30 March, 2023
<br/><br/> 

<b> Exactly WHERE will Australia&#39;s 650,000 new migrants live as the nation&#39;s housing crisis deepens</b><br/>
<br/>
<i> It&#39;s grossly irresponsible for Albanese to allow a migrant influx when housing is already so tight. He clearly doesn&#39;t give a damn about the poor people who are bearing the brunt of the present shortage. It&#39;s a long time since the Labor party cared about the worker</i><br/>
<br/>
Concerns are growing over how Australia will cope with a record level of permanent migrants entering the country as the nation continues to battle a housing and rental crisis.<br/>
<br/>
The Albanese Government is reportedly planning for a total of 650,000 new migrants to settle here by mid-2024.<br/>
<br/>
Combined with estimates for next year, this means a total of 1.2million extra people will be living Australia in June next year compared to five years earlier.<br/>
<br/>
The floodgates are being opened to skilled migrants, international students and those coming for family or humanitarian reasons, even though Sydney and Melbourne - home to more than half of those who have come to Australia in the last 20 years - have ultra-low one per cent rental vacancy rates.<br/>
<br/>
SQM Research managing director Louis Christopher said surging immigration would make it even harder for people looking for a home to find accommodation, with weekly rents in Sydney soaring by 25 per cent during the past year compared with 22 per cent in Melbourne.<br/>
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&#39;We still remain very concerned for the situation in Melbourne, Sydney and Brisbane where most international arrivals first land,&#39; he said.<br/>
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&#39;The surge in net overseas longer term and permanent arrivals relative to new residential property supply is ensuring extremely tight rental conditions remain with our two largest capital cities.&#39;<br/>
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Australia&#39;s rental crisis is so critical that some families are being forced to live in tents because there is a severe shortage of long-term accommodation.<br/>
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One Nation leader Pauline Hanson was so fed up she tweeted her disgust at plans to see net overseas migration surge to 650,000 - which is the amount coming during 2022-23 and 2023-24 combined.<br/>
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&#39;Labor&#39;s record high immigration is literally forcing Australian families to live on the streets – and winter is coming,&#39; she said. &#39;We have an unprecedented housing and rental crisis. We don’t have enough homes for everyone in Australia. &#39;Australia is in serious trouble.&#39;<br/>
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The accommodation shortage problem is widespread with Sydney having a rental vacancy rate of just 1.3 per cent compared with 1.1 per cent in Melbourne, 0.4 per cent in Perth and 0.5 per cent in Adelaide.<br/>
<br/>
Brisbane&#39;s rental vacancy rate stands at just 0.8 per cent, SQM Research data showed.<br/>
<br/>
Sydney and Melbourne housed 56 per cent of Australia&#39;s new migrants between January 2000 and August 2021, new Australian Bureau of Statistics data showed.<br/>
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Australia&#39;s net annual immigration in the year up to September 2022 stood at 303,700 people - a 15-year high - taking the overall population above 26.1 million.<br/>
<br/>
This was the biggest overseas increase since late 2008, and included skilled migrants, family reunions and international students.<br/>
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The immigration surge is also coinciding with Prime Minister Anthony Albanese facing obstacles to his plan to build 30,000 homes under its Housing Future Fund.<br/>
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Labor&#39;s plan to build new social and affordable homes during the next five years has met opposition from the Greens, whose support the government needs in the Senate to get the legislation passed.<br/>
<br/>
A bill to establish the $10billion fund is being put to a parliamentary vote this week but Brisbane-based Greens MP Max Chandler-Mather, who holds the minor party&#39;s housing portfolio, is opposed to the program investing money in shares.<br/>
<br/>

<p class="asset asset-link">
	<a href="https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-11913969/Sydney-Melbourne-taking-migrants-immigration-set-surge-650-000.html">https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-11913969/Sydney-Melbourne-taking-migrants-immigration-set-surge-650-000.html</a>
</p>
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<br/>
<b> Huge stretch of Victorian coastline returned to Aboriginal owners</b><br/>
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A huge stretch of land in Victoria along the Great Ocean Road and up to Ararat was formally recognised as Aboriginal land this week.<br/>
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There was celebrations in a small temporary courtroom in Warrnambool on Tuesday as the Federal Court of Australia granted Eastern Marr people Native Title over the 8578.35 square kilometre area.<br/>
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Eastern Maar chief executive Marcus Clarke described it as a “historic moment in time”.<br/>
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However, news of the decision prompted confusion online about what it would mean for popular tourist sites in the area – a large section of the Great Ocean Road, which is home to the famous 12 Apostles, and part of the Great Otway National Park.<br/>
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“Will we be required to purchase permits to enter?” wrote one person.<br/>
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“Wonder if the Indigenous people will put a toll on the (Great) Ocean Road and charge money if you get out of your car,” said another.<br/>
<br/>
News.com.au spoke to Jamie Lowe, director of the Eastern Marr Aboriginal Corporation and chief executive of the National Native Title Council, about some of these misconceptions.<br/>
<br/>
“We just can’t come in and unilaterally charge to use the road. The government is still in control of this stuff,” he said, explaining that instead they would be part of the discussions with government if it was to happen.<br/>
<br/>
Mr Lowe, a Gundjitmara Djabwurrung man, said the Native Title would actually help enhance the tourism experience, particularly for international visitors.<br/>
<br/>
He said some examples they were looking at to offer an Indigenous experience included Indigenous signage and Indigenous guides to give tours.<br/>
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“If we want people to stay on the road longer and spend more money, they need more things to do,” he said.<br/>
<br/>
He added more options for tourists was “a good thing for everyone”.<br/>
<br/>
The determination includes the right to camp, hunt, fish, collect plants, protect sites of cultural significance and conduct ceremony, but Mr Lowe said it was important to note the Native Title only applies to Crown lands and national parks.<br/>
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“We won’t be rocking up on people’s backyards and pitching a tent,” he confirmed of the misconception circulating online.<br/>
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The native title claim was first filed in the Federal Court more than 10 years ago in December 2012.<br/>
<br/>
In a statement, Mr Clarke said: “Our community has been steadfast in their aim to achieving Native Title and getting to this point has been a long travelled path but we are here.<br/>
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“Achieving Native Title recognition provides a strong foundation for our society to strengthen our communal goals and assertions for Country including adding another link in our chain toward strengthening and advancing our self-determination and nationhood agenda.”<br/>
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Eastern Maar citizen Jodie Sizer told the ABC, who attended the temporary courtroom where the decision was handed down on Tuesday, that it was important for generations to come.<br/>
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“It’s a recognition of rights that provides a platform for all things; from economic development to meaningful recognition, so we can ensure that we have the self-determination to secure our rightful place in the future,” she said.<br/>
<br/>
Kirrae Whurrong elder and Eastern Maar member Aunty Lee-Anne Clarke told the publication: “I’m in hope that we can take away the sorrow and oppression that we’ve actually felt and replace that with some joy and happiness, with who we are.”<br/>
<br/>

<p class="asset asset-link">
	<a href="https://www.news.com.au/travel/australian-holidays/victoria/huge-stretch-of-victorian-coastline-returned-to-aboriginal-owners/news-story/6ef612092d09b2a645be56d375ca73ea">https://www.news.com.au/travel/australian-holidays/victoria/huge-stretch-of-victorian-coastline-returned-to-aboriginal-owners/news-story/6ef612092d09b2a645be56d375ca73ea</a>
</p>
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<br/>
<b> Expanded eligibility for COVID antivirals as Covid cases rise</b><br/>
<br/>
Around 160,000 extra Australians will be able to access subsidised COVID antiviral treatments from Saturday, as virus cases rise and the federal government launches a new ad campaign encouraging booster doses.<br/>
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Australians in their 60s with one severe illness risk factor will join the eligibility list for Pfizer’s oral antiviral, Paxlovid, from this weekend, when a vaccination drive is also rolled out on television, social media and billboards.<br/>
<br/>
Health Minister Mark Butler said aged care cases had risen by about 65 per cent, antiviral prescriptions had risen by about 40 per cent, and while there were fewer hospitalisations from COVID than in the peak of the summer wave, there had been a slow and small uptick over the last five weeks.<br/>
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“All of which goes to reinforce the message that this is not over,” he said. “There will be future waves of COVID across the course of this year, and it is important to continue to reinforce those standard messages about remaining COVID-safe.”<br/>
<br/>
Less than half of the eligible population (45.2 per cent) has had their fourth COVID dose going into winter although that figure is much higher – 75 per cent or more – for groups over 70-years-old.<br/>
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Butler said the government’s campaign would emphasise new advice issued in January that shifted booster eligibility away from how many doses a person had, to how many months it had been since their last dose or infection.<br/>
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All adult Australians who have not had a COVID-19 infection or vaccination in the last six months can get an extra booster, regardless of how many vaccine doses they have previously received.<br/>
<br/>
Chief Medical Officer Paul Kelly said expanded eligibility for antiviral treatments – which prevent severe disease, hospitalisation and death – had been recommended by the independent pharmaceutical benefits advisory committee based on latest evidence and there was “plenty of supply”.<br/>
<br/>
The cost for a course of treatment for people who are not eligible for the subsidy remains close to $1000 on the private market, he said.<br/>
<br/>
“But I think the message to Australians is the people that really need it, they are now eligible for that highly subsidised PBS rate, and they’re the ones that should be making those plans [with their doctor] in case they are diagnosed with COVID in coming months.”<br/>
<br/>
Kelly also released his review of the fourth Omicron wave, which ended in February. At 19 weeks it lasted longer than expected but was flatter in terms of case numbers and severe illness.<br/>
<br/>
He said it was the first time that there had been a so-called “soup” of variants circling the community, rather than one dominant strain. “[That] actually [makes it] more difficult to predict what is going to happen in the next wave, or even the timing of the next wave,” he said.<br/>
<br/>
“I think we’ve got a ripple at the moment. Whether that will turn into wave … it’s difficult to predict at this stage. But certainly, there has been an increase in numbers over the last few weeks.”<br/>
<br/>
Kelly also said that hybrid immunity – meaning the combination of immunity from vaccines and prior infections – was making a difference, particularly in more vulnerable populations, with COVID death rates among First Nations, culturally and linguistically diverse, and disabled people now closer to resembling the general population.<br/>
<br/>
“These are positive things,” Kelly said. “There is still a need to protect our most vulnerable people and that’s very clearly the policy that we’re doing now.”<br/>
<br/>
He said the most at risk remained elderly people, particularly in aged care homes, as he strongly advised people over 65 to get a booster vaccine if they had not received one or been vaccinated in the past six months.<br/>
<br/>
The government will also extend the disaster payment scheme for aged care workers, which had been due to expire at the end of March. It will continue paying $750 a week for workers who contract COVID but do not have leave entitlements.<br/>
<br/>
Kelly said the department was giving personal protective equipment and rapid antigen tests to aged care facilities, and he would be writing to all providers on Friday to remind them of the key issues with COVID, the flu and other viruses approaching winter.<br/>
<br/>

<p class="asset asset-link">
	<a href="https://www.smh.com.au/politics/federal/this-is-not-over-vaccine-campaign-expanded-eligibility-for-covid-antivirals-as-cases-rise-20230330-p5cwr6.html">https://www.smh.com.au/politics/federal/this-is-not-over-vaccine-campaign-expanded-eligibility-for-covid-antivirals-as-cases-rise-20230330-p5cwr6.html</a>
</p>
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<br/>
<b> Greens, Coalition and entire crossbench unite to force inquiry into ‘broken’ FOI system</b><br/>
<br/>
<i> Only the party of secrecy dissented. Guess who?</i><br/>
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The Greens, Coalition and crossbench have teamed up to set up an inquiry into the freedom of information commissioner’s resignation over dysfunction and delays in the FOI system.<br/>
<br/>
The FOI commissioner, Leo Hardiman, announced his resignation earlier in March citing his lack of powers to make changes necessary to improve the timeliness of reviews of FOI decisions.<br/>
<br/>
On Tuesday the Senate voted to establish a legal and constitutional affairs references committee inquiry into the resignation, resourcing for FOI applications and reviews, and the possible “creation of a statutory time frame for completion of reviews”.<br/>
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The motion, put by the Greens senator David Shoebridge, was supported by the Coalition and the entire crossbench, passing 43 votes to 19, with only Labor opposed. The inquiry will report by 7 December.<br/>
<br/>
In March Guardian Australia revealed almost 600 freedom of information cases have languished before the nation’s information commissioner for more than three years, including 42 that are still not resolved after half a decade.<br/>
<br/>
The former senator Rex Patrick has brought a federal court case challenging lengthy delays in the FOI review process. He has warned that vast delays plague Australia’s “broken” freedom of information system and are shielding the activities of government from scrutiny.<br/>
<br/>
In March Hardiman posted to LinkedIn that “further changes are necessary to ensure that the timeliness of … reviews and, consequently, access to government-held information, is increased”.<br/>
<br/>
But without changes to his powers, Hardiman said he had come to the view he would not be able to improve the timeliness of reviews and access to information.<br/>
<br/>
“I have accordingly decided the most appropriate course is to resign my appointment.”<br/>
<br/>
Shoebridge said “anyone who has been near the FOI system will tell you it’s broken, responses are glacial, costs are obscenely high and too often no documents are released despite compelling public interest”.<br/>
<br/>
“The FOI commissioner’s appointment was intended to be a turning point in the scheme but that too has failed, it’s time to take a proper look at what’s going on,” he said in a statement.<br/>
<br/>
“The broken state of FOI laws and the impossible backlog aren’t an accident, they were intentionally created by a Coalition government that was committed to secrecy and hiding ministers from accountability.<br/>
<br/>
“What’s really disappointing is that the new Albanese government has done nothing to fix the problems in FOI, and by refusing to increase funding, they have allowed matters to get even worse.”<br/>
<br/>
In June, the attorney general, Mark Dreyfus, told Radio National he was “not sure that we need to amend the Freedom of Information Act”.<br/>
<br/>
But Dreyfus said there “needs to be a different approach” starting with “a direction to government to make information as widely available as possible”.<br/>
<br/>
A spokesperson for Dreyfus said “the former government trashed FOI, leaving the system in a dysfunctional mess”.<br/>
<br/>
“This government supports Australians’ right to know and is committed to ensuring the FOI Act is operating effectively.<br/>
<br/>
“We will use this inquiry to demonstrate our commitment to that.”<br/>
<br/>

<p class="asset asset-link">
	<a href="https://www.theguardian.com/australia-news/2023/mar/28/greens-coalition-and-entire-crossbench-unite-to-force-inquiry-into-broken-foi-system">https://www.theguardian.com/australia-news/2023/mar/28/greens-coalition-and-entire-crossbench-unite-to-force-inquiry-into-broken-foi-system</a>
</p>
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<br/>
<br>
<br/>



29 March, 2023
<br/><br/> 

<b> $15bn NRF bill clears Senate with crossbench support</b><br/>
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<i> More funds for a bloated bureaucracy, political favoritism and projects that lose money. Goverments are woeful investors</i><br/>
<br/>
The Albanese government’s flagship $15 billion National Reconstruction Fund will be created after enabling legislation passed the Senate late on Tuesday evening following a debate in which 20 amendments were voted on.<br/>
<br/>
With the support of the Greens secured before the bill passed through the House of Representatives, the government secured support from the Jacqui Lambie Network, as well as independent Senators Lidia Thorpe and Senator David Pocock earlier on Tuesday.<br/>
<br/>
The successful crossbench amendments go to the size, term and composition of the National Reconstruction Fund (NRF) board, although most of the proposed amendments did not pass. All of the Opposition’s amendments were rejected.<br/>
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The amended bill will now return to the House of Representatives, where the government holds a majority of the seats. It is expected to be officially legislated on Wednesday.<br/>
<br/>
The bill establishes the NRF Corporation, which will administer the $15 billion industry fund. It will be directed by an independent board whose members will be appointed by Industry and Science minister Ed Husic and Finance minister Katy Gallagher.<br/>
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In a statement, Mr Husic described the fund as “one of the largest peacetime investments in Australian manufacturing capability”.<br/>
<br/>
“The most successful modern economies are built on strong, advanced manufacturing capability. The NRF will help deliver this for Australia,” he said.<br/>
<br/>
“We genuinely wanted this bill to be a moment where Parliament came together to support the national interest. I am pleased the crossbench engaged constructively on this important bill that will help rebuild Australia’s sovereign capability.”<br/>
<br/>
Mr Husic said the fund – one of Labor’s key election commitments – will “position Australia as a maker of high-value added products and creating good secure jobs in the process.”<br/>
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“The NRF shows the Government is serious about investing our human capital to keep Australian smarts on shore. We want Australia to be a country that makes things, a nation that has faith in its know-how and ability to get the job done,” he said.<br/>
<br/>
With the bill to be signed off by the House of Representatives, Mr Husic and Ms Gallagher will shortly develop an investment mandate that will guide the investments of the NRF Board. The mandate will include an agreed rate of return.<br/>
<br/>
According to a government amendment to the bill in the Senate, the board must also have regard to six other considerations such as “the desirability of encouraging the commercialisation of Australian innovation and technology” and Australia’s greenhouse gas emissions reduction targets.<br/>
<br/>
The government’s other Senate amendment also requires the NRF Corporation to produce a written policy on the “impact of investments of the Corporation on First Nations Australians”.<br/>
<br/>
Investments through the NRF may be made through loans, credit, bond or other debt security purchase, guarantees, or the acquisition of equity interests. Grant funding will not be made through the NRF.<br/>
<br/>
The government has committed to seven sub-funds within the NRF, the largest of which is an up to $3 billion sub-fund for renewables and low emissions technologies. The other priority areas are for medical science, transport, value-add in agriculture, forestry and fisheries, value-add in resources, defence capability, and enabling capabilities or ‘critical technologies’.<br/>
<br/>
Just one of Jacqui Lambie Network Senator Tammy Tyrell’s three NRF amendment sheets passed. Senator Tyrell’s amendments increases the minimum and maximum NRF board membership by two – to six and eight respectively – and specifically highlights ‘the commercialisation of innovative research’ as an appropriate area of expertise for a board member.<br/>
<br/>
The legislation also requires the ministers to ensure the board members “have an appropriate balance of experience or expertise, professional credibility and significant standing” within their fields.<br/>
<br/>
Speaking to the amendment on Monday evening, Senator Tyrell said this would prevent the possibility that the board become dominated by members of a single profession, for example.<br/>
<br/>
Senator Pocock had one of his three NRF amendment sheets pass. The amendments reduce the maximum term for NRF board members from five years to four years, with the option for an additional term of reappointment. This sheet also brings forward the date of the first review of the fund from five years after passage to before 31 December 2026.<br/>
<br/>
Two second reading amendments also passed. These are not included in the NRF Corporation bill itself.<br/>
<br/>
Greens Senator Peter Whish Wilson secured a call for the NRF to support circular economy projects and to incorporate circular economy principles in the fund’s investment mandate.<br/>
<br/>
Senator Pocock’s , meanwhile, received a commitment from government to explore policy mechanisms for financing startups, as well as establishing a presence for the Corporation in the Australian Capital Territory.<br/>
<br/>
None of Senator Thorpe ‘s amendment sheets or second reading amendment passed. A requirement that consent be obtained from First Nations Traditional Owners before projects situated on their land could receive NRF investment from was pursued as an amendment to the bill as well as a call for inclusion in the Investment Mandate through a second reading amendment.<br/>
<br/>

<p class="asset asset-link">
	<a href="https://www.innovationaus.com/15bn-nrf-bill-clears-senate-with-crossbench-support/">https://www.innovationaus.com/15bn-nrf-bill-clears-senate-with-crossbench-support/</a>
</p>
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<br/>
<b> Another public trustee disgrace: Bloodsuckers</b><br/>
<br/>
<i> Stealing from pensioners is their speciality</i><br/>
<br/>
A decision was made a year ago to try to protect Mark* from being financially exploited – but now, he pays a dollar to the state agency protecting him for every dollar he gets back.<br/>
<br/>
Mark has a neurodevelopmental disorder and survives on an age pension. His sister Annie* has cared for him since their father died.<br/>
<br/>
In recent years, Annie became increasingly worried about her brother&#39;s ability to manage and protect his own finances, which prompted her to seek help.<br/>
<br/>
She applied to the State Administrative Tribunal for Mark&#39;s assets to be taken under state care. It was a decision she now regrets.<br/>
<br/>
&quot;It feels like they&#39;ve taken complete control of my brother&#39;s life, and mine. I have never been so stressed,&quot; Annie said. &quot;It feels like being incarcerated.&quot;<br/>
<br/>
Left without money for food<br/>
<br/>
Mark was put under an interim administration with the WA Public Trustee, and he was blocked from accessing his own bank accounts. He couldn&#39;t even afford to buy food, forcing Annie to pay out of her own pocket to help.<br/>
<br/>
In a statement, the Public Trustee said it could not comment on individual cases, but acknowledged that miscommunication with banks has led to other similar events.<br/>
<br/>
&quot;The Public Trustee has been alerted to instances where the bank has frozen accounts because the bank did not understand the administration order and the Public Trustee will instruct the bank to unfreeze the account.&quot;<br/>
<br/>
Annie said Mark was unable to access his bank account for almost three months.<br/>
<br/>
Eventually, after an hour-long tribunal hearing over the phone, the Public Trustee was appointed Mark&#39;s official administrator.<br/>
<br/>
A dollar for you, a dollar for them<br/>
<br/>
Mark was only given access to his money through a $200 weekly allowance authorised by the Public Trustee.<br/>
<br/>
In his first four months of administration, he received $3,500. Over that same period, the Public Trustee charged at least $3,664 in financial administration fees alone.<br/>
<br/>
Totalling all the fees, Mark paid 40 per cent of his pension to the Public Trustee, including for &quot;asset management&quot; and establishing the administration.<br/>
<br/>
It&#39;s illegal in every state and territory except the ACT to identify people like Mark who have their assets under state care. The potential penalty in WA for publishing their identity is one year&#39;s imprisonment or a fine of up to $10,000.<br/>
<br/>
It means we can&#39;t show Mark and Annie&#39;s faces, despite them wanting to share their story.<br/>
<br/>
&quot;It&#39;s a secret, secretive organisation … it&#39;s an absolute disgrace the way you&#39;re treated,&quot; Annie said.<br/>
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ABC&#39;s Background Briefing has revealed how the Public Trustee forces some clients out of their own homes, against their will, and charges tens of thousands of dollars.<br/>
<br/>

<p class="asset asset-link">
	<a href="https://www.abc.net.au/news/2023-03-29/wa-public-trustee-high-administration-fees/102092732">https://www.abc.net.au/news/2023-03-29/wa-public-trustee-high-administration-fees/102092732</a>
</p>
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<br/>
<b> Queensland is set to have &#39;the strongest hate crime laws in the country&#39;</b><br/>
<br/>
The public display of hate symbols, like Nazi flags, will be banned in Queensland under proposed laws set to be introduced by the state government today.<br/>
<br/>
Premier Annastacia Palaszczuk said there was no room for hateful ideologies, after several recent anti-Semitic incidents in Brisbane.<br/>
<br/>
&quot;Our government promised to review and strengthen serious vilification and hate crime laws and this bill is delivering on that promise,&quot; she said.<br/>
<br/>
&quot;These reforms mean Queensland will have some of the strongest hate crime laws in the country.&quot;<br/>
<br/>
What are the proposed laws?<br/>
<br/>
A new &quot;prohibited symbols&quot; offence will be introduced in a bill in parliament today by Attorney-General Shannon Fentiman.<br/>
<br/>
Under the new offence, public display, public distribution or publication of prohibited symbols in circumstances that might reasonably be expected to cause a member of the public to feel menaced, harassed or offended, are prohibited, unless the person has a reasonable excuse. <b> <i> The hammer and sickle?</i></b><br/>
<br/>
This includes publishing images or symbols online on social media platforms like Twitter or Facebook, or publicly displaying hateful tattoos.<br/>
<br/>
Criminals found guilty of violent crimes, including assault and grievous bodily harm, who are motivated by hateful ideologies, will face increased penalties, including longer jail terms.<br/>
<br/>
&quot;I think that sends a really serious message that racial vilification or vilification based on religion or sexuality, or gender identity will not be tolerated here in Queensland,&quot; Ms Fentiman told ABC Radio Brisbane.<br/>
<br/>
It&#39;s important to note it won&#39;t be illegal to possess material displaying hate symbols, only to display it.<br/>
<br/>
&quot;We can&#39;t stop people from having this kind of really disturbing material. But if you display them and it causes people distress, then that will be illegal, and it will be a crime,&quot; Ms Fentiman said.<br/>
<br/>
The new offence will give police officers and the courts expanded powers to prove a hate crime. Officers will be permitted to access the phone records of suspected offenders, provided they have a warrant.<br/>
<br/>
Are there any exemptions?<br/>
<br/>
There will be exemptions to the proposed laws, with hate symbols permitted for educational, historical, and religious purposes, as well as cultural settings.<br/>
<br/>
&quot;There will be very sensible exemptions built into the legislation,&quot; Ms Fentiman said.<br/>
<br/>
&quot;We know, for example, that the swastika, as opposed to the Nazi hooked cross, is a religious symbol for people practising Hinduism and Buddhism.&quot;<br/>
<br/>
Chief executive of Multicultural Australia, Christine Castley, said the reforms were a step in the right direction.<br/>
<br/>
&quot;The laws will enhance the safety of every person and every community in Queensland, especially for those culturally and linguistically diverse communities who all too often face harassment as they go about their lives in public spaces and places of worship,&quot; Ms Castley said.<br/>
<br/>
&quot;We will continue to amplify the voices of affected communities and individuals, and work with the Queensland government and response agencies such as the Queensland police to improve awareness and reporting of hate crimes.&quot;<br/>
<br/>

<p class="asset asset-link">
	<a href="https://www.abc.net.au/news/2023-03-29/queensland-parliament-hate-symbols-crime/102158002">https://www.abc.net.au/news/2023-03-29/queensland-parliament-hate-symbols-crime/102158002</a>
</p>
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<br/>
<b> Big coal miners warn on prices, jobs as coal faces ‘carbon tax by stealth’</b><br/>
<br/>
<i> Solar panels from China trump Australian-produced coal as an energy source</i><br/>
<br/>
Major coal companies are warning that Anthony Albanese’s deal with the Greens to pass Labor’s signature climate policy is a ­“carbon tax by stealth” that will drive up ­energy prices, destroy jobs and kill foreign investment.<br/>
<br/>
Whitehaven, New Hope, Bowen Coking Coal and Peabody Australia condemned Labor’s 11th-hour safeguard mechanism shake-up amid concern the changes would damage prosperity and make it harder and more expensive to reduce ­emissions.<br/>
<br/>
The companies – which collectively represent $15bn worth of fossil fuel projects and count billions of dollars in their investment pipeline – say the government’s proposed amendments will make Australia uncompetitive.<br/>
<br/>
While Labor locked in a second parliamentary win in securing crossbench support to pass its $15bn National Reconstruction Fund, negotiations with the Greens broke down over its signature housing policy, with the left-wing party refusing to deal with the bill until the budget sitting ­period.<br/>
<br/>
The $10bn Housing Australia Future Fund is facing parliamentary defeat, with the Greens and ACT independent senator David Pocock opposed to the scheme to underwrite 30,000 new affordable homes amid concern the ­investment will not cover projected housing shortfalls.<br/>
<br/>
The coal industry’s intervention comes after gas producers warned the Prime Minister’s ­climate policy, which forces 215 big emitters to slash emissions by nearly 5 per cent each year out to 2030, could drive up costs for households and businesses if supply is restricted.<br/>
<br/>
While the safeguard amendments have been welcomed the Business Council of Australia and Australian Industry Group, Whitehaven Coal chief executive Paul Flynn warned the Greens’ changes put Australia at a “significant” competitive disadvantage, and created risks for energy ­security for strategic partners ­including Japan.<br/>
<br/>
“Nearly 70 per cent of Japan’s thermal coal imports come from Australia so it exposes them to a material new risk in terms of security of energy supply,” Mr Flynn said. “In the midst of a global shortage of ­energy, and considering ­alternative technologies aren’t ready to pick up the slack from the 80 per cent of primary energy derived from fossil fuels today, it’s mind-boggling the government has entertained these concessions.”<br/>
<br/>
Prime Minster Anthony Albanese said the Liberal Coalition is a party addicted to ‘secrecy, coverups and denial’… after Labor was criticised for working with the Greens by the opposition. “Only a party addicted to secrecy, coverups, and denial would say that it’s a bad thing that this parliament More<br/>
Bowen Coking Coal chief executive Nick Jorss said Labor was entering “extremely dangerous and uncharted territory” with a “carbon tax by stealth” that would limit Australia’s high-quality, low-emissions coal exports.<br/>
<br/>
With coal Australia’s largest export industry, Mr Jorss said: “Global coal demand is at the highest level in history and it’s ­fanciful to think that reducing our high-quality exports in the face of record demand will do anything other than drive up energy and steel prices, create a net increase global emissions and destroy ­Australian jobs, both in regions and in cities.”<br/>
<br/>
New Hope Group chief executive Rob Bishop said the amendments were built on “a political objective on a base demonisation of fossil fuels” and that they would see Australia abandon its role as a reliable energy exporter for the region.<br/>
<br/>
President of Peabody’s Australian operations, Jamie Frankcombe, said the company was concerned the legislation would “make the mining industry less competitive at a time when it’s integral to providing the minerals and energy required for the ­energy transition”.<br/>
<br/>
“The very real danger in setting aspirational emission ­reduction targets and imposing rigid rules to achieve them is that it will reduce our cost competitiveness, lead to potential job ­losses and hurt regional communities.”<br/>
<br/>
A spokesman for Glencore said the reforms needed to achieve emissions reductions without “destroying the jobs and investments that are critical to the national economy”.<br/>
<br/>
Industry sources were concerned the government was “ring-fencing” sectors including manufacturing from their role in emissions reductions, and the “preferential treatment” would mean other groups had to “pick up the slack” after Labor carved out $1bn to support hard-to-abate sectors and critical industries during the transition.<br/>
<br/>
Private equity fund EIG – the soon-to-be owner of Origin ­Energy’s gas business – said the deal between Labor and the Greens failed to recognise the role of gas as a bridge to renewables. “it’s a mistake to treat coal and natural gas the same,” EIG chief executive R. Blair Thomas said. “I think gas does have a critical role to play in energy transition in a way that coal does not.”<br/>
<br/>
EIG, which along with Canada’s Brookfield has signed a binding $18.7bn deal to buy Origin Energy, said the Australian government must balance the need to reduce emissions while ensuring energy security.<br/>
<br/>
“If we don’t get that balance right and we have the extreme volatility, like we saw in Europe last year, I think you’re going to get very significant consumer backlash,” Mr Thomas said.<br/>
<br/>
Greens leader Adam Bandt on Tuesday said Climate Change and Energy Minister Chris Bowen now had special powers – under what he called a “pollution trigger” – to stop fossil fuel expansion that would lift pollution above legislated targets. He also said the party would push to install a climate trigger as part of an overhaul of environmental laws. This would require emissions to be considered before projects were approved.<br/>
<br/>
Despite Mr Bandt claiming the deal would stop about half of 116 coal and gas projects in the pipeline, Mr Bowen said the safeguard mechanism would not damage investment or drive up prices. Mr Bowen said emissions targets under the laws already accounted for new entrants, and the legislation included a buffer for emissions from future projects.<br/>
<br/>
He said new transparency ­requirements would see coal and gas projects brought in line with “international best practice” for emissions reductions.<br/>
<br/>
“What we negotiated was a very clear cap on emissions, which is perfectly reasonable and sensible,” he told the ABC. “They will have to meet those requirements, as will every other facility, whether it’s gas, coal, any other new facility, an industrial emitter will need to meet international best practice when it comes to ­future emissions.”<br/>
<br/>
After weeks of closed-door talks, Tasmanian Greens senator Nick McKim unleashed a torrent of criticism on green groups and claimed his own party’s negotiation position was “not as strong as it could have been”.<br/>
<br/>
“We have been in negotiations with the corrupt, ecocidal government of a petro-state that was prepared to hold a gun to the head of future generations by threatening to blow up climate action ­unless they could continue to approve massive new coal and gas projects,” he said.<br/>
<br/>
Former Greens leader Bob Brown, who torpedoed Kevin Rudd’s carbon pollution reduction scheme, backed the deal with Labor and attacked green groups for being “unhelpful”.<br/>
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28 March, 2023
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<b> Developers thrown huge tax incentives to fix housing crisis<br/>
Property developers who build affordable homes will receive a slew of tax concessions</b><br/>
<br/>
<i> The tax concessions are attractive so developers may grab them. The fact that only one out of 10 homes has to be &quot;affordable&quot; is a rort. The developer will provide minimal facilities in one propery and build the rest to an attractive standard. So the poor will still get only the most basic accommodation</i><br/>
<br/>
Property developers who build affordable homes will received a slew of tax concessions including land tax slashed in half Treasurer Cameron Dick has revealed.<br/>
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Owners of build-to-rent projects will have their land tax bill slashed in half for 20 years if they make one in every 10 units an “affordable home”.<br/>
<br/>
Other available tax concessions include a full exemption on the 2 per cent foreign investor land tax surcharge also for 20 years.<br/>
<br/>
A full exemption from the additional foreign acquirer duty for the future transfer of a build-to-rent site will also be available.<br/>
<br/>
The concessions will come in on July 1, 2023.<br/>
<br/>
Mr Dick said the private construction sector was “at capacity” across Australia, and the government was “working with industry to identify innovative ideas that create new pipelines of housing”.<br/>
<br/>
It comes as Premier Annastacia Palaszczuk announced hundreds more emergency hotel rooms across Queensland will be funded under a $28m boost to the state government’s housing response package for another year.<br/>
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The announcement comes as the state government prepares to focus the parliamentary sitting week on housing, including the push to limit rent increases in Queensland to once a year.<br/>
<br/>
The government will unveil the rent shake up as housing stakeholders gather on Tuesday to look at progress from last year’s housing summit, which the Premier called following The Courier-Mail’s Hitting Home series.<br/>
<br/>
Under the changes, it is understood property owners and landlords will only be allowed to lift the rent on their property once every 12 months.<br/>
<br/>
The move would bring Queensland in line with other states, such as Victoria and South Australia – where the rental price on a property can generally only be changed once a year.<br/>
<br/>
Ms Palaszczuk on Tuesday morning also confirmed the state government would fund its immediate housing response package for an extra year to the tune of $28m.<br/>
<br/>
The support would help “our most vulnerable Queenslanders facing homelessness and housing stress” and including funding more than 600 emergency hotel room spots, and help pay bond payments.<br/>
<br/>
“Through our immediate housing response for families package we&#39;ve supported more than 4000 families with over 44,000 nights of accommodation,” Ms Palaszczuk said.<br/>
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<b> New Origin owner Brookfield ‘flexible’ on Eraring coal closure</b><br/>
<br/>
<i> There&#39;s a lot of persiflage below but there is a committment not to close Eraring until replacement generation is available. That may never happen. The idea that batteries could help is a laugh. A battery will only last hours and then be useless</i><br/>
<br/>
The soon-to-be owner of Origin Energy will hold talks with incoming NSW premier Chris Minns on the future of Australia’s biggest coal plant, Eraring, as pressure grows to keep the station running longer than 2025 amid fears of blackouts.<br/>
<br/>
“What’s most important to us is that it is closed down as soon as it possibly can be. So within that context we’re obviously happy to have a conversation with the government and hear what they have to say,” Brookfield Australian boss Stewart Upson said.<br/>
<br/>
“But it will be important to us that whatever happens the result of our investment here is that Eraring can be closed down as soon as it can be done so in a responsible manner.”<br/>
<br/>
The takeover deal includes a plan for Brookfield to invest an extra $20bn in Origin through to 2030 to build up to 14 gigawatts of new renewable generation and storage facilities in Australia.<br/>
<br/>
Before the Brookfield approach Origin had given notice that it intended to close the 2880-megawatt Eraring power plant in the Hunter Valley in August 2025.<br/>
<br/>
Mr Minns has said his view is to seek talks to keep the nation’s biggest coal-fired generator open past the scheduled closure date.<br/>
<br/>
Mr Upson told The Australian the August 2025 date “is not a required closure date”. Any closure would also ensure there is alternative supply in place, he added.<br/>
<br/>
“It’s not a commitment by Origin to close on that date, it’s the earliest possible date, it can close.<br/>
<br/>
“Both Origin (now) and under our new ownership – are focused on closing Eraring as soon as we possibly can, only if we can only in a way that’s responsible and doesn’t have an impact on consumers or supply in the market.”<br/>
<br/>
“That’s about ensuring that we have the replacement capacity in place before we close it down, which is something Origin has already been working on with its battery project and something we will be working on as fast as we can,” Mr Upson said.<br/>
<br/>
He said he welcomes talks with the incoming NSW Premier.<br/>
<br/>
“They are a very important stakeholder and I think it’s going to be important that we work closely together to ensure that the transition happens in a way that doesn’t have a negative impact on consumers, business or the economy in general,” he said.<br/>
<br/>
The comments by Mr Upson shows the infrastructure giant is prepared to play the long game on politics as it prepares to take control of one Australia’s most important power generators.<br/>
<br/>
Mr Upson still has some way to go to win Origin, but he has got past the biggest hurdle – securing binding scheme agreement on the $18.7bn mega power deal.<br/>
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The proposal still needs to get approvals from competition and foreign investment regulators and Orgin’s shareholders are yet to vote on the deal, although it has been endorsed by the board.<br/>
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	<a href="https://www.couriermail.com.au/business/new-origin-owner-brookfield-flexible-on-eraring-coal-closure/news-story/43520f8df2008997281bb5b43be83d56">https://www.couriermail.com.au/business/new-origin-owner-brookfield-flexible-on-eraring-coal-closure/news-story/43520f8df2008997281bb5b43be83d56</a>
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<b> The Greens say they’ve derailed the Beetaloo gas project but proponent Tamboran disagrees</b><br/>
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Dozens of oil and gas projects face higher costs under a Labor climate deal with the Greens, analysts said, but claims it will scuttle two of the Northern Territory’s largest gas developments were rubbished by the project developers.<br/>
<br/>
Greens leader Adam Bandt said the safeguard mechanism would put a hard cap on greenhouse gas emissions from the nation’s 215 largest polluters, as well as introducing a “pollution trigger” requiring the Climate Change Minister Chris Bowen to test a new or expanded project’s impact on the cap and net carbon budgets.<br/>
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Mr Bandt said the net effect of the agreed amendments to the mechanism was that “the Greens have stopped many of the 116 coal and gas projects in the pipeline from proceeding ... and we’ve derailed the Beetaloo and Barossa gas fields’’.<br/>
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Credit Suisse head of integrated energy and resources Saul Kavonic said the deal represents “a far cry from a ban on new oil and gas, but certainly doesn’t indicate new oil and gas supply is welcome”.<br/>
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“The new reforms agreed with the Greens are going to be inflationary and risk jobs by hindering investment and restricting offset use across all of Australia’s heavy industry.’’<br/>
<br/>
But Tamboran Resources - developing the Beetaloo project in the NT - said claims its project would not be able to proceed under the new rules were totally incorrect.<br/>
<br/>
“This is 100 per cent wrong,’’ managing director Joel Riddle said on Monday<br/>
<br/>
“Tamboran’s progressive sustainability plan was and is doing everything already called for in these amendments.<br/>
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“This is a decisive political failure for the Greens who have campaigned to destroy industry, jobs and real progress on emissions reductions.’’<br/>
<br/>
Mr Riddle said the project was already aiming to be net zero across the company’s Scope 1 and 2 emissions for first commercial production of gas, and Tamboran has been marketing Beetaloo as “Australia’s largest green initiative’’.<br/>
<br/>
Empire Energy, which is also targeting gas in the NT, said with less than 1 per cent of carbon contained in its Beetaloo gas resource, the challenge of offsetting the emissions of our development is significantly lower than other gas sources.<br/>
<br/>
“Empire welcomes the additional clarity today’s announcement brings to regulatory requirements for the development of the Beetaloo’s natural gas resources,” Empire Energy chief executive Alex Underwood said.<br/>
<br/>
Tamboran shares fell 6.7 per cent to 21c while Empire dropped 6.3 per cent to 15c.<br/>
<br/>
Santos, which is developing the Barossa project 300km off the NT coast, declined to comment on Monday.<br/>
<br/>
Many industry figures are still grappling with details of the agreed-to amendments. However, there is broad agreement they will make developing gas projects more costly and difficult.<br/>
<br/>
While the “hard cap” did not equate to an outright ban on new oil and gas projects “it raises the bar for the resources sector in that it effectively halves the allowable emissions of new projects’’, pro vice chancellor of sustainability at Murdoch University Martin Brueckner said.<br/>
<br/>
“The resultant cost increases may render many of the 116 projects currently awaiting Australian government approval financially unviable,’’ he said.<br/>
<br/>
The deal includes a “hard cap” on emissions, which would not be allowed to exceed current levels of 140 million tonnes per annum, bettering the previous proposal which would have seen pollution rise to between 155-184 million tonnes by 2030, the Greens said.<br/>
<br/>
Mr Bandt said the “pollution trigger” element of the mechanism “could” be used by the Minister to set allowances for Australian Carbon Credit Unit offsets at zero, “effectively stopping a project from proceeding’’.<br/>
<br/>
Industry sources said this was drawing a long bow as it relied on ministerial discretion to make such a decision, and a statement released on Monday by Mr Bowen said “no limits” would be placed on the use of Australian Carbon Credit Units as offsets.<br/>
<br/>
A freeze on the use of “human induced regeneration” offsets, which the Greens claimed were “the most dubious” was also a part of the deal. The Minister’s statement also said the government would commission a review into the feasibility of an Australian carbon border adjustment mechanism (CBAM).<br/>
<br/>
“The review will give particular consideration to a CBAM for the steel and cement sectors,’’ Mr Bowen said.<br/>
<br/>
Companies such as cement producer Adbri have been calling for an Australian CBAM, in order to stop cheaper, carbon intensive imports flooding the Australian market and undercutting them.<br/>
<br/>
Adbri said it still faced a significant task to decarbonise while keeping its manufacturing plants in South Australia and Western Australia competitive.<br/>
<br/>
Mr Bowen also committed to $1bn in funding for the manufacturing sector and trade-exposed industries through the Powering the Regions Fund.<br/>
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<p class="asset asset-link">
	<a href="https://www.theaustralian.com.au/business/companies/the-greens-say-theyve-derailed-the-barossa-and-beetaloo-gas-projects/news-story/c9339c8985f11552576e6a8d0d159171">https://www.theaustralian.com.au/business/companies/the-greens-say-theyve-derailed-the-barossa-and-beetaloo-gas-projects/news-story/c9339c8985f11552576e6a8d0d159171</a>
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<b> Surging migration inconsistent with botched housing plan</b><br/>
<br/>
In the long list of ill-considered and foolish government policies that have been suggested or implemented through the years, there is little doubt that the Housing Australia Future Fund stands out as among the most imprudent.<br/>
<br/>
Raised as something of a thought bubble by then opposition leader Anthony Albanese in his 2021 budget-in-reply speech, it has now found its way into a concrete proposal that is being debated by the Senate.<br/>
<br/>
Given pressures in the rental housing market and the long waiting times for residents to secure a place in social housing, it’s not unexpected that the federal government is seeking to take action to alleviate some of these problems.<br/>
<br/>
The most direct ways would be simply to lift government spending on social housing via the states and territories; to raise the rate of government rental assistance; and to facilitate greater housing supply in general.<br/>
<br/>
But for reasons that are not completely obvious, apart from staying true to Labor’s pre-election announcement, the government has decided to press ahead with HAFF notwithstanding its glaring deficiencies.<br/>
<br/>
The plan is for the government to raise $10bn in debt – which is currently not cheap, by the way – and to get the Future Fund to invest the funds. The net returns will then be invested in social and affordable housing each year.<br/>
<br/>
From the expected average annual return of $500m, the plan is to invest in a total of 6000 social and affordable dwellings each year.<br/>
<br/>
Affordable dwellings are deemed to be for essential workers such as nurses and teachers who otherwise struggle to find accommodation within acceptable distances from their places of work.<br/>
<br/>
Let’s be clear here: these numbers are extremely modest.<br/>
<br/>
At the current rate of population growth, we need at least around a quarter of a million new homes just to accommodate the extra people. It is also estimated that there are at least a half-million people on the current waiting lists for social housing.<br/>
<br/>
It’s also worth doing the maths: at $500m each year – it’s unclear what happens if the returns are negative – it works out as just more than $83,000 a dwelling funded by HAFF each year. Everyone knows you can’t get anything for that sum of money even if you exclude stand-alone houses.<br/>
<br/>
What is not clear is what the government thinks it can achieve by allocating just more than $83,000 a dwelling – it most certainly won’t be the full costs of construction and land. Will this sum be used to subsidise other financiers by, for example, subsidising the gap between the market and actual rents paid by low-income tenants?<br/>
<br/>
What the federal government doesn’t appreciate is that it doesn’t really matter who funds the additional social and affordable housing because the cost is the cost. Any amount of financial engineering doesn’t alter this.<br/>
<br/>
It may be the case that non-government entities are better at running and maintaining rental accommodation than government agencies, but it’s not necessary to establish a costly and convoluted investment fund such as the HAFF to achieve this.<br/>
<br/>
The HAFF is essentially a bet on the equity risk premium that generates higher returns than the cost of the debt. If this were really a good idea, it should be extended to all forms of government spending which, of course, no one thinks is a good idea.<br/>
<br/>
The only explanation seems to be the political value of cashing in on the Future Fund brand and having a perpetual entity.<br/>
<br/>
In the meantime, the news on the rental crisis becomes grimmer as each month passes. The vacancy rates in many parts of the country are at historic lows and the annual rate of increase in rents ranges from 10 to 30 per cent. Rents are gobbling up higher proportions of tenants’ incomes, for those who can find suitable accommodation in the first place.<br/>
<br/>
But here’s the real rub: just when it’s clear that the rental situation is dire and becoming worse, the federal government has facilitated a substantial surge in the number of migrants entering the country, particularly international students but other temporary entrants as well.<br/>
<br/>
Prime Minister Anthony Albanese’s $10 billion Housing Australia Future Fund is on track to be rejected by key…<br/>
Talk about poor timing. Before the pandemic, the annual net overseas migration (long-term arrivals minus long-term departures) was 240,000 in 2019. On current trends, NOM will end up between 350,000 and 400,000 this calendar year. Combined with natural population growth, that’s more than the entire population of Canberra – although the migrants don’t live in Canberra but largely in Melbourne and Sydney.<br/>
<br/>
The Treasurer has tried to justify this surging migration by making the point that there was a substantial hiatus during Covid and we are only making up for the “lost” arrivals.<br/>
<br/>
What he fails to mention is that the pandemic was also associated with a substantial stalling in the building of new accommodation that is needed to accompany strong population growth. In other words, the last thing we should do is to try to make up for these “lost” arrivals. It’s a clear case of the government implementing inconsistent policies.<br/>
<br/>
The HAFF, on the one hand, is ill-conceived and won’t do anything to alleviate the rental crisis any time soon. It’s also too small to have any real impact. On the other hand, egged on by pro-immigration Treasury officials and other vested interests, the government has decided to open the flood gates for even more migrants to come here and stay. This involves a substantial loosening of the conditions that are attached to the various visa categories.<br/>
<br/>
Prime Minister Anthony Albanese says the Housing Australia Future Fund will make a “practical difference” to…<br/>
Needless to say, these migrants need somewhere to live and this is making the battle for accommodation even fiercer, driving up rents even further. State governments toy with various perverse policy responses, such as more pro-tenant laws, outlawing rent bidding and even rent controls, which further deter investors from putting money into residential real estate<br/>
<br/>
The bottom line is that the HAFF should be jettisoned before it gets off the ground and the government should go back to the drawing board to deal with the rental crisis. It also should consider means of throttling the current number of new migrants.<br/>
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There is little doubt that the labour market will soften towards the end of the year; we won’t want the migrant intake to be running at its current high level at that stage.<br/>
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	<a href="https://www.theaustralian.com.au/commentary/surging-migration-inconsistent-with-botched-housing-plan/news-story/4a042e3234735c805a146c92e79daa40">https://www.theaustralian.com.au/commentary/surging-migration-inconsistent-with-botched-housing-plan/news-story/4a042e3234735c805a146c92e79daa40</a>
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27 March, 2023
<br/><br/> 

<b> Australian Olympic Committee CEO Matt Carroll says Gabba just needs a ‘coat of paint’ to host 2032 Games</b><br/>
<br/>
<i> Some sense at last</i><br/>
<br/>
The Gabba just needs “a coat of paint” to be able to host the Brisbane 2032 Olympic and Paralympic Games, Australia’s Olympic boss has sensationally declared.<br/>
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The Gabba Stadium just needs “a coat of paint” to be able to host the Brisbane 2032 Olympic and Paralympic Games, the head of the Australian Olympic Committee Matt Carroll sensationally declared.<br/>
<br/>
Speaking at the National Press Club, Mr Carroll made an appeal to the Federal Government for a $2 billion investment in sport over the next 10 years, saying, “the Brisbane Games will not be a success if the Australian teams are not successful”.<br/>
<br/>
But Mr Carroll also declared the $2.7 billion investment in the Gabba Stadium redevelopment was not about the Olympics.<br/>
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It comes after Premier Annastacia Palaszczuk announced in April 2021 that the redevelopment would cost $1bn, a figure Queensland Auditor-General Brendan Worrall told a parliamentary committee came “from a press release”.<br/>
<br/>
Last month Ms Palaszczuk announced, alongside Prime Minister Anthony Albanese, that the Gabba would be demolished and rebuilt for $2.7bn – 170 per cent more – with the state government set to foot the bill.<br/>
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“Let’s be honest. The infrastructure of the Gabba is for the AFL and cricket,” Mr Carroll told the National Press Club.<br/>
<br/>
“The Olympics and Paralympics will use it for a month. They could just give it a coat of paint.<br/>
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“Those sports will be the beneficiaries of a rebuild of the Gabba.”<br/>
<br/>
He said the Games being hosted in Australia meant it could “turbo charge” investment in sport and sporting facilities, including for the community.<br/>
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“The other facility which is they’re building in Queensland, particularly the indoor sport facilities in various suburbs across southeast Queensland, Australia’s fastest-growing population, are needed for the people,” Mr Carroll said.<br/>
<br/>
“This investment in infrastructure is not just for the Olympic Games. We’re going to use them but they are there for the community.<br/>
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“Without those infrastructure builds, particularly in the community sports, we won’t get what we’re looking for – more kids playing sport. They’ve gotta be able to play somewhere.”<br/>
<br/>
Mr Carroll said without the $2 billion investment in sport, increased funding for the Australian Institute of Sport, a federal department of sport and the Sports Minister promoted into Cabinet, the success of the Brisbane Games was at risk.<br/>
<br/>
“Unless the situation is rectified, Australia will be staring failure in the face of the 2026 Commonwealth Games and the Brisbane 2032 Olympic and Paralympic Games, because our home teams will have been undermined by inaction. The time starts now,” he said.<br/>
<br/>
“The Brisbane Games will not be a success if the Australian teams are not successful.<br/>
<br/>
“The Olympic flame is going to be lit in July 2032. That date will not shift, you can’t put it off, it will not go away.<br/>
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“Ready or not, you’ve got to be there.”<br/>
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<p class="asset asset-link">
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<b> Union boss Ian Leavers rejects claim shooting victim was unarmed</b><br/>
<br/>
<i> The only reason why this incident is controversial is that the offender was Aboriqinal</i><br/>
<br/>
Aubrey Donohue was shot by police after a four-hour siege at a Mareeba address on Saturday, after he allegedly approached officers with a knife.<br/>
<br/>
Queensland Police Union president Ian Leavers said because the matter was before the coroner he was limited in what he could say but that he must “correct the misinformation” stated by some people.<br/>
<br/>
“Despite reports to the contrary, I can confirm the violent offender was definitely brandishing a knife and threatening the hostage,” he said.<br/>
<br/>
“I can confirm the offender had an extensive history of highly violent domestic violence incidents.<br/>
<br/>
“All police involved in this matter performed professionally, responsibly and with great restraint.<br/>
<br/>
“Police only acted when it was clear that the life of an innocent hostage was in jeopardy.”<br/>
<br/>
Mr Leavers said police were called specifically about a serious domestic violence incident and not a mental health issue.<br/>
<br/>
“All police involved should be commended for their actions and it was pleasing to see that the new domestic violence situations assessment tool brought in as a result of the recent Commission of Inquiry into domestic violence was utilised and it demonstrated that the offender was identified as “extreme” in every single assessment category,” he said.<br/>
<br/>
“We are very lucky that police were able to prevent the murder of an innocent domestic violence victim.”<br/>
<br/>
Dozens of protesters have rallied outside the Mareeba police station, holding &quot;black lives matter&quot; and &quot;jail killer cops&quot; signs, after the shooting death of 27-year-old Aubrey Donahue.<br/>
<br/>
Dozens of protesters have rallied outside the Mareeba police station, holding &quot;black lives matter&quot; and &quot;jail killer cops&quot; signs, after the shooting death of 27-year-old Aubrey Donahue.<br/>
A police spokesman said CPR was performed but Mr Donahue could not be revived.<br/>
<br/>
Police attended following reports Mr Donahue threatened self-harm and allege Mr Donahue was not allowing another occupant of the house, a woman, to leave.<br/>
<br/>
Despite this, family members have been vocal at a meeting on Sunday and again at a protest on Monday, alleging that the police shot him when he was unarmed and that domestic violence was not the reason for police to attend.<br/>
<br/>
One person in the crowd called for the officer who fired the bullets to be stood down, another wanted the officer publicly named.<br/>
<br/>
On Sunday, a man claiming to be a brother-in-law disputed Mr Donahue was armed. “He was walking out the door to give himself up. He said to them he only had a phone in his hand,” he said.<br/>
<br/>
Mr Donahue’s mother, Desley, told the tense, 100-strong crowd at a community meeting on Sunday that she was at a loss to understand why her son had died. “My son has got bullet holes in his body. I’m his mother, and they (police) aren’t telling me anything,” she said.<br/>
<br/>
Officers were verbally abused and had objects thrown at their cars when they left the community meeting.<br/>
<br/>
At a media conference held on Sunday afternoon, Far North regional crime co-ordinator Detective Acting Superintendent Sonia Smith said an “extensive investigation” into the circumstances surrounding Mr Donahue’s death was underway. The incident is being investigated by the Ethical Standards Command on behalf of the State Coroner<br/>
<br/>

