This document is part of an archive of postings by John Ray on Australian Politics, a blog hosted by Blogspot who are in turn owned by Google. The index to the archive is available here or here. Indexes to my other blogs can be located here or here. Archives do accompany my original postings but, given the animus towards conservative writing on Google and other internet institutions, their permanence is uncertain. These alternative archives help ensure a more permanent record of what I have written
This is a backup copy of the original blog. Backups from previous months accessible here
31 July, 2024
We trust the police. But the court system? Not so much
I have previously shown via survey researh that the public thinks most sentences handed down are too light
http://jonjayray.com/prisent.html
Just 30 per cent of Australians have faith in the country’s courts and justice system according to a new poll, but more than double that figure trust the police and feel safe in their homes and suburbs.
A whopping 47 per cent of people in the recent Resolve Political Monitor survey said they did not have faith in the judiciary, with another 23 per cent declaring they were either undecided or neutral.
The lack of faith in Australia’s court system follows a series of high profile trials in recent years. Bruce Lehrmann and decorated former soldier Ben Roberts-Smith had findings made against them in defamation cases but not in criminal proceedings – Lehrmann for rape and Roberts-Smith for war crimes.
In contrast to people’s lack of faith in the courts, the survey of 1603 people, taken earlier this month, found 69 per cent trusted the police; 13 per cent said they did not and 18 per cent were undecided.
A total of 82 per cent agreed they felt safe in their own home, with 9 per cent disagreeing and 9 per cent undecided, while 67 per cent agreed they felt safe in their local area or suburb, with 19 per cent disagreeing and 15 per cent neutral or undecided (some figures add up to more than 100 per cent due to rounding).
Social media was also marked down, with 59 per cent agreeing with the statement they felt safe on the internet and social media, while 21 per cent were undecided and 21 per cent disagreed.
The exclusive findings are contained in the most recent Resolve Political Monitor survey of 1603 people, conducted from July 10 to 13 by pollsters Resolve Strategic. The results have a margin of error of 2.4 percentage points.
Resolve pollster Jim Reed said while most people trusted the police, “less than a third trust the justice system to deliver, which is hardly surprising given the conga line of mis-trials, appeals, resignations, scandals and inconsistent results we’re seeing in high profile cases like the Lehrmann prosecution”.
The finding was important to the legal profession but also for social cohesion, he said.
“We can only operate as a society if we all agree to certain shared values, behaviours, rights and responsibilities, and if those administering the rules lose our collective trust the whole show is at risk.”
Voters were asked during the survey to nominate three types of crime they thought authorities should tackle as a priority in Australia right now. An almost equal number of men (64 per cent) and women (67 per cent) nominated ending violent attacks, including rape and murder, as their top priority. Tackling domestic violence and stalking came in second, with 59 per cent, but far fewer men (52 per cent) than women (66 per cent) nominated this as a priority.
Child abuse (38 per cent) was the third most-nominated priority, with men (30 per cent) and women (46 per cent) split over how much of a priority it should be.
Voters want Labor to allow MPs more freedom to break ranks
Men were more likely to prioritise tackling scams and fraud (36 per cent) and stopping the physical theft of vehicles, mugging and burglary (34 per cent) than child abuse, whereas 32 per cent of women nominated scams as a priority and 25 per cent nominated physical theft.
People failing to pick up dog poo was nominated by just 2 per cent of people, while cracking down on vapes and e-cigarettes (5 per cent) and on vandalism (5 per cent) were low on people’s priorities.
A total of 12 per cent of those surveyed said they’d witnessed a crime in the last 12 months, while 8 per cent said they’d been the victim of a crime. Surprisingly, just 51 per cent of people who’d experienced a crime said they had reported it, while 38 per cent said they had not done so.
Reed said crime statistics suggest Australia is becoming a safer place.
“But when one-in-12 are telling us they’ve been a victim of crime in the last year, and only around half of them reported it, we are not perfect - and neither are the statistics we rely on to judge that,” he said.
“It’s encouraging that most people believe crimes endangering people should be prioritised. At the end of the day, you will recover from a stolen car, a scam or graffiti on your fence, but the loss and trauma stemming from violence stays with us.”
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Universities need to look closely at how they are perceived
Australia is not the only place in the world where universities are on the nose among a significant proportion of the population. For a sample of feeling in the US, see the speech by Republican vice-presidential candidate JD Vance that is getting new attention since Donald Trump chose him as his running mate.
The Universities are the Enemy is its unequivocal title, and it comes from a man whose arts degree from Ohio State and law degree from Yale were stepping stones in his journey from a dysfunctional, drug-ridden community in the post-industrial midwest to where he is now.
The anti-university feeling in Australia is not close to the level of sheer venom felt by Trump supporters in the US. But here it’s real enough, both at the level of the general population and in the political arena. Universities’ ability to directly influence political decision-making is minimal. The evidence is there in the casual ease with which the Albanese government has ransacked the international education industry this year without pushback from any political party. The fact that international education earned nearly $50bn in export revenue last year seemingly counted for nothing.
Yet Universities Australia has estimated that the government’s first action last December to restrict the issuance of student visas will cost universities $500m in revenue this year. If the government’s legislation for student caps passes parliament then universities and other international education providers will be hit with a second round of pain when Education Minister Jason Clare puts caps on student numbers with powers that enable him to control numbers down to course level and by geographic location.
How did universities arrive in this invidious position? There are two parts to the story. One is universities’ own blinkered journey to the precipice. The other is the lack of general awareness – both among the public and in political and business circles – as to what universities actually do and why it has importance.
Starting with the former: universities’ mishandling of their relationship with the public reached a peak in their handling of two issues.
One was vice-chancellors’ million-dollar salaries. University governing bodies, and vice-chancellors themselves, acted as if this issue – perceived by the public as an example of the gross indifference of the elites – didn’t matter.
But it did and does matter, and badly damages universities’ ability to be taken seriously by the public when they argue for more resources. Australian university leaders’ salaries are well above those in comparable countries. This was abundantly clear when Brian Schmidt, one of the few university leaders who have acted sensibly in this matter, became vice-chancellor of the Australian National University in 2016. He asked that his salary be pegged to international benchmarks and he accepted a package worth two-thirds the amount received by his predecessor. No other vice-chancellor is known to have followed his example.
There was another telling moment. When Michael Spence chose to leave the vice-chancellorship of the University of Sydney in 2020 to become head of University College London, a university of greater prestige, he halved his $1.5m salary package. What more needs to be said?
The other key issue on which universities have lost public trust is international students. For more than three decades they have been a growing source of revenue for most universities, filling the ever widening gap in research funding.
There has always been an underlying level of public disquiet about international students. There are fears that they take Australian students’ places – they don’t – and more well-founded evidence that too many international students have poor English skills and that some courses are overwhelmed by international students to the detriment of locals. Universities responded to this in the wrong way.
Yes they had a valid reasons to enrol international students. In reasonable numbers they enrich campus life and offer wider benefits to the nation by boosting exports and building strong ties in the region. But most universities reacted to the public disquiet by being secretive about how many international students were enrolled, how they were distributed across various degree courses, and how many came from each student source country.
In the absence of information, speculation and partial truths filled the gap. Parents heard only what their children told them about classes overcrowded with international students with poor English.
What if universities, 10 years ago, had collectively decided to put limits on the total number of international students (say at one-third of enrolments), and limited the proportion of international students enrolled in each course and the proportion from each source country? And then reported each year on these figures and also shared with the public more details of what they were doing to secure housing, part-time jobs and other necessities for international students?
If they had, they would be in a far better position to withstand the heavy pressure today to cut international student numbers. Such self-regulation would have required a revenue sacrifice from the big five universities – Melbourne, Monash, Queensland, NSW and particularly Sydney – which have benefited enormously from the wave of Chinese students coming to Australia. But it probably would have avoided the financial pain universities now are facing, let alone the damage being done to Australia’s reputation among international students.
But let’s be fair to universities. There really is a lack of appreciation of the importance of their role. Even those who buy the extreme Vance line that universities are so dangerously woke they pose a threat to Western civilisation (which I don’t) still have to acknowledge what universities do on a day-to-day basis. They make critical research breakthroughs, they invent new technology and they train the next generation of engineers, teachers, tech workers, nurses and specialists in countless disciplines that modern society is utterly dependent on. All of this has very little to do with woke students, freedom of speech controversies or disputes over Gaza and anti-Semitism.
I’ve come to the end of my nearly seven years as higher education editor at The Australian. It’s 21 years since I first covered the university sector and much has changed in that time. But universities are facing a more difficult outlook now than any I have seen.
What’s the solution? It’s up to universities to take a clear eyed look at what they do and how they do it. It’s not enough for them to cite their achievements. They need to look at their weaknesses and where the public isn’t buying their story.
And it’s up to the rest of us to acknowledge the critical benefits universities produce and ensure that they can continue.
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Specialist disability schools won’t be phased out, government says
The federal and state governments won’t move to phase out specialist disability schools and have kicked the future of disabled group homes and segregated employment programs down the road in their response to the $600m disability royal commission.
The Albanese government also put a new disability rights act on the backburner, along with a federal watchdog to protect disabled people’s rights, and knocked back a proposal for a new federal minister for disability inclusion.
The commonwealth and state governments outlined their initial response to the 222 recommendations in the final report of the royal commission into violence, abuse, neglect and exploitation of people with disability on Wednesday, an inquiry that ran for more than four years.
Of the 172 recommendations for which it has primary or shared responsibility with the states, the federal government accepted 13 recommendations and another 117 in principle, while a further 36 were under consideration. Six were “noted”, an indication the government is unlikely to act on them, including the recommendations on segregated education.
The government’s response noted the split among the six commissioners on education, with three calling for special schools to be phased out by 2051 and the others saying they remained a viable option.
Developing Australians Communities Co-founder River Night has weighed in on whether or not the National Disability Insurance Scheme [NDIS] is costing Australians too much.
“The Australian government recognises the ongoing role of specialist settings in service provision for students with disability and providing choice for students with disability and their families,” the federal response notes.
“State and territory governments will continue to be responsible for making decisions about registration of schools in their jurisdictions, with the intent to strengthen inclusive education over time.”
To facilitate some of the recommendations, the federal government said it was committing an additional $117m on programs including improving community attitudes to disability and supporting advocacy.
This was on top of more than $225m previously announced for a new disability employment program and $3bn over the last three budgets to drive greater safety and inclusion for people with disability, social services minister Amanda Rishworth said.
Ms Rishworth said the government was committed to the disability royal commission’s vision “where people with disability are free from violence, abuse, neglect and exploitation.”
She said many of the recommendations were accepted in principle, meaning more work was required to flesh out the detail, and there would be a six monthly report delivered to monitor progress.
Around 5.5 million Australians have some form of disability, and 600,000 are on the National Disability Insurance Scheme.
The royal commission reported in September after more than four years of hearings. While it laid out a broad road map for disability reform, the commissioners were split on key policy areas such as group homes, education and segregated employment.
The commission called for a response from government by March 31, but this was delayed to allow for more consultation with the sector.
The government’s response noted more work would be done on disability housing within the NDIS review framework before a final view was taken on the future of group homes
“The Australian Government and state and territory governments support the development of a diverse range of inclusive housing options for people with disability that support them to exercise choice and control over their living arrangements,” the government’s response said.
It said any consideration of a new disability rights act should be done in conjunction with ongoing work around whether Australia should establish a new federal Human Rights Act.
And it said there was already sufficient representation in cabinet on disability issues through the social services and NDIS ministers in “noting” the recommendation for a new Minister for Disability Inclusion.
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The Queenslander hand-picked by Prime Minister Anthony Albanese to clean up the CFMEU has put his home state’s militant branch on notice for its “really worrying conduct”
New Workplace Relations Minister Murray Watt, a Queensland senator, said he didn’t believe the bad behaviour of the CFMEU was limited to Victoria and New South Wales.
It comes after the federal government, in light of allegations of criminal conduct in CFMEU construction branches in Victoria and New South Wales, made an unprecedented request for the Fair Work Commission to put the union’s east coast arms into administration.
This is yet to occur, with Fair Work Commission head Murray Furlong seeking advice on making an application to the Federal Court.
Senator Watt said ultimately the scope of the application would be a matter for the regulator.
“Reform of the CFMEU is a very high priority for me … we’re serious about cleaning up this union,” Senator Watt said.
“My role would be as the lead within the government to deliver the intervention that’s required into the CFMEU.
“And if that takes legislation, then that’s my job to deliver that.”
Allegations of links to the bikie underworld or corrupt behaviour have not been levelled against the Queensland branch of the CFMEU, though the union has continued to be a thorn in the side of government and developers across major project sites in the state.
Senator Watt said it was a matter of record that there had been “really worrying conduct” led by the CFMEU in Queensland for some time.
“Our government thinks it’s in the interests of construction workers and members of the CFMEU to clean this up. I think all union members want to be part of a clean union who is putting the interests of its members first,” he said.
“And I think sadly the CFMEU doesn’t fall into that category.”
Senator Watt confirmed his first briefing in his new portfolio was the progress on the administration process and signalled the government was working what legislative levers it needed to pull to ensure it happened.
He indicated the government was conscious the CFMEU was “cashed up” and had a history of very long-running litigation.
“If any application made by the general manager of the Fair Work Commission is opposed, or if there are barriers to that, then we will remove those barriers through legislation,” he said.
CFMEU Queensland secretary Michael Ravbar recently told members the union would not support any administrator appointment over “unproven media allegations”.
“The last week-and-a-half has been tough, because at the end of the day your union has done nothing wrong,” Mr Ravbar said.
“Why is the CFMEU being talked to be put in administration? If you’re going to have a look about criminality and corruption in the industry, you start from the top of the food chain, you don’t start down the bottom.”
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30 July, 2024
Adelaide woman Brooke Robran exposes issue her generation faces
I do feel sorry for this woman. She is up against it. But where were her parents? By the time she got to university, they should have had enough to pay the fees for her. Parents have been saving for their children's education since the 19th century.
It's cheaper to pay HECS in advance anyway. I paid all my son's fees in advance so he entered the workforce with zero debt and now in midlife has significant assets
And she is attractive so why does she not get a bloke to help share the costs? Everything does not have to be paid for by the government. Too much is already paid -- mostly for nonsense such as windmills. Better spend it on education than superfluous "renewables"
A young Aussie has sparked a fierce debate after calling out older generations and saying they have ruined the possibility for younger generations of buying their own homes.
Adelaide influencer Brooke Robran explained young Aussies were struggling to move out of home due to soaring HECS debts and unattainable property prices.
'How the f**k are people in their early 20s meant to move out of home now?,' Ms Robran asked in a video posted to social media.
'Generations before us have really f***ed us over here.
'When people used to go to uni it was free. Now the people that go to uni have $26,000 on average HECS debt.
'People like me aren't moving out of home until they're thirty now because they can't afford it. I swear you need four different jobs to make the amount you need to buy a house now.'
University was once free for students under Australia's 21st Prime Minister, Gough Whitlam.
During his brief four-year term, Mr Whitlam famously abolished tuition fees in 1974 and introduced a living allowance for full-time students.
Mandated payments returned in 1989 under Bob Hawke's Labor government, which also introduced the HECS programme.
Initially, all degrees had a uniform annual fee of $1,800. This changed in 1996 when the Howard coalition government introduced a three-tiered fee system.
The fees increased from a flat rate of $2,454 to $3,300 for Band One degrees, such as education and humanities, and $5,500 for Band Three degrees, including law and accounting.
Both sides of Australian politics have since agreed students should continue to pay the cost of higher education.
Data from comparison website Finder shows the average HECS debt sits at $40,000 with 21 per cent owing between $40,000 and $100,000 and just over one per cent owing more than $100,000
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The secret probe into university facing foreign student allegations
There have long been allegtions that lots of Indian students get into Australia via fake docements and it is true that many cannot cope with their studies when they get here. But they generally become productive members of the workforce anyway so it is no great grief. Where do you think all the Indian restaurants come from?
The country’s higher education watchdog is probing an Australian university accused of aggressively poaching foreign students from other institutions and for having lax recruitment practices and low English standards for admissions.
Documents obtained by this masthead reveal Torrens University is under scrutiny from the Tertiary Education Quality and Standards Agency after the agency became concerned by the university’s recruitment of international students and a rapid increase in its enrolments.
The correspondence also reveals multiple Australian universities enrolled students who were later found to have provided fake documents in their applications, as part of systemic fraud occurring in Haryana state in northern India.
The documents, released under freedom of information laws, show TEQSA has launched a compliance assessment into Torrens to determine whether the university is still meeting the standards required to remain registered.
Torrens, which has campuses in Sydney, Melbourne, Brisbane and Adelaide, has been the subject of 12 complaints since 2022. The watchdog said this was a “large number” for one institution.
Elite unis lower ATARs in favour of special entry schemes
Among the allegations made by complainants was that Torrens pushes education agents to poach from other providers, offering a 35 per cent fee discount for onshore international students.
Separately, an unnamed NSW public university alleged Torrens’ agents had been involved in unethical behaviour and were actively encouraged to poach its students by promising large discounts and other incentives.
Another complainant alleged high visa refusal rates were driven by “corrupt behaviour” in markets such as India, and that Torrens sales staff had made decisions related to student admissions.
The documents also revealed allegations that staff who raised concerns about the practices were forced to resign or had their employment terminated.
A Torrens spokesman said staff were bound by its code of conduct and undertook regular mandatory compliance training, while recruitment agents were also bound by stringent requirements.
“We would terminate – and have done so – any contract where an agent was found to be in breach,” he said.
The ongoing probe into the university’s practices comes as the federal government pushes ahead with a major crackdown on foreign student numbers. Education Minister Jason Clare said “shonks and crooks” were undermining the international education sector.
The government late last year changed its visa processing system to prioritise higher education providers deemed the least risk of recruiting “non-genuine” students, those who come to Australia primarily to work, not study.
University risk ratings from the Department of Home Affairs were updated in April. Federation University, the University of New England and the University of Tasmania were all given level 3 grade, the lowest category. Torrens University remained a level 2 provider.
‘Sudden and significant’ increase in enrolments
The watchdog wrote to Torrens in January last year concerned about its “sudden and significant increase” in international students
“TEQSA is concerned about the risk that students may lack the academic preparation and proficiency in English required to participate in their intended study,” the letter reads.
“The significant increases, particularly from new and existing source countries such as Laos, Kenya, Ghana and Nepal, also raises concerns about the measures taken by [Torrens] to ensure that student agents are only recruiting genuine students.
“In addition, we have identified a number of agents engaged by [the university] who had high visa refusal rates in 2022 and in previous years. This raises material concerns about the efficacy of the agent monitoring framework.”
In July 2023, TEQSA was concerned enough about the university’s practices that it moved to launch a compliance assessment, which is still under way.
It also wrote to at least one other university in 2023, expressing concern over its recruitment practices and formally requesting further information, the documents reveal.
Former TEQSA chief commissioner Professor Peter Coaldrake wrote to universities and colleges in August, warning them of their obligations when recruiting, admitting and supporting overseas students. He revealed the regulator was investigating several institutions’ risk of non-compliance.
However, TEQSA has refused to reveal if those investigations led to compliance assessments into other universities’ practices. Compliance assessments can begin only when the regulator identifies “serious compliance risks”.
