paramount – and I think that’s what Jacinta is bringing out and good on her.”
Thorpe added that people needed to respect there was not a singular homogeneous view across the Indigenous community, saying: “We have different ways that we think would bring this country together. Jacinta has hers and I, through the black grassroots movement in this country, have another way.”
Price – who has argued the Voice proposal lacks detail, is racially divisive and will add only another bureaucratic layer to failed governance structures in Indigenous communities – is expected to join forces with conservative Indigenous commentator Warren Mundine to spearhead the No case in the lead-up to the referendum, which is due in the second half of this year.As the Nationals’ sole Indigenous MP, Price’s strident opposition to the Voice was a key factor in the party room’s decision last year to formally oppose it, which triggered the defection of Calare MP Andrew Gee, a Voice supporter, to the crossbench.
Replacing Gee on the opposition frontbench on Wednesday, veteran Nationals MP Darren Chester said he was not against the concept of the Voice but believed it was a “step too far” to enshrine this body in the Constitution, saying it could be legislated instead.
The Greens’ policy position is to progress all three elements of the Uluru Statement from the Heart – – the Voice to parliament, a treaty with Indigenous people, and a truth-telling process – while demanding Labor implement the outstanding recommendations from the decades-old Royal Commission into Aboriginal Deaths in Custody and the Bringing them Home report.
But in comments that add to the confusion around the Greens’ policy, Thorpe said it was incorrect to characterise the party’s position as broadly supportive of the Voice.
“That’s not the position. The position is that we’re in negotiation and that we’re not going to say that we support something when that undermines our negotiation power,” she said.
“So we don’t support anything. We don’t support a No campaign, we don’t support a Yes campaign until we see Labor action those recommendations that save our people’s lives and provides a guarantee that our sovereignty won’t be ceded.”
She called for Labor “to provide legal evidence” from an international constitutional expert that Indigenous sovereignty would not be ceded by being “incorporated into the colonial Constitution”, adding: “If we get evidence to the contrary – and we don’t have an opportunity for treaties – then we are doing the wrong thing.”
Attorney-General Mark Dreyfus said the Voice would not have any impact on sovereignty, but would instead “improve the lives of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Australians. It will ensure the government hears from local communities about local solutions and how to address existing policies that aren’t working”.
Thorpe’s hardline negotiating position has been criticised by Voice advocates as political gamesmanship, including by high-profile Aboriginal academic Marcia Langton, a leading member of the Albanese government’s Indigenous Voice referendum working group, who last year accused the Greens of demanding “impossible” trade-offs.
Thorpe’s position also appears to be at odds with previous positions advanced by her federal colleagues, including leader Adam Bandt.
In the lead-up to the federal election last May, Bandt described the Voice to parliament as something that “cannot fail”, saying the party’s policy was to “improve, not block vital legislation” and it would work to further truth, treaty and voice.
“We may only get one chance at a referendum to enshrine a Voice to parliament in the Constitution,” he tweeted in April.
In October, Greens senator Sarah Hanson-Young declared she would be doing “everything I can” to support the Yes case.
Asked whether her position conflicted with the broader Greens membership – Resolve polling from December showed 85 per cent of Greens voters backed the Voice – Thorpe said she took her guidance from the party’s grassroots First Nations network, known as the Blak Greens.
“So if there’s anybody who disagrees with that policy, well then they need to chase it up with the Blak Greens,” she said.
She suggested a treaty process could deliver dedicated First Nations senate seats, which she said would be “real power” rather than an advisory body whose advice “was either taken or it’s not”.
*************************************************
Is Snowy 2 an impossible dream?
The massive Snowy hydro-electricity "2.0" project is rolling on, but without a chief executive, after the collapse of one of the key builders and with a growing question about what it will deliver.
This has been a season of drama for the controversial project, which is building 27 kilometres of tunnels and seeking to revolutionise Australia's electricity grid.
When Snowy Hydro boss Paul Broad's snap resignation was made public in August, the reason given was delays with the project.
But within days, he said it was a clash with Energy Minister Chris Bowen.
"Issues have arisen obviously between what I think of the world and what Chris Bowen, minister for energy, thinks of the world and, rather than create a drama, I resigned," Mr Broad told the ABC at the time.
"I didn't want to put the company in a position where we were seen to be fighting at every level with whatever the government may or may not want to do."
Just a week later, Webuild reached agreement with the Clough administrators to buy Clough's Australian organisation including offices, brand, credentials, business references, senior management and office personnel, as well as its share of the Snowy 2.0 and Inland Rail contracts, with the related workforce.
Webuild has a backlog of work in Australia worth 8.9 billion Euro ($14 billion) and has completed projects including the airport rail line in Perth.
The Snowy Hydro 2.0 project is a mega project. The first tunnel, completed in October, was a 10-metre-wide, 2.8-kilometre stretch to create access to a cavern 800 metres underground where a new power station would be housed. And it only gets harder from there.
The original scheme produced electricity by buildings dams and releasing the water stored in them to power turbines.
Construction began in 2019 on the so-called "Snowy 2.0" project, which involves a system of "pumped hydro".
Two existing dams will be linked by a 27-kilometre underground tunnel and a new underground power station that will allow water to be pumped and re-used – because it will flow through the turbines twice.
It's due to be finished by 2026. But even without delays, there are problems. One of the biggest dangers for Snowy Hydro 2.0 is that it will be too late to prevent a catastrophic shortfall in energy.
Ageing coal plants are shutting, but many of the closure dates rely on the machinery holding out — and the economics holding up.
Dr Dylan McConnell from the School of Photovoltaic and Renewable Energy Engineering (SPREE) at University of New South Wales says there is some good news.
"Pumped hydro projects like Snowy 2.0 are a form of energy storage that provides a useful source of dispatchable generation, useful for balancing the grid," he said.
The reason they provide balance is they can pump and fill their reservoirs when there's abundant energy supply and then provide generation later when supplies are low, such as when the sun goes down or if it's not windy.
But the bad news, he says, is that delays to the project could have a cascading impact on the amount of power in the system.
"The market operator doesn't see a delay to Snowy 2.0 having a material impact on the reliability outlook for New South Wales," Dr McConnell says.
"However, that assessment is also contingent on some significant transmission projects being delivered in a timely manner."
But the clock is ticking. "A key question is how much of the anticipated projects — particularly transmission projects — might be delivered in a timely way," he says.
The Snowy Hydro 2.0 project is set to have a huge impact on the price and reliability of our power.
Beneath the ground, workers are busy digging and building. On the surface, the problems keep mounting.
***************************************************
How Labor unleashed youth crime wave in Queensland
One Queensland family’s Christmas has been ruined by a gang of recalcitrant juveniles who have repeatedly terrorised their family home. A week before Christmas three youths broke into their home and stole car keys.
The initial crime spree was foiled when the juveniles hit other cars while trying to get away. They were then scared off by locals responding to the commotion. But the juvenile criminals took the keys and have been back twice (including on Christmas Eve) scoping out the home in balaclavas.
Understandably this young Queensland family now struggle to sleep in their own home.
The local police know the offenders but their hands are tied by Queensland’s lax youth crime laws. Instead, police have told the frightened family that they should install a fence and buy a German shepherd. Why should Queenslanders have to turn their homes into a jail when it is the criminals that should be there?
When pressed one police officer said they need to write letters asking for tougher laws and that they should “blame the Labor Government.”
Queensland has been shocked by the tragic stabbing death of a young mum of two, Emma Lovell, on Boxing Day at her home in North Lakes. Her sad passing is the regrettable culmination of the surge in break-ins committed by juveniles since 2019. But for the grace of God, any break in creates the risk that something tragically goes wrong.
Why have juveniles been breaking the law with abandon since 2019? In August 2019, the Queensland Government changed the Youth Justice Act. In the words of the Government’s Explanatory Note about these changes, they had the “objective of removing legislative barriers to enable young people to be granted bail.” The changes told judges that the principle should be “detention as a last resort”, and that “the bail decision-making framework” incorporated an “explicit presumption in favour of release.”
Judges must be shaking their heads at the chutzpah of the Queensland Premier who under pressure given the spate of juvenile crime last month cowardly told judges “to do their job”. The Premier’s own Government told the courts just three years ago to rule with an “explicit presumption in favour of release!”
The data shows the clear impact of Labor’s liberal approach to young criminals. In the 12 months before the bail changes in 2019, there were a reported 6184 “unlawful entries” by juveniles. In the 12 months before November last year (the last month data is available for) there were 10,108 reported “unlawful entries” by juveniles.
There has not been an increase in unlawful entries by non-juveniles, in fact they have slightly fallen since 2019. This provides strong evidence that Labor’s youth bail changes are to blame.
Following Labor’s changes to bail there has been a staggering 63 per cent increase in juveniles breaking in to people’s homes and businesses. This is a recipe for a repeat of the tragic outcomes we saw on Boxing Day.
In response to the clear failure of their laws, the Labor government has tried a couple of times to put a band aid on this open wound. In 2021, the Government announced that courts could require juveniles to wear GPS tracking devices when on bail. Since then just 8 juveniles have been fitted with such devices. With 27 juvenile break-ins occurring every day in Queensland over the past year this will hardly make a difference.
Now again the Labor Premier is trying to her tired schtick of blaming others while announcing a hasty response that is meant to distract attention from the real issue. The Government’s latest thought bubbles include trialling engine immobilisers and the appointment of a new Police Assistant Commissioner.