<p class="asset asset-link">
	<a href="https://www.couriermail.com.au/truecrimeaustralia/police-courts-qld/union-boss-ian-leavers-rejects-claim-shooting-victim-was-unarmed/news-story/a816f8e0243f149ce4c80197abc2ca33">https://www.couriermail.com.au/truecrimeaustralia/police-courts-qld/union-boss-ian-leavers-rejects-claim-shooting-victim-was-unarmed/news-story/a816f8e0243f149ce4c80197abc2ca33</a>
</p>
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<br/>
<b> Kochie smashes Baby Boomer housing ‘myth’</b><br/>
<br/>
<i> He is right. I remember paying 19% mortgage interest in the &#39;80s. But houses were much cheaper then. The flood of amost free money unleashed by governments in response to the pandemic is the problem. It shot the cost of buying to unprecedented levels</i><br/>
<br/>
Sunrise host David Koch has unleashed on Baby Boomers with a brutal message aimed at smashing the myth that young Aussies are simply too lazy to save for a home.<br/>
<br/>
While it remains a persistent talking point among older Australians that younger generations are bad savers, the breakfast TV host analysed the issue to determine exactly why home ownership seems increasingly out of reach.<br/>
<br/>
Koch, commonly referred to as Kochie, compared the financial burdens weighing on those trying to buy a home in the late 1980s versus now — and he found it had nothing to do with avocado toast.<br/>
<br/>
“Back in my day, I was paying 17 per cent on my home loan. Now that was tough,” Koch began.<br/>
<br/>
“All right, now hands up who has said that or been told that at a family get together recently. Is that grumpy oldie right or wrong? These are the facts.”<br/>
<br/>
While it is true that the interest rate in 1989 and 1990 was at a staggering 17 per cent, compared to the six per cent rate today, Koch said exceptionally cheap house prices meant Boomers still had the better deal.<br/>
<br/>
House prices have skyrocketed in Australia in recent years, while wages have struggled to keep pace. In fact, wages essentially did not move in the entire decade to 2023.<br/>
<br/>
“Back in the 80s, the average cost of an Aussie house was $70,000. Now it’s $700,000 — ten times more expensive,” Koch told Channel 7’s Sunrise on Monday.<br/>
<br/>
“A 20 per cent deposit has gone from $14,000 to $140,000, but wages have not kept pace.”<br/>
<br/>
The TV host and financial expert explained how, in the 1980s, the average salary was $19,000. In 2023, it’s about $90,000.<br/>
<br/>
“So in the 80s, the price of a house was four times the average person’s income,” he said.<br/>
<br/>
“In 2023, it’s eight times the average Aussie salary.”<br/>
<br/>
The situation is even worse in the most densely populated parts of the country. A 20 per cent deposit on the median dwelling in Sydney, for instance, is a staggering $220,000.<br/>
<br/>
Contrary to the boomer myth, a recent study from the University of Sydney found the majority of young Australians already had a robust savings plan in place.<br/>
<br/>
The study, which tracked a group of 25-35-year-old prospective first home buyers in Sydney and Perth, found that most had implemented standard budgeting strategies like cutting back on discretionary spending. One of the households surveyed only ate two-minute noodles for weeks at a time in their attempts to buy a home.<br/>
<br/>
Still, the study found that 95 per cent of the group didn’t even come close to having enough savings for a home deposit. Three-quarters had less than $5000 in savings, and 40 per cent planned to call upon the bank of mum and dad when it came time to buy.<br/>
<br/>
Koch’s tirade comes after a Finder survey revealed that one in three young Australians have missed their mortgage repayments in recent months.<br/>
<br/>
The Reserve Bank of Australia’s 10 consecutive rate hikes since May are biting, as the financial comparison website’s monthly cost of living report showed 31 per cent of Gen Z borrowers (born 1995 onwards) had missed a mortgage repayment in the past six months.<br/>
<br/>
By comparison, 11 per cent of Gen Y — also known as Millennials — had missed a repayment, and eight per cent of Gen X.<br/>
<br/>
“Increases in housing costs are having a higher impact on Australian households than any other metric,” the report said.<br/>
<br/>
“Younger generations were far more likely to report financial difficulty in managing their mortgage repayment.”<br/>
<br/>

<p class="asset asset-link">
	<a href="https://www.couriermail.com.au/entertainment/television/kochie-smashes-baby-boomer-housing-myth/news-story/60ad99c43bdc36ec5bb287d8de71f95f">https://www.couriermail.com.au/entertainment/television/kochie-smashes-baby-boomer-housing-myth/news-story/60ad99c43bdc36ec5bb287d8de71f95f</a>
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<br/>
<b> Climate deal struck after Labor and the Greens reach safeguard mechanism agreement</b><br/>
<br/>
<i> Keeping the lights on to be a bigger and bigger challenge</i><br/>
<br/>
The federal government has secured the support it needs to implement its central climate change commitment, after reaching a deal with the Greens following months of safeguard mechanism negotiations.<br/>
<br/>
The Greens have long demanded Labor commit to no new coal and gas projects, but the government has repeatedly ruled this out.<br/>
<br/>
Greens leader Adam Bandt said the deal included a hard cap on emissions, which would impact new or expanded high-polluting projects.<br/>
<br/>
He predicted the hard emissions cap would make it unviable for 116 new coal and gas projects in the pipeline because they would be unable to get their emissions below the limit.<br/>
<br/>
&quot;The Greens have stopped about half of them [in the pipeline] but Labor still wants to open the rest,&quot; Mr Bandt said.<br/>
<br/>
&quot;And, so, now there is going to be a fight for every new project that the government wants to open.&quot;<br/>
<br/>
The safeguard mechanism bill before the parliament seeks to impose emissions limits on the 215 largest-polluting facilities in the country.<br/>
<br/>
It requires those companies to cut, or pay offsets, to reduce their emissions by 4.9 per cent each year to 2030.<br/>
<br/>
Climate Change Minister Chris Bowen has led the safeguard negotiations with the Greens since Labor won power last year. He said Labor only accepted amendments that were in keeping with Labor&#39;s election commitments and policy agenda.<br/>
<br/>
&quot;They do two things, strengthen accountability, transparency and integrity of the scheme and, secondly, provide extra support for those strategic manufacturing industries that are so important for our economy and transition as well,&quot; Mr Bowen said.<br/>
<br/>
Extra support for some sectors<br/>
<br/>
The deal will see the government offer extra money to support &quot;Australia&#39;s sovereign capability&quot; in the steel, aluminium and cement sectors.<br/>
<br/>
There had been fears that those sectors would be forced offshore without additional support to cut emissions.<br/>
<br/>
Mr Bandt said that, while the negotiations had been in good faith, he was critical of Labor&#39;s approach to coal and gas. &quot;Negotiating with Labor is like negotiating with the political wing of the coal and gas corporations,&quot; he said. &quot;Labor seems more afraid of the coal and gas corporations than the climate collapse.&quot;<br/>
<br/>
Prime Minister Anthony Albanese thanked the Greens and the crossbench for engaging constructively in negotiations but took aim at the opposition.<br/>
<br/>
&quot;It says a lot about the state of the Liberal and National parties in 2023 that, in spite of the election result, they have excluded themselves from any participation,&quot; he said.<br/>
<br/>
The Greens&#39; support means Labor now has the numbers to pass the bill through the Senate, allowing it to take force from July 1.<br/>
<br/>
Shadow Climate Change Minister Ted O&#39;Brien said the cap agreed to as part of the deal would hurt Australian industry.<br/>
<br/>
&quot;In order for Australia to decarbonise our economy, we have to get the balance right between cutting emissions and allowing the economy to grow,&quot; he said.<br/>
<br/>
&quot;What we see today is a deal between Labor and the Greens that throws that balance out of whack.&quot;<br/>
<br/>
But the Business Council of Australia said it was still supportive of the government&#39;s policy. &quot;Additional support for trade-exposed businesses and workers, as well as critical sovereign capabilities, is a crucial step that will help save jobs and ensure Australian businesses are competing on the global stage,&quot; BCA chief executive Jennifer Westacott said.<br/>
<br/>
&quot;As designed, the safeguard mechanism and its baseline targets are tough but achievable, so we&#39;ll be working with members to assess the full impact of proposed changes.&quot;<br/>
<br/>
Mega projects into doubt<br/>
<br/>
The agreement has thrown two major gas projects in the Northern Territory into doubt, according to the Greens and environmentalists.<br/>
<br/>
Gas companies have been wanting to open up hydraulic fracturing in the Beetaloo Basin while gas giant Santos has been seeking to open up the Barossa Gas Field, located off the coast of the NT.<br/>
<br/>
The Nurrdalinji Native Title Aboriginal Corporation, which represents traditional owners of the Beetaloo Basin region, released a statement today expressing optimism the amendments to the Safeguards Mechanism Bill would make it harder for gas companies to get their projects approved.<br/>
<br/>
&quot;Our country is in the hands of these big gas companies and I feel very grateful that we may one day not have to fight to protect our land, sacred sites, culture and water,&quot; said the corporation&#39;s chair, Johnny Wilson.<br/>
<br/>
&quot;No one has seen the jobs and economic benefits which have long been promised by the fracking companies, and we do not believe they will ever come.&quot;<br/>
<br/>
Beetaloo fracking decision looms<br/>
<br/>
The oil and gas industry&#39;s peak body says Beetaloo fracking licences could be issued in a month, as critics say the government&#39;s promise to implement a key inquiry is &quot;impossible&quot;.<br/>
<br/>
Mr Bowen said the agreement would require &quot;scope one&quot; emissions from the Beetaloo to be offset. Scope one and two emissions are emissions that are directly controlled or owned by companies, while scope three emissions are emissions not directly controlled by a company.<br/>
<br/>
Mr Bowen said new gas fields would be required to have &quot;zero reservoir carbon&quot; during development. &quot;That&#39;s a condition which is international best practice and has been Australian best practice for many years,&quot; Mr Bowen said.<br/>
<br/>
Mr Bandt said the agreement had effectively &quot;derailed&quot; both projects by imposing a limit on carbon emissions that prevented new coal and gas projects from being approved.<br/>
<br/>

<p class="asset asset-link">
	<a href="https://www.abc.net.au/news/2023-03-27/greens-safeguard-mechanism-labor-agreement-bandt-bowen/102148956">https://www.abc.net.au/news/2023-03-27/greens-safeguard-mechanism-labor-agreement-bandt-bowen/102148956</a>
</p>
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<br/>
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26 March, 2023
<br/><br/> 

<b> It&#39;s not hate to allow women to have their own spaces and their own events</b><br/>
<br/>
<i> The desperation of the elites to look good lies behind this suddenly invented &quot;trans&quot; war. The elite are aware that others envy and dislike them so grab at anything that will make them look good and wise and noble. So the poor old trannies have suddenly been elevated to an important group requiring support at all costs<br/>
<br/>
For a while &quot;women&quot; were a big cause to the elites but women were just a convenient group for them to use to show that they cared. The fact that they all along did not care about women at all is now so clearly revealed that they are not even prepared to name them. It must be quite a shock to genuine advocates for women to find that they have gone overnight from friend to enemy in the minds of the insecure Leftist elites<br/>
<br/>
  And once the elites have set the ball rolling and given the latest issue big support, lots of other attention seekers climb on board in support of the issue in the hope of also becoming seen as good and wise and noble. They too seize the chance to be seen as virtuous</i><br/>
<br/>
There are two issues at stake in the transwars that are again finding their way to our shores with ‘Posie Parker’s’ (aka Kellie-Jay Keen-Minshull’s) Australian Let Women Speak tour. These are: children’s bodily integrity, and women’s rights including the need for single-sex spaces. These issues have very different histories, politics, and ontologies but they coalesce around transgenderism because this is the point at which the conflict of interest arises.<br/>
<br/>
On social media and in the legacy media this week, this critique has been presented as tantamount to Nazi ideology. What we have is a classic case of reductio ad Hitlerum, defined by Leo Strauss as a type of ad hominem used to derail arguments by creating a ‘guilt by association’. In other words, ‘playing the Nazi card’.<br/>
<br/>
This means if neo-Nazis are on the steps of the Victorian Parliament, ushered around by police and with excellent camera crews capturing their Sieg Heil, and you happen to be in the vicinity, you’re ‘guilty by association’.<br/>
<br/>
If you’ve been so propagandised as to assume that there is no legitimate discussion to be had around these issues, then you’re a victim of a corrupt media that has ceased to do its job. The Third Estate has well and truly died if a smallish group of women, including MPs, teachers, doctors, and philosophy professors, can’t gather in a public place to discuss matters of cultural and political importance to women.<br/>
<br/>
When Victorian Premier Daniel Andrews and progressive party leaders such as the Greens’ Adam Bandt define these women (or their protest) as associating with ‘neo-Nazis’, we have a gross misrepresentation at play and one that anyone participating in this charade should be ashamed of.<br/>
<br/>
This whole mess is an orchestrated misrepresentation that amounts to propaganda.<br/>
<br/>
It is obliterating the legitimate concerns of women regarding the safety and privacy of women and girls in rape crisis centres, women’s shelters, women’s prisons, women’s changerooms, and toilets. It is sabotaging the discussion around how women can possibly compete against natal males in sport, and of the gross inequality of quotas, prizes, or shortlists for women being filled by trans-identifying males. It is also about the loss of meaningful language for motherhood, including the removal and replacement of words such as pregnant woman, mother, and breastfeeding (with abominations such as ‘vulva owner’, ‘birthing people’, and ‘chest feeder’). These are important conversations, nothing more, but also nothing less. It is not and never has been about the violation of trans people’s legal, civil, or social rights. It is about the recognition of women’s rights.<br/>
<br/>
Sure, feel free to disagree but don’t engage in this false and indeed defamatory characterisation of the gender-critical feminist voice. There are two sides to this discussion; not one legitimate side (trans) and a motley assortment of neo-Nazi bigots. Moreover, we have seen misogynist overtones from male leaders who appear to dismiss women speaking about issues of fundamental importance like equality, privacy, safety, and the well-being of children.<br/>
<br/>
The neo-Nazi optics are undoubtedly appalling, and one can’t help but wonder how this came about. At the very least, this alignment serves the status quo very well, as every polite mainstream-media-reading centre-Left, small ‘l’ liberal who, having never left their media ecosystem, assumes that ‘Terfs’ are a bunch of scary bigots with radical ‘far Right’ views. Political goal achieved.<br/>
<br/>
A quick lesson in protests: not all who attend a protest are in agreement. Some are widely divergent politically. Moreover, ‘outside agitators’ can and are planted to stir up trouble and/or to alter the public’s perception. A quick lesson in propaganda: the truth doesn’t matter if the lie has been accepted. Certainly, in the public’s mind, ‘gender critical feminism’ and the important political issues this argument represents, have been thoroughly besmirched.<br/>
<br/>
In the public’s mind, Kellie-Jay has a kitsch Norma Jean aesthetic going on and seems to be showcasing more star-spangled nylon and sequins as her social media following grows (and concomitantly, as we descend into the ‘bread and circuses’ era of the culture wars). Moreover, in my opinion she has failed to overtly distance herself from the far Right, as some local feminist groups have rightly pointed out.<br/>
<br/>
Nonetheless, her message is direct and simple, delivered in a working-class idiom: ‘men can’t have vaginas’, ‘men can’t give birth’, ‘men can’t be women’, ‘men shouldn’t be in vulnerable women’s spaces’, ‘men can’t (or shouldn’t) compete in women’s sports’, and ‘children aren’t old enough to surgically remove their primary and secondary sex organs, or make decisions about adult sexuality or fertility’.<br/>
<br/>
These were all uncontroversial statements not long ago. Indeed, the first three statements were common knowledge in all cultures, in all places, and across all time until maybe five years ago (that’s a pretty big sample!). At this point, inner-urban, educated progressives extrapolated an obscure set of gender ideologies localised to arcane corners of university Arts departments and gaslit or bullied anyone who disagreed.<br/>
<br/>
Magically, and in lockstep, governments the world over introduced legislation and policy to allow self ID, to outlaw ‘conversion therapy’ (i.e., newspeak for adopting an exploratory approach to gender dysphoria rather than uncritical affirmation), to update the protected category of sex in law, and to revise statutes regarding sex discrimination so that sex-category was replaced with gender identity.<br/>
<br/>
This effectively created a mandate around the acceptance of transgenderism with no capacity – politically or socially – to disagree. If the ‘choice’ is to agree or be an incorrigible bigot with few job prospects, except perhaps as Mark Latham’s cleaning lady, then most people are going to shut up and go along with this agenda. This is the coward’s bargain; it is not agreement.<br/>
<br/>
Let’s stop pretending this doesn’t have the full force of the corporate-state and captured media and academia behind it. Let’s stop pretending that there are two sides to this ‘debate’: there is one side and a maligned minority of women bravely fighting for the right to have a conversation. As I have said before, what we are owed is more and better disagreement, not slogans and abuse.<br/>
<br/>
Until a moment ago we all understood what a woman was, and we understood that men were physically stronger than women. Most also understood that women had been historically excluded from political rights with ongoing ramifications for their civil standing in liberal democracies. Feminism was the movement for women’s rights that began with married women’s property rights and culminated in suffrage and access to education and the professions. It was the movement to end women’s legal and political subjection. From second-wave feminism onwards, larger questions were asked concerning women’s role in society, the family, sexuality, and psyche as women entered into paid work en masse and redefined what it meant to be women.<br/>
<br/>
That the ‘category of woman’ is now being jettisoned (or revised beyond all recognition) at the precise historical hour that women in the West have gained a political and cultural voice is disturbing. Moreover, in redefining women’s rights almost entirely in terms of queer identity politics, crucial issues such as women’s poverty and homelessness, sexual and domestic violence, and mothering and care work, fade from view. These issues barely raise a mention as sex-class transmogrifies into gender ID.<br/>
<br/>
Assuming this debate is like other debates between say, liberals, and conservatives, or between opposing philosophical paradigms like positivism and hermeneutics, is sadly mistaken. This debate, like so many in the contemporary culture wars, is on an entirely new epistemological terrain: what is at stake here is nothing short of reality itself!<br/>
<br/>
The ‘priors’ therefore of either side are no longer shared; we need rather to understand this issue (as with several other contested political issues) as a disagreement, not on a shared understanding of reality, but rather a disagreement about the nature of reality itself. The question pivots, interestingly enough, on what it means to be a woman.<br/>
<br/>
A poignant example to illustrate this point can be seen in the nomenclature used: one party refers to themselves as ‘gender critical feminists’ and sympathetic media outlets adopt this terminology, sometimes situating it in the longer history of feminism. This side suggests that ‘transwomen’ are better understood as ‘trans-identifying males’ to locate both the person’s natal or biological gender and their preferred identification.<br/>
<br/>
However, the other side, the trans activists and their allies, refer to gender-critical feminists as ‘transphobic’ and as committing dangerous ‘hate speech’. These are such egregious accusations that, if true, require punitive action and redress. Thus, a position itself is defined by one side as ‘gender critical’ and based on women’s ‘sex-based rights’ and by the other as ‘hate speech’. The issue pivots on the ‘category of woman’ which is defined by one side (the gender criticals) as a political class – a ‘sex class’ – founded in biology and given its contemporary meaning in society.<br/>
<br/>
That is, from a classical feminist perspective, the category of woman is a biological category with political implications, namely subjection within a patriarchal society. The newer definition replaces gender with sex and defines the category of woman (or man) as one that can be opted into, it is a subjective state or a feeling. Thus, we haven’t even made it out of the paradigmatic gate before we find ourselves fighting over the nature of reality itself. The category of sex is the site of the struggle. If we cannot agree that sex exists or is materially, politically, and linguistically distinct from gender, then we are not arguing about the same thing. To invoke Smith’s famous aphorism regarding the two women arguing from their respective balconies: they were arguing from different premises!<br/>
<br/>
To suggest that any discussion which assumes natal women have a claim on the sex category woman is a priori an act of discrimination is effectively to quash the discussion. It is to define it as an abominable act of hate speech before it is even out of the gate. How is this a fair discussion? To suggest that gender-critical feminists are neo-Nazis is transparent bullying and it’s coming from the top – literally the leader of the Victorian government – not from minorities as we’re being told. It has the sanction of the mainstream media who are hacks failing in their duty to the electorate to fairly represent the issues from all sides.<br/>
<br/>
Parker’s Let Women Speak Tour gives women an opportunity to speak about their experience of this inflamed political and cultural conflict without being silenced.<br/>
<br/>
In the sinkhole of partisan politics and propaganda this act of discursive generosity is defined as ‘far Right’. In the real world of heterodox politics and culture, Posie Parker’s message cuts across the increasingly defunct Right/Left divide and indeed speaks to women and men across the political spectrum.<br/>
<br/>

<p class="asset asset-link">
	<a href="https://www.spectator.com.au/2023/03/guilt-by-association-2/">https://www.spectator.com.au/2023/03/guilt-by-association-2/</a>
</p>
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<br/>
<b> Posie Parker protests: iron fist of intolerance in velvet glove of woke</b><br/>
<br/>
It is a mystery to me that anyone could look at those Posie Parker gatherings and think Posie Parker is the problem.<br/>
<br/>
On one side there’s the diminutive bottle-blonde from Britain whose rallying cry is “Let women speak”. Parker’s supporters are mainly women, too. All of them have been impeccably civil. They’ve stood still in a public place and given calm, sensible speeches, mainly on their concerns with transgenderism.<br/>
<br/>
On the other side, in contrast, there is a baying mob. We’ve seen huge crowds of Posiephobics bellowing insults at these women who only want to speak.<br/>
<br/>
I was horrified by the sight of independent senator Lidia Thorpe crawling on her hands and knees – after she was knocked to the ground by cops – so she could tell “that thing” (Parker) that she was not welcome here.<br/>
<br/>
That thing? Now that’s dehumanising language.<br/>
<br/>
I was shocked by the sight of the Tasmanian Greens senator Nick McKim saying Parker and her gang of “Nazi-supported transphobes” should not be referred to as TERFs but as TERDs.<br/>
<br/>
A TERF is a trans-exclusionary radical feminist – that is, a woman who commits the thoughtcrime of believing men cannot become women. A better title for them was TERDs, McKim said – “trans-exclusionary right-wing dropkicks”.<br/>
<br/>
“They’re not TERFs, they are TERDs,” he said, much to the juvenile glee of Posie-haters on Twitter. You don’t need a PhD in linguistics to work out why McKim chose the acronym TERD. It’s because it sounds the same as turd: excrement, faeces.<br/>
<br/>
A public official grossly demeans women whose only offence is to speak in public and we’re meant to be more outraged by Posie?<br/>
<br/>
I have been alarmed by the heaving crowds that have tried to menace Parker into silence. The mob has chanted “F..k off, Posie, f..k off”. Social media has overflowed with hyperbolic effluent about Parker. She’s scum, she’s a Nazi Barbie. Misogyny much?<br/>
<br/>
So, yes, there has been hate and hysteria on the streets of Australia these past couple of weeks. But it hasn’t come from Posie’s camp. It has come from her searingly intolerant critics.<br/>
<br/>
The woke demonise Parker as a bigot, but it is they who behave like bigots.<br/>
<br/>
The Oxford Dictionary of English defines bigotry as “intolerance towards those who hold different opinions from oneself”. Who does that better describe – Parker and her supporters, who only want to express their beliefs, or the mobs who furiously shout down these women, these “things”, these turds?<br/>
<br/>
The fury around Parker tells us a really important truth about political correctness. It comes dolled up in the language of kindness and fairness, but in reality it’s a chillingly unforgiving creed that will destroy anyone who deviates from its commandments. In the mob loathing for Parker we can glimpse the iron fist of intolerance that lurks in the velvet glove of woke.<br/>
<br/>
Posie Parker is the pseudonym of Kellie-Jay Keen-Minshull, one of the best-known blasphemers against trans thinking.<br/>
<br/>
She believes sex is immutable. She thinks a man never becomes a woman, no matter how many hormones he takes or surgeries he undergoes. She wants biological males out of women’s sports and women’s spaces.<br/>
<br/>
Her Let Women Speak initiative is genius, in my view. She cleverly entices the woke to behave in a menacing fashion in full public view.<br/>
<br/>
Across Britain and now in Australia, her public stunts lure misogynists into daylight. She knows the counter-protesters will make her point for her. She and her allies say: “Let women speak”, and the mob essentially replies: “No. Shut up. Go home.”<br/>
<br/>
Hey presto, the sexism that she believes courses through the veins of the trans lobby makes itself visible. Job done.<br/>
<br/>
For me, the most cynical thing the Posie-haters did during her visit to Australia was brand her movement “Nazi-adjacent”. They did this after a bunch of hard-right idiots turned up to Parker’s gathering in Melbourne. Uninvited, it should be noted.<br/>
<br/>
This gave rise to the chant: “Posie Parker, you can’t hide/You’ve got Nazis on your side.”<br/>
<br/>
What desperate stuff. Virtually every anti-Israel demo of recent times has had anti-Semites on it, people who horrifically demean Jews as Nazis or child-killers. Yet the left never describes Palestine solidarity as “Nazi-adjacent”.<br/>
<br/>
Their hurling of the Nazi gibe at Posie’s women is a sexist silencing tactic. It’s designed to paint these harridans as being beyond the pale, and thus ripe for censure and punishment.<br/>
<br/>
Posie and her allies are defending reason and freedom. They’re standing up for biological truth and the right of women to express themselves.<br/>
<br/>
Their woke persecutors, meanwhile, are the foot soldiers of irrationalism. They fantasise that there are 72 genders and they clamour for the silencing of all who disagree.<br/>
<br/>
Liberty or absurdity? I know which side I’m on.<br/>
<br/>

<p class="asset asset-link">
	<a href="https://www.theaustralian.com.au/inquirer/posie-parker-protests-iron-fist-of-intolerance-in-velvet-glove-of-woke/news-story/055c3f5abaa9fd20be68943e1c34a707">https://www.theaustralian.com.au/inquirer/posie-parker-protests-iron-fist-of-intolerance-in-velvet-glove-of-woke/news-story/055c3f5abaa9fd20be68943e1c34a707</a>
</p>
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<b> Sir Lunchalot goes down again</b><br/>
<br/>
<img src="https://lh3.googleusercontent.com/blogger_img_proxy/AHs97-ngxJkDz-DipilDD1ZWALvpYn05RdtjKmNJNjUH30k__SZhFe9G2go6UMc2bAFVfgSHKj4jw_SRHOyUjDChN6NMIg4z0oqCC49DVZ2SVAsltLJydXou9VcUbYqIiBOYLH_SgJ2_eqPJXb5tb5CGOR5ESGpsH7niOBcZwD_PVxNBoEO59RqShZVRgkHvZTcNK5fCbp8_=s0-d">
<br/><br/>
<i> He was just looking after his union mates. There seems to be no claim that he personally profited</i><br/>
<br/>
Ex-NSW Labor minister Ian Macdonald gets 14-year jail sentence for corruptly awarding mine licence<br/>
<br/>
Ian Macdonald is already serving a maximum nine-and-a-half-year jail sentence for another offence. (AAP: Joel Carrett )<br/>
Former New South Wales Labor minister Ian Macdonald will stay in jail until at least 2027 for misconduct in public office involving two mining licences.<br/>
<br/>
In 2022, Macdonald, 74, was convicted after a retrial for issuing the Doyles Creek mine licence to a company chaired by former union boss John Maitland.<br/>
<br/>
Mr Maitland was acquitted of being an accessory to the misconduct.<br/>
<br/>
The men were granted the retrial in 2019, after an appeal court found the judge in their original trial misdirected the jury about the state of mind required for Macdonald to be found guilty.<br/>
<br/>
Justice Hament Dhanji, who presided over the retrial without a jury, found Macdonald wilfully made decisions to benefit Mr Maitland, and there was no justification for his actions.<br/>
<br/>
In sentencing him to 14 years and six-months&#39; jail, with a non-parole period of 10 years, the judge said a high degree of criminality was involved.<br/>
<br/>
&quot;The misconduct occurred at the time the finances of the state were under considerable strain. The damage to the institution of government is a serious loss that affects the entire community,&quot; he said.<br/>
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The Doyles Creek licence was granted by direct allocation in 2008 when Macdonald was resources minister, and the court heard he lost the state tens-of-millions of dollars in fees paid by other mining companies for coal exploration licences.<br/>
<br/>
Around the same, time a tender process saw Chinese company Shenhua pay $300 million for an exploration licence in the Liverpool Plains and a BHP subsidiary pay $91 million for an exploration licence at Caroona.<br/>
<br/>
Justice Dhani said Macdonald had expressed no remorse and the crime was committed 15 years ago, making it a &quot;stale crime&quot;.<br/>
<br/>
He said the sentence has been backdated, discounted and influenced by special circumstances, including Macdonald&#39;s range of health issues including a large hernia and anxiety, and threats from other prisoners.<br/>
<br/>
The judge noted Macdonald was already concurrently serving a maximum nine-and-a-half-year jail sentence for conspiring with former Labor minister Eddie Obeid and Obeid&#39;s son Moses, over a separate mine licence for Mount Penny in the Bylong Valley.<br/>
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Justice Dhanji said with time already served for misconduct over both mine licences, Macdonald won&#39;t be eligible for parole until 2027.<br/>
<br/>

<p class="asset asset-link">
	<a href="https://www.abc.net.au/news/2023-03-24/ex-nsw-labor-mnister-ian-macdonald-jailed-again/102142928">https://www.abc.net.au/news/2023-03-24/ex-nsw-labor-mnister-ian-macdonald-jailed-again/102142928</a>
</p>
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<b> The national curriculum substitutes emotion for hard learning</b><br/>
<br/>
Occasionally our political representatives will say things which stand the test of time, but more than often, they do not. One example which springs to mind is a comment made in 2004 by the then federal education minister Julie Bishop, who optimistically proposed that the creation of a national curriculum would wrestle education out of the hands of the left-wing ideologues occupying state bureaucracies and give it to a national board of studies comprised of educators from the ‘sensible centre’.<br/>
<br/>
Unfortunately, the Institute of Public Affairs’ new report on the latest iteration of the National Curriculum, De-Educating Australia: How the National Curriculum is Failing Australian Children reveals beyond a shadow of doubt that the Australian Curriculum and Reporting Authority (ACARA) is now irreversibly stacked with utopian activists who know that in order to change the world, you have to change what children are taught.<br/>
<br/>
What is currently being unleashed in classrooms across this country is about as far away from a traditional curriculum as you can possibly get. Rather, it is an anarcho-political manifesto which seeks to dismantle the entire edifice of the modern state of Australia by undermining its values and institutions.<br/>
<br/>
Children taught according to the dictates of this curriculum will finish school with a set of beliefs, a worldview and a sense of what it means to be Australian that are at odds with those which have previously been passed on to generations of Australians.<br/>
<br/>
This document is indoctrinating the young and impressionable with radical theories about race and gender, which were once marginal academic ideas but have now become the pedagogy favoured by the progressive educationalists employed by the state.<br/>
<br/>
Take critical race theory, for example. This American import is now interwoven into the arts, history, civics and citizenship learning areas. In the health and physical education syllabus students will ‘gain insights into the impact systemic racism and discrimination have had on Australian First Nations Peoples’.<br/>
<br/>
The progressive educationalists are using their considerable institutional power to bring forth and legitimise radical ideas such as the notion that Australia is a fundamentally racist country, and that all of its institutions are smokescreens for racial domination. It introduces children to the fiction of ‘systemic racism’, as well as the racist concept of ‘whiteness’ being problematic.<br/>
<br/>
Students studying Australia’s history will leave school convinced that Aboriginal Australians were not, and never have been, beneficiaries of the universal rights afforded to all Australians that were brought by the British to this country in 1788. In year 9 history, students will study ‘potential barriers to equality of access to justice, such as education and literacy, location and proximity to legal avenues, financial constraints, race or ethnicity especially for First Nations Australians’. At the same time, the curriculum teaches that the source of Aboriginal Australians’ rights is different from that of non-Aboriginal Australians, the implication being that Aboriginal Australians are in some way legally separate from other Australians. In the years 7 to 10 arts syllabus, for example, students are informed that, ‘First Nations Australian cultures have internationally enshrined rights to ensure that these diverse cultures can be maintained, controlled, protected and developed’. They will also be taught about ‘rights relating to Indigenous Cultural and Intellectual Property and how these rights can be protected through respectful application of protocols’. We should hardly be surprised that in a recent YouGov poll, 64 per cent of 18 to 25-year-olds were in favour of establishing an Indigenous Voice to parliament.<br/>
<br/>
In the meantime, the ‘Sustainability Cross Curriculum’ priority is doing significant damage to Australia’s youth. It has become the gateway through which children are being introduced to concepts and ideologies that have nothing to do with looking after the environment in the true sense. They are schooled in environmental determinism, which is the concept that humans and their natural environment are interrelated, and that environmental factors such as climate change presuppose the success or failure of civilisations. The priority promotes the idea that a sustainable world cannot be achieved without a socially just world, and that the two are inextricably linked. Children are repeatedly asked to ‘recognise that the interdependence of Earth’s systems and values of diversity, equity and social justice are essential for achieving sustainability’.<br/>
<br/>
In every learning area, they are bombarded with the view that society is not progressing towards greater wealth, prosperity, and improvement in the human condition, but that because of our attachment to plastic straws and bad recycling habits, we are careering headlong towards an environmental cataclysm. We should also not be surprised that young Australians are suffering from severe bouts of ‘eco-anxiety’.<br/>
<br/>
This is placing an extremely unfair burden on young Australians. On the one hand, they are being fed the current prognosis of the ‘scientific consensus’ that every day of inaction brings us closer to catastrophe, while on the other they are being told that only they can avert that catastrophe through activism. In ‘foundation arts’, we see four-year-olds rapping about climate change. Eight-year-olds are ‘identifying ways they can change their behaviours to support the sustainability of the Earth’s systems’ in health and physical education. Students of French are organising real protests and rallies to ‘raise awareness of environmental, social or ethical issues’, and year 7 science students are writing letters to editors of newspapers to ‘express a view about an environmental issue affecting local ecosystems’.<br/>
<br/>
Children are repeatedly informed that they are global citizens and that the global problems are theirs to solve, yet the curriculum does not even give them the basic literacy and numeracy skills they need to flourish and live fulfilled lives, let alone tackle imagined problems of a global nature.<br/>
<br/>
There is no doubt that the bureaucrats at ACARA have deliberately jettisoned the acquisition of knowledge and replaced it with pure, unadulterated emotion. They have created a curriculum that will elicit feelings of guilt about the past, anger about the present and sheer terror about the future. In this way, they are manipulating children for political gain. As Thomas Sowell notes, ‘there are few things more dishonourable than misleading the young’.<br/>
<br/>

<p class="asset asset-link">
	<a href="https://www.spectator.com.au/2023/03/misleading-the-young/">https://www.spectator.com.au/2023/03/misleading-the-young/</a>
</p>
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<br/>


24 March, 2023
<br/><br/> 


<b> Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change reports reveals Great Barrier Reef could be destroyed</b><br/>
<br/>
<i> This is a thoroughly dishonest piece of reporting. It takes scenarios that the IPCC deems highly unlikely (3C+ warming) and treats it as if it were probable. It&#39;s just blatant propaganda from a fanatic below</i><br/>
<br/>
The Great Barrier Reef could be destroyed and Queensland could endure extreme weather conditions if the planet warms more than 3C, a new report has revealed.<br/>
<br/>
A United Nations report by the Intergovernment Panel on Climate Change warned that time may be running out for the world to only warm by 1.5C, saying it was already at 1.1C.<br/>
<br/>
The report details what changes a rising temperatures would bring to Australia.<br/>
<br/>
If they increaee by 4C globally, Australi’s temperaturs could possibly surge by 6C, meaning the potential for 50C days.<br/>
<br/>
Director of Griffith University Climate Action Beacon Professor Brendan Mackey said to make sure the dire effects of global warming won’t happen we need to transition away from fossil fuels and accelerate to clean energy.<br/>
<br/>
“Each government has made a pledge of policies and programs to achieve mitigation which is what the current government propose,” Prof Mackey said.<br/>
<br/>
“If you add all the commitments it would limit global warming.<br/>
<br/>
“A global warming of three would mean the end of the Great Barrier Reef as we know it,” he said.<br/>
<br/>
“Every increment of warming, that makes it hard for everyone. For Queensland it would mean much heavier impacts for agriculture, huge impacts for Great Barrier Reef.<br/>
<br/>
“If you have a temperature of 40C, it’s life threatening and the doctor would send you to hospital, when we talk about levels of warming a healthy temperature would be 0 above pre-industrial levels.”<br/>
<br/>
Prof Mackey said the Reef couldn’t handle the amount of choral bleaching that would occur.<br/>
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Prof Mackey said things were heating up fast. “That means we are going to see a big increase in climate impact, an increase of severity of extreme weather events,” he said.<br/>
<br/>
“For Queensland this is interesting, as it is highly exposed to extreme weather events.”<br/>
<br/>
“It would mean more heavy flooding, we will have more of everything that’s bad when it comes to weather.<br/>
<br/>
“Every increment of warming, that makes it hard for everyone.”<br/>
<br/>
But Prof Mackey said the report also revealed there was still opportunity to cap the amount of climate change and limit it at 1.5C.<br/>
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“It’s really Queensland’s interest to prevent further climate change, while Queensland has a lot of fossil fuels, it also has the minerals that it needed for clean energy, there’s a huge opportunity to become a clean energy powerhouse,” he said.<br/>
<br/>
“What the report is saying for Queensland is that climate change is going to get worse than its better. That’s going to be more climate risk for Queensland.”<br/>
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<p class="asset asset-link">
	<a href="https://www.couriermail.com.au/news/queensland/qld-politics/intergovernmental-panel-on-climate-change-reports-reveals-great-barrier-reef-could-be-destroyed/news-story/a84013275ac983b1e53e37845f33e721">https://www.couriermail.com.au/news/queensland/qld-politics/intergovernmental-panel-on-climate-change-reports-reveals-great-barrier-reef-could-be-destroyed/news-story/a84013275ac983b1e53e37845f33e721</a>
</p>
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<b> Big tech will back flawed Voice</b><br/>
<br/>
In the push to enshrine an Indigenous Voice to Parliament in Australia’s Constitution, censorship is the greatest weapon – and Big Tech has received the green light to use it.<br/>
<br/>
The Albanese government has confirmed that there will be no changes to how digital platforms monitor freedom of expression and ‘disinformation’ relating to the upcoming referendum on the Voice. This has fuelled concerns over just how fair the debate will be, and rightly so. Given their record of political interference, unhinged bias, and censorship, platforms such as Facebook and Google do not deserve the trust of the Australian people. To ensure that foreign-owned media companies cannot hijack the conversation around one of Australia’s most sensitive domestic matters, the Albanese government should adopt the Institute of Public Affairs’ proposal to legislate against such platforms censoring political viewpoints regarding the referendum.<br/>
<br/>
In explaining why no changes will be made, Communications Minister Michelle Rowland places great trust in Big Tech’s ability to self-regulate. She states that they have policies which ‘protect the integrity of democratic processes and facilitate freedom of expression while addressing misinformation/disinformation’.<br/>
<br/>
Far from protecting democratic ideals, existing social media policies are consistently used to undermine free dialogue in the pursuit of one narrative. Whether it is relying on fact-checkers to flag so-called ‘misinformation’ or arbitrarily declaring that certain content ‘advertisements’ cannot be promoted, digital platforms overwhelmingly silence perspectives that remotely question the logistics or scope of the Voice proposal.<br/>
<br/>
Since September 2022, Google and Facebook have censored three videos produced by the Institute of Public Affairs. In one of these videos, an IPA research fellow details reports regarding the nature of and desire for a traditional information pamphlet surrounding the Voice Proposal. In taking the clip down, Google painted the video as an ‘Australian election ad’ featuring politicians, thereby attracting some technical obligations with which the IPA did not comply. Facebook claimed that another video questioning the extent to which racial equality would be secured by the Voice was an ‘ad’ that violated Facebook’s social and political policies – offering no explanation as to how this was the case. Similarly, conservative lobby group Advance Australia ran advertisements urging Australians to oppose the Voice, claiming that it would create ‘special rights’ for Indigenous Australians. True to form, Facebook cited the increasingly meaningless term ‘misinformation’ to justify pulling the ads in January.<br/>
<br/>
Regardless of whether the Voice affords Indigenous Australians advisory rights and privileges that are not available to any other race – or ‘special rights’ as some say – Facebook’s censorship is a gross intrusion into sensitive domestic affairs. With one of the most significant changes to Australia’s Constitution set to be decided on in coming months, it is vital that any and all interested parties be afforded freedom of speech and expression. To this end, the IPA proposes amending the Broadcasting Services Act to ensure a free and fair debate. By compelling broadcasters – including digital platforms – to offer all referendum participants the opportunity to broadcast referendum material, as IPA Executive Director Daniel Wild argues, the Act can give Australians ‘an equal say over the big issues facing our nation’s future’.<br/>
<br/>
It is for Australians – not foreign-owned tech companies – to debate and decide the country’s constitutional future. Why should Big Tech retain the ability to control the dialogue of our nuanced, domestic affairs when they are not the ones who deal with the consequences? For them to do so is nothing short of foreign interference that attacks the heart of Australia’s democracy. It is odd that Home Affairs Minister Clare O’Neil denounces foreign interference as it ‘fundamentally undermines our democracy’, just as the Albanese government refuses to address it by way of legislative change.<br/>
<br/>
By hindering the fully informed debate necessary for Australia’s referendum, Big Tech is impeding Australia’s democratic standards. With the referendum fast approaching, it is high time to reign in digital platforms, reminding them that Australia’s course should be steered by Australians.<br/>
<br/>

<p class="asset asset-link">
	<a href="https://www.spectator.com.au/2023/03/big-tech-only-wants-to-hear-one-voice/">https://www.spectator.com.au/2023/03/big-tech-only-wants-to-hear-one-voice/</a>
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<b> Voice question ‘far worse’ than feared: constitutional law expert Greg Craven</b><br/>
<br/>
Prominent constitutional law expert Greg Craven has warned that the proposed question on the Indigenous voice to parliament is “far worse than I had contemplated the worst position being”.<br/>
<br/>
Professor Craven, a member of the government’s constitutional law working group, said the wording for the referendum released by Anthony Albanese “takes the problems that people have identified with the preceding drafting and multiplies it”.<br/>
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“The criticism of the preceding draft was the all embracing proposition that the Indigenous voice could make representations to executive government. The question was whether that would simply wrap-up every decision of government in legal challenges by the voice or by people on behalf of the voice,” Professor Craven told 3AW.<br/>
<br/>
“It was widely expected that would be wound back and Attorney-General (Mark) Dreyfus tried to do that, he was defeated. Those words are still there in all their glory. “That in a sense is a defeat of hopes for some sort of compromise.”<br/>
<br/>
The former Australian Catholic University vice-chancellor, who has always been a supporter of the principle of a voice and backs the referendum, criticised the “incredibly vague ‘design principles’ that have been endorsed by Cabinet”.<br/>
<br/>
“They will be the substitute for actual detail. So the position is significantly worse,” he said.<br/>
<br/>
Professor Craven said the problem with including executive government is it captures the “whole of the decision making of the Commonwealth government” and could potentially impact decision-making on national security, defence and foreign affairs.<br/>
<br/>
“If you get into a situation, for example the voice hasn’t yet made a representation on some important view and the Commonwealth hasn’t told the voice and given it that chance then legally it is entirely practical for someone to take a challenge to court to stop that action until the voice has made a representation.”<br/>
<br/>
“In theory, you could actually challenge the substance of the decision by saying there hasn’t been natural justice or you haven’t taken into account the right considerations. Basically, what executive government does is it judicialises the whole of the voice. It invites the High Court to be active.”<br/>
<br/>

<p class="asset asset-link">
	<a href="https://www.theaustralian.com.au/nation/voice-question-far-worse-than-feared-constitutional-law-expert-greg-craven/news-story/2d31d19b604d39b68fd1f13687df1b2c">https://www.theaustralian.com.au/nation/voice-question-far-worse-than-feared-constitutional-law-expert-greg-craven/news-story/2d31d19b604d39b68fd1f13687df1b2c</a>
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<b> Labor’s safeguard mechanism to cut emissions from big polluters</b><br/>
<br/>
Australia’s largest greenhouse gas emitters could be forced to keep their net pollution below a set limit, if a controversial bill being debated by federal parliament gets up.<br/>
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Known as the “safeguard mechanism”, proponents claim it would have the environmental effect of taking two thirds of the cars off Australia’s roads.<br/>
<br/>
But that could mean higher prices for consumers, right in the middle of a cost-of-living crisis.<br/>
<br/>
Here’s everything you need to know about the legislation and how it could affect you.<br/>
<br/>
Why is parliament debating the ‘safeguard mechanism’ and what is it?<br/>
<br/>
The “safeguard mechanism” was first proposed by the Abbott Liberal government in 2014, as a means to ensure Australia’s biggest greenhouse gas emitters did not go over certain pollution baselines. But the measure lacked teeth; since it was introduced in 2016, emissions have actually increased.<br/>
<br/>
Labor wants to introduce a new arrangement whereby the emissions baselines will come down by 4.9 per cent each year between 2023 and 2030 – meaning polluters will have to continually develop new processes to reduce their emissions, or else buy carbon offsets if they fail to do so.<br/>
<br/>
So will the safeguard mechanism increase prices?<br/>
<br/>
According to Liberal leader Peter Dutton, yes. Businesses will have to invest more to reduce their emissions, or buy carbon credits – and either way, those costs will be passed on to the consumer, he has said.<br/>
<br/>
The Business Council of Australia, which supports the government’s plan, has been a bit more circumspect, with CEO Jennifer Westacott telling a Senate committee the “fate of the Safeguard Mechanism has flow on consequences for the entire economy”.<br/>
<br/>
Clean Energy Finance director Tim Buckley said any price increases arising from the safeguard mechanism would be “immaterial”.<br/>
<br/>
“The impact of the safeguard mechanism on the Australian consumer is almost immaterial in terms of the overall impact of energy prices and the resulting wider inflation,” he said.<br/>
<br/>
Extreme weather events had a much greater impact on an Australian business’s bottom line than any costs they would incur under the safeguard mechanism legislation, Mr Buckley said, citing the $8.5 billion in losses caused by flooding in 2022 alone as an example.<br/>
<br/>
So what sorts of costs could go up as a result of the safeguard mechanism, and when?<br/>
<br/>
Unless you buy your coal or iron ore by the ton, rest easy. The safeguard mechanism does not cover agricultural enterprises, transport, services or light manufacturing, so it’s not as though these everyday things will suddenly shoot up in price.<br/>
<br/>
But as the Productivity Commission recently noted in its five-yearly productivity inquiry, abatement measures “increase the direct costs of production” and we can expect those costs to be passed on to the consumer.<br/>
<br/>
But they also noted that “higher production costs can be viewed as the price of reducing the chance of even greater climate-related productivity costs in the future”. In other words: some higher costs now could prevent even higher costs down the track.<br/>
<br/>
When those costs are incurred by big businesses (and then passed on to consumers) will vary from industry to industry, though it should be noted most facilities have already started the work of trying to reduce their emissions.<br/>
<br/>
Interestingly, the Productivity Commission has called for the Safeguard Mechanism to be expanded into other sectors, including liquid fuel wholesalers, when the policy settings for the legislation are reviewed in 2026-27. That would certainly have a cost impact on motorists, but it should be stressed that’s a proposal only at this stage.<br/>
<br/>
Who will the safeguard mechanism apply to?<br/>
<br/>
The mechanism applies to 215 of Australia’s biggest emitting facilities – things like coal mines, natural gas plants, and heavy industrial factories.<br/>
<br/>

<p class="asset asset-link">
	<a href="https://www.couriermail.com.au/technology/environment/safeguard-mechanism-the-basics-explained/news-story/e7bd6c28f57df3cb6feec3810b4c4e32">https://www.couriermail.com.au/technology/environment/safeguard-mechanism-the-basics-explained/news-story/e7bd6c28f57df3cb6feec3810b4c4e32</a>
</p>
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23 March, 2023
<br/><br/> 
<b> Anthony Albanese announced wording of the question<br/>
The Voice to Parliament will be voted on by Aussies</b><br/>
<br/>
<i> One word makes this very disturbing. The parliament will be able to give &quot;powers&quot; to the new body, WITH NO RESTRICTIONS. They could even give it veto power over all legislation. Australia would have the most racist parliament since Apartheid South Africa</i><br/>
<br/>
In the referendum, due to be held between October and December, the public will be asked to consider: &#39;A proposed law: to alter the constitution to recognise the First People&#39;s of Australia by establishing an Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Voice. Do you approve this proposed alteration?&#39;<br/>
<br/>
In an emotional press conference, Mr Albanese said: &#39;This moment has been a very long time in the making. It&#39;s a simple matter from the heart.<br/>
<br/>
&#39;Recognising Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Australians in our Constitution is the best chance this country has had to address the injustices of the past and move Australia forward for everyone, the best way to do this is to give people a voice.&#39;<br/>
<br/>
For 122 years, the Constitution has made no reference to Indigenous Australians, who, the PM pointed out, have had &#39;more than 65,000 years of continuous connection to this vast land&#39;.<br/>
<br/>
If a majority of Australians vote in favour of the Voice, the Constitution would be amended as follows:<br/>
<br/>
1. There shall be a body, to be called the Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Voice; 2. The Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Voice may make representations to the Parliament and the Executive Government of the Commonwealth on matters relating to Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoples;<br/>
<br/>
3. The Parliament shall, subject to this Constitution, have power to make laws with respect to matters relating to the Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Voice, including its composition, functions powers and procedures.<br/>
<br/>

<p class="asset asset-link">
	<a href="https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-11892353/The-Voice-referendum-Anthony-Albanese-chokes-reveals-wording-question.html">https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-11892353/The-Voice-referendum-Anthony-Albanese-chokes-reveals-wording-question.html</a>
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<b> Premier firms on yearly limit to rent increases in property reform</b><br/>
<br/>
<i> To get more housing available, you need to ENCOURAGE landlords to provide it. Creating difficulties for landlords is a moron act that ony a Leftist would do. If these caps are enacted many landlords would see it as writing on the wall and would get out of the rental market while they could, thus further REDUCING the availability of properties to let. </i><br/>
<br/>
Landlords would be limited to a single price increase each year in a rent cap move canvassed by Premier Annastacia Palaszczuk — a policy one economist warned could encourage investors to lift rents by more severe amounts.<br/>
<br/>
In another sign the Queensland government is winding back its controversial proposal following heated backlash from industry groups and economists, Ms Palaszczuk volunteered the option as a possible solution to assist tenants bearing the brunt of the housing crisis.<br/>
<br/>
“People are reporting to me they are seeing rents going up $200 a week, $400 a week, and people are finding it so hard to make ends meet, especially with the higher cost of living,” she told Nine’s Today show on Wednesday morning.<br/>
<br/>
“So one example that’s on the table is limiting those increases to once a year, rather than twice a year, to put a bit of downward pressure.”<br/>
<br/>
Leading independent economist Saul Eslake was critical of the rent cap pitch earlier in the week, but said the updated proposal to limit the number of increases as opposed to a ceiling on the amount was a more reasonable approach.<br/>
<br/>
But he warned landlords might err on the side of safety by imposing bigger increases.<br/>
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The industry peak body responded furiously to the initial announcement of a rent cap but said it was open to a conversation about further tightening the frequency of rent increases.<br/>
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Real Estate Institute of Queensland chief executive Antonia Mercorella described it as the best of the worst proposed controls on landlords. “There are already statutory caps around how frequently rent can be increased,” she said.<br/>
<br/>
“It would be our preference not to continue further rent control but we would be open to having a discussion.”<br/>
<br/>
UNSW housing researcher Hal Pawson, who authored a landmark report on housing in Queensland that led to Ms Palaszczuk proposing the reforms, said the option floated was on the “extreme low end of ambition”.<br/>
<br/>
He described the reform as a first small step along the way to governments having some influence on the rents tenants are paying, but insisted it should also be paired with a benchmark limit such as the Consumer Price Index — similar to the ACT.<br/>
<br/>
“It doesn’t go to the heart of the problem (controlling huge increases in rent) — it’s touching the edges of the problem,” Professor Pawson said.<br/>
<br/>
Queensland Council of Social Service chief executive Aimee McVeigh said rental reform consisting of a single yearly lift was a “light touch intervention” that would be insufficient in providing a meaningful solution. “We need some consumer protections,” she said.<br/>
<br/>
“Almost 40 per cent of Queenslanders rent and those people deserve a fair rental market where they can be have some certainty about what the price of that basic human need for shelter will be.”<br/>
<br/>
Mr Eslake stressed the tinkering of moderate rental reform was a poor substitute for alleviating the crisis by providing homes for those in need, citing a Productivity Commission report earlier this year that revealed Queensland social housing stock had only marginally increased in a decade.<br/>
<br/>
“A more effective response to the undoubted upward pressure on rents and the insecurity that tenants are feeling as a result of that would be to do more to boost the supply of housing,” he said.<br/>
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<p class="asset asset-link">
	<a href="https://www.couriermail.com.au/news/queensland/qld-politics/premier-firms-on-yearly-limit-to-rent-increases-in-property-reform/news-story/2e4533772584aeb83ce87d6c326c8a11">https://www.couriermail.com.au/news/queensland/qld-politics/premier-firms-on-yearly-limit-to-rent-increases-in-property-reform/news-story/2e4533772584aeb83ce87d6c326c8a11</a>
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<b> Australia recorded relatively more ‘excess deaths’ during the Covid-19 pandemic than Sweden</b><br/>
<br/>
Australia recorded relatively more “excess deaths” during the Covid-19 pandemic than Sweden, which chose not to lock down its populations, new analysis from the OECD reveals.<br/>
<br/>
As the world approaches the three-year anniversary of the start of lockdowns this week, top academics say data showing Sweden’s success in keeping mortality rates down brings years of civil liberty restrictions and billions of dollars in government spending in other nations into question.<br/>
<br/>
New OECD analysis comparing excess deaths in 2020 and 2021 – the two worst years of the pandemic – for 36 developed nations reveals Australia had the fifth lowest increase in excess deaths, but came in behind Sweden, which attracted global scorn for resisting closing businesses, schools and ordering citizens to stay at home.<br/>
<br/>
Including excess deaths – defined as those over and above what was expected – for 2022 as well puts Australia even further behind Sweden with an 8.2 per cent increase over the three-year period compared with Sweden’s 3.1 per cent.<br/>
<br/>
Stefano Scarpetta, the director of employment, labour and social affairs at the OECD, said: “If you control for population growth (higher in Australia), Australia’s excess deaths rate over the three-year period as a whole was 2.1 per cent and in Sweden it was -0.6 per cent, that is no excess mortality. The reason why we use excess mortality (instead of Covid-19 deaths) is because in practice counting the number of deaths because of Covid is very difficult.”<br/>
<br/>
Dr Scarpetta said there were variations in classification and testing across countries, and it was difficult to determine whether elderly victims had died with or from Covid-19.<br/>
<br/>
The OECD report, Ready for the Next Crisis? Investing in Health Care Resilience, found half of all Covid-19 deaths occurred among people aged 80 across 22 OECD countries with comparable data, and one third occurred in nursing homes.<br/>
<br/>
Mexico and Colombia, which did impose lockdowns, endured the greatest increases in excess deaths of about 50 per cent. Japan and Sweden, the only two OECD nations to resist them, prompting international condemnation at the time, had among the lowest increases, ranking 4th and 8th, respectively.<br/>
<br/>
Two US public health experts who in 2020 recommended the Swedish approach – Stanford University’s Jay Bhattacharya and Harvard’s Martin Kulldorff – said they felt vindicated but ­despaired at the lack of appreciation of the findings and feared the same policies would be followed again.<br/>
<br/>
“The thing to emphasise is that Sweden has had one of the lowest excess mortalities in all Europe during the pandemic no matter how you cut the data,” Professor Bhattacharya said. “If lockdowns were necessary to prevent death it should have had one of the worst. Sweden served as a control group for the world in ethical pandemic management and it was a rousing success.”<br/>
<br/>
He said the success Australia had in having “little Covid on the island for a full year came at tremendously high cost: 270 days of lockdown in Melbourne, ­essential imprisonment of the population”.<br/>
<br/>
The underlying health of a country’s population (including rates of obesity), vaccination levels against Covid-19, and the capacity and quality of the available health care system best explained the widely different rates of excess deaths across countries, the OECD found.<br/>
<br/>
Former US president Donald Trump in April 2020 said Sweden was “suffering badly” from its decision to follow its pandemic plan, but the US, where lockdowns pushed the jobless rate above 15 per cent in 2020, ended up with five times as many excess deaths as Sweden and the sixth worst outcome, according to the OECD data.<br/>
<br/>
“Extended quarantining of healthy populations, the closing of schools, and massive violation of civil rights: these were never part of any pandemic plan that I’m aware of for respiratory viruses,” Professor Bhattacharya said.<br/>
<br/>
Epidemiologists at the UK’s Imperial College, whose dire forecasts early in the pandemic convinced the UK and US to impose lockdowns in March 2020, forecast Sweden would endure 96,000 Covid-19 deaths by July 2020 if it didn’t follow China and then Italy in imposing lockdowns. After three years, Sweden has experienced 23,777 deaths from or with Covid-19, compared with Australia’s 19,477, according to the World Health Organisation.<br/>
<br/>
Sweden’s population is older than Australia’s, with a median age of 41, compared with Australia’s 38.<br/>
<br/>
“The principle of public health is that you can’t just focus on one disease; you have to look at cancer, cardiovascular disease and mental health,” Professor Kulldorff said.<br/>
<br/>
He said Australia’s lockdowns had caused “huge collateral damage in public health, even if you ignore the impact on the economy and government finances”.<br/>
<br/>
According to the IMF, Australia’s gross public debt as a share of GDP surged from 47 per cent to 59 per cent between 2019 and 2022, mainly as a result of federal and state stimulus programs that accompanied lockdowns, while Sweden’s public debt declined from 39 per cent to 31 per cent.<br/>
<br/>
The OECD report found the number of in-person doctor consultations fell by an average of 17 per cent across OECD countries in 2020, and more than one in five people reported having forgone a needed medical examination.<br/>
<br/>
Japan, whose then prime minster, the late Shinzo Abe, was also criticised for resisting a European-style lockdown of the densely populated island nation, had the lowest level of reported population sadness in 2020 (11 per cent), according to the OECD report, while Mexico and Colombia reported the highest, each above 30 per cent.<br/>
<br/>
This new OECD analysis reflected the findings of the UK statistical agency, which found Sweden had the second lowest excess death rate in Europe.<br/>
<br/>