Widespread fraudulent applications
The documents separately reveal multiple universities – who were not identified – were in contact with TEQSA in 2022 and 2023, concerned about admissions fraud in Haryana state.
One university informed TEQSA in October it had determined there was systemic fraud in applications coming out of the region. It said students had been using fake academic documents and fake employment records.
It discovered the fraud only after the students were enrolled. This was after it was known that too many applicants from the region were “non-genuine” temporary entrants.
Former Department of Immigration deputy secretary Abul Rizvi said that while smaller operators had been the target of much of the government’s visa crackdown, larger Group of Eight institutions, such as the University of Sydney, needed more scrutiny.
He believes the increase in foreign student admissions has affected universities’ ability to deliver high-quality degrees.
“If I was sending my child to another country to get an overseas education, the last thing I’d want was for my child to be studying in a class full of students from the same country,” he said.
The Torrens spokesman said it closely managed its recruitment of international students, who make up 48 per cent of its cohort, and that it was proud to have maintained a level 2 risk rating.
“Our offshore international student enrolments grew in 2022 compared to 2019 – as borders re-opened post the COVID pandemic. However, this was substantially offset by a decline in onshore international student enrolments,” he said.
“We believe in student choice, and Torrens University works hard to offer a highly competitive and high-quality educational experience with small class sizes, individualised support and an innovative curriculum, that is competitively priced for international students.”
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Hydrogen nonsense
Mining magnate Andrew ‘‘Twiggy’’ Forrest surprised many in the media on July 17 when he announced he was scaling back his green hydrogen commitments.
Yet, journalists following the global energy debate should have known this holy grail of power storage and pollution-free fuel was running into trouble around the world — even as Forrest continued to make multibillion-dollar announcements with state and federal leaders here and with governments overseas.
This is why politicians should not try to pick winners: the rush of capital looking for taxpayer-guaranteed returns is no measure of a technology’s viability. Nor does history show Australian politicians are any good at making decisions properly left to investment market professionals.
This column has long been sceptical of various firming technologies for variable wind and solar power. Back on October 17, 2022, I wrote: “Perhaps the most important question (in this area) that journalists should be asking relates to the feasibility of green hydrogen, being spruiked around the world … by Forrest.”
It quoted climate campaigner and engineer Saul Griffith estimating Forrest’s hydrogen would be between five and six times more expensive than using wind and solar only for power. Griffith said power would need to be priced at 2c per kilowatt hour to produce hydrogen for the then-new Albanese government’s $2 per kilogram target price.
Most states at the time were charging between 25c and 40c per kilowatt hour.
The week before the latest federal budget this column had a crack at Jim Chalmers for pinning so much of his government’s “Future Made in Australia” ambition on green hydrogen. The piece pointed out industry was expecting more taxpayer funds for green hydrogen in the budget the following week, but even the green evangelist Grattan Institute warned in December optimism about hydrogen was overblown.
Grattan energy specialist Tony Wood said government and industry would be wise to limit hydrogen expectations to green ammonia for fertiliser, green steel and green alumina.
Wood said even confining hydrogen ambitions to these sectors would “require more than 30 gigawatts of electricity, 60 per cent more than we have in the National Electricity Market today”.
Yet, on budget night, May 14, the Treasurer announced a further $19.7bn over 10 years under the “renewable energy super power banner”. Green hydrogen support was extended to $6.7bn over a decade.
Forrest, Chalmers and Anthony Albanese all claimed last week they remained committed to green hydrogen despite Forrest’s lay-off of 700 workers and his scaling back of several projects. He did remain committed to five hydrogen projects here and overseas.
Yet, had Chalmers and the Prime Minister read Saul Griffith’s testimony before the federal parliament last year, they might have been more cautious.
The Renew Economy website on April 6 last year quoted Griffith, also co-founder of Rewiring Australia, telling a parliamentary inquiry committing taxpayer funds to hydrogen would be a costly economic mistake.
“The idea that hydrogen will play a large role in the energy future does not make economic or thermodynamic sense,” Griffith’s written submission to the joint standing committee on the energy transition says. Griffith, like Wood, believes hydrogen will play a role in certain hard-to-abate sectors.
Griffith said people with a strong vested interest had “a heavy hand on the tiller of the hydrogen conversation”.
Forrest’s climb-down from the hydrogen pulpit came as the EU sounded a warning about hydrogen.
The Brussels-based European Court of Auditors said on July 17 — the same day as Forrest’s announcement — the EU’s hydrogen goals were unrealistic, despite the billions of euros already invested.
The EU had committed €18.8bn ($31bn) to make 10 million tonnes of green hydrogen by 2030 and to import a further 10 million tonnes by 2030. Forrest alone claimed he could make 15 million tonnes by 2030.
The following night on ABC’s 7.30, host Sarah Ferguson gave Forrest a rare, almost interruption-free, 11 minutes to obfuscate on the central question: has hydrogen been over-hyped?
It was an interview in stark contrast with her latest nuclear power exchange with opposition energy spokesman Ted O’Brien. Ferguson talked over the top of him throughout and interrupted during most of the points O’Brien tried to make.
Yet, nuclear power is tried, tested and reliable while green hydrogen is in early development stages and may not be viable at scale.
A paper by the conservative Manhattan Institute released on February 1 this year, Green Hydrogen: A Multibillion-Dollar Energy Boondoggle, gets to the heart of the hydrogen problem. Hydrogen creates less energy than is used to make it.
The study examines various hydrogen technologies and homes in on EROI: energy return on investment.
The EROI of green hydrogen via electrolysis is 0.5. It releases half as much energy as is invested in making it.
The EROIs of traditional power sources are 28 for natural gas, 30 for coal and 75 for nuclear power. This is the science; it’s not about climate denial but the reality of physics and chemistry.
The point of the hydrogen story for a column on journalism? Scepticism is a key quality needed for good and accurate reporting. Journalists need to be especially sceptical in testing claims in-line with their own personal biases.
In the energy transition, conservative-leaning journalists who favour nuclear power have been unable to accept the Coalition’s plan to build nuclear reactors will do nothing to reduce CO2 emissions until 2040.
Therefore, unless a Coalition government were to scrap its emissions reduction targets, it would not markedly slow the rollout of wind and solar technology which, for all its problems, will reduce emissions.
Remember, too, the Coalition plan calls for nuclear as a dispatchable backup rather than a whole-of-system power source. As O’Brien has said, it would eventually operate in tandem with wind and solar.
Similarly, left-leaning journalists like those who dominate the ABC need to test their inherent biases in favour of anything claimed to reduce emissions.
Ferguson has been a prime example in recent weeks. Why the soft approach to Forrest while applying attack tactics in her nuclear interview with O’Brien in March?
Similarly, ABC Media Watch has for decades been on the hunt for any stories it thinks might hide secret climate denial.
Last Monday, July 22, it was again on its favourite hobby horse: bollocking Sky News Australia. This time it targeted the network’s coverage of EVs.
It did acknowledge what has been clear for over a year: while Australian buyers were late to the EV party, buyers in Europe and North America have been walking away from the technology.
Why? The problems reporters at this paper have been describing for almost a decade: range anxiety, price, increasing insurance premiums, fears about battery fires, the cost of battery repair and the high cost of smash repair. The latest EV hot-button issue has been deep price discounting by Tesla which has left recent former buyers out of pocket compared with new buyers.
Media Watch ignored most of these issues and failed to make the central point. Most EVs in Australia, unless powered by a home battery connected to rooftop solar, receive electricity from a power grid still largely fired by burning coal.
Now, that should make any thinking journalist a bit sceptical.
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Former ABC chair Ita Buttrose says journalists at the broadcaster are too sensitive to criticism
Some interviewers at the ABC are reluctant to tell both sides of the story and the public broadcaster needs to improve the quality of its journalism, the taxpayer-funded organisation’s recently-departed chairwoman Ita Buttrose has declared.
In extraordinary comments just four months after she stepped down from the ABC board, Ms Buttrose warned the ABC was too sensitive to criticism and its reporters should just give up if they cannot handle scrutiny.
Ms Buttrose’s comments were the media doyenne’s most strident criticism of the broadcaster she once led and have been backed by another recently departed ABC board member, businessman Joe Gersh.
Speaking to ABC radio on Monday, Ms Buttrose said that having both sides of the story was “much better” for the broadcaster’s audience and blasted un-named presenters for not doing so.
“I think there’s no harm in presenting both sides of an argument, and I don’t understand the reluctance of some of our interviewers not to do that,” she said.
“Have both sides of the story, it’s much better for the viewer or the listener.”
Former ABC board member Joe Gersh – who was on the board alongside Ms Buttrose before his tenure ended in 2023 – said he agreed with Ms Buttrose’s comments.
The Jewish businessman said the ABC could have done a much better job at reporting on anti-Semitism during the Israel-Hamas conflict.
“As a member of the Jewish community, a supporter of the ABC and a former director, I’ve been extremely troubled by the ABC’s apparent lack of concern at the alarming and unprecedented rise of anti Semitism in Australia,” Mr Gersh said.
“The failure of the ABC to meet its impartiality obligation in respect of the Israel-Hamas conflict means that in some respects it is part of the problem, rather than part of the solution.
“The ABC has an obligation of impartiality and it’s of concern of when it falls short of meeting that obligation.”
Ms Buttrose finished her five-year term at the ABC in March and was replaced by Kim Williams.
The Australian asked Mr Williams on Monday if he agreed with Ms Buttrose’s remarks but he would not comment.
Mr Williams said in March: “If you don’t want to reflect a view that aspires to impartiality, don’t work at the ABC.”
During the interview Karvelas claimed News Corp, which includes mastheads such as The Australian, “have gone after ABC frontline reporters and presenters pretty hard, including me.”
“Is that something that you think is concerning and does it have a chilling kind of impact,” Karvelas asked.
Ms Buttrose dismissed the claims put to her.
“No, look, quite frankly I think you are all too sensitive about News Corp; let them do what they want to do, it doesn’t really matter,” she said.
“When Kerry Packer was alive he didn’t like the ABC either and I used to have vehement arguments with him about the role of the ABC, because I was brought up on the ABC because of my father (journalist Charles Oswald).
“I used to have big arguments with Kerry about the role of the ABC and why it was important, and News Corp seems to share Kerry’s feelings about the ABC.
“If the ABC can’t take the criticism then it should just give up. It doesn’t matter what they say, it doesn’t matter, don’t keep worrying about what they say. Just keep doing your own job, which you have to do, just do it.”
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29 July, 2024
Court rules in favour of Roundup over cancer query
A great relief. The Greenie jihad against glyphosate has been relentless
Australian farmers are relieved by a Federal Court ruling that the commonly used herbicide Roundup does not cause cancer.
Regarded as a key tool for controlling weeds in agricultural crops, Roundup’s manufacturer Monsanto has been hit by a barrage of legal action across the world in recent years.
A landmark class action in the Federal Court against Monsanto’s Australian offshoot, Huntsman Chemical Company, was filed by 800 on-Hodgkin lymphoma patients in 2020, but judge Michael Lee late on Thursday found the evidence did not prove the glyphosate based herbicide was carcinogenic.
German chemicals and pharmaceuticals company Bayer, which bought Monsanto in 2018, is facing multiple lawsuits in the US and has in some cases been found liable by juries for causing cancer.
National agencies, including the Australian Pesticides and Veterinary Medicines Authority, which last considered glyphosate in 2016, European Food Agency and European Chemicals Agency and the US Environmental Protection Agency have all approved use of glyphosate as a weed killer, subject to conditions, after strict safety assessments.
Justice Lee found there was not enough evidence to prove Roundup caused the non-Hodgkin lymphoma of 41-year-old Kelvin McNickle, who was diagnosed with the cancer six years ago after two decades of using the chemical on his family’s property.
The National Farmers Federation said Justice Lee’s decision was reassuring, given the widespread use of the product in the agriculture sector.
“As a farmers and stewards of the land, it’s important we use products that are safe for humans and the environment,” the NFF said after the verdict.
“Glyphosate is one of the most common products farmers and home gardeners use all over the world to combat invasive weeds. It allows us to be more productive and sustainable, often being associated with no or minimal till farming, which preserves soil structure.
“The decision from the Federal Court today reinforces that our regulator is doing its job to ensure the health and safety of our farmers, communities and environment.”
Describing glyphosate as “a critical component of modern and sustainable agricultural production”, NSW Farmers Ag Science Committee chair Alan Brown said Australian farmers were “well aware of how to use this chemical correctly to protect the health of their families and communities”.
“Without access to the chemical, farmers would have to resort to cultivation to manage weeds – degrading our landscape and making it harder than ever to maintain productivity” Mr Brown said.
Bayer said the decision was consistent with worldwide regulatory and scientific assessments and “remains committed to supporting Australian farmers by ensuring safe-for-use and effective products such as Roundup continue to be available”.
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COVID effect to cause 'excess' deaths for years to come
Death rates in Australia could be impacted for years by the lingering effects of COVID-19. (Steven Saphore/AAP PHOTOS)
Australia could continue to feel the tail effects of the COVID-19 pandemic for years as more people die because of the virus and its impacts.
Some 8400 more people died in 2023 than would have been expected under pre-pandemic conditions, an Actuaries Institute report, released on Monday, found.
The figure was down from the 20,000 "excess" deaths recorded in 2022.
Of the extra deaths logged in 2023, 4600 were directly because of COVID-19 while another 1500 were linked to the virus.
The institute's mortality working group said the substantial drop in excess deaths between the two years had not prevented the 2023 rate sitting higher than it had during bad flu years before the pandemic.
"We think COVID-19 is likely to cause some excess mortality for several years to come, either as a direct cause of death or a contributing factor to other causes such as heart disease," actuary Karen Cutter said.
"In our view, the 'new normal' level of mortality is likely to be higher than it would have been if we hadn't had the pandemic."
A higher death rate could remain as things such as vaccination rates and jabs' efficacy continued to be managed, Australian National University epidemiology lecturer Rezanur Rahaman said.
"It could be said that the excess deaths will continue for some time as it is a highly contagious respiratory pathogen that will not die out anytime soon," he told AAP.
But University of Technology Sydney bio-statistics professor Andrew Hayen noted the report found the age-standardised death rate in 2023 was almost the same as in 2019.
"We've already witnessed a considerable decline in excess deaths as measured by the Actuaries Institute (and) we are likely to see a continued decline in mortality, particularly due to COVID," he said.
It was difficult to attribute deaths specifically to post-COVID effects, rather than reduced health care during the pandemic, Professor Hayen said.
"Many of the deaths in 2022 were probably due to mortality displacement and there may also be issues relating to pressures on emergency services and delays in standard care, like elective surgery rates," he said.
"However, it's not possible to attribute exactly what proportion is attributable to putative causes."
Comparing Australia's experience with 40 other countries, the actuaries' report found the local excess death rate of five per cent between 2020 and 2023 was low by global standards, which averaged 11 per cent.
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Aussie Olympics star says Paris Games are so woke they're ruining athletes' chances of setting world records
Retired Olympic swimmer James Magnussen has taken a swipe at the Paris Olympics, saying they are so eco-friendly that they're ruining athletes’ chances of setting world records.
Magnussen won gold, silver, and bronze medals at the Olympic Games in 2012 and 2016. He also secured the title of 100m freestyle world champion in 2011 and 2013. Magnussen retired from competitive swimming in 2019.
He believes that the pinnacle sporting event in the world has an eco-friendly, vegan-first mentality that is damaging performance.
'There’s multiple factors that make village life far from ideal,' the dual Olympian wrote in his News Corp column.
'It’s the cardboard beds, which can’t give you optimal sleep.
'It’s the no airconditioning, which is going to play a bigger factor as the week goes. It was 20 degrees and raining yesterday. It’s going to be mid 30s in the coming days.
'That’s going to play a factor and the Australian team having their own portable air conditioners will be a welcome relief.
'It’s the crowded buses with no air flow. It’s all of the walking everywhere. The one thing we noticed in London was I was getting up to 6000-7000 steps a day, going from my room, to the food hall, to the bus stop, to the pool.'
Organisers of the Paris Games have been aggressive with their green approach, billing the event as the most sustainable ever.
Magnussen however believes they've gone overboard and that the environment that has been created for the athletes might be the toughest ever to produce world record swims.
'The lack of world records boils down to this whole eco-friendly, carbon footprint, vegan-first mentality rather than high performance,' he said.
'They had a charter that said 60 per cent of food in the village had to be vegan friendly and the day before the opening ceremony they ran out of meat and dairy options in the village because they hadn’t anticipated so many athletes would be choosing the meat and dairy options over the vegan friendly ones.
'The caterer had to rejig their numbers and bring in more of those products because surprise, surprise — world class athletes don’t have vegan diets.
'They must have watched the Netflix doco Game Changers and assumed everyone was the same. But let me tell you, Usain Bolt, Michael Phelps, Roger Federer — none of those guys are on a vegan diet.'
Conditions in the athletes village have already raised eyebrows among the Aussie contingent.
The 'anti-sex' cardboard beds went down like a lead balloon with water polo star Tilly Kearns and her teammate Gabi Palm, who said 'my back is about to fall off' after their first night.
Tennis star Daria Saville revealed the village is nothing like being in a hotel in a social media post on Tuesday.
'We don't really have hotel-like housekeeping here in the Olympic Village, so you have to get your own toilet paper,' she wrote in a caption alongside video of herself grabbing several rolls.
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State’s ‘old school’ switch offers a template for the nation
When a starry-eyed Paul Martin launched his teaching career at a western Sydney high school, he was shocked that so many of his teenage students struggled to read. Thirty-five years later, he has just produced a new primary school teaching syllabus that will revolutionise learning for nearly 1.3 million students in one of the world’s biggest schooling systems.
In a startling confession, the chief executive of the NSW Education Standards Authority now says that for a half-century education systems have been doing a lot of things wrong.
“I started teaching in 1989,” Martin recalls. “I walked into a year 7 class where more than a third of the kids couldn’t read. And I had no idea how to teach them to read because all I knew how to do was what the syllabus said – and it had nothing in it. By the time I’d finished classroom teaching, I had the desire to change all of that.”
The new primary school curriculum for NSW, launched on Wednesday, is a clear and concise document that focuses on phonics and facts, erasing the gobbledygook and feel-good theories that still clutter curriculum documents across the nation. NSW is returning to the old-school method of teaching children vital facts, in sequence. It is based on cutting-edge research that proves children learn best when they are explicitly taught facts and given practice to embed them in long-term memory.
For decades, children’s learning has been sabotaged by left-wing ideologies that regard schooling as an opportunity for indoctrination and social engineering under the cover of “critical thinking and creativity”. Phonics and facts were dirty words for the “child-centred” groupthink.
“Without being too condemnatory of the past, some of the earlier syllabuses were written at a high point of what I would call progressivist ideology – the ‘choose your own adventure’ of education,” Martin says. “Some things were potentially wrong, like whole-language reading, and we took grammar out of syllabuses. Beforehand, some of the syllabuses expected kids to do things in, say, history, in terms of writing expectations, that they hadn’t yet learned in English.”
The flaws in the previous curriculum have produced a generation of children who often struggle with basic reading and mathematics, and have a poor general knowledge.