It is time for the Queensland Government to stop eating Christmas pudding and instead digest some humble pie. Their botched 2019 reforms have clearly led to a youth crime epidemic and it is time to roll back to the laws we had pre-2019 before more innocent people are killed.
An online petition calling for an “Emma’s law” to strengthen bail laws has already received 134,000 signatures. The only reason the Queensland Government is not listening to this outcry is that the Premier is too proud to admit she was wrong.
If the Government will not act maybe it is time for us to take up the advice of that frustrated policeman and all write letters calling for action.
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Australian woman opens up about her devastating vaccine injury
The wife of high-profile doctor Kerryn Phelps has detailed the horrific side effects in her first interview about her battle with a debilitating Covid vaccine injury.
Jackie Stricker-Phelps told Daily Mail Australia her life as she once knew it is gone and there is no prospect of recovery from her vaccine injury.
The former schoolteacher's symptoms started minutes after her first Pfizer jab in May 2021 and she is still unable to walk without pain.
She is one of thousands of Australians who suffer devastating long-term side effects, but feel like the government and medical regulators deny it's happening.
'I have had debilitating neurological and rheumatological effects since the initial Pfizer vaccine,' she said.
'I had a surge of heat in my head, my face went bright red, my gums and sinuses started to throb, I felt my hands and feet go numb and I developed pins and needles all over my torso, arms and legs. 'I could hardly walk, and so begin the next 19 months of hell.'
Ms Stricker-Phelps said she saw a neurologist the next day, who closely monitored her symptoms, and later also visited a rheumatologist.
'I have had visual disturbance, nerve pains, burning gums, flushed face, hair loss, musculoskeletal inflammation, and night sweats,' she said. 'I tried multiple prescribed medications, steroid injections into my spine and hips for pain.
'Two of my specialists have confirmed it is a vaccine injury and say they see other people with the same adverse events.'
Both she and Dr Phelps, who also suffered a serious vaccine injury from her second Pfizer jab, investigated the possible risks before getting vaccinated.
'We were told the most common symptoms were a sore arm with maybe a temperature for a few days and a rare possibility of anaphylaxis. We were both told it was far safer to get the vaccine than the illness,' she said.
To manage the risk of anaphylaxis, Ms Stricker-Phelps had her shot in a hospital and was observed afterwards by Dr Phelps, another doctor, and a registered nurse.
When her symptoms began, she claimed the nurse told her 'this is not anaphylaxis so you can go home' despite her barely being able to walk.
Ms Stricker-Phelps said her symptoms had not shown any significant improvement and frequent flare-ups made her unable to perform many basic tasks.
In the midst of a recent flare-up, she found it extremely painful to walk, communicating was difficult, and she struggled to leave the house.
'Flareups are even harder to deal with as there are no protocols in place for treatment,' she said.
To deal with the latest one, her specialist sent her for 'yet another spinal injection' to try to reduce inflammation across her body.
Even when the flare-ups subside, exercise is difficult because of the pain she suffers throughout her body.
But she said the hardest thing was having to live an isolated life to avoid catching Covid.
'I cannot receive any more of the current vaccines so am not protected from Covid,' she said. 'I have to isolate from family and friends, and avoid group activities such as parties or the theatre as the virus is transmissible even from vaccinated people.'
Ms Stricker-Phelps said she had no idea if and when her condition would improve, let alone recover, because so little was known about it. 'The best chance of recovery is for more effort and funding into research to find the underlying mechanism of the injury and for specific treatments to be developed,' she said.
'But first, the government and the medical profession need to acknowledge the extent of the problem.'
'The cloak of silence has been lifted and people are starting to talk about long Covid and vaccine injuries,' Ms Stricker-Phelps said.
Because the government never publicly acknowledged the full risk, she argues Australians didn't have proper informed consent when they decided to get the jab.
'It is important that people have fully informed consent by being made aware of the risks and then make their own decisions about their vaccinations,' she said.
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5 January, 2023
New Omicron subvariant XBB.1.5 is detected in Australia
An Omicron subvariant that has been tearing through parts of the United States was detected in Australia just before Christmas, health authorities have confirmed.
The highly transmissible XBB. 1.5 subvariant, which has been dubbed “The Kraken”, was detected in small numbers in the two weeks to December 24, NSW Health said on Thursday.
There is no evidence the subvariant causes more severe symptoms than the original Omicron Covid strain, but it is reportedly behind more than 40 per cent of new Covid cases in the US.
Data from NSW Health’s two-week Covid summary released on Thursday showed Covid cases had decreased 40 per cent in the week to December 31. Positive cases amounted to 22,281 compared to 37,371 in the previous week to December 24.
The BR. 2 Omicron subvariant was the most common source of infection, but XBB. 1.5 had been detected, a statement said.
Infectious diseases expert Professor Robert Booy told Sky News existing vaccination levels and natural immunity meant the subvariant would not be a major risk to the community.
“Our vaccines probably do protect against it and we shouldn’t be overly concerned although I’ve called it ‘extra bad boy’ - it’s just a way of remembering the name XBB.1.5,” he said.
“It’s more transmissible, it’s more active, young and able to get around but it’s not more severe it’s not more virulent, it’s not more likely to put you in hospital.”
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Major investors telling Rio to ‘not go so hard’ on carbon but focus on returns, says chairman
Rio Tinto faces a growing shareholder push to soften its focus on decarbonising its operations in favour of returns, according to its chairman, Dominic Barton.
Mr Barton became the Rio chairman in May, and told a KPMG podcast before Christmas he had already noticed a shift in focus from some of Rio’s institutional shareholders, with even previously strong supporters of the company’s push to cut its carbon emissions shifting their focus to cash returns to shareholders.
Rio accelerated its decarbonisation plans in October 2021, announcing it planned to spend $US7.5bn ($11bn) on renewable energy and other projects to try to halve its scope 1 and 2 emissions by the end of the decade, while maintaining its goal of reaching net zero emissions by 2050.
The company fleshed out those intentions at its annual investor day in November, laying out plans to spend up to an extra $US600m by 2026 to build solar, wind and battery generation to power its Pilbara iron ore operations, on top of a previous $US2.1bn decarbonisation spend in the division, and to buy renewable energy plans for those of its assets connected to the grid.
But Mr Barton told KPMG’s UK chair, Bina Mehta, that major investors were asking how Rio could maintain its shareholder returns in light of that spending, saying even some strong supporters of its decarbonisation plans were asking questions about Rio’s spending priorities.
“Rio Tinto wants to be net zero by 2050, and we’re going to cut our carbon emissions by 50 per cent in 2030. That takes a lot of capital,” he said. “So investors are saying we want you to do that. But we also want the returns.”
Geopolitical uncertainty has thrown a shadow over a broader post-pandemic recovery, and rising inflation has hit major economies across the world. With central banks lifting interest rates to combat inflation, investment returns are likely to be lower in the coming year after a long period of strong stock performances.
Amid the wreckage of technology stocks and poor returns elsewhere on the market, resource companies made up eight of the top 10 performing stocks on the ASX 200 in 2022, on a total return basis, led by coal miners Whitehaven Coal and New Hope Corporation. But with doubt hanging over China’s short-term economic recovery due to the spread of Covid-19, analysts are divided over whether strong commodity pricing will continue into 2023.
“One thing I’m finding interesting – even though I think I’ve been in this role for about five months now, at the beginning it was all ‘That’s great, focus on decarbonising’,” Mr Barton said.
“Now there’s a little more, ‘You know what, maybe you don’t need to go as hard on that one’, and the (shareholder) return side is picking up even from some investors who’ve been talking about being strong proponents of the other side.”
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Problems ahead for Australia
As 2023 gets underway, Australia is at last shaking off its pandemic derangement syndrome, yet it is considerably weaker than before it descended into Covid mania. In 2019, former treasurer Josh Frydenberg finally managed to bring government spending more or less in line with revenue for the first time since the Global Financial Crisis and net debt was less than 20 per cent. And former energy minister Angus Taylor had also wrangled the government into keeping its emissions reductions target in line with what could be achieved with existing technology.
Yet what a difference three years make. Net debt is now 23 per cent of GDP and on track to pass 28 per cent in three years. Additionally, the former federal government abandoned its principled position of not committing to emissions reductions that it did not have the technological capacity to deliver. Now, the new Labor government will drive up government spending further and has embarked on a recklessly rapid and ruinous reduction in emissions that cannot be achieved in either the short or long term, will drive up energy costs, and send businesses broke or offshore, without reducing global emissions. It is this sort of quixotic tilting at wind turbines that has brought the UK and Europe to their knees, but Prime Minister Albanese and Energy Minister Bowen are determined to follow in that continent’s ill-fated footsteps, egged on by the Greens, the Teal independents, and half the Liberal party. China and the rest of the developing world will laugh all the way to the bank at our greenhouse gas follies.
Yet that’s not the end of the economic pain. China’s abandonment of its delusional zero Covid policy spells uncertainty for Australia with further disruptions to supply chains and an unwelcome prolongation of the inflationary spiral that is that price we are forced to pay for our profligate spending over the last three years.
Perhaps, with Covid creating illness and economic hardship at home, China may be less likely to launch an attack on Taiwan, unless President Xi wants to distract from domestic discontent. Australians had better hope that 2023 does not usher in a war in the Taiwan Strait because this nation and its allies are woefully unprepared.