<p class="asset asset-link">
	<a href="https://www.theaustralian.com.au/nation/australia-recorded-relatively-more-excess-deaths-during-the-covid19-pandemic-than-sweden/news-story/0fdf8df15b4ef00f3534e6ba9626e3b2">https://www.theaustralian.com.au/nation/australia-recorded-relatively-more-excess-deaths-during-the-covid19-pandemic-than-sweden/news-story/0fdf8df15b4ef00f3534e6ba9626e3b2</a>
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<br/>
<b> Health minister warns further restrictions to come for the distribution of vapes</b><br/>
<br/>
<i> These things can be quite poisonous</i><br/>
<br/>
New statistics have emerged detailing the rising number of children found ingesting nicotine as a result of vapes, causing health ministers across the country to action new regulations to the distribution of these harmful devices.<br/>
<br/>
Despite the lack of evidence as to the long-term effects of vaping on human health, the smoking alternative has quickly become a major health concern across Australia.<br/>
<br/>
Most recently, it’s been taking over school kids, with vaping now the biggest behavioural issue in primary schools.<br/>
<br/>
Victorian health minister, Mark Butler has announced that a state-wide action plan will soon be enforced to put a stop to the harmful effects of vaping in children, after 50 kids under the age of four were found to have ingested nicotine as a result of the vaporised cigarettes.<br/>
<br/>
“The Victorian poisons hotline has reported that in the last 12 months, more than 50 children under the age of four have had to be reported to the hotline because of the dangerous ingestion of nicotine,” Butler told ABC Radio.<br/>
<br/>
“Four. This is now the biggest behavioural issue in primary schools.”<br/>
<br/>
It comes after changes to the distribution legalities last year which saw all consumers required to obtain a prescription in order to purchase nicotine vaping devices.<br/>
<br/>
A quick trip down to the local Cignall or TSG shop would confirm that this new policy has rarely been enforced. On top of this, a black market for e-cigarette distribution has emerged, largely targeting underage children.<br/>
<br/>
Mr Butler says the emerging avenues for the retail of vapes and e-cigarettes has already singlehandedly began to undo the decades of work and effort to lower the rate of smoking in Australia, as well as cause a new, “very real harm to our children.”<br/>
<br/>
“This is an industry that is trying to create a new generation of nicotine addicts so they get around all of the hard work our country and other countries have done over recent decades to stamp out smoking.”<br/>
<br/>
Earlier this month, a video posted online saw an adult force an 11-month-old baby to suck on a vape, proving further that there is a severe lack of education as to the damaging effects vaping has on our health.<br/>
<br/>
Adding to the insane discoveries of vaping in children, Mr Butler cited that a young child was found to be hiding a vape in her pencil case at school, disguising it as a highlighter so she could use it between classes.<br/>
<br/>
According to the Lung Foundation Australia, there is a widespread misconception surrounding vaping, denoting it as a harmless water vapour product, where in fact, it is a product of “toxic particles”.<br/>
<br/>
Vapes are known to emit a number of harmful compounds, including: formaldehyde and acrolein, “which can cause irreversible lung damage,” as well as propylene glycol, “which is toxic to human cells”.<br/>
<br/>
As vapes are still relatively new, the long-term effects are yet to be measured, though if they are to hold similar health concerns as smoking, it’s likely that cancer and early death are two very likely consequences.<br/>
<br/>
Mr Butler said “all options were on the table” when it comes to addressing the rising health concern, including a greater crackdown on down on import controls and stricter regulations on sales.<br/>
<br/>
Nationals party leader David Littleproud also made a stern claim that attractive packaging made to lure children to the products should be banned. “We have to get ahead of this because children are the ones that are the victims of this,” Mr Littleproud said on Tuesday.<br/>
<br/>
One thing that Mr Butler is sure about is that normalisation of vaping will not be on the cards.<br/>
<br/>
“We can’t just say oh, well, it’s all too hard, let’s just normalise it because we know why these products exist,” he said. “These products are pushed so hard by the tobacco industry is because they want to create a pathway back to cigarettes.”<br/>
<br/>

<p class="asset asset-link">
	<a href="https://www.couriermail.com.au/lifestyle/health-minister-warns-further-restrictions-to-come-for-the-distribution-of-vapes/news-story/f3f63fafa286876a947a4b0e13c3c5e7">https://www.couriermail.com.au/lifestyle/health-minister-warns-further-restrictions-to-come-for-the-distribution-of-vapes/news-story/f3f63fafa286876a947a4b0e13c3c5e7</a>
</p>
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<br/>
<br/>


22 March, 2023
<br/><br/> 

<b> How can Australia pay $368 billion for new submarines? Some of the money will be created from thin air</b><br/>
<br/>
<i> A good explanation of how deficit budgeting works below. But the bottom line remains that we will all have to spend less to cover the purchase of these pointless submarines</i><br/>
<br/>
Australia&#39;s decision to buy three nuclear-powered submarines and build another eight is so expensive that, for the $268 billion to $368 billion price tag, we could give a million dollars to every resident of Geelong, or Hobart, or Wollongong.<br/>
<br/>
Those are the sort of examples used by former NSW treasury secretary Percy Allan on the Pearls and Irritations blog, &quot;in case you can&#39;t get your head around a billion dollars&quot;.<br/>
<br/>
Such multi-billion megaprojects almost always go over budget.<br/>
<br/>
For instance, when then prime minister Malcolm Turnbull announced the Snowy Hydro 2.0 pumped hydroelectricity project in 2017, it was supposed to take four years and cost $2 billion. The latest guess is it&#39;ll actually take 10 years and cost $10 billion.<br/>
<br/>
So to pay for those two megaprojects alone, there&#39;s an awful lot of money we will need to find from somewhere. Or will we?<br/>
<br/>
&#39;No simple budget constraint&#39;<br/>
<br/>
In the first year of the pandemic, Australians were given a glimpse of a truth so unnerving that economists and politicians normally keep to themselves.<br/>
<br/>
It&#39;s that, for a country like Australia, there is &quot;no simple budget constraint&quot; &#8212; meaning no hard limit on what we can spend.<br/>
<br/>
&quot;No simple budget constraint&quot; is the phrase used by Financial Times&#39; chief economics commentator Martin Wolf, but he doesn&#39;t want it said loudly.<br/>
<br/>
The problem is, he says, &quot;it will prove impossible to manage an economy sensibly once politicians believe there is no budget constraint&quot;.<br/>
<br/>
A quick look at history shows he is correct about there being no simple budget constraint, despite all the talk about the need to pay for spending.<br/>
<br/>
As you can see below, Australia&#39;s Commonwealth government has been in deficit (spent more than it earned) in all but 17 of the past 50 years. The US government has been in deficit for all but four of the past 50.<br/>
<br/>
There is no hard limit on how the Commonwealth can spend over and above what it earns, just as there&#39;s no hard limit on how much you and I can spend. But whereas you or I have to eventually pay back what we have borrowed, governments face no such constraint.<br/>
<br/>
Because the Commonwealth lives forever, it can keep borrowing forever, even borrowing to pay interest on borrowing. And unlike private corporations, it can borrow from itself &#8212; borrowing money it has itself created.<br/>
<br/>
Governments create money<br/>
<br/>
That&#39;s what the Morrison government did in 2020 and 2021, in the early days of COVID.<br/>
<br/>
To raise the money it needed for programs such as JobKeeper, the Government sold bonds (which are promises to repay and pay interest) to traders, which its wholly-owned Reserve Bank then bought, using money it had created.<br/>
<br/>
The Government could have just as easily cut out the traders and borrowed directly from its wholly-owned Reserve Bank, using money the bank had created &#8212; effectively borrowing from itself. But the Reserve Bank preferred the appearance of arms-length transactions.<br/>
<br/>
And there&#39;s no doubt the Reserve Bank created the money it spent, out of thin air. Asked in 2021 whether it was right to say he was printing money, Governor Philip Lowe said it was, although the money was &quot;created&quot;, rather than printed.<br/>
<br/>
People think of it as printing money, because once upon a time if the central bank bought an asset, it might pay for that asset by giving you notes, you know, bank notes. I&#39;d have to run my printing presses to do it. We don&#39;t operate that way anymore.<br/>
<br/>
These days the Reserve Bank creates money electronically. It credits the accounts of the banks that bank with it.<br/>
<br/>
One way to think about it (the way so-called modern monetary theorists think about it) is that none of the money the Government spends comes from tax.<br/>
<br/>
The Government creates money every time it gets the Reserve Bank to credit the account of a private bank (perhaps in order to pay a pension), and destroys money every time someone pays tax and the Reserve Bank debits the account.<br/>
<br/>
If it creates more money than it destroys, it&#39;s called a budget deficit. If it destroys more than it creates, it&#39;s called a budget surplus.<br/>
<br/>
Too much spending creates problems<br/>
<br/>
Can the Government create more money than it destroys without limit? No, but where it should stop is a matter for judgement.<br/>
<br/>
If it spends too much money on things for which there is plenty of demand and a limited supply, it&#39;ll push up prices, creating inflation.<br/>
<br/>
Where to stop will depend on how much others are spending.<br/>
<br/>
If there&#39;s little demand (say for builders, as there was during the global financial crisis) the Government can safely spend without much pushing up prices (as it did on builders during the global financial crisis).<br/>
<br/>
If it wants to spend really big (say on building submarines), it might have to restrain the spending of others, which it can do by raising taxes.<br/>
<br/>
But it&#39;s not a mechanical relationship. The main function of tax is not to pay for government spending, but to keep other spenders out of the way.<br/>
<br/>
If the economy is weak in the decades when the subs are being built, the burst of government spending will be welcome, and needed to create jobs. There will be no economic need to offset it by raising tax.<br/>
<br/>
But if the economy is strong, so strong the Government would have to bid up prices to get the subs built, it might have to push up tax to wind other spending back.<br/>
<br/>
This truth means there&#39;s no simple answer to the question &quot;how they are going to pay for subs?&quot; &#8212; just as there was no simple answer to questions about how to pay for a much-needed increase in the JobSeeker, or anything else.<br/>
<br/>
The deeply unsatisfying answer is that, from an economic perspective, it depends on who else is spending what at the time<br/>
<br/>

<p class="asset asset-link">
	<a href="https://www.abc.net.au/news/2023-03-22/australia-aukus-submarines-368-billion-some-money-thin-air/102124540">https://www.abc.net.au/news/2023-03-22/australia-aukus-submarines-368-billion-some-money-thin-air/102124540</a>
</p>
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<b> Pauline Hanson shuts down proposals for rent to be paid to Aboriginals because their land was stolen and issues a very blunt message to Indigenous leaders</b><br/>
<br/>
One Nation leader Pauline Hanson has blasted a movement calling for Australians to pay a weekly rent to Indigenous groups based on their ancestral claims to the land.<br/>
<br/>
She branded the movement - backed by First Nations senator Lidia Thorpe - as an &#39;outrageous&#39; money grab based on greed and &#39;racist identity victim politics&#39;.<br/>
<br/>
In a blistering attack in Parliament, senator Hanson savaged the &#39;Pay The Rent&#39; movement supported by senator Thorpe and feminist writer Clementine Ford.<br/>
<br/>
&#39;The idea that Australians should pay rent for living in their own country is offensive,&#39; she said in a speech to the Senate on Monday.<br/>
<br/>
&#39;It&#39;s based on the idea that only Aborigines own Australia. They don&#39;t. Australia belongs to all Australians.&#39;<br/>
<br/>
She insisted that anyone born in Australia has equal claim to the ownership of the country, regardless of any Indigenous heritage.<br/>
<br/>
&#39;We have all contributed to this country and we all share in its achievements, failures, resources, disasters, virtues, values and shortcomings,&#39; she said.<br/>
<br/>
&#39;The only good thing about the race-based rent idea is that the activists who want it reveal their true motivation. It&#8217;s not about &#8216;justice&#8217; or &#8216;redress&#8217;. It&#8217;s just about money &#8211; other people&#8217;s money. It&#8217;s just about their greed.<br/>
<br/>
&#39;If this mob succeed in their bid for a race-based Voice to Parliament, it&#8217;s only a matter of time before this idea is on the political agenda. &#39;It&#8217;s only a matter of time before non-aboriginal Australians are forced to pay yet more tax &#8211; a race-based rent tax.&#39;<br/>
<br/>
She claimed that system would be abused and the money diverted away from those most in need. &#39;As usual, the Aboriginal industry will keep all the money and truly disadvantaged Aborigines in remote communities will continue to suffer poverty, unemployment and crime,&#39; she said.<br/>
<br/>
&#39;One Nation calls on all sensible Australians to reject this discrimination. &#39;We urge the government to audit the Aboriginal industry, and to finally act to fix the real problems in Aboriginal communities.&#39;<br/>
<br/>
The &#39;Pay the Rent&#39; model movement allows homeowners to pay a percentage of their income to a body led by Aboriginal elders without any government oversight.<br/>
<br/>
One per cent of weekly wages is the level suggested by Robbie Thorpe, a veteran Aboriginal rights activist from Melbourne who ran a similar scheme in Fitzroy in the 1990s.<br/>
<br/>
Under the suggested one per cent - with the median Australian employee&#39;s earnings of $1,250 per week - it would cost each Aussie around $12.50 a week, or around $650 a week.<br/>
<br/>
Mr Thorpe aaid the rent scheme is &#39;a rational, reasonable, responsible means of reconciling 200 years of unchecked genocide, as far as I&#39;m concerned&#39;.<br/>
<br/>
Proponents say it could then be extended to all users of the land, with people holding weddings or organising concerts also encouraged to hand over money.<br/>
<br/>
On the eve of Australia Day, senator Thorpe said: &#39;It assists sovereign grassroots fight the many campaigns and struggles we face everyday. &#39;Pay the rent from grassroots for grassroots. No strings attached to government agenda. &#39;<br/>
<br/>
Author Clementine Ford added: &#39;We need to stop paying lip service to decolonisation and start paying the rent to the First Nations people.&#39;<br/>
<br/>

<p class="asset asset-link">
	<a href="https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-11887963/One-Nations-Pauline-Hanson-slams-pay-rent-Aboriginal-people-proposal.html">https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-11887963/One-Nations-Pauline-Hanson-slams-pay-rent-Aboriginal-people-proposal.html</a>
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<br/>
<b> Coalition won&#8217;t block Voice referendum machinery bill</b><br/>
<br/>
The Coalition will not stand in the way of a bill establishing the architecture for the Voice referendum after spending weeks threatening to block it.<br/>
<br/>
Labor&#8217;s referendum machinery bill will pass the parliament imminently after the Coalition dropped its demand to provide equal funding to the Yes and No campaigns in the referendum to be held between October and December.<br/>
<br/>
The bill proposes to modernise how referendums are conducted by replicating the features of a federal election, including establishing a new financial disclosure regime for private fundraising by the Yes and No camps<br/>
<br/>
Winning the support of the Coalition, whose leadership argued in favour of doing a deal in a partyroom meeting yesterday, means the government will not need to deal with the Greens to pass the law.<br/>
<br/>
Senior Coalition frontbencher Simon Birmingham said the opposition did not get everything it wanted, but was satisfied the referendum would be conducted with integrity.<br/>
<br/>
Country Liberal Party senator Jacinta Price, a leading opponent of the proposed Voice advisory body, announced today that she may cross the floor and vote against the bill.<br/>
<br/>

<p class="asset asset-link">
	<a href="https://www.smh.com.au/national/australia-news-live-us-president-to-address-parliament-in-may-aukus-deal-questioned-by-labor-mps-20230321-p5cu2y.html?post=p54onc#p54onc">https://www.smh.com.au/national/australia-news-live-us-president-to-address-parliament-in-may-aukus-deal-questioned-by-labor-mps-20230321-p5cu2y.html?post=p54onc#p54onc</a>
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<b> Let&#8217;s stop pretending we are going to recycle all this plastic</b><br/>
<br/>
The report in this newspaper that Australia stands no chance of reaching its goal of recycling 70 per cent of its plastic waste by 2025 is at once depressing and predictable.<br/>
<br/>
Most of our single-use plastics cannot be recycled into a useful product at a reasonable cost. As voters and consumers we keep pretending it can, because we like plastic. It is cheap and useful.<br/>
<br/>
So governments and industry go along with the charade, providing us with pantomime recycling efforts.<br/>
<br/>
In turn, petrochemical companies, facing the end of the fossil fuel era, happily increase production.<br/>
<br/>
You need only compare the economics of recycling streams to get a sense of how useless most of our waste plastic is.<br/>
<br/>
Most metals and glass can be recycled endlessly, exhibiting the same quality in each of its new lives. That&#8217;s why people pay for scrap metal, while we had to pay China to take our waste plastic.<br/>
<br/>
In 2017, China finally tired of taking the world&#8217;s plastic waste and banned new imports, leaving the rest of us to scramble to find something to do with our growing stockpiles.<br/>
<br/>
In Australia, we have seen the collapse of REDcycle, the nation&#8217;s largest waste recycling scheme, with admissions that thousands of tonnes of warehoused plastic is bound for landfill.<br/>
<br/>
In Europe, much of it is burned for energy in machines that might not release particulate pollution but do release carbon dioxide into the atmosphere &#8211; burning plastic is after all burning oil.<br/>
<br/>
In other parts of the world, plastic simply chokes rivers and seas and the creatures that live in them.<br/>
<br/>
The New South Wales environment watchdog has issued &#8216;clean-up&#8217; orders to the supermarket giants for 15 warehouses and storage depots around the state where soft plastics have been stockpiled.<br/>
<br/>
Whether plastic is dumped under the ground or into the ocean, or burnt for energy, all plastic will eventually end up as a greenhouse gas.<br/>
<br/>
In fact, according to analysis published in February by the Minderoo Foundation in conjunction with the global energy analysis firm Wood McKenzie, the climate consultancy Carbon Trust and KPMG, single-use plastics now generate as much greenhouse gas emissions as the United Kingdom.<br/>
<br/>
Minderoo&#8217;s second Plastic Waste Makers Index found growth in single-use plastics made from fossil fuels was 15 times that of recycled plastics, and that between 2019 and 2021 global use of them surged from 133 million tonnes per year to 139 million tonnes, or about 1 kilogram per person on earth.<br/>
<br/>
ExxonMobil remains the largest producer of polymers bound for single-use plastics &#8211; responsible for six million tonnes in 2021 &#8211; followed by China&#8217;s Sinopec, which produced 5.8 million tonnes, and US-based Dow third.<br/>
<br/>
Growth in single-use plastics production was driven by demand for flexible packaging such as films and sachets, which grew from a 55 per share of all single-use plastics in 2019, to 57 per cent in 2021.<br/>
<br/>

<p class="asset asset-link">
	<a href="https://www.smh.com.au/environment/sustainability/let-s-just-stop-pretending-we-are-going-to-recycle-all-this-plastic-20230321-p5ctvq.html">https://www.smh.com.au/environment/sustainability/let-s-just-stop-pretending-we-are-going-to-recycle-all-this-plastic-20230321-p5ctvq.html</a>
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21 March, 2023
<br/><br/> 

<b> Deputy Premier Steven Miles says the state government is unlikely to implement a rental freeze</b><br/>
<br/>
Fronting the media 24 hours after Premier Annastacia Palaszczuk said the government was “very seriously” considering a cap on rental prices, Mr Miles said there needed to be a “conversation” on whether a limit should be placed on the size and frequency of rent increases.<br/>
<br/>
He accepted the investors needed to “see a return on their investment”.<br/>
<br/>
“In an environment where inflation is very high, where property prices have increased and where interest rates are increasing, that investors will need to see an increased return,” Mr Miles said.<br/>
<br/>
“But whether there should be limits placed on that increase, or whether there should be limits on how often and how they can be increased, they are all the sorts of things we want to discuss”.<br/>
<br/>
Ms Palaszczuk on Monday revealed the state government was “very seriously” considering how to put a rental cap in place, prompting economists to warn the move would make the state’s housing crisis worse.<br/>
<br/>
A Labor-controlled committee, in reviewing a private members bill by the Greens on a rent freeze in 2022, noted rent controls generally were “not effective in improving housing affordability for renters and can lead to distortions in the rental market”.<br/>
<br/>
Mr Miles was adamant the state government was not attempting to rehash Greens’ policy, saying it was “highly unlikely” that Labor would adopt a rent freeze approach.<br/>
<br/>
Ms Palaszczuk’s comments came after a report commissioned by the Queensland Council of Social Service revealed 300,000 people across the state were experiencing housing insecurity amid soaring rental prices and inadequate social housing supply.<br/>
<br/>
The Blueprint to Tackle Queensland’s Housing Crisis report revealed the rate of homelessness surged 22 per cent since 2017 – nearly triple the national rate.<br/>
<br/>
New data from PropTrack also recently revealed tenants in more than 1140 Queensland suburbs were paying up to $430 a week more than they were a year ago, with strong interstate migration and the return of international students adding to pressures.<br/>
<br/>
But economists, including the Grattan Institute’s Brendan Coates, said interfering in the market by putting a cap on rents was bad policy and would make the “race for space even worse” by discouraging investment in rental housing and reducing supply.<br/>
<br/>
“You could potentially make things better in the short term for existing renters, but the very act of making it easy for existing renters will make it worse for those that need housing,” he said.<br/>
<br/>
“A better policy in our view would be boosting the incomes of those struggling to keep a roof over their heads, by raising rent assistance by at least 40 per cent.<br/>
<br/>
“That should be the No. 1 priority right now.”<br/>
<br/>
A Labor-controlled committee, in reviewing a private member’s Bill by the Greens on a rent freeze last year, noted rent controls generally were “not effective in improving housing affordability for renters and can lead to distortions in the rental market”.<br/>
<br/>
Details on what the state government is proposing on rent caps is being finalised, with Deputy Premier Steven Miles signalling a “range of options” would be put forward at a housing roundtable next week.<br/>
<br/>

<p class="asset asset-link">
	<a href="https://www.couriermail.com.au/news/queensland/qld-govt-urged-to-rule-out-illconsidered-rental-caps-plan/news-story/65f17007b9a0f06d523fa3315a01faf1">https://www.couriermail.com.au/news/queensland/qld-govt-urged-to-rule-out-illconsidered-rental-caps-plan/news-story/65f17007b9a0f06d523fa3315a01faf1</a>
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<br/>
<b> Attempts to bring NDIS under control will trigger outrage from Greens, lobby groups</b><br/>
<br/>
Over the next four weeks, the federal government will hand out almost $3bn in National Disability Insurance Scheme payments and a further 6000 Australians will join the scheme.<br/>
<br/>
Next month, this figure will be significantly higher, and the month after that it will be higher again because the cost of the scheme is increasing by an average of $75m a month, and in the year to January it increased by $900m.<br/>
<br/>
The NDIS, meant to provide assistance for people suffering from a significant disability, has become a financial sinkhole.<br/>
<br/>
Are an additional 1500 people every week being found to be genuinely suffering from such a disability? You could be excused for wondering.<br/>
<br/>
To suggest that is has become the National Rort The Taxpayer Scheme is to risk being labelled as uncaring and cynical.<br/>
<br/>
But the reality is that successive governments have allowed the scheme to spiral out of control, fearful of the electoral backlash that could attend any attempt to cap the funding and tighten eligibility rules.<br/>
<br/>
Admittance to the scheme has now become yet another entitlement.<br/>
<br/>
Even supporters of the NDIS such as Sylvana Mahmic, one of the country’s leading autism advocates, are voicing their concerns at what would appear to be systemic abuse of the system.<br/>
<br/>
According to Ms Mahmic, private diagnostic services are charging parents $5000 and more to provide a diagnosis of autism for their child, telling them that their money will buy them, courtesy of the government, “a guarantee of funding for life”.<br/>
<br/>
This might account for a sharp increase in the number of children with what are described as “developmental delays” joining the scheme, with about 42 per cent of NDIS participants now under 14.<br/>
<br/>
The scheme is virtually open-ended.<br/>
<br/>
Something has to give but who is going to blow the full-time whistle on the rorters?<br/>
<br/>
Bill Shorten, the person to whom Prime Minister Anthony Albanese handed the poisoned chalice that is ministerial oversight of the NDIS, is doing what governments do when faced with an odious issue, which is to hold an inquiry which is scheduled to report in October.<br/>
<br/>
The government doesn’t need an inquiry.<br/>
<br/>
It knows the depth of the problem and if it wants some forensic detail, it only has to ask the chief of the Australian Criminal Intelligence Commission Michael Phelan.<br/>
<br/>
He went public in The Age newspaper and on 60 Minutes last year, saying that ACIC’s investigations had revealed that the NDIS was easy to exploit and was the subject of widespread fraud that could be siphoning off as much as 20 per cent of its total expenditure, which at current rates it is exploding and could exceed $60bn by 2030.<br/>
<br/>
This would represent the annual theft of $12bn of public funds.<br/>
<br/>
Commissioner Phelan didn’t pull his punches. “You’ve got to wonder how far down the scumbag scale you get before you start ripping off our most vulnerable people,” he said.<br/>
<br/>
He claimed the rip-offs had been happening since the scheme began in 2013 and said that ACIC believed criminal syndicates were threatening and extorting people on the scheme and stealing their NDIS entitlements.<br/>
<br/>
He said others were in league with doctors, pharmacists and accountants who they used to bill phantom clients, inflating invoices and charging for non-existent services. Due to the poor auditing procedures within the NDIS, these fraudulent practices are not detected.<br/>
<br/>
Shorten has conceded he is “very concerned” at the reports of widespread overcharging and false invoicing and that the original concept of the scheme, which was to give people who have significant functional impairment assistance so that they can live an ordinary life, had become lost.<br/>
<br/>
Queensland and other states are also guilty here, Shorten accusing them of folding their mental-health programs into the NDIS, saying that it was never meant to cover everyone with a psychosocial illness or to be for every Australian with a disability.<br/>
<br/>
He’s right, but we don’t need to endure a lengthy inquiry, another voluminous report and its attendant lengthy debate to take action.<br/>
<br/>
Any attempt to bring the scheme under control will inevitably trigger shrieks of outrage from the Greens and lobby groups, but so be it.<br/>
<br/>
The Albanese government has a big-spending agenda and no particular idea of just how it’s going to fund it. It could start by reining in the NDIS, which has become a $100m-a-day money pit.<br/>
<br/>

<p class="asset asset-link">
	<a href="https://www.couriermail.com.au/news/opinion/mike-oconnor/mike-oconnor-attempts-to-bring-ndis-under-control-will-trigger-outrage-from-greens-lobby-groups/news-story/272ee3e224f7948636233d3986eb1a6f">https://www.couriermail.com.au/news/opinion/mike-oconnor/mike-oconnor-attempts-to-bring-ndis-under-control-will-trigger-outrage-from-greens-lobby-groups/news-story/272ee3e224f7948636233d3986eb1a6f</a>
</p>
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<br/>
<b> Transgender laws critic Kellie-Jay Keen cleared to speak at Hobart rally</b><br/>
<br/>
A Hobart rally led by British transgender rights critic Kellie-Jay Keen will go ahead, after state parliament rejected demands it ban the gathering in the wake of Melbourne’s neo-Nazi protest.<br/>
<br/>
Presiding officers of the Tasmanian parliament on Monday ruled that the rally on the parliamentary lawns planned for Tuesday could proceed, rejecting demands by transgender activists and the Greens to ban the event.<br/>
<br/>
Greens leader Cassy O’Connor accused the group behind the rally, Let Women Speak, of being “fake feminists who play footsies with fascists”.<br/>
<br/>
However, LWS and its supporters said the neo-Nazis at its rally in Melbourne on Saturday were gatecrashes and that the group ­opposed Nazis as much as anyone.<br/>
<br/>
LWS called for its own ban – on a counter rally being organised by transgender rights activists for about the same time and the same location.<br/>
<br/>
House of Assembly Speaker Mark Shelton, a Liberal, and Legislative Council president Craig Farrell, of Labor, rejected both demands on the grounds of protecting free speech.<br/>
<br/>
“The lawns at parliament have always been a gathering place for democratic activity, including protests of all persuasions,” they said in a joint statement.<br/>
<br/>
“While there may at times be opposing views to the protests ­occurring, censoring free speech is not in the interests of a democratic society. All protests are ­expected to be conducted peacefully and lawfully.”<br/>
<br/>
LWS said its rally was about saying “no to men in women’s changerooms, toilets, refuges and prisons”, opposing “sex self-identification laws”, and defending the rights of lesbians to “meet in women-only spaces”.<br/>
<br/>
In a letter to Mr Shelton, Anna Sharman of Women Speak Tasmania said the only “risks and ­occasions of violence and harm” at Melbourne’s rally “came from the trans rights activists”.<br/>
<br/>
“The neo-Nazi men in black were not there to support LWS and have publicly stated their ­opposition to LWS,” Ms Sharman said. “The women attending LWS denounce their presence and ­actions and considered them an equal threat to our society as the trans rights activists.”<br/>
<br/>
But Ms O’Connor accused the group of “standing shoulder to shoulder in solidarity with Nazis” and “sharing an ideology of ­demonising a minority – transgender people”.<br/>
<br/>
Equality Tasmania said free speech “comes with a responsibility not to harm others”. “Parliament House, the home of Tasmanian democracy, should not be giving a platform to speakers who attract Nazi sympathisers,” spokesperson Rose Boccalatte said.<br/>
<br/>
The Tasmanian government said the rallies were a matter for the presiding officers, but Liberal cabinet minister Guy Barnett ­appeared to endorse their decision. “We support free speech in Australia including in Tasmania but it needs to be respectful,” he said.<br/>
<br/>

<p class="asset asset-link">
	<a href="https://www.theaustralian.com.au/business/legal-affairs/transgender-laws-critic-kelliejay-keen-cleared-to-speak-at-hobart-rally/news-story/c97029fcf61f9428a3367c21d8dbfe9e">https://www.theaustralian.com.au/business/legal-affairs/transgender-laws-critic-kelliejay-keen-cleared-to-speak-at-hobart-rally/news-story/c97029fcf61f9428a3367c21d8dbfe9e</a>
</p>
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<br/>
<b> Let Women Speak event hijacked: clowns to the left of Moira, Nazis to the right</b><br/>
<br/>
John Pesutto advised Moira Deeming on Sunday night that her position in the Victorian Parliamentary Party was untenable after she attended the Let Women Speak event in Melbourne on Saturday organised by Kellie-Jay Keen-Minshull.<br/>
<br/>
Moira deeming was recently elected to the Victorian Upper House, and is a former local councillor and school teacher. In her maiden speech, Deeming presented a clear platform for women’s rights and talked about her broad association with more left-leaning woman in solidarity against gender identity ideology.<br/>
<br/>
The women’s rights rally has since been skirmished by neo-Nazis who proceeded to do a Sieg Heil salute on the parliamentary steps where the women were speaking.<br/>
<br/>
Speaking after the rally, Moira Deeming said she was frightened when she first saw the men dressed in black wearing masks because she assumed they were trans activist that were about to attack women. She was however confused that the police appeared calm and didn’t approach the men or initially attempt to remove them.<br/>
<br/>
Deeming said until the men did the Sieg Heil salute there was no outward indication that the men were Nazis, even though they were clearly not associated with the women’s group.<br/>
<br/>
It is interesting to note that Antifa were present to protest the women’s event but at no point objected to the neo-Nazis. The neo-Nazis were dressed in very basic black shorts and T-shirts and black masks and carried a sign that said ‘destroy paedo freaks’ (which is a sign the women’s campaigners would not have carried, obviously).<br/>
<br/>
Many women at the rally, including M?ori woman Michelle Uriarau, Co-Founder of women’s group Mana W?hine Kòreo, said the salute was ‘chilling’. Moira Deeming is also a M?ori woman and was reading out a letter from a Muslim migrant at the rally, she seems an unlikely person to be targeted as a white supremacist by her own party.<br/>
<br/>
The Australian Jewish Association have made comments that the women’s event was ‘crashed’ by far-right extremists, accepting that the women’s event had no association with the unwelcome intruders. The Jewish Association also raised questions as to why the police were unable to keep the men out of the event appearing to have deliberately let them in.<br/>
<br/>
Far-right website XYZ reported that the group of 20 men dressed in black were led by a well-known neo-Nazi. The report called Keen an ‘atheist radical feminist’. She is not a radical feminist, but right-wing men’s group are often too stupid to understand the difference between a grassroots women’s movement and more structured and academic-based radical feminism.<br/>
<br/>
Women’s right’s campaigner Kellie-Jay Keen-Minshull has been no stranger to controversy, cancellation, and police attention since she first commissioned a billboard with the dictionary definition of a woman; ‘Adult Human Female’ in the UK in 2018. The billboard was removed because it was offensive to the transgender community.<br/>
<br/>
Keen and her organisation, Standing for Women, have since become famous for holding outdoor ‘speakers corner’ free speech events for women, that are regularly protested by trans activists. The events are often littered with Keen’s trademark merchandise, her rallies always start with her in brightly coloured outfits singing a short tune, and making bold and now controversial statements like ‘women don’t have penises’, ‘no man has a vagina’, women are ‘adult human females’, and ‘transitioning children is child abuse’.<br/>
<br/>
Keen is a single-issue campaigner and takes a deliberate non-partisan stance, having previously been a supporter of the Labour Party in the UK. Trans activists and some radical feminists have made accusations the Keen is ‘far right adjacent’, in that her events are sometimes attended by far-right groups of men that are never invited to speak and are clearly separate from the, mostly left-leaning women.<br/>
<br/>
Nonetheless Keen has come under criticism within the gender-critical community for not dealing with the right-wing groups with repeated ‘denouncement’. There is no indication that Keen has any far-right sympathies, but she knows enough about social media politics to see that these groups turn up to her events for their own purposes, and as a free speech absolutist she can’t stop them attending.<br/>
<br/>
However, the event on Saturday was long planned and co-ordinated with the Victorian Police, event organisers made public warnings that far-right groups were expected and not welcome. The motivation of the far-right groups can only be speculated, but for my money they attend for their own social media optics, for the clashes with the trans activists, and for the flashpoints that feed the new social media political landscape. It is also extremely convenient for the Andrews government, which has taken gender identity policies to draconian levels, to associate all resistance with Nazis.<br/>
<br/>
I met Keen last week when she was in Brisbane as part of her Australian Let Women Speak tour, she is a tiny, intelligent, and very savvy woman. Keen is friendly and personable, while being understandably guarded. While we chatted, I noticed her glancing at my phone that was sitting on my lap to check if it was recording. She is cautious without being paranoid, political without being partisan, and in possession of sharp operational instincts.<br/>
<br/>
I am absolutely astounded at the stupidity of the Victorian Liberals. As if allowing a dictator like Daniel Andrews take over the state unopposed is not humiliating enough, they seem to be determined to lose at every point. Conservatives around the world who are adopting gender-critical feminist points are seeing some success against the onslaught of gender identity ideology in institutions. In the UK, women have at least maintained sex as a protected category in law, fought off self ID, and secured the right to speak about their issues in public, in their workplace, and in the media. This is more than Australian women currently enjoy.<br/>
<br/>
It is only a matter of time that the self ID laws in Victoria will breed a scandal that we have seen in Scotland, that has seen the downfall of Sturgeon. Trans-identified male rapists are already in women’s prisons in Victoria but the media has so far managed to ignore it in exactly the way the police ignored the fascists entering the rally. This situation can’t be sustained, even with a virtual media blackout on these stories.<br/>
<br/>
A woman wearing an Adult Human Female shirt was attacked in Melbourne by a trans-identified man last year, leaving her disabled. The attack appeared to be motivated by political prejudice and misogyny but doesn’t register as a hate crime in any Victorian law that protects only identity and not sex. The incident was only recently reported in an international feminist publication. Australian media are not fit for purpose.<br/>
<br/>
The systemic corruption in Victoria currently hides the crimes against women of the Andrews government, but when these atrocities come to light, there will be no high ground for the Victorian Liberals to take after they have refused a publicly elected woman of colour the right to political assembly, free association and have smeared her as a Nazi.<br/>
<br/>

<p class="asset asset-link">
	<a href="https://www.spectator.com.au/2023/03/let-women-speak-event-hijacked-clowns-to-the-left-of-moira-nazis-to-the-right">https://www.spectator.com.au/2023/03/let-women-speak-event-hijacked-clowns-to-the-left-of-moira-nazis-to-the-right</a>
</p>
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<br/>
<br/>
<br/>


20 March, 2023
<br/><br/> 

<b> Neo-Nazis performed Hitler salute in front of protestors </b><br/>
<br/>
<i> What a laugh! These were almost certainly Leftists pretending to be Nazis in order to discredit the genuine protesters. The Left have a history of faking hate crimes.  If there is not enough hate around for them, they invent some</i><br/>
<br/>
The shocking moment a gang of far-right thugs marched down a busy Melbourne street performing Hitler salutes has been caught on camera in an ugly weekend for the Victorian capital.<br/>
<br/>
The ugly scenes happened on Saturday when rival protestors clashed in front of Victoria&#39;s State Parliament during a &#39;Let Women Speak&#39; rally in the city.<br/>
<br/>
The footage showed mounted police officers corralling the crowds as they hurled abuse at one another, while cops on the ground formed a human chain to prevent the opposing protestors clashing.<br/>
<br/>
A group of around a dozen black-clad men wearing balaclavas stood in formation while ring-leader Thomas Sewell shouted: ‘Come here you communist f***ots!’<br/>
<br/>
The group, who were flanked by two individuals carrying Australian flags, brandished a sign that said ‘destroy paedo freaks’.<br/>
<br/>
 The men stood is silence with their arms raised in a Heil Hitler salute while the far larger opposition crowd chanted over and over: ‘Unite, unite to fight the right!’<br/>
<br/>
The thugs then walked towards the crowds of protestors who were being held back by police and taunted them while throwing Hitler salutes.<br/>
<br/>
One man, who was wearing a black cap and had his balaclava down around his neck, could be seen smiling and laughing.<br/>
<br/>
Victoria Police were slammed for failing to stop the neo-Nazis from brazenly performing their Heil Hitler salutes.<br/>
<br/>
Police Association of Victoria secretary Wayne Gatt said officers prevented a fight between rival groups but were powerless to stop the actions of the neo-Nazis.<br/>
<br/>
In response, Attorney-General Jaclyn Symes announced on Monday that the state would strengthen its anti-vilification laws to ban the Nazi salute.<br/>
<br/>

<p class="asset asset-link">
	<a href="https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-11879737/Neo-Nazis-throw-Hitler-salutes-trans-protest-outside-Parliament-House-Melbourne-Victoria.html">https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-11879737/Neo-Nazis-throw-Hitler-salutes-trans-protest-outside-Parliament-House-Melbourne-Victoria.html</a>
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<br/>
<b> Rental crisis Qld: Premier ‘seriously considering’ introducing rental price cap</b><br/>
<br/>
<i> A price cap is another word for rent control and rent control always leads to a REDUCTION in housing availability. Is that what the government wants? Queensland had rent control decades back but had to abandon it to ease the shortages it created. That reducing the price reduces the supply is one of the iron laws of economics. No goverment can repeal it. It does however lead to abuses, such as large bonds, &quot;key money&quot; and shorter term rentals. And it is the poor who will suffer from such abuses</i><br/>
<br/>
Annastacia Palaszczuk revealed the state government is “very seriously” considering introducing a price cap on private rentals after a new report laid bare the scale of Queensland’s housing crisis.<br/>
<br/>
The Premier also confirmed the government is in discussions to buy thousands of homes that will lose funding from the winding back of a federal support scheme.<br/>
<br/>
Ms Palaszczuk said she was “very concerned” about the crisis in Queensland after it was revealed 150,000 households were in critical housing stress and the rate of homelessness soared 22 per cent since 2017.<br/>
<br/>
She said sharp increases in rents had squeezed Queensland families, leading to the government considering reforms to cap rental prices which she said will be discussed at the Housing Summit roundtable meeting next week.<br/>
<br/>
“This is a big issue for families,” Ms Palaszczuk said. “They are constantly being faced with huge increases in rent and this is putting a lot of pressure on families.<br/>
<br/>
“We’re looking very seriously at how a rental cap can be put in place.”<br/>
<br/>
Before leaving office, the Morrison government began to wind back the National Rental Affordability Scheme (NRAS) but Ms Palaszczuk said she was in discussions with Treasurer Cameron Dick and Deputy Premier Steven Miles about acquiring those homes to continue support.<br/>
<br/>
“There are over 5000 properties as part of that scheme – Queensland stands ready to purchase those houses,” Ms Palaszczuk said on Monday morning.<br/>
<br/>
“What we do know is that we do need additional support from the federal government and where the federal government is stepping out, we are stepping up.”<br/>
<br/>
Mr Miles said NRAS was a time-limited plan to subsidise rent for 5000 properties with the looming end of the support approaching in the next couple of years.<br/>
<br/>
“So they will go into the general rental market – the only way to avoid that is by stepping in with support of social housing providers and purchasing them, ensuring that they remain within the social housing stock,” the Deputy Premier said.<br/>
<br/>
“We are, as the premier said, discussing with those social housing providers exactly how we can do that.”<br/>
<br/>
St Vincent de Paul Society Queensland chief executive Kevin Mercer said they had resorted to paying people’s car registrations.<br/>
<br/>
“Sometimes the best response we can provide is to pay someone’s car registration so they can live and sleep in it ... to get them through as a temporary solution,” he said.<br/>
<br/>
Mr Mercer said homeless services had been full for a long time.<br/>
<br/>
“The designated specialist homeless services are designed to be short-term accommodation,” he said.<br/>
<br/>
“We’ve got people that have been in our services for 18 months, almost two years, because there’s nowhere for them to go. And we’re not going to put them out on the street.”<br/>
<br/>

<p class="asset asset-link">
	<a href="https://www.couriermail.com.au/news/queensland/qld-politics/rental-crisis-qld-premier-seriously-considering-introducing-rental-price-cap/news-story/da003b64b6ef1a92f2771e98963413e7">https://www.couriermail.com.au/news/queensland/qld-politics/rental-crisis-qld-premier-seriously-considering-introducing-rental-price-cap/news-story/da003b64b6ef1a92f2771e98963413e7</a>
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<br/>
<b> Greenie&#39;s advice to tenants ahead of open homes</b><br/>
<br/>
<i> This is fine in principle. People should be told in advance of problems. But the response it produces might not be so favourable. The outgoing tenant may find himself/herself unacceptable as a future tenant elsewhere, for starters. Landlords normally require a reference from the previous landord</i><br/>
<br/>
A Brisbane councillor has encouraged renters to post notes around a property ahead of open homes warning prospective tenants of its problems.<br/>
<br/>
Greens councillor for the Woolloongabba ward Jonathan Sriranganathan shared one Brisbane tenant’s example originally posted in the Brisbane Renters Alliance Facebook group started by Mr Sriranganathan.<br/>
<br/>
“If you‘re moving out of a rental and your landlord/agent is showing the property to new prospective tenants, consider leaving some notes or posters like this in a few prominent locations around the home,” he wrote.<br/>
<br/>
Attached was a photo of notes detailing the tenant’s issues during their lease such as mould, rats and excessive dust posted as ­soaring rental prices leave at least 150,000 households in critical housing stress.<br/>
<br/>
“Re-occurring (sic) MOULD in Air-con main room & Lounge room,” said one. “CONSTRUCTION SITE Excessive noise from 6am daily (and) RATS,” and “House has excessive DUST from construction site/Train,” said others.<br/>
<br/>
It was intended to alert potential tenants of issues relevant to deciding fair rent for the property that may not be clear during a short inspection.<br/>
<br/>
Mr Sriranganathan argued it was illegal for an agent or landlord to interfere with the signs as they were considered tenant property.<br/>
<br/>
“A landlord‘s right to enter a property to show it to prospective tenants does not give them any rights to interfere with the tenants’ property.”<br/>
<br/>
“It‘s a pretty straightforward legal position and widely accepted that when you rent a property from someone, your landlord doesn’t have the right to come into your house and move stuff around,” he said.<br/>
<br/>
The post had close to 900 comments on Monday morning with some applauding the move as renter solidarity in a housing crisis that favours landlords.<br/>
<br/>
“For far too long Landlords have had free rein to abuse their power with no sort of recording or accountability of their behaviour. I’ve had some wonderful ones and some horrendous ones,” commented Kate Coxall.<br/>
<br/>
“Gotta (sic) love all the cranky landlords in the thread, some quality comments here from the terrible ones just being leeches of society,” said Shannon Felini.<br/>
<br/>
The landlords Ms Felini referred to said Mr Sriranganathan promoted sabotage and warned that this kind of action could face repercussions. “Stop trashing our investment property and moving on to the next house to trash,” said Julie Hands.<br/>
<br/>
“As a Woolloongabba voter, I think it is disgraceful for an elected member to promote sabotage,” commented another.<br/>
<br/>
“If you poke the bear you’re not going to get a new place,” said Glenn Maymann.<br/>
<br/>
Mr Sriranganathan replied to Mr Maymann’s comment to clarify if he was implying he would take revenge on tenants.<br/>
<br/>
“Sounds like you‘re admitting that you would take revenge on tenants by giving them a bad reference simply because they drew attention to legitimate maintenance issues?” queried Mr Sriranganathan.<br/>
<br/>
“What crap Jonno,” responded Mr Maymann. “I’m saying that encouraging your readers to do this will give them little chance of getting another place.”<br/>
<br/>
One landlord threw her support behind the tenant’s notes saying she was “horrified” at what she had seen other landlords doing. “I don‘t blame these tenants at all if this is what they have been putting up with. That said, agents could easily remove and replace these signs,” said Delma Clifton<br/>
<br/>

<p class="asset asset-link">
	<a href="https://www.couriermail.com.au/news/queensland/jonathan-sriranganathans-advice-to-tenants-ahead-of-open-homes/news-story/93bd269bf066f881d9fd338d23c8adcf">https://www.couriermail.com.au/news/queensland/jonathan-sriranganathans-advice-to-tenants-ahead-of-open-homes/news-story/93bd269bf066f881d9fd338d23c8adcf</a>
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<br/>
<b> Arms race: UQ vax version 2.0 ‘puts Brisbane tech up against one of the best’</b><br/>
<br/>
One of the lead scientists behind the University of Queensland’s molecular clamp vaccine technology says it could be as good or better than mRNA vaccines, as it heads into phase I clinical trials.<br/>
<br/>
The vaccine platform uses a small molecule to “clamp” a protein into the same shape as the protein on the surface of a virus, triggering the same immune response from the body.<br/>
<br/>
The first version of the clamp was considered a frontrunner to produce a viable vaccine for COVID-19, but had to be halted when it was found it gave off positive HIV markers in blood tests.<br/>
<br/>
There was no risk of HIV infection to people who had the vaccine, but the potential impact on national screening programs was too great.<br/>
<br/>
Now, after rejigging the clamp, version 2.0 is ready to be put through its paces after doing well in pre-clinical testing.<br/>
<br/>
Project leader, Associate Professor Keith Chappell, said the early results suggested their clamp 2.0 vaccine was just as good as version 1.0 and had advantages over mRNA vaccines.<br/>
<br/>
“Firstly, safety – in our first clinical trial [for version 1.0] we didn’t see any incidences of headaches or fevers or those sorts of responses associated with mRNA vaccines.<br/>
<br/>
“Also transport – it requires simple refrigeration rather than the minus 80 degrees required for some mRNA vaccines.”<br/>
<br/>
Clamp 2.0 will be put through its paces against the TGA-approved Novovax vaccine, which is not an mRNA vaccine, but which Chappell said would provide a good comparison.<br/>
<br/>
“We are recruiting 70 individuals for the trial – half will receive our vaccine and the other half will get the Novovax,” he said.<br/>
<br/>
UQ’s clamp technology has been supported from an early stage by the Coalition for Epidemic Preparedness Innovation (CEPI), which provided $8.5 million for the current round of development. The Queensland and federal governments also contributed funding.<br/>
<br/>
The clinical trial will be run by Nucleus Network, with the company’s chief medical officer Jason Lickliter saying they were also excited by the vaccine’s potential. “It is a great opportunity for Queenslanders to participate in a study of a vaccine that was developed in Queensland,” he said.<br/>
<br/>
“Should there be a future global disease outbreak, this will potentially allow us to respond faster.”<br/>
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<p class="asset asset-link">
	<a href="https://www.brisbanetimes.com.au/national/queensland/arms-race-uq-vax-version-2-0-puts-brisbane-tech-up-against-one-of-the-best-20230317-p5ct0b.html">https://www.brisbanetimes.com.au/national/queensland/arms-race-uq-vax-version-2-0-puts-brisbane-tech-up-against-one-of-the-best-20230317-p5ct0b.html</a>
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<br/>



19 March, 2023
<br/><br/> 

<b> ‘Porn’ comic book off Logan library shelves after conservative lobbyist Bernard Gaynor lodges complaint with police, classification board</b><br/>
<br/>
Logan City Council will review its library policy after complaints were lodged about an allegedly inappropriate comic book which refers to masturbation, gay porn, blow jobs while driving and vagina slime.<br/>
<br/>
Gender Queer: A Memoir, a book which details sexual topics that may affect young people, is aimed at helping them understand their sexuality.<br/>
<br/>
It was taken off Logan City Council library shelves this month following a complaint from conservative political activist Bernard Gaynor.<br/>
<br/>
According to the book’s author Maia Kobabe, Gender Queer: A Memoir, came about after their own experiences searching for answers to questions about nonbinary identities.<br/>
<br/>
“I started questioning these topics when I was like 12, 13 years old, and then didn’t come out as nonbinary until I was 25,” Kobabe said on a podcast with US-based group GLAAD last year.<br/>
<br/>
“Having a book like this, or any book that explored nonbinary identity, would have probably taken 10 years of confusion and uncertainty out of my life,” Kobabe said.<br/>
<br/>
After Mr Gaynor alerted police, QPS referred the book to the Australian Classification Board, which will review the matter and determine what action to take.<br/>
<br/>
Mr Gaynor, who wants the book permanently removed from library shelves, launched a protest outside the council’s Wembley Rd offices.<br/>
<br/>
It is unknown whether all copies have been removed while the council investigation is under way.<br/>
<br/>
Since the initial complaint on March 4, four others books have been targeted.<br/>
<br/>
Logan City councillor Karen Murphy said the council review had already started. “This review will be undertaken with reference to council’s Library Collection Development Policy,” Ms Murphy said online. “This policy is consistent with national public library standards and guidelines.<br/>
<br/>
“Council will make no further comment until the review is completed.”<br/>
<br/>
Mr Gaynor said Logan council should not be loaning out the books to children but he was glad it had been removed from library shelves.<br/>
<br/>
However, he said the council was still keeping Gender Queer and would make it available, upon request, even to children.<br/>
<br/>
“As far as I know, it is the first time this book has been challenged successfully anywhere in Australia,” he said.<br/>
<br/>
“There is a reason these books are written and published and placed on shelves ... in public libraries – none of this is an accident. It happens by design.”<br/>
<br/>
Mr Gaynor said he was determined to see the book banned permanently and said Logan City Council staff had refused to meet with him, telling him there was nothing wrong with Gender Queer.<br/>
<br/>
The classification board, which can censor, restrict or ban content, said it was yet to classify Gender Queer and had not had any requests to do so until recently.<br/>
<br/>