The “long tail of disadvantage” described in 2009 by Julia Gillard, the former federal Labor education minister and prime minister, has grown ever longer. In last year’s NAPLAN tests, one in three children starting high school failed to meet the minimum standard expected for reading, writing and mathematics.
Australian students are twice as likely to fail than excel in English and maths, despite taxpayers pouring $72bn a year into schools. By 15, one in three teenagers can’t read to the level required for year 9. Is it any wonder so many drop out of school, sucked into street crime and a life of dysfunction?
Martin, 60, worked as a teacher in some of Sydney’s poorest communities and was an education policy adviser for the NSW and federal governments before taking the helm at NESA in 2019, when he initiated a clean-up of what he regarded as a “cluttered curriculum”. A new syllabus for English and mathematics was released last year and this week he delivered teaching materials across all subjects – the bipartisan policy love child of former Coalition NSW education minister Sarah Mitchell and her successor, Labor’s Prue Car.
Car, who also is NSW Deputy Premier, insists teachers must rely on evidence of “what works” to help children learn, just as doctors perform operations based on proven and best-practice surgical techniques. “It’s the bleeding obvious,” she says. “We would never tell a surgeon, ‘Do what works for you, see how you feel on the day and it’s up to you, here is the scaffold.’ No! We say, ‘This is how you do it based on the evidence of what works.’ ”
As the mother of a teenage son, Car has seen first-hand the failures in longstanding teaching techniques. “When my son was learning to read I, like so many other parents, was obsessively reading books to him constantly,” she recalls. “A lot of the conversation at that time was about the use of sight words, and looking at pictures next to the words they’re learning to read.
“Now when I’m in classrooms, I can see that teachers are using a combination of that plus phonics. The kids can actually make the sounds out because that’s the building blocks on which they learn how to read and write and understand. So I think every parent – me included – can see that would have been very useful to us back then. Being able to read changes lives.”
Australia has a national curriculum that was streamlined and updated in 2022 to Version 9. In Queensland, schools have until 2027 to adopt the changes, so many children will go through most of primary school being taught a defunct curriculum.
NSW, Victoria and Western Australia have written their own syllabus materials, which give more detail and guidance to put flesh on the bones of the national curriculum, which is confusing to comprehend given its “three-dimensional” nature with layers of online documents that must be cross-referenced.
The differences across Australia are stark: in NSW, a year 2 student will be taught to locate the seven continents and five oceans of the world, read ancient Greek legends and identify significant Aboriginal sites across NSW.
In Queensland, the year 2 syllabus based on the old national curriculum confuses teachers with vague and rambling explanations. “Continuity and change are not only key concepts in history but ones that challenge students to move from simplistic notions of history as a series of events, to powerfully complex understandings about change and continuity,” it states.
“Changes occurs at different rates simultaneously, linking forward and backward in time.”
This is why hardworking teachers are constantly complaining about late nights wasted trying to interpret the curriculum and devise practical plans for the next day’s lessons.
WA’s year 2 naval-gazing history lessons focus on a child’s own family, in line with the national curriculum. While NSW kids will listen in wonder about Roman gods and Dreamtime legends, yawning seven-year-olds in WA will learn about their own name, what they look like and what objects are familiar to them.
Young children who have not learned to read and write fluently are being expected to “analyse and explain” concepts in history or science.
Victoria updated its syllabus last month, mandating that from next year schools explicitly teach children up to year 2 to read using structured phonics – the sounding out of letters and letter combinations to form words. The Australian Education Union’s Victorian branch blasted this change as a “burden” and instructed teachers to ignore the mandate.
In NSW, the Minns government consulted 200 expert teachers and involved the NSW Teachers Federation, which has given a lukewarm endorsement that “curriculum with high levels of subject knowledge and rigour can be positive”. The union secured a compromise that while teachers can start using the new syllabus this week, it won’t be compulsory until 2027.
The NSW reforms are based on a two-year review by Australian Council for Educational Research chief executive Geoff Masters, who insists teachers and students need a clear “pathway” for learning.
“It’s important that it’s clear to teachers what they should be teaching and what students should be learning,” he says. “You need a high-quality curriculum and a clear sequence of learning. The curriculum has to be a pathway that all students will follow.”
Masters says schools must ensure children don’t fall behind on the learning pathway but also let them race ahead if they’re ready.
“We have many students in our schools who are being taught things currently that they’re not ready to learn because they lack the prerequisites,” he says. “The curriculum has moved too far ahead for them. And we have other students who are being taught things they already know, when they need to be stretched.”
Small gaps in basic facts taught to children in primary school can grow into a chasm of ignorance in high school. No one would expect a teenager to become a violin virtuoso without having been taught how to hold the violin and bow, read music and practise musical scales. Yet somehow we expect kids to master algebra even if they haven’t learned their times tables or fractions first.
Young children who have not learned to read and write fluently are being expected to “analyse and explain” concepts in history or science. They end up stressed and struggling. Children who are bored or anxious are likelier to muck up in class or drop out of school.
“Many kids are getting well into their school life before anybody has recognised that they’ve missed some really basic things,” says Masters. “Right at the beginning of schooling, whether it’s reading or mathematics, the curriculum has marched on. Everything is so time-bound currently, where students are required to move on whether or not they’ve mastered what they’ve just been taught.
The consequence of that is many students lack the prerequisite for what they’re to be taught next, and they struggle and fall further behind as the next year-level curriculum gets further and further beyond their reach.”
Knowledge Society chief executive Elena Douglas, who has been driving reforms to teaching methods and curriculum content, hopes NSW has “broken a stalemate” over the best way to teach.
“This is how we get smart and creative citizens,” she says. “It doesn’t matter what postcode, we need the same formula of calm and orderly classrooms, teacher-led instruction, a well-sequenced and ambitious curriculum and lesson plans, and evidence-based reading instruction. I hope this starts a race to the top.”
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28 July, 2024
COVID left us poorer, sicker and with a big financial headache, inquiry told
COVID-19 has left Australians with poorer physical and mental health, helped fuel inflation because of too many government handouts and encouraged people into the black economy, the first wide-ranging inquiry into the pandemic has heard.
Businesses, unions, health experts and the education sector have told the inquiry, due to report in weeks, that Australia needs to prepare for future pandemics to avoid repeating mistakes made across all levels of government that are still being felt in some parts of the nation.
The inquiry, promised by Anthony Albanese ahead of the 2022 federal election, is being headed by former senior public servant Robyn Kruk plus economist Angela Jackson and infectious diseases expert Professor Catherine Bennett.
Established last year, the 12-month inquiry is due to report by September. It has been given a wide remit to look at joint Commonwealth-state actions, although its terms of reference preclude examining unilateral actions taken by states and territories or international programs.
Across a series of roundtables, the inquiry has been told of major shortcomings with elements of the federal and state governments’ responses to COVID-19 and the long-term problems these have caused.
Health experts said border closures had a “significant” impact on healthcare provision, particularly in rural, remote and border communities, arguing health workers should be exempt from such restrictions.
Australia’s average age fell last year while the country experienced a record number of deaths in 2022.
Chronic disease monitoring and cancer screening were disrupted, the sector said, noting a nationally co-ordinated effort was now required to clear the backlog of tests.
“People are currently waiting longer for care than before the pandemic, are often sicker and [are] finding it less affordable,” the sector said.
Experts said the mental health system was in crisis before the pandemic, and COVID-19 had exacerbated problems that had only worsened since.
Anthony Albanese announces inquiry into COVID-19 pandemic
An inquiry into how Australia dealt with the COVID-19 pandemic has been announced by Prime Minister Anthony Albanese.
“Australian communities are experiencing a process of rolling recoveries from one emergency to the next (extreme weather events and the pandemic), with resulting cumulative trauma,” they told the inquiry.
“More emphasis is needed on community resilience and on strengthening the system ahead of the next emergency.”
Economists from academia and the private sector said original government spending was important in supporting households and businesses, but the speed at which it was rolled out meant “compromises” in policy design that should be avoided in future pandemics.
However, the ongoing financial support proved too much for the economy, they said.
“The scale of the initial fiscal and monetary support was likely warranted during a period of uncertainty. However, the winding back of these measures as the pandemic progressed was too slow,” they said.
The small business sector said differences in public health orders between the states and territories caused significant problems for many companies.
This, coupled with confusion over the definition of essential services and essential workers, encouraged some businesses to participate in the black economy.
“The lack of clarity and consistency around important definitions and public health orders resulted in an increase in the number of sole traders operating in the cash economy in some sectors, such as hairdressing,” it told the inquiry.
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Facts at a premium in blustery climate debate
We think we are so clever. The conceit of contemporary humankind is often unbearable.
Yet this modern self-regard has generated a collective idiocy, an inane confusion between feelings and facts, and an inability to distinguish between noble aims and hard reality.
This preference for virtue signalling over practical action can be explained only by intellectual vanity, a smugness that over-estimates humankind’s ability to shape the world it inhabits.
Moonshot? Old news. Supersonic global travel? Been there, done that. Contraceptive pill, heart medication, painkillers, Viagra and antidepressants? Pharmacies are goldmines. Computers, video cameras, internet access to all knowledge of all history, audiovisual communication and electronic transactions? All in the palm of our hands.
Hot water when we want it, cool rooms when we need them, frozen meals, out-of-season fruits, self-driving cars, smart fridges and Uber deliveries. It is a wonder we bother getting out of bed.
As a result we have a tendency to believe we are masters of the universe, that we can control the climate and regulate natural disasters. Too lazy or spoiled to weigh facts and think things through, we are more susceptible than ever to mass delusion.
We have seen this tendency play out in deeply worrying ways, such as the irrational belief in the communal benefits of Covid vaccination despite the distinct lack of scientific evidence. Too many people just wanted to believe the vaccine had this thing beaten.
For that matter, we accepted draconian restrictions such as curfews and outdoor mask mandates when there was no medical evidence presented to support them. With most media operating hand-in-glove to generate fear and trepidation, our political and bureaucratic masters imposed frightening constraints on our freedom of expression, but most people seemed compliant because they wanted to believe we could control the virus and not vice versa.
Still, there is no area of public debate where rational thought is more readily cast aside than in the climate and energy debate. This is where alarmists demand that people “follow the science” while they deploy rhetoric, scare campaigns and policies that turn reality and science on their heads.
This nonsense is so widespread and amplified by so many authoritative figures that we have become inured to it. Teachers and children break from school to draw attention to what the UN calls a “climate emergency” as the world lives through its most populous and prosperous period in history, when people are shielded from the ill-effects of weather events better than they ever have been previously.
Politicians tell us in the same breath that producing clean energy is the most urgent and important task for the planet and reject nuclear energy, the only reliable form of emissions-free energy. The activists argue that reducing emissions is so imperative it is worth lowering living standards, alienating farmland, scarring forests and destroying industries, but it is not worth the challenge of boiling water to create energy-generating steam by using the tried and tested technology of nuclear fission.
Our acceptance of idiocy, unchecked and unchallenged, struck me in one interview this week given by teal MP Zali Steggall. In many ways it was an unexceptional interview; there are politicians and activists saying this sort of thing every day somewhere, usually unchallenged.
Steggall was preoccupied with Australia’s emissions reduction targets.
“If we are going to be aligned to a science-based target and keep temperatures as close to 1.5 degrees as we can, we must have a minimum reduction of 75 per cent by 2035 as an interim target,” she said.
Steggall then patronised her audience by comparing meeting emissions targets to paying down a mortgage. The claim about controlling global temperatures is hard to take seriously, but to be fair it is merely aping the lines of the UN, which argues the increase in global average temperatures can be held to 1.5 degrees with emissions reductions of that size – globally.
We could talk all day about the imprecise nature of these calculations, the contested scientific debate about the role of other natural variabilities in climate, and the presumption that humankind, through policy imposed by a supranational authority, can control global climate as if with a thermostat. The simplistic relaying of this agenda as central to Australian policy decisions was not the worst aspect of Steggall’s presentation.
“The Coalition has no policy, so let’s be really clear, they are taking Australia out of the Paris Agreement if they fail to nominate an improvement with a 2035 target,” Steggall lectured, disingenuously.
“The Labor government, they need to do better, we are currently not on track to keeping temperatures within sound boundaries from a climate risk point of view.”
This was Steggall promulgating the central lie of the national climate debate – that Australia’s emissions reduction policies can alter the climate. It is a fallacy embraced and advocated by Labor, the Greens and the teals, and which the Coalition is loath to challenge for fear of being tagged into a “climate denialism” argument.
It is arrant nonsense to suggest our policies can have any discernible effect on the climate or “climate risk”. Any politician suggesting so, directly or by implication, is part of a contemporary, fake-news-driven dumbing down of the public square, and injecting an urgency into our policy considerations that is hurting citizens already with high electricity prices, diminished reliability and a damaged economy.
Steggall went on to claim we were feeling the consequences of global warming already. “And for people wondering ‘How does that affect me?’, just look at your insurance premiums, our insurance premiums around Australia are going through the roof,” she extrapolated, claiming insurance costs were keeping people out of home ownership. “This is not a problem for the future,” Steggall stressed, “it is problem for now.”
It is a problem all right – it is unmitigated garbage masquerading as a policy debate. Taking it to its logical conclusion, Steggall claims if Australia reduced its emissions further we would lower the risk of natural disasters, leading to lower insurance premiums and improved housing affordability – it is surprising that world peace did not get a mention.
Mind you, these activists do like to talk about global warming as a security issue. They will say anything that heightens fears, escalates the problem and supports their push for more radical deindustrialisation.
Our national contribution to global emissions is now just over 1 per cent and shrinking. Australia’s annual emissions total less than 400 megatonnes while China’s are rising by more than that total each year and are now at 10,700Mt or about 30 times Australia’s. While our emissions reduce, global emissions are increasing. We could shut down our country, eliminating our emissions completely, and China’s increase would replace ours in less than a year.
So, whatever we are doing, it is not changing and cannot change the global climate. Our national chief scientist, Alan Finkel, clearly admitted this point in 2018, even though he was embarrassed by its implications in the political debate. Yet the pretence continues.
And before critics suggest I am arguing for inaction, I am not. But clearly, the logical and sensible baseline for our policy consideration should be a recognition that our national actions cannot change the weather. Therefore we should carefully consider adaptation to measured and verified climate change, while we involve ourselves as a responsible nation in global negotiations and action.
Obviously, we should not be leading that action but acting cautiously to protect our own interests and prosperity.
It is madness for us to undermine our cheap energy advantage to embark on a renewables-plus-storage experiment that no other country has dared to even try, when we know it cannot shift the global climate one iota. It is all pain for no gain.
Yet that is what this nation has done. So my question today is what has happened to our media, academia, political class and wider population so that it allows this debate and policy response to occur in a manner that is so divorced from reality?
Are we so complacent and overindulged that we accept post-rational debate to address our post-material concerns? Even when it is delivering material hardship to so many Australians and jeopardising our long-term economic security?
Should public debate accept absurd baseline propositions such as the idea that our energy transition sacrifice will improve the weather and reduce natural disasters, simply because they are being argued by major political groupings or the UN? Or should we not try to impose a dose of reality and stick to the facts?
This feebleness of our public debate has telling ramifications – there is no way this country could have embarked on the risky, expensive and doomed renewables-plus-storage experiment if policies and prognostications had been subject to proper scrutiny and debate.
Our media is now so polarised that the climate activists of Labor, the Greens and the teals are able to ensure their nonsensical advocacy is never challenged, and the green-left media, led by the publicly funded ABC, leads the charge in spreading misinformation.
Clearly, we are not as clever as we think. Our children need us to wise up.
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Who cares about the sisterhood when you look cute in a keffiyeh!
Gemma Tognini
A lot can happen in nine months. In some countries (definitely not Australia) you could build a small house. A baby can go from crawling and curious to teetering around on two small feet, suddenly and terrifyingly mobile. A gangly teenage boy can become, seemingly before his parents’ eyes, a young man.
And, the most obvious of all, a woman can become pregnant and give birth.
There are five young Israeli women in their late teens who have been hostage for this length of time.
I want to remind you that in a highly disturbing video released a few months ago, their captors were filmed saying these chilling words: “These are the women who can get pregnant. These are the Zionists.” And then: “You are very beautiful.”
We don’t know if these young women are pregnant but people fear that is what has happened.
Don’t like to think about it? Neither do their parents. Neither do their siblings and friends. Neither do I. But I’m going to insist we do because somehow it feels like much of Australia and the world has become shamefully comfortable with the fact these young women are still being held hostage.
We’ve been comfortable with the obfuscation and the whataboutism that says look the other way. Well, I’m not comfortable with it. And I want to make you as uncomfortable as I can.
We know if any of these young women were an Australian citizen they’d be collateral damage. That much is clear. If Australian women were being kept hostage in Gaza, being sexually abused and paraded around for the world to see like bargaining chips, Hamas would be in receipt of a very stern word salad.
Australia’s current government wouldn’t have the international clout or the ticker to rescue our own. It’s easy indeed to call for calm and suggest a two-state solution (that is, a reward for effort to the terrorists) when you’re safe and uninvested on the other side of the planet.
Few here outside the Jewish community speak of these young women and the other hostages any more. In the context of the ongoing dialogue about women’s safety and broader gendered violence, the most complicit in their silence are Australia’s feminists.
They’ve lost their tongue when it comes to these young women. When it comes to the sexual violence of October 7 last year, the weaponisation of sex during this conflict, they’ve had nothing to say except attempting to legitimise the regime that perpetrated this evil.
Is modern feminism dead? And if not yet, why not? Surely it’s time to end the charade that is third-wave feminism. It is nothing but a frenemy at best to women.
Modern feminists in Australia and elsewhere are, by their silence and invisibility, OK with young female hostages in Gaza. They are, for the most part, invisible on Iran.
They shout “From the river to the sea” without so much of a word about what life is like for women under Hamas’s strict sharia law.
I wrote about those inconvenient truths back in December. Under sharia, and in Gaza under Hamas, a woman’s testimony is legally worth half a man’s. If she can get a divorce, she has to pay her ex-husband for it. Intra-family sexual violence is legal and justified.
As I said back then: feminists, when you’re throwing your fist in the air and yelling “From the river to the sea”, you’re championing a regime that says it’s OK for a father to rape or beat his daughter. A son is legally permitted to abuse his mother.
But none of this matters if you look cute in a keffiyeh.
Third-wave feminists have had nothing to say on the butchering of Christian women in the Plateau region of Nigeria. And, closer to home, where have they all gone since the voice to parliament was rejected by most Australians?
The plague of family and domestic violence. Terrible, systemic disadvantage that disproportionately affects Indigenous women hasn’t gone anywhere. It has not magically disappeared because the government threw its hands up after the failed referendum. The problems are still there. The lack of virtue to signal seems directly proportional to the silence of modern feminists when it comes to all of these issues.
They pick and choose their causes and their champions. The right kind of woman versus the wrong kind.
Melania Trump, for example, is fair game. Her choice in husband is none of my concern but the feminist, leftist narrative around her and her marriage is laughable. Compare this with how Hillary Clinton is feted and adored as some kind of icon for empowered women. As if her husband weren’t caught bonking the intern in the Oval Office behind his wife’s back, then lying about it to America and the world.