By presenting a picture of abject weakness in its shambolic departure from Afghanistan, the US encouraged President Putin’s ill-judged military invasion of Ukraine. That Putin now finds himself in quagmire does not alter the fact that the US and UK governments are depleting their military supplies doing the lion’s share of arming the Ukraine. Yet neither has the capacity to fight a war in Europe as well as a war in the Pacific. This alone might tempt President Xi to launch an attack on Taiwan sooner rather than later.
Meanwhile, our ageing submarines are not fit for service and their nuclear replacements are decades away. The notion that meeting our urgent national security needs can be delayed until we have the wherewithal to build our own nuclear submarines is a dangerous joke, but nobody should be laughing. With the Middle Kingdom more bellicose than at any time in its history, we need the capacity to credibly deter war and contribute to the protection of vital sea lanes now, not in several decades. Put simply, the federal government needs to bite the bullet and commit to buying nuclear submarines off the peg. Instead of building nuclear submarines, we would be far better off building a nuclear industry with not just the capacity to service subs, but to build small modular reactors so that we can guarantee that we have the unlimited low-emissions energy on demand that we will need to ensure we maintain the high standard of living that Australians have every right to expect. While we are at it, we should also develop the safe nuclear waste storage industry that Australian scientists pioneered nearly half a century ago with the development of Synroc.
Critically, two-faced Janus should prod us to take an unflinching look back at the blunders we committed over the last three years and learn the lessons. We not only abandoned our pandemic preparedness plans with their emphasis on focused protection of the vulnerable, while allowing the strong to work and the economy to function, we abandoned the scientific method, imposing censorship and propaganda in place of rational debate. We must never let this happen again. Yet the threat that history will repeat itself is real. The same charlatans who cheered on the imposition of tyranny justified by Covid pseudo-science now plan to convert their strictures into a permanent abrogation of our freedoms in the name of climate-change alarmism. This ideology poses an intolerable threat to our prosperity and freedom and unless we defeat it there will be no happy new year.
https://spectator.com.au/2023/01/happy-new-year-2/
****************************************************Tax office vows to crack down on glam ‘influencers’ and their ‘gifts’
The ATO is coming for Australia’s multimillion-dollar “influencer” industry, with a promise to tax glammed-up social media stars on gifts they receive from companies, make them pay GST, and stamp out bogus deductions.
The Daily Telegraph can reveal Australian Taxation Office staff have an arsenal of “data-matching” technologies to help them compare tax returns of “Insta-famous” people with the lifestyle and valuables on display in their online posts.
An ATO spokesman confirmed the fresh crackdown, saying: “If you are paid in-kind, such as with goods or other benefits (for example, being able to keep an item or outfit used in a post, or being ‘gifted’ something) … you are subject to the same income tax and GST treatment as normal cash or credit payments.
“We have sophisticated data-matching and analytical tools that enable us to identify people that may be under-reporting their income from a range of activities.”
Influencers who make an income from their posts are required to pay tax, even if it’s just a hobby, and if they make more than $75,000 they also have to register for GST.
The value of all “gifts” given to influencers in exchange for promotional posts must be declared as income. It is Australian law that influencers disclose publicly when they are promoting “non-cash benefits” by using the hashtags “ad”, “gifted” and “sponsored”.
Gifting is an increasingly common practice for businesses and public relations executives instead of cash payments. “Cash is really simple, but if you are gifted product in return for a service, it is much harder to police,” said one high-profile accounting executive, who did not want to be named.
“It is a grey area … the tax office will say, take the recommended retail price, then you must pay tax on that, but the key question will always be: what is the benefit for the recipient if they have to pay tax on something that they don’t technically pay money for?
“It is well and good to walk around with a $5000 handbag, but if you can’t afford the tax, what is the point?
“It is a game-changer that will have influencers rethinking the situation.”
One celebrity agent, who also did not want to be named, was thrilled to learn of the crackdown, saying “the gravy train is over for influencers”. “A crackdown will take a much-needed weed whacker to the infestations of wannabe Kardashians of late,” the agent said.
Sydney influencer Suzan Mutesi said she was not surprised the ATO was clamping down. “You have to adjust to the rules,” she said. “If you classify yourself as a sole trader, report how much you earn. “I think just do it right because then it doesn’t bite you in the back later.”
However, when it came to reporting the value of gifts, Ms Mutesi said the process was quite complicated because it could be hard to know their true value.
“It’s hard. There are certain things they (companies) would give you that are samples and they’re not for sale. How do you value that,” she said.
“Let’s say, if Gucci sends you a bag it can be different. It’s not going to be what the consumer will buy, because they are buying it so theirs will probably be bigger and have more details.
“Sometimes they personalise your gifts, like sometimes I get perfumes with my name on them or they’ll put on a personal message, so it’s different.”
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4 January, 2023
Price caps: It’s the seductive solution that almost always goes badly
It's brainless in fact. It rapidly WORSENS the cost problem by restricting supply
It clearly came as something of a surprise to Anthony Albanese that one coal-fired power plant in Queensland could receive close to $450m in compensation for the coal price cap. And that’s just for starters. At this rate, taxpayers could end up paying as much to power plants as the financial compensation to low-income households hit by higher electricity prices.
Mind you, economists won’t be surprised because schemes designed to cap prices have a habit of going badly, with all sorts of unexpected and unintended consequences. If that’s not bad enough, the exit arrangements for these schemes are extremely tricky to construct and navigate.
By rights, Treasury strongly should have advised the government against imposing price caps based on the clear theoretical and empirical knowledge that this type of intervention is ultimately ineffective at meeting the policy objective of reducing prices while carrying high costs.
Of course, price caps are a seemingly seductive solution to rising prices. There are plenty of examples where governments have been tempted.
In August 1971, US president Richard Nixon ordered a 90-day freeze on all prices and wages. Initially the move was popular politically, with The New York Times declaring “we unhesitatingly applaud the boldness with which the president has moved”.
In combination with marked volatility in the value of the US dollar – Nixon had abandoned the gold standard at the same time – the freeze resulted in the onset of stagflation (inflation and rising unemployment).
Having said this, price caps never go totally out of fashion, with the city of St Paul, Minnesota recently deciding to impose rent controls to improve housing affordability. Rent increases were capped at 3 per cent a year. (The Greens are in favour of this policy here.) The effect on supply was immediate, with building applications for rental developments falling by more than 85 per cent in a year. Unsurprisingly, building activity soared in the twin city of Minneapolis with no rent controls. As The Wall Street Journal summed it up, “rent control is destructive because it reduces the supply of housing, especially for low-income households”.
Let us return to the policy dilemma faced by the federal government in relation to the sharp rises in the price of electricity and gas forecast in the October budget. Initially this news wasn’t accompanied by much concern, let alone policy relief. But as it dawned on the government leadership team that soaring energy costs would be politically unpopular as well as economically damaging, a view emerged that “something had to be done”.
In addition to encouraging more supply, the most straightforward way to deal with the problem was to provide targeted support for low-income households and affected businesses. To be sure, there is some automatic assistance for these households given the indexation of welfare payments. Moreover, several state governments have implemented schemes to provide electricity price relief for consumers.
The problems faced by Jim Chalmers were twofold: first, where was the money coming from to pay the compensation; and, second, compensation could be potentially inflationary in the context of a close-to-full capacity economy.
My assessment is that these problems were not insurmountable because, by the time the compensation was being rolled out, economic conditions would likely have weakened. Sure, fiscal affordability may have been an issue, but the government’s final policy position will involve substantial additional spending in any case.
With only a weak understanding of how the east coast electricity market operates – and bear in mind that it is complicated and varies from state to state – the federal government took the unexpected decision to impose a short-term price cap on gas of $12 a gigajoule, after which a “reasonable pricing provision” would apply, as well as a price cap on thermal coal of $125 per tonne.
Why a coal price cap was determined as necessary is anyone’s guess. While coal continues to supply most of the electricity on the east coast, it is rarely the price setter. It’s also unclear how many plants were paying more than the cap, with many plants having their own coalmines and with that coal not available for export.
What seems to have driven the policy is the small number of contracts signed by coal plants that referenced international coal prices and the owners of these plants being keen to break these contracts. Given the imprimatur of government legislation and compensation paid to the providers of coal making up the difference between the price cap and the international price, a deal was sealed. There is little doubt that this aspect of the policy will turn out to be very bad deal indeed.
The only rational explanation for a coal price cap was the avoidance of a marked shift to the use of gas to generate electricity. The worry may have been that a gas price cap without a coal price cap would have disproportionately swung the economics to gas production. This could prove problematic in the context of the relative shortage of gas on the east coast plus constraints on its movement.
Of course, this illustrates what a dense thicket is quickly created once a decision is taken to impose price caps. And there are just so many complications that the bureaucrats in Canberra have no knowledge of, including different types of coal, different contractual arrangements of the various plants, transport considerations – the list goes on.
When it comes to the gas price cap, most of the producers could probably have lived with the $12 figure for 12 months or slightly longer. Mind you, there is no compensation for these producers along the lines given to the coalmines. The real kicker in the legislation is the reasonable pricing provisions, which inevitably will have a chilling effect on supply. Indeed, we are already seeing the cancellation of some projects.
Moreover, the wholesale gas market has effectively collapsed as industrial gas users refuse to enter into contracts with the gas producers on the basis that a better deal is around the corner given the government’s intervention.
Without understanding the real reasons behind surging electricity and gas prices – the war in the Ukraine is only part of the story, with the turmoil in global energy markets apparent before then – the government has stumbled into a complicated, expensive and likely ineffective policy approach.