<p class="asset asset-link">
	<a href="https://www.couriermail.com.au/questnews/logan/porn-comic-book-off-logan-library-shelves-after-conservative-lobbyist-bernard-gaynor-lodges-complaint-with-police-classification-board/news-story/8e7dafa221f6752e551ef231697b85b4">https://www.couriermail.com.au/questnews/logan/porn-comic-book-off-logan-library-shelves-after-conservative-lobbyist-bernard-gaynor-lodges-complaint-with-police-classification-board/news-story/8e7dafa221f6752e551ef231697b85b4</a>
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<br/>
<b> MARK LATHAM&#39;S no-nonsense election manifesto that will make sense to millions of struggling Aussies: Go nuclear, supply cheap electricity - and teach schoolkids what REALLY matters</b><br/>
<br/>
We need to return to what worked best: coal and gas-fired power and now, with the advent of Australian nuclear submarines, we also need nuclear electricity generation.<br/>
<br/>
Only dependable, 24/7 baseload power can keep the lights on in NSW and ease the cost of living crisis.<br/>
<br/>
In schools policy, Perrottet and Minns have been just as negligent. The Education Minister, Sarah Mitchell, doesn&#39;t do anything unless the Education Department tells her to.<br/>
<br/>
She is totally captive to unelected bureaucrats - the same people who have given NSW the fastest-falling school academic results in the world.<br/>
<br/>
The Labor policy, under orders from the Teachers Federation, is to convert 10,000 casual teachers to permanent positions.<br/>
<br/>
This won&#39;t add a single teacher to any classroom or school, or address the teacher shortage crisis.<br/>
<br/>
It simply changes the employment classification of existing teachers, many of whom want to stay as casuals because of the workplace flexibility it delivers.<br/>
<br/>
One Nation has a different approach. We would lift the professional standards of teaching plus pay our best teachers more to bring high-achieving school leavers back into the State&#39;s classrooms.<br/>
<br/>
We would also return teaching itself to the evidence base.<br/>
<br/>
It&#39;s hard to believe the NSW Government doesn&#39;t require any classroom to be taught according to the education research.<br/>
<br/>
We know exactly what works and doesn&#39;t work in schools. If we know these things, why doesn&#39;t the Minister require every classroom to teach to the evidence?<br/>
<br/>
That means Direct Instruction, phonics in literacy, strong behavioural standards, lots of testing and data assessment and individual student learning plans.<br/>
<br/>
This is how you reverse the State&#39;s slide down international league tables and lift student results.<br/>
<br/>
It&#39;s not hard to see why the major parties are failing. They have become old, complacent and ineffective.<br/>
<br/>
It&#39;s time for change. It&#39;s time for the &#39;minor parties&#39; to become major ones and force into government policy real solutions to longstanding problems.<br/>
<br/>
In NSW, we need intent, not imagery; solutions, not spin.<br/>
<br/>

<p class="asset asset-link">
	<a href="https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-11865995/One-Nations-Mark-Latham-policies-NSW-election-promising-cheap-electricity-better-schools.html">https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-11865995/One-Nations-Mark-Latham-policies-NSW-election-promising-cheap-electricity-better-schools.html</a>
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<br/>
<b> Subs hypocrisy shows common sense has left the building</b><br/>
<br/>
<i> Australia will have five nuclear reactors sailing around our coastlines but it will remain illegal to build nuclear reactors on the mainland.</i><br/>
<br/>
Over the past year, Germany has reopened 24 coal-fired power stations, China is building more than 100 gigawatts of coal-fired power and the Biden administration just approved a massive expansion of oil drilling in Alaska.<br/>
<br/>
But Australia cannot even contemplate building a coal-fired power station to keep the lights on. It does not make any sense.<br/>
<br/>
And, keeping the lights on might be at the lower end of the risks we face. The Albanese government’s purchase of two (and possibly five) nuclear-powered American submarines received widespread approval, except from the Greens and Paul Keating.<br/>
<br/>
Just a few years ago, it would be impossible to contemplate broad support for nuclear submarines. Opinion has shifted rapidly because of the impending risk of conflict in our region. There remains an alarming gap, however, between the risks of war and what we are doing to prepare our broader economy for such a grim eventuality.<br/>
<br/>
The purchase of submarines is one thing, but we cannot defend Australia without a functioning industrial economy.<br/>
<br/>
Last month, the Australian energy regulator, known as the Australian Energy Market Operator, warned that Australia would be 8 gigawatts short of reliable power over the next decade, which is roughly an amount of power equal to four large coal-fired power stations. Wind and solar cannot fill this gap. We need power options that can be on all the time.<br/>
<br/>
So where is our “nuclear submarine” answer to this impending crisis for our industrial economy?<br/>
<br/>
I suppose one option could be that we park the nuclear submarines in Sydney Harbour and run a long extension cord to the mainland to help. That would at least deliver one-eighth of the power gap from the nuclear reactors on board.<br/>
<br/>
While a joke, this underscores the absurdity of our situation. We are going to permit up to five nuclear reactors to sail around our coastlines, and dock in our harbours, but it would remain illegal to build a nuclear reactor on the mainland. Make it make sense!<br/>
<br/>
We do not have the time to protect sacred cows.<br/>
<br/>
Scott Morrison made a courageous decision to overturn decades of perceived political wisdom on nuclear submarines. He was rewarded for his courage with barely a whimper of political opposition. It is time for the courage of politicians to lift to match the level of the crisis we face.<br/>
<br/>
Instead, we continue to pointlessly fight a climate war almost alone even though we have no chance of winning it on our own. How does it make sense to think that we can trust China to act on climate change while we also spend more than $300bn because we are worried they will start a war in our region?<br/>
<br/>
If we cannot trust China on coronavirus, if we cannot trust them to reduce the risks of conflict, we cannot trust them on climate.<br/>
<br/>
And, if China does not act on climate, all our costly climate policies, which are increasing the cost of living, mean nothing.<br/>
<br/>

<p class="asset asset-link">
	<a href="https://www.couriermail.com.au/news/opinion/opinion-subs-hypocrisy-shows-common-sense-has-left-the-building/news-story/ff849e38676f0c9521d2fbc0e79d0a3a">https://www.couriermail.com.au/news/opinion/opinion-subs-hypocrisy-shows-common-sense-has-left-the-building/news-story/ff849e38676f0c9521d2fbc0e79d0a3a</a>
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<br/>
<b> Super betrayal: it’s not a tax on the rich, it’s a tax on the young</b><br/>
<br/>
Throughout my twenty years as a financial planner, a frequent objection to my strategies is, ‘I don’t trust super’. The proposed new taxes from the Labor government further erodes trust in the Australian superannuation system. And in politicians.<br/>
<br/>
However, despite what the Australian Labor Party want you to believe, and no matter how much they downplay the changes, this great big new tax isn’t tinkering around the edges. It goes to the very heart of our superannuation system and will prevent many Australians from securing a self-funded retirement.<br/>
<br/>
This is because the socialists deliberately did not index the $3 million level where the tax will kick in. So as inflation occurs, the $3 million will have a reducing present value.<br/>
<br/>
Contrast this with the 1 July 2017 introduction of Morrison’s maximum $1.6 million limit which people could place in pension phase. This limit was indexed and will be moving to $1.9 million in July of this year. That’s 18.75 per cent higher in just 6 years; if the same had applied to $3 million, it would now be $3,562,500.<br/>
<br/>
This illustrates how quickly inflation devalues money.<br/>
<br/>
Let’s say you’re 60 now. If inflation averages 5 per cent over the next 7 years, the $3 million will have a present value of $2,132,044. And if, after the RBA has crushed the economy, the inflation rate then drops to 3.0 per cent, by the time a 50-year-old reaches 67, the $3 million limit will be $1,586,441 today’s dollars. For a 40 year old it’ll be $1,180,461.<br/>
<br/>
Sure, still healthy balances, but not astronomically high.<br/>
<br/>
In fact, it is getting very close to the current asset level where a single non-homeowner can start receiving some aged pension – $846,750. And in twenty years’ time, factoring in increases to the pension eligibility levels, it’ll be lower. The government will be taxing people’s superannuation at 30 per cent, whilst giving them pension payments. Classic socialist Labor.<br/>
<br/>
This bastard move from Anthony Albanese and the ALP is very deliberate. They know full well what they are doing; how could they not? The government’s current proposed legislation on the objective of superannuation gives the game away:<br/>
<br/>
They then define adequacy as ‘to support a minimum standard of living in retirement’.<br/>
<br/>
This is what Labor want the super system to be; something that gives you a minimum standard of living. And as a matter of course, if their new tax is legislated, within a few decades they will have achieved their objective. There won’t be fully self-funded retirees, and everyone will be reliant on at least some payment ‘from’ the government.<br/>
<br/>
Whilst ALP politicians try and make this a class war, the only war going on is between the politicians and the people. Albanese and his pension will not be impacted, many public servants on defined benefits won’t either, but average Australians certainly will.<br/>
<br/>
Unfortunately, the lobby group for most of the actual superannuation funds hasn’t even put out a media release on Labor’s proposed new tax, or worked out what the impacts will be. This could be because the majority of member funds are union funds. But the AFSA show their priority by stating any assessment will factor in ‘importantly, the extent to which the associated tax savings will be used to address the gender retirement gap and to boost super balances for low-income earners’. You can see a list of what I believe to be activist super funds here.<br/>
<br/>
To anyone under 50, your chances of a fully self-funded retirement just got significantly more unlikely.<br/>
<br/>

<p class="asset asset-link">
	<a href="https://www.spectator.com.au/2023/03/super-betrayal-its-not-a-tax-on-the-rich-its-a-tax-on-the-young">https://www.spectator.com.au/2023/03/super-betrayal-its-not-a-tax-on-the-rich-its-a-tax-on-the-young</a>
</p>
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<br>
<br/>
17 March, 2023
<br/><br/> 
<b> Native Title cuts Qld beach off from locals</b><br/>
<br/>
<i> This is pretty obnoxious</i><br/>
<br/>
A small strip of land in sleepy Burrum Heads has ignited debate over native title and residents’ access to a public beach, which has sparked warnings from an MP it could lead to “more challenges across the country”.<br/>
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The Butchulla people were granted almost 100ha of native title land on the Fraser Coast in December 2019, including 17ha of which is exclusive use.<br/>
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One small section of this exclusive-use section stretches along a foreshore in front of Burrum Heads residents’ homes and includes a car park which was previously used by people to access the beach.<br/>
<br/>
The car park was recently blocked off with logs, while residents have complained that people are now being chased off this land and feel unsafe crossing the strip to the beach, which remains public.<br/>
<br/>
Police were called to at least one incident which took place on Australia Day, but a Queensland Police Service spokeswoman said it was “verbal in nature” and no offences were found to have been committed.<br/>
<br/>
Griffith Law School associate professor Kate Galloway said while it was understandable the residents may feel disappointed, the law was clear that when an exclusive-use determination was made the native title holders had the property rights.<br/>
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She said it was possible to negotiate a land use agreement with the traditional owners.<br/>
<br/>
The state Resources Department confirmed that access to the land was not permitted without agreement of native title holders and that it was working on the situation with the council and Butchulla Native Title Aboriginal Corporation.<br/>
<br/>
One resident, who declined to be named, said people did not have an issue with the native title being granted, but wanted to access the beach as they had for decades. “People used to walk along the beach, but they’re not game to do it now,” he said.<br/>
<br/>
Hinkler MP Keith Pitt said something needed to be sorted out before the situation escalated further. “This is not a remote piece of land. This is almost 100ha near populated areas used by all Australians for a long period of time and that should be able to continue,” he said.<br/>
<br/>
“I think there’s going to be more of these types of challenges across the country, not less, into the future.”<br/>
<br/>
Prof Galloway said native title was the same as any other property right, and that right had been determined by the court.<br/>
<br/>
“Previously, it appears that the residents have assumed that they hold a substantive right relating to the land. The court now says that they do not have this right,” she said.<br/>
<br/>
“The same situation could occur regardless of the type of property right of the residents’ neighbour, whether it was native title, Crown land, or freehold.”<br/>
<br/>
“It is understandable that residents who believed that they held an access right would feel disappointed by this outcome. However when it is put in perspective, and assuming that they did not in fact have such a right, the outcome is more understandable.”<br/>
<br/>
The Butchulla Native Title Aboriginal Corporation were contacted but declined to comment.<br/>
<br/>

<p class="asset asset-link">
	<a href="https://www.couriermail.com.au/news/queensland/native-title-cuts-qld-beach-off-from-locals/news-story/0b1e0fdcdd59fe823a9dc3c7eec4520b">https://www.couriermail.com.au/news/queensland/native-title-cuts-qld-beach-off-from-locals/news-story/0b1e0fdcdd59fe823a9dc3c7eec4520b</a>
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<br/>
<b> Don’t axe QoVax: A priceless biobank with the answers to long Covid is threatened with destruction</b><br/>
<br/>
Rebecca Weisser<br/>
<br/>
Why has the Queensland health department withdrawn funding for its award-winning QoVax research program studying the safety and efficacy of Covid-19 vaccines?<br/>
<br/>
Only last August, Queensland’s Health Minister, Yvette D’Ath, and the chief operating officer of Queensland Health, Dr David Rosengren, celebrated the work of the QoVax team, led by Professor Janet Davies, which was a highly commended finalist in the Pursuing Innovation category at the 2022 Queensland Health Awards for Excellence.<br/>
<br/>
The prize was no surprise. The program is the creation of 27 highly-skilled researchers, health professionals and administrative service staff with over fifty research, digital, scientific, and clinical skillsets such as laboratory scientists, nurses, solution and enterprise architects, pathologists, molecular and computational biologists, bioinformatician data scientists and infectious disease specialists. They were supported by multiple partners including twelve health service agencies, five universities, and two private pathology services<br/>
<br/>
QoVax was also strongly supported by Queenslanders, rapidly enrolling more than 10,000 participants, both vaccinated and unvaccinated, from 85 per cent of postcodes across the state including communities in regional and Far North Queensland of whom more than 2 per cent identify as Aboriginal and/or Torres Strait Islander.<br/>
<br/>
That level of support didn’t just happen. People from the QoVax team like Josh, an Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander health worker, and Janette, a registered nurse from Cairns, met with elders and First Nation communities in remote locations. They were accompanied by the Royal Flying Doctors Service who transported blood samples back to the laboratory in Cairns for testing.<br/>
<br/>
Countries like Australia and New Zealand were uniquely placed to investigate vaccine efficacy because their diverse population was, until late in the pandemic, relatively free of the Covid-19 virus. Full marks to Queensland, and Professor Davies, for seizing the initiative. She was conscious from the outset that the Covid vaccine rollout was the largest coordinated vaccination program that had ever been undertaken and she wanted to record and evaluate the experience of Queenslanders.<br/>
<br/>
The QoVax team didn’t just collect the standard data. Participants provided information on environmental and social determinants of health and biospecimens of blood and saliva that have been used to derive genomic, transcriptomic and proteomic datasets that will shed light on how the novel vaccines impact the immune system.<br/>
<br/>
The secure digitally integrated biobank has 120,000 biospecimens: serum, saliva and peripheral blood mononuclear cells, in three -80 degrees Celsius freezers and three liquid nitrogen dewars. The linked data repository has four million linked data points and more than 500 whole genomes.<br/>
<br/>
In addition, the biobank has access to real-time electronic medical records. With 70 per cent of hospitals in Queensland storing medical records electronically, the study was intended to allow long-term digital surveillance of health outcomes related to Covid-19 vaccinations, and intersections between vaccine responses and Sars-CoV-2 infection.<br/>
<br/>
Studying immune responses is a vital part of assessing vaccines and Davies’ work is consistent with similar studies completed on other vaccines but her research is particularly important because two new vaccine delivery platforms were used – modified messenger RNA and viral vector DNA. The multiomic datasets that her team has collected will be critical to deciphering the impact of these platforms on the DNA, RNA and proteins synthesis of the human immune system. This is particularly important because the original trials of these vaccines were meant to last two years but the placebo group was vaccinated after only two months. As a result, there is a shortage of rigorous data adding even more importance to Davies’ research which includes an unvaccinated cohort. The information will allow researchers not just to better understand how the vaccines work but why vaccinated or unvaccinated people get repeat infections, long Covid, severe Covid or indeed die of Covid.<br/>
<br/>
The study and the biobank have enormous international significance. The main comparable study is the UK Biobank but that country had very different early experience with high Covid caseloads prior to the rollout of vaccines.<br/>
<br/>
Already the QoVax team has presented early findings at five conferences. The team was working on next steps to make the QoVax biobank and data repository accessible. The process had begun to scope and develop a user interface through collaborative workshops with researchers and health professionals across Australia.<br/>
<br/>
Yet instead of answering vital questions about why Australia, one of the most highly vaccinated countries in the world, has such high excess mortality, and so many cases of long Covid in vaccinated people, Professor Davies is being forced to close down the QoVax program and sack her staff.<br/>
<br/>
Worse still, the biobank, which should be a resource for the world, is threatened with destruction. Its precious resources will be destroyed in twelve months to save a trivial sum of money. The whole project has cost only $20 million.<br/>
<br/>
Australia usually punches above its weight in medical research with eight Nobel prizes for physiology and medicine. Unfortunately, it also has a reputation for treating its scientists with contempt. Nobel laureates Barry Marshall and Robin Warren were ostracised in Australia for several decades after their amazing discovery of the bacterium Helicobacter pylori and its role in gastritis and peptic ulcer disease by a ‘gastric mafia’, an entrenched coterie of established scientists who refused to accept their findings because the therapeutic implications dented their vested interests.<br/>
<br/>
The value of this data collected by QoVax is incalculable. It is a national scandal that it is not properly resourced. Every Queenslander involved in the project needs to speak up, as does every vaccinated person who has suffered from long Covid, or repeated Covid infections, or has been hospitalised with Covid, as well as every person that has suffered a vaccine injury or death and every person subjected to a vaccine mandate (when the vaccines did not stop transmission of the virus).<br/>
<br/>
All Australians deserve answers to the questions these vaccines have raised. The best chance at finding those answers lies in the samples stored in the QoVax biobank. Brainless bean counters and bureaucrats and those with a vested interest in not answering those questions must not be allowed to destroy it.<br/>
<br/>

<p class="asset asset-link">
	<a href="https://www.spectator.com.au/2023/03/dont-axe-qovax/">https://www.spectator.com.au/2023/03/dont-axe-qovax/</a>
</p>
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<br/>

<br>
<b> Australia has already achieved net zero. What climate crisis?</b><br/>

<br>
Australia has more than reached net zero emissions, and we are in surplus, argues the nation’s leading climate scientist.<br/>
<br/>
So why is the Albanese government pouring billions into going even further with this agenda, and in the process wrecking lives by replacing one of the cheapest and most reliable electricity systems in the world with one of the most expensive and least reliable?<br/>
<br/>
And with a leading Scandinavian car ferry line banning electric cars for safety reasons, why is the NSW Liberal National party government pushing apartment buildings into making it easier to charge EV’s when it should be banning such dangerous death traps from all car parks?<br/>
<br/>
Fortunately, there are those who stand out against this. Prominent among these is the nation’s best-known geologist, the highly credentialled Professor Emeritus Ian Plimer.<br/>
<br/>
Notwithstanding the frequent calls by politicians to ‘follow the science’, few consult or even read Plimer just as few media outlets publish or broadcast him.<br/>
<br/>
However, he recently gave an extended interview, ‘What climate crisis?’, available free on demand on ADH TV<br/>
<br/>
Plimer challenges the elites’ determination to move to net-zero emissions. Even if the discredited global warming theory were true, he says net zero is unnecessary for Australia.<br/>
<br/>
He has come to the startling conclusion that Australia has already achieved net zero. He explains that when we burn coal and petroleum products and release CO2 into the atmosphere, this is sequestered into grasslands, crops and forests and dissolved in the coastal sea.<br/>
<br/>
Incidentally, never fall for yet another linguistic trick from the Orwellian Minitruth, the Ministry of Truth, and call CO2 ‘carbon’. That’s done to suggest something unclean. Similarly, for reasons explained previously, never ever use ‘gender’ when you mean ‘sex’.<br/>
<br/>
Returning to the sequestration of CO2, this occurs during photosynthesis, the process by which a plant uses CO2 from the air and water with energy from the light of the sun to produce its own food and what we need, oxygen.<br/>
<br/>
Now, unlike politicians, plants do not distinguish between the 3 per cent of CO2 which is man-made and the rest. To a plant, it’s all food and not a pollutant, the silliest claim the elites could make .<br/>
<br/>
Since Australia is lucky enough to be a continent with very few people, says Plimer, we absorb far more CO2 than we need.<br/>
<br/>
Far from net zero, we are in a massive surplus, absorbing ten times our CO2 emissions. To achieve what we already have, our politicians are wasting billions and billions.<br/>
<br/>
Plimer argues we should become the centre of every CO2 emitting industry in the world. After all, if a politician is under the delusion that CO2 is a pollutant and that it’s going to change the climate, he or she should campaign to locate heavy industry, smelting, metal manufacturing, in Australia.<br/>
<br/>
Plimer’s thinking is impeccable. Why is he being silenced? Why don’t the global warmists try to prove this eminent scientist wrong? Is it because they cannot?<br/>
<br/>
Asked what he would do if he were in power, he says he would stop subsidies and get rid of ‘foolish policies’ that as soon as you have electricity from wind or the sun, coal-fired power stations are to be blown up.<br/>
<br/>
Rejecting claims about fossil fuel, he’d repeal legislation banning nuclear energy. Wholesale electricity contracts would be for the life of a nuclear power station, 80 or 100 years, to protect investors from politicians trying to stop them from providing cheap and reliable electricity ‘24/7, 365 days a year’.<br/>
<br/>
Professor Plimer is right. What climate crisis indeed?<br/>
<br/>

<p class="asset asset-link">
	<a href="https://www.spectator.com.au/2023/03/australia-has-already-achieved-net-zero/">https://www.spectator.com.au/2023/03/australia-has-already-achieved-net-zero/</a>
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<br/>
<b> Qld youth justice laws pass amid heated debate in Parliament</b><br/>
<br/>
<i> Better than nothing</i><br/>
<br/>
Queensland’s new youth justice laws aimed at boosting community safety in the wake of the teen crime crisis have passed after days of heated debate.<br/>
<br/>
The new laws, announced by Premier Annastacia Palaszczuk following the tragic death of Moreton Bay mother Emma Lovell, have been criticised by some advocates as not going far enough, while others condemned them as a knee-jerk reaction that will see vulnerable kids end up in jail.<br/>
<br/>
Legislative changes included breach of bail being applied to children, increasing the maximum penalty for stealing a car from seven to 10 years, plus a more severe penalty of 14 years if the offence is committed at night or involves violence.<br/>
<br/>
However, restrictions to maximum allowed penalties for juveniles mean it would be unlikely children would ever receive such a jail term – a point seized on by the LNP.<br/>
<br/>
It also included increased penalties for criminals who boast about their crimes on social media, and amendments to the Youth Justice Act requiring courts to take into account previous bail history and criminal activity.<br/>
<br/>
This week the Premier also announced a review into the assistance offered to victims of crime following a push by Labor MP Jonty Bush.<br/>
<br/>
Despite voting in support of the laws, the LNP said immediately afterwards the measures would have little impact on the youth crime crisis.<br/>
<br/>
“The most significant measure to make it through this week was the one thing that the Palaszczuk Labor Government fought against for two years – breach of bail,” LNP police spokesman Dale Last said.<br/>
<br/>
“The LNP’s breach of bail policy has been adopted word for word by the Palaszczuk Labor Government and (Thursday) became law.<br/>
<br/>
“It is the firm view of the LNP Opposition that detention as a last resort must be removed from the Youth Justice Act, to work hand-in-hand with breach of bail. The Palaszczuk Labor Government chose not to support that in Parliament.”<br/>
<br/>
Key stakeholders and advocates had also been critical of the process, arguing there was not enough time for submissions and public consultation.<br/>
<br/>
Police Minister Mark Ryan has defended the state’s new justice measures, saying increasing the seriousness of a crime – like stealing a car at night – would mean the young offender could dealt with in the District Court rather than the Magistrates’ Court, meaning the sentence imposed would be higher.<br/>
<br/>
Since Ms Palaszczuk made the December announcement, other deaths allegedly at the hands of youths have shocked Queenslanders.<br/>
<br/>
Toowoomba pensioner Robert Brown, 75, died after being allegedly attacked by four teens while waiting for a taxi at the city’s Grand Central Shopping Centre, while Uber driver Scott Cabrie was allegedly killed by his teenage passengers on the Fraser Coast during an attempted robbery.<br/>
<br/>
The state government had conceded its new youth crime measures were a breach of human rights, but had pushed through with the laws by overriding protections.<br/>
<br/>
Greens MP Michael Berkman, in a fiery spray against the government on Thursday, said Labor had “started a race to the bottom they cannot win” as he slammed them for “copying” the LNP’s homework.<br/>
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16 March, 2023
<br/><br/> 


<b> The Keating speech on submarines</b><br/>
<br/>
<i> I rarely agree with the old slimebucket but I think he is the only one talking sense on the submarine deal. We are no threat to China and China is no threat to us. We are too far apart geographically. So why are we spending billions to make ourself a threat to China? By all means buy defence weaponry but that is drones these days, not submarines. We should leave the fight over Taiwan to Taiwan and the USA. Our help would be minor anyway<br/>
<br/>
I am putting the speech up in full below as it makes many good points and for the same reason I am putting up nothing else on this blog today. I don&#39;t agree with all his flourishes but I think he has got the basics right</i><br/>
<br/>
The Albanese Government’s complicity in joining with Britain and the United States in a tripartite build of a nuclear submarine for Australia under the AUKUS arrangements represents the worst international decision by an Australian Labor government since the former Labor leader, Billy Hughes, sought to introduce conscription to augment Australian forces in World War One.<br/>
<br/>
Every Labor Party branch member will wince when they realise that the party we all fight for is returning to our former colonial master, Britain, to find our security in Asia – two hundred and thirty-six years after Europeans first grabbed the continent from its Indigenous people.<br/>
<br/>
That of all things, a contemporary Labor government is shunning security in Asia for security in and within the Anglosphere.<br/>
<br/>
And in an arrangement concocted on the English coast at Cornwall by Scott Morrison, Boris Johnson – one of the great vulgarians of our time – and Joe Biden, Australia is locking in its next half century in Asia as subordinate to the United States, an Atlantic power.<br/>
<br/>
We have been here before: Australia’s international interests subsumed by those of our allies. Defence policy substituting for foreign policy. But this time it is a Labor government lining us up.<br/>
<br/>
Anthony Albanese’s government has picked up and has taken ownership of the strategic architecture of the Morrison government – but taken it up in full and with unprecedented gusto.<br/>
<br/>
The Morrison government, at great cost, walked away from the French submarine and approached the United States, for Australia to join its nuclear submarine program.<br/>
<br/>
And because Boris Johnson succeeded in dynamiting Britain out of Europe with Brexit, Britain is trawling the world trying to stitch up the new ‘Global Britain’. And guess what? They believe they have turned up a bunch of naïve old comrades in Australia, an accommodating Prime Minister, a conservative defence minister and a risk-averse foreign minister – and all surrounded by a neo-con bureaucracy.<br/>
<br/>
Yet, we approached the United States – not the other way around, on the arguments put to Morrison by the security agencies led by Andrew Shearer and ASPI and as it turns out, without even reference to the Department of Foreign Affairs or its minister. Rather, and remarkably, a Labor government has picked up Shearer’s neo-con proclivities and those of ASPI, a pro-US cell led by a recent former chief of staff to Liberal foreign minister Marise Payne.<br/>
<br/>
And that approach was to have the United States supply nuclear submarines for deep and joint operations against China.<br/>
<br/>
And how did this come to be? And by a Labor government?<br/>
<br/>
The answer lies in Anthony Albanese’s reliance on two seriously unwise ministers, Penny Wong and Richard Marles. Penny Wong took a decision in 2016, five years before AUKUS, not to be at odds with the Coalition on foreign policy on any core issue. You cannot get into controversy as the foreign spokesperson for the Labor Party if you adopt the foreign policy of the Liberal Party – if you are on a unity ticket to deny the Liberals any wedge on foreign policy and defence.<br/>
<br/>
You may stay out of trouble, but you are compromised. Self-compromised.<br/>
<br/>
The cost was that Labor entered a policy depression on Asia – a bit like a low weather trough but in foreign policy. This trough – all five years of it – had Penny Wong and Labor on a unity ticket with Julie Bishop and Marise Payne – a unity ticket which supported the United States dominating East Asia – but not as the balancing power to all the other states, including China, but as the primary strategic power – notwithstanding that the United States was a country not resident in the metropolitan zone of Asia but on a continent of its own, 10,000 kilometres away – the other side of the world.<br/>
<br/>
It was into this policy void, this twilight zone, that Scott Morrison summoned Anthony Albanese, Penny Wong and Richard Marles to unveil his secretly negotiated AUKUS agreement.<br/>
<br/>
In the afternoon of Wednesday 20 September 2021, Morrison gave Labor a confidential briefing on dumping the French submarine to take up the US Virginia class boat and less than 24 hours later Labor adopted the policy unqualifiedly.<br/>
<br/>
Anthony Albanese told Michael Fullilove at the Lowy Institute on 4 March this year – ‘I’m proud of what we did in less than 24 hours’. The Prime Minister thought a gigantic shift of this kind deserved less than twenty-four hours’ analysis, – notwithstanding the huge implications for sovereignty, for the budget, for manufacturing and relations with the region – and of course, with China. The Prime Minister is proud to buy submarines that will forever remain within the operational remit of the United States or now, of Britain – with technology owned and dependent on US management – in fact, buying a fleet of nuclear submarines which will forever be an adjunct to the navy of the United States – whether commanded by an Australian national or not.<br/>
<br/>
And just dropping the word ‘sovereignty’ into every sentence like a magic talisman does not make it real.<br/>
<br/>
From a clear sovereignty capable of execution by Australia over a French conventionally powered submarine to sovereignty suborned to the whim and caprice of a US administration – that’s where we are now.<br/>
<br/>
More than that, Morrison said his government would reserve twenty months to consider the enormity of the issues. So Labor had the same twenty months of leeway available to it. It could have spent twenty months trawling through the plethora of issues and then announced a considered decision. And, of course, a big one.<br/>
<br/>
But instead, Labor’s valiant three fell immediately into line – they would join the neo-cons in the Office of National Intelligence, ASPI, the country’s principal US apologist, the security agencies and the hapless Defence department. And Morrison, the Member for Cook.<br/>
<br/>
And in the meantime, no White Paper, no major ministerial or Prime Ministerial statement to explain to the Australian people what exactly is the threat we are supposedly facing and why nuclear submarines costing more than any national project since Federation were the best way to respond to such a threat.<br/>
<br/>
And you can understand why. Penny Wong had spent five years rustling not a leaf – and was not about to start. There was to be no khaki election for her. Marles, though well-intentioned, completely captured by the idea of America, couldn’t wait to join the pile on.<br/>
<br/>
And the then Opposition leader not ever having displayed any deep or long-term interest in foreign affairs, fell in with Wong and Marles as leader of the great misadventure.<br/>
<br/>
And the Prime Minister tells us, this is something to be proud of.<br/>
<br/>
As someone who has had a share of big issues and over a long time, I can only regard these fateful events, the overnight conversion, as a lack of perceptive capacity in understanding the scale and weight of the issues at hand or more than that, a benign disregard of responsibility. Or both.<br/>
<br/>
Signing the country up to the foreign proclivities of another country – the United States, with the gormless Brits, in their desperate search for relevance, lunging along behind is not a pretty sight.<br/>
<br/>
The result is that through AUKUS, Australia is providing expensive support to the UK and US defence companies. At yesterday’s kabuki show in San Diego, there were three people but only one payer. The Australian Prime Minister. The US President and the UK Prime Minister could barely conceal their joy with A$368 billion heading the way to their defence companies – in the UK, BAE Systems, in the US its east coast submarine shipyards. No wonder they were smiling, and the band was playing.<br/>
<br/>
But through the policy fog, informed American congressional figures soon realised that the provision of eight Virginia class nuclear submarines would seriously disrupt the US shipyard supply program to the US Navy.<br/>
<br/>
So, conversations and ideas then turned to perhaps the UK building a tripartite-designed submarine for Australia and the United Kingdom itself, instead of one supplied out of the east coast yards of the United States.<br/>
<br/>
The US would remain in the so-called AUKUS, not because it was building submarines for Australia but because it would forever own the nuclear propulsion technology and the fire control systems of any built elsewhere.<br/>
<br/>
So Britain, which removed its battle fleet from East Asia in 1904, surrendered its citadel in Singapore in 1942, adopted its East of Suez policy in 1968, formally walking out on strategic obligations to Australia, New Zealand, Singapore and Malaysia with its FPDA, the so-called Five Power Defence Agreement – finally dumping us in 1973 following its grand entry into the European Common Market, is now to be rewarded in its long contempt of us by having us fork out for the design of Britain’s next Astute class submarine.<br/>
<br/>
That is, we subsidise the design of the next British attack class Astute submarine simply to be able to grab half a dozen for ourselves on the way through.<br/>
<br/>
We find this week, that that grand bargain has been struck.<br/>
<br/>
Australia will buy six to eight nuclear powered submarines. But to deal with the capability gap, the United States will agree to supply between three and five aged Virginia class subs to Australia in the meantime. That is, ahead of any newly designed Astute class boats being delivered to the Australian Navy.<br/>
<br/>
Designed to attack in China’s peripheral waters, it is in these waters where China is most advantaged, where its anti-submarine platforms and sensors are most concentrated. And no Australian nuclear submarine could have more than a token military impact against China, using as is planned, conventional weaponry.<br/>
<br/>
In short, a plan to spend around $368 billion, for nuclear submarines to conduct operations against China in the most risky of conditions, is of little military benefit to anybody, even to the Americans.<br/>
<br/>
The marginal benefit to Australia’s own defences is minimal while the cost is maximal – indeed, off the scale. The proposal is irrational in every dimension. And an affront to public administration.<br/>
<br/>
Imagine the complexity of the deal? Participating in the manufacture of a new Astute class boat to be built at Barrow-in-Furness in Britain while porting half a dozen ex-US Virginia class boats in and around Australia and crewing them.<br/>
<br/>
But all this leads into the bigger point. That is, that the United States does not see itself as the ’balancing power’ in East Asia but the ’primary strategic power’. Its geostrategic priority is to contain China militarily and economically.<br/>
<br/>
China does not present and cannot present as an orthodox threat to the United States. By orthodox, I mean an invasive threat. The United States is protected by two vast oceans, with friendly neighbours north and south, in Canada and Mexico.<br/>
<br/>
And the United States possesses the greatest arsenal in all human history. There is no way the Chinese have ever intended to attack the United States and it is not capable of doing so even had it contemplated it. So, why does the United States and its Congress insist that China is a ‘threat’?<br/>
<br/>
The US Defence department’s own annual report to Congress in late 2022 said ‘the PRC aims to restrict the United States from having a presence on China’s periphery’.<br/>
<br/>
In other words, China aims to keep US navy ships off its coast. Shocking.<br/>
<br/>
Imagine how the US would react if China’s blue water navy did its sightseeing off the coast of California. The US would be in a state of apoplexy.<br/>
<br/>
The fact is China is not an outrider. It is part of the international system. It is a member of the WTO, the IMF, the World Bank, the WTO, the G20 and APEC. And has been happy to be.<br/>
<br/>
It has adopted and has a vested interest in globalisation – its President Xi Jinping proselytised for this at Davos six years ago.<br/>
<br/>
China is a world trading state – it is not about upending the international system.<br/>
<br/>
It is not the old Soviet Union. It is not seeking to propagate some competing international ideology.<br/>
<br/>
If you were a sensible American, of the likes of Kissinger or of a Brzezinski, you would celebrate the fact that you had turned up a co-stabilising power in Asia – China. A power with which you could manage both great oceans – the Atlantic and the Pacific.<br/>
<br/>
But no. China is to be circumscribed. It has committed the mortal sin, the high sin in internationalism – it has grown as large as the United States.<br/>
<br/>
Nowhere in the American playbook is there provision for this affront to be explained<br/>
<br/>
or condoned. For the exceptional State to be co-partnered, let alone challenged.<br/>
<br/>
The 1.4 billion of those Chinese, should keep their place – even if their place is safely land and water locked.<br/>
<br/>
And should they not keep their place we, the United States, will shut them in – contain them – and with the complicity of a reliable bunch of deputy sheriffs, Japan, Korea, Australia and India.<br/>
<br/>
But this week, China’s new Foreign Minister Qin Gang said the United States is heading for ’conflict and confrontation’ with Beijing – accusing America of engaging in ‘suppression and containment’.<br/>
<br/>
And Qin would not have said this without President Xi’s express agreement.<br/>
<br/>
President Xi later himself said that the United States and Western countries led by the United States ‘have implemented all-round containment, containment and suppression on our country’.<br/>
<br/>
This is not the China Daily saying this, or the Global Times in Beijing, this is the President himself. In other words, the rhetoric from the Chinese side, now they have worked out what the US game plan really is, is now sharper and more assertive.<br/>
<br/>
So, the ball game has begun.<br/>
<br/>
Nominally for the United States, over the future of Taiwan, but really in service of its underlying imperialism.<br/>
<br/>
Taiwan, a territory which became a so-called ’democracy’ as late as 1996.<br/>
<br/>
And for this matter to be resolved in the favour of the United States, we are enjoined in Australia by the Hartchers and Jenningses of this world to step up to World War Three.<br/>
<br/>
Indeed, two of our major dailies, the Sydney Morning Herald and the Age, have for five years now, argued the notion of war against China. Or readiness for war.<br/>
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I said at the Press Club in November 2021 that Taiwan is not a vital Australian interest. And it remains not a vital Australian interest.<br/>
<br/>
A vital Australian interest would, for instance, be an invasive attack on Tasmania – that would constitute a vital interest for Australia – but Taiwan, a territory we have never recognised as a State – should not be commensurably considered.<br/>
<br/>
I dare the Prime Minister to explicitly suggest or leave open the question Australia might go to war over Taiwan – at the urgings of the United States or anyone else.<br/>
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Before the Prime Minister attended the G20 in Indonesia ahead of his inaugural meeting with Xi Jinping I had an hour’s conversation with him at Kirribilli.<br/>
<br/>
Generally, I have found the Prime Minister responsive to calls, texts and email.<br/>
<br/>
But on 2 February 2023, I emailed a long paper to the Prime Minister arguing that the first responsibility of a government to its community was the untrammelled maintenance of sovereignty – the right to make the right choices for your own country. I received no reply to this correspondence.<br/>
<br/>
More recently, on 21 February, I spoke to a member of the Prime Minister’s staff inviting the Prime Minister into a conversation with me ahead of any meeting with the US President and particularly in respect of AUKUS and the submarines. The message was delivered but I heard nothing from the Prime Minister.<br/>
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So, it is not that anything I say today could not first have been put to the Prime Minister. The fact is, he did not wish to hear the message or have the conversation.<br/>
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I don’t think I suffer from relevance deprivation, but I do suffer concern for Australia as it most unwisely proceeds down this singular and dangerous path.<br/>
<br/>
Unambiguously, unqualifiedly and solely arraigning itself with an Atlantic power which upon any defeat or setback will see that power likely repair to California and with alacrity – ten thousand kilometres across the moat of the Pacific, as it retreated from Iraq and Afghanistan, leaving the scarified locals to deal with the destruction and chaos.<br/>
<br/>
Labor has invariably got the big international ones right.<br/>
<br/>
The Party knocked over Hughes when he sought to conscript young men to serve in Belgium in World War One.<br/>
<br/>
Curtin knocked over Churchill when Churchill sought to ship our troops from Tobruk to Burma. In a clear exercise of sovereignty, Curtin brought the troops home to defeat the Japanese marines in Kokoda and Milne Bay.<br/>
<br/>
Arthur Calwell valiantly, and correctly, opposed Australian military participation in the war in Vietnam – a national disaster for us and especially for the Americans.<br/>
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Simon Crean, as leader, firmly opposed Howard’s commitment to Iraq – a commitment which led to tragic consequences for the Iraqi people and ourselves, and again, for the Americans – friends, we again failed to properly warn as to the folly of their adventurism.<br/>
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This one, AUKUS, is where Labor breaks its winning streak of now over a century.<br/>
<br/>
Falling into a major mistake, Anthony Albanese, befuddled by his own small target election strategy, emerges as Prime Minister with an American sword to rattle at the neighbourhood to impress upon it the United States’s esteemed view of its untrammelled destiny.<br/>
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Naturally, I should prefer to be singing the praises of the government in all matters but these issues carry deadly consequences for Australia and I believe, it is incumbent on any former Prime Minister, particularly now, a Labor one, to alert the country to the dangerous and unnecessary journey on which the government is now embarking.<br/>
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This week, Anthony Albanese screwed into place the last shackle in the long chain the United States has laid out to contain China.<br/>
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No mealy-mouthed talk of ‘stabilisation’ in our China relationship or resort to softer or polite language will disguise from the Chinese the extent and intent of our commitment to United States’s strategic hegemony in East Asia with all its deadly portents.<br/>
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History will be the judge of this project in the end. But I want my name clearly recorded among those who say it is a mistake. Who believe that, despite its enormous cost, it does not offer a solution to the challenge of great power competition in the region or to the security of the Australian people and its continent.<br/>
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15 March, 2023
<br/><br/> 

<b> Did the ivermectin ban cost lives?</b><br/>
<br/>
It appears that we live in a reality where doctors are censored and early treatments such as ivermectin are banned, apparently to ensure public confidence in the government’s vaccine rollout is not undermined.<br/>
<br/>
AHPRA and National Boards threatened doctors with regulatory action on March 9, 2021 if they made any statements that ‘undermined public confidence in the vaccination rollout’. The TGA also banned ivermectin’s use for the prevention or treatment of Covid in September 2021 because, according to the TGA, if people had access to it they may not get vaccinated. Are we seeing a trend?<br/>
<br/>
In whose interests are decisions really being made? Ivermectin is safe, cheap, fully approved, and has been shown effective in the prevention and treatment of Covid, as will be demonstrated. As repeatedly outlined in Senate estimates by Martin Fletcher, CEO of AHPRA, doctors can use their clinical judgment and the best available evidence to treat their patients – except they can’t in this country because of excessive government overreach. These decisions do not seem to make any medical sense, let alone resemble public protection. Is it possible that the TGA, being 96 per cent funded by the pharmaceutical industry, is influencing restrictions and approvals? Some in the medical industry have asked the question now, and in the past, including a ‘scathing review’ from the BMJ in July of 2022. The TGA has always maintained that their decisions are made independent of financial attachment. Even so, a Goldman Sachs analyst suggested in a 2018 report, ‘Is curing patients a sustainable business model? These questions arise when trying to explain the banning of ivermectin as a safe, Nobel prize-winning, WHO essential medicine which showed a strong signal of benefit, under the banner of sudden safety concerns.<br/>
<br/>
What the TGA does is to cite safety and a lack of evidence against ivermectin, and then instead it goes in favour of vaccines only provisionally-approved, novel, poorly tested, and lacking in safety data. These are vaccines that in reality don’t work well and at the same time have the highest rate of adverse events of any therapeutic ever prescribed, according to government information outlets, both in Australia and overseas.<br/>
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On September 10, 2021, a delegate of the Secretary of the Department of Health considered the advice provided by the Advisory Committee on Medicines Scheduling (ACMS) and made the decision to amend the Poisons Standard by creating a new Appendix D listing for ivermectin, and thus eliminated its use as an off-label treatment option for Covid. This occurred with reference to subsection 52E(1) of the Therapeutic Goods Act 1989, in particular paragraph (f), which empowers the Secretary to act on any other matters that the Secretary considers necessary to protect public health.<br/>
<br/>
The Australian Medical Professionals’ Society made a public submission to the TGA Consultation on September 29, 2022 arguing that the Poison Scheduling for ivermectin was inappropriate, not evidence-based, and not in the best interests of medicine in Australia. Our submission reviewed extensive evidence showing ivermectin use was associated with statistically significant reductions in mortality, time to clinical recovery, and time to viral clearance for Covid. It can be argued and indeed it is, in fact, being argued here that denying Australians access to ivermectin poses a threat to public health and the secretary’s other matters were not used appropriately to protect the public.<br/>
<br/>
The TGA on February 3, 2023 following a review of multiple extensively-referenced submissions decided not to amend the current Poisons Standard in relation to ivermectin, ‘for your safety’, of course. This decision continues the ban on doctors’ ability to prescribe ivermectin either in isolation or as part of a multi-drug protocol for the prevention or treatment of Covid.<br/>
<br/>
In our opinion, from a scientific and medical perspective the TGA approval decisions surrounding ivermectin make no sense. The TGA banned a cheap, safe fully approved repurposed medicine that showed great promise for the prevention and treatment of Covid with 95 clinical trials worldwide. It was banned in favour of promoting a provisionally-approved (experimental) novel genetic lipid nanoparticle synthetic mRNA vaccine that was never tested for transmission, and had poor efficacy of unknown duration with what amounts to limited reliable safety data, according to the TGA’s own reports. Ivermectin efficacy has been tested in more than 90 clinical trials including more than 100,000 patients while the Advisory Committee on Vaccines (ACV) recommended Pfizer be approved on data from one study with the FDA issuing the EUA on efficacy data of 170 patients.<br/>
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The risk versus benefit analysis by the TGA claims first that ivermectin safety is an issue, and secondly that the efficacy evidence base for use in Covid is not well established. Our AMPS submission addressed these two reasons for denying Australians access to ivermectin for the treatment of Covid.<br/>
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AMPS showed ivermectin has a well-established safety record – ‘more than 3.7 billion doses of ivermectin have been administered to humans worldwide since the 1980s’. The TGA’s 2013 AusPar Report for ivermectin stated, ‘No significant safety concerns were found with the use of ivermectin.’ Very importantly, the report found no safety concerns even at 10 times the (then) current approved dose of 200ug/kg. The U.S. National Institute of Health (NIH) has recognised that ‘ivermectin has been widely used and is generally well tolerated’.<br/>
<br/>
A recent systematic review stated ‘ivermectin at the usual doses is considered extremely safe for use in humans’. In 2018, ivermectin was added to the WHO list of Essential Medicines, and in supporting the submission for inclusion in the list, the WHO concluded that the adverse events associated with ivermectin are ‘primarily minor and transient’. The clinical evaluator in the WHO Report found that there were no significant safety concerns or serious adverse events reported with the use of ivermectin.<br/>
<br/>
Ivermectin is one of the safest medications on the planet. Why, then, in 2021 the TGA decided ivermectin was all of a sudden unsafe is perplexing. Coincidentally, ivermectin was banned just as the government was about to start implementing vaccine mandates. Correlation doesn’t equal causation…<br/>
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In response to claims by the TGA that there is not enough evidence of ivermectin effectiveness in Covid our submission detailed extensive evidence of efficacy. A comprehensive systematic review summarises the antiviral effects of ivermectin, including in vitro and in vivo studies over the past 50 years. Another paper titled, Ivermectin: an award-winning drug with expected antiviral activity against Covid put forward that ivermectin, an FDA-approved broad-spectrum antiparasitic agent, had demonstrated antiviral activity against a number of DNA and RNA viruses, including severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2). As well as ivermectin’s antiviral benefits there is also research literature that outlines its recognised ‘anti-inflammatory capacity’.<br/>
<br/>
Further, a review titled Emerging Evidence Demonstrating the Efficacy of Ivermectin in the Prophylaxis and Treatment of Covid concluded:<br/>
<br/>
Meta-analyses based on 18 randomised controlled treatment trials of ivermectin in Covid have found large, statistically significant reductions in mortality, time to clinical recovery, and time to viral clearance. Furthermore, results from numerous controlled prophylaxis trials report significantly reduced risks of contracting Covid with the regular use of ivermectin. Finally, the many examples of ivermectin distribution campaigns leading to rapid population-wide decreases in morbidity and mortality indicate that an oral agent effective in all phases of Covid has been identified.<br/>
<br/>
Additionally, an online real-time meta-analysis of the clinical safety and efficacy of ivermectin in Covid disease is well worth considering and can be found at <a href="https://www.ivmmeta.com">www.ivmmeta.com</a> : as of September 9, 2022, this includes 91 studies, of which 41 were randomised controlled trials involving 11,141 patients. This resource illustrates the high level of international interest in the clinical submission of ivermectin for potential use in Covid. When taken in totality, the clinical data presented at <a href="https://www.ivmmeta.com">www.ivmmeta.com</a> presents a compelling case for the safety and efficacy of ivermectin. More than 20 countries (including India, Mexico, regions of Peru, Argentina, Japan, Dominican Republic, and Brazil) have adopted ivermectin for the management of Covid. Collectively, the studies strongly suggest that ‘ivermectin reduces the risk for Covid with very high confidence for mortality, ventilation, ICU admission, hospitalisation, progression, recovery, [number of] cases, viral clearance, and in pooled analysis… Meta-analysis using the most serious outcome measure shows 62 per cent [57-70 per cent] and 83 per cent [74-89 per cent] improvement for early treatment and prophylaxis.’<br/>
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A juxtaposition of the evidence and risk-versus-benefit analysis for the provisionally-approved vaccines shows the safety and efficacy profile comparisons are not even close. To begin with, provisionally approved by definition means lacking in safety and efficacy data. To understand our confusion over the decision to ban ivermectin on safety and efficacy claims one need only look at the safety and efficacy information provided by the TGA. The TGA’s own Australian Public Assessment reports (AusPAR) for the provisional approval of Pfizer in January 2021 published prior to the vaccine rollout stated that in addition to the unknown longer-term safety and unknown duration of vaccine protection, there are other limitations with the submitted data.<br/>
<br/>
The following questions have not yet been addressed:<br/>
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Vaccine efficacy against asymptomatic infection and viral transmission.<br/>
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The concomitant use of this vaccine with other vaccines.<br/>
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Vaccine data in pregnant women and lactating mothers.<br/>
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Vaccine efficacy and safety in immunocompromised individuals.<br/>
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Vaccine efficacy and safety in paediatric subjects (&lt; 16 years old).<br/>
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A correlate of protection has yet to be established. The vaccine immunogenicity cannot be considered and used as the surrogate for vaccine protective efficacy at this stage, as stated by the FDA in May 2021.<br/>
<br/>
Other important identified risks are anaphylaxis.<br/>
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Important potential risks include vaccine-associated enhanced disease (VAED) including vaccine-associated enhanced respiratory disease (VAERD).<br/>
<br/>
In September 2021 a delegate of the Secretary of the Department of Health used their power to act on any other matters that the Secretary considers necessary to protect public health to ban the Australian people from accessing ivermectin. A questionable decision that appeared to support the government’s vaccine-only strategy. Ivermectin has been proven safe, has been given in billions of doses with very low side effects, and has extensive data evidencing its effectiveness in the prevention and treatment of Covid. mRNA Covid injections have been proven neither safe nor effective, have been given in billions of doses, and have the highest rate of adverse events of any medicine in human history including rocketing all-cause mortality rates. A recent preprint analysis using the Bradford-Hill criteria demonstrates a causal link with the Covid vaccination roll-out. We appear to be experiencing what he calls an iatrogenic pandemic.<br/>
<br/>
On the information presented, whose interests are served by the banning of ivermectin? Perhaps Dr Pierre Kory is onto something when he says, ‘When you see our health agencies literally working in the service of the pharmaceutical industry by destroying the credibility of repurposed drugs, it’s terrifying. They’re not working according to the interests of patients or physicians but the pharmaceutical companies.’ His comments were made in relation to the US legal case involving a group of doctors who are suing the Food and Drug Administration and the Department of Health and Human Services for their attempt to ban the prescribing of ivermectin to treat Covid.<br/>
<br/>
Banning doctors from prescribing ivermectin for the prevention or treatment of Covid does not appear to be following the science, nor does it seem to be about public protection. Ivermectin in comparison to mRNA injections is safe and effective and can save lives. If our TGA cannot follow the evidence, what are they following?<br/>
<br/>
<a href="https://www.spectator.com.au/2023/03/did-the-ivermectin-ban-cost-lives/">https://www.spectator.com.au/2023/03/did-the-ivermectin-ban-cost-lives/</a> ?<br/>
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<br/>
<b> Covid’s cockups and conspiracies: Australia wasn’t immune</b><br/>
<br/>
Those debating whether the deadly schemozzle of pandemic mismanagement that has cast a pall over the last three years was due to a cockup or a conspiracy should abandon binary thinking. All the evidence, from both sides of the Atlantic, indicates that there were both cockups and conspiracies and they came not as single spies but in battalions.<br/>
<br/>
In the UK, the ‘Lockdown files’, a trove of 100,000 WhatsApp messages released by the Telegraph over the last week, provide a portrait of former health minister Matt Hancock as a cruel careerist and a clown better suited to appearing on ‘I’m a Celebrity… Get Me Out of Here’, which he did for a fee of hundreds of thousands of pound, rather than running Britain’s pandemic policy.<br/>
<br/>
The liberty of millions of Britons was curtailed based on the whims of decision-makers who, because they were not subject to parliamentary scrutiny, simply claimed they were following the best scientific advice.<br/>
<br/>
Guilt and fear were shamelessly used to enforce the draconian dictates with Hancock writing that he would ‘frighten the pants off everyone’ with a new strain to get compliance.<br/>
<br/>
A fan of Klaus Schwab and the World Economic Forum (WEF), Hancock wrote that he hoped Covid would propel his career into the next league. He discussed with his advisers how ‘pushing on vaccines’ would be ‘the most politically beneficial thing’ to do. When Dame Kate Bingham who led the UK vaccine taskforce suggested in October 2020 that only people who were ‘at risk’ should be vaccinated, Hancock branded her as ‘wacky’ and ‘totally unreliable’.<br/>
<br/>
In the US, the Twitter files made public by Elon Musk exposed a conspiracy between key members of Team Biden, agencies such as the FBI and Big Tech to help Biden get elected and to censor and smear those who criticised the government orthodoxy.<br/>
<br/>
Evidence of conspiracies continues to be uncovered by House Republicans. The latest emails show that Dr Anthony Fauci, director of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases from 1984 to 2022 and chief medical advisor to the president from 2021 to 2022 and Dr Jeremy Farrar, director of the Wellcome Trust, the third largest charitable foundation in the world, hid their roles in February 2020 in the writing of a scientific paper whose purpose was to cast as much doubt as possible on the fact that the Covid virus originated in a lab in Wuhan. Both pretended they played no part in the paper’s genesis but both prompted the scientists to write it, Farrar edited it and Fauci hid the fact that his agency funded research in a Wuhan lab to make bat coronaviruses more dangerous.<br/>
<br/>
In view of Farrar’s role in obfuscating the origins of Covid, leading scientists such as Dr Richard Ebright, a microbiologist at Rutgers University, has called for him not to take up an appointment announced last year to be the next chief scientist at the World Health Organisation.<br/>
<br/>
Farrar also signed a notorious letter to the Lancet organised by Peter Daszak, the CEO of the EcoHealth Alliance who provided US tax dollars for research into bat coronaviruses at the Wuhan Institute of Virology. The letter condemned as ‘conspiracy theories’ any suggestion that Covid-19 did not have a natural origin.<br/>
<br/>
Conspiracies were not limited to promoting lies about the origins of Covid. As Dr Marty Makary, a professor of surgery and health policy at Johns Hopkins University said in sworn testimony before the House Select Subcommittee on the Coronavirus Pandemic’s first hearing on Tuesday 28 February, ‘The greatest perpetrator of misinformation during the pandemic has been the United States government’.<br/>
<br/>
Makary damned public health officials for lying to the American people that Covid was spread through surface transmission, that vaccinated immunity was greater than natural immunity, that masks were effective, that myocarditis was more common after infection than vaccination, that young people benefit from a booster and that vaccine mandates would increase vaccination rates. ‘We’ve seen something that is unforgivable,’ he said, ‘and that is the weaponisation of medical research itself’.<br/>
<br/>
The common link between the UK cockups and the US conspiracies is the total disregard for scientific evidence, which either didn’t exist or contradicted what policy makers wanted to do and so was ignored or discredited.<br/>
<br/>
There is no comfort for Australia in any of this. Like Little Sir Echo it copied all of its pandemic policies from the US and the UK. The question is what to do now?<br/>
<br/>
It is impossible to prevent cockups or conspiracies, but it is possible to make them more difficult to engage in by subjecting governments and their agencies to greater scrutiny. We could start by requiring that they table all health advice.<br/>
<br/>
Agencies such as the Therapeutic Goods Administration (TGA) need to collect more data about adverse events, for example, by requiring the same information that is collected in the US. It needs to publicly state the background rates for adverse events, the rate of these events for comparable drugs, and provide a weekly update on the rate of these events in new products so that dangerous drugs can be withdrawn as soon as warning signs appear.<br/>
<br/>
The meetings of committees that advise the TGA should be publicly televised as they are in the US and anybody who advises the TGA or any other part of government on health should be required to publicly disclose any funding they receive from pharmaceutical companies or other interested parties.<br/>
<br/>
The power of the Australian Health Practitioner Regulation Agency needs to be curbed. By issuing an edict telling healthcare workers that they must do nothing to undermine confidence in the government’s response to the pandemic, it pressured health practitioners not to report adverse events or tell their patients about the potential for adverse events.<br/>
<br/>
The misinformation and disinformation laws tabled by the Morrison and now by the Albanese government are also a shameless attempt to curtail totally justified criticism of pandemic polices.<br/>
<br/>
Too often over the last three years, Australians’ rights and freedoms have been violated in the interest of ‘public health measures’ that were harmful.<br/>
<br/>
Only by making the work of the government and its agencies fully transparent can we start to restore confidence that we will be subjected to anymore conspiracies or cockups.<br/>
<br/>