One of the worst things about that whole grubby situation was that Monica Lewinsky’s life suffered the most. Where were the feminists then? Talk about a power imbalance. Bill Clinton should never have been able to show his face again. Hillary was never judged for staying in that marriage.
Gosh, it must be exhausting being consistently caught in your own hypocrisy. I could write reams about this subject. Truly, I could.
I’ve shared before that the world I grew up in was gender blind. As a child, my Nonna worked full time. My Zia too. My mum went back to work when my brother and I were closer to high school, but that wasn’t a choice made out of victimhood, it was about purpose over preference. Nobody needed to tell me women could do anything. I saw it every day. Nobody needed to tell me that choosing to be a mum for a while, then go back to work (if the circumstances of life allowed it) was a beautiful and worthy sacrifice. I saw that in my mother.
That being said, I was well aware of the huge gender and opportunity pay disparity because we spoke about it at home and as a family more broadly.
I’ve experienced that too in my previous career and have shared openly about that. I say all of that by way of context and to say gently that, to me, modern feminism has lost sight of the sacrifices women in previous generations made. It has conveniently forgotten that we ladies today, of all ages, are standing on the shoulder pads of giants. Women who went before us and fought for things of substance.
That’s not to say, well gals, this is as good as it gets. What I am definitely saying is that we must not lose sight of the fact feminism was never about picking and choosing which women were supported, heard and fought for. It was always about women being empowered to live the lives of their choosing. About saying no woman should be taken and held hostage. Not being judged for the men they marry or divorce or choose not to marry. And I will say this until I’m blue in the face. Men are not the enemy. We are better together, always.
Those young women chained up in Gaza, suffering god knows what. They are being kept prisoner. They have been held for close to a year and modern feminists at the UN, in Australia and elsewhere have shamefully turned the other way. Have become OK with it. They can protest all they like but their silence betrays them.
Modern feminism is a cheap imitation of the real thing. It’s not about equality, it’s about revenge. It’s not about women for women. It’s what infatuation is to love, what a one-night stand is to a healthy marriage. If it’s not dead yet, the sooner and the significantly better off we’ll be.
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Green feels chop over Labor deals: For New South Wales Labor, green morality trumps forestry
Last month, 15 timber harvesting operations were suspended by the NSW timber industry controller Forestry Corporation. The Environment Protection Authority changed the habitat protection rules for the endangered greater gliders, making timber harvesting illegal.
Environmental activists have deployed a Victorian-style lawfare in an effort to shut down native timber production. But no amount of marsupial propaganda masks the human toll inflicted by the government’s betrayal.
Despite the NSW timber industry having more teeth than its Victorian counterparts and some sharp operators like ex-Labor Minister Joel Fitzgibbon, there is limited political interest in the arguments for sustainable management, homes, and sovereign capacity.
Activist environmentalists are cunning; having crippled the Victorian timber industry, they have worked out a successful model and are now replicating it in NSW. They take legal action against government bodies that trigger ‘stop work’ orders. This forces businesses to suffer death by attrition – court actions take years to resolve, and even if they are successful, few businesses are left, and fewer financial institutions are willing to back them.
Agriculture Minister Tara Moriarty barely rated a whimper when responding to the crisis, stating that her government was ‘committed to delivering the right balance between protecting the environment and sustaining our state forests’. As to what that means, who knows?!
The Australian Forestry Products Association CEO James Jooste called for an intervention into dispute resolution three months ago, likely knowing full well the impact of the strategy.
‘We need a better resolution-dispute mechanism so we’re not spending six months out of our forests where we have no environmental outcomes and no productive outcomes,’ he said.
This fell on deaf ears, with neither the Minister for Agriculture, Tara Moriarty, nor the Minister for Natural Resources, Courtney Houssos, offering a solution. A surprising betrayal considering Minister Houssos’ commitment prior to the NSW election, where she promised:
‘No net job losses and an independent skills audit to guide investment and incentives and encourage new economic opportunities in the forestry industry.’
The truth is Labor cannot be trusted on forestry. The party has been overrun by inner-city greens, while the political hard-heads of old Labor are too weak to stand up for their traditional base.
This should not be the story for native forestry. The government should ensure that environmental activists cannot abuse the court process. If regulations need to change, then do so in a consultative manner over a period of time. Anything less is a calculated betrayal.
If Labor wants to close the book on native forestry, they should do so with an industry transition over decades, not weeks. Chile and Uruguay fought deforestation by investing in hardwood plantations; today, they have a thriving industry exporting Australian timber species, Eucalyptus Grandis, to the world. The question NSW Labor should be asking is, why can’t we?
Political parties on the centre-left have become unreliable for industry, because the unions which founded them are no longer run by workers. And as a result Green morality has defined many industries as immoral and destructive.
Blaming environmental activists for the final nail in the industry’s coffin is easy, but frankly, the timber industry helped build the box. Over the past decade, industry groups and unions ignored the signposts. Emotive and targeted messaging changed public opinion against the forestry industry, such that ultimately, dead koalas became more powerful than thousands of jobs and millions of homes.
If the industry wants to survive in Queensland, South Australia, and Tasmania, it must make an ongoing effort to change its reputation. This requires sharp and consistent communication to make the case for the importance of timber products to our economy, a demonstration of genuine outcome-driven conservation, and a long-term plan for industry transition.
Several industry organisations are already seeing the light on this, but without the long-term bipartisan backing of government, it may all be too little too late.
https://www.spectator.com.au/2024/07/green-feels-chop-over-labor-deals/
****************************************25 July, 2024
Restoring the presumption of innocence -- particularly for men
Bettina Arndt
For a nation that used to pride itself on hosting festivals of ‘dangerous ideas’, there has certainly been a ridiculous amount of protest and outrage regarding the innocuous-sounding Restoring the Presumption of Innocence conference.
It seems no one is allowed to talk publicly about how a vital legal principle – the presumption of innocence – has been undermined by the sisterhood’s long and successful ideological effort to tilt the justice system in favour of alleged victims.
Bruce Lehrmann and his ‘trial by media’ was originally intended as the headline act, but this promoted a petition calling on the local council to prevent the discussion going forward ‘before it causes any further harm or damage to the victim survivor community’. A recent judgment against Lehrmann meant he had to withdraw from the event to continue his legal battle.
The conference lives on, having been moved to August 31.
If you believe in the presumption of innocence and would like to hear law professors, criminal lawyers, political commentators, and other experts speak to the issue, you can book your tickets here.
It will be held in Rushcutters Bay, but it says a great deal about the childish nature of progressive culture that the exact details of the location and the identities of some of the well-known speakers are being kept secret until closer to the event.
Welcome to Australia, where silence is guaranteed by the incessant harassment of cancel culture.
Considering Restoring the Presumption of Innocence will present evidence from eminently qualified academics, experts, statisticians, criminal lawyers, and doctors – it is absurd that activists would attempt to close it down.
Mind you, it’s easy to see why activists are nervous.
The truth about our justice system is a can of worms and there is plenty of evidence that something is going very wrong.
In the last year, six NSW District Court judges have spoken out about rape cases being pushed through to trial supported by insufficient evidence – leading to the Crown Prosecution office conducting an audit of all current sexual assault cases. In addition, there are plenty of outrageous stories that have made it to the press in recent years that do not pass ‘the pub test’ when it comes to public expectations of innocence, guilt, and evidence.
With the presumption of innocence under siege, it is the right time for a proper public discussion about what is going on here. Luckily there are many in the community concerned about the silencing of debate about these pivotal issues.
Restoring the Presumption of Innocence is being hosted by Australians for Science and Freedom, an organisation founded by concerned doctors, lawyers, and academics who objected to the government’s response to the pandemic. Readers may have been to other events hosted by them that centre around liberty and medical freedom. Now, they focus on broader goals, including encouraging ‘better institutions that embed respect for freedom and scientific approaches for society’s problems’.
The event is sponsored by Mothers of Sons, which is an organisation I helped to establish some years ago in which I brought together mothers wishing to expose the injustice suffered by their sons within the criminal and family courts. A number of the Mothers of Sons family members will be speaking at the conference, revealing the devastating impact that false allegations of sexual assault can have on the entire family – including a lasting financial and emotional cost.
There will also be some exciting mystery speakers – including a celebrity who has had his life destroyed by a #MeToo accusation.
False allegations are a key theme of this forum. A recent YouGov survey found that Australia has one of the highest rates of false allegations in the world, mostly related to family law disputes. Across the country, our police and our courts are drowning in unproven domestic violence accusations which, in NSW alone, take up 50-70 per cent of police time and 60 per cent of local court time.
Lawyers are now bracing for a tsunami of fresh allegations with the introduction of ‘coercive control’ into law for NSW (and Queensland to follow). Many lawyers believe this will open the floodgate for women to allege a partner has been emotionally controlling. Such an accusation may be enough to see him put in prison. Coercive control, as a criminal offence, is difficult to define, impossible to prove, and many believe it was designed as a weapon to be used against men.
The NSW government has launched a massive campaign on the topic, including publishing a list of those ‘most at risk’ from coercive control:
Funny that. This list cautions almost everyone, except ordinary, heterosexual blokes – ‘cisgender’ men, as the government literature calls them. Instead, these men are typecast as being overwhelmingly likely to be the perpetrators. Which is odd, considering the Australian Bureau of Statistics has acknowledged that men are just as likely as women to be victims of emotional abuse – defined using many of the same behaviours now listed as coercive control.
The government has released a flood of video material explaining coercive control where men are invariably featured as perpetrators. Yet the Restoring the Presumption of Innocence conference will hear from Australian men who have already fallen victim to coercive control within domestic relationships. These men were selected from nearly 1,000 local men who took part in the large international survey on male victims of coercive control run by the University of Central Lancashire. Their experiences represent the truth that our governments are so determined to bury.
There’ll be other truth-tellers at the conference, presenting evidence about all sorts of politically incorrect subjects – like research that shows false rape allegations are far more common than often claimed. And the international literature clearly demonstrating that most family violence involves both male and female perpetrators. And the data showing children are more at risk when dad is removed from the home.
Plenty to inform anyone with an interest in how social engineering is now unfairly targeting men and denying them fair treatment under the law. Yet conference organisers are keen to also attract parents of young men who are particularly vulnerable to false allegations. Many parents assume that they can keep their sons out of trouble by raising a good young man who treats women with respect and follows the rules on consent. It never occurs to them that he is still vulnerable if he is unlucky enough to get involved with a woman who becomes angry if he doesn’t want to become her boyfriend or has sex she later regrets.
This vital one-day conference will tell it as it is. Forewarned is forearmed.
https://www.spectator.com.au/2024/07/restoring-the-presumption-of-innocence/
*********************************************A pilot plant for Net Zero: Let’s use Canberra as the test case for green insanity
Viv Forbes
Both solar and wind energy have fatal flaws – solar stops when the sun goes down or if a cloud blocks the sun; wind fails if the wind is too strong or too weak. But every day we hear of some fantastic and expensive plan to keep the lights on when these unreliable energy twins stop working.
The latest thought bubble from Mr Bowen (the Australian Minister for Generating Blackouts) is for him to be able to drain the energy from electric car batteries to back up a failing grid. He suggests that batteries could also power the house or sell energy into the grid. (No doubt the government is already scheming on how to use smart technology to prevent homeowners from charging their own batteries when flicker power is fading.)
Bowen’s sole sensible comment was ‘electric cars are batteries on wheels’.
Batteries do not generate power. And when they are flat, they do not store power. Fancy trying to keep the lights on while recharging all those batteries with flicker-power; and imagine discovering your Tesla battery is flat when you need your car some frosty morning. You have just performed a public service – the power in your batteries was drained to cook suburban breakfasts and keep the early trains running!
People who bought an electric car for quiet mobility will suddenly find they were financing a cog in Bowen’s Blackout Insurance Plan.
Australia is an energy island – there are no handy extension cords to French nuclear power, Scandinavian hydro, Icelandic geothermal, or American natural gas. Maybe if we ever get that long extension cord from Darwin to Singapore we can organise a sub-station in Indonesia and import reliable coal-powered electricity from them?
Australia has abundant coal, gas, and uranium resources but exploiting these natural assets is demonised and blocked by red/green tape and law-fare. Most of our petroleum products are imported and we have a tiny stockpile of refined fuels. To undertake extensive oil and gas exploration in Australia we would need infinite patience, many lawyers, and very deep pockets.
So, like drunken teenagers in a stolen car on the wrong side of the road, we accelerate towards the green energy mirage – Net Zero by 2030.
We need to see a Net Zero pilot plant operating before we follow Pied Piper Bowen down this risky road. And we need to know the full cost.
Mr Bowen should declare Canberra the site of a Net Zero Pilot Plant. This city-state is ideally suited to host such a demonstration plant – it has well-defined boundaries with significant rural, urban, and industrial areas; its population and local politicians strongly support the green energy agenda; and every federal politician and Cabinet Minister visits regularly and can monitor progress of this important experiment.
Mr Bowen should be in charge and he should start by declaring a deadline of 2027 to stop all usage of coal, gas, and diesel electricity or heating within the Australian Capital Territory. To demonstrate the bona fides of this pilot plant it should be legislated now that all power lines bringing coal and gas power into the ACT should be cut no later than December 2026.
Most Canberra residents are well paid so he should mandate that the roof of every residence or factory must be covered with solar panels, with battery-powered cars in the garage and backup batteries on every veranda.
Canberra also has plenty of hills to host wind turbines – they could also replace that massive flagpole on Parliament House with a large wind turbine. (They should also insist that the wind companies fund a permanent veterinary station nearby to treat injured birds and bats.)
There is also a lot of green space and parkland in ACT – these can host their quota of solar panels, all angled correctly to maximise collections from the far northern sun. Moving the massive and controversial Wallaroo Solar Factory planned for the Yass Valley into nearby ACT will kick-start Canberra’s green revolution. Pet goats must be encouraged to keep the grass tidy under all those panels.
Burning gas or wood within ACT should be banned – Mr Bowen could get Twiggy to build a floating green hydrogen generator on Lake Burley Griffin. This will provide locally-generated green fuel to use in their cars, taxis, barbecues, and lawnmowers.
Greens blame cattle for global warming – so there should be no beef products on sale in ACT – loyal Canberrans will surely welcome the chance to test a diet of mealworms, grass-fed goat meat, sun-dried sourdough, and almond milk. This will bring a personal green focus to the Net Zero crusade.
Canberra will need to streamline their approvals processes for all this green land use change. With Net Zero at stake we cannot allow eternal objections such as those which caused a 13-year delay for extensions to the Acland Coal Mine in Queensland. Just a brief notice in the classified ads in the Canberra Times should suffice in this race to save the planet.
Any Canberra residents who are sceptical that this green energy pilot plant will operate successfully should be free to import a small modular nuclear reactor for their suburb. Or move to Queensland.
The whole Anglosphere has been led into a green energy swamp – our enemies cannot believe their luck.
Hopefully, the trio of Trump, Farage, and Dutton will lead us back to safe ground before the Bowen blackouts arrive.
https://www.spectator.com.au/2024/07/a-pilot-plant-for-net-zero/
*************************************************The VERY surprising name - once touted as a future Prime Minister - rumoured to be among exodus from Team Albo
Linda Burney and Brendan O'Connor to quit politics But Jason Clare has also been suspiciously quiet...
Anthony Albanese reshuffling his frontbench may be akin to shuffling deck chairs on the Titanic.
While HMAS Labor isn't guaranteed to sink, plenty of its senior ministers are contemplating grabbing life rafts and bailing on their political careers.
Longtime Labor hands, Indigenous Affairs minister Linda Burney and skills minister Brendan O'Connor, both announced their retirement on Thursday morning.
But there is also speculation that education minister Jason Clare could make it a triumvirate of cabinet ministers who pull the pin.
Such pre-election announcements would force major changes to Albo's ministry, giving him the chance to also reshuffle the likes of Clare O'Neil and Andrew Giles out of the home affairs and immigration portfolios, where they have presided over bungles and failures.
Meanwhile those looking to fight on and contest the next election are already hitting the campaign hustings, in sharp contrast to some who are not - a lead indicator of who is staying and who is going.
Western Sydney MPs Tony Burke and Ed Husic have started posting examples of their local community work on social media, not something either Cabinet minister has done in recent months.
Clare's community presence remains visibly absent, adding to speculation that he might be a surprise departure at just 52 years of age.
The official Labor Party campaign spokesperson from the last election, Clare holds the seat of Blaxland once held by former PM Paul Keating.
Long touted as a future Labor leader himself, Clare’s political career hasn’t met the lofty expectations many had for him.
Sources close to Clare say that if he does leave politics now it is because he sees himself as still young enough to embark on a second career outside of politics. Perhaps in the private sector.
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Fast-food plea: hold the penalties
The Australian Industry Group will use the Fair Work review of part-time employment to push for a new clause in the fast-food and retail awards that would remove automatic access to overtime payments if a part-timer worked more hours than initially agreed.
Under the proposal, the clause could only be activated by agreement between the employer and employee. Employers said the current restrictions in the two awards meant they often had to employ casuals or labour hire in place of part-timers, and the new clause would give extra pay to part-timers if they were happy to work additional hours.
Ai Group chief executive Innes Willox said most awards contained clauses governing part-time employment that were far too complex and restrictive, with employers forced to engage staff as casual workers rather than on a permanent part-time basis.
“Ai Group has proposed that awards be varied to make it easier for employers to offer part-time workers additional hours without facing the need to pay penalty rates, where an employee agrees,” he told The Australian.
“The practical reality is that many part-time employees would value the opportunity to earn additional income from working extra hours from time to time, where an employer can offer it.”
He said the “sensible” change would greatly increase permanent employment opportunities across a range of industries.
“We can’t allow union mania for rigid workplace rules and regulation to undermine a legitimate form of employment that has worked well for employers and employees for decades,” he said.
“At a time of a cost-of-living crisis, the ability to provide additional work when it is available to the part-time workforce without major additional costs and restrictions should be a priority for the workplace relations system.”
ACTU president Michele O’Neil hit back at the employer claims, saying unions would oppose the business lobby push.
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24 July, 2024
Union power is just one way the new laws will hit family businesses
Robert Gottliebsen
In the US, both political parties encourage aspiration and family business.
In Australia, we have embraced the reverse strategy and decided to hit our family businesses hard.
And alarmingly, the vast majority of Australia’s 2.5 million family enterprises – which account for some five million workers or around 40 per cent of the private sector work force – have no idea they are about to be savaged by the Albanese government.
Today, I detail some of the globally unprecedented blows they face starting next month. They will be required by legislation to share management control of their business with newly appointed union delegates.
Forcing on family enterprises a decision-making process that is entirely incompatible with the staff trust that causes those businesses to succeed will create incalculable damage to Australian productivity and standard of living. But it will substantially increase the current token union membership in family enterprises.
Large enterprises can handle Albanese’s legislated management formula because usually they have the market power and can pass on the cost.
Most family enterprises don’t have that market power and gain their competitiveness by their trusting relationship with their workforce and the efficiency that delivers.
Let me explain how the family business will be hit.
* Unions have the power to appoint a delegate to any business employing at least one person. It is not clear how the various unions will share that right, but the Fair Work Commission indicates one union delegate per fifty employees is appropriate.