But given the inflammatory language used by federal Industry and Science Minister Ed Husic to demonise the gas industry, it’s hard to see a negotiated solution that could moderate prices while guaranteeing future supply options.
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Immunity from previous infection protects from new Covid strain
Only one in five people who reported an infection in December were known to have had COVID-19 previously, according to the ACT government.
While data is unavailable for most of the country, the numbers from the ACT suggest that past exposure to the disease provides some protection against the prevailing strains.
This contrasts with widely publicised fears that newer COVID-19 subvariants are highly effective at evading the body's immune defences.
The ACT is one of few jurisdictions that reports its reinfection rate, though its outbreaks largely mirrored those in New South Wales and Victoria last year.
About 46 per cent of Australians had already had COVID-19 by June last year, according to an analysis of antibodies in blood samples.
That proportion is almost certainly far higher today. This, combined with the ACT data, suggests a previous infection is strongly associated with avoiding infection during this latest surge.
Infectious diseases specialist Sanjaya Senanayake, an associate professor at the Australian National University, said the ACT data reflected what was happening overseas.
Singapore, for example, was also reporting that about 20 per cent of known new cases were reinfections.
Dr Senanayake said this relatively small number of reinfections showed that immunity — whether from vaccines or past exposure — was working for most people.
"It's hard to differentiate, in a place like Australia, between purely vaccine-induced immunity and infection-induced immunity, because many of us have both been COVID-19-infected and have had [several] vaccines," he said.
"This is hybrid immunity we're seeing.
"And what it tells us is that, even though in laboratory settings … these new subvariants have the potential to evade the immune system, this hybrid immunity is providing good protection."
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Darwin CBD retailer Paul Arnold installs panic room in his store as others report being punched, grabbed by drunken itinerants
"Itinerant" is NT code for "Aboriginal"
Darwin's retailers are warning violent behaviour has increased to the point where their staff are no longer safe and it is driving customers away from the city centre.
In Darwin's central Smith Street shopping mall, food retailers and other business owners have claimed they are losing money hand over fist because drunk itinerants regularly brawl and aggressively demand money from their customers.
"People are scared, they are demanding food and money from my customers, which is very much [affecting] the business, and we don't know where to get help with this problem," one of the mall's food shop owners said.
Ashvin Gill — who manages another business in the mall — said she regularly has to lock her front door after violent, drunk itinerants try to force their way in.
"As the front face of this business, apart from doing my job, I also have to be aware and alert at all times of my own safety as well as my clients, so it can be pretty overwhelming and exhausting" she said.
Ms Gill said when her business had been attacked or she felt under threat, the police have come to assist, but sometimes it took a long time for them to arrive.
"Almost daily, I see police officers but, at the same time, it takes time to call these people. So, it's not an immediate effect of protection," she said.
Retailers report being grabbed, punched
A worker from another shop said she was attacked recently while walking to her car in a car park off the mall after work. "I was actually grabbed. He was drunk, and I just said: 'Let me go! let me go!'
She said she didn't tell police about the attack because being confronted by drunk itinerants on the street and in the shop has become such a regular occurrence.
Nigel manages another store in the mall.
"Two Friday nights ago, I got punched in the mouth because I didn't want someone sitting in my doorway and he objected," he said.
"Two weeks before that I had a drunk guy come in and completely trash the shop. "I've had rocks thrown at my window, rocks thrown at me."
Nigel said the violence was severely damaging the business. "It's scaring the living daylight out of the tourists, they come in and hide in my shop," he said.
Nigel said he felt the problem had escalated well beyond anti-social behaviour to a serious crime situation.
"As retailers, we've seen what's happened in Tennant Creek and Katherine. We've just lost Alice Springs, I fear that's where we're heading if we don't get this under control."
Photographer and Darwin city councillor Paul Arnold has a gallery in the mall. "This is the worst Christmas I've had in the CBD and I've got 15 years I've been in the CBD, people are voting with their feet and not coming into the city," he explained. "The cost to small business is getting out of control."
He said he had installed a lockable panic room in the back of his gallery for staff. "If the shop gets trashed, the shop gets trashed, and they can watch on CCTV and call police."
Calls for more police resources in the CBD
Mr Arnold said that, despite many meetings between retailers, government staff and police, the problem was getting worse.
"We've had public meetings and we hear there is short staffing," he said. "But the answer is that the police need to be keeping our retailers and business owners in the CBD, and patrons, they need to be keeping them safe, and I'm sorry, they're not."
For a few years, the Northern Territory government and Darwin City Council have been paying a private security almost $1 million a year to employ a few staff to patrol the CBD in golf buggies.
Nigel said the security guards were limited in what they could do, as they could not touch nor arrest people.
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Problems in the Queensland government
This will come to be remembered as the year the Queensland Labor Party blew it. It was the year the Palaszczuk government poisoned the political ecosystem and caused pain to innocent bystanders.
When the Premier wasn’t gallivanting on the red carpet, she was frantically covering up one scandal after another.
The year ended on a tragic note with the alleged stabbing murder of Emma Lovell by teenage home invaders, one of whom was out on bail. Palaszczuk was forced to defend her government’s softening of juvenile justice laws.
Labor was especially shamed by failures in Queensland Health.
An enduring memory for me will be a story in the Gold Coast Bulletin about an 89-year-old great-grandmother who waited 7½ hours for an ambulance after falling in her kitchen and breaking her hip and leg.
Shirley Prestipino had to lie on the floor like a wounded animal, her daughter Tina Barber told the paper.
Inept Health Minister Yvette D’Ath was caviller and unconvincing in pretending long waits for emergency care was the new normal.
In a “bombshell” parliamentary hearing, the Opposition successfully pressed bureaucrats into admitting that Queenslanders were waiting up to 15 hours in overcrowded emergency departments.
The LNP also calculated that Queensland’s ambulance crisis was the worst in the country, with more than one in three ambulances routinely ramped outside hospitals.
Ministerial documents D’Ath kept hidden showed ramping was getting worse despite record federal hospital funding. A Right to Information search by the LNP revealed patients were waiting longer in the back of ambulances stuck outside hospitals, despite there being thousands fewer call-outs than the previous year.
D’Ath’s veracity was also under question. The RTI showed the Labor government did not once meet its Code 1A response time target in a three-month period, despite the Health Minister saying these targets were being met. Between June and September, paramedics and patients were ramped for close to 40,000 hours. The worst hospitals for ramping were Logan, Ipswich, PA and QEII.
A patient suffering severe abdominal pain and vomiting died after waiting 9hr 19min for an ambulance. An aged care resident who fell died after an ambulance took more than three hours to arrive, while a woman threatening self-harm took her own life after an ambulance delay of more than two hours.
The year ends with Queensland’s forensic laboratory in a terrible mess. Botched DNA testing saw murderers and rapists go free. An inquiry by Walter Sofronoff KC found the Queensland Health lab was run by a prolific liar who mishandled evidence and compromised thousands of cases.
The failures in the DNA tests have serious ramifications for the criminal justice system. Sofronoff, a retired Supreme Court judge, was “astounded” by what was uncovered and said the failings were “as big as it gets”.
He found several scientists employed at the lab had been clamouring for years about a dangerous lack of scientific integrity. As usual when bad news comes to the surface, the government was slow to act.
A low point in Labor’s political year came with revelations in parliament of interference in the independent watchdog groups. Ousted state archivist Mike Summerell said the government was “toxic”, with parliament misled and reports falsified to hide “bad news”.
Former integrity commissioner Nikola Stepanov had her staff slashed to one person with no legal training while she investigated alleged illegal lobbying. Her computer system was so old it lacked the capacity to update files relating to lobbying. Stepanov’s laptop was seized and the contents “deleted without my knowledge or consent”. In other evidence, she told the House she was referred to as “bitch on a witch hunt”.
Former legal services commissioner Bob Brittan called for a far-reaching inquiry, saying he was bewildered that ethical issues he raised were ignored. Auditor-General Brendan Worrall advocated law changes to bolster his independence amid concerns the state government holds too much power over his office.
There is much unfinished business. Parliament heard Logan city councillors had been involved in a “travesty of justice”. The councillors were forced out of office and unable to run again after charges were made against them that were later found to be unsubstantiated. They are suing. Also charged and thereby ineligible for re-election was Moreton Bay mayor Allan Sutherland. Charges against him were dropped.
Jonathan Horton (then) QC told the parliamentary inquiry that CCC chairman Alan MacSporran had not ensured the CCC acted impartially, independently, and fairly at all times in the Logan case. MacSporran’s appointment was terminated.
We also learned this year that Annastacia Palaszczuk has a tin ear, embarking on a jolly social life at taxpayer expense while middle-aged mortgage men and women were at home tightening the belt.
At the hands of her government, few were spared extra taxes and charges. Learner drivers are forced to pay $186.55 for their licence – seven times more than southern states.
And now resource companies are abandoning Queensland as a direct result of a controversial new royalties scheme introduced by Treasurer Cameron Dick. With Dick at the helm, service has never been worse while debt has never been higher.
Meanwhile, some are still not willing to forgive Palaszczuk for milking Covid-19 for political gain, extending lockdowns at great harm to families and small business.
Peter Beattie was chastised for saying so, but he was right when he said Palaszczuk should be grooming a successor. While she is happy to take the spotlight for good news announcements, she quickly retreats to the shadows when bad news arrives.
I’m convinced she will not survive another year.
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3 January, 2023
China border farce proves Covid alarmists have Anthony Albanese’s ear
Anthony Albanese has always been keen to remind us that he is a strong believer in science.