<p class="asset asset-link">
	<a href="https://www.spectator.com.au/2023/03/covids-cockups-and-conspiracies/">https://www.spectator.com.au/2023/03/covids-cockups-and-conspiracies/</a>
</p>
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<br/>
<b> Who qualifies for the Voice?</b><br/>
<br/>
Alex Antic<br/>
<br/>
The so-called ‘Voice to Parliament’ is a proposal for a race-based advisory body established via a referendum to amend Australia’s Constitution. We have only just commenced this corrosive process and already, we are seeing more questions than answers.<br/>
<br/>
I oppose the Voice as a matter of principle. It is a cynical attempt to divide Australians by race and distract them from those contemporary issues which the government would otherwise be defending like the cost of living, inflation, and mortgage stress.<br/>
<br/>
That said, one of the key issues being whispered around the dinner tables and front bars of our country, involves the question of who will qualify as a representative of the Voice and on what terms? To put it more bluntly, who will be deemed an Aboriginal or Torres Strait Islander? It appears to be a question that politics is too afraid to ask but is as critical an issue as any associated with this frolic.<br/>
<br/>
During the last round of Senate estimates, I asked the Attorney General’s Department that very question, and the responses were underwhelming to say the least. After some bureaucratic fumbling, I was directed to the three-part test which has been used to determine Aboriginality since the Mabo High Court decision of 1992. I explained that I was familiar with the test, which has three criteria: descent or lineage, self-identification, and acceptance by the local Indigenous community. However, what I wanted the department to explain was how descent is established. In other words, how does one prove that they are Indigenous for the purposes of the ‘Voice,’ or any legal matter (for example, government grants)?<br/>
<br/>
One would think this a simple question for a government seeking to establish a Constitutionally enshrined advisory board on Indigenous matters but, just as the Department of Health couldn’t tell me what a woman is, the Attorney General’s Department couldn’t seem to tell me how Indigenous people are identified, so I pressed the issue. Is one considered Indigenous if they have one grandparent, or one great, great, great grandparent, who was Indigenous?<br/>
<br/>
Predictably, I was informed that this line of questioning was ‘not appropriate’, and the Labor minister at the table called my line of questioning ‘borderline racist’. I wonder if the minister views all Australians who are concerned about the lack of transparency regarding the Voice to Parliament in this way. It’s unfortunate that name-calling, guilt-tripping, and accusing opponents of various ‘isms’ and ‘phobias’ is all they have, given their lack of clear answers.<br/>
<br/>
Furthermore, when I asked whether the department was concerned about people falsely identifying as indigenous, I was informed that this question was too ‘hypothetical’.<br/>
<br/>
One would think that getting this simple matter bolted down would be a top priority for the Labor government, but this is not the case. The reason is simple: the ‘Voice’ is not about helping Indigenous Australians, but about further expanding the bureaucratic class, trashing our heritage, and exacerbating the victimhood mindset that the left uses to make people dependants.<br/>
<br/>
We can expect more name-calling as the debate goes on. Such accusations are a cudgel that the left have been able to wield for too long. We must stop being afraid of being called names. If an opponent resorts to such actions, you know you are winning.<br/>
<br/>
Meanwhile, details about the ‘Voice,’ such as who will qualify, how candidates will be selected remain opaque. Surely the millions of dollars the ‘Voice’ referendum will cost taxpayers could be used in a more beneficial way.<br/>
<br/>
Fundamentally, the details of the ‘Voice’ are not the issue. Australia is already too divided along the lines of race due to the woke takeover of our bureaucracies, especially our education system, and the media. White children are taught to be ashamed of their heritage, and Indigenous children are taught that they are being held back by ‘systemic racism’. The fundamental assumption behind the ‘Voice’ is that Indigenous people don’t have a say in our political system – a claim that is blatantly untrue.<br/>
<br/>
We do not need more racial division or welfare state solutions in Australia; we need unity, appreciation of our heritage, and practical solutions. As my colleague Senator Jacinta Nampijinpa Price has said, ‘We don’t need a voice, we need ears.’ Never mind an Indigenous ‘Voice to Parliament’, Senator Nampijinpa Price is an Indigenous voice in Parliament. Of course, her approach to Indigenous issues is not well received by Labor and the Greens. If they and the bureaucrats in Canberra listened to her voice, they wouldn’t get to feel good about themselves for doing nothing except unnecessarily altering our Constitution to create more jobs for bureaucrats in Canberra.<br/>
<br/>
Identity politics and victim culture, two tools in the so-called progressive playbook for gaining and maintaining control, are tearing this country apart. Australians should not be divided by their race. The politics of sentimentality must come to an end. If the government can’t even tell us how Aboriginality is defined for legal purposes, why are we even discussing the ‘Voice to Parliament’? Simply put, if Labor were interested in helping aboriginal people, they’d do that, rather than wasting our time and money over the ‘Voice.’<br/>
<br/>
Saying no to the Voice doesn’t make you a racist. Australians will not be bullied.<br/>
<br/>
<a href="https://www.spectator.com.au/2023/03/who-qualifies-for-the-voice/">https://www.spectator.com.au/2023/03/who-qualifies-for-the-voice/</a> ?<br/>
<br/>
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<br/>
<b> Biggest problem with a four-day work week trial</b><br/>
<br/>
There is currently a push on in Australia to cut the working week from five days to four days. Meanwhile, there is a push on in South Korea to increase the working week from 52 hours to 69 hours.<br/>
<br/>
This alone probably tells you everything you need to know about those two countries.<br/>
<br/>
But it’s also proof of yet another weird post-pandemic problem that has emerged: Nobody really knows how much they work anymore.<br/>
<br/>
Ever since the chattering classes have been allowed to work from home and never really came back to the office, the line between work and family hasn’t so much been blurred as completely erased so that the personal and professional parts of people’s lives are now just one gluggy mess.<br/>
<br/>
Even as I write this, I am pulled over in the family car on the way to a job for one boss while filing this copy for another. My last Zoom meeting was held at school pick-up and my inbox is constantly interrupted by YouTube videos about Minecraft and tweens doing shopping dares at Target.<br/>
<br/>
Compounding the problem is that work is like a gas. It expands to fill whatever space it is given. And so when there are no boundaries to work, it just keeps piling up ad infinitum. There will always be something else to do, and it will always be the person already working the most who will do it.<br/>
<br/>
As the old saying goes, if you want something done, ask a busy man. And it’s a saying everyone in my working life seems to be very familiar with.<br/>
<br/>
But maybe that gas can also be compressed. Maybe if we officially reduce the working week to four days, everyone will just do five days’ worth of work in the same time – or at least the ones who do all the work in the first place.<br/>
<br/>

<p class="asset asset-link">
	<a href="https://www.couriermail.com.au/lifestyle/smart/can-we-reduce-our-working-week-when-lines-between-professional-and-personal-are-blurred/news-story/5dd2fc5a5db6998dc6044886b9b901b6">https://www.couriermail.com.au/lifestyle/smart/can-we-reduce-our-working-week-when-lines-between-professional-and-personal-are-blurred/news-story/5dd2fc5a5db6998dc6044886b9b901b6</a>
</p>
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<br><br/>


14 March, 2023
<br/><br/> 
<b> Panelist calls out Australian TV for being too white as our local shows are branded a &#39;neo-Nazi&#39;s wet dream&#39;</b><br/>
<br/>
<i> The rave below offers no statistics or evidence. It is in fact a very strange thing to say about Australia&#39;s politically correct media<br/>
<br/>
By contrast, <a href="https://pcwatch.blogspot.com/2023/02/blackwashing-just-side-issue-to.html">Malcolm Smith</a> has given examples to show that minorities are OVER-represented on Australian TV.  
  <br/>
<br/>
So the unhappy lady is probably peeved only because HER minority group is little mentioned. She is simply over-generalizing. Ironic that the the host of the TV program where she made her accusations is in fact an Aborigine, a dark minority group<br/>
<br/>
In any case Australians are overwhelmingly of European ancestry so that is the group that advertisers or others would reasonably aim to reach. Targeting such people is simply what you have to do if you want your messages to have maximum reach and impact<br/>
<br/>
And the big irony is that the Arab population that produced the angry lady REALLY IS NAZI. The antisemitism of Islamic countries is well known.</i><br/>
<br/>
A guest on ABC&#39;s Q+A has branded Australian television a &#39;neo-Nazi&#39;s wet dream&#39; after Indigenous host Stan Grant slammed it for being dominated by white faces.<br/>
<br/>
Australian journalist Antoinette Lattouf - whose parents moved Down Under from Lebanon in the 1970s - blasted networks for being stuck in the era of the 1960s&#39; White Australia policy.<br/>
<br/>
Ms Lattouf lashed out at the representation of multicultural Australia on mainstream local television shows, saying it was now badly lagging behind the rest of the world. &#39;Australia&#39;s really far behind the UK or the US,&#39; she raged on Monday night&#39;s show.<br/>
<br/>
&#39;We still have networks or programs that look like a neo-Nazi&#39;s wet dream. We still do despite the fact that more than half of the population are culturally diverse. &#39;[But] we&#39;re just gonna kind of ignore those voices.&#39;<br/>
<br/>
Her comments came after Grant hit out at the lack of representation for people of colour on local television.<br/>
<br/>
Monday night&#39;s show featured an otherwise all-white line up of 80s British pop star Billy Bragg, Labor MP Josh Burns, economist Gigi Foster, and Senator Perin Davey.<br/>
<br/>
Grant claimed the lack of diversity was giving viewers a false impression of the multicultural society they actually live in.<br/>
<br/>
&#39;People like you and I are still rare on our screens,&#39; the veteran broadcaster and outspoken racism activist told Ms Lattouf. &#39;And stories are still told by people who look like other people on the panel here tonight. &#39;What does it take to break through, because the world doesn&#39;t look like that? It looks like us!&#39;<br/>
<br/>
Grant, along with Ten&#39;s The Project host Waleed Aly and Malaysian-born ABC newsreader Jeremy Fernandez, are among the few people of colour regularly seen on mainstream Australian TV.<br/>
<br/>
Ms Lattouf, a mother-of-two who founded Media Diversity Australia in 2017, said it required grit-teethed determination to succeed as a non-white in Australia. &#39;It takes patience. It takes a thick skin,&#39; she told Grant. &#39;It takes having to fight the urge to go into Tourette-style swearing spiel when you get the opportunity. &#39;Because sometimes it&#39;s frustrating that the change is glacial. You take one step forward, four steps back.<br/>
<br/>
&#39;Even in the year of the referendum [on the Voice to Parliament], we still have all-white panels discussing things like the referendum. &#39;We still have all-white panels talking about refugees and asylum seeker policy - that baffles me.&#39;<br/>
<br/>
She added: &#39;At least in the UK, when you see politicians when you flick on the telly, even the Prime Minister, though arguably he&#39;s not a great win for progressive politics.<br/>
<br/>
&#39;All our all our storytellers, all our institutions of power - they have all been largely white men. &#39;There&#39;s a bit of progress now. We&#39;ve got white women. And so there is a lot more work to be done.&#39;<br/>
<br/>

<p class="asset asset-link">
	<a href="https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-11855925/ABC-Q-host-Stan-Grant-calls-Australian-TV-white-Antoinette-Latouf.html">https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-11855925/ABC-Q-host-Stan-Grant-calls-Australian-TV-white-Antoinette-Latouf.html</a>
</p>
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<br/>
<b> A disastrous Aboriginal school in South Australia</b><br/>
<br/>
<i> Schools with Aboriginal majorities are well-known for violence in Queensland but the problem is not confined to Queensland. Everybody is too politically correct to take the firm measures needed to deal with the problem</i><br/>
<br/>
A student at Port Augusta Secondary School has refused to return to school after a brutal bashing by a fellow student left him with concussion and almost shattered his cheekbone.<br/>
<br/>
The 16-year-old boy, who was attacked on February 21, says he is too scared to go back amid fears he will be targeted again.<br/>
<br/>
During the attack, the boy, who asked to remain anonymous out of fear of retaliation, was punched in the head from behind before being pushed over a retaining wall and hit several more times.<br/>
<br/>
The boy’s father told The Advertiser his son had suffered post-traumatic stress disorder as a result of the incident and did not feel safe leaving the house on his own.<br/>
<br/>
“Enough is enough,” he said. “Somebody’s going to end up dead.”<br/>
<br/>
The father said he flagged threats made to his son in the weeks before the attack but police and Port Augusta Secondary School took no action. “My son can’t even go down the street on his own,” he said.<br/>
<br/>
The father said violence had continued at the school despite the installation of CCTV and the use of security guards. “They’ve had nothing but issues,” he said. “These kids are still going at it. Cameras aren’t going to keep the kids safe.”<br/>
<br/>
He also said escalating violence on the town’s streets was being “dragged into the school”. “It’s just got to stop. Kids shouldn’t be doing this,” he said.<br/>
<br/>
On Friday, The Advertiser revealed students at Port Augusta Secondary School were being “stomped on” during fights.<br/>
<br/>
“The school is f**ked,” one student said.<br/>
<br/>
In February, parents of another student who was the victim of a vicious attack told The Advertiser they had warned the school about a potential fight before the incident.<br/>
<br/>
Videos of fights, which appear to be planned, have been posted to several social media accounts in recent months.<br/>
<br/>
An Education Department spokeswoman said the student who assaulted the 16-year-old had been “excluded” from the school for the maximum period of 10 weeks.<br/>
<br/>
She said the school met with the victim’s family on “numerous occasions” before the attack but “despite their efforts an assault did occur”.<br/>
<br/>

<p class="asset asset-link">
	<a href="https://www.couriermail.com.au/news/south-australia/port-augusta-secondary-school-student-16-refuses-to-return-to-school-after-brutal-bashing/news-story/2baf6fe2befc9628d50263e59e657f74">https://www.couriermail.com.au/news/south-australia/port-augusta-secondary-school-student-16-refuses-to-return-to-school-after-brutal-bashing/news-story/2baf6fe2befc9628d50263e59e657f74</a>
</p>
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<br/>
<b> Griffith University research could fast-track treatment for long Covid patients</b><br/>
<br/>
New research from Griffith University has revealed that long Covid and chronic fatigue syndrome can have similar effects on brain structure – offering hope to finding a treatment to long Covid.<br/>
<br/>
Using an ultra-high field MRI, Griffith researchers investigated how the two conditions mirror the same effects on the brain in both myalgic encephalomyelitis/chronic fatigue syndrome (ME/CFS) and long Covid patients, with the results showing major consistencies in brain-stem volume in these patients compared to those who did not suffer from the same ailments.<br/>
<br/>
The research came after reports that 13-58 per cent of long Covid patients experienced symptoms similar to chronic fatigue syndrome, including brain fog, fatigue, pain, and autonomic dysfunction.<br/>
<br/>
Lead author Dr Kiran Thapaliya said the MRI results revealed larger brain stems in long Covid and ME/CFS patients compared to those without the conditions. “It also showed similar volumes of the brain stem in patients which could be the reason long Covid patients exhibit all common core symptoms of ME/CFS,” Dr Thapaliya said.<br/>
<br/>
“We also discovered smaller midbrain volumes were associated with more severe breathing difficulty in ME/CFS and long Covid patients. “Therefore, brain-stem dysfunction in ME/CFS and long Covid patients could contribute to their neurological, cardiorespiratory symptoms, and movement disorder.”<br/>
<br/>
Dr Thapaliya said these findings could lead to further research into treatment and management of long Covid, which had previously been poorly understood and difficult to diagnose.<br/>
<br/>
“Since we saw that there was an overlap between MECFS and long Covid, this could fast-track the treatment for the long Covid patients,” Dr Thapaliya said.<br/>
<br/>
“For the treatment of chronic fatigue syndrome, we have used low dose Naltrexone, so this might pass as a treatment for long Covid persons So this could potentially fast-track finding a treatment”.<br/>
<br/>
According to health experts, up to 43 per cent of people infected by SARS-CoV-2 did not recover fully and develop long Covid, including children.<br/>
<br/>
Researchers at Griffith University will continue investigating the correlation between these two illnesses, including testing on a larger sample size and looking at the duration of the brain stem changes<br/>
<br/>
“The next stage of our research is to see whether these changes in the brain stem are temporary, or permanent in long Covid and CFS patients,” Dr Thapaliya said<br/>
<br/>

<p class="asset asset-link">
	<a href="https://www.couriermail.com.au/news/queensland/griffith-university-research-could-fasttrack-treatment-for-long-covid-patients/news-story/32470e206a8f459aba6c44bde0679d96">https://www.couriermail.com.au/news/queensland/griffith-university-research-could-fasttrack-treatment-for-long-covid-patients/news-story/32470e206a8f459aba6c44bde0679d96</a>
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<br/>
<b> Why Bruce Highway is a monument to Qld’s political ineptitude</b><br/>
<br/>
<i> A tunnel is needed but all we get is buck-passing</i><br/>
<br/>
In play was the political football known as the North West Transport Corridor, the plan to build a motorway that has been kicked from one end of the electoral field to the other for decades without anyone kicking a goal.<br/>
<br/>
It rained a few weeks ago, the weather gods unleashing one of those brief subtropical afternoon downpours that are a summer trademark of our city.<br/>
<br/>
The result was traffic gridlock. I know this because it took me 45 minutes to travel from Newstead to the CBD, a distance of less than 4km.<br/>
<br/>
Such is the fragile nature of the system that if rain slows the traffic flow, chaos ensues. Anyone forced to use Gympie Rd during peak periods that get longer every year will attest to its inability to cope.<br/>
<br/>
A minor collision on the Story Bridge brings the city to a standstill.<br/>
<br/>
I drove back from the Sunshine Coast one afternoon last week. Southbound the traffic flowed but the northbound lanes were a carpark, traffic snaking back for kilometre after kilometre as the system failed to carry the traffic volume – and this happens virtually every day.<br/>
<br/>
The Bruce Highway is a monument to bureaucratic and political ineptitude, one that stretches from Brisbane to Cairns, and which is closed, cutting off North Queensland, whenever there is significant rainfall. What a joke.<br/>
<br/>
There aren’t enough vehicular bridges and there aren’t enough tunnels.<br/>
<br/>
On the one hand, the council spends mountains of money on “green” bridges, which are lovely for cyclists and joggers, but do absolutely nothing to alleviate traffic woes, while the state government looks the other way and does what it does best, which is nothing.<br/>
<br/>
You don’t need to be an engineer to appreciate that building a freeway through the densely populated northern suburbs is not practical.<br/>
<br/>
A tunnel is the obvious choice but rather than the council and the state government joining forces to drive this, we have petty bickering and name calling.<br/>
<br/>
The North West Motorway is meant to take about 110,000 vehicles a day off surrounding roads by 2031. Thanks to procrastination, blame-shifting and general incompetence, this will never happen.<br/>
<br/>
Put all of this in the context of the 2032 Olympics and the omens portent disaster writ large.<br/>
<br/>
The announcement the state government will assume overall control of infrastructure construction should send alarm bells ringing throughout the Olympic movement.<br/>
<br/>
Whenever the state government gets involved in a project, the costs blow out, the unions have a picnic, it’s late in delivery and questions as to how the money is being spent and who is getting it are waved away with claims of “commercial-in-confidence”.<br/>
<br/>
I would like to think that the Olympics will be a happy experience for my home town but I fear the worst.<br/>
<br/>

<p class="asset asset-link">
	<a href="https://www.couriermail.com.au/news/opinion/mike-oconnor/mike-oconnor-why-bruce-highway-is-a-monument-to-qlds-political-ineptitude/news-story/2578706bd11ebb2efb66df533daa1859">https://www.couriermail.com.au/news/opinion/mike-oconnor/mike-oconnor-why-bruce-highway-is-a-monument-to-qlds-political-ineptitude/news-story/2578706bd11ebb2efb66df533daa1859</a>
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<br/>
<br/>
<br/>


13 March, 2023
<br/><br/> 
<b> Andrew Tate is flooding Australian schoolboys with an aggressive ideology contemptuous of feminist correctness</b><br/>
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<i> So what are the schools going to tell the boys? Under feminist pressure, the official ideology is that boys should be more like girls. Such advice will go down like a lead balloon. Telling boys to be sensitive and respectful is probably good advice but it will at most get a bored yawn.<br/>
<br/>
Tate has shown the emperor to have no clothes. There is no considered guide to healthy masculinity. There is nothing to replace his message. Masculinity is simply attacked by elite writers</i><br/>
<br/>
A prominent principal has warned schools are contending with a “tsunami” of misogynistic digital trends and revealed they are tackling the problem with in-house education programs to specifically address the rise of so-called ”mega misogynist” Andrew Tate.<br/>
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Tate, the former professional kickboxer turned king of “toxic masculinity’’ has amassed a huge global following on social media sprouting his extreme anti-feminist, alpha male views.<br/>
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Youth workers say Tate, currently in a Romanian jail under investigation for human trafficking, rape and forming an organised crime group, has emerged as a key influencer of 11-17 year old boys.<br/>
<br/>
St Joseph’s Nudgee College principal Peter Fullagar, 62, said Tate had been on the school’s radar for the past 12 to 18 months and discussions about him had been incorporated into its educational programs.<br/>
<br/>
“There is a tsunami working against us to be fair. It is relentless,’’ Fullagar said.<br/>
<br/>
“We do talk to boys about Andrew Tate and rather than say, ‘Don’t go there’ and try to shut it down, we want to learn why boys are attracted to his message.<br/>
<br/>
“As schools, as educators, we are working really hard to give boys an opposite message.<br/>
<br/>
“We are dealing with young boys‘ behaviour all the time through mistakes they make in and around misogynistic behaviour, homophobic language, racial comments, bullying and harassment. It is part of young people’s landscape today.<br/>
<br/>
“The power of social media has come at us in a rush over the past 10 years so schools are continually responding and refining responses. If it’s Andrew Tate currently, it will be a bigger name in a couple of years time.’’<br/>
<br/>
Fullagar said his school’s established Student Formation Program covered a range of issues including respectful relationships, the definition of masculinity, mental health and wellbeing, risk taking, drugs, issues of consent, social media and being safe in the online environment. Andrew Tate was discussed in the context of social media and what it means to be a young man in today’s world.<br/>
<br/>
St Paul’s School, a coeducational private school north of Brisbane, is also aware of Tate’s influence. Headmaster Dr Paul Browning said young people were bombarded with negative social media messages.<br/>
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“The temptations are right there in their face, in their bedroom at night time. Unfortunately, undesirable influences follow them into that space,’’ Browning said.<br/>
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“You can’t ignore it and we have strong programs at the school to help with social and emotional development of young people and the development of their character. We’re not just interested in a child’s academic achievement but also the type of people they are becoming.’’<br/>
<br/>
St Paul’s executive director of Faith and Community Nigel Grant said he first became aware of Tate about a year ago when year nine boys “tried to shock me’’ during a school wellbeing program called The Rite Journey. “We are trying to be on the front foot on this,’’ he said.<br/>
<br/>
“We were having a conversation with year nine boys about what it means to be a man, asking who they respected and who were their heroes. It was in that context that Andrew Tate’s name came up.<br/>
<br/>
“The boys had heard all about him and were aware of the power to shock adults. Some had been impressed by some of the stuff he was saying.<br/>
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“I was suitably naive but quickly became well informed and, as a group of teachers, we addressed the issue directly and tried to produce a suitable counter message.<br/>
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“We are regularly shocked but rarely surprised at the content young people see. The internet is like the wild, wild west. Even the best filters can be worked around and children are particularly vulnerable.’’<br/>
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QUT Professor of sociology Michael Flood, an expert in engaging men in violence prevention, men and masculinities, said schools must be proactive in dealing with toxic social media influencers.<br/>
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“Schools have an absolutely central role to play particularly through respectful relationships education in inoculating young people against the sexism and the misogyny that Tate and others preach,’’ Flood said.<br/>
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“Conversations about influencers like Tate should be going on in schools and certainly growing numbers of teachers are forced to have those conversations whether they want to or not because boys and young men are repeating some of the things that Tate claims.’’<br/>
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A Department of Education Queensland spokesperson said the Respectful Relationships Education Program has been available in Queensland schools since 2017.<br/>
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<br/>
<b> Voice to Parliament is expensive and unnecessary</b><br/>
<br/>
Poor Anthony Albanese. How was he to know he already has a Voice to Parliament, telling his ministers what to do for Aborigines?<br/>
<br/>
With all his engagements at the Australian Open, the cricket and the Gay and Lesbian Mardi Gras, how could he know he’s already paying $160m a year to 1200 people in 39 offices around the country to do exactly that?<br/>
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How embarrassing, because Albanese keeps insisting we need his Voice in the constitution so “Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people have a say in the policies and decisions that affect their lives”.<br/>
<br/>
Yet the National Indigenous Australians Agency is doing that very thing, claims its head, Aboriginal woman Jody Broun: “We lead and influence change across government to ensure Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoples have a say in the decisions that affect them.”<br/>
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That’s its job, under the government order establishing the NIAA: “to build and maintain effective partnerships with Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people … and enable policies, programs and services to be tailored to the unique needs of communities”.<br/>
<br/>
So we can now add the NIAA to all the other groups already telling the government what to do for our 810,000 Aborigines – more than 30 land councils, 3000 Aboriginal corporations, 11 Aboriginal federal politicians and the Coalition of Peaks, representing around 70 big Aboriginal agencies.<br/>
<br/>
At the very least, the Prime Minister should say which of them we can scrap if he still goes ahead with his Voice, plus its 35 regional Voices.<br/>
<br/>
After all, this NIAA does not come cheap, and nor will the Voice. The NIAA’s leaders are collectively paid $2.5m a year, and last financial year spent nearly $2 billion.<br/>
<br/>
But its boss says it’s doing a wonderful job: “The NIAA works in genuine partnership to enable the self-determination and aspirations of First Nations communities.”<br/>
<br/>
So who needs the Voice?<br/>
<br/>
The NIAA also assures us it’s got the government’s ear. It doesn’t just report to Albanese’s Indigenous Australians Minister, his assistant Indigenous Australians Minister and his special envoy for “reconciliation”, but last year gave advice to 12 parliamentary committees.<br/>
<br/>
So, again, who needs Albanese’s Voice?<br/>
<br/>
News of the NIAA’s existence, raised on social media by Voice opponents, has created panic in the ABC. “No, Indigenous Australians don’t already have a Voice to Parliament,” shouted its “Fact Check Unit” on Friday.<br/>
<br/>
For evidence it consulted two pro-Voice academics – Dr Dylan Lino, a senior lecturer in law, and – ha ha ha – Asmi Wood, an Australian National University law professor on Albanese’s Referendum Consulting Group.<br/>
<br/>
Yes, well. Wood’s expertise in constitutional law may be judged by the fact he keeps repeating the ludicrous myth that our constitution once “regulated ‘Aboriginal natives’ as fauna”.<br/>
<br/>
So why do these experts deny the NIAA is already doing the work of the Voice?<br/>
<br/>
One, because they claim the NIAA’s public servants aren’t independent of government, but the Voice will be.<br/>
<br/>
But the government’s blueprint of the Voice, written by Marcia Langton and Tom Calma, says its members will not be elected, but mysteriously selected. By whom, exactly? The government will set those rules, determine powers and decide who gets paid what. How independent is that?<br/>
<br/>
Two, Wood admits the NIAA is actually “meant to give free and fearless advice”, but complains the minister still “makes the final decision”.<br/>
<br/>
But wait! Albanese claims Parliament will still make the decisions if we get a Voice. Or are we being conned?<br/>
<br/>
And three, Lino says that unlike the Voice, the NIAA isn’t all-Aboriginal. Only a fifth of its staff identifies as white, even if two of its three top executives and both its ministers are Aborigines and calling the shots.<br/>
<br/>
But whites could be on the Voice, too, or choose who is.<br/>
<br/>
Aboriginal activists such as Suzanne Ingram claim as many as 300,000 of our 810,000 Aborigines are actually fakes, and the Langton-Calma report says it doesn’t want direct elections for the Voice because “confirming Indigeneity … has historically been divisive in some communities”. Aborigines would complain of white fakes voting and running, and they must be shut down.<br/>
<br/>
I guess that leaves the big difference: that unlike the NIAA, the Voice – being in the constitution – cannot be sacked, even if it’s totally useless, or worse.<br/>
<br/>
No, let’s stick with the NIAA and save the grief and the cash. After all, it’s doing what Albanese says he wanted, right? Or is there something else he isn’t saying?<br/>
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	<a href="https://www.couriermail.com.au/news/opinion/andrew-bolt/andrew-bolt-voice-to-parliament-is-expensive-and-unnecessary/news-story/9efe4642aae958b8769165e83cbbf71d">https://www.couriermail.com.au/news/opinion/andrew-bolt/andrew-bolt-voice-to-parliament-is-expensive-and-unnecessary/news-story/9efe4642aae958b8769165e83cbbf71d</a>
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<b> Old king coal riding high again</b><br/>
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About two million tonnes of coal left Australian shores for China last month in signs of growing confidence Beijing’s unofficial ban on the resource is coming to an end, according to market experts.<br/>
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It comes as trade data shows Queensland’s trade with China rise by $3 billion in the past year, compared to the previous 12 months.<br/>
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Commodity market data agency Argus Media said shipping data showed more than 2 million tonnes of coal left Australia for China in February, and of that about 700,000 tonnes of that came out of Queensland.<br/>
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Chinese Communist Party state-owned news the Global Times has indicated “the full resumption of Australian coal” trade could start from as early as next month.<br/>
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Before Beijing implemented an unofficial ban on Australian coal in November 2020, among a range of other trade restrictions and sanctions on the back of rising diplomatic tension at the time, Queensland’s coal trade to China was worth $10 billion a year.<br/>
<br/>
Argus Media spokeswoman Jo Clarke said the 2 million was a significant increase compared to the 140,000 tonnes which left Australian shores in January.<br/>
<br/>
While the first shipment of Australian thermal coal was unloaded in China’s Guangdong port on February 5, Ms Clarke said coking coal had now also been successfully unloaded at China’s Zhanjiang port on February 10. “No coking coal cargoes have been turned back on account of customs clearance processes in China,” she said.<br/>
<br/>
“But the availability of domestic coking coal at a significant discount to Australian cargoes means that Chinese buyers are not looking to buy Australian cargoes at the moment.”<br/>
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Coal from Queensland’s Moranbah North mine, previously expected to arrive in February, has been delayed until March due to logistic issues, Ms Clarke said.<br/>
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Last week the Global Times claimed Chinese companies were “regaining confidence towards Australians goods” in light of improved diplomatic relations.<br/>
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“There is a speculation that the full resumption of Australian coal may take place in April,” it reported.<br/>
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Meanwhile, Australian Bureau of Statistics Trade data showed there was $16 billion in trade between Queensland and China in the 12 months ending January 31, up $3 billion on the previous 12 months.<br/>
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Trade Minister Don Farrell has been in India as part of the Prime Minister’s trade trip, but is understood to be seeking to follow up his recent virtual meeting with his Chinese counterpart with an in-person visit.<br/>
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<p class="asset asset-link">
	<a href="https://www.couriermail.com.au/news/queensland/qld-politics/2m-tonnes-of-aussie-coal-sent-to-china-full-resumption-next-month/news-story/cf9fb6877563a74aad6239c246befb37">https://www.couriermail.com.au/news/queensland/qld-politics/2m-tonnes-of-aussie-coal-sent-to-china-full-resumption-next-month/news-story/cf9fb6877563a74aad6239c246befb37</a>
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<br/>
<b> Australia Post recommences mail delivery to Alice Springs homes after meetings with NT Police</b><br/>
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Australia Post has recommenced delivering mail and parcels to hundreds of homes in Alice Springs, almost a fortnight after halting the service due to staff safety concerns.<br/>
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Following multiple allegedly violent attacks against a veteran postie, some residents in Sadadeen were notified that their mail would be redirected to the town&#39;s post office for collection.<br/>
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A spokesperson for the government-owned postal service confirmed deliveries would recommence from Monday following &quot;close consultation with local police and relevant authorities&quot;.<br/>
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&quot;We thank our customers for their understanding and appreciate the support of the community and local authorities to ensure the safety of our team members,&quot; the spokesperson said.<br/>
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The ABC understands a federal government minister&#39;s office was involved in meetings with NT Police to find a solution for impacted residents.<br/>
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The incidents that led to Australia Post&#39;s extraordinary decision allegedly involved rock-throwing and the use of a knife and occurred over a period of several months.<br/>
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It comes as NT Police report a significant drop in crime and anti-social behaviour in the central Australian town in the weeks following the implementation of strict new alcohol restrictions.<br/>
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NT Police Assistant Commissioner Martin Dole said the force was now working with Australia Post management to ensure posties could safely carry out deliveries throughout Alice Springs.<br/>
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&quot;The management of Australia Post made that decision to withdraw services without any consultation with NT Police, without asking us what we were doing in that space,&quot; he said.<br/>
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&quot;After some meetings with our management team and Australia Post, I think we&#39;ve reassured them that we are actively doing some proactive stuff in that space, and it should be a lot safer for their postal delivery workers.&quot;<br/>
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Assistant Commissioner Dole said there were additional &quot;concentrated efforts&quot; in the Sadadeen area, and police were working to identify those responsible for the alleged attacks.<br/>
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<p class="asset asset-link">
	<a href="https://www.msn.com/en-au/money/markets/australia-post-recommences-mail-delivery-to-alice-springs-homes-after-meetings-with-nt-police/ar-AA18xn7i">https://www.msn.com/en-au/money/markets/australia-post-recommences-mail-delivery-to-alice-springs-homes-after-meetings-with-nt-police/ar-AA18xn7i</a>
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12 March, 2023
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<b> ‘Too pretty to be Aboriginal’: Meet the model who wants to abolish our beauty ‘paradigm’</b><br/>
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<a class="asset-img-link"  style="display: inline;" href="https://static.ffx.io/images/$zoom_0.363%2C$multiply_1.9577%2C$ratio_1.5%2C$width_756%2C$x_27%2C$y_194/t_crop_custom/q_62%2Cf_auto/02105d5300b05390b17f721bf167e36d1edaa03b"><img class="asset  asset-image at-xid-6a00e008de3ffc883402b7519a2897200c img-responsive" alt="image from https://static.ffx.io/images/$zoom_0.363%2C$multiply_1.9577%2C$ratio_1.5%2C$width_756%2C$x_27%2C$y_194/t_crop_custom/q_62%2Cf_auto/02105d5300b05390b17f721bf167e36d1edaa03b" title="image from https://static.ffx.io/images/$zoom_0.363%2C$multiply_1.9577%2C$ratio_1.5%2C$width_756%2C$x_27%2C$y_194/t_crop_custom/q_62%2Cf_auto/02105d5300b05390b17f721bf167e36d1edaa03b" src="https://jonjayray1.typepad.com/.a/6a00e008de3ffc883402b7519a2897200c-580wi" /></a><br />
</p>
<i> Fat chance. Her looks are just average by normal Western standards. The Nordic ideal is heavily entrenched in Western minds: Narrow face and nose, fair skin, blue eyes and blonde hair. She has none of that. Her lips are rather fashionable, though.<br/>
<br/>
As I move around the shopping centres, nearly every young woman I see is wearing her hair long, straight and blonde. And few naturally have that hair colour. That is very clear evidence of how entrenched the Nordic ideal is. I can think of nothing that is likely to change it</i><br/>
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Sasha Kutabah Sarago has been a model, a magazine editor, a documentary maker and a writer: now, she describes herself as an abolisher of paradigms.<br/>
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The Wadjanbarra Yidinji, Jirrbal and African-American woman wants us to reject the idea of beauty perpetuated by corporations and across pop culture, and in her just released memoir, Gigorou, she details her mission for change.<br/>
<br/>
Through the book she traces her life as being surrounded by beauty, from her first job as an assistant at her mother’s salon to the revelation of seeing the black supermodels of the 1990s, then becoming a model herself. In reaction to that experience, she launched the first digital magazine for women of colour, Ascension, in 2011.<br/>
<br/>
“When I look at beauty... I look at it more through sovereign beauty,” she says. “What I was born into: how my community embraces me and nurtures me. If we all looked at where we come from and the beauty in who we are, the lineage, the bloodlines ... that’s where you abolish paradigms, or make the change.”<br/>
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To her mind, things have changed for the better since the Black Lives Matter movement and that informs her belief that change will only come from the individual, “Putting the onus on the government or the beauty industry, we set ourselves up to fail. You just have to look at how the system was built and then you’ll find your answer.”<br/>
<br/>
She questions what we’ve been fed by popular culture, folklore and the multi-billion-dollar Australian beauty industry - particularly how women of colour were told they were not beautiful for so long. “If you’ve ever dimmed your light or hated how you looked or searched for beauty in all the wrong places, this is the book for you,” she says.<br/>
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As a child of 11, she was told “you’re too pretty to be Aboriginal”. In those days, she says, “we internalised our shame and tried to reconcile it as best we could”. That ugly comment inspired her 2019 documentary of the same name.<br/>
<br/>
Researching the film, she spent time in the State Library of Victoria, going through shocking and offensive material about Indigenous women in articles from The Bulletin, People and even this newspaper, as well as in films, music, literature and advertising. “There seemed no limits to the colonial perversion that sullied our women; there was no room for her dignity,” she writes.<br/>
<br/>
Sarago writes as she speaks and although the book deals with many big and confronting issues, it is also very funny. When her aunt, who often travels alone in the bush, speaks of the ‘little man that travels with her and protects her’, she quips: “That’s where I draw the line. I don’t do spirits.”<br/>
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There’s also the experience she had dropping $1500 on a Louis Vuitton bag only to find it was completely impractical: handcream tarnished the leather handles, “finding clean surfaces for Louis to sit on, checking the weather to see if Louis could join me for the day... and where were the goddamn compartments?”<br/>
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At the opposite end of the spectrum are warnings about men with fetishes for Black women, and Harvey Weinstein-types who she says you’ll inevitably find in any industry that involves women and money.<br/>
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In Gigorou, Sarago reflects on her experience modelling and then a magazine editor. Those insights inform her firm belief that the system is inherently flawed. “Working for government in the past and in the corporate world to the fashion and beauty industry, I see how the machine works and I see how the game is played. So for me to thrive and to be able to make change, I have to extract myself from them. That’s why I talk about decolonising beauty. I talk about it with a First Nations perspective - after going through the mainstream and then trying to find my beauty or my self-worth through those systems, I’ve always failed.”<br/>
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“You’re working within a system that is designed to serve a certain group, so why would I go and play in that space again? And get burnt? It’s insanity, doing the same thing and expecting different results.”<br/>
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Her vision is bigger than just beauty - she underlines how much would be gained by Australian society if we were to embrace the world’s oldest living culture. Sarago speaks proudly about how her people operated before colonisation.<br/>
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“We had women’s business and men’s business... the symbiotic relationship and connectedness that everything had. There was a system of lore that would govern if things were out of discord, if there were boundaries that were stepped over. It was written over 60,000 years ago [and operated] until colonisation.”<br/>
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<p class="asset asset-link">
	<a href="https://www.brisbanetimes.com.au/culture/books/too-pretty-to-be-aboriginal-meet-the-model-who-wants-to-abolish-our-beauty-paradigm-20230307-p5cq42.html">https://www.brisbanetimes.com.au/culture/books/too-pretty-to-be-aboriginal-meet-the-model-who-wants-to-abolish-our-beauty-paradigm-20230307-p5cq42.html</a>
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<b> African attitudes come to Sydney</b><br/>
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<img src="https://img-s-msn-com.akamaized.net/tenant/amp/entityid/AA18rC2N.img?w=534&h=301&m=6&x=249&y=56&s=55&d=55">
<br/><br/>
A Sydney woman [from Sudan] who murdered a former boyfriend by crushing him against a wall with a car, has been sentenced to 20 years in prison for what a judge called a &quot;fatal explosion of emotion&quot;.<br/>
<br/>
Jackline Sabana Bona Musa, 47, was found guilty by a jury last year after a trial in the NSW Supreme Court over the June 2020 death of Payman &quot;Paul&quot; Thagipur.<br/>
<br/>
The court heard Musa received no response to a heartfelt text message one morning and drove around looking for Mr Thagipur, before going to his Wentworth Point apartment.<br/>
<br/>
There, she found another woman in his bed, spat in his face and left.<br/>
<br/>
In the building&#39;s car park, Musa fatally pinned Mr Thagipur against a wall after driving at him in a Toyota Kluger.<br/>
<br/>
Justice Richard Button on Friday said Musa and the victim had been in a romantic relationship, but its true nature was somewhat unclear.<br/>
<br/>
What was clear, he said, was that Musa&#39;s feelings for Mr Thagipur were much stronger than his.<br/>
<br/>
The judge found she &quot;spontaneously&quot; formed an intention to inflict serious harm in a matter of seconds. &quot;His final ordeal was short, but terrifying, and he surely died in enormous pain,&quot; Justice Button said in sentencing. &quot;What occurred was a deeply self-centred imposition of violence on a fellow human being.&quot;<br/>
<br/>
Musa was handed a maximum term of 20 years in prison, with a non-parole period of 14 years.<br/>
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<p class="asset asset-link">
	<a href="https://www.msn.com/en-au/news/australia/jackline-musa-jailed-for-20-years-for-crushing-ex-partner-with-car-after-finding-him-with-another-woman/ar-AA18rQvO">https://www.msn.com/en-au/news/australia/jackline-musa-jailed-for-20-years-for-crushing-ex-partner-with-car-after-finding-him-with-another-woman/ar-AA18rQvO</a>
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<br/>
<b> Dramatic scenes as anti-transgender groups and LGBTQI campaigners clash in a park where controversial UK &#39;transphobe&#39; Kellie-Jay Keen started her speaking tour of Australia</b><br/>
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<i> There should be no special rights or privileges for sexual minorities</i><br/>
<br/>
Anti-trans rights groups clashed with LGBTQ+ activists as hundreds of protestors descended on Sydney&#39;s Victoria Park on Saturday.<br/>
<br/>
UK-based activist Kellie-Jay Keen, who also goes by the name Posie Parker online, has travelled to Australia for a series of anti-trans rallies.<br/>
<br/>
Her presence in Sydney is being protested by trans advocacy groups with loud chants of: &#39;Posie Parker you cant hide, you&#39;ve got Nazis on your side&#39; and &#39;TERFS go home&#39; as she took the stage.<br/>
<br/>
Ms Keen, a self-described transphobe, believes it&#39;s impossible to change gender and campaigns to exclude trans women from female-only spaces.<br/>
<br/>
She also argues that trans people should be &quot;dead named&quot; and not have the right to chose their own pronouns.<br/>
<br/>
Tensions threatened to boil over towards the end of rally but a strong police presence including mounted cops stopped it.<br/>
<br/>
Chants of &#39;bigots gone and anti-queer TERFS are not welcome here&#39; were shouted by LGBTQ+ groups while Ms Keen spoke to crowds.<br/>
<br/>
TERF is an acronym for trans-exclusionary radical feminist and describes those whose views on gender identity are hostile to transgender people and who oppose social and political policies designed to be inclusive of transgender people.<br/>
<br/>
Speaking at the rally, Ms Keen, dressed in a white jumpsuit with &#39;WOMAN&#39; emblazoned across it, described trans women as &#39;men&#39; and said they are &#39;upset they can&#39;t wear dresses because they&#39;ve never been told no before&#39;.<br/>
<br/>
She added that when people say they &#39;believe in trans rights&#39; what they are actually saying is &#39;men should be in girls spaces and play girls sports&#39;.<br/>
<br/>
The campaigner added that trans people are trying to take &#39;every tiny little bit of the world that women have carved for ourselves&#39; and described trans men as &#39;human shields for the fetishisers&#39;.<br/>
<br/>
She also sang to crowds, saying it was a &#39;wonderful day to be a TERF&#39; and said that the LGBTQ+ groups made &#39;even menopausal women look sane&#39;.<br/>
<br/>
The right-wing speaker added the &#39;pornifcation of society&#39; is making &#39;AGP people breed like rabbits&#39;.<br/>
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AGP is a term used by anti-trans groups referring to autogynephilia, a pseudoscientific concept describing a man&#39;s propensity to be sexually aroused by the thought of himself as a female.<br/>
<br/>
After her speech, Ms Keen gave the microphone to other protesters, with one claiming her teenage granddaughter &#39;is depressed&#39; because her &#39;teachers are trying to convince her she is a trans man&#39;.<br/>
<br/>
Australian TERF groups were there in support of Ms Keen, including divisive Liberal candidate Katherine Deves who told crowds: &#39;We will not be silenced. We will stand our ground. I am still fighting the fight.<br/>
<br/>
She added that trans groups &#39;deny women and girls the right to language&#39; and &#39;male free spaces&#39;.<br/>
<br/>
&#39;We see them coming for the children. We see them coming for families. We now have state intrusion into our home and our families. &#39;And parents have been told they will be criminalised if I try to defend their children.<br/>
<br/>
&#39;Race in our education system that is trying to indoctrinate our children into this way of thinking.&#39;<br/>
<br/>
Ms Keen has come under fierce criticism from many groups in the past, including for allegedly posing with a campaigner who celebrated Winnie Mandela&#39;s death and called the anti-apartheid fighter &#39;a whore&#39; and &#39;white farmer murdering c***&#39;.<br/>
<br/>
She has also been slammed by a British MP for saying access to abortion and contraceptives need to be rolled back for children and teenagers.<br/>
<br/>
Ms Keen raised eyebrows recently after she criticised British MP Jess Phillips for reading out the name of a teenage trans murder victim Brianna Ghey in the House of Commons during an International Women&#39;s Day speech.<br/>
<br/>
She has also spoken alongside a number of figures in far-right groups, including Christopher Barcenas, a member of the Proud Boys, who was deposed by the US government due to his presence at the January 6 Capitol riots.<br/>
<br/>
Pride in Protest activists as well as National Union of Students were among the counter protesters in the inner Sydney park.<br/>
<br/>
The National Union of Students has also called for a series of counter-protests against Ms Keen.<br/>
<br/>
 Speaking on 2GB with breakfast host Ben Fordham on Friday , Ms Keen described herself as a &#39;transphobe&#39; but argued that she&#39;s &#39;not scary&#39; because she&#39;s &#39;really small&#39;.<br/>
<br/>
She argued people had &#39;attempted to cancel her&#39; and that she &#39;does nothing to invite controversy&#39; but she&#39;s &#39;so influential, trouble follows her&#39;.<br/>
<br/>
When asked by Fordham why people were scared of her, Ms Keen said: &#39;It&#39;s my ability to speak directly and speak the truth.<br/>
<br/>
&#39;I think that&#39;s quite frightening for some people. We&#39;ve lost the ability both in the UK and Australia and elsewhere, to just speak plainly, just just to speak the truth.&#39;<br/>
<br/>
&#39;In today&#39;s money, because being transphobic means that you say &quot;a woman doesn&#39;t have a penis&quot;, and probably I am a transphobic.&#39;<br/>
<br/>
When asked if she&#39;s an anti-trans activist, she replied: &#39;I am a woman&#39;s right activist&#39; and that she defines a woman as an &#39;adult human female&#39;.<br/>
<br/>
&#39;Because so many people are complete cowards, social media has been able to manifest into a mass silencing tool,&#39; Ms Keen added.<br/>
<br/>
&#39;There&#39;s a weird social currency of acceptance. And I think underpinning that is really not caring at all about women.&#39;<br/>
<br/>

<p class="asset asset-link">
	<a href="https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-11846879/Anti-trans-groups-clash-LGBTQ-campaigners-Sydney.html">https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-11846879/Anti-trans-groups-clash-LGBTQ-campaigners-Sydney.html</a>
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<br/>
<b> Why the gender pay gap theory just doesn’t add up</b><br/>
<br/>
JUDITH SLOAN<br/>
<br/>
As International Women’s Day approaches each year, there is the usual flood of commentary on how badly women are doing in the workforce and the persistent gender pay gap. I tend to take as little notice as possible because most of the material is highly misleading.<br/>
<br/>
Consider the inevitable press release of the Workplace Gender Equality Agency. We are told “the national gender pay gap is 13.3 per cent … and this means women earn $253.50 less than men every single week as a result of gender”. Take it from me, this does not mean that at all: women do not earn less than men just because they are women.<br/>
<br/>
The staff at the agency should really know better than to put out such a deceptive release. To be sure, there is grudging recognition by the agency that the gender pay gap is actually the lowest it has ever been. But I guess if you want to maintain relevance, such an admission needs to be well-hidden.<br/>
<br/>
The gender-pay gap between full-time working women and men is at… its lowest ratio “it’s ever been” according to figures from the “insidious sounding” Workplace Gender Equality Agency, says The Australian’s Contributing Economics Editor Judith Sloan. “We know what affects earnings – things like industry, occupation, qualifications, job tenure,” More<br/>
Recall here that it is a legal requirement in Australia that equal pay applies to the same job. This has been the case for decades. What it means is that it doesn’t matter whether the worker is male or female, the same rate of pay applies to the job.<br/>
<br/>
If you really want to understand why the gross gender pay gap is what it is – and at least the WGEA uses full-time earnings, which avoids hours of work, at least to a degree, contaminating the result – it is necessary to account for the factors known to affect earnings. These include industry, occupation, qualifications and job tenure. Economists undertake this sort of multivariate analysis all the time.<br/>
<br/>
When this is done, the gender pay gap almost disappears. And rather than industry and occupation contributing to women earning less than men, in Australia’s case, the impact of regulated wages is actually to inflate the earnings of women relative to men.<br/>
<br/>
What is often forgotten in the debate is that many men have low-paid jobs – think here delivery drivers and labourers – where wages are low and not well-regulated.<br/>
<br/>
Research by University of Sydney economics professor Deborah Cobb-Clark has demonstrated that the occupational/industry gender segmentation actually lifts the relative pay of women in Australia, with all the gender pay action occurring at higher earnings.<br/>
<br/>
Of course, industry and occupational gender segmentation – some industries/occupations are female-dominated, others male-dominated – may offend feminists who would rather see a more even spread of the sexes. It is interesting that the degree of segmentation has changed little across time and, in some cases, has become more extreme – teaching is an example that has become more feminised.<br/>
<br/>
But this is a different issue to the gender pay gap. Care also needs to be paid to directing – or even attempting to direct – women into occupations or industries that may not be their first preference just because this is seen as progress by policy-oriented feminists. Let’s face it, it doesn’t suit everyone to have a fly-in, fly-out job in the Pilbara. The pay may be great but the sacrifices to family life may be too high for some women (and men) to contemplate.<br/>
<br/>
The overseas literature on the gender pay gap is fairly conclusive: notwithstanding the narrowing of the pay gap in many countries, its persistence is essentially the result of women’s dislike of jobs that involve long and unpredictable hours as well as work travel. This is the firm conclusion of Harvard University economics professor Claudia Goldin, who is the standout researcher in this field.<br/>
<br/>
A recent Swedish study has shown that women’s pay in that country is still not 100 per cent of men’s notwithstanding the vast array of pro-women arrangements, including extended paid parental leave schemes for both parents, flexible working arrangements and highly subsidised childcare. Again the issue is the preference for women to have work arrangements that suit their family situations and to drive work-life balance.<br/>
<br/>
One of the issues that has been in the news lately is the much lower superannuation balances of women relative to men, including on retirement. This, of course, follows from the earnings-related nature of superannuation and the lower lifetime earnings that many women earn compared with men.<br/>
<br/>
By law, however, superannuation is a joint asset of a marriage/partnership and in the event of divorce/separation, the asset is split on a 50-50 basis unless otherwise agreed. In fact, when John Howard was prime minister, consideration was given as to whether couples could set up joint accounts into which employer contributions would be made. It was decided at that time that taxation and other complications made it too difficult.<br/>
<br/>
The reality is that many decisions are made by couples to balance their family and financial needs. Across time, many men have become much more involved in household and child-rearing duties than was once the case. It’s fine for advocates to recommend even more involvement, including men making more use of paid parental leave. But at the end of the day, these are private decisions.<br/>
<br/>
Would adding superannuation contributions to paid parental leave make much difference? Some private firms already do this. In fact, it would make only a slight difference to the final superannuation balances achieved by women – this was demonstrated in the 2020 Callaghan retirement income review. Subject to fiscal pressures, it could still be worth doing.<br/>
<br/>
There is a lot to celebrate in terms of women’s role in the labour market. Female workforce participation is at a historic high and the gender pay gap is at a historic low. Those two facts alone could make eating a cupcake worthwhile.<br/>
<br/>

<p class="asset asset-link">
	<a href="https://www.theaustralian.com.au/inquirer/why-the-gender-pay-gap-theory-just-doesnt-add-up/news-story/d6779529872c1f23bd527a76fd408c5c">https://www.theaustralian.com.au/inquirer/why-the-gender-pay-gap-theory-just-doesnt-add-up/news-story/d6779529872c1f23bd527a76fd408c5c</a>
</p>
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<br/>
<br/>
<br/>