* The tasks and powers of the union delegate(s) are wide-ranging. They must be consulted on all major workplace changes including rosters and any process or procedure in which employees are entitled to be represented, including resolution of grievances or disputes, performance management and disciplinary processes. The definition of whom union delegates can contact in an enterprise effectively means everyone.
* Enterprises employing 15 or more people must be given time to attend the Trades Hall for “training”. Those with under 15 employees can do their training online. Transport enterprises are excluded because they have their own set of rules designed to push up costs by around 10 per cent by eliminating efficient and safe independent family owned truckies.
* It will be dangerous to retrench or sack a union delegate, and employers must give them access to space to do their work and to use the workplace communication system. The union delegates’ rights to share information among delegates in rival enterprises will be the subject of much controversy.
* Almost certainly, union delegates will be instructed by Trades Hall to insist that employers obey the new laws on casual employment. As I set out on April 23, the new law defines casual employment in such a complex way that most businesses currently employing casuals will be acting illegally if they continue with the current arrangement after August 26, 2024.
They will need to be punished. Businesses that obey the law and remove casuals will cause great anger among casual workers who are currently getting 25 per cent premium for their casual work which they use to pay rent and mortgages.
Delegates to family enterprises may be instructed by their union bosses to wait until after the election before “dobbing in” their employer’s “illegal” casual hiring.
The Albanese government legislative aim is to convert casuals to part or full-time employees so they are much easier to recruit as union members. But, not only do most casuals like the current “illegal” flexibility and cash rewards, casuals in many areas lift business productivity and competitiveness.
* Enterprise agreements and arrangements will be gradually replaced by industry awards that incorporate the most expensive provisions that unions in a particular enterprise were able to negotiate with companies that had no choice but to give in.
This eliminates any competitive advantage and its impact on Australian family business productivity is incalculable.
I meet many smaller family enterprises, and the horror and disbelief that I encounter when I personally explain what is about to happen to the employee trust that drives their enterprise is heart-wrenching.
I will never forget the emotion in one of the few family businesses to survive after the closure of the automotive making industry.
The person who drove the parts business into new global areas stood up and said to his son with some with emotion: “We must sell”. Unfortunately, it was too late.
The above rules are merely snippets from the 700 pages of industrial relations legislation, which from August 26 will form the basis of running businesses in Australia.
Along with government imposed rises in long-term energy costs and other government imposts, the legislation locks in higher than necessary inflation for longer, which impacts interest rates.
It is also significant that the vast majority of jobs that have been created over the last year or so have come from activities that were either government owned or relied on government income to operate. Health and education have been important.
Australia needs to restore balance, but the legislation is designed to push employment away from family businesses that do not rely on government income.
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Excellent NSW curriculum changes should be national
Reforms to the NSW primary school curriculum will help children who are struggling at school.
This clear and commonsense curriculum will change children’s lives.
Other states and territories must copy NSW’s A+ homework and simplify their own syllabus materials.
NSW’s gutsy reforms will take the guesswork out of schoolwork for students, teachers and parents.
The new syllabus shies away from woke and worthy lessons to focus on giving kids the knowledge and skills they need to grow into successful, educated adults.
One in three Australian kids is starting high school barely literate, having failed to grasp the fundamentals of reading and writing in primary school
This sets them up for failure.
For decades, too many Australian kids have been bored stupid – quite literally – because they can’t comprehend what they’re being taught in classrooms, or find the content dull and irrelevant.
Now NSW has delivered a succinct syllabus co-designed by classroom teachers, instead of ivory-tower academics who think “phonics’’ is a dirty word.
This new curriculum spells out precisely what children need to learn, using plain-English wording and practical examples. It is clear, coherent, carefully sequenced and far more interesting for inquisitive kids. Teachers will no longer have to stay up all night Googling definitions of education jargon, or swapping lesson plans on Instagram.
The scandal is that this fundamental reform has taken so long, and that so many children have fallen through the cracks of a flawed education system.
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Female footballer beats up teenager
An NRLW player has been charged with assaulting a teenager inside a Sydney eastern suburbs unit block over an argument relating to a food delivery order.
Parramatta Eels player Kate Fallon, 20, was charged after emergency services were called to an apartment complex at Namatjira Place, Chifley at about 1.30pm last Tuesday.
Paramedics treated a 17-year-old girl for injuries to her head before she was taken to Prince of Wales Hospital as a precaution and released.
Ms Fallon was arrested at the scene and charged with assault occasioning actual bodily harm.
She was granted bail and will appear in Waverley Local Court on August 14.
The girl’s father told 2GB that the alleged altercation occurred when she ordered $70 worth of UberEats and it did not arrive.
He described her injuries as “gruesome”.
“She’s not too bad considering what she’s been through, you know what I mean,” he said.
“And the funny thing about it is I haven’t received a call from anyone, the NRLW, Parramatta or even the Integrity Unit.”
Parramatta said in a statement that they were aware of a matter involving one of their NRLW players.
“The club advised the NRL integrity unit as per our normal process,” the club said. “As it is a police matter, the club will not be making further comment at this time.”
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Your home will be worth less with us: Greens
Catchy!
Greens housing spokesman Max Chandler-Mather has made clear the minor party’s policies are aimed at achieving a real decline in housing values over time to ensure the next generation has a better chance of buying a home
Mr Chandler-Mather said that Labor had failed to comprehend that “the social contract has been broken”, and that an “entire generation of people who previously, I think, probably would have got involved in the Labor Party have abandoned them”.
He said that a hard working, well educated young Australian with a good job could now be “earning a $100,000-plus a year wage” and it was “still impossible for you to buy a home”.
The Greens have proposed a major overhaul to phase out negative gearing and abolish the capital gains tax discount, as well as the establishment of a government-owned property developer to rent and sell at below-market prices.
The party has also advocated for a rent freeze and cap on rents, arguing that 20 per cent of renters across the nation vote Green.
In an interview with The Australian as part of a series exploring the Greens’ policy platform, Mr Chandler-Mather said the party’s key objective was to halt housing price growth.
“I think our goal, our stated goal, is to stop house price growth, so zero per cent growth, to give wages a chance to catch up,” he said. “I think the net effect would be a stabilisation of house prices.
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23 July, 2024
The Coalition must follow Trump’s lead
Wokeism is collapsing. The most putrid ideology to ever inflict liberal democracies is finally crashing. The perpetrators, those silvertails who ponce about with their virtues offered to all and sundry as leading lights, have been exposed as the frauds they always were.
This includes the Teals, the Greens, the communist left of the Labor Party, and the most sickening of all, the left of the Liberal Party who are effectively traitors to Menzies’ forgotten people.
In America, Trump and Vance are emerging as Menzian in their outlook. What I mean by this is they are offering a more pragmatic policy platform that is not driven purely by ideology. The Coalition must follow Trump’s lead as it is only a matter of time before the reversal of the Woke trends in America hits our shores.
The rise of China and the re-emergence of Russia have upset the globalisation apple cart. While global free trade promised to end wars and global poverty, the return to nationalism is a reaction to those who hate the very idea of freedom. But freedom is something that must be learnt through the patient study of philosophy and the great books or what the late Harold Bloom referred to as the Western Canon.
Bloom was no leftie and he referred to those on the left who insist on hating all that is good about Western thought and the liberal tradition as the School of Resentment. Synonymous with this school are the Wokerati.
Freedom, or more appropriately, liberty, is a concept that relies on an educated populace. The Wokerati have been hell-bent on destroying education to become not a system for critical thinking and debate, but an orthodoxy of Wokeness. In the words of Milton in his Areopagitica:
Where there is much desire to learn, there of necessity will be much arguing, much writing, many opinions; for opinion in good men is but knowledge in the making.
The Wokerati have used our education system to stifle debate, silence critics, cancel writers they don’t like, and package their opinions as facts. This is exactly what dictators, who are antithetical to liberty, attempt to do. It may well explain why global free trade was unable to achieve the universal benefits it promised. Which brings me back to pragmatism.
Trump and Vance have captured the nationalist spirit and with it, America’s forgotten people. These are the people JD Vance speaks of in his memoir, Hillbilly Elegy. The similarities between Vance’s people and my own are remarkable. You may have to leave the big cities to find them, but they are the salt of the earth and the heart and soul of Australia.
Unlike big-city Millennials, the forgotten people would defend Australia with their last breath. The 98-year-old American second world war veteran who said that with Trump as commander in chief, he would ‘re-enlist and storm any beach America needs me to’ represents that spirit.
Trump is often referred to as a ‘populist’. This is not an endearing term but one that the Wokerati use to refer to ‘far right’ politicians (read: everyone right of socialism). Populism refers to a leader who represents the ‘forgotten people’ against the elites who are taking the piss out of the common people. The Wokerati in the US and Australia are these elites. Trump and Vance are taking up the challenge, and it is time the Coalition did, too.
While Australia and America are different political beasts, our politics are necessarily intertwined. Trump is already talking about 10 per cent tariffs on all imported goods and making America’s allies share the burden of the cost of defence. Trump is an expert negotiator so this might just be the starting point, but it does signal what will probably be in store for Australia after November.
The Albanese government has been all over the place and the hits just keep on coming. Albo has been weak on defence and weak in his support of the alliance with America. He has made Australia a leaner not a lifter in the security partnership with our most important ally.
The Coalition need to engage with the Trump-Vance team now. Pragmatism must be the aim and not ideology. I have argued elsewhere that Dutton’s nuclear policy will require a big government approach. Rather than seeing this as ‘unnatural’ for the Liberals, they have to go back to their Menzian roots and reinvent Menzies’ approach to the post-globalisation world we now live in.
This means capturing the hearts and minds of Australia’s forgotten people once more. Who would have thought two years ago that the Teals would prove such a failure, that the Albanese government would likely become a one-term government, or that Trump would be looking at becoming America’s 47th President?
The Wokerati are on the ropes, and Australians are fed up with our self-inflicted cost of living crisis and an education system producing uncritical, Woke automatons.
To win, the Coalition needs to develop a credible defence policy as a bargaining chip for Trump. We need this too, so it is no skin off our nose. But the Coalition also needs to develop a trade policy that will work with an isolationist America, as an insider rather than an outsider. This will be essential to our survival in the decades to come.
Trump’s choice of JD Vance as his running mate, as opposed to Trump’s security detail, is no diversity pick. Trump is not chasing Teals but America’s working class (read: the forgotten people).
The Teamster’s leader speaking at the Republican National Convention suggests there is tension in the labour ranks. Australia’s labour movement is in a similar position and these voters are screaming for political representation.
But most importantly, the Coalition needs to excise the Wokerati from their ranks. Chasing Teals is a waste of time. Winning the hearts and minds of the contemporary forgotten people, in Australia as in America, is the way to victory and an end to Woke nonsense.
https://www.spectator.com.au/2024/07/the-coalition-must-follow-trumps-lead/
*********************************************************Reforms failed on maths teaching, says new report
Students’ falling maths scores can be stemmed and reversed by focusing on teacher effectiveness instead of dedicating resources to measures such as increasing teacher-to-student ratios or lifting funding for disadvantaged groups, a new report claims.
“There has been limited interaction with the science of learning with key domains, particularly mathematics and mathematical cognition and learning,” according to the report from the Centre for Independent Studies.
Siobhan Merlo, author of The Science of Maths and how to Apply it, said she hoped the report “gives teachers the tools that they need to understand how learning works and what the implications are for the way they teach”.
She contrasted Australia’s faltering performance in international scores compared to peer countries such as Japan, Singapore, and Taiwan.
“I feel like in Australia … we have instructional casualties,” she said, adding the reasons were “multifaceted” including the country was not producing enough maths teachers.
“Teachers generally don’t go into maths teaching as much as they go into other subjects, so we definitely don’t have enough maths teachers. We have a lot of out-of-subject teachers teaching maths in Australia.”
She said focusing on measures such as teacher-to-student ratios and directing funding to disadvantaged students – measures of the kind that had been proposed in the Gonski review – had not worked.
“If these things they did target had worked, we wouldn’t see the results we’ve got now,” she said. “Despite this funding and despite these best efforts, we’re seeing that decline or stagnation. Teacher effectiveness has not been properly addressed in the Gonski review.”
On the topic of teaching effectiveness, Dr Merlo’s report advocates for thinking about it in a “measurable-effectiveness focused” way.
This school of thought focuses on “explicit instruction and developing mathematical competency”, the report states.
“Engagement happens via building competency and setting students up for success, not via relaxing requirements on correctness of answers or refraining from using timed tests.”
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Jacinta Nampijinpa Price lists the benefits of colonisation - as she warns Indigenous prosperity is being held back by victimhood culture
Jacinta Nampijinpa Price has sensationally claimed that 'no one is disadvantaged because they are Indigenous' - as she lists how Australia has benefited from colonisation.
Sharing her views in an opinion piece for The Australian, the controversial Liberal Senator argued it was inevitable that the country would be colonised and it was only a question of 'by whom and when'.
The Opposition Indigenous affairs spokeswoman said British settlement afforded Australia a common law legal system, democracy, freedom and prosperity - things that were not previously known to Indigenous people.
Ms Price admitted Australian history is 'not perfect' and there are 'shameful chapters' but claimed the country is now a 'modern success story'.
'Crimes were committed, violence and injustice perpetrated by bad actors, but I don't think it should be controversial to say that both black and white Australia were making the best of things by the standards of the times,' she wrote.
'This is demonstrated by the fact that, out of these decades of disruption, something resembling a nation emerged.
'So much so that when duty called our first Anzacs to serve in the Great War, more than a thousand Indigenous Australians signed up to fight. Many of these heroes went above and beyond.'
Ms Price also claimed Indigenous prosperity was being held back by a victimhood culture - which she argued was creating division.
She said Indigenous culture prior to British settlement was marked by violent conflicts and if we continue along a 'separatist road' negative parts of Indigenous culture will be left alone to 'grow and fester' - such as arranged marriage, violent cultural payback and attributing tragedies to 'sorcery'.
She said the 'progressive left' put too much focus on the 'less than savoury' aspects of Indigenous history, rather than celebrating the events that led to the nation's 'great prosperity, security and success'.
She said it is not commonly acknowledged that British rulers ordered settlers to maintain friendly relations with the native people - although the instructions were often ignored.
She also noted that Europeans and Aboriginals were viewed equally before the law, and settlers who killed Indigenous people were sentenced to death - citing the Myall Creek massacre, where seven white men were found guilty and hanged.
She also claimed that many descendants of the Stolen Generations' now enjoy greater prosperity and success than those generations who were simply neglected and left to live in poverty and squalor' and argued the best way forward for the nation was for everyone to view themselves as modern Australians.
'The simple fact is that no one is disadvantaged just because they are Indigenous. But those who are disadvantaged will remain so if we don't learn the lessons of our past and move forward together,' she wrote.
'Last year, in my address to the National Press Club – at the height of the voice referendum debate – I made more than a few headlines when I highlighted positive impacts of colonisation on Indigenous Australians, instead of merely regurgitating the standard deficit narrative peddled by those seeking to maintain the victim mentality.
'I stand by that view, because when you take an honest, even-handed position on our nation’s history, it’s obviously true.'
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Stakeholders Disconnected from Corporate ESG Efforts: Research
‘While corporate activism may appeal to a small, vocal minority, it risks alienating a broader base of stakeholders, including consumers,’ said Emilie Dye.
In light of corporations increasingly engaging in social activism, new research has found that many shareholders, employees, and customers disagree with their companies’ social and political activities.
The Centre for Independent Studies (CIS) has released a report (pdf) shedding light on stakeholders opinions on corporate advocacy and activism.
The study, which surveyed 2,500 Australians (1,000 consumers, 1,000 employees, and 500 shareholders), found that most stakeholders were unaware of their companies’ social and political activities.
Specifically, 58 percent of the employees, 66 percent of the shareholders, and 44 percent of consumers did not follow their companies’ advocacy for social causes.
The figures were even higher for political causes, with 83 percent, 74 percent, and 65 percent reporting a lack of engagement.
Corporate Social Activism Misaligns With Stakeholders
According to the report’s co-author Emilie Dye, over 60 percent of employees and 41 percent of shareholders felt that corporate support for political causes did not align with their personal convictions.
“Among consumers, 60 percent say the corporate political advocacy rarely or never aligns with their views,” she added.
“In fact, 6 percent of employees say they have left a job because of their employer’s activism.
“The results suggested that far from being a mass movement, driven from the ground up, these activism initiatives are considered peripheral—if not largely ignored—by most shareholders and employees.”
While younger generations increasingly wanted businesses to intervene in contentious public debates, Ms. Dye said two-thirds of Gen Z respondents (born between 1997 and 2012) preferred companies to focus on providing good service and high returns, and stay out of public debates.
The report also found that consumers were twice as likely to avoid purchasing from a company they disagreed with, compared to those who would choose a company they agreed with.
When asked why companies engaged in social activism, 24 percent of respondents believed it was to increase profits, followed by fear of public backlash (22 percent) and gaining favour with the public and politicians (20 percent).
“The data suggest that while corporate activism may appeal to a small, vocal minority, it risks alienating a broader base of stakeholders, including consumers,” Ms. Dye said.
Echoing the sentiment, Simon Cowan, another co-author, said there was a “critical misalignment” between corporate activism and stakeholder values.
“This report should give strength to managers who feel bullied into taking a public position on contentious social issues, and make those who have been convinced to do so take pause,” he said.
The CIS report comes as companies in Australia and around the globe are increasingly engaging in political, environmental, and social issues.
During The Voice movement, an initiative by the Labor government to embed an Indigenous advisory body into the Australian Constitution, it was reported that 14 of the 20 top ASX companies supported the Yes campaign.
Despite the top companies donating millions of dollars to support the movement, it was overwhelmingly voted down by Australian voters.
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22 July, 2024
The Pell case is another one that should never have even been prosecuted
An even shakier case than in the Brittany Higgins debacle. Higgins was a beneficiary of pro-feminist prejudices. Pell was a victim of anti-Catholic prejudice
The Pell case was a serious miscarriage of justice. So far there has been no inquiry into the actions of the police or how the legal system managed to get this so wrong, and worst of all there seems to be no mood in Victoria for a serious inquiry into Pell’s case.
However, as Daniel Andrews made pretty clear, the presumption of innocence didn’t even seem to apply in cases such as the cardinal’s, with the then Victorian premier’s “we hear you and believe you” remark after the High Court judgment, meaning all complainants are “victims”.
Nevertheless, many commentators and distinguished legal experts have called for such an inquiry, not the least of whom is former High Court justice Michael Kirby, who has said basic evidence in the case showed “a very serious doubt was raised as to cardinal Pell’s guilt”, adding: “Effective protections against miscarriages of justice must be there for all serious cases, even for a cardinal.”
So, what do the shenanigans in Rome have to do with any of this? Good question. The charges against the cardinal occurred close to the time he had alleged that corrupt forces within the Vatican had sought to stop his work in reforming the Catholic Church’s finances. Shortly afterwards, some of the people he had brought in from outside were sacked.
I saw him just after the police interviewed him in Rome and he was simply incredulous about the obvious attempts to fit him up, including about things that supposedly happened in Australia when he was overseas. He frankly dismissed the whole thing and told me he had more to worry about in Rome than those “clowns” in Victoria because he had “great faith in the Australian justice system”.