The only problem for the prime minister is that science doesn’t vote. Teals, Twitter hysterics, and doctors’ lobbies all do.
Hence the government’s bizarre decision to go over the top of its own high priest of science, Chief Medical Officer Paul Kelly, to impose what pretty much everyone agrees is a window dressing requirement for negative Covid tests for travellers from China.
Here it’s worth considering our two nations’ respective Covid caseloads.
To put it simply, while China and Australia may be very different countries, one thing we have in common is an absolute ton of Covid.
Australia, the incredibly helpful Worldometers website tells us, has something like the 16th highest number of new cases in the world – an amazing accomplishment for a nation that for a time was second only to China in its love of locking people up for their own good.
And we know that number is likely far higher because even pernickety rule-following Australians have for the most part stopped telling anyone connected with officialdom if they test positive, with growing numbers of people just acting normally and staying home if they feel a bit crook.
China, meanwhile, has basically stopped reporting its Covid cases altogether both because no one has ever trusted their figures and anyway if they did publish them the number of 0’s would run off the edge of the page.
Yet the country which terrified the world with what were in retrospect hilariously slapstick viral (ahem) videos of Covid sufferers collapsing in the streets is now seeing something like a million people infected every day.
The biggest problem with this, we are told, is not that their hospital system is overwhelmed – though it is probably not fun to be an ER doc at Shanghai General – but that so many people are calling in sick that the world is going to face delays getting parts and materials and electronic gewgaws out of mainland factories.
Oh, the humanity.
Of course, we are told that there are good scientific reasons behind the Albanese government’s flicking the switch to, if not full blown alarmism, then “an abundance of caution”.
We were also told that there was good scientific reasoning behind cops harassing and fining people for sitting in a park reading a book or going for a swim in the ocean.
The reasoning was so sound that in November a court finally vacated over 33,000 Covid related fines issued by NSW Police which, in far too many cases, seemed to relish its job “keeping us safe” a little too much.
And people wonder why there is a declining trust in “experts”.
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Treasurer Jim Chalmers on economic issues ahead
Treasurer Jim Chalmers has revealed his grim outlook for the Australian economy in 2023, with one “big issue” predicted to spell trouble for hip pockets.
Speaking to radio station 2GB on Tuesday, Dr Chalmers pointed at one in particular of five major concerns facing the national economy as the factor most likely to hurt Aussie bank balances.
“I think one of the big issues here is that a fifth of mortgages will become variable rate mortgages in 2023,” he said.
Many Aussies who entered into fixed-rate mortgages at the height of soaring house prices are going to see their contracts switch over to a variable rate in 2023.
Dr Chalmers reiterated that interest rate rises take some time to be felt in the economy and predicted Australians would be hit hardest in the “middle of the year”.
“That’s when the interest rate hikes are expected to hit the hardest,” Dr Chalmers said.
Interest rates are just one of five crucial issues the Treasurer forecasts will cause problems for Aussies this year.
“An extraordinarily large wave of Covid in China, the war in Ukraine, the situation in the US and UK, interest rates and the threat of natural disasters,” Dr Chalmers said.
He indicated the growing wave of Covid-19 cases in China will bring a “substantial” amount of risk to the supply chain. “We need to make our supply chain more resilient to these major global hits,” Dr Chalmers said. “There’s a process; we can’t just do that in one hit.”
Boosting manufacturing on home soil and “value-adding” to hard-hit areas of the global supply chain are medium-term strategies the federal government is considering.
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Australia’s migration rate has made a stunning turnaround and is on track to return to pre-pandemic levels
The rapid increase is being turbocharged by the return of international students, many of them Chinese, since the lifting of Covid travel restrictions in December 2021, it reveals.
The federal government’s 2022 Population Statement, to be released on Friday, notes net overseas migration is “forecast to reach the pre-pandemic trend of 235,000 (people) from 2022-23 and remain at that level thereafter”.
“Had the pandemic not occurred, cumulative net overseas migration was expected to be 473,000 persons higher across 2019-20 to 2025-26,” an excerpt from the report states.
The statement notes that while the rebound in migration numbers is being led by international students, working holiday visa holders and permanent migrant arrivals have also jumped since Covid restrictions were eased.
“In mid-October (last year) there were 36,000 (or 90 per cent) more Chinese students in Australia than in mid-December 2021,” the report states. “The number of all international students in Australia increased by 122,000 in the same time period.
“Offshore student grants from January to September 2022 were higher than the corresponding period in any previous calendar year,” it reveals. “(And) offshore grants of working holiday visas and other temporary visas have also surpassed 2019 levels.”
But in a warning against over-optimism, Jim Chalmers said the strong rebound in migration numbers was not enough in itself to grow the nation’s economy.
“Migration is an important part of the story but should never be a substitute for training more Australians or making it easier for parents and seniors to work more if they want to,” the federal Treasurer said.
“Migration has played a crucial role in our economic development and will be critical in the future too if it’s well-considered and well-managed.
“This matters at multiple levels – the global scramble for talent, the filling of genuine skills shortages, and making sure migrant workers aren’t exploited,” the Treasurer said.
“Australia’s migration settings need to be sustainable, serve Australia’s national interest, and not be a substitute for … building the capacity of our domestic workforce.”
The federal government boosted the permanent migration program from 160,000 to 195,000 for 2022-23 in September, saying it would help to address skills gaps in areas such as nursing and technology.
The policy change “further strengthened” the outlook for permanent arrivals, the number of whom are forecast to continue rising after hitting a low in March 2021, the report states.
Dr Chalmers said the government was currently undertaking both a review of the migration system and developing an employment White Paper to ensure the nation has a bigger and better-trained workforce in 2023 and beyond.
“Migration policy is economic policy,” he said.
A common hope for many international students who come to Australia to study is to stay and work after they finish their university courses.
In Sydney for the new year celebrations, Yiping Qiao, who recently completed a masters degree in civil engineering at the University of Queensland, is one.
“I moved to Brisbane from China to study for a masters degree and I only graduated a couple of months ago … I hope to stay on and find a job in the design industry because of the way of life in Australia and the people,” the 25-year-old said.
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Changing the date of Australia Day is nothing but a 'warm and fuzzy' notion that won't have any real impact on the lives of Indigenous Australians, Aboriginal professor warns
Installing an Indigenous Voice to Parliament is the thing that will truly have a tangible impact on the lives of Indigenous Australians, not changing the date of Australia Day, an Aboriginal professor has said.
Leading Indigenous Voice to Parliament campaigner Megan Davis claimed moving the date would only be 'symbolic' and give people a 'warm and fuzzy notion of reconciliation'.
She said Australians wanting to make a real difference should back constitutional changes like the Voice to Parliament.
'Supporting "change the date" is fine, but really supporting the referendum and the Voice to Parliament is something that's actually going to make a difference on the ground,' Professor Davis told Sydney Morning Herald.
'It's a tactile reform. So if changing the date comes after that, that makes a lot of sense, but to change the date without any substantive reform, it's a symbolic move.'
The Indigenous Voice to Parliament is a proposed body that will advise federal parliament on matters concerning Indigenous people.
Professor Davis said it would finally allow Aboriginals to be part of a democratic system 'in a way they haven't been up till now'.
Professor Davis has been pushing for a constitutionally enshrined Voice for years.
She is a Cobble Cobble woman, co-chair of the Uluru Dialogue and one of the architects of the 2017 Uluru Statement From the Heart.
Indigenous Australians Minister Linda Burney revealed the government planned to introduce legislation to parliament in March to set up the referendum.
Ms Burney said the 'yes' campaign would likely begin in late February.
'Once that all mobilises, I think we're going to have a country that's ready for change,' she said.
Ms Burney said the legislation would be scrutinised by a parliamentary committee once it was introduced.
The government will seek to have the legislation pass through parliament in May, which could allow a vote to be held as early as August or as late as November.
A spokesman for shadow attorney-general Julian Leeser said the opposition had asked for 'serious detail' on the constitutional change, which was important as the majority of referendums in Australia had failed.
'Australians are naturally cautious about changes to our governing document,' he said.
'Australians will want the detail about how the voice will work, that's only fair given the government is asking for Australians to decide.'
Last year, Prime Minister Anthony Albanese said the draft question for voters would be: 'Do you support an alteration to the constitution that establishes an Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander voice?'
Mr Albanese has reiterated he believes the question regarding whether a voice should be enshrined in the constitution should be a simple yes-or-no referendum.
The Nationals have announced they will not support the referendum despite a split within the party after Calare MP Andrew Gee broke away as an independent to support the campaign.
The Liberals under Peter Dutton have not yet formed a position on the referendum, but the opposition leader has repeatedly called on the government to release more detail about the form the voice will take
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2 January, 2023
How Teal eco warriors fuel hypocrisy
If the radical parties pushing climate alarmism believed in their own messaging, they would lead by example, not by marketing novelty merchandise destined for landfills, shipped from Bangladeshi factories to Port Botany on polluting mega-carriers.
However, Climate 200 and the Greens were flogging novelty trinkets, such as shirts and water bottles, hoping recipients would parade them at their local gym to show how enlightened they are.
All the while, the Teals were bringing in a Bill to rush changes in Australian fuel standards which would see the end of cheap E10 as we know it, for highly refined European-standard fuel, capable of working only in hi-tech engines and which relies on a chemical so foul that it is illegal on our shores.