10 March, 2023
<br/><br/> 

<b> Greens off on another planet: Today’s Greens make their predecessors look sensible</b><br/><br>
Judith Sloan<br/>
<br/>
It was the formidable Labor finance minister, Peter Walsh, who first described the Greens as akin to fairies at the bottom on the garden. He held their idealistic and unrealistic ideas in complete contempt. In his view, the Greens’ way was a highway to penury, particularly for those on the lowest incomes.<br/>
<br/>
He was also suspicious of their environmental methods, claiming, for instance, that the failure to maintain national parks by clearing, weeding and regular burn-offs would simply lead to devastating bushfires and an extraordinary loss of environmental benefits.<br/>
<br/>
Fast-forward through the intervening decades and it would seem that the Greens have moved on from the bottom of the garden and are now flying in an entirely parallel universe where the practicalities of running a government completely elude them. Indeed, from today’s perspective, former Greens leader, Bob Brown, appears almost sensible; OK, at least he was living on Planet Earth when he was in parliament – at least most of the time.<br/>
<br/>
Today’s cohort of Greens parliamentarians has less connection with the environmental movement – saving forests and endangered species, etc, (although they are obsessed with climate change) – and more connection with hard-left political stances. They support big government, high taxation, anti-capitalism and favourable treatment for all minority groups. Sadly, most of them can’t even spell freedom.<br/>
<br/>
The Greens are now led by the unappealing Adam Bandt who comfortably holds the seat of Melbourne, home to woke types, students and some doctors’ wives. There is no prospect of Labor wresting this seat from the Greens and the adjoining ones are always at risk of being lost to some former teacher turned climate activist.<br/>
<br/>
Of course, it’s been great sport watching the antics of Lidia Thorpe, former Greens senator for Victoria. For those in the Greens party room, it must have been like having a rabid dog running around, incapable of being controlled. Even though Bandt assures us he did everything he could to keep her in the party, one suspects that there were a few sighs of relief when she decided to quit and become an independent senator.<br/>
<br/>
Even so, she probably continues to inflict damage on her former party through her opposition to the Voice on the basis it doesn’t go far enough – truth-telling and treaties are the only road for her – and her antics at the recent Pride March in Sydney.<br/>
<br/>
What is the point of lying on the road and stopping the procession of a float? It escapes me, although she was evidently making a point about the brutal and discriminatory behaviour of the police force. Luckily, the attending police officers had no hesitation moving her on.<br/>
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Thorpe has zero chance of being re-elected to the Senate as an independent, but she will be in office for some time still, creating mayhem and damaging the Greens – maybe that’s not such a bad thing.<br/>
<br/>
But let me get back to the chasm that the Greens deliberately create by advocating much higher government spending while calling for all sorts of perverse measures, up to and including the banning of coal and gas projects. Without these projects, there is no prospect there will be sufficient revenue to fund their over-the-top spending aspirations.<br/>
<br/>
The Greens’ wish list is close to endless: free childcare, free TAFE and university, free dental care, higher dole, higher rental assistance, more public housing, more public transport, more spending on government schools, more foreign aid and on and on it goes.<br/>
<br/>
Unless you believe that government spending is costless and never-ending – OK, for a while the crazy advocates of Modern Monetary Theory held sway until the ugly face of inflation reared its head and the interest payable on government debt began to rise – the Greens cannot escape that perennial political question: how are you going to pay for it?<br/>
<br/>
But here’s the thing: the main reason Australia is not completely in the fiscal dog-house is the surging company tax revenues from mining companies and high commodity prices. Now I know some Speccie readers are a little bit allergic to numbers, but bear with me if I point out a few simple facts.<br/>
<br/>
Take iron ore, which is a mainstay of our budget. For every $US10 increase in the price of iron ore per tonne, there is a lift of $600 million in company tax receipts. The high prices of coal, both thermal and coking, as well as liquefied natural gas, have similarly led to rapid growth in company tax receipts.<br/>
<br/>
At the time of the election last year, the Treasury expected company tax revenue for 2022-23 to come in at a tad over $90 billion. It now expects it to be $127 billion – a jump of nearly one third. Company tax revenue is now at an historic high which, in turn, is mainly because of the surging tax being paid by the mining companies so reviled by the Greens.<br/>
<br/>
Talk about contradictory: it’s not just having your cake and eating it too; it’s about having the whole bakery. This underscores my conclusion that the Greens are now living on a different planet rather than partying at the bottom of the garden. They want to shut down most of the resource sector but think that government spending can be jacked up big-time.<br/>
<br/>
And let’s not forget here that federal Labor already has substantial spending plans. Next financial year, it expects to spend $666 billion and in 2025-26, the figure is $729 billion, an increase of over 9 per cent in real terms. The Greens’ ambitions are in addition to this increase.<br/>
<br/>
Don’t get me onto some of the other proposals from the Greens. The geniuses in the party think that imposing national rental controls is the answer to our housing rental crisis. The fact that the attractiveness of residential real estate for investors has declined is regarded as neither here nor there by them. And this is before the full impact of the higher cost of investment loans.<br/>
<br/>
They also want to achieve net zero by 2035, think that the ambition of B1(Climate Change and Energy Minister, Chris Bowen) to reduce emissions by 43 per cent by 2030 is woefully inadequate and want 100-per-cent renewable energy by the end of the decade. In Bernie Sanders’ style, they think that ‘taxing the billionaires and big corporations’ will release oceans of revenue and a 6 per cent annual wealth tax is the way to go.<br/>
<br/>
Walshy must be spinning in his grave; he would surely conclude that the dotty Greens of his era were sensible pragmatists compared to today’s loopy lot.<br/>
<br/>

<p class="asset asset-link">
	<a href="https://www.spectator.com.au/2023/03/greens-off-on-another-planet/">https://www.spectator.com.au/2023/03/greens-off-on-another-planet/</a>
</p>
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<b> Pervasive greenwashing apparent</b><br/>
<br/>
A quick look on the websites of some of Australia&#39;s largest companies — from fossil fuel and electricity providers, to telecommunications and banks — shows many are &quot;certified carbon neutral&quot;.<br/>
<br/>
National Australia Bank (NAB) claims to be the country&#39;s &quot;first carbon-neutral bank&quot;, Cooper Energy claims to be &quot;Australia&#39;s first carbon-neutral domestic gas supplier&quot;, and Telstra is certified for its &quot;business operations, and its retail electricity and gas products&quot;.<br/>
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Their carbon-neutral credentials come from Climate Active — a government-backed program that started life as the National Carbon Offset Standard in 2010, and as &quot;Greenhouse Friendly&quot; before that.<br/>
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Climate Active claims to oversee one of the world&#39;s &quot;most rigorous&quot; carbon neutral certifications.<br/>
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According to its website, the program assists businesses in reducing their greenhouse gas emissions, and that by &quot;supporting businesses with the Climate Active trademark, you are supporting climate action&quot;.<br/>
<br/>
But critics say the government-backed body is engaging in &quot;greenwashing&quot; — providing environmentally friendly cover for polluting industries to carry on with business as usual, while giving the impression they&#39;re taking meaningful action on climate change.<br/>
<br/>
The devil in the details<br/>
<br/>
On NAB&#39;s website, there&#39;s a page dedicated to the company&#39;s track record on, and ambitions for, climate action.<br/>
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&quot;In 2010, we became the first Australian-owned bank to achieve carbon neutrality under the Climate Active (then National Carbon Offset Standard (NCOS)) Carbon Neutral Program,&quot; reads a description on the bank&#39;s Environment and Climate Change page.<br/>
<br/>
But Polly Hemming of the Australia Institute says what the bank is referring to, and what the average person on the street might interpret their statement to mean, aren&#39;t necessarily the same thing.<br/>
<br/>
In February, lawyers acting for the Australia Institute lodged a complaint with the Australian Competition and Consumer Commission (ACCC), asking the ACCC to investigate whether the Climate Active trademark program, including its use by companies involved with the program, was misleading or deceptive under Australian Consumer Law.<br/>
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Melbourne Law School economist and former chair of the ACCC Allan Fels says some of the complaints made by the Australia Institute against Climate Active, and potentially some of the companies using their accreditation, will be looked at seriously by the ACCC.<br/>
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&quot;One of the claims about deceptive conduct looks fairly persuasive,&quot; he says.<br/>
<br/>
Against Climate Active in particular, Professor Fels says it must be established whether they&#39;re engaged in trade or commerce, and therefore covered by Australian consumer law.<br/>
<br/>
&quot;Climate Active receives significant income from certificates and other things. Is that enough to constitute trade or commerce?<br/>
<br/>
&quot;In a sense, it&#39;s a good test case for that.&quot;<br/>
<br/>
Part of the Australia Institute&#39;s criticism stems from what, under the Climate Active certification system, is termed &quot;emissions boundaries&quot; — things that are inside or outside of consideration, depending on the type of certification being granted.<br/>
<br/>
In the case of NAB, their certification type is listed under &quot;organisation&quot;. Inside their emissions boundary are things like office electricity use, vehicle fuel and office paper.<br/>
<br/>
But outside their boundary are international emissions, emissions from the use of the products they sell, from downstream leased assets, capital goods, investments and lending — including to fossil fuel expansion projects.<br/>
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A report from Market Forces in 2021 estimated that the lifetime emissions from fossil fuel projects funded by NAB between 2016 and 2020 will run into the billions of tonnes.<br/>
<br/>
In short, only a part of NAB&#39;s total operations are carbon neutral. And it&#39;s a similar story for many other Climate Active-certified banks.<br/>
<br/>
Gas exploration and development (mining) company Cooper Energy also displays its carbon-neutral certification prominently on its website and in sustainability reports, and claims to be Australia&#39;s first carbon-neutral domestic gas supplier.<br/>
<br/>
Again though, that&#39;s carbon neutrality for the organisation and doesn&#39;t include &quot;downstream processing of products by customers, downstream transmission and distribution of products by customers, or downstream combustion of products by customers and consumers&quot;.<br/>
<br/>
In other words, it doesn&#39;t include the burning of their gas, which they produce &quot;exclusively for Australia&#39;s east coast market&quot;.<br/>
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The things outside these companies&#39; emissions boundaries mostly fall under what are termed scope 3 emissions — emissions outside the direct control of the company.<br/>
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They often add up to a much larger footprint than the direct emissions of a business, which are known as scope 1 and 2.<br/>
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Scope 3 emissions are also generally the hardest to get down.<br/>
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Most certified brands acknowledge, though sometimes in finer print, the limitations of their certification, and Climate Active details the emissions boundaries for each of its certified brands in annual reports.<br/>
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And Climate Active&#39;s classifications, including for organisational carbon neutral certification, are based on Australian and international standards, such as the National Greenhouse and Energy Reporting scheme and the Greenhouse Gas Protocol.<br/>
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But Climate Active also claims to be helping consumers make informed, climate-friendly choices.<br/>
<br/>
Ms Hemming says instead, the carbon neutral certification is potentially misleading consumers.<br/>
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&quot;You really have to go quite deep into the certification. You have to understand different terminology in relation to carbon accounting — scopes, supply chains, downstream emissions.<br/>
<br/>
&quot;That&#39;s a pretty unreasonable ask of a consumer.&quot;<br/>
<br/>
According to polling by the Australia Institute last month, nearly 60 per cent of the 1,012 people surveyed said that all emissions from a business&#39;s &quot;operations, products and services&quot; should be included in claims of carbon neutrality.<br/>
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&quot;A majority of people said a carbon-neutral organisation is an organisation that has offset its products, processes and investments,&quot; Ms Hemming said.<br/>
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Professor Fels says Australian law about greenwashing covers claims that are &quot;misleading or deceptive in the mind of the consumer&quot;.<br/>
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&quot;It doesn&#39;t matter what the intention of the person issuing the statement is, it&#39;s how an ordinary consumer would interpret it.<br/>
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&quot;The ordinary consumer doesn&#39;t have a great technical knowledge, and you would take that into account.&quot;<br/>
<br/>

<p class="asset asset-link">
	<a href="https://www.abc.net.au/news/science/2023-03-10/carbon-neutral-emissions-climate-active-greenwashing-companies/101991904">https://www.abc.net.au/news/science/2023-03-10/carbon-neutral-emissions-climate-active-greenwashing-companies/101991904</a>
</p>
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<br/>
<b> British rail expert backs push for upgrades to &#39;rather decayed&#39; Canberra to Sydney train line</b><br/>
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A British rail expert has described the train line from Sydney to Canberra as &quot;rather decayed&quot; and thrown his support behind calls to upgrade it to cut travel times between the two cities.<br/>
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The train journey between the national capital and Sydney currently takes more than four hours, making it far slower than travelling by bus, car or plane.<br/>
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Three years ago, Infrastructure Australia estimated only 1 per cent of people making the trip used rail.<br/>
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Professor Andrew McNaughton, the chair of the authority that manages Britain&#39;s high-speed rail line, recently examined the route as part of a yet-to-be-released fast rail strategy delivered to the New South Wales government.<br/>
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He said basic improvements to the track, such as straightening out bends, could reduce the journey to roughly three hours, which would be comparable to travelling by road.<br/>
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Professor McNaughton said he believed this would lead to increased demand and more frequent trains, taking cars off the Federal and Hume highways and helping build the case for a new high-speed rail line in coming decades.<br/>
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&quot;Most of it is just about basic infrastructure management to get a decent railway out of what you&#39;ve got,&quot; Professor McNaughton said.<br/>
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&quot;Traffic will build up. More people will elect to go by rail, particularly if it&#39;s a decent quality service.&quot;<br/>
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ACT Chief Minister Andrew Barr has long urged the NSW and federal governments to fund improvements to the 320-kilometre-long track, which winds around hills and was built to 19th-century freight train requirements.<br/>
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In 2017, Mr Barr took the train to Sydney to illustrate his point, and his journey took even longer when his service got stuck behind a freight train.<br/>
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&quot;[The track] is like a canal, it goes all over the place to keep gradients down,&quot; Professor McNaughton said.<br/>
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&quot;If you want serious journey time you need something pretty straight that goes up and down the hills.&quot;<br/>
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In 2020, the line was added to Infrastructure Australia&#39;s priority list for upgrades, including potential straightening and duplication.<br/>
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NSW Transport says about 18,900 passengers per month travelled on the route over the past year, which was roughly in line with pre-COVID levels.<br/>
<br/>

<p class="asset asset-link">
	<a href="https://www.abc.net.au/news/2023-03-10/british-rail-expert-back-push-upgrade-canberra-sydney-train-line/102076296">https://www.abc.net.au/news/2023-03-10/british-rail-expert-back-push-upgrade-canberra-sydney-train-line/102076296</a>
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<b> More control over your electricity usage coming</b><br/>
<br/>
The Albanese government and the Greens have a hidden agenda and it’s not good for you. Why you might ask did the Greens demand as their trade-off for supporting the government imposing price caps on gas, that the government provide tax-payer funded subsidies to get households to get rid of their gas appliances and go all electric. You might also wonder just why there is such a rush for electric cars. The two are connected.<br/>
<br/>
AEMO (Australian Energy Market Operator) publishes information that provides some answers but it never gets publicly discussed. The fact is that part of the government’s plan involves use of devices owned by you. The plan is called the Distributed Energy Resources Program or simply DER and it’s designed to suck up your stored energy. That is the energy stored in for example your car battery, your solar panels and your domestic battery storage system. The plan is to allow AEMO to fill shortages of electricity in the grid with your stored energy and ration your use of electricity by turning off your hot water system or air-conditioner through your smart meter which you will be required to have.<br/>
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The push for electric cars is about making more battery storage available – not to improve your driving experience. As long as your car battery is charged up at home, it’s ready to have its stored energy siphoned off. All of this is known to the cognoscenti but totally unknown to everyday Australians being fed a constant diet of propaganda as to how cheap and simple renewable energy is.<br/>
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And then there is the inevitable new database ready to hack – and thereby compromise – all of your DER devices so they can source your stored energy.<br/>
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AEMO describes DERs as, ‘consumer-owned devices that as individual units can generate or store electricity or have the “smarts” to actively manage energy demand’. It then lists examples of DERs as rooftop solar photovoltaic units, wind generating units – residential or commercial, battery storage systems, pool pumps and air-conditioners, smart appliances and electric vehicles.<br/>
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AEMO describes its desired two-way energy system stating ‘DER devices are “plugged in” to the energy grid with the objective of secure and reliable power for all’. In other words, it is admitting the grid needs a base-load energy resource and how your car battery and other devices will provide it.<br/>
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This is where the Greens demand for subsidies to get people out of their gas appliances fits in. You cannot plug in gas-powered devices so they want people to have electric devices that are available for their stored energy to be fed into the grid. This cannot be done with gas hot water systems, nor can this happen with a car with an internal combustion engine but it certainly can with an electric car battery.<br/>
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Much is speculated about the importance and potential success of big batteries termed BESS (Battery Energy Storage Systems) or ‘grid-scale’ batteries, a term which might cause one to believe they are something large and special but they are not. In the words of AEMO they ‘consist of rows of domestic or lithium batteries installed together’.<br/>
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In their grand plan, these systems are seen as essential to the wish to move off fossil fuels, but the language is aspirational and hopeful for the future, not concrete or factual. Quotes from AEMO clearly show this:<br/>
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‘New innovations in technology are overcoming limitations… as technical innovation expands storage capacity, batteries will be able to deliver power for longer periods of time’. ‘The 300 MW battery to be completed in Geelong will have the theoretical capacity to service the average needs of 400,000 household for one hour’. ‘System strength and system restart are two key services provided by coal/synchronous generations that are not currently provided by batteries. However, as technology improves, and with sufficient batteries installed they may be able to take on this role with the potential to operate as a vertical synchronous machine’.<br/>
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This they hope will take on some of the role of coal-fired power stations which provide over 60 per cent of our power needs.<br/>
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All this just confirms the technology to get rid of base-load power provided by coal and gas does not exist. There are hopes and aspirations that it might in the future but at what cost, inconvenience and risks to households and businesses alike? AEMO’s forecast demand for 2030 and 2050 is that maximum demand is for 44 gigawatts for 2030 and 55 gigawatts by 2050. The cost estimates for achieving this through a grid powered by renewables are eye-watering and estimated in the trillions – and in the words of Mark Mills of the Manhattan Institute ‘is just an exercise in magical thinking’.<br/>
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Having access to capacity to store energy in individually owned personal devices is essential to the government and Greens dream to rid Australia of fossil fuels which we will continue to export as it pays our nation’s bills.<br/>
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The estimated capacity is 69 gigawatts of power from rooftop solar panels and 31 gigawatts from domestic and electric vehicles with charged-up batteries ready to be siphoned off by a government agency. DER scenarios require the owners of these devices to foot the bill and the more batteries that are cycled the more they wear out.<br/>
<br/>
The DER program is designed to try and fill the gaps in the dream or fantasy of having Australia’s homes and businesses powered by wind and solar. Thousands of square meters covered by panels (which, along with the thousands of windmills, have a limited life-span and are thus all destined for landfill) will not give households and businesses all the power that is needed. Even the addition of hugely expensive grid-connected power generators, 13,200 km of new transmission lines, Snowy Hydro 2.0, new pumped storage schemes, grid stabilisation controls, cost of property leasing, and transmission line rights of way still won’t keep the lights on.<br/>
<br/>
By closing coal-fired power stations prematurely, restricting gas exploration and generation, and refusing to entertain nuclear solutions, the politicians forcing this upon the nation without telling the truth of what is entailed place individuals and the nation at great risk.<br/>
<br/>

<p class="asset asset-link">
	<a href="https://www.spectator.com.au/2023/03/now-albo-wants-your-electricity-too/">https://www.spectator.com.au/2023/03/now-albo-wants-your-electricity-too/</a>
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<br><br/>


9 March, 2023
<br/><br/> 
<b> Super funds add to ‘too high’ fees by using expensive external managers</b><br/>
<br/>
<i> This is precisely why I manage my own retirement investments. A small percentage in fees every year can soon wipe out any gains.</i><br/>
<br/>
Super funds are spending more than $2.5 billion of members’ money annually on top end of town fund managers, adding to fees that experts say are too high by world standards.<br/>
<br/>
Official statistics show that over the eight years to 2022, super funds streamed $18.2bn from retirement savers to fund managers, part of a $45.3bn bonanza enjoyed by an army of administrators, consultants, lawyers and other service providers hired by the sector.<br/>
<br/>
Last year just one investment manager, IFM Investors, which is owned by union and employer-controlled industry super funds, collected $412m in fees from its hundreds of clients.<br/>
<br/>
Experts question whether super funds are getting value for members’ money when they pay external fund managers to direct investments rather than taking care of it in house.<br/>
<br/>
They say reducing fees, which currently average about 1 per cent of super balances, is more urgent than the Albanese government’s proposal to enshrine a purpose for super in legislation – something Treasurer Jim Chalmers last month said would enable more investment in nation building projects.<br/>
<br/>
Xavier O’Halloran, the head of Super Consumers Australia, said that while it was important to have a debate about what superannuation was for “in terms of the here and now and what the trustees are delivering, this focus on fees is really important”.<br/>
<br/>
“It will put more money in the savings accounts of people, ultimately, which is going to lift the performance of the system overall.”<br/>
<br/>
Disclosure documents show that the country’s top three super funds – AustralianSuper, Australian Retirement Trust (ART) and Aware Super – use dozens of external investment advisers including Seek co-founder Paul Bassat’s tech group, Square Peg, investment bank Macquarie Group – dubbed the “millionaire’s factory” due to its high executive pay – and IFM Investors, which is itself owned by a group of industry super funds.<br/>
<br/>
The biggest fund, AustralianSuper, paid $669m in investment expenses last year, while ART paid $350m and Aware paid $479m.<br/>
<br/>
According to Canstar data, the highest-fee fund in Australia is Perpetual Select, which charges $1024, or 2.05 per cent, to manage $50,000 in super savings, and last year lost members 6.1 per cent.<br/>
<br/>
For the same balance the lowest-fee option, REST Super, charged just $133, or 0.27 per cent, but performance was worse with the fund shedding 8.5 per cent of its value.<br/>
<br/>
Canstar executive Steve Mickenberger said it was questionable whether external investment managers were doing a better job picking stocks than index funds that simply track the market at large.<br/>
<br/>
“When you look at the returns from some funds, you’ve got to scratch your head and say, ‘Are they doing better than the index over an extended period’,” he said.<br/>
<br/>
“And now we’ve published the five-year returns and you can see that there are some index funds that are performing pretty well.”<br/>
<br/>
He said funds that invested directly in property and infrastructure, such as toll roads, tended to do well. Funds with lower fees also generally did better because taking out fees reduces the amount available to invest.<br/>
<br/>
Canstar’s data shows that average fees for mainstream MySuper funds fell from 1.27 per cent in January 2019 to 1.06 per cent in January this year.<br/>
<br/>
The fall follows the introduction of performance tests in 2021 as part of the Morrison government’s Your Future Your Super package that have forced funds with sub par returns to merge with better operators.<br/>
<br/>
However, Mr O’Halloran said fees should be further reduced. “If you look at the tens of billions of dollars it’s costing to run Australia’s superannuation system, I think there’s still more value to be had,” he said. “Any of that value goes directly back into people’s retirement balances.”<br/>
<br/>
Fund performance tests currently only cover the simpler MySuper funds, which hold about half Australia’s $3.3tn super nest egg, and exclude so-called “choice” funds, which hold the rest and typically offer retirement savers a long list of investment options.<br/>
<br/>
Mr O’Halloran said this meant choice funds have been “able to get away with charging exorbitant fees without any real proper checks and balances in place”.<br/>
<br/>
“We know the government is reviewing right now whether and how to expand the performance says to the choice segment – we’re really encouraging them to get on with the job because we know there are significant cost savings that will flow from that,” he said.<br/>
<br/>

<p class="asset asset-link">
	<a href="https://www.couriermail.com.au/news/national/super-funds-add-to-too-high-fees-by-using-expensive-external-managers/news-story/e54effe2b946840385f13023ee6f3400">https://www.couriermail.com.au/news/national/super-funds-add-to-too-high-fees-by-using-expensive-external-managers/news-story/e54effe2b946840385f13023ee6f3400</a>
</p>
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<br/>
<b> Changing climate change: debunking the global colossus</b><br/>
<br/>
Mark Imisides<br/>
<br/>
In a previous article, I discussed how climate science has grown from an obscure theory in the late 80s to a worldwide colossus that will soon overtake the oil and gas industry in terms of its size.<br/>
<br/>
How is it that despite the scientific case for a climate apocalypse comprehensively collapsing some 20 years ago, we have seen a 16-year-old girl (at the time) being invited to address the United Nations, weeping children marching in our streets, and a federal election outcome in which this issue dominated the political landscape?<br/>
<br/>
Where did we go wrong? And by ‘we’ I’m referring to those of us termed sceptics – people who understand the science, and the house of cards that comprises the notion of Anthropogenic Climate Change.<br/>
<br/>
Mainly, we have fallen into the trap of thinking that just because the evidence is on our side, people will come around to our way of thinking. Or to put it another way, we naively assume that everyone is as interested in evidence as we are.<br/>
<br/>
They are not. The Climate Change industry is a massive global entity with unimaginably large financial and political interests. There is too much at stake for those involved to sully themselves with things like evidence…<br/>
<br/>
The time is ripe for a major political party to take up the cudgels and go to the next election on the ‘cost of living’ platform by tossing every initiative or program with ‘eco’, ‘green’, and particularly ‘renewable’ in the bin. Peter Dutton, I’m looking at you.<br/>
<br/>
How do we do it?<br/>
<br/>
Put simply, we must learn the art of the polemic. The art of rhetoric. We must recognise that there’s no point in having evidence on our side if we don’t know how to use it.<br/>
<br/>
We begin with this proposition. There is no case for reducing our carbon footprint unless all four of these statements are true:<br/>
<br/>
The world is warming.<br/>
<br/>
We are causing it.<br/>
<br/>
It’s a bad thing.<br/>
<br/>
We can do something about it.<br/>
<br/>
No rational person can have any problem with this, and if they do, we need to find out why.<br/>
<br/>
Here’s where we have to decide which of these points we want to contest. Remember, you only have to falsify one of them for the whole thing to collapse like a house of cards.<br/>
<br/>
Most sceptics, in my view, pick the wrong fight. They do this by attempting to prosecute the case based on one of the first two points. This is a mistake.<br/>
<br/>
Here’s why.<br/>
<br/>
Arguments about whether the world is warming revolve around competing graphs: ‘My graph shows it’s warming. If your graph shows it isn’t, then it’s wrong – no it isn’t – yes it is – no it isn’t…’<br/>
<br/>
This argument also looks at Urban Heat Island Effects, and examines manipulation of data by government agencies.<br/>
<br/>
This is a poor approach to take because:<br/>
<br/>
You’re never going to prove your graph is right.<br/>
<br/>
You can be very easily and quickly discredited as a conspiracy theorist (Brian Cox did this to Malcolm Roberts on Q&A a few years ago).<br/>
<br/>
 People just do not believe that government agencies would manipulate data.<br/>
<br/>
We should not fear a warming world. Records began at the end of the last ice age, so it’s only natural that the world is warming. And the current temperatures are well within historical averages.<br/>
<br/>
As for arguments about whether we are causing the warming, this is even more problematic. The various contributions to global temperatures are extremely complex, involving a deep understanding of atmospheric physics and thermodynamics. With a PhD in Chemistry, this is much closer to my area of expertise than Joe Public, but I am very quickly out of my depth. I recognise most of the terms and concepts involved, but know just enough to know how little I know.<br/>
<br/>
Sadly, many people on both sides of the debate don’t understand how little they know, nor how complex the subject of atmospheric physics is, and it is nothing short of comical seeing two people debating about a subject of which both of them are blissfully ignorant.<br/>
<br/>
This approach is taken simply because it is so tempting. We can point to the Vladivostok ice cores that prove that CO2 follows temperature changes. We can ask why the cooling period from 1940-75 coincided with the greatest increase in CO2 production the world has ever seen. It’s very tempting. But, I’m sorry to say, it is simply a futile approach.<br/>
<br/>
The bottom line is this – they simply don’t change anyone’s minds – ever. Having seen these arguments used for years, and having used them myself, I cannot point to a single person that has said, ‘Oh yes! I see it now…’ The whole point of arguing, or debating, is to change someone’s mind (including, at times, your own). If that isn’t happening, then it’s futile to continue with the same approach.<br/>
<br/>
I think the reason both these approaches fail that most people do not believe that all these experts, and the government, can be wrong. You say the world isn’t warming? Oh, I’m sure you have the wrong graph. You say that CO2 is not responsible? Oh, I’m sure the government scientists know more than you do.<br/>
<br/>
This then brings us to the third point. Why is a warmer world a bad thing?<br/>
<br/>
This is even more tempting than the first two points, as it’s so easy to prove that a warming world, so far from being a crisis, is actually a good thing. The reason for this is that, unlike with the first two points, they don’t have to look at a complex scientific argument. They just have to look at the weather. Are cyclones and hurricanes increasing? Are droughts increasing? Are flooding events increasing?<br/>
<br/>
Regretfully, it is impossible to get people to even look at this. Even worse, they seem oblivious to the simple concept of cause and effect. We see this in that they simply can’t see that droughts and floods are opposites, and the same cause cannot produce exactly opposite effects. Astonishingly, they somehow think that charts that plot these extreme events are somehow manipulated, even when they come from a primary source such as the BOM, and that there really is a ‘climate crisis’.<br/>
<br/>
Where does that leave us? Well, before we adopt Catweazle’s mantra of ‘nothing works’, there is one more point – point 4 (can we do anything about it?).<br/>
<br/>
Most people will have seen the address of Konstantin Kisin at an Oxford Union debate, where he prosecuted this case to great effect. He pointed out, in simple terms, that as the UK only contributes 2 per cent to the global CO2 budget, anything they did will have negligible effect, and that global CO2 levels will be determined by people in Africa and Asia. He then pointed out that people in these countries ‘didn’t give a sh*t’ about climate change, as all they want to do is feed and clothe their children, and they don’t care how much CO2 that produces.<br/>
<br/>
Finally, he pointed out that Xi Jinping knows that the way to ensure that he isn’t rolled in a revolution, as happened to so many other leaders in former communist regimes, is to ensure prosperity for the Chinese people. And indispensable to that goal is cheap, reliable, power, which is the reason that China is now building lots more coal-fired power plants – in 2021 alone they built 25 GW of capacity – equivalent to 25 x 1000MW plants.<br/>
<br/>
By all accounts, his speech was well-received, with many people turning to his side. The beauty of prosecuting this case, as opposed to the other three, is that people don’t have to look at any evidence. They don’t even have to look at the weather.<br/>
<br/>
The argument is at the same time simple, compelling, and irresistible. The question is this: will we see a major political party with the courage to take it on?<br/>
<br/>
That part remains to be seen. But what is certain is this – the definition of insanity is doing the same thing and expecting different outcomes. If, for twenty years we’ve been telling people either that the world isn’t warming, or if it is we aren’t causing it, or if it is warmer but there’s no climate crisis, and not a single person has been persuaded by our arguments, then we have the brains of a tomato if we think anything is going to change.<br/>
<br/>
Konstantin Kisin’s talk, and in particular the way it was received, fill me with hope that I haven’t had in years. It fills me with hope that if the case is prosecuted wisely, the climate change colossus can be brought to a grinding halt, politicians will unashamedly take on energy security as a political mantra, and the notion of climate change will at last be exposed as the unscientific, anti-human, regressive, apocalyptic cult that it is.<br/>
<br/>

<p class="asset asset-link">
	<a href="https://www.spectator.com.au/2023/03/changing-climate-change-debunking-the-global-colossus">https://www.spectator.com.au/2023/03/changing-climate-change-debunking-the-global-colossus</a>
</p>
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<br/>
<b> The Left’s aversion to teacher quality is harming our kids</b><br/>
<br/>
The Productivity Commission has recently thrown down the gauntlet on teacher quality, and its importance to the nation’s economic health. Despite the difficulties and complexities, we should pick it up and finally embrace the challenge.<br/>
<br/>
Australia’s educational woes are well documented, with student learning outcomes in free-fall over the last two decades. But a recent report by the Productivity Commission has provided a ray of light.<br/>
<br/>
Its report into Australia’s education system found the largest single factor in student success, and their ability to go on and make a meaningful economic contribution, is teacher quality. As a former teacher myself, I would say: quelle surprise!<br/>
<br/>
The commission determined that students taught by above-average teachers will earn almost $500,000 more over their lifetimes than those taught by average teachers. Not exactly loose change. So, we need to have an overdue and difficult conversation about teacher quality.<br/>
<br/>
Let’s get one thing straight: the majority of our teachers are amazing. They care for the students they teach. They’re dedicated and expert. Before entering Parliament, I was the head of a large secondary school in my electorate, so I know this first-hand.<br/>
<br/>
Nonetheless, as is the case in any profession, some teachers are not currently up to scratch. Do you know someone who, as a result of struggling to get a job elsewhere, ultimately fell into teaching?<br/>
<br/>
I do. And recently, I’ve been really concerned to find out that one in 10 new teachers can’t meet the necessary standard in critical learning areas like numeracy and literacy. Moves are afoot to change this.<br/>
<br/>
Back in 2016 a Literacy and Numeracy Test for Initial Teacher Education Students was introduced. I’m hopeful that it will ultimately become a valuable tool. It’s also good that universities are lifting the ATAR scores required for admission to teaching degrees.<br/>
<br/>
I’ll concede that not every teacher has to be a brain surgeon or a rocket scientist. Yet mastery of their chosen subject area is essential. Teaching requires significant intellectual grunt.<br/>
<br/>
There’s a lot more to do at the front end, but here’s a much trickier question: how do we support the 300,000 Australian teachers – currently plying their craft – to be their very best?<br/>
<br/>
One response must be to put in place meaningful and rigorous systems of teacher appraisal.<br/>
<br/>
I commenced my teaching journey fifteen years ago. As a 24-year-old, entirely new to the profession, I could not believe the amount of autonomy I had. There was certainly no appraisal. What’s more, there were no key performance indicators. Indeed, there was very little oversight of any kind.<br/>
<br/>
This meant that I could teach whatever I wanted, however I wanted. Coming from the fishbowl of politics, as a staffer, I loved my newfound freedom.<br/>
<br/>
Teacher autonomy is hard-wired into the culture of our school systems which we borrowed from the British public school model. After a hundred and fifty years, that’s no easy thing to change. But it’s certainly not conducive to best-practice, or personal growth.<br/>
<br/>
Change has started, albeit slowly, in the best private schools. A small proportion of schools have excellent models in place.<br/>
<br/>
These involve regular lesson observations by a school leader and targeted feedback; student surveys about teacher performance; professional development informed by a mentor; and goal setting with ongoing reviews to assess progress.<br/>
<br/>
Of course, powerful public sector unions are stridently opposed to processes such as these. Yet, in my personal experience, they can be enacted in a way that is highly supportive of staff.<br/>
<br/>
I’ve been appraised myself on many occasions. It’s nerve-wracking, sure. But what I’ve seen is that the many fantastic teachers are affirmed, while those who are struggling are supported to get better, or find a job that better fits their skills.<br/>
<br/>
These conversations are difficult. As a (biased) former teacher I have a high regard for those still in the profession. Yet facts are facts. Our students have never performed worse in the crucial areas of literacy, numeracy, and science – at least not since the Program for International Student Assessment commenced publishing its reports in 2000.<br/>
<br/>
Of course, the quality of teaching is not entirely to blame for this. But it can play a huge part in arresting Australia’s learning decline. That, says the Productivity Commission, will pay real dividends for us all.<br/>
<br/>
<a href="https://www.spectator.com.au/2023/03/the-lefts-aversion-to-teacher-quality-is-harming-our-kids/">https://www.spectator.com.au/2023/03/the-lefts-aversion-to-teacher-quality-is-harming-our-kids/</a> ?<br/>
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<br/>
<b> The feminists have won</b><br/>
<br/>
International Women’s Day is a day when women of the chattering classes parade their virtue and moral superiority to the rest of us. If you were listening to the ABC last Thursday and expected your favourite male presenter, tough. And if you wanted a provocative, balanced read from the Age’s opinion pages, you were greeted instead by woman polemicists including ex-ABC broadcaster Virginia Hausegger and Fairfax’s resident feminist, Clementine ‘Fight Like a Girl’ Ford.<br/>
<br/>
‘Are you done with women yet? Sick of hearing about them?’ were the first words of Hausegger’s Age piece. Her argument, however, boiled down to warning like-minded readers to beware ‘the brewing whiff of backlash’. ‘As women continue to push for progress’, she wrote, ‘men are clearly disoriented by the demands for change’.<br/>
<br/>
The premise of International Women’s Day is that women need to be empowered, to lead, to shatter the glass ceiling. So Peta Credlin, herself a very powerful woman before she found her voice at Sky News, writes in the Australian decrying the Liberal party for not changing as fast as she wants. Tanya Plibersek and other grandstanding progressive politicians, male and female, brand feminism as a progressive Left triumph. Labor talks 50:50 gender quotas for its MPs; Credlin and other Liberals talk affirmative action and mentoring within the party’s preselection processes.<br/>
<br/>
Credlin and Plibersek make a surreal unity ticket, but on one thing they’re indeed very much united: the final triumph of the feminist revolution in politics isn’t coming quickly enough for their liking. Yet they overlook the fear of a feminist backlash helps keep poor political performers who happen to be women, like Michaelia Cash, in post where men who blunder as royally would be sent packing. It means the sisterhood not condemning the bad examples of female politicians already in leadership, like Tasmanian Labor leader Rebecca White, whose petulant and deluded concession speech on election night made Turnbull’s ugly and spiteful 2016 effort look tame.<br/>
<br/>
Labor’s much-touted seat quotas are tokenistic. That they simply guarantee more mediocrities enter parliamentary ranks under the guise of gender equality doesn’t matter to Emily’s Listers. And the Liberals mentoring women candidates is pointless when factional and personal loyalties now count more than ability in picking MPs of either gender.<br/>
<br/>
But feminist polemicists and Q&A panellists should be honest about just who’s on top. Every day is now International Women’s Day. Feminist issues, feminist values now shape and frame what’s appropriate and what’s not in public discourse, especially in politics and the media. Public and business figures who once would have got away with louche personal behaviour towards women are now called out and broken. Not that some men in power don’t deserve what comes: Barnaby Joyce’s selfish disregard for his wife, daughters, mistress and even unborn child makes middle-aged white blokes look more pathetic and ludicrous than even Clementine Ford could assert in a fire-snorting Fairfax column.<br/>
<br/>
Thus the #timesup and #metoo movements enthusiastically call out male sexual harassers and predators, their starting premise that every man is by nature a predator on women, and preternaturally disposed to aggression and violence. Thomas Hobbes’s dark vision of men’s natures is as nothing to that of Hollywood virtue-signallers and their political allies.<br/>
<br/>
Consequently in politics, business and the media, men are being denounced and rooted out, and the ideology of the gender revolution benchmarks public life. Middle-aged white men in authority positions and ‘traditional’ male occupations particularly are fair game: we are a generation of Calibans to be tossed aside for fair, enlightened Mirandas. The progressive media, not just the ABC and Fairfax, are willing arbiters of what’s acceptable in this brave, new world. Ever-angry feminist pundits like Ford and Hausegger rage as if the struggle’s all before them, when it absolutely is not. They deny what straight middle-aged white bloke dinosaurs like me already know: the gender revolution is not a work in progress, but already won.<br/>
<br/>
The social and cultural norms of 10,000 years of Western civilisation, that always have presumed men, with our physical strength, are the hunter-gatherers, warriors and natural leaders and protectors of families and communities, have been overturned in not quite two generations. That’s astonishing, but in this age of technology manpower counts for little. Brain is the new brawn and it’s not gender-specific: men’s natural advantage over women is obsolete. Women now have the upper hand and set the gender agenda. What is happening now is not, therefore, the feminist revolution, but its mopping-up operation. High-profile naming and shaming like #metoo is the revolutionaries consolidating victory, the new regime denouncing and purging pre-revolutionary leaders and hate figures, and all they represent. The vile behaviour of ogres like Harvey Weinstein simply makes their task easier.<br/>
<br/>
Revolutions happen because the evils of what they replace can no longer be ignored or tolerated. Endemic sexual harassment and one person’s abusing personal power over another rightly deserve calling out. But in correcting the perceived excesses of millennia, and in the heady thrill of toppling the likes of Weinstein, Don Burke and now Robert Doyle, revolutionary zeal and a desire for vengeance can create dictatorships potentially as bad, even worse, than the regimes they topple. Think Jacobin France, Soviet Russia and post-Shah Iran.<br/>
<br/>
For feminist elites, International Women’s Day is their May Day in Moscow, showcasing themselves and consolidating their revolution. Establishment acts of solidarity like the ABC’s unnecessarily ostentatious, all-female International Women’s Day ensured the rest of us got the message.<br/>
<br/>
Instead of securing their equality goal, the media and political Revolutionary Guards of Australian feminism are creating a new, permanent gender imbalance. The new matriarchy is here. We men have lost.<br/>
<br/>

<p class="asset asset-link">
	<a href="https://www.spectator.com.au/2018/03/australian-notes-160">https://www.spectator.com.au/2018/03/australian-notes-160</a>
</p>
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<br/>
<br/>


8 March, 2023
<br/><br/> 


<b> Baby boomers warm to casual sex after ‘following the social norm’</b><br/>
<br/>
<i> Interesting that Australia is by far the most accepting country when it comes to casual sex. I am actually (just) a PRE-baby boomer but I have had sex with many women over the years. I stopped counting when I got to 50. So I guess I am simply a good Australian. But I DID come of age in the free-wheeling &#39;60s</i><br/>
<br/>
A one-night stand, fling, tryst or even a dalliance – whatever the name – casual sex is often seen as the preserve of the young.<br/>
<br/>
Yet nearly a third of baby boomers now approve of no-strings-attached sex, according to a new academic study.<br/>
<br/>
Data from The Policy Institute at King’s College London show that UK attitudes on casual sex has changed not just over time but also between the generations, with researchers concluding that, when it comes to casual intimacy, “the social norm has changed and the boomers have just followed that.”<br/>
<br/>
The researchers collated data from an international survey conducted across the past four decades and found that in 2009, just eight per cent of baby boomers (who are born between 1946 and 1964) found casual sex was “justifiable”. But by 2022, this had jumped to 30 per cent.<br/>
<br/>
However, younger cohorts such as Gen Z, which captures anyone born between 1997 and 2012, and millennials, who are born between 1981 and 1996, are still far more likely to hold this view at 67 per cent and 55 per cent respectively.<br/>
<br/>
The researchers also found that in 1999, overall, one in 10 Britons thought having casual sex was justifiable.<br/>
<br/>
However, more than four times as many (42 per cent) held this view in 2022, with a considerable rise from as recently as 2018 (27 per cent).<br/>
<br/>
This shift means the UK is now the fourth most accepting country when it comes to casual sex, ahead of France (26 per cent) and Norway (33 per cent) – and not far off Australia (48 per cent), which tops the list.<br/>
<br/>
‘Moral concerns’ now ‘simple facts’<br/>
<br/>
Professor Bobby Duffy, director of The Policy Institute, said: “It’s easy to lose sight of just how much more liberal the UK has become over a relatively short period of time, and how liberal we are relative to many other nations.<br/>
<br/>
“What were once pressing moral concerns – things like homosexuality, divorce and casual sex – have become simple facts of life for much of the public, and we now rank as one of the most accepting countries internationally.<br/>
<br/>
“This mostly isn’t just driven by younger generations replacing older generations. All generations have changed their views significantly, although the oldest pre-war cohort now often stand out as quite different, and on some issues, like casual sex, there is a clear generational hierarchy, with the youngest much more accepting.”<br/>
<br/>
The researchers also surveyed attitudes around other subjects and found that increased support for euthanasia and divorce marks the UK as one of the most socially liberal countries overall.<br/>
<br/>
Attitudes towards assisted dying in Britain have changed gradually since data was first collected in 1981, but there was a clear acceleration in acceptance between 2009 and 2022, when the proportion of the British public who found it justifiable rose by around 20 per cent.<br/>
<br/>
This attitude shift comes alongside a rise in the number of British members of Dignitas. The assisted dying association reported that there had been an 80 per cent rise in British members in the past decade, from 821 in 2012, to 1,528 by the end of 2022.<br/>
<br/>
The UK had the second highest proportion of people who believed euthanasia was justifiable, just below France, at 19 per cent. Other European countries ranked much lower on this issue, with Italy at nine per cent, and Greece at two per cent.<br/>
<br/>
The UK also ranked highly for acceptance towards divorce, as 68 per cent of Britons said it is “justifiable”.<br/>
<br/>
However, Christopher Snowdon, head of lifestyle economics at the Institute of Economic Affairs, said while it is “encouraging to see the British public becoming more libertarian over time among all age groups … I suspect that if it was extended to ask about free speech and lifestyle issues such as smoking and obesity we would find that tolerance is on the wane.”<br/>
<br/>

<p class="asset asset-link">
	<a href="https://www.inkl.com/newsletters/morning-edition/news/baby-boomers-warm-to-casual-sex-after-following-the-social-norm?utm_campaign=2023-03-08&utm_content=body&utm_medium=morning-edition&utm_source=inkl">https://www.inkl.com/newsletters/morning-edition/news/baby-boomers-warm-to-casual-sex-after-following-the-social-norm?utm_campaign=2023-03-08&utm_content=body&utm_medium=morning-edition&utm_source=inkl</a>
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<b> The Australian education system is woefully outdated</b><br/>
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<i> Achievement within it is a poor reflection of abiity</i><br/>
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The education system in Australia is slow to adapt to the changing needs of society. The Department of Education claims that the opportunities their system provides is central to what students achieve and yet it has failed to provide what I believe is true equal opportunity through the outdated nature of the system.<br/>
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Naturally, the grades of a student in Australia at all ages are crucial to their opportunity to progress further in the education system. The lowest-performing students in high schools don’t have access to ATAR studies which even then only the highest-scoring ATAR students have access to a university education studying the course that they would like. To study a postgraduate education at university you need to be achieving higher scores than many of your fellow students.<br/>
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A university degree has become a common requirement for many jobs and positions in society, with year 12 grades an absolute minimum. The further a student is able to travel along the education system, the greater access to and chance of getting better jobs. The education system claims to put the smartest and therefore most appropriate people into the most skilled jobs, jobs which in turn earn the most occupational reward as a reflection of their higher level of intelligence and education. This is shown by the fact that to achieve the most skilled and highest-paying jobs, you need to progress further than many other people along the education system.<br/>
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However, it does not appear that, in practice, the education system worldwide is putting the most skilled and appropriate people in the most lucrative occupational positions in society. Tim Cook, CEO of Apple (a company whose success is incontestable), claimed in 2019 that over half of his workforce did not have a college degree.<br/>
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You are also able to read many stories of college dropouts going on to become huge successes. Many companies will hire dropouts from some of the most prestigious universities in the world because the value is in the acceptance letter and not the actual degree. Universities such as Harvard and Yale only accept the brightest students in the world. Employers know they are getting the smartest young minds and, as Tim Cook says, the years spent at university could be spent shaping these obviously capable students into top employees instead of learning a lot of information at university which he claims is by a large part irrelevant to the actual roles of the job.<br/>
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We can claim that the education system is not putting the most skilled and most appropriate people into the best jobs in society because it is a fact that your intelligence does not equal your occupational reward. If you were to take 100 people of 100 IQ, they would all be earning different occupational rewards. The system cannot claim that the most intelligent students are the ones able to progress further and therefore achieve the incentive of the better-paid jobs because the grading systems of modern education simply do not rely on intelligence.<br/>
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The façade of the education system is present in the league table system used to rank schools on their performance. The position of a school on the table is determined by the grades of its pupils with the ‘better’ performing schools at the top of table. The league tables are not a true reflection of the performance of a school. For example, the table could compare school Y and school Z, with school Y producing mostly grade A students and boasting a lucrative position at the top of the table, and school Z sitting in a modest position on the table as this school on average produces grade C students. The league table would suggest that school Y far outperforms school Z based on their student’s grades. However, the tables fail to mention any context. If we were to say that school Y only accepts students who are already at a grade A level and school Z accepts students of a grade E or grade D level, we could argue that in reality school Z is a better-performing school as it shows the greater actual improvement amongst performance of students.<br/>
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The same logic can be applied to all areas of Australian schooling. University students are denied postgraduate study if their grades aren’t high enough in a condition the universities impose to make sure only the most intelligent students can progress the furthest.<br/>
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However, your grade point average and unit scores which determine your ability to progress further are not an accurate representation of your ability or your intelligence. The Australian education system needs to move on from its heavily quantifiable way of ranking students. A non-working student living with their parents scoring an average of 75 per cent will be considered more favourably for opportunity than a student living alone working full-time hours to survive who is scoring 72 per cent. This is a backwards way of thinking as modern living has changed many factors such as an increased number of international students as well as driven up costs of living. Many students do not have the ability to perform their studies as well as other students so why are we offering opportunity on the sole basis of a student’s ability to perform their studies?<br/>
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Obviously, we do not want people in university who won’t put in the effort and low scores can be reflective of this, but it is not always the case. The pandemic moved most study online and some students wouldn’t have had consistent access to computer facilities to make the most out of their studies, through no fault of their own. We need an education system that takes more into account of the situation of the individual student as opposed to just seeing them as a number and denying opportunity on the very basis of that number. It seems ironic that the opportunities that the education system aim to provide at ‘the very centre of what they do’ are restricted by the very same workings of that system.<br/>
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Across all ages students are instinctively judged on their grades. We are judging people on their ability to perform as opposed to their intelligence which is what the education system claims. The capability to progress further in based solely on these test scores and numbers. We need more modern thinking and consideration to the individual situation of students as opposed to a system that is simply rewarded students who are in the most privileged positions of access to study.<br/>
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<p class="asset asset-link">
	<a href="https://www.spectator.com.au/2023/03/the-australian-education-system-is-woefully-outdated/">https://www.spectator.com.au/2023/03/the-australian-education-system-is-woefully-outdated/</a>
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<b> The ‘anti-discrimination’ bandwagon – coming to a school near you</b><br/>
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You have to hand it to the ‘anti-discrimination’ warriors – they are effective. Watch them go from city to city preaching ‘tolerance’ and ‘diversity’, the only catch being you must submit totally to their worldview.<br/>
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This cottage industry has seen great success in Western Australia, Queensland, and the Northern Territory: jurisdictions that have all sought to curtail religious freedoms. Since taking the reins of power in Canberra, the Albanese government has similarly been only too happy to oblige – accepting calls for a review on religious exemptions for schools in federal law.<br/>
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But the feel-good, anti-discrimination messaging of the review’s supporters disguises a radical agenda, one which strips schools of protections that allow them to operate according to a self-determined set of values.<br/>
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The new provisions, released by the Australian Law Reform Commission (ALRC), fly in the face of religious freedom and parental rights. As it stands, political parties would be allowed to hire staff who share their ethos, while schools would not.<br/>
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Most fair-minded individuals would be appalled by such blatant double standards.<br/>
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The Institute of Public Affairs’ submission to the Commission’s inquiry found the proposed reforms would; curtail the right of parents to give their children an education consistent with their values; facilitate sectarianism by pushing religious disagreements into the courts; and give government bodies, such as the Australian Human Rights Commission, the power to control what faith-based schools can do, say, and teach.<br/>
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The ALRC wants government agencies to enforce compliance with new restrictive standards. And yes, you read that right, the ALRC essentially wants to take parents out of the equation and disregard the values and beliefs they want instilled in their children.<br/>
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It is something straight out of George Orwell’s dystopian novel 1984, except it’s likely to become reality in Australia.<br/>
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Make no mistake, religious freedom is under direct attack in Australia, and the first formal steps towards new religious discrimination laws have been taken by the Albanese government.<br/>
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Out with the old and in with the new. Freedom, choice, and Judaeo-Christian values are to be replaced with a rigid creed, which entrench radical ideologies on gender and sexuality.<br/>
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Worse still, the ALRC wants its reforms extended to all religious bodies in due course, which is perhaps the most concerning part of the whole Consultation Paper. If the narrative that religious protections are harmful to certain marginalised groups takes hold, then the cottage industry of activists has won.<br/>
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Left-wing activists have been working hard for years to normalise this very idea with little courage shown by religious groups, who have typically been desperate to accommodate the howls of activists at every turn.<br/>
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The bottom line is that when harm is equated with hurt feelings and is used to put a stop to the dissemination of genuinely held beliefs, religious freedom is dead. The proposed changes will foster greater intolerance and, as such, impacts all people of faith: Muslims, Jews, Hindus, Buddhists, and Christians alike.<br/>
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By pushing for legislative change, the ‘anti-discrimination’ warriors have ensured their cottage industry will continue to thrive long after this debate fades from public discussion.<br/>
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Advocates have praised the reforms as progressive, but ultimately the recommendations are in direct conflict with Australia’s long-standing tradition that upholds religious toleration and pluralism.<br/>
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In the name of progress, ‘anti-discrimination’ warriors are determined to throw out the Western intellectual tradition and replace it with identity politics and Critical Race Theory. Here, the subjective feelings of the individual are elevated above basic freedoms of religion, association, and expression.<br/>
<br/>
Fortunately, there has been some pushback from the Christian community on this issue. Two major Christian schooling associations that represent 150,000 students across the country, have pulled out of the consultation process with the ALRC. The groups claim to have ‘lost faith’ in the inquiry remaining ‘balanced’ in addressing the issue.<br/>
<br/>
As one Catholic Bishop warned late last year, preventing religious schools from requiring staff to teach in line with the school’s faith would strip these schools of their religious essence, while ushering in a Woke quota system for hiring, rather than a system based on shared worldview.<br/>
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The provisions, if enacted, will also do parents a disservice by taking away their choice to send their child to a school with a genuine religious ethos.<br/>
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This move against religious freedom also highlights a deeper and more troubling phenomenon occurring across Australia, the detachment of the political class and inner-city elites from mainstream Australians who want their freedoms preserved and to get on with their life.<br/>
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As you go about your busy day, you may ask yourself, why all the fuss? As former High Court Chief Justices Mason and Brennan once wrote in a joint judgment, freedom of religion is the ‘paradigm freedom of conscience’ and ‘the essence of a free society’.<br/>
<br/>
Ultimately the proposed changes will foster greater intolerance and impact all people of faith – Muslims, Jews, Hindus, Buddhists, and Christians alike. This is not only a serious problem for religious freedom, but also seriously problematic for free speech.<br/>
<br/>
Never forget, many had to fight for the freedoms we enjoy today, we must ensure they are not surrendered in silence.<br/>
<br/>
<a href="https://www.spectator.com.au/2023/03/the-anti-discrimination-bandwagon-coming-to-a-school-near-you/">https://www.spectator.com.au/2023/03/the-anti-discrimination-bandwagon-coming-to-a-school-near-you/</a> ?<br/>
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<br/>
<b> &#39;Living nightmare&#39;: Airline customers call for independent ombudsman</b><br/>
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If our bulging mailbag of replies is anything to judge by, January’s column about the airline consumer advocate struck a nerve with readers.<br/>
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One of them, Claire, has had a torrid time since she and her sick partner tried to check in for their flight home from London in September, only to discover her partner’s Doha-Perth leg hadn’t actually been ticketed.<br/>
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The flight was operated by Qatar, but booked through Qantas. Qatar said it had informed Qantas of the issue two months previously, in July, but the couple was never told. (Qantas later apologised “for the oversight”.) The airline couldn’t offer them another flight before October and said her partner couldn’t fly home solo using her valid ticket. So, at great expense, they bought seats on Singapore Airlines. A call-centre operator assured them Qantas would refund their fares.<br/>
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They made formal complaints to the airline after getting home, had no joy (it refused to reimburse them), and went to the airline customer advocate in October. At the time of writing, they’d had no reply. Now they’re waiting on a Victorian Civil and Administrative Tribunal date to hear their case. They’ve been told that could be six months away.<br/>
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“I am appalled at the lack of airline regulation in Australia,” Claire wrote. “The blatant disregard for consumers… needs to be addressed by independent regulation.”<br/>
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That was a common sentiment among our correspondents. “The airline customer advocate is useless,” wrote another aggrieved passenger, Peter Weyling. “Never did I feel confident that the ACA was right on top of my complaint… they did not keep me informed.<br/>
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“ACA is merely a post office. How can it hold airlines to account if those very same airlines pay for its existence?”<br/>
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Gleness Stiles wrote about the “living nightmare” she’s been through trying to get reimbursed $10,500 for two business-class flights to South America. The flights were cancelled by Qantas and, she says, the airline agreed she was eligible for a refund way back in April last year. It never came.<br/>
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In July she forwarded her dispute to the ACA, which replied in August that it couldn’t help because she still had an open complaint with an airline. She’s had repeated assurances over several months from Qantas personnel that they’ve refunded her fares. But she still hasn’t received any money. Gleness and Claire’s ordeals sound like exactly the sorts of cases an independent ombudsman would resolve. If only we had one.<br/>
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There were many more tales of woe. Jacob L flew to Hawaii with his partner last June where they had to holiday without their luggage – for eight days. The airline took three months to respond to their appeals, after which he lodged a request with the advocate’s office. He finally heard from Catherine Addison-Walsh (the advocate) at the end of January that she’s requested an update from the airline. Eight months have passed since the incident and he’s still waiting for a resolution.<br/>
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Cathryn Stavert runs a “Jetstar Support Group” on Facebook that was formed in the Covid chaos of 2020. “People were just screaming out for help. Where do we go?” she says.<br/>
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She’s had plenty of experience since then helping peeved passengers with complaints to the ACA. Many of those who contact her think the advocate is an impartial referee. She has to explain repeatedly that it’s not, that it’s funded by the country’s four main airlines.<br/>
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There is one happy ending to this story. Phillip Carruthers used to work at the Telecommunications Industry Ombudsman so knows his way around complaint-handling schemes. He had never heard of the advocate until a recent dispute with Virgin over a $3000 discrepancy.<br/>
<br/>
“I contacted the advocate about a month after my travel. I (knew) there must be some kind of complaints body, but it wasn’t easy to find!” he wrote.<br/>
<br/>
Barely a month later he received an email from the advocate confirming Virgin would pay him the outstanding $3000. A few weeks later the money was in his account.<br/>
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“In summary, I was happy with the service but, really, I did all the work, using the right terms from my consumer protection background. All the advocate really had to do was send it on to an appropriate person.”<br/>
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Stavert dismisses the advocate as “a complete waste of time”. “Why isn’t there an ombudsman for airlines, and the travel industry?” she asks, quite reasonably.<br/>
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After the travel turmoil of recent years, now would seem a good time for the federal government to look at establishing just such an agency. A properly independent one.<br/>
<br/>