Nevertheless, Pell was found guilty in 2018. The Victorian Court of Appeal upheld the conviction in August 2019. While all this was happening the vast irregularities of the Vatican finances began to emerge. Archbishop Angelo Becciu fell under suspicion and has since been found guilty of embezzlement, complete with a telephone recording that emerged later saying after Pell’s conviction, “the way is now open for you”. So it seems there could have been a link between the prosecution of the cardinal and the financial misdeeds of clerics close to the Pope.
Or could there? What does any of this really matter to us?
There are several strands in modern-day Catholicism. There is the nominal Catholic, the everyday practising type (me) and then there are the real ultraconservatives. At that end of the spectrum are a growing number of Catholics who have been disappointed with the current papacy and the Pope’s pronouncements on everything from marriage to war and the calibre of candidates for the priesthood in seminaries. Pell was not a fan of the current papacy, so it is not hard to see how a conspiracy theory about Pell has flourished in some conservative milieus.
However, the fact remains for all Australians that the case against Pell should not have been prosecuted. The Victorian Office of Public Prosecutions rejected it three times. Even the magistrate in the committal hearing noted: “If a jury accepted the evidence of the Monsignor (Charles Portelli) and Mr Potter (Max Potter, the sacristan) … then a jury could not convict”. Pell was convicted on the say of one accuser with no corroborating evidence. The High Court went as far as stating that no jury acting “rationally” would not have found reasonable doubt. So why didn’t the jury act “rationally”?
Obviously, the main reason was the huge campaign instigated by the Victoria Police in concert with the ABC to denigrate the cardinal as a covert sexual predator. He was subject to a relentless campaign of persecution by the public broadcaster whose minions, Louise Milligan and Sarah Ferguson, were desperate to pin something, anything, on that man, even after the High Court had exonerated him: bizarre accusations about swimming pools, a libellous book, even nasty songs – all of it was aimed at the public.
The injustice Pell had to face in Victoria, not Rome, is where the focus should lie. Each time I met the cardinal and even after he was convicted and had to go to prison, he said he had great faith in the Australian legal system. It is a great pity that faith was so sorely tested and that some of the powers that be did not have the same faith.
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Why some parents have swapped school for homeschooling
Heidi Ryan says it took until her eldest child reached year 11 to realise mainstream school was doing her three children more harm than good.
So she turned to homeschooling.
Like her two older children, now 24 and 20, her youngest daughter, 16, is autistic. Each struggled with the teaching style at school and so, six years ago, Ryan decided to become both teacher and mother.
“It was the best thing we ever did,” she said. “For their mental health, us as a family and for their understanding of who they are and how they learn.”
She is one of a growing number of “accidental homeschoolers” who now account for about 85 per cent of the sector, according to Queensland University of Technology education researcher Dr Rebecca English.
“These are families who never intended to homeschool but for reasons such as school refusal, neurodivergence, bullying or just having kids who are different prompted parents to look for alternatives,” she said.
A speech therapist, Ryan said not having to follow standardised assessments took the pressure off and allowed activities and subjects to be child-led. A fan of cosplay, Ryan has included wig styling in their lessons.
“We don’t do any formal assessment, I don’t quiz them on things. I can see and acknowledge their learning is happening in subtle ways.”
Ryan has used open university courses, online apps and programs from support organisations like the Home Education Network, and has tapped into parent-run groups, which organise excursions and other learning opportunities.
She made sure her children kept in contact with existing school friends and encouraged them to form new friendships through their homeschooling network and extracurricular activities, such as volleyball, archery, pottery, cosplay and tennis.
Once the domain of libertarians and Christian families, English said the impact of COVID restrictions on schools had proved a tipping point for many families.
“It was like a risk-free trial,” English said of enforced homeschooling under COVID restrictions. “People got a taste of how family life could be organised, and once they tried it many didn’t go back.”
Department of Education data shows the number of students being homeschooled jumped 112 per cent from 5333 in 2018 to more than 11,332 students in 2022.
As of June last year, there were 10,481 students registered. While it represents an 8 per cent decrease on 2022’s COVID-induced spike, data shows registrations have grown steadily since 2018.
“The numbers were tracking up anyway but COVID was a real shot in the arm,” English said.
Last year 59 per cent of homeschooled students were aged under 12, with the remainder aged 13 and over.
Families who chose to homeschool need to register with the Victorian Registrations and Qualifications Authority, which audits 10 per cent of homeschooling households a year. Parents are not required to follow a prescribed curriculum or provide progress reports, but they do need to submit lesson plans covering eight key learning areas.
If requirements of homeschooling are not met, the authority can cancel the homeschooling registration.
Kirsty James from the Home Education Network said homeschooling suited a range of students, particularly neurodiverse, disabled and high-performing students and those unable to attend mainstream schools.
“Some children with sensory issues can’t deal with noise or uniforms that are uncomfortable or scratchy, or they struggle with bright lighting,” James said. “When a child is in their home they are in an environment that is comfortable to them.”
Asked what she would have done if homeschooling wasn’t an option, Ryan pauses.
“I don’t know,” she said. “I think we would have just pushed through because we wouldn’t have had a choice. We would’ve come out of the other end with a dislike of school and learning. Which is a bit sad.”
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Nuclear experts have refuted Labor’s claims about nuclear energy water use
ALL power stations vaporize a lot of water for cooling purposes
Leading nuclear experts have rejected Agriculture Minister Murray Watt’s claims that nuclear power stations would take water from farmers and put cropping and grazing land at risk of accidents.
State and territory agriculture ministers from around the country raised concerns on Thursday about potential effects of proposed nuclear power stations on farming land.
A joint statement issued ahead of the quarterly meeting of agriculture ministers called on the opposition to outline plans to protect land used for cropping and raising livestock in the event of an emergency.
Agriculture ministers or government representatives from Labor states endorsed the joint statement, but Tasmania, a Liberal state that is not home to a proposed nuclear reactor, was not included.
Federal Agriculture Minister Murray Watt, speaking at The Australian’s Global Food Forum in Brisbane on Wednesday, said the Coalition’s plan to build nuclear plants on seven coal-fired power station sites in Queensland, NSW, Victoria, Western Australia and South Australia would take water from farmers.
Senator Watt on Thursday rejected Coalition claims that Labor was running a scare campaign, and cited parliamentary research showing there were 11,955 farms located within an 80km radius of the selected sites, requiring “expensive” risk mitigation plans.
“I think it’s about time the federal opposition provided some answers to Australia’s farmers and our ag sector, about where the water will come from, what would happen in the event of a nuclear accident, and what preparations they would be making with the agriculture sector to prepare for such an event,” he said.
“What are those 12,000 farmers going to be expected to do if we do have an accident, and what steps would they need to take to ensure that the food and fibre that they produce is safe?”
The claims have been refuted by nuclear engineering experts and Nationals leader David Littleproud, who accused Senator Watt of misunderstanding the science of nuclear energy production and the comparable rate of water usage between coal and nuclear power plants.
Nuclear engineer and advocate Tony Irwin, an honorary associate professor at the Australian National University, said new technologies meant reactors were safer than ever and could be set up for use with significantly less cooling water.
“Solar and wind farms have far more effects on farming in Australia than nuclear will ever have,” Dr Irwin told The Australian. “There’s far less impact from nuclear plants because they are on existing industrial sites … using existing cooling water supplies.
“I think Labor are getting a bit desperate … Wind and solar have definitely a part to play … but when you start taking farmland for solar and wind, that’s a bad idea.”
Dr Irwin said the concerns around nuclear accidents on farmland were unfounded.
“There’s always fallback plans for any sort of disaster,” he said.
Nationals MP Keith Pitt, a former water and resources minister, said Australians wanted a nuclear energy debate based on facts. “Nuclear reactors in Europe have been operational for decades in agricultural environments and coal-fired power stations already have significant water allocations and storage,” he said.
Minerals Council of Australia CEO Tania Constable said it was disappointing “misinformation” was being used to stir fear in regional communities.
“For decades, operating nuclear power stations have coexisted with productive agricultural regions throughout Europe and North America without any negative impact,” she said.
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Immigration has become a potent issue that lies beyond the traditional political divisions
Buried away in the British election results is a huge warning for Australia, made all the more relevant by the Senator Fatima Payman saga. On the face of it, the election was a triumph for British Labour, of course. It won over 65 per cent of the seats in the House of Commons. But in electoral terms, it won only 34 per cent of the vote.
The Conservatives saw their vote plummet from 44 per cent to 24 per cent in just five years. But behind the facade of that result lurked the toxic issue of immigration and multiculturalism. It’s what the Americans like to call a “third rail” issue.
Across the English Channel, the French election was also a huge warning for Australia. In that election, the anti-immigration party of Marine Le Pen won more votes than any other political party although the parties of the centre and the left by collaborating each won more seats. Le Pen’s party won 37.3 per cent of the vote while the coalition of the left won 26.9 per cent. This was a huge vote against immigration and multiculturalism.
This same trend has been seen over the past year in the Netherlands and Italy and more importantly helps explain the Trump phenomenon in the United States. For a long time, commentators argued this rise in support for these hitherto fringe political movements was caused by globalisation: the loss of manufacturing jobs to China, the decline in living standards in traditional industrial towns, and so on.
There may be some truth in this. After all, centre-left and centre-right governments believe heavy manufacturing should be closed down because of the CO2 emissions it generates. Better to transfer those emissions to China and India. A lot of punters may think that policy is not just damaging to them but intellectually absurd. But still, that isn’t the main reason many people are shifting away from traditional parties.
The fundamental cause of this drift away from traditional political parties of the centre left and centre right is the way immigration and multiculturalism have been handled. It would be a mistake to think that in Britain, France, the Netherlands, the US and Italy the public are opposed to immigration. It’s not that simple. And it’s not that they object to people because of their colour. Immigration is not so much the issue as two aspects of it. The first is unregulated immigration. Tens of thousands of migrants have been pouring into Europe and America without approval, normally courtesy of people-smugglers.
Unregulated immigration is deeply unpopular. And the second issue is those migrants who fail to integrate into society. Multiracialism is one thing but the term multiculturalism, which we all praise, denies the existence of cultural norms that bind a society together. That is resented and creates tensions and divisions.
In France and the UK, some migrants have congregated very heavily in particular suburbs of major cities, turning those suburbs into what appears to more traditional people little more than foreign enclaves.
The people within those enclaves are often alienated from the rest of society by virtue of their physical isolation. The enclaves have their own schools, religious institutions, shops and so on. In recent elections, these concentrations of migrants have had an alarming effect on electoral outcomes.
In the recent UK election, in constituencies where at least 40 per cent of people are Muslims, the Labour vote actually declined from the 2019 election by nearly 34 per cent! In constituencies where Muslims made up between 10 and 20 per cent of the vote, Labour’s vote fell by 6.8 per cent, whereas in constituencies where Muslims accounted for less than 10 per cent of the electorate, Labour increased its vote by an average of 3 per cent. In a general election that was a triumph for the Labour Party it nevertheless lost five seats to Muslim activist independents.
This recent practice of migrants or the descendants of migrants of a particular religious persuasion voting en bloc – in this case on the issue of the Hamas-induced war in Gaza – has alarmed not just the Labour Party but the broader British population. But for immigration and multiculturalism to be embraced, and for a country successfully to hold together as an entity, there have to be some binding principles and attitudes that define the nation. Without that, the nation will atomise.
As British philosopher Sir Roger Scruton wrote: “We, like everyone else, depend upon a shared culture for our security, our prosperity and our freedom … we can welcome immigrants only if we welcome them into our culture, and not beside or against it.” Three days after the election, former Labour prime minister Tony Blair gave some stark advice to the new government. He said new Prime Minister Keir Starmer “needs a plan to control immigration” and made the very simple point: “If we don’t have rules, we get prejudices.” That’s exactly right.
In the US this issue is also very potent and one of the driving forces of former president Donald Trump’s popularity. It is claimed that some 10 million illegal migrants have entered the US since President Joe Biden was elected. That figure may be a bit of an exaggeration, but still, the problem of illegals pouring over the Mexican border is huge.
Within the US multiculturalism is embraced and accepted. In the main. But like anything, it can be taken too far. To use it as a tool by specific ethnic groups to denigrate the nation that has welcomed them, to pour scorn on its history and to appear supportive of its adversaries is politically inflammatory. It is also disrespectful of the country that has welcomed these people to its shores.
So what about our own country? We have to be careful. Senator Payman was elected on a Labor Party ticket and has resigned from that party over the issue of a foreign war in which Australia is not involved. If our politics is going to descend into this kind of ethnic conflict, then it’s going to be hard to keep our country together.
But don’t worry, the punters won’t tolerate that and will start voting with greater enthusiasm for fringe political movements if our two mainstream parties don’t just control immigration – the Howard government explained all that many years ago – but make sure there are core principles that hold our country together. We cannot afford to allow a hugely successful country to atomise.
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21 July, 2024
Hatred of feminism linked to violence, report finds
Rubbish! The headine above may perhaps be accurate but the "Report" that underlies that headline shows no such thing. the "Report" is here
https://minerva-access.unimelb.edu.au/items/9c386698-5d92-4667-8bbb-4060ed59f42b
All it shows is that various negative attitudes tend to correlate with one-another. There is NO demonstrated link to violence or any other form of behaviour."Reports" are a common way of bypassing the critical scrutiny that publication in academic journals articles requires
A new report has warned that anti-feminist beliefs are a strong predictor of violent extremism, with 20 per cent of Australian men surveyed believing feminism is dangerous to society and should be fought with violence if necessary.
According to the survey of 1020 men and women, 30 per cent of all respondents agreed or slightly agreed with hostile sexist attitudes and 19.4 per cent of the men believed it is legitimate to resist feminism using force.
Some of the statements put to the respondents include that feminism has ruined modern relationships and feminists are trying to get more power than men.
The research found hostile sexist attitudes and attitudes permissive of violence against women are strongly associated with most forms of violent extremism, including extremism motivated by religion, ethnicity and incel ideologies.
The Misogyny, Racism and Violent Extremism report said addressing the role of racial and gendered biases as underlying drivers of violent extremism and terrorism is significant but an “overlooked” security concern.
Report author Dr Sara Meger, who teaches international security and gender in international relations at the University of Melbourne, said she sent her research to commonwealth agencies in the hope it will help the Australian Security Intelligence Organisation redefine what is recognised as violent extremism.
“The biggest shortcomings we had this year with the Bondi Junction attack is that the current acting definition of terrorism can’t grasp how someone is motivated for a hatred of woman or anti-feminist ideology,” Dr Meger told The Australian. “We were motivated to do this research because … we thought we needed some empirical data to corroborate the growing recognition that there is some sort of element of gender ideology driving violent extremism.”
Independent MP Allegra Spender has called for a greater focus on violence against women following the Bondi stabbings.
The report also found that if policy were to define violent anti-feminist beliefs as a form of extremism, it would be the most prevalent form in the country.
It said that young people and boys are more likely to support violent extremism in all forms and those in the 18-39 age bracket are more likely to agree with restricting a woman’s right to choose her sexual partners compared to older respondents.
Dr Meger said “online echo chambers” are the biggest influence on younger generations preferencing these views over older people.
“These young men for whatever reason who are struggling socially, financially, emotionally, they’re looking for answers in these online forums. They find an easy one and blame feminism. Some forums might say feminism is the reason your life isn’t as good,” Dr Meger said.
She said it would take a whole-of-society approach and more online content regulation to prevent young Australians from adopting harmful views.
“I think it’s going to be a very difficult issue as there’s such mistrust with authority figures that goes along with this radicalism and polarisation,” she said.
The report said terrorist attacks and incidents of mass violence in Australia were found to have gendered and racialised determinants, and pointed to the Lindt Cafe siege terrorist who had a domestic violence intervention order against him at the time of the attack, and the Bondi Junction killer who was described by his father as frustrated by his lack of dating success.
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Government guarantees tax breaks for private schools
The Albanese government has buckled to a private school backlash by ruling out plans to axe tax breaks for donations to more than 5000 schools within five years.
The Productivity Commission on Thursday unveiled radical tax reform proposals that were condemned as a “direct attack’’ on religious schools.
Despite a storm of protests from private and Catholic schools, the commission refused to back down on its controversial call that parents and other donors be stripped of tax deductions for donations to school building funds.
But Andrew Leigh, the Assistant Minister for Competition, Charities and Treasury, immediately ruled out changes to school donations.
“The recommended changes to tax settings for donations to school building funds are not being considered,’’ he said.
“A world-class education system is essential to tackling inequality, driving economic growth and supporting well-paid, secure jobs, and our school system is a key part of it.’’
In its final report on philanthropy, released on Thursday, the commission calls on governments to directly fund school infrastructure instead of relying on public donations.
It also recommends the Albanese government axe tax deductions for donations that pay for religious instruction or ethics education in schools.
Tax breaks benefit wealthy parents in private schools, the report states, adding: “The capacity of schools to raise donations varies widely, depending on the wealth and income of the school community. There is a material risk that higher levels of indirect government support to schools through tax-deductible donations would benefit communities with higher socioeconomic advantage.
“A DRG (deductible gift recipient) status for school building funds is unlikely to deliver support to the areas of greatest need.’’
The PC warns donors could benefit financially, because building funds lower the cost of school fees. “There is the potential for a donor to be able to directly or indirectly convert a tax-deductible donations into a private benefit,’’ the report states. Potential donors are most likely to be people directly involved with the school and benefit directly from donations, such as students, their parents or alumni. Alternative government funding arrangements should be put in place.’’
The commission calls for a five-year transition period before schools are stripped of their DRG status. The report states that “it is highly unlikely that donations would fall to zero without it’’.
The commission found that private schools make up 3500 of the 5000 schools with building funds. Its analysis of donations shows that 20 per cent of all donated money went to just 1 per cent of schools, with 71 per cent of total donations shared between 10 per cent of schools.
The commission says tax breaks should be granted to education charities that have “an explicit equity objective’’ – such as scholarships for poor students.
It says universities and TAFE colleges should retain their DRG status because they “tend to be involved in public research’’.
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Australians pay the price for CFMEU tactics, figures show
Australians are paying the price for union tactics that add billions to the nation’s building costs and weaken productivity, as the federal government works on an urgent draft law to ensure it can overcome any attempts to block an overhaul of the CFMEU.
Labour productivity has fallen 18.1 per cent in the construction sector since 2014, far worse than in other parts of the economy, while the CFMEU is being blamed for a cost surge in the industry.
The work on the draft law comes after the federal government said the Fair Work Commission would seek to impose an external administrator on the CFMEU after days of revelations from an investigation by The Age, The Sydney Morning Herald, The Australian Financial Review and 60 Minutes into the union’s ties to organised crime.
Employment Minister Tony Burke is preparing the new laws so they are ready to go next month if needed to impose the changes despite union objections.
Union to go to war over bid to stamp out CFMEU corruption
Opposition Leader Peter Dutton has turned the dispute over the CFMEU into a political test over the cost of living, claiming the union has added 30 per cent to the cost of major projects.
The changes have the potential to influence costs across the economy because of the central role of the construction sector and the way major projects can be a burden on taxpayers and can impact households through housing and other costs.