Climate 200’s North Sydney MP Kylea Tinks’ fuel Bill proposes keeping Australian standards in lock-step with Europe’s madness in perpetuity.
What does it matter to her if people can barely afford the rising living costs, let alone new cars with engines fitted with technology to use European-standard fuel by 2024 and the additional cost of refining imported crude oil to service them?
She doesn’t have to pay for fuel or her car — the taxpayer covers it for her.
The Bill wants to copy Europe. The problem is that European fuel uses a chemical, MTBE, which is banned in Australia. MTBE (methyl tert-butyl ether) may reduce pollution emissions in fuel, but it is highly pollutant in water, fouling it so it is unpalatable.
You would think so-called environmentalists from the second-driest continent on Earth after Antarctica would be across that.
Tink’s Bill claims there would be no financial impact, but every driver who doesn’t own an engine that can cope with European-standard fuel would need a new car to use it – and manufacturers still make cars that don’t. Flogging ill-considered proposals stands to drive people further into poverty and fails to address the big emitters.
Shipping emits three times as much as our entire country. So why are Australians who are just trying to get to school, the doctors and shops the focus for Climate 200?
These enormous ships are already taking Greens and, presumably, Climate 200 merch, along with 99 per cent of our trade, to Australia, creating three times the emissions our entire country does.
Instead of telling people to buy new cars, why not push for enormous cargo ships to adopt nuclear instead of heavy fuel oil? Nuclear on ocean vessels is not new. It’s already on submarines and naval ships.
Tink’s Bill stands to kick a massive own goal, forcing pensioners and families into unaffordable debt to take on a Climate 200-approved car.
The reality of this policy will be that people hold on to their old second-hand vehicles for longer because a new Mercedes is slightly out of their reach.
The coming safeguard mechanism will put more pressure on our last two oil refineries. If they shut down, we will rely entirely on imported fuel.
If our trade routes were shut down, our entire fleet would be zero-emission because none of them would be able to go anywhere.
Why not focus on expanding our Australian-made biofuel industry instead of vehicles that can only run on refined crude oil imported from Malaysia, Saudi Arabia and Qatar and shipped through waters with an expanding Chinese military presence?
If you want to have any conversation about fuel, we should be brutally honest about how exposed we are.
We cannot only see this issue through the prism of European cleanliness when we have our own homegrown opportunities, such as the biofuels industry — worth just 1.1 per cent of our national pool but worth $3.5 billion to the US and booming in South American nations.
Is total reliance on imports where you want to be? Europe is paying the price for outsourcing its energy sources to other countries.
We could have less international dependence if we grew our biofuel industry – which is recyclable and renewable.
You would think the Climate 200-funded independents who campaigned on reducing emissions would want to actually reduce emissions.
Yet for Climate 200, their “happy holidays” message centred on urging its donors to purchase merch in the form of gift cards to spend on “last-minute Teal coloured gifts”, including water bottles, T-shirts, and other paraphernalia that didn’t grow on trees.
This is the disconnect between Teals, who campaign against fossil fuel use, mining and exploration, yet use fossil fuels to manufacture and ship merchandise to foster the consumerist need to acquire more material possessions.
Teal voters will again fall prey to a marketing machine — and not even an original one. Their key shirt slogan, “A woman’s place is in the House”, takes directly from an Australian Greens Party shirt with the same etching of Parliament House with: “A woman’s place is in the House. And the Senate. And the Cabinet.”
Funny, they don’t think Senator Jacinta Price’s place is in the House.
Why is Climate 200 merchandise unnecessary waste serving no real purpose but to temporarily satisfy a desire for novelty from a community which wishes to be seen as environmental warriors while contributing to the ecological degradation they profess to rail against?
The Greens’ merch bearing slogans such as “This is a Climate Emergency” and “Big Green Power” are made in a part of Bangladesh powered by heavy fuel oil and doubling its coal-fired power stations to feed our desire for cheap clothes.
It is then shipped on a cargo carrier with more heavy fuel oil.
If you want to campaign for the environment, get Queensland to lift its uranium mining ban, refit massive transport ships with their own nuclear propulsion, and address the need for an Australian-made alternative to crude oil.
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Labor still botching Qld youth crime after eight years
The Palaszczuk government has had almost eight years – a dream run in political life – to action reform and yet: It. Still. Does. Not. Get. It.
The Premier had to be dragged to the table – under yet another harsh media spotlight – to address public outrage over the senseless stabbing death of mother-of-two Emma Lovell on Boxing Day.
Three days after the horrific incident, Annastacia Palaszczuk announced a handful of supposedly tougher measures to tackle youth crime.
She seemed serious about it too. “A lot of people aren’t going to like some of these announcements today, but I’m going to stand by them,” she told a press conference.
Not sure to which people she is referring – young criminals? – but the amendments are farcical, cosmetic and will not work.
No surprises there. This is a government that has consistently placed public image above practical solutions as it lurches from one crisis to the next.
I’m not the only one who thinks Ms Palaszczuk’s grandstanding on Thursday was offensive.
Waiting so very long – years – to even begin to address inadequate laws is an insult to families who have lost loved ones in crimes that could, and should, have been prevented.
And it provides zero comfort to the rest of us who, so far by a stroke of luck, have not had our lives wrecked by repeat juvenile offenders.
One of the laughably “bold” moves to stop young criminals in their tracks is to increase the maximum penalty for stealing a car from seven to 10 years. You can just see them mulling this over, can’t you, as they stand beside a Porsche nervously debating if should they risk it.
Another genius idea by Team Too-Little-Too-Late is to require courts to take into account bail history and previous criminal activity when sentencing.
Courts already do this so it’s hardly worth mentioning. The problem is left-leaning magistrates (which are in the majority as judicial officers are government appointed) have the power to release repeat offenders anyway – and they do.
In more ridiculous news, Palaszczuk has announced engine immobiliser trials. Fat lot of good that will do if someone breaks into your house and steals your car keys. But hey, let’s throw money at trials and make it seem like we’re doing something positive.
Palaszczuk and her pack of underperformers have missed yet another golden opportunity to make a dent in youth crime – which has reached epidemic proportions on their watch. At the very least, making breach of bail a crime needs to happen – not in February when Parliament resumes but right now.
And minimum sentences must be mandated so recidivist offenders are removed from our streets.
Following my column on Thursday when I said decisive action was missing, Judy Lindsay got in touch. Not a day goes by when she doesn’t miss her only child, Hayley Russell, who was killed by a drink-driver in 2009.
Ms Lindsay is now an ambassador for CARS (Citizens Against Road Slaughter) and somewhat of a thorn in the government’s side.
She is also the person who started the petition Clean up Queensland’s Youth Justice Act in January 2021 following the deaths of Matt Field, Kate Leadbetter and their unborn baby Miles. They were killed on Australia Day by a 17-year-old male who was out on bail and driving a stolen car.
That petition garnered more than 200,000 signatures in a matter of days and prompted a police taskforce to target criminal gangs.
Ms Lindsay, like the rest of us, is sick of political stunts and go-softly tactics. “We asked for a taskforce last year but nothing has come out of it,” she says. “The Premier has allowed youth crime to escalate to where it is now – she is accountable and she is wrong.”
Ms Lindsay says this week’s measures are “nowhere near hard enough”. “I think once you get caught for something, you don’t get let out at all, there is no bail,” she says.
“Yes, that will require the building of more facilities if they refuse to use Wellcamp, but it will save lives.
“The minimum sentencing for any serious crime, including stealing cars, should be at least seven years – and if you do the crime, you do the full time.
“If 16-year-olds are legally able to drive they should be sentenced as adults, and they don’t get out on good behaviour. “This generation has proved we can’t give them anything; they don’t show any respect for the law.”
Ms Lindsay is spot on when she says: “If we don’t take action now, we won’t be safe anywhere we go.”
Queenslanders deserve so much better than this band-aid rubbish from a tired government that is wholly reactionary and embarrassingly clueless.
Instead of telling the courts to “do their jobs”, Ms Palaszczuk should start doing hers.
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Andrew Bolt: Plans for ‘Voice’ is dangerous and dumb
ABC host Phillip Adams swears he’s no racist because – look! – his white-complexioned wife, former model Patrice Newell, is actually Aboriginal.
Yes, that’s his excuse for mocking Malaysian-born singer Kamahl as an “Honorary White”. An Uncle Tom.
“Adams a racist?” Adams tweeted after even fans complained. “I doubt my Aboriginal wife and youngest daughter would agree.”
That’s our race politics today. Adams insists the black Kamahl is white and his white wife is black. And uses that to excuse being cruel to Kamahl.
But I should thank the old fraud. Adams shows why the Albanese government’s plan for a referendum this year to create a “Voice” – a kind of Aboriginal-only parliament, enshrined in our Constitution – is dangerous and dumb.
This fuss with Kamahl blew up when a letter emerged, in which cricket legend Sir Donald Bradman congratulated then Prime Minister Malcolm Fraser two days after Fraser’s Liberals crushed Gough Whitlam’s Labor.
This infuriated Adams, a Labor tribalist who tweeted Bradman was “a RWNJ [right-wing nutjob]”, prompting Kamahl to defend Bradman, a friend for 13 years.
Adams turned savage: “Clearly, Kamahl, he made you an Honorary White. Whereas one of the most towering political figures of the 20th century [Nelson Mandela] was deemed unworthy of Bradman’s approval.”
Adams was not just vicious but wrong. Bradman certainly approved of Mandela, exchanging letters and inscribing a bat: “To Nelson Mandela. In recognition of a great unfinished innings.”