<p class="asset asset-link">
	<a href="https://www.couriermail.com.au/lifestyle/living-nightmare-airline-customers-call-for-independent-ombudsman/news-story/b89f27b88ee7586a6210411cbd672a05">https://www.couriermail.com.au/lifestyle/living-nightmare-airline-customers-call-for-independent-ombudsman/news-story/b89f27b88ee7586a6210411cbd672a05</a>
</p>
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7 March, 2023
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<b> Australia stuck in reverse on energy, IR and tax: Productivity Commission chair Gary Banks</b><br/>
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<i> A very refreshing dose of cold logic</i><br/>
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Inaugural Productivity Commission chair Gary Banks says Australia is going backwards on energy, industrial relations, taxation and government spending, with the public losing confidence in democracy and the nation facing new sovereign risk problems.<br/>
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Professor Banks, the chair of the Productivity Commission ­between 1998 and 2013, said the nation was losing the ability to implement policies to properly “cope with change, to be competitive and support economic growth”.<br/>
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In an interview with The Australian ahead of the release of a review into Australia’s productivity performance, Professor Banks said the nation had written off its comparative advantage in energy, failed to pursue lowest cost emissions cuts and electricity was ­becoming an unreliable luxury.<br/>
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His intervention coincided with a pre-budget submission from BHP saying the government’s industrial relations agenda would harm productivity and any move to increase taxes in the resources sector would lead to “reduced investment, fewer jobs and ... lower living standards for ­Australians”.<br/>
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Professor Banks said “the monumental bungling of the so-called ­energy transition” had seen ­multiple governments contrive to “maximise the cost to the nation of reducing emissions” while ­evidence-based policy had been abandoned in favour of “simple-minded belief”.<br/>
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“We are in a situation where it’s become impossible to openly discuss the best way forward,” he said.<br/>
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“Any attempt to use evidence or logic immediately brands you as a ‘denier’. In the Ukraine, power stations are destroyed by Russian missiles. In Australia, we blow them up ourselves.<br/>
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“And we do this without having a way to replace the critical 24/7 service they provide ... As if that’s not bad enough, our governments are making it hard for gas to step into the breech – and is dismissing nuclear out of hand. Talk about daft.”<br/>
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Professor Banks said decisions being taken by Labor were exacerbating the energy crisis, with a “U-turn” on workplace regulations saddling the nation with higher labour costs on top of the inflation of power bills caused by the “subsidised displacement of fossil fuels”.<br/>
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“Historically, this country’s low-energy costs partly offset the high self-imposed burdens of our rigid labour market. That’s no longer the case. In fact we’ve brought about the opposite situation,” he said. “On the one hand, we have been busily eliminating our comparative advantage in ­energy, while on the other we are reviving our traditional disadvantage with respect to labour.”<br/>
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Ahead of the release by Jim Chalmers of the Productivity Commission’s 1000-page, five-yearly review expected later this month, Professor Banks launched a withering assessment of the expansion in government, likened the NDIS to a “fiscal sinkhole” and lamented increased spending in education and health despite declining student attainment and a deterioration in key health performance indicators.<br/>
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“The government position seems to be that most public spending is untouchable, even at the political cost of breaking its election promises on taxation,” he said. “While many private sector firms are under the pump, the public sector is flourishing. Employee numbers and salaries went up spectacularly during Covid.<br/>
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“It would be great to mark this as a plus for the economy but government services tend to have low measured productivity and many involve waste – either through poor design or rorting. This has not improved with extra funding.<br/>
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“While education spending has gone up a lot, student attainment has gone down, at least by OECD standards. Health spending has continued its upward trajectory, but indicators of performance continue to ­languish. Then there’s the fiscal sinkhole called the NDIS, a painful lesson about the unintended consequences of policy on the run.”<br/>
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Professor Banks also took aim at a tax system geared more towards redistribution than growth, the return of subsidies for favoured industries that had been “greatly ramped up under the current government” and infrastructure policy being used for “short-term politics rather than long-term economic benefit”.<br/>
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The combination of policy failures had seen Australia enter a “new phase in our democracy in which electorates can no longer trust what a political party says it will do or not do in office”.<br/>
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“This erodes public trust in government and in democracy itself, as recent survey results illustrate. Moreover, when companies lose confidence in the rules, their propensity to invest, particularly in long-lived projects, is obviously impaired,” he said. “I never thought the sovereign risk issues prevalent in certain Third World or socialist countries would one day afflict my own.”<br/>
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The Treasurer used an essay in The Monthly earlier this year to flag an overhaul of the Productivity Commission to “renew and revitalise” the economic body and ensure it focused on ­“prosperity and progress more broadly”.<br/>
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In February, he also flagged the release of the Productivity Commission’s five-yearly review by the end of March, revealing it contained nine volumes and more than 70 recommendations.<br/>
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“The government won’t pick up and run with every single recommendation from the Productivity Commission, but I think there will be areas of common ground,” Dr Chalmers said. &quot;I hink there will be opportunities to align our economic plan with some of the directions put forward by the PC.”<br/>
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Professor Banks urged Dr Chalmers to lead a national debate on the findings as “(Paul) Keating and (Peter) Costello did so effectively in the past” but was sceptical of the chances of major reform. He suspected only a few recommendations would be embraced.<br/>
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The two policy areas of which Professor Banks was most critical were energy and industrial relations, with government legislation expanding access to multi- ­employer bargaining being singled out as a major mistake.<br/>
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“Now we have another flurry of IR legislation designed to further boost union power, under the pretext of ‘getting wages moving’ and ‘job security’. Most of these so-called reforms will only succeed in further undermining the market ‘dynamism’ that Treasury sees as paramount to raising productivity growth,” he said.<br/>
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“In the fashion of the times, the legislation that got rushed through parliament was called ‘secure jobs, higher wages’. I thought at the time that a more accurate title would have been ‘secure unions, fewer jobs’ And this has further to run.”<br/>
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Professor Banks said the “truth that is no longer spoken out loud” was that Work Choices “actually made economic sense” but that its overturning by Kevin Rudd had resulted in every Coalition leader since John Howard being “gun-shy” about IR reform.<br/>
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On climate and energy policy, Professor Banks said the 1990s Industry Commission had determined that “as a tiny contributor to a global phenomenon, Australia should only act in concert with other countries”.<br/>
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“Without action by the big emitters like China and America, nothing could be gained,” he said. “Secondly, in order to minimise damage to the economy, we should make use of market-based instruments like taxes and tradable permits. That’s because in principle these enable emissions to be reduced where the costs of doing it are lowest.<br/>
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“These and other findings went over pretty well with both sides of politics at the time, as I recall. So the policy outlook seemed hopeful ... How did we get to a situation in which electricity will not only become a luxury but an unreliable one?”<br/>
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His comments come amid a political contest over the passage of the government’s safeguards mechanism aimed at slashing the emissions of big emitters by nearly 5 per cent a year out to 2030.<br/>
<br/>

<p class="asset asset-link">
	<a href="https://www.theaustralian.com.au/nation/politics/australia-stuck-in-reverse-on-energy-ir-and-tax-productivity-commission-chair-gary-banks/news-story/72781db5eb8c40de7ab6f9429cdd0be0">https://www.theaustralian.com.au/nation/politics/australia-stuck-in-reverse-on-energy-ir-and-tax-productivity-commission-chair-gary-banks/news-story/72781db5eb8c40de7ab6f9429cdd0be0</a>
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<b> Pauline Hanson calls out Anthony Albanese as migration to Australia is set to soar past 300,000 despite the nation face a housing crisis</b><br/>
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<i> Where will they all live?</i><br/>
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Pauline Hanson has called out Anthony Albanese over the estimated 300,000 migrants set to arrive in Australia this year as the country battles a severe housing crisis.<br/>
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The One Nation senator took to social media to lambast the prime minster on immigration as she shared an image of a series of newspaper stories that illustrated Queensland&#39;s crippling rental crisis on Monday.<br/>
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&#39;Anthony Albanese&#39;s broken immigration election promise means Australia faces an influx of 300,000+ foreign arrivals this year alone!&#39; she wrote.<br/>
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&#39;Meanwhile, many Aussie families are struggling to find a house to rent or buy and those that do are paying a huge price!&#39;<br/>
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She claimed it was &#39;more lies, more broken promises, and more pain for Aussies&#39;.<br/>
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Senator Hanson told Daily Mail Australia: &#39;The Albanese government stated it would increase immigration from 160,000 to 195,000 per year (not including refugees), primarily to address skills and labour shortages in Australia.&#39; &#39;However, more than 300,000 are coming in. That is more than a 50% increase.<br/>
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&#39;Most Australians do not favour high immigration levels and One Nation wants a national plebiscite to be held on the question so the major parties can be unequivocally shown this and put in place immigration policies which reflect what the electorate wants, rather than what big retailers want.&#39;<br/>
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Mr Albanese had in fact agreed before last year&#39;s election to increase permanent migration from 160,000 to 195,000 places and to speed up visa processing for foreign workers.<br/>
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Treasurer Jim Chalmers conceded back in January that Treasury had &#39;underestimated&#39; immigration numbers. He explained that the higher figure was likely due to severe labour shortages and the return of international students. &#39;We&#39;ve got serious skills and labour shortages that are acting as a handbrake,&#39; he said.<br/>
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&#39;It&#39;s a reasonable assumption the number may be higher than the 235,000 printed in the Budget.&#39;<br/>
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Senator Hanson suggested that the miscalculation was a significant oversight by Treasury. &#39;The Treasurer is right on board with the big retailers and other big companies, and is ignoring the electorate - most of us simply do not want a big Australia,&#39; she said.<br/>
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&#39;The underestimate to which he refers shows that immigration is out of control under Labor and they cannot be trusted.&#39;<br/>
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To remedy the housing crisis, One Nation has called for a ban on foreign ownership of all residential property, both new and established, and give foreign owners 12 months to &#39;get out of the market&#39;.<br/>
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Both New Zealand and Canada have already implemented similar measures to ban or heavily restrict foreign ownership.<br/>
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&#39;This would significantly increase the supply of housing for Australians to buy,&#39; Senator Hanson said.<br/>
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&#39;Many foreigners who buy Australian residential properties come from countries which do not allow Australians to buy property there.&#39;<br/>
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The party wants immigration to be reduced to &#39;sustainable levels&#39; to lower the demand for housing in Australia.<br/>
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A 2018 housing affordability study by the Grattan Institute estimated that up to 550 new dwellings were needed in Australia for every 1,000 new immigrants.<br/>
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One Nation has also called for planning reform at both the state and territory level, reducing or eliminating stamp duty and red tape at the local government level to fix the housing crisis.<br/>
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The party says the government needs to train up a skilled home-grown workforce to fill labour shortages rather than outsourcing work.<br/>
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&#39;There are more than 920,000 Australians currently receiving unemployment benefits, and while many may be unemployable for a variety of reasons that cannot possibly be the case for all of them and probably isn’t the case for most of them,&#39; she added.<br/>
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The migration figures come just over a year after Mr Albanese refused to back the Morrison government&#39;s push to take on 160,000 new migrants when he was opposition leader.<br/>
<br/>

<p class="asset asset-link">
	<a href="https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-11824633/Pauline-Hanson-slams-Anthony-Albanese-migration-set-soar-past-300-000-amidst-housing-crisis.html">https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-11824633/Pauline-Hanson-slams-Anthony-Albanese-migration-set-soar-past-300-000-amidst-housing-crisis.html</a>
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<b> Labor makes dramatic coal policy backflip that&#39;s sure to infuriate the party&#39;s green left</b><br/>
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NSW Labor leader Chris Minns has risked a serious rift within his party by flagging the possibility of buying back Australia&#39;s largest coal-fired power station in a bid to shore up the state&#39;s energy supply and bring down electricity bills.<br/>
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The Australian Energy Market Operator last week warned the east coast could face rolling blackouts with renewable energy generation and gas unlikely to keep up with demand in the next few years.<br/>
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Despite the impending threat of the lights going out, coupled with spiralling retail energy costs, there has been great reluctance from governments to pour money into the fossil fuel industry - fearing backlash from environmentally-conscious voters.<br/>
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But Mr Minns appears to be positioning Labor for a major backflip in energy policy ahead of the March 25 election.<br/>
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The Opposition leader said a government he leads may look to take control of the Eraring power station in Lake Macquarie, which is scheduled to close in 2025, seven years earlier than previously planned.<br/>
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&#39;I&#39;m not going to let the power run out in NSW, and I&#39;m not going to rule out (buying Eraring),&#39; he told told 2GB&#39;s Ben Fordham. &#39;It might be a negotiation between the government and a private company and I acknowledge that before the election, I&#39;m putting that out there.&#39;<br/>
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Mr Minns said Eraring provides 25 per cent of NSW&#39;s electricity needs. &#39;If it&#39;s taken offline, and there&#39;s not the firming power in place, we could have major shortages,&#39; he said.<br/>
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When its owner Origin Energy made the announcement last year that it would close in 2025, NSW Energy Minister Matt Kean said he was disappointed by the decision.<br/>
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He promised the state would build what he described as the &#39;biggest battery in the southern hemisphere&#39; to make up for the power production that would be lost. But, having sold the plant in 2013, the Coalition then tried to buy it back in 2021 for almost five times the selling price.<br/>
<br/>
&#39;This power station was sold for $50million, Matt Kean tried to buy it back for $240million,&#39; Mr Minns said. &#39;When you sell off critical infrastructure that the state needs, it undermines industry, the economy and the budget position in the long run.&#39;<br/>
<br/>
The Labor leader&#39;s comments came after Mr Kean said the Coalition, if reelected, could intervene to keep Eraring open past 2025 to ease shortfalls and rising prices.<br/>
<br/>
But as Labor flipped to a more pro-coal view of power supply, the Liberals flipped the other way and Mr Kean walked away from what he had said hours earlier.<br/>
<br/>
Premier Dominic Perrottet, whose Liberal Party is facing strong challenges from pro-environment Teal candidates in several seats, said intervening to extend Eraring&#39;s lifespan was &#39;not part of our plans&#39;.<br/>
<br/>
&#39;We have an energy roadmap that&#39;s delivering $32billion of private sector investment to ensure we have a long term reliable and clean energy future. That&#39;s our plan,&#39; he said.<br/>
<br/>
The Premier added that he and Mr Kean were &#39;on completely the same page&#39; about the power station&#39;s future.<br/>
<br/>
Mr Minns told Fordham that the Australian Energy Market Operator - the national regulator - &#39;released a report last week indicating that we do need to worry about shortfalls in supply in the energy markets over the next 24 months&#39;.<br/>
<br/>
He said one of the reasons Labor plans to set up a NSW Energy Security Corporation is because &#39;we&#39;re worried about exactly these things&#39;.<br/>
<br/>
&#39;When the sun isn’t shining and the wind isn’t blowing we need to make sure we’ve got dispatchable power for the people of NSW,&#39; Mr Minns said.<br/>
<br/>
&#39;At the moment that&#39;s not going to happen because Matt Kean has not done the work to make sure there&#39;s energy security within the network. &#39;I can&#39;t rule out further action in relation to Eraring.<br/>
<br/>
The Coalition sold off all five NSW coal-fired power plants since it won power in 2011, while the previous Labor NSW government sold off energy suppliers, but Mr Minns has ruled out any further privatisation if Labor wins power.<br/>
<br/>
In February, he said &#39;Privatisation does not work. It has been a disaster for NSW and under Labor it stops.&#39;<br/>
<br/>
If Labor bought Eraring back, it would be the opposite of privatisation, it would mean the state taking back control of a previously privatised asset.<br/>
<br/>
If the buyback was about almost anything other than a coal-fired power station it would get the backing of Labor&#39;s left and the Greens.<br/>
<br/>
But it does concern fossil fuels - and Mr Minns will have calculated that however many votes the switch loses to the Greens and minor parties the decision will come back in spades in the seats Labor needs to win in Western Sydney.<br/>
<br/>

<p class="asset asset-link">
	<a href="https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-11825145/NSW-election-Labors-Chris-Minns-backflips-energy-policy-plans-buy-Eraring-power-station.html">https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-11825145/NSW-election-Labors-Chris-Minns-backflips-energy-policy-plans-buy-Eraring-power-station.html</a>
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<br/>
<b> Anthony Albanese is accused of breaking ANOTHER election promise with two big tax changes</b><br/>
<br/>
Anthony Albanese has been accused of breaking yet another election promise as his government pushes new franking credit tax laws that will affect Australian shareholders.<br/>
<br/>
The Prime Minister has already copped political heat over his contentious new superannuation tax policy and now he&#39;s facing a new political battle over franking credits - a policy that arguably cost Labor the 2019 election.<br/>
<br/>
The government introduced a bill last month that seeks to restrict the ability of companies to distribute franking credits to shareholders as part of a share buyback or capital raising.<br/>
<br/>
Debate on the bill is resuming on Tuesday, with shadow treasurer Angus Taylor accusing Labor of breaking yet another election promise.<br/>
<br/>
Franking credits are tax credits that prevent shareholders from being taxed twice. The scheme gives tax credits to shareholders on their dividends, taking into account how a corporation they have invested in has already paid the 30 per cent company tax.<br/>
<br/>
Mr Albanese had previously ruled out major changes to both superannuation and franking credits.<br/>
<br/>
But Labor&#39;s proposals would affected those aged over 75 and superannuation funds.<br/>
<br/>
WHAT ARE FRANKING CREDITS?<br/>
<br/>
Franking credits are tax credits that stop &#39;double taxation&#39;.<br/>
<br/>
Companies have already paid tax on their profits when they hand them out to shareholders as dividends.<br/>
<br/>
Dividends, which are typically funded by profits, are then distributed to shareholders &#39;fully franked&#39;, with a &#39;franking credit&#39; applying.<br/>
<br/>
At tax time, shareholders get the value of the franking credit as a tax refund.<br/>
<br/>
That means they don&#39;t pay tax on profits, because a company has already paid tax. This stops double taxation.<br/>
<br/>
One major change the government is making would stop dividends from capital raisings being eligible for franking credits.<br/>
<br/>
They would also give off-market share buy-backs the same treatment as on-market buy-backs.<br/>
<br/>
On-market buybacks are when a company buys its shares through an exchange, such as the ASX, whereas off-market buybacks are when a company will offer to buy shares back directly from the shareholder.<br/>
<br/>
The changes set to be announced on Tuesday would result in almost $600million in budget savings over the next five years.<br/>
<br/>
Australians aged over 75, Australian super funds and companies, and charities have been found to benefit the most from franking credits, according to data released by the government last week.<br/>
<br/>
Mr Taylor criticised the changes, arguing they would hurt those who lived off their dividends during a cost of living crisis. &#39;The Prime Minister and the Treasurer went to the election promising Australians that they &#39;wouldn&#39;t touch&#39; franking credits and yet in 10 months they&#39;ve added two tax grabs on Australian shareholders,&#39; he said.<br/>
<br/>
&#39;This is just another tax on super. Another tax on Australians&#39; retirement savings. And another broken promise on tax. &#39;Whether it is franking credits or superannuation, Labor can&#39;t control its spending and so it&#39;s going after the hard-earned dollars of Australians to pay for its pet projects.<br/>
<br/>
&#39;You can&#39;t trust Labor to keep promises and you can&#39;t trust Labor to run the economy.&#39;<br/>
<br/>
Bill Shorten brought a policy changing franking credit laws to the 2019 federal election, and later admitted that the plan contributed to his loss.<br/>
<br/>
The Prime Minister promised weeks before the May 2022 election there would no changes to superannuation.<br/>
<br/>
But late last month, he announced his Labor government would stop Australians with more than $3million in super from being able to make contributions and pay a concessional rate of just 15 per cent, from July 1, 2025.<br/>
<br/>

<p class="asset asset-link">
	<a href="https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-11827759/Anthony-Albaneses-government-comes-fire-franking-credit-tweaks.html">https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-11827759/Anthony-Albaneses-government-comes-fire-franking-credit-tweaks.html</a>
</p>
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<br/>
<br/>
<br/>

6 March, 2023
<br/><br/> 

<b> ‘Sick of it’: Catholic women vent frustration over sex, power and abuse</b><br/>
<br/>
<i>Sometimes I regret being an academic with long experience in survey research.  It means that  much of what I read stinks of dishonesty.  The survey reported  below is a case in point.  <a href="https://catholicwomenspeak.com/">The originators of the survey</a> say bluntly that "the survey does not claim to be representative of all Catholic women" yet you get no idea of that in the report below.  You get the impression that what was found DID represent what Catholic women think.  
  <br/>
<br/>
But it is a basic axiom of survey research that to find out about a given population by survey research you have to draw the sample in such a way that it IS representative of the population you want to study, otherwise it could tell you all sorts of untrue things about the population concerned.<br/>
<br/>
And sampling or the lack of it is not the only problem on this occasion.  We read <a href="https://www.catholicweekly.com.au/survey-of-catholic-women-questioned/">here</a> that the questions in the survey were largely leading questions, not fair ones.  So the survey tells us only what its authors wanted to hear.  To be blunt about it, it is nothing more than Leftist propaganda.  It tells us nothing truthful</i>
<br/>
<br/><br>
The largest study of Catholic women in the church’s 2000-year history has found they are hungry for reform. They resent their lack of decision-making power, want to follow their consciences on sex and contraception, and think the church should be more inclusive of the diverse and the divorced.<br/>
<br/>
Australian researchers led the global study, to be presented at the Vatican on International Women’s Day, which also found women want to be allowed to preach, dislike priests promoting political agendas, and are concerned about a lack of transparency in church governance.<br/>
<br/>
Theologian and sociologist of religion at the University of Newcastle Tracy McEwan co-authored the study, which surveyed 17,200 women from 14 countries.<br/>
Theologian and sociologist of religion at the University of Newcastle Tracy McEwan co-authored the study, which surveyed 17,200 women from 14 countries.CREDIT:FLAVIO BRANCALEONE<br/>
<br/>
“There was this underlying sense of hurt, and certainly this feeling of being voiceless and ignored,” said co-author Tracy McEwan, a theologian and sociologist of religion at the University of Newcastle. “These are not women on the edge. These are women in the church. Being Catholic is important to them, and they are struggling.”<br/>
<br/>
The study, which surveyed 17,200 women from 140 countries, comes as Pope Francis leads the church in a discussion about whether women should have a greater role in its governance and ceremonies. He has ruled out female priests, but the deaconate – someone who assists priests during mass and can preach the homily – is a possibility.<br/>
<br/>
McEwan will present the findings to female ambassadors to the Holy See on Wednesday. They will include Australia’s representative, Chiara Porro, who helped organise the presentation. The first woman ever to be allowed to vote with the Vatican’s synod of bishops, Xaviere sister Nathalie Becquart, has also been briefed on the research.<br/>
<br/>
The survey results show 84 per cent of women supported reform in the church, and two-thirds wanted radical reform. Almost three in 10 said there would be no place for them without it. There was significant concern about abuses of power and spiritual harm, particularly by male clerics. “I cling on to the church by my fingernails,” said one respondent.<br/>
<br/>
Almost eight in 10 agreed women should be fully included at all levels of church leadership, and more than three-quarters agreed that women should be able to give the homily, a commentary on the gospel during services. Two-thirds said women should be eligible for the priesthood. “I’m ashamed of my church when I see only men in procession,” said one respondent.<br/>
<br/>
More than four in five said LGBTQ people should be included in all activities, and just over half strongly agreed same-sex couples were entitled to a religious marriage. Seven in 10 said remarriage should be allowed after civil divorce, and three-quarters agreed that women should have freedom of conscience on their sexual and reproductive decisions.<br/>
<br/>
Some respondents pointed out that they do much of the work in the church, but get no recognition or say. “If every woman in every parish stopped cleaning, cooking, dusting, typing, directing ... for just one week, every parish would have to close,” said one. “Yet, why do women have so little real power?”<br/>
<br/>
Co-author Kathleen McPhillips, a sociologist at the University of Newcastle, said she was surprised at the enthusiasm with which women embraced the survey. “What it showed is they’re really sick of it,” she said. “They want to be there, but they’re sick of not being able to contribute. In their secular lives, they can do so much more.<br/>
<br/>
“It’s still the largest religion in the world. It’s hugely important we understand it. The church itself hasn’t been interested in studying its own population.”<br/>
<br/>
The results varied between countries. Australia was more conservative than the global average on some of the indicators; 74 per cent of women said they wanted reform, compared with the global average of 84. Appetite for change was strongest in the Catholic strongholds of Ireland and Spain, as well as Germany.<br/>
<br/>
But the tension has been evident in the Australian church and boiled over at a historic plenary council meeting last year, at which bishops failed to pass two motions aimed at empowering women in the church. About 60 delegates staged a silent protest. The motions were re-worded and passed.<br/>
<br/>
Younger women were also more conservative than older ones, with the 18- to 25-year-old age group least likely to want reform, according to the survey, and the over 70-year-olds most likely. The eldest women were also more likely to support same-sex marriage and the homily being preached by women.<br/>
<br/>
But even among conservative women, there was concern about having their contribution respected. “They were articulating the idea that you want women to be a certain way, that’s OK, but give us our due, give us our voice,” said McEwan.<br/>
<br/>
The church is a hierarchical patriarchy, but McEwan hopes the results will get through to those who will ultimately make the decisions. “I’m hoping that presenting this major report to the women ambassadors and to the more senior women in the Vatican will have an impact, and it will feed through,” she said.<br/>
<br/>
Catholicism is the largest religion in Australia. They make up 20 per cent of the population (women make up slightly more than half), and Sydney is its most Catholic city. The church is the country’s largest non-government provider of health care, education and welfare, and employs almost two per cent of the nation’s workers.<br/>
<br/>
Archbishop of Sydney Anthony Fisher was contacted for comment, but a spokesman declined, saying he was in Rome.<br/>
<br/>

<p class="asset asset-link">
	<a href="https://www.smh.com.au/national/sick-of-it-catholic-women-vent-frustration-over-sex-power-and-abuse-20230303-p5cp6r.html">https://www.smh.com.au/national/sick-of-it-catholic-women-vent-frustration-over-sex-power-and-abuse-20230303-p5cp6r.html</a>
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<br/>
<b> &#39;Not suitable for treatment&#39;: FOI documents reveal Garran Surge Centre fears</b><br/>
<br/>
Canberra&#39;s multi-million dollar pop-up emergency department set up in response to the pandemic was not suitable for treating infectious COVID patients, a damning review of the centre found.<br/>
<br/>
Documents, released to The Canberra Times under freedom of information, show a review of the centre expressed concerns about ventilation and airflow.<br/>
<br/>
Emails between health authorities show the centre was not suitable for infectious patients during the ACT&#39;s second lockdown &quot;without significant work being carried out&quot;.<br/>
<br/>
The pop-up hospital was designed based on guidelines developed for facilities in low- and middle-income countries and a review said it did not meet all national standards, documents also showed.<br/>
<br/>
Both the government and Aspen Medical, the contractor which built the centre, have defended the venue, saying it was built during a medical emergency when global health systems were overwhelmed and the spread of COVID was thought to largely be from droplets.<br/>
<br/>
The ACT government has said the emergency department, which was designed to have 50 beds including six resuscitation bays, was never designed to be a &quot;ward area&quot; for overnight patients.<br/>
<br/>
A review conducted in October 2021 by consultants showed concerns about negative pressures in the centre, along with a lack of filtration and &quot;non-compliant exhaust discharges&quot;.<br/>
<br/>
&quot;The facility is generally not suitable for treatment of COVID-19 infected patients as it is,&quot; the review said.<br/>
<br/>
The review of the centre also found there was a fire risk if ventilators were used within the facility.<br/>
<br/>
&quot;The high use of ventilators that could be expected in a &#39;ward area&#39; for COVID-19 patients the environment [sic] could be oxygen enriched increasing the fire risks and so places extra emphasis [on] fire related systems,&quot; the review said.<br/>
<br/>
But a spokeswoman said this review was commissioned so health authorities could consider a &quot;revised model of care&quot;, including whether the centre could be used to treat patients overnight.<br/>
<br/>
&quot;CHS consultants undertook an assessment of the building mechanical services infrastructure at the Garran Surge Centre in late 2021, as part of due diligence, to assess whether the scope of services within the building could be expanded for a short-term, revised model of care,&quot; a spokeswoman said<br/>
<br/>
&quot;The decision was made not to progress these works to avoid additional building changes. This did not affect the health, safety and wellbeing of staff and patients in the building for the services it was being used for.<br/>
<br/>
&quot;The facility was constructed in April 2020 and was not designed to be a ward area.&quot;<br/>
<br/>
&#39;Acting now to increase capacity of our health services&#39;<br/>
The Garran Surge Centre, which only closed last week, was initially built to be an emergency department for COVID patients.<br/>
<br/>
But it was never used for this purpose. Instead, it served as a vaccination centre, a testing centre and a COVID-specific walk-in centre.<br/>
<br/>
It was initially expected to cost $23 million but only cost $14 million. It was built in just 37 days on Garran Oval in early 2020. It was built to specifically handle COVID patients in the scenario where existing emergency departments did not have enough capacity to meet demand.<br/>
<br/>
When announcing the project in April 2020, ACT Chief Minister Andrew Barr said the project was aimed at preventing horror scenes overseas where authorities had to race to set up makeshift hospitals.<br/>
<br/>
&quot;We don&#39;t want to be in the sort of situation other cities around the world are currently in,&quot; he said.<br/>
<br/>
&quot;We are acting now to increase the capacity of our health services so we can continue to provide emergency care for Canberrans throughout this pandemic.&quot;<br/>
<br/>
Authorities had hoped the hospital would never need to be used.<br/>
<br/>
By the time the centre was completed in May 2020 the territory&#39;s first wave of COVID was largely finished. There was no community transmission in Canberra until August 2021, which plunged the ACT into a nine-week lockdown.<br/>
<br/>
It was during this second wave that authorities started to consider whether it would need to be used to treat patients.<br/>
<br/>
The government spokeswoman said the centre never had to be used as the demand on the emergency department was &quot;manageable&quot; as long as a range of hospital diversions were in place.<br/>
<br/>

<p class="asset asset-link">
	<a href="https://www.inkl.com/newsletters/morning-edition/news/not-suitable-for-treatment-foi-documents-reveal-garran-surge-centre-fears?utm_campaign=2023-03-06&utm_content=body&utm_medium=morning-edition&utm_source=inkl">https://www.inkl.com/newsletters/morning-edition/news/not-suitable-for-treatment-foi-documents-reveal-garran-surge-centre-fears?utm_campaign=2023-03-06&utm_content=body&utm_medium=morning-edition&utm_source=inkl</a>
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<br/>
<b> To defeat climate change, Australia must do the impossible</b><br/>
<br/>
The argument between Labor and the Greens about new gas projects is strange and pointless. New projects must be included in the government’s emissions reduction target, which doesn’t change.<br/>
<br/>
But it’s true that new mining and industrial projects of almost any sort will make it harder, and new fossil fuels will mean achieving that target goes from being almost impossible to impossible.<br/>
<br/>
None of what the government has said about Australia’s latest plan to reduce emissions, or the media coverage of it, has properly conveyed its difficulty.<br/>
<br/>
The politics has been all about the wonderful opportunity of the green energy economy, and how Australia is going to be a big winner.<br/>
<br/>
This is mostly flim-flam, and sets the country up for a nasty shock.<br/>
<br/>
Sure there will be opportunities – mainly digging up and shipping the lithium, copper and nickel needed for batteries, but we can’t make batteries here because of the carbon emissions that would cause, taking us over our limit.<br/>
<br/>
But as hard as the emissions reduction task is going to be, it will have to be done. There is no choice, and it would be helpful if the government told the truth about it.<br/>
<br/>
The plan is to reduce greenhouse gas emissions by 43 per cent from Australia’s 2005 level by 2030, and to net zero by 2050.<br/>
<br/>
That was an exercise in split-the-difference back-engineering: 43 per cent was roughly halfway between the Coalition’s 28 per cent target and the Green’s 75 per cent, so they started with that number and worked backwards. Spreadsheet jockeys were paid to assure them, and us, that it could be done, no problem, which they duly did.<br/>
<br/>
There’s no mention of “apart from new gas projects” in the fine print. It’s unconditional, and it looks like an election promise that can’t be broken … unlike those about taxes.<br/>
<br/>
Much of the work of emissions reduction has to be done by the 215 firms that each belch more than 100,000 tonnes of carbon dioxide a year into the atmosphere and are responsible for 28 per cent of Australia’s emissions. They have to cut their total emissions by about a third over seven years, from this year’s estimated 143 million tonnes to 100 million.<br/>
<br/>
Sitting comfortably atop that list of very anxious big emitters is Woodside’s North West Shelf gas project, at 6.78 million tonnes last year. The company’s huge, lucrative Scarborough project is due to come onstream in 2026. and Woodside has said its emissions will be 880 million tonnes over 30 years, or about 30 million a year, on average.<br/>
<br/>
All going well, and assuming no other new projects, that 4.9 per cent a year legislated requirement will have reduced the emissions of the 215 to 117 million tonnes by 2026. But suddenly, thanks to Woodside and Scarborough, emissions are back to something like 147 million tonnes – and now with only four years to go!<br/>
<br/>
That presumably means the task – for everyone – in the last four years between 2026 and 2030 is a 9 per cent reduction per year, not 4.9 per cent, which is hard enough.<br/>
<br/>
Pressure to reduce production<br/>
<br/>
It’s actually amazing that the other 214 big emitters haven’t already marched on Canberra to support the Greens’ demand for no new projects, although they’re probably more worried about their own gas supplies.<br/>
<br/>
Commonwealth Bank commodities analyst Vivek Dhar has figured out that the businesses covered by the safeguard mechanism will need to reduce their production by an average of 0.3 per cent a year to meet the 4.9 per cent a year reduction.<br/>
<br/>
Considering that executives are paid bonuses to increase production and launch new projects to satisfy shareholders, that is going to require a very big and unlikely change in corporate culture and remuneration.<br/>
<br/>
It results from the collective need, if they don’t reduce production, also calculated by Vivek Dhar, to reduce emissions intensity – that is, carbon dioxide per unit of production – by 35 per cent by 2030.<br/>
<br/>
The National Electricity Market (NEM) is an example of what can be done on this score. Thanks to a huge increase in renewable power generation, the NEM has cut its emissions intensity in the seven years from 2014 to 2021 – by 24 per cent.<br/>
<br/>
So the 215 largest Australian emitters are being asked to do almost 50 per cent better than the NEM has done with all the renewable electricity that’s been added to its grid.<br/>
<br/>
They won’t cut production and can’t cut emissions intensity that much, so they’ll buy lots of offsets to obey the law, or Australian carbon credit units (ACCUs) that are generated by planting trees or not cutting them down.<br/>
<br/>
Anticipating massive demand for ACCUs leading to a brutal carbon tax, the government has said that the price will be capped at $75 a tonne and then increased by CPI plus 2 per cent per year after that.<br/>
<br/>
But that’s not quite true. That’s just the price at which government itself will trade them, as buyer and seller of last resort. Others can buy and sell them for whatever price they want.<br/>
<br/>
Trees, millions of trees<br/>
<br/>
And if the non-government market price goes above $75, no one will want to sell to the government at $75. So how will Energy Minister Chris Bowen get hold of enough to satisfy what is likely to be enormous demand for cheap government ACCUs?<br/>
<br/>
That’s not explained, but it looks like Mr Bowen will have to create them, like the Reserve Bank prints money, by planting trees! Presumably we’ll see harried public servants driving around in utes packed with seedlings and spades, planting trees on every spare bit of dirt they can find.<br/>
<br/>
Without government forests springing up everywhere, it’s likely that two things will happen:<br/>
<br/>
Companies in the safeguard mechanism will be forced to choose between cutting their production and losing market share to imports from countries with less rigorous climate change policies, or increasing their costs and prices by buying ACCUs<br/>
<br/>
The non-government price of ACCUs will go very high indeed, which will be a new cost to businesses in the safeguard mechanism, or those that have voluntary committed to net zero by 2050 themselves, and have said they won’t engage in “greenwashing” by buying cheap, dodgy offsets from overseas.<br/>
<br/>
Normally I’d say that when this rubber hits the road in five years’ time, and everyone realises how hard and expensive the carbon abatement task actually is, politicians will run a mile and the country will go off the whole idea and exhume Tony Abbott to repeal Labor’s legislation again.<br/>
<br/>
Australia, and specifically the 215 hapless big emitters, will have to do the impossible, and the Prime Minister needs to start telling them and us that yesterday.<br/>
<br/>

<p class="asset asset-link">
	<a href="https://thenewdaily.com.au/opinion/2023/03/06/climate-carbon-target-kohler/">https://thenewdaily.com.au/opinion/2023/03/06/climate-carbon-target-kohler/</a>
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<b> NSW Labor promises to slash $1.6bn from budget by cutting private labour hire</b><br/>
<br/>
<i> Wotta joke. They will use government employees instead? That will cost MORE</i><br/>
<br/>
NSW opposition leader Chris Minns has vowed to cut the use of private external contractors by a quarter if Labor wins the state election in March. Photograph: Steven Saphore/AAP<br/>
New South Wales Labor says it will save the state’s budget $1.6bn by slashing the use of private labour hire, claiming government expenditure on third-party workers has grown more than $1bn over the past decade.<br/>
<br/>
On Monday, opposition leader Chris Minns will announce Labor would cut the use of private external contractors by a quarter if it wins election later this month, vowing to reinvest the extra savings into health and education spending.<br/>
<br/>
Labor said it had commissioned an analysis showing the use of contingent labour had grown by 19% a year since 2016, reaching as high as $1.8bn a year in the current financial year.<br/>
<br/>
It said its own analysis showed labour hire costs would reach $2bn a year by 2025, after the NSW auditor general last week released a report which found $1bn had been spent on private consultants since 2017.<br/>
<br/>
The auditor found in many cases departments did “not procure and manage” the cost of private consultants effectively, and most “do not have a strategic approach to using consultants, or systems for managing or evaluating their performance”.<br/>
<br/>
During his campaign launch speech on Sunday, Minns also said he would cut back on the use of consulting firms.<br/>
<br/>
“We’ll end that exorbitant waste, we’ll find savings to make sure our public services run better. The truth is it’s far too top heavy, and the money must be directed where it’s needed – to those who deliver the services,” he said.<br/>
<br/>
Ahead in the polls less than three weeks out from the 25 March state election, Labor is seeking to paint the Coalition as reckless on spending. When Dominic Perrottet finally ruled out further privatisations after weeks of Labor pressure, the opposition accused the government of racking up billions in gross debt over its ambitious infrastructure pipeline.<br/>
<br/>
Minns said while Labor “recognises that we will have to work with the private sector in government” he wanted to prioritise getting “the budget back under control while reinvesting the savings to repair our schools and hospitals”.<br/>
<br/>
“We will only spend within our means, not make promises no one believes and government can’t keep,” he said.<br/>
<br/>
The analysis on labour hire costs shows the use of third-party firms is predicted to hit about $2.1bn by 2025, up from about $700m in 2016.<br/>
<br/>
The shadow treasurer, Daniel Mookhey, said the use of third-party labour had seen the public service “run by a shadow army of non-permanent workers”.<br/>
<br/>
“With a severe shortage of critical workers across NSW, Mr Perrottet is spending an enormous amount of taxpayer money filling ICT and administrative tasks with temporary workers,” he said.<br/>
<br/>
“The Public Service Commission said as early as 2017 that contingent labour should only be used when it is the most efficient and effective option available to respond to an agency’s business needs. It also recommended that agencies use contingent labour when informed by proper workforce planning.<br/>
<br/>
“Premier Perrottet and his treasurer have not done the work to comply with these recommendations.”<br/>
<br/>
The proposed $1.6bn saving would be used to fund previous Labor commitments to create 10,000 fixed teaching roles.<br/>
<br/>
It comes after Labor announced a suite of measures aimed at public sector workers at its campaign launch on Sunday, including a$76m promise to encourage students into healthcare by offering $12,000 subsidies on university as well as a $93m commitment to hire 1,000 apprentices in government-owned entities like Sydney Water.<br/>
<br/>

<p class="asset asset-link">
	<a href="https://www.theguardian.com/australia-news/2023/mar/06/nsw-labor-promises-to-slash-16bn-from-budget-by-cutting-private-labour-hire">https://www.theguardian.com/australia-news/2023/mar/06/nsw-labor-promises-to-slash-16bn-from-budget-by-cutting-private-labour-hire</a>
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<br/>


5 March, 2023
<br/><br/> 

<b> When hate speech is OK</b><br/>
<br/>
When it emerged that a 2022 Sydney Festival dance production was being supported with a $20,000 grant from the Israeli embassy, more than two dozen performers boycotted the festival and demanded it be shut down for “normalising apartheid”.<br/>
<br/>
When it was revealed that this month’s Adelaide Writers Week would feature authors who have published what reads like violent abuse towards supporters of Israel, mocked Jews over the Holocaust and expressed support for Vladimir Putin, the response from festival organisers and participants was of a different kind.<br/>
<br/>
The show must go on.<br/>
<br/>
In the past fortnight, Adelaide Writers Week has become a national flashpoint for those who believe that, far from being challenging spaces which invite the exchange of multiple ideas, arts festivals are now captive to fixed left-wing orthodoxies, including questioning whether the state of Israel has the right even to exist.<br/>
<br/>
The furore invites broader questions. Are there limits to free speech? At what point does robust free speech descend into hate speech? Do the social media ramblings of a person count towards an assessment of their output and character?<br/>
<br/>
Key Jewish-Australian organisation have been appalled by the conduct of Adelaide Writers Week and its director Louise Adler, the former chief executive of Melbourne University Publishing, in crafting a line-up which they say gives a platform to bigots.<br/>
<br/>
Adler is curating her first Adelaide Writers Week under a three-year deal, having taking the reins from previous director Jo Dyer, who ran unsuccessfully as a teal candidate for the SA seat of Boothby at last year’s federal election.<br/>
<br/>
Critics of AWW say that not only is the festival stacked in favour of the Palestinian cause, it has rolled out the red carpet to people they regard as extremists.<br/>
<br/>
Their anger is shared by Australian Ukrainians, who in the lead-up to the first anniversary of Russia’s illegal invasion were dismayed to learn Adelaide was playing host to an author who believes the continuing war is the fault of the Ukrainian government and people.<br/>
<br/>
The fallout so far has been significant – three authors have cancelled in protest, sponsors have threatened to pull funding, The Adelaide Advertiser has removed all its staff from the daily “Breakfast with Papers” program, and Premier Peter Malinauskas has been urged to intervene.<br/>
<br/>
The two authors who sparked the dramas are Jerusalem-based Palestinian poet Mohammed El-Kurd and Palestinian-American author Susan Abulhawa.<br/>
<br/>
Aged just 24, El-Kurd is hailed by his supporters as one of the most important new voices in Palestinian literature, his 2021 debut collection Rifqa credited with “laying bare the brutality of Israeli settler colonialism”. He also works as the Palestine correspondent for The Nation and in 2021 was named, with his twin sister Muna, as one of the 100 most influential people in the world by Time Magazine.<br/>
<br/>
El-Kurd’s grace as a poet is less evident in his tweeting, where he has described supporters of Israel as “sadistic barbaric neo-Nazi pigs” with an “unquenchable thirst for Palestinian blood”.<br/>
<br/>
“I hope every one of them dies in the most torturous and slow ways,” he has tweeted. “I hope that they see their mothers suffering.”<br/>
<br/>
He has ridiculed Jews for having to wear so much sunscreen – suggesting it proves they don’t belong in the Middle East – and made Holocaust references, including accusing Israel of “kristallnachting” the Palestinian people.<br/>
<br/>
With this back catalogue of vitriol, it’s not surprising that the Anti-Defamation League and Executive Council of Australian Jewry have both written to the Adelaide Festival arguing that El-Kurd is not so much the Wordsworth of the West Bank but a peddler of anti-Semitic abuse.<br/>
<br/>
His fellow author Abulhawa is also well regarded as a writer; her latest book Against the Loveless World lauded as a moving exploration of statelessness and resistance in the context of the Palestinian struggle.<br/>
<br/>
But again, less elegant on Twitter, where she has written “It’s possible to be Jewish and a Nazi at the same time” and described Israel as “the only ‘nation’ that systematically kidnaps and tortures children daily”.<br/>
<br/>
It is Abulhawa’s views on Russia’s illegal invasion of Ukraine that have caused the most blowback for AWW. In multiple tweets, Abulhawa has declared the war is Ukraine’s fault for trying to join NATO and parroted the Moscow line with a tweet which simply read: “Denazify Ukraine.”<br/>
<br/>
She has described Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky as “a depraved Zionist trying to ignite World War III” and said: “This man is no hero. He’s mad and far more dangerous than Putin.”<br/>
<br/>
It was for this reason that three Ukrainian authors have withdrawn from the festival, all of them writing to Adler saying they would not share a platform with someone who peddled Russian propaganda in defence of genocide.<br/>
<br/>
“I feel saddened that calls to be sensitive in relation to Ukrainians who have been attacked in this genocidal war and to not give a platform to voices that repeat Kremlin propaganda are not always heard,” author Olesya Khromeychuk wrote.<br/>
<br/>
Fellow author Kateryna Babkina wrote to Adler: “I’m afraid I can’t participate in any kind of event that gives voice to the person considering Ukrainians should give up their right to decide what to do with their destiny and their independent country and just become a ‘neutral nation’ pleasing Russian ambitions in order not to be killed.”<br/>
<br/>
The fallout from all this has been acute for the Adelaide Festival. Board members have been lobbied urging them to intervene; sponsors Minter Ellison, PwC and IT firm Capgemini have demanded their signage be removed as they weigh future support for the festival; Malinauskas vowed not to attend any sessions involving the offending authors, despite grudgingly honouring a pre-made commitment to speak at the opening of the event.<br/>
<br/>
But Malinauskas, who has Lithuanian ancestry from his refugee grandfather, has made no secret of his concern at the presence of the pair on the AWW line-up.<br/>
<br/>
“There is a distinction between provoking thought and facilitating the spreading of a message that simply does not accord with basic human values,” he said. “That is worthy of contemplation for Writers Week.”<br/>
<br/>
Adler has now made several public statements saying authors at AWW have been reminded that hate speech or bigotry of any kind will not be tolerated.<br/>
<br/>
But she is sticking to her guns with the line-up on free speech grounds, arguing that it is vital that different ideas be put forward and contested.<br/>
<br/>
“I am interested in creating a context for courageous and brave spaces where we can have civil dialogue and discussion about ideas that we may not all agree on,” Adler said.<br/>
<br/>
“If we all gather together just to agree with one another or with people who share our views, well some people might enjoy that, but I don’t think that’s the point of a literary festival.”<br/>
<br/>
Adler’s detractors laugh at the assertion of diversity, with former federal Labor MP Jewish-Australian Michael Danby noting there are seven Palestinian authors and not one Israeli at the event.<br/>
<br/>
A quick look at the AWW political line-up does little to bolster Adler’s claims to it being a freewheeling orgy of disagreement. From the world of politics, Liberal moderate Amanda Vanstone will be joined at AWW by Bob Carr, Wayne Swan, Bob Brown, Steve Bracks, Gareth Evans, Sarah Hanson-Young, Maxine McKew, along with ACTU secretary Sally McManus and teals founder and funder Simon Holmes a Court.<br/>
<br/>
If this is diversity, it is a brand of diversity which extends all the way along the ideological spectrum from the rabidly left-wing to considerably left-wing to somewhat left-wing.<br/>
<br/>
In defending the presence of El-Kurd and Abulhawa, Adler has tried to draw a distinction between their published works and their social media posts, as if the tweets can almost be expunged from the record.<br/>
<br/>
“Twitter is more for succinct targeted polemic rather than nuanced discussion,” she told this newspaper.<br/>
<br/>
It’s a defence which is rubbished by the third Ukrainian author to withdraw from the festival, Kharkiv-born Australian author Maria Tumarkin, who in a withering blogpost made it clear she regarded AWW as an intellectual indulgence while an actual war was going on.<br/>
<br/>
“I’m a Ukrainian Jewish Australian, no hyphens or hyphens, I don’t care. My world (as I knew it) ended on February 24, 2022. I have no connection to any ‘interest groups’, ‘sponsorship money’, ‘Zionist lobby’, ‘pearl-clutching’ (snort!), ‘attempts to silence marginalised voices’, ‘propaganda’ propagation – what else have you got for me?<br/>
<br/>
“I’d rather not be lectured on developing a higher tolerance for ‘confronting ideas’. All good on that front, thanks.<br/>
<br/>
“In the last 12 months I’ve learned a lot and changed my mind a lot. Perhaps the most salient lesson is that anti-war can mean pro-genocide. It means pro-genocide right now in Ukraine.<br/>
<br/>
“Statements in which Zelensky (who’s Jewish) is called a Nazi, fascist, someone responsible for Russia’s invasion of Ukraine and/or WWIII are not anti-Zelensky and/or pro-Putin. They are forms of genocide cheering (a step up from genocide apology). They do not exist in the space of discourse only and do not represent something that can be classified as merely a contentious political opinion. If only.<br/>
<br/>
“And while we’re on the subject, I see no difference between Twitter feeds and books if tweets are pro-genocidal and knowingly so.”<br/>
<br/>
Adler is the daughter of Holocaust survivors. As such, she invites a degree of awe with her bulletproof commitment to free speech principles. But she is clearly out of step with a great number of Jewish and Ukrainian people who regard this not as free speech but hate speech. And her promise of diverse speech is not backed up by the AWW program.<br/>
<br/>
In the broader context of the cultural arc of these modern-day festivals, one wonders if he were alive today what kind of reception the Italian chemist and Auschwitz survivor Primo Levi would receive were he scheduled to appear in Adelaide this week at the Pioneer Women’s Memorial Garden.<br/>
<br/>
Would If This is a Man be hailed for what it is, the definitive first-person chronicle of the high point of human evil, or a tendentious sob-story aimed at bolstering Israeli hegemony? The answer would probably be the latter, especially if the Israeli embassy dared sponsor Levi’s appearance.<br/>
<br/>

<p class="asset asset-link">
	<a href="https://www.theaustralian.com.au/inquirer/when-does-robust-free-speech-descend-into-hate-speech/news-story/084b8243431b852d54c6fde5c1f6670a">https://www.theaustralian.com.au/inquirer/when-does-robust-free-speech-descend-into-hate-speech/news-story/084b8243431b852d54c6fde5c1f6670a</a>
</p>
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<br/>
<b> Youth crime epidemic in Queensland</b><br/>
<br/>
There are many adjectives which Queenslanders have employed to describe Campbell Newman over the years but “fearful” is not among them.<br/>
<br/>
Yet tonight, as a story in today’s Sunday Mail reveals, the former hard-nosed Queensland premier who began working life as an army engineer, and whose own political pugnaciousness unquestionably contributed to his downfall in 2015, admits freely that he is fearful, increasingly anxious and genuinely concerned for his own personal safety.<br/>
<br/>
In a Sky News documentary screened tonight, the same Newman who launched a legislative assault on bikies and simply dismissed the threats and intimidation which followed reveals it is kids roaming the street outside his home that scare him.<br/>
<br/>
He locks his bedroom door every night, horrified by recent events which include a stabbing murder only 1000m from his home.<br/>
<br/>
“I’m ready for them to come through my back window,’’ he says.<br/>
<br/>
Newman, more than eight years removed from high office, is not dissimilar to average folk with a limited ability to formulate public policy. He is now not a member of any political party.<br/>
<br/>
And while his ideological affiliation with the conservative side of politics remains, his opinions are largely bipartisan in the sense they are being expressed in all quarters, right across this state.<br/>
<br/>
His remarks will resonate with mums and dads who go to bed at night now wondering whether their car will be stolen. Youth crime is no urban myth, nor a media generated community panic. It’s now factored into our ordinary lives.<br/>
<br/>
Those security cameras which only a few years ago were the sign of a wealthy homeowner living in a large compound are now winking at us as we knock on the door of ordinary Queensland suburban homes.<br/>
<br/>
Queenslanders now sense that many of these youthful criminals have no framework of reference for ordinary behaviour – that they will, quite literally, kill you if you disturb them in their attempts at theft, and then have little capacity for self-reflection after the event.<br/>
<br/>
That lack of a capacity to grasp the enormous damage they have caused to a fellow human being is noted by many youth workers who see, time and time again, how many of these serious offenders have been totally divorced from any sympathetic human connection almost from the day of their birth.<br/>
<br/>
Newman, with an indisputable grasp of public policy stretching back 20 years to his days as Brisbane mayor, has some cutting criticisms to make of the Labor state government on this issue.<br/>
<br/>
Queenslanders don’t want to play politics with this issue but they too are grappling with the same questions.<br/>
<br/>
This government cannot deny, and will not deny, its policies on youth crime have been developed through a more academic prism which is opposed to incarceration as a method of rehabilitation and reflects criminal justice trends going back half a century.<br/>
<br/>
But, as Newman points out in his blunt manner, that system hasn’t worked.<br/>
<br/>
Newman sees a principal purpose of criminal justice as keeping people safe from violence. Yet he is against locking children up in detention centres.<br/>
<br/>
Instead, he sees an answer in youth offenders being signed up to community service or being sent off to boot camps remote from our major population centres.<br/>
<br/>
Many Queenslanders will now agree that anything is worth a try.<br/>
<br/>