Dutton’s cost claim is backed by Master Builders Australia and has some support from independent economists as well as the former head of the Australian Competition and Consumer Commission, Rod Sims.
“If somebody said the behaviour of the union was pushing up costs by 30 per cent, that would not surprise me,” Sims said.
“I don’t have any evidence to support the 30 per cent, but directionally it’s got to be right, and I suspect the quantum is not far out.”
Sims said construction affected everything from new supermarkets to office blocks and the cost increases were passed on to consumers.
“It also means there are projects that are not going ahead because they can only proceed if costs are below a certain level, and if the costs are pushed up because of activity by the CFMEU, then that means some projects don’t go ahead,” he said.
“It’s quite clear to me, from general observation over a long time, that that is exactly what’s happening.”
Master Builders Australia commissioned Queensland Economic Advocacy Solutions to analyse CFMEU wage deals that imposed sweeping conditions that could stop work, limit hours and put other restrictions on how work was done.
The analysis said an apartment project would be 3.5 per cent more expensive with a low application of the CFMEU provisions, 18.2 per cent more costly with a medium application and 33 per cent more expensive with a high application of the rules.
This meant a two-bedroom unit in Brisbane would cost $287,000 more than otherwise, it said. A three-bedroom unit would cost an extra $430,000, pushing its cost to $1.7 million.
CFMEU national secretary Zach Smith has not responded to requests for comment since the government’s announcement on Wednesday, and it is not yet known whether he will support the administration process.
Independent economist Harley Dale, who was the Housing Industry Association’s chief economist for 17 years, said CFMEU conduct at building sites had hampered productivity and added costs to consumers in both the residential and commercial sectors.
Labour costs were also a factor alongside issues such as planning delays, the cost of construction materials and the shortage of skilled workers, he said.
“There’s been a trend in the decline of labour productivity in construction since 2014 and it had a fresh low in 2023 after more than 10 years,” he said.
“I would argue that some of the obstructive behaviour on the part of the CFMEU has certainly been part of that.
“All of that’s got to feed through to the bottom-line pricing of these construction projects. Absolutely, it has to be passed on.”
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‘Reckless renewables’: The NSW community fighting a massive solar farm
The residents of the tiny hamlet of Wallaroo in the NSW Southern Tablelands are quick to say they support renewable energy, yet they are united against a proposal for a giant solar farm on their doorstop.
In a microcosm of the problems besetting the broader renewables rollout, the community sent a clear message to the NSW Independent Planning Commission at a public meeting on Thursday: the proposed Wallaroo Solar Farm is the wrong project in the wrong place.
Many of the 570-odd community members – farmers, vineyard owners, commuters to Canberra and retirees – have solar panels on the roofs of their own homes or farm sheds, and some have a biodiesel generator as back-up.
But a massive solar farm, with about 182,000 photovoltaic modules, a substation and battery storage system spanning 165 hectares across two properties in Wallaroo, is a different proposition.
The project, which could power about 48,000 homes mostly in Canberra, is deemed state significant, and is supported by the NSW Department of Planning, Housing and Infrastructure.
Community member Adam Gresham told the meeting his main concern was the number of trucks travelling on the narrow country roads each day during construction and beyond.
He said there were 56 children, including his own – aged 16, 12 and 10 – who catch the school bus from the end of their driveways or across the road.
“The verge is quite small and to think that people would allow multiple trucks to come through that area daily, and not think that is a risk, is quite scary for us,” he said, speaking to The Sydney Morning Herald after his presentation.
His wife Christy added that they were “not wealthy people”, and with a “monster mortgage”, they would be unable to move if prices dropped.
Gresham, an ACT firefighter for more than 20 years, is also concerned about the fire risk both in Wallaroo and on the outskirts of Canberra since the area is prone to bushfires and battery storage systems can be volatile.
“To have something within hundreds of metres of residential properties and the toxins that will be created if something goes wrong, that will be carried through smoke to these residents is a major concern,” he said.
At the Murrumbateman Community Hall about 20 minutes from Wallaroo, the public meeting stretched over four hours, with a break for lunch. Twenty-five residents spoke against the project, raising issues about the impact on views, tourism, traffic and road safety, and fire risk.
Only the development manager for the project, Ben Cranston, spoke in favour. He said the project would deliver $1.6 million for community projects over 30 years, employ 150-200 people during construction, and four to five during the operational phase.
“If the project is approved, we will remove approximately 215,000 tonnes of greenhouse gases from the atmosphere [annually],” he said.
Cranston said the project had been amended in the past week to reduce the footprint, as well as previous concessions to add landscaping, reduce glare, and control traffic.
Community member Ben Faulks told the Herald the landowners would make money, but the rest of the community would pay the price in lost amenity and lower property values.
“This is a transfer of wealth from the residents of Wallaroo to one or two landowners,” Faulks said.
Faulks said he supported renewables, but argued the project location was driven by the proponents rather than a planning decision about where a solar farm should be sited.
Real estate agent Mark Johnstone, a resident of 23 years, told the meeting he expected a 20 per cent drop in property values from the loss of scenic beauty.
“I support renewables but not reckless renewables,” Johnstone said. “This is not the right location.”
Community member Andrew Cunich told the meeting he bought his property in 2020, paying a premium for the view, and building an outdoor lifestyle around it.
“Imagine if you bought yourself a brand new telly and somebody came up with a black texta and just went right across the centre of it and said ‘enjoy your TV’,” Cunich said.
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18 July, 2024
The coverup of vacine side-effects takes a life
She and her family knew she had vulnerabilities from pre-existing conditions but were not told of the vaccine side effects that combined with those conditions to kill her
The death of a young woman in her 20s after she received a Covid-19 vaccine could progress to a full coronial inquest.
Coroner Catherine Fitzgerald told the involved parties that she would tighten the reins on expert reports being filed to the court, as mountains of medical information piled up.
Natalie Boyce, 21, died in March 2022 at The Alfred Hospital in Melbourne, five weeks after receiving a Moderna vaccine booster.
Lawyers for Ms Boyce's family opposed Moderna's request on the grounds the doctor saw the young woman for lupus four years before she died.
Natalie Boyce died from myocarditis. She spent the last three weeks of her life unconscious.
Ms Boyce was studying at Deakin University. She spent the last three weeks of her life unconscious. Her death certificate lists myocardial infarction with subacute myocarditis as the cause.
When she was 15, Ms Boyce was diagnosed with an uncommon blood clotting disorder that affects about one-in-2000 people.
Ms Boyce's mother, Deborah Hamilton, previously told a parliamentary inquiry that she believed her daughter would be alive if she had not received the Covid-19 vaccine booster.
'Had we known that there were risks there would have been no way that I would have allowed Natalie to receive another vaccine and I know that she would not have had it either,' Ms Hamilton told MPs in Canberra in 2023.
The day after getting the Moderna booster, Ms Boyce fainted, had a fever, stomach pain and vomiting. Her condition deteriorated over trips to doctors and several different hospitals.
Ms Hamilton has blamed both the vaccine mandates and 'medical negligence' from Victoria's health system.
Ms Boyce was encouraged by her part-time employer to get vaccinated and required a vaccination to go to the university campus.
https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-13642351/Natalie-Boyce-died-Covid-vaccine.html
************************************************Cleo Smith update: New photos show insight into her life after being kidnapped
The family of Cleo Smith have shared a miracle update on their little girl three years after she was kidnapped.
A mammoth police operation was launched for Cleo, who was four years old at the time, which led to her dramatic rescue 18 days later.
Now aged seven, Cleo has adjusted to a normal life following the horrific abduction and intense media scrutiny.
A collection of photos, shared to Instagram on Wednesday by 60 Minutes Australia showed a beaming Cleo enjoying life with her family.
The photos received an overwhelming response from social media users all around the world, with many sharing well wishes for the family and for Cleo.
Police smashed down the locked door of a house in Carnarvon - just 3km from her family's home - at 12.46am on November 3, 2021, freeing the little girl.
Cleo was held captive by Terrence Darrell Kelly and locked alone in a bedroom of the home.
Terence Kelly was arrested and subsequently charged with one count of forcibly taking a child under 16.
Her captor, one of Australia's "First Nations" people
He pleaded guilty and was sentenced on April 5, 2023, to 13-and-a-half years behind bars. The sentence was backdated to his arrest in November 2021. Kelly will be 48 by the time he's eligible for parole in May 2032.
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Top doctor hits out at plans to introduce a 'sin tax' on sugary drinks in Australia
Nick Coatsworth has hit out at a proposed tax on sugary treats arguing that '$8 cans of coke' will only punish the poor and fail to fix the nation's obesity crisis.
A recent Senate report recommended a 20 per cent tax on unhealthy products such as soft drinks in order to curb surging obesity rates, particularly in children.
But the prominent doctor, who became the face of Australia's Covid vaccine campaign as the national deputy chief medical officer, argues that implementing a so-called 'sin tax' is misguided and echoes the draconian government overreach seen during the pandemic.
'It's hard to escape the conclusion that sin taxes are proposed by rich people looking down on the behaviour of the sinful masses,' Dr Coatsworth told Daily Mail Australia.
'Can you imagine a can of Coke costing $8? Is that what it will take to reduce consumption?
'In regional and indigenous communities I predict it will reduce consumption by precisely zero.'
He noted that while governments can legitimately regulate things such as age of consumption of products such as alcohol and penalise people who sell harmful products to children, it should be cautious in applying such restrictions to adults.
'The recent trend to is to make penalty and prohibition the first choice and not the last resort, and this is leading to bad policy choices,' Dr Coatsworth said.
'If you're struggling to make an income and support your family there is much less capacity to make good health choices, and the 'sins' help you get through a tough day.
'A sin tax that does nothing to lift people into a position that they can make positive health choices.'
Dr Coatsworth also warned there are limits in trying to legislate people into being healthier.
'We've just been through a very disturbing episode in our lives where we criminalised or harshly penalised legitimate actions of citizens in the name of public health,' he said referring to the Covid period.
'As a basic principle public health should operate by consent of the community not by coercion.
'This applies as much to current debates as it did to Covid.'
The Australian government already imposes similar taxes on tobacco products and raises the excise every year to make it prohibitively expensive. It currently stands at about 75 per cent of the sale price.
Although the rate of smoking has decreased from above 20 per cent in 2001 to 11 per cent now, illegal vaping rates have soared along with the illicit tobacco trade.
'It's a law of diminishing returns,' Dr Coatsworth said.
'Tobacco excise had climbed so high that a black market has blossomed.'
'It's clear that the Australian Federal Police can't stop illicit tobacco coming into the country, let alone illegal vapes and it's creating a problem for state policing who now have to deal with the emergence of organised crime.
'It's bizarre that the same people who acknowledge that a 'war on drugs' is the wrong way to tackle hard drug use passionately declare that a 'war on vapes' is likely to work.'
Despite Dr Coatsworth's opposition to raising taxes on unhealthy food and drink, he does agree that there is an 'obesity crisis in Australia and that diabetes is an enormous cost-burden for our health system'.
'There is a big gap between agreeing with that and asserting that sugar taxes will have a meaningful impact on either,' he said.
'The classic behaviour of the activist is to surf a moral panic and then criticise an opponent as being an enemy of the public good.
'Labelling someone as being an enemy of public health is a very effective way of silencing debate.'
Earlier this month a Senate report recommended the federal government implement a levy on sugar-sweetened beverages and look to international examples to fix prices.
It pointed to the British example of 'tiered tax' where the levy grows with the amount of sugar in a product.
The Parliamentary Budget Office estimated applying a 20 per cent tax on all sugar sweetened drinks would bring in about $1.4billion annually
https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-13638369/Nick-Coatsworth-sin-tax.html
***********************************************PsiQuantum to help shape Qld university offerings
Queensland’s biggest universities have struck a skills partnership with PsiQuantum that gives the Silicon Valley startup a say in the direction their science, technology and maths courses take.
The memorandum of understanding, which comes as the company looks to secure a pipeline of talent for its attempts to build the world’s first fault tolerant quantum computer, also opens the door to joint research projects with the universities.
Five universities, together accounting for some 110,000 students, are represented in the consortium: the University of Queensland, Griffith University, Queensland University of Technology, the University of South Queensland and the University of the Sunshine Coast.
Announced on Tuesday, the university and research tie-up with PsiQuantum is the first partnership to emerge from the $940 million joint investment by the federal and Queensland governments.
The investment, which includes $370 million in equity, has been mired in controversy since it was announced in April, with key details still to emerge almost three months on.
Under the new partnership, the five universities will work with PsiQuantum to create targeted educational programs that develop the skills required for quantum computing and other advanced technology industries.
PsiQuantum will have input in the development of “study modules, courses, degree, lectures and industry training”, including at both the undergraduate and postgraduate levels.
The programs will also provide “pathways for traditional STEM careers like engineering and software development into the quantum sector”, allowing upskilling of “diverse scientists” to take place.
Roles in the company’s sights include quantum applications engineers, software developers and other technical lab staff, as well as more traditional roles like mechanical, optical and electrical engineers.
“This collaboration will provide a framework for academic institutions in Australia to offer opportunities for academic, postgraduate, and undergraduate placements that will attracts and retain leading Australian and global talent,” PsiQuantum said.
The company has also previously promised PhD positions, mentoring and internship opportunities, although they were not included in Tuesday’s announcement.
PsiQuantum chief executive and co-founder Jeremy O’Brien said the partnership will “help ensure that Australia is developing the necessary skills and driving research to continue leading this field for decades to come”.
Professor O’Brien developed the beginning of the photonics-based quantum approach being pursued by PsiQuantum at the University of Queensland. The approach uses uses photons as a representation of qubits instead of electrons.
University of Queensland vice-chancellor Deborah Terry said the university will “work with PsiQuantum across the education spectrum – from schools, through TAFE, to universities– to prepare our students for future jobs in quantum and advanced technologies.
“Our researchers are also incredibly excited to explore and find projects of common interest with PsiQuantum, taking full advantage of this unique opportunity,” she said.
https://www.innovationaus.com/psiquantum-to-help-shape-qld-uni-offerings/
****************************************17 July, 2024
Suspended doctor says he told truth about COVID
A doctor suspended over allegations he wrote fake COVID-19 exemptions and shared misleading information about the virus insists he told the truth about vaccines and their risks.
Disciplinary proceedings have begun between the Medical Board of Australia and Mark Hobart, with the Melbourne doctor maintaining he did nothing wrong.
In a brief hearing at the Victorian Civil and Administrative Tribunal, Dr Hobart applied on Monday to have the matter dismissed or struck out on the grounds it was "frivolous, vexatious, misconceived".
He has filed a 27-page document setting out his submissions.
Despite this, his application to have the matter dismissed was denied.
A mention for those proceedings is expected to be held on August 16, with a three-day hearing expected to start early next year.
Dr Hobart has been suspended since November 2021 based on eight allegations of misconduct, including issuing almost 600 COVID-19 vaccination and mask exemptions.
Dr Hobart argues that the Board exceeded its jurisdictional powers in the matters, and says it cannot tell doctors what information they can or cannot provide to patients.
He also claims he told the "truth to patients about vaccines" and complied with his duty of care, including the obligation to do no harm.
Tribunal senior member Elisabeth Wentworth denied Dr Hobart's application to dismiss the matter, saying the allegations against him were serious.
"This is not a frivolous proceeding," Ms Wentworth said in her written findings.
She said the allegations raised important questions about a doctor's professional responsibility in relation to disease prevention and control.
Victorians were subject to strict vaccination mandates and mask rules throughout the pandemic.
Melbourne's metropolitan area was subject to six lockdowns of a cumulative 260-plus days in 2020 and 2021, giving the Victorian capital the dubious honour of being the most locked-down city in the world.
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Take heart! Australia is still better and fairer than most
Ross Gittins
Don’t be disheartened by recent events. Things in the Land of Oz are far from perfect, and we have our share of problems. But don’t be tempted by the thought that if America’s going to the dogs, we won’t be far behind. No, we’re holding things together much better than the Yanks are.
Of late, it’s been tempting to think that the goal of every generation being better off than their parents has been lost. It’s not true. Not yet, anyway. And there’s still time to ensure that Gen Z – youngsters in their teens and early 20s – get a fair shake.
It’s not easy to compare generations with statistical accuracy. But lately, statisticians have made progress in linking information from the census and official surveys with banks of data held by government departments. And last week, the Productivity Commission used this advance to publish a much more authoritative study on economic mobility.
It confirms that, on average, each generation earns more than its parents did at the same age. That’s because the economy has grown almost continuously over the decades, raising material standards of living. This would be true of all the developed economies.
Of course, it’s also true that it’s easier for children born into poorer families to do better than their parents than it is for children born into well-off families.
However, living standards haven’t grown much over the past decade or so. Were this to continue for a further decade or more, it could become true that Gen Z isn’t doing better than its parents.
A different question as to whether overall living standards are continuing to rise in real terms over the years is how easy it is for people to change where they stand in the distribution of incomes as their lives progress.
How easy is it for people starting out towards the bottom of the ladder to climb to a higher rung?
This is the meaning of income mobility. Can you better yourself if you try hard enough?
Now, this is where the Americans keep telling themselves they’re the land of opportunity. Log cabin to the White House and all that. Well, it may have been true in Abraham Lincoln’s day, but it hasn’t been true for decades. As a general rule, the more unequal incomes are, the harder it is for people’s positions on the ladder to change.
America’s incomes are highly unequal, and it’s one of the countries where changing your income status is hardest.
But this is where the Productivity Commission’s research brings good news. On income inequality, Australia is in the middle of the pack of rich countries. But when it comes to income mobility, we do what Australians love to think of themselves as doing: punching above our weight.
We pride ourselves on being the land of the fair go. Or, as dear departed Scott Morrison preferred to put it: if you have a go, you get a go. Well, guess what? We now have documentary evidence that it’s still true. According to the commission’s calculations, Australia is among the most income-mobile countries, scoring better than even the fabled Scandinavians.
Two qualifications. First, people in the middle 60 per cent of the distribution enjoy the most opportunity to move. If you start in the bottom 20 per cent of personal incomes, you have less ability to improve. And if you’re already in the top 20 per cent, it’s harder to go higher.
Second, although the commission doesn’t spell this out, mobility cuts both ways. Remember, we’re talking about relative incomes, not absolute incomes. So, if it’s easier for me to pass you on the ladder, it’s easier for you to fall below me.
How do people seek to improve their earning potential? The obvious way is to get a better education. On average, people with a uni degree or higher earn 23 per cent more over their lifetime than those who only complete year 12. And those who complete high school earn significantly more than those who don’t.
Mobility is adversely affected by significant life events, such as unemployment, serious health problems and relationship breakdowns.
So far, we’ve been focusing just on income. But wealth – the assets you own – also affects your mobility. Unsurprisingly, the less wealth you have, the harder it is to move up, and the more wealth you have, the easier it is to stay up.
The rich have always been with us, but I think the inordinate rise in the cost – and value – of homes, which is already handicapping young people without access to parental help, will also make inheritance a bigger influence on people’s income mobility.
As Australians, we have a lot to be pleased about and proud of. But we have no cause for complacency.