But Adams wouldn’t apologise, insisting instead he couldn’t be racist because his wife was Aboriginal.
Yet Adams’ pathetic excuse exposes some of the idiocy behind Labor’s planned “Voice”. He hasn’t just shown that the most avid backers of the Voice can be very cruel, more into dividing us than uniting. More importantly, who exactly is this Voice meant to represent? Adams’ wife?
Newell discovered only late in life her birth mother had Aboriginal ancestry, and Newell now calls herself a “proud Gundijtmara woman”, even though she was adopted by a white family and lived as a white woman for most of her life.
Why does she now need additional political rights as an Aborigine?
Indeed, the last two census collections show 130,000 Australians decided to identify as Aboriginal when they hadn’t the census before.
So Adams makes me ask again: shouldn’t the Albanese government sort out who really is Aboriginal before creating this extra parliament?
Even better, why not call off this madness and just ask everyone to be polite? Adams especially.
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Labor’s stage three tax cut plan ‘hasn’t changed’
Treasurer Jim Chalmers has reaffirmed Labor’s commitment to stage three tax cuts in the new year as the nation’s cost of living crisis continues.
Mr Chalmers flagged the Albanese government’s position on the tax plan remained firm.
“Our position on the tax cuts hasn’t changed,” he told reporters on Monday.
The tax cuts, due to come into effect in July 2024, are part of changes to the tax regime implemented by the Morrison government. Stage three involves abolishing the 37 per cent marginal tax bracket for those earning $120,000 to $180,000.
The threshold for the highest marginal tax bracket of 45 per cent will be raised to those earning above $200,000.
Stage three also involves placing everyone earning between $45,001 and $200,000 on the same tax rate of 30 per cent, with the majority of people in that bracket currently being taxed at a rate of 32.5 per cent.
Labor supported the plans when they were put to parliament in 2019 and Prime Minister Anthony Albanese went to the 2022 election promising no changes would be made to the scheme.
Australia’s current tax brackets look like this:
Up to $18,200 – no tax
$18,201 – $45,000: 19% tax rate
$45,001 – $120,000: 32.5% tax rate
$120,001 – $180,000: 37% tax rate
$180,001 and above: 45% tax rate
After Stage Three:
$18,200 – no tax
$18,201 – $45,000: 19% tax rate
$45,001 – $200,000: 30% tax rate
$200,001 and above: 45% tax rate
The changes were implemented by the previous government in an attempt to eliminate bracket creep, when inflation causes people to have more of their income lost to tax as they “creep” into higher brackets over time.
Critics of the cuts claim the measures only stop bracket creep for the highest-paid workers, as those earning up to $120,000 – approximately 90 per cent of Australians – will only see an adjustment of 2.5 per cent.
Mr Chalmers flagged the upcoming Budget will see more opportunities for cost of living relief for Australians.
“There will be cost-of-living relief in the budget, of course, because we’re working with the states and territories on some assistance for energy bills in particular,” he said.
“We will always do what we can to support people dealing with high inflation and provide responsible cost of living relief, as we did in October, as we will in May, if we can afford it.”
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1 January, 2023
Cops arrest extremely disruptive African woman inside busy McDonald’s Adelaide CBD store
Customers and staff at an Adelaide McDonald’s were left in shock as they witnessed a woman go over the counter to hurl abuse at workers while helping herself to food and drinks.
The incident, which occurred on Thursday night at the Hindley St store in the CBD, led to the woman’s arrest and multiple criminal charges.
The two-minute video begins with the woman, 19, already on the wrong side of the counter as startled staff watch her warily, with fries scattered in the background.
“What? I’ll beat you up and I’ll leave,” she yells, pushing her face towards staff in a challenge as she holds two drinks.
“Oh what’s that, what’s in that?” she asks, then grabs a paper bag. Not satisfied with what’s inside, she throws it away and continues to confront staff. Customers watch from the other side of the counter, some filming her.
Staff attempt to walk away from her as she approaches them and appear to remain calm throughout the clip. The woman can then be seen in the kitchen of the McDonald’s restaurant.
She then heads towards the Macca’s process line where they make all the burgers and helps herself, picking up a burger box and using her bare hands to shove some chips inside.
At this point, two staff members appear to be keeping a close eye on her, with one on the phone while the other films her.
The woman opens the drinks fridge. As she peruses the shelves, she says “Ooh what do I want” before grabbing a bottle of water for herself. She calls one of the staff members a “dumbass b***h”.
A customer tells her to “get out” and she says “Get the f**k out? Aww okay” but on her way out she is distracted by the McCafe display. She picks something from behind the glass display and pops it into her mouth.
Two police officers have arrived by this point. They calmly surround her and escort her out.
One of the young McDonald’s workers begins to tear up after the ordeal is over. Some customers try to console the clearly shaken staff members.
In a statement to news.com.au, South Australian police confirmed that a 19-year-old woman was arrested after the incident which happened around 10.35pm on Thursday night.
“It will be alleged the woman damaged a door and threw a bottle of water at staff,” police said. She was charged with disorderly behaviour, property damage and assault. She made bail and is due to appear in the Adelaide Magistrates Court on March 3, according to police.
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Queenslanders now have the right to die
A very limited right
Terminally ill Queenslanders are able to ask for medically-assisted death at a time of their choosing after the state's voluntary-assisted dying scheme came into effect.
State parliament voted to legalise voluntary-assisted dying in September 2021 after Premier Annastacia Palaszczuk took to the policy to the 2020 election.
People suffering a disease, illness or medical condition that is advanced, progressive and terminal and with less than one year to live can ask for medically-assisted death as of Sunday.
The decision to grant a request will be made by a panel of medical experts and must be approved by the patient's treating doctor.
The laws include safeguards to protect vulnerable people and ensure they have the mental capacity to make a request and it has been made without coercion.
Euthanasia advocates argue it gives terminally ill patients the right to choose how they want to spend their final days and to die with dignity.
Clem Jones Trust chair David Muir says the start of the scheme was due to activists and politicians working for decades to give Queenslanders a wider range of choices at the end of their lives.
"Many individuals and organisations have worked hard not just for years but for decades to achieve VAD laws in Queensland," he said in a statement.
"We should also recognise the MPs in the Queensland parliament from across the political spectrum who voted for the new laws.
"They all knew that voluntary assisted dying was never about them or the beliefs they may or may not hold, but has always been about enabling terminally ill Queenslanders to make a personal choice.
"As experience elsewhere shows, some people who apply for and are granted approval to access voluntary assisted dying end up not using it, but the mere fact it is available can deliver a humane and palliative effect at the end of life."
Opponents have argued it raises ethical and moral concerns and may put pressure on vulnerable people to end their lives and called for more funding for palliative care.
Queensland was the fifth jurisdiction to legalise euthanasia after Victoria, Western Australia, South Australia and Tasmania.
NSW passed voluntary assisted dying laws in May, meaning the laws will come into effect universally over the next 18 months.
Last month, federal parliament repealed a 25-year-old law put in place by Liberal MP Kevin Andrews restricting the rights of the ACT and Northern Territory to make euthanasia laws after the latter legalised assisted dying in 1995.
The ACT government plans to introduce legislation next year but the NT is yet to reveal its plans.
https://au.news.yahoo.com/queenslanders-now-die-163041432.html
***********************************************Save the planet – ditch environmentalism
Since becoming custodians of the environment, left-wing politicians, bureaucracies, and businesses have done little except monetise the rapid expansion of renewable energy which, ironically, is one of the most wasteful and destructive technologies in modern history.
Far from ‘saving the planet’, these environmentalists have made their intentions perfectly clear – and we should listen to them.
‘This is about system change!’ read the banners held aloft by the likes of spiritual leader Greta Thunberg and her pre-pubescent minions. She is the moral guide for a generation of children, teaching them to stand in the street screeching at the sky while the clunk of public money hits the pockets of the elite.
In Climate Book, Greta Thunberg describes the capitalist system as: ‘defined by colonialism, imperialism, oppression, and genocide by the so-called Global North to accumulate wealth that still shapes our current world order.’
Who is going to tell her that capitalism has been the default economic position underpinning human trade since we wandered out of the caves? Would you trust a person who believes the West invented capitalism with the future of human civilisation?
This is a religion to absolve the guilty, not an economic policy.
It could not be clearer that those who lack an education will never be able to save the world from anything, let alone dangerous ideology such as this. The only thing brainwashed children are useful for are the votes they cast in adulthood.
By ‘system change’ what the activists behind the children mean is ‘communism’ – or even a new variation of collectivism that we are beginning to know as eco-fascism. The flavour of destruction depends on which group of activists you come across and what the personal beliefs were of its leaders before the arrival of the #ClimateChange hashtag.
Some environmentalists think a form of communism will ‘save the planet’ because only dictatorial governments have the necessary power over individuals and the economy to carry out ‘uncomfortable change’ (read mass theft of property and rights).
Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau is one such individual who is warming up to the allure of dictatorship: ‘There’s a level of admiration I actually have for China. Their basic dictatorship is actually allowing them to turn their economy around on a dime.’ Before Trudeau gets too excited, someone should point out that China is the most polluted nation on Earth where the worst man-made famine in human history took place, all under the watch of communism.
Other activists have aligned themselves with international corporations whose influence over global politics dwarfs the democratic process. These are the suited class that sip their way around closed-door lobbying conferences like the World Economic Forum, pretending that innovation rather than political coercion is driving their eco-success. These environmentalists believe that an authoritarian marriage between the State and Corporate can deliver profit at a faster rate than sluggish market forces, held back by concerned citizens.