<p class="asset asset-link">
	<a href="https://www.couriermail.com.au/news/opinion/editors-view-home-truths-cut-through-in-state-of-fear/news-story/2ab988e339babdb72d32ae5b5e72009e">https://www.couriermail.com.au/news/opinion/editors-view-home-truths-cut-through-in-state-of-fear/news-story/2ab988e339babdb72d32ae5b5e72009e</a>
</p>
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<br/>
<b> International Women’s Day is a farce</b><br/>
<br/>
Organisations such as Australia’s Workplace Gender Equality Agency add up all the salaries earned by men and women and then announce how much less in total women got paid. According to the agency’s latest calculations, it’s now 13.3 per cent less.<br/>
<br/>
This is partly because there are female-dominated professions, such as nursing and teaching, that should be better paid. But even the agency admits it isn’t because women are paid less for doing the same job as a man.<br/>
<br/>
So the persistent difference between men and women’s total earnings comes down to something more fundamental: personal choice. It’s important to recognise this to create better outcomes for women in later life.<br/>
<br/>
Many men and women design their entire lives and career choices around a family unit which includes children. Divorce settlements, if it comes to that, need to account for that implicit deal. That includes asset-splitting. This would be the best way to support women who take jobs with less responsibility or fewer hours because they pragmatically realise that “having it all” is a furphy.<br/>
<br/>
While we’re at it, “having it all” is another trope that should be cut from the International Women’s Day line-up. If a woman is “having it all” – that is, kids and a kick-arse career – chances are there’s both childcare involved and a nanny at home. That’s other women, for the most part. Why don’t they get to “have it all”?<br/>
<br/>
And if we’re not “having it all”, for instance, because the desired family didn’t eventuate, or the career isn’t so stellar, the International Women’s Day “all” is an annual kick in the guts about what it takes to be complete as a woman.<br/>
<br/>
Those women who aren’t being guilted into attending some patronising event, are spending International Women’s Day doing twice the work. For instance, the nannies, mentioned above.<br/>
<br/>
And the ABC likes to celebrate by creating all-female line-ups on its flagship shows, presumably giving the chaps the opportunity to put their feet up. Meanwhile, Champions of Change (until recently known as Male Champions of Change) provides an opportunity for men to burnish their CVs by turning gender equality into a form of corporate charity.<br/>
<br/>
All this dressed up in the blare of pink that adorns International Women’s Day. “CONGRATULATIONS, YOU’RE A GIRL,” it announces, like an annual late-life gender reveal.<br/>
<br/>
Thanks, without your help, we’d never have figured it out.<br/>
<br/>
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<br/>
<b> Australia’s cultural treasure Trove hangs in the balance</b><br/>
<br/>
Billions of stories held within the National Library of Australia’s online portal, Trove, are hanging in the balance as the federal government considers a funding plea to maintain the beloved platform.<br/>
<br/>
The archive’s funding is due to expire on June 30 and chief executive of the Australian Library and Information Association, Cathie Warburton, said it would be disastrous if the resource was lost.<br/>
<br/>
“Trove is the envy of the world,” she said. “Its international reputation as a keystone of Australia’s national research infrastructure with free access to digital sources is a credit to Australian librarianship. It would be an unmitigated tragedy if we lost it.”<br/>
<br/>
The National Library has warned that without at least $7 million in additional government support in the May budget, the popular archive could cease operations from July.<br/>
<br/>
The National Trusts of Australia is the latest organisation to call for urgent funding for the portal. Chairman Lachlan Molesworth described Trove as a national treasure.<br/>
<br/>
“I would call Trove the single most important custodian of digital heritage in the country in the same way that we are probably the most important custodian of the physical cultural heritage in the country,” he said.<br/>
<br/>
“Trove records the best and the worst part of this country’s history ... losing that is losing part of our cultural heritage.”<br/>
<br/>
Arts Minister Tony Burke last month met leaders of eight national galleries and museums including the National Library, the National Gallery of Australia and the National Portrait Gallery.<br/>
<br/>
The government’s own advisory body on national cultural policy has recommended arts and cultural organisations be exempt from efficiency dividends, a method by which cumulative cost-cutting is enforced.<br/>
<br/>
Burke last week said no decision had been made on additional funding for Trove, but hinted Labor was favourable to funding what he described as an “incredibly important” resource.<br/>
<br/>
“It is fair to say that Labor has always had a commitment to the cultural institutions,” he said.<br/>
<br/>
Spanning some 6 billion items, Trove has an estimated 70,000 daily users.<br/>
<br/>
It contains all manner of Australiana: advice on making wartime rations go further, a 1936 recipe for sliced heart and bananas fried in fat – and a map drawn in 1940 showing “the distribution of the Aboriginal tribes of Australia”.<br/>
<br/>
Researching a bluestone fountain in the heart of Melbourne started Irene Kearsey’s journey into the ever-evolving database that is Trove.<br/>
<br/>
Stanford Fountain, on Spring Street, was constructed in 1870 by Pentridge prisoner William Stanford of bluestone, the only material available to him. Stanford later succumbed of silicosis – then called “stonemasons’ disease” – literally dying for his art.<br/>
<br/>
His story is just one of billions held within the portal, which holds digital copies of newspapers, government gazettes, maps, magazines, books, photographs, archived websites, music and interviews.<br/>
<br/>

<p class="asset asset-link">
	<a href="https://www.smh.com.au/national/australia-s-cultural-treasure-trove-hangs-in-the-balance-20230301-p5com5.html">https://www.smh.com.au/national/australia-s-cultural-treasure-trove-hangs-in-the-balance-20230301-p5com5.html</a>
</p>
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<br/>



3 March, 2023
<br/><br/> 

<b> The perennial Aborigine problem</b><br/>
<br/>
When the Australian editorialises (24/02/23) that, ‘No one who has followed [its] reporting over decades could remain untouched by the misery afflicting many of our Indigenous communities’ (it means Aboriginal communities, but let that common error pass), it can so claim without fear of contradiction. Nor, it goes on, ‘would they question the vital need to solve the problems that underlie that misery’. True, but the issue has always been, and remains, how to do so?<br/>
<br/>
For longer than I care to remember, well-meaning people like that editorial writer have said we ‘need to solve’ those problems. Program after program has been devised in efforts to do so, and billions upon billions of dollars provided by Australian taxpayers to finance those programs. Yet stubbornly, the problems remain. How can that be?<br/>
<br/>
Some reasons, I suggest, are obvious. For example, when that same editorialist says that the Australian ‘has long been in favour of an acknowledgement [in our constitution] of the country’s first peoples’, does he or she really believe that such a development would have any positive influence on those unsolved problems? Of course it wouldn’t; so why do otherwise intelligent people continue to prattle on to the contrary?<br/>
<br/>
(To digress for one moment, incidentally, there is no sustainable basis for Aboriginal ‘recognition’ in our constitution. As has been said, that document is a rule book, not a history book. It laid down the basis on which six British colonies agreed ‘to unite in one indissoluble Commonwealth under the Crown…’. It had nothing to say about the then inhabitants – non-Aboriginal or Aboriginal – of those colonies (thenceforth states). In 1999, John Howard (demonstrating that even great men can make fools of themselves) put forward a referendum to insert a ‘recognition’ statement via a new preamble to the constitution. The Australian electorate, wise in such matters, consigned it to the flames, with only 39 per cent in favour nationally, and defeating it in every state and territory.)<br/>
<br/>
‘Most Australians’, as that editorial said, ‘bear enormous goodwill towards the first inhabitants of this continent…’. However, I greatly doubt that that goodwill springs, as the editorialist suggests, from ‘sharing a pride in their tens of thousands of years of culture’. Culture? What culture? The one that, as the late Tim Fischer once bravely pointed out, never even managed to invent the wheel? The one in which, as English soldiers observed in 1788, male Aborigines maltreated their women abominably? – as they continue to do today in so many parts of this country. The one in which superstition and retrograde concepts such as ‘payback’ are so firmly entrenched? The 1999 referendum proposed ‘honouring Aborigines… for their ancient and continuing cultures which enrich the life of our country’. Examples of that ‘enrichment’ have recently been manifesting themselves in no uncertain manner on the streets of Alice Springs.<br/>
<br/>
Few topics in this country evoke so much emotion – and so much intellectual confusion – as the state of Aboriginal affairs. One major reason for this is that our ‘Aborigines’ in fact fall into two very different categories. The first category – the one in which Aboriginal culture still holds sway and those ‘problems’ remain so apparent – comprises the 60,000 to 70,000 whose ancestry is wholly Aboriginal. The second category – several times more numerous – consists of people of mixed ancestry, who have chosen to identify as ‘Aboriginal’, but who could equally (or even more accurately in many cases) identify with their Caucasian, Chinese, or other non-Aboriginal forebears. (Senator Jacinta Nampijinpa Price, whose outstanding qualities almost literally shine out of her, has actually taken this bull by the horns, referring to herself from time to time as ‘part-Aboriginal’.) These people live in the community side-by-side with their non-Aboriginal neighbours, go to work on a regular basis, send their children to school, take out mortgages, and so on. So why do governments include them in programs devised to deal with Aboriginal problems? Because, I suggest, the politicians leading those governments lack the intestinal fortitude to refuse to do so.<br/>
<br/>
That is precisely the problem with the current controversy over the so-called Voice to parliament – the matter to which the editorial mentioned at the outset principally pertains. The undeniable fact is that this proposal seeks to insert into our constitution provisions endowing one set of Australians (Aborigines – however defined!) with rights not available to the rest of us. But as the Institute of Public Affairs, writing about this many months ago, said: ‘Race has no place in Australia’s Constitution.’ (It was not merely opposing the Voice on those grounds, but arguing for removal of the two existing race-based passages in that document.) This is so obvious that all the questions about how the Voice would work, were it to come to pass, are plainly irrelevant. Why then are our politicians? – particularly the leader of the opposition, Peter Dutton – so reluctant to say so?<br/>
<br/>
I have read almost every issue of the Australian since its first day of publication in 1964. It is a great newspaper, towering over the pygmies otherwise littering the Australian media landscape. It has a claim, indeed, for inclusion among the ten (or even possibly the five) best newspapers in the world. Why then, in the face of all reason, does it continue to support the Voice? It is not the case that, ‘Lack of detail on voice risks losing nation’s goodwill’, as the headline to that editorial claimed. Nor is it the case that, as the subsidiary headline claimed, ‘Time is running out for the government to allay legitimate fears’. As noted, those fears are irrelevant. What does risk losing people’s goodwill is the unprincipled push to destroy the constitutional foundation whereby all Australians are equal. With all due respect to a great newspaper, when will reality break in?<br/>
<br/>

<p class="asset asset-link">
	<a href="https://www.spectator.com.au/2023/03/australian-notes-328/">https://www.spectator.com.au/2023/03/australian-notes-328/</a>
</p>
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<br/>
<b> Nazi attitudes are alive and well right here in Australia</b><br/>
<br/>
A Palestinian author appearing at Adelaide Writers Week has described a Jewish-American civilian murdered by terrorists in Israel this week as “human garbage” who deserves no sympathy.<br/>
<br/>
The comments came as South Australian Premier Peter Malinauskas revealed he had considered axing funding for the writers’ week but did not want to set a precedent where governments determined who could speak.<br/>
<br/>
Susan Abulhawa is one of two authors at Adelaide Writers Week who have been condemned by key Jewish and Ukrainian groups over a string of inflammatory remarks that have seen three writers pull out of the festival and sponsors threaten to withdraw funding.<br/>
<br/>
Abulhawa’s latest comments involve the murder of Elan Gan­eles, a 26-year-old Jewish-American civilian ambushed and shot near the Dead Sea last Monday while visiting Israel for a friend’s wedding.<br/>
<br/>
His death was labelled an act of terrorism by the Israeli Defence Forces, in which Ganeles had served as a computer programmer before returning home last year to Connecticut to finish his studies at Columbia University.<br/>
<br/>
Ganeles was killed a day after two Israeli brothers were shot dead in a similar attack in the West Bank, the incident prompting a violent outbreak by hardline Israeli settlers who torched hundreds of Palestinian homes and vehicles in Nablus, with one Palestinian death confirmed and many people seriously injured.<br/>
<br/>
Abulhawa took to Twitter this week to ridicule a eulogy for Ganeles posted by the Israeli ­consulate-general in New York that said Israelis were “shattered by his loss” and he had been a good man “who sought to better the world”.<br/>
<br/>
“Privileged white man leaves US to violently colonise another people, gets killed by the people he’s robbing and oppressing,” ­Abulhawa said. “Simultaneously his coloniser friends go on a murderous rampage, committing a pogrom in Nablus. “And y’all are upset over this human garbage.”<br/>
<br/>
The comments have been condemned by the Executive Council of Australian Jewry as another example of Abulhawa’s violent abuse towards Jewish people.<br/>
<br/>
ECAJ co-chief executive Alex Ryvchin told The Australian ­Abulhawa’s latest tweet was “unstable and despicable”.<br/>
<br/>
“I pity Susan Abulhawa,” he said. “It can’t be easy to live with such inhumanity as to mock and celebrate the murder of an innocent young man. The writers’ week director and any board members that still support her should feel deeply ashamed.”<br/>
<br/>
Abulhawa’s comments about the death of Ganeles and subsequent attacks on Palestinians were made despite the IDF denouncing the anti-Palestinian ­violence and warning Israeli hardliners against vigilantism.<br/>
<br/>
The Israeli general in charge of troops in the West Bank, Major General Yehuda Fuchs, described the attacks as a “pogrom” and admitted the IDF was unprepared for the scale of anti-Palestinian ­violence, accusing the Israeli settlers of “spreading terror”.<br/>
<br/>
The participation of Abulhawa and fellow Palestinian author Mohammed El-Kurd has sparked outrage over Adelaide Writers Week and strong criticisms of its director, former Melbourne University Publishing chief Louise Adler.<br/>
<br/>
Abulhawa is a fierce critic of Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky, whom she has described as “a depraved Zionist trying to ignite World War III”. <i> [Zelensky is Jewish]</i><br/>
<br/>
She has written several tweets saying the war is Ukraine’s fault for trying to join NATO and has tweeted declaring “DeNazify Ukraine”, the line used by Moscow to defend the invasion.<br/>
<br/>
She has also described Mr Zelensky as “mad and far more dangerous than (Vladimir) Putin” and written “It’s possible to be Jewish and a Nazi at the same time”.<br/>
<br/>
El-Kurd has written scores of tweets that prompted the New York-based Anti-Defamation League and the ECAJ to write to Adelaide Festival organisers to say they were giving a platform to “unvarnished anti-Semitism”.<br/>
<br/>
He has described Israel as “demonic”, “sadistic” and a “death cult”, labelled Zionists “barbaric neo-Nazi pigs” with a “lust” for Palestinian blood, and compared Israel with the Nazi regime whose genocide led to the creation of the Jewish state, ­including accusing Israel of ­“Kristallnachting” Palestinian people.<br/>
<br/>
The Australians has approached Abulhawa and El Kurd for comment through AWW organisers but has had no reply.<br/>
<br/>
Despite saying last week that he would boycott any writers week sessions featuring Abulhawa and El-Kurd, Mr Malinauskas on Thursday night honoured a commitment to launch AWW at the Adelaide Town Hall alongside its director, Ms Adler.<br/>
<br/>
Mr Malinauskas used the launch to repeat his criticisms of the authors but said he did not want to set a precedent of a government deciding what could be said at a writers festival.<br/>
<br/>
“I confess to contemplating removing government support for writers week,” he said. “And to be sure, this may have been a politically expedient action for the government to take.<br/>
<br/>
“But as the holder of the highest elected office in our state, I can’t just be a politician looking to get a six-second grab up on the nightly news. “As Premier, I have the responsibility to actively contemplate all the consequences of each and every decision I make.<br/>
<br/>
“If I was to unilaterally defund writers week on the basis of Susan Abulhawa’s views, what path does that take us down? “It’s a path to a future where politicians decide what is culturally appropriate.<br/>
<br/>
“And at worst, it leads us to a future in which politicians can directly stifle events that are themselves predicated on freedom of speech and the expression of ideas … a path, in fact, that leads us into the territory of Putin’s ­Russia.”<br/>
<br/>
Jewish Community Council of South Australia spokesman Norm Scheuler said Adelaide’s Jewish community “could not believe” that Mr Malinauskas honoured his commitment to open writers week, especially in light of Abulhawa’s latest tweets.<br/>
<br/>
“Not only are we surprised, we are bitterly disappointed,” he said.<br/>
<br/>
Asked about the latest Abulhawa tweet, Adelaide Festival chief executive Kath Mainland gave this statement: “Ms Abulhawa is one of 160 writers from 10 countries taking part in Adelaide Writers Week, which has a zero-tolerance policy to racist com­mentary at and during the event.”<br/>
<br/>

<p class="asset asset-link">
	<a href="https://www.theaustralian.com.au/arts/books/terror-victim-was-human-garbage-says-adelaide-writers-week-author/news-story/4158211cc278b26f4dbfcf327391d963">https://www.theaustralian.com.au/arts/books/terror-victim-was-human-garbage-says-adelaide-writers-week-author/news-story/4158211cc278b26f4dbfcf327391d963</a>
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<br/>
<b> Treasurer’s super raid could be a tax on young Australians</b><br/>
<br/>
The great flaw in Jim Chalmers’ superannuation raid is that higher taxes will apply to more and more Australians every year because he will not adjust the $3m threshold above which higher taxes will apply. With inflation running at 8 per cent, $3m will soon not be what it is today.<br/>
<br/>
Labor’s new tax is not a tax on the rich, it is a tax on young Australians because many of them will need $3m (or even more) by the time they retire.<br/>
<br/>
The government’s proposal is to double the tax rate for those with superannuation balances of $3m or more. The government claims that this will affect fewer than 0.5 per cent of Australians. But that is just for today.<br/>
<br/>
Some quick sums show that many more will be affected if the $3m threshold stays fixed. Take a 30-year-old today with a $200,000 superannuation balance.<br/>
<br/>
Assuming that person earns $100,000 a year, and makes average returns on their superannuation, this person will have a superannuation balance of more than $3m by the time they are 62 years old. This is the power of compound interest.<br/>
<br/>
Does the government think that someone on $100,000 a year is rich? The average full-time wage is now $94,000.<br/>
<br/>
Say upon retirement at 65, this Australian plans to have their superannuation provide for them for another 20 years.<br/>
<br/>
Thanks to Labor’s tax changes, they will now have $50,000 a year less to provide for themselves in retirement. Over their lifetime, they will pay $700,000 more in superannuation taxes.<br/>
<br/>
Younger Australians are facing a much poorer and harsher<br/>
retirement if Labor’s tax changes are not stopped.<br/>
<br/>

<p class="asset asset-link">
	<a href="https://www.couriermail.com.au/news/opinion/matt-canavan-treasurers-super-raid-could-be-a-tax-on-young-australians/news-story/15d929533ccac2708cf7d2e396266c7b">https://www.couriermail.com.au/news/opinion/matt-canavan-treasurers-super-raid-could-be-a-tax-on-young-australians/news-story/15d929533ccac2708cf7d2e396266c7b</a>
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<br/>
<b> China trade thaw as coal, cotton exports resume</b><br/>
<br/>
A two-year freeze on coal and cotton exports to China appears to have thawed with a lift in the volume of goods being sent to Australia’s biggest trading partner, but the Albanese government remains cautious about proclaiming an end to Beijing’s unofficial ban.<br/>
<br/>
The first shipments of Australian coking coal arrived in a southern Chinese port in early February, and ASX-listed, Chinese-owned coal company Yancoal confirmed this week it had sent two cargoes of coal to China this year.<br/>
<br/>
Some 25 ships with a total of 2.5 million tonnes of Australian coal had sailed for China “since January”, commodity analyst S&P Global told the Australian.<br/>
<br/>
Australian coal sales to China were cut back in 2019 and halted in 2020 by informal bans imposed as a result of political tensions. Two-way trade between Australia and China was worth $300bn last year.<br/>
<br/>
The coal hiatus saw dozens of ships with Australian coal forced to moor off Chinese ports. As many as 80 shipments were believed to be affected.<br/>
<br/>
Australian cotton sales to China had also resumed, with a shipment of several thousand tonnes of cotton arriving in the port of Qingdao “in recent days”, China’s Global Times reported.<br/>
<br/>
Federal Trade Minister Don Farrell said the trade flows were positive for Australian companies but warned the full resumption of exports between the two countries could take some time.<br/>
<br/>
“We welcome any step towards the full resumption of trade” with China, Senator Farrell said. “It is in both countries’ interest for trade impediments to be removed.”<br/>
<br/>
But he warned that “the trade impediments didn’t occur overnight, and they won’t be resolved overnight”.<br/>
<br/>
While more unofficial trade sanctions across a range of products are expected to be lifted this year, ending formal trade sanctions against Australian wine and barley will be more challenging, as both are subject to formal tariffs from China and a federal government appeal to the World Trade Organisation is on foot.<br/>
<br/>

<p class="asset asset-link">
	<a href="https://www.theaustralian.com.au/business/economics/china-trade-thaw-as-coal-cotton-exports-resume/news-story/564bcb7b20e16ac4c4bc7bd7577d9592">https://www.theaustralian.com.au/business/economics/china-trade-thaw-as-coal-cotton-exports-resume/news-story/564bcb7b20e16ac4c4bc7bd7577d9592</a>
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<br/><br/><br/> 


2 March, 2023
<br/><br/> 

<b> No jab, no transplant: Covid vaccine rules are heartless and senseless</b><br/>
<br/>
Vicky Derderian is a fighter. For seven years her heart has struggled to pump blood around her body, stretching thinner and growing weaker, a condition called dilated cardiomyopathy. In 2020, she was fitted biventricular assist devices, implantable pumps that help both sides of her heart function while she awaits a transplant.<br/>
<br/>
There’s only one obstacle. The Alfred Hospital in Melbourne insists she get a Covid vaccine even though Vicky has a permanent exemption provided by the Australian Technical Advisory Group on Immunisation (ATAGI) because of the well-known risk that Covid vaccines can trigger heart inflammation.<br/>
<br/>
Dr Peter McCullough, one of the most published cardiologists in the world, has been in Australia this month speaking at sold-out events about treating Covid. He says that under no circumstances should Vicky, or any heart transplant patient, get a Covid vaccine because of the damage it can do to the heart.<br/>
<br/>
That’s what happened to Natalie Boyce. She was only 21 and a competitive netball player. Yet she died of heart failure at the Alfred in March 2022, six weeks after receiving a Moderna booster.<br/>
<br/>
Natalie had been diagnosed with antiphospholipid syndrome (APS), an autoimmune disorder that can cause the body to make antibodies that attack the cells lining blood vessels causing blood clots. People with a history of autoimmune disorders were excluded from the Covid vaccine clinical trials because it was recognised the vaccine might trigger dangerous clotting. Sure enough, in March 2021, a 27-year-old woman with undiagnosed APS developed catastrophic clotting and kidney failure. She survived thanks to the expert care she received and her case was published in the Journal of Clinical and Experimental Rheumatology on 7 December 2021.<br/>
<br/>
Tragically, the Therapeutic Goods Administration (TGA) failed to warn Australians of the risk Covid vaccines pose to people with APS. Three months later Natalie died after the Moderna booster triggered catastrophic clotting causing kidney and heart failure.<br/>
<br/>
The TGA has also refused to warn Australians that the Pfizer Covid vaccine triggered fatal myocarditis in Roberto Garin, a healthy 52-year-old father of two who died a week after his first jab. The Australian Bureau of Statistics (ABS) accepted that Roberto’s death was caused by a Covid vaccine. It lists a total of 15 deaths in this category. The TGA only lists 14. The ABS explains the difference by noting that it accepts expert reports while waiting for a coronial finding, which can take years. Despite repeated approaches, the TGA refuses to explain, on the record, why it has not accepted the findings of the expert forensic pathologist Bernard l’Ons.<br/>
<br/>
L’Ons found that Roberto had an undiagnosed sarcoidosis, a benign inflammatory condition affecting his heart. The heart also showed a clear transition from cardiac sarcoidosis to fulminating myocarditis, an inflammation of the heart muscle so rapid and severe that it is frequently fatal. Critically, l’Ons dates the time of transition to the time of Covid-19 vaccination.<br/>
<br/>
So concerned was l’Ons that he suggested sarcoid patients receive an echocardiogram prior to a Pfizer Covid-19 vaccination to check whether the sarcoidosis affected their heart so that if it did, alternative vaccination types could be considered.<br/>
<br/>
In the context of a pandemic caused by a novel pathogen and the use of novel vaccines which have only provisional approval, why is the TGA sitting on this vital information? Dr l’Ons’ warning is acutely important to Vicky. She has already been diagnosed with ‘chronic heart inflammation suggestive of untreated myocarditis’ and ‘likely cardiac sarcoidosis’. Dr McCullough says if Vicky’s heart sustains any more damage it is almost certainly going to be lethal.<br/>
<br/>
Desperate to get the authorities to respect Vicky’s vaccine exemption, her husband John asked Victorian Senator Ralph Babet of the United Australia Party to raise her case in the Senate, which he did. It led to national television coverage. On the Today program Dr Nick Coatsworth, Australia’s former deputy chief medical officer, told Vicky she should get a Covid vaccine because if she got Covid after her transplant not only might she die, her transplanted heart would die with her.<br/>
<br/>
This makes no sense. Everybody from Bill Gates to Albert Bourla has admitted that Covid vaccines don’t stop infection. More importantly, vaccination is more dangerous for Vicky than infection. This is because the vaccine is injected into the body and circulates in the blood stream where it can enter the cells of any tissue or organ in the body – including her heart – and create spike proteins which are always inflammatory.<br/>
<br/>
A respiratory infection, on the other hand, starts in the mucous membranes of the nose, giving Vicky a chance to fight it off with her innate immune system aided by nasal sprays, antivirals and anti-inflammatory drugs before it gets into her lungs and from there into her blood stream.<br/>
<br/>
It has also now been admitted, in a study published in the Lancet on 16 February and funded by the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation no less, that vaccine immunity wanes far more rapidly than infection-acquired immunity. That is hardly surprising since it is true for every other infection yet this fact has been denied for most of the pandemic by US and Australian health authorities.<br/>
<br/>
Not only does vaccine immunity wane rapidly, it isn’t triggered until the virus gets into the blood, whereas infection immunity kicks in in the nose. In addition, a study conducted in the Faculty of Medicine at the University of Freiburg and published in the peer-reviewed journal Pathogens this month shows that in heart transplant recipients natural infection gives superior immunity compared to vaccination.<br/>
<br/>
A last problem for Vicky is that there are studies in corneal and lung transplantation which show that vaccination in either the donor or the recipient can increase the risk of organ rejection or failure. There is no data yet on heart transplants but in an ideal world, says Dr McCullough, it would be better to receive a donated organ from an unvaccinated person.<br/>
<br/>
Nobody knows better than Vicky that this is not an ideal world as she battles on in search of doctors and regulators with a heart and a brain.<br/>
<br/>

<p class="asset asset-link">
	<a href="https://www.spectator.com.au/2023/02/no-jab-no-transplant/">https://www.spectator.com.au/2023/02/no-jab-no-transplant/</a>
</p>
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<br/>
<b> The iron triangle of energy realism</b><br/>
<br/>
Possibly the most powerful argument against the quest for Net Zero can be briefly stated using the Iron Triangle of Power Supply, bearing in mind the logic of testing (or falsification, as Karl Popper called it).<br/>
<br/>
The three aspects of the triangle are:<br/>
<br/>
Continuous input of power to the grid. Adequate input is required all the time, not just most of the time or almost all the time.<br/>
<br/>
Wind droughts and especially windless nights break the continuity of input from wind power when there is no solar.<br/>
<br/>
There is effectively no storage to bridge the gaps (despite all the talk about batteries and pumped hydro).<br/>
<br/>
Consequently, the proposition that the grid can run on wind and solar power is falsified (ruled out) and there is no justification for the decision to contaminate the grid with subsidised and mandated intermittent input from environmentally ruinous wind and solar facilities.<br/>
<br/>
In defiance of the Iron Triangle, the official position is that we just need more installed wind and solar facilities, and more storage. That is stated by the Prime Minister, the Climate and Energy Minister, and the CEO of the Australian Energy Market Operator (AEMO). It is dutifully repeated by all the usual suspects in the ABC and the mainstream media, although over a hundred leading journalists have received the briefing notes from the Energy Realists of Australia over the last three years.<br/>
<br/>
The briefing notes were compiled by an elite squad of almost-dead white males and Ben Beattie, recruited to work with The Energy Realists of Australia – joking, of course.<br/>
<br/>
What is the point of more wind and solar capacity?<br/>
<br/>
Wind and solar can displace coal (to a point that we have almost reached), but they can’t replace it.<br/>
<br/>
The rate of exit from coal is not accelerated by increasing penetration on good wind and solar days, it is limited by the lowest level of output on nights with little or no wind, as a convoy travels at the speed of the slowest vessel, the water penetrates the levee at the lowest point, a chain is only as strong as the weakest link and stock get out of the yard through gaps in the fence even if the rest of the fence is built to the sky.<br/>
<br/>
What storage?<br/>
<br/>
Batteries can be dismissed very quickly by comparing the capacity of the biggest batteries in the world with the amount of power required to get through a windless night. Journalists don’t help by reporting the capacity of batteries in MW instead of MWh (megawatt hours). Scribes who report MW instead of MWh should be promptly escorted from the building with their personal effects thrown into the street after them.<br/>
<br/>
More words are required to describe the inadequacy of pumped hydro because there are many large schemes around the world, and there are some small ones in Australia already. However, I am not aware of any large scheme that runs on wind and solar alone. The largest facility at Bath, Philadelphia (US), runs entirely on coal and nuclear power to enable those plants to run continuously at their optimum output.<br/>
<br/>
Conclusion<br/>
<br/>
We need to keep enough conventional power, mostly coal power, to meet the highest levels of demand at dinner times in high summer and deep winter, until we have nuclear power on deck.<br/>
<br/>
A note on the logic of testing that was mentioned at the start of this piece. It has gone missing in science (on walkabout?) since it became generally accepted in the 1960s that Thomas Kuhn’s paradigm theory (science by consensus) had superseded Karl Popper’s critical approach (forming a preference after rigorous testing and comparison of rival theories.) That is an important topic for another day.<br/>
<br/>

<p class="asset asset-link">
	<a href="https://www.spectator.com.au/2023/02/the-iron-triangle-of-energy-realism/">https://www.spectator.com.au/2023/02/the-iron-triangle-of-energy-realism/</a>
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<br/>
<b> One in two companies found to overstate green credentials in ACCC review</b><br/>
<br/>
More than one in two companies surveyed by the Australian Competition and Consumer Commission were found to have overstated their clean or green credentials in a move which may expose them to legal action.<br/>
<br/>
The ACCC said it was concerned at the level of greenwashing identified in a blitz of the advertising and packaging of 247 businesses.<br/>
<br/>
The regulator found 57 per cent of the companies reviewed made inflated or wrong claims about their environmental impact, with the cosmetics, clothing, footwear, and food and drink industries the worst offenders.<br/>
<br/>
ACCC deputy chair Catriona Lowe said these companies may find themselves the target of legal action or infringement notices to correct their statements or face fines.<br/>
<br/>
Ms Lowe said the regulator would not tolerate greenwashing that wrongly gave the impression a product was more environmentally sensitive than it was.<br/>
<br/>
“We’re seeing businesses not providing evidence of the claims they’re making,” she said.<br/>
<br/>
“We are increasingly seeing consumers making their purchasing decision on the basis of the green credentials for their goods and services.”<br/>
<br/>
Ms Lowe said the ACCC would not just stop at claims made on products, but would seek to scrutinise claims made by businesses around offsetting emissions or announcing environmental targets “without clear plans of how they’re going to achieve those goals”.<br/>
<br/>
“It is possible of course that some of the claims that are being made are able to be verified but of course we’re standing in the shoes of the consumer,” she said.<br/>
<br/>
The ACCC’s planned crackdown comes days after the Australian Securities and Investments Commission handed out court action against superannuation giant Mercer, over its green claims.<br/>
<br/>
Australia&#39;s best business newsletter. Get the edge with AM and PM briefings, plus breaking news alerts in your inbox.<br/>
<br/>
Ms Lowe said the ACCC would take a firm line on companies that misled or deceived consumers around their green credentials, warning fines could be levied into the millions.<br/>
<br/>
“We will certainly be undertaking our assessment and thinking carefully about the impact on consumers and the gain that may have been obtained by making the false claims relative to the investment required to make the claim true,” she said.<br/>
<br/>
A report by the ACCC notes the regulator will conduct further analysis of these issues and is planning to produce and release “economy-wide guidance material, as well as targeted guidance for specific sectors” outlining expectations around green claims.<br/>
<br/>
Ms Lowe said the regulator was concerned about companies making claims packaging could be recycled when those products could not be accepted by most recyclers.<br/>
<br/>
An ACCC spokeswoman said the regulator was engaging with “relevant industry participants” in a bid to ensure clarity and transparency about handling soft plastics recycling after the REDcycle scheme collapsed.<br/>
<br/>
The NSW Supreme Court ordered on Monday to wind up the REDcycle company after finding it was hopelessly insolvent and failed to pay fees for storing thousands of tonnes of soft plastics around the country.<br/>
<br/>
“The ACCC is conscious of the significant financial and environmental impacts if food and grocery suppliers were to dispose of existing packaging containing the REDcycle logo and Australasian Recycling Label (ARL) ‘return to store’ labelling in landfill,” the spokeswoman said.<br/>
<br/>
“We have engaged with industry participants about taking all reasonable alternative steps to ensure that representations to consumers are accurate. For example, this could be achieved through information provided in their other advertising and marketing.”<br/>
<br/>

<p class="asset asset-link">
	<a href="https://www.theaustralian.com.au/business/companies/one-in-two-companies-found-to-overstate-green-credentials-in-accc-review/news-story/e28d321a98012a169b62c77441e178f9">https://www.theaustralian.com.au/business/companies/one-in-two-companies-found-to-overstate-green-credentials-in-accc-review/news-story/e28d321a98012a169b62c77441e178f9</a>
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<br/>
<b> Fossil fuel shift: Electrifying all households could cost more than $60bn</b><br/>
<br/>
A move to electrify all Australian households could cost taxpayers more than $60bn, analysis from the national peak body for pipeline infrastructure has revealed, highlighting the challenges of paying for the country’s transition away from fossil fuels.<br/>
<br/>
The Australian Pipelines and Gas Association chief executive Steve Davies said the “enormous price tag” of fully electrifying all homes had been “frequently downplayed”.<br/>
<br/>
Mr Davies pointed to costings by the Parliamentary Budget Office for independent senator David Pocock that calculated it would cost $11.3m over the forwards to help a single ACT suburb electrify.<br/>
<br/>
This figure was based on a model to give $13,000 a household to help 1000 homes in Canberra transition to be fully electric.<br/>
<br/>
The taxpayer-funded subsidies would cover 50 per cent of the capital and installation costs for solar panels, electric reverse-cycle airconditioning and heat pump water heaters.<br/>
<br/>
Mr Davies said the total price of electrifying all 5.1 million households across the nation currently on gas suggested the total taxpayer bill could exceed $66.3bn.<br/>
<br/>
He said Australia’s transition towards renewables must be done with consideration given to the nation’s “cost-of-living” crisis. “Every change we make to decarbonise our country will come at a cost and the enormous price tag of fully electrifying Australian homes and business has been frequently downplayed,” he said.<br/>
<br/>
“Each industry, including the gas infrastructure sector, has a responsibility to decarbonise and do so in a way that’s economical for households and businesses during this cost-of-living crisis.”<br/>
<br/>
Under Senator Pocock’s model costed by the PBO, households would be expected to fund the other half of the transition through concessional loans from the government.<br/>
<br/>
Senator Pocock is pushing for a national electrification program to accelerate emissions reductions and help reduce household energy bills.<br/>
<br/>
In conjunction with Saul Griffith and Rewiring Australia, Senator Pocock said the cost of a nationwide rollout would be about $12bn, roughly equal to the government’s annual fossil fuel subsidies.<br/>
<br/>
He has advocated for the ­government to develop a “demonstration project” in Canberra to create the world’s first fully electrified suburb, which would guarantee participating households a 20-25 per cent saving per annum on fuel and energy bills.<br/>
<br/>
A spokeswoman for Senator Pocock said a pilot program would help identify obstacles and work through solutions. “It is about creating jobs, saving people money and ensuring we reap the benefits of the smart energy transition already under way,” she said.<br/>
<br/>
“Australians clearly understand and appreciate the benefits of electrification as the world-leading adoption of rooftop solar shows, together with the rapid increase in the rate of uptake in electric vehicles.”<br/>
<br/>
Energy and Climate Change Minister Chris Bowen isin talks with the Greens to develop an electrification package to help households and businesses transition off gas, after Labor struck a deal with the minor party to ensure passage of its $1.5bn energy support package in December.<br/>
<br/>
The Australian understands negotiations are ongoing over what is included in the package and how it will be funded.<br/>
<br/>
Greens leader Adam Bandt said it was time “coal and gas corporations paid their fair share of tax” to help households and businesses switch to clean power. “Greedy gas corporations have seen the writing on the wall and they’re desperate to eke out a few more years gouging customers and cooking the planet,” he said.<br/>
<br/>
“What’s expensive is giving greedy gas corporations billions in public subsidies while they pay no tax and drive households and businesses into the ground with wartime profiteering.”<br/>
<br/>
Deloitte Access Economics partner Pradeep Philip said electrification in the economy was a “no-brainer” but that governments should not be expected to pay for the whole transition to ­renewables.<br/>
<br/>
“Governments can be catalytic in driving investment but they cannot be expected to do the lot,” Mr Philip said. “One reason is because you want markets to work and need competitive markets to be more efficient, and there are limits to government.<br/>
<br/>
“The key is there is good commercial returns for Australian businesses as they electrify. Governments have to be prudent and invest budget dollars widely.”<br/>
<br/>
Opposition climate change and energy spokesman Ted O’Brien said Australians would ultimately pay through higher energy bills or higher taxes if the government poured “billions” into electrification programs.<br/>
<br/>
“If the government pours billions into new programs like this one, it’ll be the Australian people who ultimately pay through higher energy bills or higher taxes,” he said.<br/>
<br/>
“Instead of reducing mounting cost-of-living pressures on households and businesses, the government keeps making the situation worse by doing deals with the Greens and with the ­independents.”<br/>
<br/>

<p class="asset asset-link">
	<a href="https://www.theaustralian.com.au/nation/politics/fossil-fuel-shift-electrifying-all-households-could-cost-more-than-60bn/news-story/43e077a8db81c451fe0e7b0f3e56f4fb">https://www.theaustralian.com.au/nation/politics/fossil-fuel-shift-electrifying-all-households-could-cost-more-than-60bn/news-story/43e077a8db81c451fe0e7b0f3e56f4fb</a>
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<br/>
<br/>



1 March, 2023
<br/><br/> 
<b> Queensland Audit Office reveals huge spike in ambulance and specialist doctor wait times</b><br/>
<br/>
More than 100,000 Queenslanders are waiting to see a specialist doctor - a surge of 80 per cent in seven years - and ambulance officers spent more than 134,000 hours in a year sitting with patients on ramps at emergency departments.<br/>
<br/>
The concerning reality of the state's health system has been laid bare in the latest Auditor General report, who also flagged delays to the delivery of critical hospital bed and budget blowouts.<br/>
<br/>
In the 2021/22 financial year, the number of long waits for specialist outpatient services - which is patients waiting to see a specialist doctor - surged by 80 per cent to about 104,000 people.<br/>
<br/>
The disturbing spike adds another layer of concern to the ballooning elective surgery wait list which The Courier-Mail revealed this week rose to nearly 60,000, given the more than 100,000 waiting to see a doctor could further squeeze surgery delays.<br/>
<br/>
Queensland Health introduced a new strategy in 2015 to improve management processes and allow patients to access treatment within clinically recommended time.<br/>
<br/>
But the Queensland Audit Office said the total number of patients waiting to see a specialist in the last financial year was "significantly higher" than when the department introduced the Specialist Outpatient Strategy in mid-2015.<br/>
<br/>
"In 2021-22, the total number of long waits increased by 80 per cent due to Covid-19 impacts on system capacity," Auditor-General Brendan Worrall wrote.<br/>
<br/>
The delays have also caused a knock-on effect to the ultra-long waiting list - where patients have waited more than two years for an initial specialist outpatient appointment - which Mr Worrall said would grow further if the backlog of wait times more broadly was not improved.<br/>
<br/>
"Ultra-long waits continued to decrease until 2019, but have increased again over the last three years," the Auditor General wrote.<br/>
<br/>
"Of the 2481 patients waiting more than two years for an appointment as of 1 July 2022, there were none for category 1; 634 for category 2; and 1847 for category 3.<br/>
<br/>
"The large increase in long waits and reduced system capacity will place pressure on ultra-long waits if specialities are unable to clear the backlog of long waits quicker than when new referrals come in."<br/>
<br/>
Mr Worrall also noted the growing demand on the Queensland Ambulance Service (QAS), including for the most urgent of patients.<br/>
<br/>
"The time it takes ambulance crews to transfer patients into the care of emergency departments increased significantly in 2021/22," he wrote in his audit into health services in Queensland.<br/>
<br/>
"If patient transfer takes longer than 30 minutes, the extra time is considered 'lost' time for QAS.<br/>
<br/>
"In 2021/22, QAS lost approximately 134,155 hours - a 20 per cent increase compared to 2020-21."<br/>
<br/>
A performance target for patient off-stretcher time to have 90 per cent of patients transferred into emergency departments was not achieved in the past eight years.<br/>
<br/>
"The percentage of patients transferred off stretchers in less than 30 minutes has shown a significant downward trend in the past five years," Mr Worrall wrote, noting the further pressure placed on the system from the Covid-19 pandemic.<br/>
<br/>
"Hospitals have adopted new infection control measures, such as social distancing and personal protective equipment, which have increased treatment time and affected patient flow.<br/>
<br/>
"Several Queensland hospitals also provide Covid-19 fever clinics from their emergency departments."<br/>
<br/>
Health experts have warned authorities will struggle to improve ramping times and overstretched emergency departments without boosting the bed capacity in the system.<br/>
<br/>
Mr Worrall said ageing health infrastructure needed to be replaced and expanded given the continual surge in the state's population coupled with its ageing demographic.<br/>
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But he warned the state government was unlikely to deliver on its commitments to deliver 2200 additional beds through building three new hospitals and expanding existing facilities, flagging delays and budget blowouts.<br/>
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"The sector will face challenges in achieving the desired outcomes from the capital investment program, with current market conditions placing considerable pressure on costs and shortages in materials and labour creating risks around timing," Mr Worrall wrote.<br/>
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"Related operational costs will need to be included in future budgets to ensure these assets can be effectively and efficiently used."<br/>
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	<a href="https://www.couriermail.com.au/news/queensland/qld-politics/queensland-audit-office-reveals-huge-spike-in-ambulance-and-specialist-doctor-wait-times/news-story/a0d92021eeece153cd752c37d2341e91">https://www.couriermail.com.au/news/queensland/qld-politics/queensland-audit-office-reveals-huge-spike-in-ambulance-and-specialist-doctor-wait-times/news-story/a0d92021eeece153cd752c37d2341e91</a>
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<b> Mandatory psychiatry training flagged for doctors</b><br/>
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<i> This sounds about right. 10 weeks should be enough to learn all there is to learn about psychiatry</i><br/>
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Every doctor trained in Queensland would complete a mandatory placement in psychiatry within two years of graduating, under a bold plan to help junior doctors better deal with patients experiencing mental health issues.<br/>
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The Royal Australian and New Zealand College of Psychiatrists is calling on the Queensland Government to introduce an eight- or 10-week psychiatry term in a bid to better support doctors who are already bearing the brunt of the woefully under-resourced mental health sector.<br/>
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Today The Courier-Mail continues its series examining the state of Queensland's health system, and with mental health accounting for a significant amount of all emergency department presentations and up to 70 per cent of all visits to the GP, it continues to be a major area of concern.<br/>
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Patients who need to see a psychiatrist in Queensland can expect to wait between six and 12 months and the wait to see a child psychiatrist is at least 12 months.<br/>
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Despite this doctors frequently report feeling underprepared to deal with mental illnesses with very little of their studies dedicated to the vital area.<br/>
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The college's Queensland branch chair Professor Brett Emmerson said mandatory training would go a long way to improving knowledge and confidence of people to be able to deal with mental health, as well as reducing the stigma of it.<br/>
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The Courier-Mail understands the Department of Health has met with RANZCP to and is keen to consider the proposal.<br/>
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Minister Health and Ambulance Services Yvette D'Ath said her government had the biggest investment in mental health Queensland had ever seen - $1.6 billion over five years.<br/>
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"Our record investment in the budget delivers the funding over five years to improve mental health, alcohol and other drug services which means more beds, dedicated services, increased crisis responses, suicide prevention initiatives and a package dedicated toward First Nations peoples," she said.<br/>
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Research undertaken in 2018 by the Australasian College for Emergency Medicine found that mental health patients frequently waited longer than other patients with a similar severity of physical illness before being treated - often due to a lack of specialist mental health staff.<br/>
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Professor Emmerson said the decision for mandatory postgraduate training for medicine graduates moving from one year to two years would give the time needed to introduce mandatory mental health terms.<br/>
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The Royal Australian and New Zealand College of Psychiatrists is also creating a Diploma of Psychiatry that doctors could opt to complete, to broaden their knowledge.<br/>
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The diploma would aim to help doctors assessed patients presenting with new mental health problems, manage risk in relation to patients who may harm themselves or others, start therapeutic care or prescribe appropriate medication.<br/>
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<p class="asset asset-link">
	<a href="https://www.couriermail.com.au/news/queensland/qld-politics/qld-health-crisis-mandatory-psychiatry-training-flagged-for-doctors/news-story/f0e58c0bd33e3fd42bc28a80c4bf05bf">https://www.couriermail.com.au/news/queensland/qld-politics/qld-health-crisis-mandatory-psychiatry-training-flagged-for-doctors/news-story/f0e58c0bd33e3fd42bc28a80c4bf05bf</a>
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<b> 'It's lifesaving for men': Why blokes need more mates</b><br/>
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Men's difficulty in forming friendships is at a crisis point and is contributing to a sense of social isolation and poor quality of life, experts say.<br/>
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While women's friendships tend to flourish throughout life, the struggle for men to form solid friends begins in adolescence and continues into adulthood, according to the head of youth mental health organisation Batyr, Nic Brown.<br/>
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"If we look at male suicide, for every nine suicides that happen daily in Australia, seven are men, and a significant part of that is the inability to have important conversations early enough to avoid getting to that point," Brown says.<br/>
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"Less than 40 per cent of young men are reaching out for support. They so often don't feel they have the friendships to have the conversations that are needed."<br/>
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The language around articulating feelings can also be part of the challenge for men, compared to women and girls who, Brown says, are more enabled to converse in that way.<br/>
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"It's the difference between being told to man up when you're a boy and being asked what's wrong when you're a girl," he says.<br/>
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Clinical psychologist and Movember director of mental health training Zac Seidler says the research clearly shows men don't prioritise social relationships, particularly after the age of 18.<br/>
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"This is when women are forming and strengthening relationships but men, around the same time, go to university and focus on achieving to be a good provider, to find a mate as a reflection of self-worth," Seidler says.<br/>
<br/>
"Friendships, while important in high school, fall away at this point and continue on that path so you end up with a vacuum. So many men are reliant on their partner to tend to social relationships so, when that central relationship breaks down, there's a serious breakdown in all the relationships for men.<br/>
<br/>
"Friendship is fundamentally lifesaving for men. It has to be put front and centre because this is very serious and has been for a long time, but it requires a vulnerability for the man to say 'I need you'."<br/>
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Male pride is more likely to prevent men from initiating contact or letting a friendship drop away if the invitations stop. "We need to find ways to encourage emotional disclosure among other men and this must start very early in life," he says.<br/>
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Happiness Institute psychologist Dr Tim Sharp says social isolation is an epidemic, particularly for men, and he believes we're all part of the solution. "We're not just dealing with men's attitudes and may need to look at their partners or women around them and wider society," Dr Sharp says.<br/>
<br/>
"There are mixed messages. We're trying to get the message out that it's important for men to speak out. Just as we go to a mechanic when our car is in trouble, we need to seek help when we're struggling emotionally, but there's also a subtle message to stop complaining.<br/>
<br/>
"The most important thing when it comes to health and wellbeing is to have at least one person you can be open with. This isn't 100 Facebook friends. It's the really intimate ones, we call them 3am friends where, if something goes wrong, you can call at any time of day and they'll listen and offer constructive support."<br/>
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Psychologist Stephen Brown says friendship is just as important to men as a job and family in having stable mental health and a good quality of life.<br/>
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"It's what keeps men on the highway, not drifting off," Brown says. "A male has to have his own interests and that needs to be encouraged. I don't think men are being as encouraged to go out there and this leads to caution and a lack of confidence."<br/>
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Once part of a vibrant friendship circle, life circumstances, including a divorce and two moves interstate for work, left Guy Thompson with just a few friends he considers close enough to "have your back".<br/>
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But busy schedules for everyone means the group only get together every couple of months, leading Thompson to develop Crewmen, an app that matches men with others that share similar interests and encourages them to meet face-to-face to develop a sense of camaraderie and mateship.<br/>
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"Everybody wants to do more things with their mates but, when you have only got a small pool of mates to catch up with, finding the right time is really hard," he says.<br/>
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"Having a wider circle means more opportunities for catch-ups with people that have the same hobbies and are on the same page."<br/>
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Thompson says surviving challenging times without a strong group of mates is tough, but sometimes it's the happiest moments that can cause the greatest sense of loneliness.<br/>
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"Having good mates allows you to celebrate achievements and milestones in your life," he says.<br/>
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"For me, it's like what's the point in achieving things if you don't have anyone to celebrate with? Without that, those achievements can seem like they don't even exist."<br/>
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	<a href="https://www.couriermail.com.au/lifestyle/smart/its-lifesaving-for-men-why-blokes-need-more-mates/news-story/631e50e56535c92524438ef158870c10">https://www.couriermail.com.au/lifestyle/smart/its-lifesaving-for-men-why-blokes-need-more-mates/news-story/631e50e56535c92524438ef158870c10</a>
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<b> Wood veneer is both &quot;Green&quot; and attractive</b><br/>
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<i> It&#39;s common in cheap furniture but is probably the best when solid wood is too dear -- which it often is these days. I prefer laminated wood, which is something of a halfway house</i><br/>
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The current Federal Government continues beating a path toward reducing carbon emissions, passing climate change bills as recently as September 2022.<br/>
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The Australian emissions reduction target of 43 per cent and net zero emissions by 2050 is now enshrined in legislation, but the Architecture 2030 report found the built environment generates 40 per cent of annual global CO2 emissions, from construction elements such as steel, concrete, glass and plastics.<br/>
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As we build or renovate our homes, we can all seek products that will help, not hinder a greener future - while naturally still looking drool-worthy.<br/>
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Sometimes a bad reputation just clings to a product decades after its quality has improved beyond belief. An unfair rap has certainly proved hard for timber veneers to shake.<br/>
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The word "veneer" itself suggests fakery, when in fact it is such a genuine material made from a natural, renewable resource - unlike laminates which are truly synthetic and arguably responsible for the unfair maligning of the real thing.<br/>
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Melbourne-based architect with the award-winning sustainable architecture and design practice Breathe, Madeline Seawall is a strong advocate for using beautiful veneers at every opportunity. "Designing sustainably means choosing the material that is most suitable for every application," Seawall says.<br/>
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"We love using timber veneers instead of hardwood door panels for joinery because it is such an efficient use of a precious resource," she says, urging Australian Forest Stewardship Council certified timber only.<br/>
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Imagine sitting back in your lounge, looking at the finishes about you and delighting in the uniqueness. Those wormholes, swirls and burls all signify nature's dateless design.<br/>
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Ancient art<br/>
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Veneers were originally the go-to material for furniture makers as a solution to expanding and contracting solid wood. The practice dates to Ancient Egypt, where wood was the same precious resource it is today.<br/>
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Flash forward and the word veneer still has some people baulking, but here's a reality check: timber veneers in 2023 are beautiful, sustainable, remarkably pliant and responsible for some of the best design breakthroughs this century.<br/>
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Plus they're made of actual timber, glued to inexpensive particle board backing. Wood slices for veneer use can be as thin as 0.5mm thickness. According to the Timber Veneer Association of Australia, one cubic metre of timber can generate 1000 sqm of veneer. If you had to buy 1000 sqm of solid Queensland red cedar, you'd have to sell the Bentley.<br/>
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And if you're looking for the newest products in the range, go to Elton Group and let your eyes dance across their range of WoodWall products - which can be applied as easily as wallpaper. Wow. If you do use veneers in your own home, not only are you smart, you'll join the fine company of some of this country's greatest designers.<br/>
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Fine figures<br/>
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Wood is an excellent sustainable building product that looks cool and contemporary while at the same time being warm and welcoming.Have you visited Sydney's Qantas First Class Lounge? Well, neither have I (though I live in hope), but the pictures of it are fabulous.<br/>
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How about the Margaret Court Arena? Sydney's Knox Grammar? The Melbourne School of Design?<br/>
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The range of available timbers boggles the mind. From imported ash styles to Australian Huon pine, there seems to be a "figure" (or surface pattern) that works for every design concept.<br/>
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	<a href="https://www.couriermail.com.au/lifestyle/home/fake-the-way-to-reducing-your-carbon-emissions/news-story/4c244ebd88d39f4a96f64f6eea47c192">https://www.couriermail.com.au/lifestyle/home/fake-the-way-to-reducing-your-carbon-emissions/news-story/4c244ebd88d39f4a96f64f6eea47c192</a>
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<br/>
Also see my other blogs. Main ones below:<br/>
<br/>
<a href="https://dissectleft.blogspot.com">http://dissectleft.blogspot.com</a> (DISSECTING LEFTISM -- daily)<br/>
<br/>
<a href="https://antigreen.blogspot.com">http://antigreen.blogspot.com</a> (GREENIE WATCH)<br/>
<br/>
<a href="https://pcwatch.blogspot.com">http://pcwatch.blogspot.com</a> (POLITICAL CORRECTNESS WATCH)<br/>
<br/>
<a href="https://edwatch.blogspot.com">http://edwatch.blogspot.com</a> (EDUCATION WATCH)<br/>
<br/>
<a href="https://snorphty.blogspot.com/">http://snorphty.blogspot.com/</a> (TONGUE-TIED)<br/>
<br/>
<a href="http://jonjayray.com/blogall.html">http://jonjayray.com/blogall.html</a> More blogs<br/>
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