This magical fountain of money is to be ripped out of the general public via green taxes and unreasonable legislation. Like robbing a bank, no one has a plan for what happens tomorrow when there is no apocalypse and no capitalist economy creating public wealth. Perhaps they’ll start taxing the carbon in our bodies and air in our lungs to make up the difference in their parallel economy…
New Zealand offers a glimpse of the future, with socialist Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern proud of what is, quite literally, a race-based water management policy. Such incoherent madness would have been laughed off last century. Her propensity for hypocrisy allows her to demonise farmers for their emissions while pleading with America to send as many tourists as possible, via plane, to a volcanic sandpit which leaks greenhouses gases like an open valve.
The reason that no particular label accurately defines the modern environmentalist movement as a whole is because they are a fractured group of competing political ideologies, all of which are jumping on the ‘green’ bandwagon to elevate their sphere of power. It is time for rational people to see them clearly. These ideas are the weeds of politics, infesting Western Civilisation with the intent of colonisation and eventual suffocation.
Short-sighted businesses, unaware that the end game does not benefit them, think that ‘going green’ means that the government will both kill off their market competitors via legislation and make available fortunes of public money for ‘investment’ justified by the undefined label of ‘saving the planet’.
Politicians hitched a ride early on, seeing that universities and schools had been inundated by failed communists who, to hide the rapid decline in education standards, now elicit praise for raising ‘responsible global citizens’ (who cannot add, spell, or reason). Not only have political movements capitalised on Millennials, they are pushing to lower the voting age to prop up their regimes with children.
The Greens and Labor have never cared much for economic stability or civil liberty, so it was no surprise to see them lead the charge on this. It was similarly inevitable that a movement like the Teals would emerge comprised of bored, wealthy, affluent women funded by self-interested renewables billionaires. They get to virtue signal to the cafe class while their victims remain quarantined in the poorer suburbs.
What remains astonishing is how easily the Liberals and Nationals burned their principles, buried their morality, and scrambled up after unscrupulous Parliamentarians to get a piece of that green salvation.
To be clear, conservation is admirable – eco-fascism is disgraceful, and all we have seen of our politicians in the last decade is a race to install a carbon prison state.
Australians used to be responsible. Clean up Australia Day was one of those worthy initiatives that taught children to take care of the land. Now, instead of cleaning up their local area, kids are demanding that the world’s worst polluters ramp up operations because their teachers gave them a slogan that was never questioned.
How are children ‘making a better world’ by the installation of millions of solar panels and wind turbines destined for landfill within 20 years? Or hundreds of acres of battery farms that face the same fate?
Did any of them do the cost and environmental calculations on the mining, transport, manufacturing, installation, maintenance, and disposal of these ‘planet saving’ technologies? How many of them know that kids, just like them, are sitting in mud pits mining cobalt while entire nations are having their natural resources financially raped by China’s debt trap diplomacy leaving local residents impoverished?
Do they know that sacred sites and ancient communities throughout China’s ‘autonomous’ region of Tibet are destroyed for renewable mining operations, and that their first nations people are imprisoned if they protest? Are they aware that the oceans are facing danger from rare earths deep sea mining operations, or that rare earths represent the largest mining boom in modern history, triggering huge amounts of devastation?
Because it’s not ‘coal’, it doesn’t make the news… Speaking of fossil fuels, their demonisation is done without mention of the pharmaceutical industry which is wholly reliant on petrochemicals. You cannot have the socialist dream of free healthcare without fossil fuels.
Conservative parties had a duty to Australia to fight against destructive collectivism and to see through the cynical green cloak hiding its red core. Instead, they validated the incoherent, fanciful screeching. In their attempt to win a few elections, the conservatives kicked open the Pandora’s Box that formed the Teals. Affluent blue-ribbon seats never would have waded into this sick game without their friends in politics and business insisting it was ‘the right thing to do’. Those voters believed it without evidence, adopting Tealism as though it were a fashion trend.
Worse, these allegedly conservative politicians are still taking advice from the same green-eyed merchants of misery – the end result of which is Matt Kean.
As for the Nationals, there is no saving a party that sides with an international bureaucracy with policies devoted to the destruction of family agriculture. What farmer is going to vote for a local member who nods along while the United Nations demands herd culling to ‘meet Net Zero goals’? What food grower is going to sit by while Australia tries out the Sri Lankan approach to farming?
2023 is a new year, and if the conservatives want to have both an election future and a clean, environmentally friendly Australia – they have to apologise for adopting Net Zero garbage and immediately start a new course toward a genuinely sustainable future (that means, a future where Australians can afford to heat their homes and buy food for their kids).
Neither communism nor fascism does the environment any favours. Australia was clean and green when it was free of grifting activists rolling around in the hay of big business.
We absolutely should embrace conservation, but that is not going to happen if we impoverish, oppress, and starve Australians in pursuit of a Net Zero utopia. Utopias, by definition, do not exist.
Save the planet – ditch environmentalism.
https://spectator.com.au/2022/12/the-crimes-of-eco-fascism/
************************************************************If a race-based constitutional body is endorsed at next year’s referendum, it would send a permanent message that Australia is no longer committed to equal rights for all
Anthony Albanese’s warning this week about the “corrosive, insidious forces” attacking democracy needs to be taken seriously, particularly by those seeking a constitutional entity to represent Indigenous Australians.
The Prime Minister’s remarks, delivered at the Woodford Folk Festival, are a reminder about the ease with which well-meaning initiatives can damage the principles that hold this nation together.
In the same speech in which Albanese defended democracy he recommitted himself to a policy that would threaten democratic principles: establishing a race-based constitutional body to be known as the Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Voice.
If this is endorsed at next year’s referendum, it would send a permanent message that this country is no longer committed to equal rights for all.
The Prime Minister’s assessment of the challenge confronting democracy is consistent with the danger identified by the Washington-based Freedom House in its 2022 report on the state of democracy. Equality of citizenship takes pride of place at the start of the Freedom House report: “Around the world, the enemies of liberal democracy – a form of self-government in which human rights are recognised and every individual is entitled to equal treatment under law – are accelerating their attacks.”
The first step to defeating this threat is to recognise it when it is staring you in the face. That is only way to describe the proposed Indigenous voice to parliament.
The second step requires an understanding of what needs to be defended. And that means accepting that democracy means much more than regular elections and majority rule. According to Freedom House: “In its ideal form, it is a governing system based on the will and consent of the governed, institutions that are accountable to all citizens, adherence to the rule of law, and respect for human rights …
“It creates a level playing field so that all people, no matter the circumstances of their birth or background, can enjoy the universal human rights to which they are entitled and participate in politics and governance,” the Freedom House report says.
The threat to these principles from the Indigenous voice is real.
Equality of citizenship is ignored in the plan for the voice that has been drawn up by Tom Calma and Marcia Langton. This plan is outlined in a report that was endorsed by Albanese in parliament on November 30.
If enacted, some people, based on their race, would have two methods of influencing public policy: through their representatives in parliament and their representatives on the voice.
The Calma-Langton plan also falls short when assessed on the requirement for accountability.
The voice would not be accountable to ordinary indigenous voters but would answer to local and regional “voices”.
These unknown groups would decide who would sit on the national voice and whether any of its 24 members would be elected or merely selected. This is the system that the Calma-Langton report proposes: “The national voice membership would be structurally linked to the local and regional voices by the local and regional voices within each jurisdiction collectively selecting national voice members.
“Secondary options under this model may be used if Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people of the relevant jurisdiction agree.
“An election or expression of interest process may still be held for a jurisdiction if Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people in those areas prefer. This decision would be made with the relevant local and regional voices,” the report says.
The great strength of Albanese’s address was the implicit recognition that he has a responsibility not merely to govern, but to strengthen democracy for the next generation. “Our democracy is precious, something we have carefully grown and nurtured from one generation to the next. One of our core responsibilities is to make it stronger …” he said.
But this is matched by his failure to recognise that an indigenous voice, as proposed by the Calma-Langton report, would have a permanent corrosive impact on democracy.
It would divide the nation into those with additional influence over public policy and those without. It would not be limited to indigenous affairs.
“Restricting the scope of the advice function would diminish the role of the national voice as a national broadbased representative body,” the Calma-Langton report says.
Resentment at such inequitable treatment would be inevitable. Indigenous people would also have cause for complaint.
An institution of state, purporting to represent indigenous people, would have no direct accountability to ordinary indigenous people, stripping it of democratic legitimacy.
Despite these shortcomings, Albanese asserted at Woodford that the push for a “yes” vote at the referendum was gaining momentum. If that is the case, why are the government’s constitutional experts exploring other approaches?
On December 12 Linda Burney, the Minister for Indigenous Australians, posted a document on her website that outlined a summary of advice from the federal government’s constitutional experts group. Their advice concerned the draft constitutional amendment that would create the voice.
Without elaboration, the document says: “The expert group agreed that there could be – and gave consideration to – different policy and process approaches to key features of the draft constitutional amendment.”
Really? What are these key features that the experts believe are worth “different policy and process approaches”.
And why do the experts believe different approaches were worth exploring? Is there some weakness in the form of words unveiled by Albanese at the Garma festival in July? When does the government propose to share the expert group’s views with the community? Before or after the referendum?
This is not the way to secure informed consent for a change to the Constitution.
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