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I witnessed the rot set in at the CFMEU. Here’s how it happened
The expression that evil flourishes when good people do nothing goes a fair bit of the way explaining the mess the CFMEU construction division is in today. Yet eventually people who turn a blind eye for long enough become as big a problem as their plainly corrupt colleagues.
Why do these people turn a blind eye? For some, it’s out of physical fear. For others, it’s just a question of keeping your head down and staying on the payroll.
Corruption and criminality in the CFMEU didn’t start during the time of John Setka’s reign. The 1986 deregistration of Norm Gallagher’s Builders Labourers Federation (BLF) is probably the starting point. They were deregistered by the Hawke government because of their industrial recklessness, thuggery and corruption.
Gallagher was jailed for taking kickbacks from developers to build his beach house. His union used extensive industrial action to get the big construction companies to influence the government to release him. Not exactly how our judicial system works.
When the BLF was deregistered, other building unions recruited tens of thousands of BLF members in NSW, Victoria and the ACT. In the early 1990s, the building unions formed the new super union, the CFMEU.
As part of that process, the federal industrial relations minister Peter Cook was keen for the non-deregistered BLF branches in Western Australia, South Australia, Queensland and Tasmania to join the new union. A sticking point was what to do about some former BLF officials from Victoria. The BLF branches and Cook were keen for the CFMEU leaders to let them in. Protracted negotiations, which I participated in, saw former Victorian official John Cummins come onto the books of the CFMEU.
Agreement could not be reached about young John Setka because of his past behaviour. History shows that within 18 months, Cummins secured Setka a job in the Victorian CFMEU.
Between 1993 and 2000, the former BLF forces gradually strengthened their position in the Victorian branch and didn’t hide the fact they aimed to take over the federal office and grab control of the whole union. In 2000 they made their move, and a series of ugly events saw gangsters, corruption, bitter internal fighting and the Cole royal commission into the building industry.
Between 2000 and 2010, the Victorian branch didn’t have the numbers to take control. The NSW, Queensland, ACT and Tasmanian branches stood together and represented the biggest faction. A new Queensland CFMEU leader took office around 2008 and started voting with the Victorians. This represented a serious change in the direction and culture of the CFMEU construction division.
Warning on CFMEU intimidation sent to Allan, Albanese in 2022
Those who had been trying to remove me since 1994 now had the numbers, and I left the union at the end of 2010 after 31 years.
Shortly thereafter there were leadership changes in the NSW branch, which then became embroiled in ugly allegations of corruption. Gangsters started to circle. The Heydon royal commission into trade unions ventilated extensive evidence about nefarious activities by leading NSW officials. Remarkably, no criminal charges followed. The officials subject to examination by the royal commission were not deterred and strengthened their control of the branch. Father and son Darren Greenfield and Michael Greenfield have been the secretary and assistant secretary for the past seven years or so.
Meanwhile, Setka, who became the Victorian branch secretary in 2012, continued to strengthen his control of that branch. Many longstanding officials and site delegates were replaced by a new brigade, some with a history of bikie gang activity and criminal involvement.
Given the size of the Victorian branch and Setka’s powerful presence, he became the dominant force across the construction division nationally. For many years, the Victorian and NSW branches had been at loggerheads about the appropriate style of unionism, but under the Setka and Greenfield leaderships there was a new close affinity. Paralleling this was the rise in prominence of colourful identities Mick Gatto in Victoria and George Alex in NSW.
Is the Setka style of unionism all bad? No. In many ways, the crude use of power and muscle corresponds with the raw nature of the construction industry. Big developers and construction companies often crush small fry, whether subcontractors or workers. The use of union militancy to push for wage demands and safety has often been positive. But when Setka and his band took control, muscle became everything – no matter where the muscle came from.
What is the future of the CFMEU construction division? Nothing short of a clean-out of corrupt officials in the Victorian and NSW branches will suffice. It’s highly unlikely the union can clean itself up.
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Controversial British author Toby Young unloads at 'woke' Australia: 'Crocodile Dundee would be in jail'
A right-wing British author has claimed Australia is surrendering its larrikinism to the 'woke mind virus' and argued free speech is under threat in the country.
Toby Young, 60, made the comments after wrapping up a nationwide speaking tour of Australia last week.
Young authored 'How to Lose Friends and Alienate People' - which was turned into a 2008 Hollywood movie starring Simon Pegg, Kirsten Dunst and Megan Fox.
Young, the founder of the Daily Sceptic which runs pieces challenging government positions on climate change and Covid, also founded the Free Speech Union.
He says the union, which has chapters in Australia, New Zealand and South Africa, protects the right to express opinions - across the political spectrum - from attempted restrictions by the 'radical progressive left'.
Young told Daily Mail Australia the country was losing its famed free-spirit and anti-authority bravado - and had become more closed-minded than it was decades ago.
'These days it is as if Crocodile Dundee is languishing in a prison cell waiting for trial,' he said. 'He’s awaiting trial for hate speech somewhere in Victoria.
'The emergence of wokeism has introduced a puritanical intolerance into the left which has meant a downgrading of how much they value free speech.'
Young argued free speech was in 'dire straits across the western world' because America had 'exported the woke mind virus'.
'We’re seeing the gradual spread of the woke religion, the great awokening, across the media, universities, governments, officials, the museums and heritage sector, the arts and that’s all been deeply depressing,' he said.
'And here you don’t seem to have much at all to protect you.'
Young said Australia's Online Safety Act 'has empowered your eSafety Commissioner to effectively run amok'.
eSafety Commissioner Julie Inman Grant recently made an unsuccessful bid to force X to take down images of the Wakeley Church stabbing from its platform worldwide.
'That was an extraordinary over-reach on the part of the eSafety Commissioner to demand not just a video be removed from X in Australia but globally,' Young said.
'That is indicative of just how unlimited the censorious ambitions of people like Julie Inman Grant are.
'They want to cleanse social media of any dissenting or heretical content that challenges their radical progressive views, under the guise of protecting people.'
'What does she think gives her jurisdiction, the authority to make a demand like that?'
Young also took aim at the Albanese government's proposed laws to curb misinformation and disinformation online.
He argued 'we all know' what misinformation and disinformation 'really means'.
'It is any opinion that members of the radical progressive left disagree with,' he said.
'The fact that the losing side in the Voice referendum blamed misinformation and disinformation gives you a clue as to what a chilling effect the anti-misinformation Bill would have on free speech in Australia.'
Young said he was a victim of cancel culture in 2018 when then-British Prime Minister Theresa May appointed him as a non-executive director of the Office for Students regulator.
Young's education credentials were established when he set up the West London Free School, a first-of-its-kind school independent of the educational authority but which received government funding.
Young said the board position was a 'nothing burger of a job' which was not paid and only required he meet with other directors four times a year.
'That was the invitation to offence-archeologists to go back through everything I had ever said or written from 1987,' Young said.
'Because I have been a professional journalist all my life, it didn’t take long to find a Tutankhamun tomb’s worth of offensive content.
'After eight days of leading the news on 'resignation watch' I stood down and apologised for some of the more sophomoric things I had said on X late at night.
'I thought that would draw a line under it but it was just the opposite effect. It was like throwing raw beef to a shoal of piranha fish, there was blood in the water.
'They came for me in four other jobs so I ended up having to stand down from five other positions. So, I was well and truly cancelled.'
It was that sequence of events that inspired to launch his Free Speech Union, which takes up the cause of other people who have been cancelled, fired or banned for expressing an opinion.
'When I recovered I thought what I really needed when that was happening to me to was a professional organisation who could provide me with really good advice, should I apologise or will that make things worse?' Young said.
'Should I get out and defend myself or will that just prolong the story?
'Is there anyone else this has happened to and you can put me touch with and give me a few pointers for support?
'But there was no organisation like that so that’s why I decided to start the Free Speech Union.'
https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-13637635/Toby-Young-Australia-Crocodile-Dundee.html
****************************************16 July, 2024
Climate plans of Australian companies would be exempt from private litigation for three years under proposal
Long overdue. Should be 5 years
The climate plans of Australian companies would be immune to private litigation for three years under an Albanese government proposal before parliament.
The grace period is included in legislation before the Senate that would expand the information companies must provide about the risk the climate crisis poses to their business and what they will do about it.
The bill has been praised as a necessary step in improving corporate climate disclosure and accountability, but lawyers and shareholder activists are concerned that polluting companies accused of greenwashing could avoid public scrutiny – and investors could be denied information about companies – for an extended period.
The draft legislation says some types of statements by companies, directors and auditors would be protected from legal challenge during a phase-in period unless the business was accused of criminal behaviour or an action brought by the Australian Securities and Investments Commission (Asic).
Law firm Equity Generation said the laws would have almost certainly prevented cases that successfully challenged the Commonwealth Bank and NAB over funding fossil fuel projects. The bill could also have stopped a “world-first” challenge to Rest Super over its duty to consider the climate crisis when making investments.
David Barnden, Equity Generation’s principal lawyer, said the proposed immunity – which applies to company statements about climate scenario analysis, transition plans and “scope 3” emissions released by customers when they use the company’s products – would “remove a critical avenue for investors to ensure market integrity”.
The Australasian Centre for Corporate Responsibility, a shareholder advocacy organisation, said “an extended enforcement holiday” from existing accountability would reduce motivation for companies to take mandatory climate disclosure requirements seriously.
Its executive director, Brynn O’Brien, said she was particularly concerned the immunity period would affect the information disclosed by big heavy emitters that already release climate transition plans in line with the recommendations from the global taskforce on climate-related financial disclosures.
“[The centre’s] case that challenges statements made by oil and gas company Santos, for example, could not be brought by a shareholder for three years under the draft legislation,” O’Brien said. “It is an inappropriate burden to place the sole responsibility of enforcing these provisions on under-resourced regulators for such a prolonged period.”
Mayleah House, of boutique fund manager Ethical Partners, said the immunity period would undermine shareholder rights and corporate responsibility. She said directors had adequate protection under existing misleading and deceptive conduct laws.
“Companies that have had the foresight to see what’s coming down the track should be – and are – prepared for disclosures,” House said.
The Greens have proposed an amendment to reduce the three-year immunity period to one year.
The party’s spokesperson for economic justice and Treasury, Nick McKim, said Labor’s mandatory disclosure legislation was “an important part of pushing money out of coal and gas and into the clean investments we need for a safe future”, but “a three-year holiday given to the biggest corporations is too generous”.
“Asic hardly has a reputation as a tough corporate cop on the beat, so we hope the government supports the Greens’ amendments in the Senate to rein in the disclosure immunity back to one year and narrow its scope,” he said.
The mandatory disclosure proposal is based on the work of the International Sustainability Standards Board. A spokesperson for the treasurer, Jim Chalmers, said the government was “taking action on climate reporting to unlock more investment in cheaper and cleaner energy and help companies and investors manage climate risks”.
“We’re doing this in a responsible way that ensures we incentivise more investment as quickly as possible without the risk of penalising businesses that are trying to do the right thing,” he said.
The Coalition has said the mandatory reporting regime would increase costs on business, particularly small and medium-sized operators, describing it as “more red and green tape”.
If passed, the new regime would start on 1 January.
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Lending statistic about big four banks: Greenies are 'very concerned'
Australia's big four banks loaned more than AU$3.6 billion to fossil fuel projects and companies in 2023 - at odds with the government's 'net zero' targets - according to research by Friends of the Earth.
Analysis by Market Forces - a part of the green group Friends of the Earth - found ANZ, NAB, Commonwealth Bank of Australia and Westpac loaned a combined total of $3.6 billion to fossil fuel reliant energy projects in 2023.
That was half the level of financial support that existed in 2022.
Market Forces banks analyst and report author Kyle Robertson said it was important the Big Banks understood its customers didn't appreciate greenwashing.
'Customers are very concerned that big banks are pouring billions of dollars into companies expanding coal, oil and gas when we must accelerate efforts to limit climate change and deadly disasters,' Mr Robertson said.
'The big four banks are engaged in a monumental facade as long as they continue undermining a safe climate by funnelling billions to companies steaming ahead with more coal, oil and gas.'
'When will the banks live up to their climate commitments, follow the science and stop funding climate collapse?'
The new research found 2023 was the first year the big four Australian banks did not directly finance a new or expanded coal, oil or gas project since the Paris Agreement on carbon dioxide emissions was signed.
'ANZ takes the cake as the biggest funder of fossil fuels, pouring more than $20 million into coal, oil and gas since Australia adopted the Paris Agreement to limit climate change,' he said.
https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-13636411/ANZ-CBA-Westpac-NAB-fossil-fuel.html
*********************************************************CFMEU want traffic controllers paid $250,000 per year
A deeply parasitic union. They have no shame
More than one 100 construction workers are striking at the access to one of Brisbane’s major Cross River Rail sites, marking the latest instalment of tense CFMEU protests in the city.
About 150 tradies are outside the entry to the Roma St entrance of the Brisbane City Cross River Rail site after gathering around 6.30am.
Workers are also protesting at Albert St, Woolloongabba, Boggo Rd and the Exhibition Station sites, with many holding flags and banners.
It’s understood the protest occurred following a breakdown in days-long negotiations between the CFMEU and CPB, the Cross River Rail lead contractor, over pay.
People familiar with negotiations revealed the union had asked for traffic controllers on sites to be paid the equivalent of an entry-level construction worker - some $250,000 if the union is successful in its call for a pay increase.
CFMEU representatives and CPB were locked in negotiations for several days, including almost all of Monday, in an effort to avoid protest action.
It’s understood the stop work action could happen for the rest of the week.
No roads are blocked and the group is not causing any disturbances.
The Courier-Mail understands a group of CFMEU members are discouraging workers from entering the sites, but not physically preventing them from entering.
Earlier reports that the worksites had been blocked by a padlock are incorrect.
It’s understood the action is over a pay dispute between the union and contractor, CPB Contractors, which has been ongoing for months.
The previous agreement between CFMEU and CPB Contractors expired at the end of last year.
A Cross River Rail Delivery Authority spokesman said it was a matter between the contractor and union.
“Enterprise Bargaining Agreement negotiations have been ongoing for some time, and this is a matter between the major contractor and unions representing employees,” the spokesman said.
“We encourage all parties involved to continue to bargain in good faith and to reach a resolution, so we can continue to deliver this transformational project.”
The protected action is expected to continue until Friday, and again on Monday, July 22.
CFMEU’s Qld Assistant State Secretary Jade Ingham slammed the CPB Contractors over major occupational health and safety hazards.
“I cannot speak highly enough of the workers who, over the past four years, have given everything to turn this job around despite immense pressure and mismanagement by CPB,” Mr Ingham said.
“Many workers are labouring long hours, and with none of the usual protections afforded to permanent workers.
“That’s why CPB workers are resolute in their demands for equity across the entire project, so that no worker is left behind in the agreement.
“The workers are united in this democratic action and expect CPB to engage in good faith.”
In Bowen, Hills, about 20 workers were also sat at the end of the gate 5 driveway at the Exhibition Showgrounds talking to workers as they approached.
Another group were standing near the Exhibition Equestrian Centre entrance on O’Connell Tce.
They had tied CFMEU flags on nearby street signs.
At a site carpark across the road workers were gathered in small groups chatting as others left.
The union has previously made headlines earlier this year when a picket line at Dutton Park Cross River Rail site was the scene of an explosive brawl among workers.
Sources at the time told The Courier-Mail frustrated subcontractors were attempting to access the site to work, only to be confronted by men - some wearing CFMEU-branded attire - blocking access.
In 2022 the union stormed the Department of Transport and Main Roads building, forcing staff to hide.
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Time’s up for Qld Labor’s own Dead Parrot Sketch
If you are not familiar with the Dead Parrot Sketch as made famous by John Cleese and the Monty Python crew, it goes something like this.
Cleese brings a parrot into the pet shop where he had bought it a few hours earlier and complains that it is dead. Plainly, it has deceased. Not so, says the pet shop owner. It’s sleeping.
If Premier Steven Miles and his merry band are wondering why it seems likely they’re headed for the Opposition benches in October, it’s because Queenslanders have finally tired of political versions of the Dead Parrot Sketch.
There’s the one in which the government tries to pretend that opening medical centres which have no beds or doctors is the same as building new hospitals. Most people know this is nonsense, and those who don’t find out quickly enough when they turn up for treatment and are sent off in search of a real hospital. The parrot is dead, not asleep.
The government blames immigration, winter, road accidents and everything except the war in the Ukraine for an ongoing and scandalous shortage of beds and staff in the health system, when it is evident that the cause is a lack of planning and political leadership under Labor for the past nine years. The parrot is not dead, the government insists. It is sleeping.
We’re told that everything will be just fine come 2032 and that Brisbane will host an Olympic Games of which we will all be proud.
No we won’t. Most people don’t want them and the entire affair has been a shambolic, half-arsed, ego-driven exercise since day one. Little has happened except lots of meetings which have generated nothing but media releases.
Watching from our imaginary grandstand we can see this but we are told that all is sweetness and light. Our Olympic plans aren’t dead. They’re sleeping.
If you heard a whistle blow last week, it was the one announcing the imminent arrival of the latest gravy train to pull into trade union headquarters courtesy of Premier Miles and Energy Minister de Brenni.
On board was a draft copy de Brenni’s plans to apply Best Practice Industry Conditions to the state’s renewable energy projects, plans which he said were close to being finalised.
BPIC is the sweetest of sweetheart deals struck to accommodate one of the government’s paymasters, the Construction, Forestry and Maritime Employees Union. This deal guarantees massive take home pay packets for its members and ensures it takes up to 65 weeks longer to build an apartment block in Brisbane compared to Sydney and depending on size, adds from $140,000 to $600,000 to the cost of an apartment.
The state’s renewable energy projects, those that actually have a business case and some chance of being built, backed by government subsidies and in semi-remote locations offer the potential for even richer pickings for the CFMEU.
Everyone knows that BPIC is a disgraceful rort for which ultimately we all end up paying, but Minister de Brenni insists otherwise.
“Our job is to deliver good wages for working Queenslanders – that is our purpose,” he says prodding the supine parrot and insisting it’s just sleeping
No it’s not minister. It’s to govern the state in the best interests of us all without fear or favour.
It’s not sleeping, mate. It’s dead.
The government can at least claim to have outshone the rest of the nation in one regard and can now proudly claim to run the most strike-prone state in the country with 105 days lost to industrial action on every worksite in the first three months of this year.
CFMEU Queensland boss Michael Ravbar, giving the parrot’s cage a shake, has dismissed claims of industrial anarchy as representative of an “unhealthy obsession with our union”.
All those non-CFMEU workers not earning $250k-plus and who have to turn up on hot days and when rain threatens reckon the parrot didn’t move. It’s not sleeping, mate. It’s dead.
Should Opposition Leader David Crisafulli gain government, he has the job in front of him to show the electorate that responsible government in Queensland isn’t dead. It’s just sleeping.
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15 July, 2024
Australian Territory drops more details from its COVID-19 death reports
The history of Covid is one coverup after another
ACT Health has decided to stop sharing the age ranges of COVID deaths in a move to match the reporting of other notifiable diseases.
The change comes after the Health Directorate's weekly report revealed a patient in his 40s had died, making him the youngest-COVID related death this year. ACT Health did not report whether the man was immunocompromised or had any comorbidities due to patient privacy.
Officials were notified of his death between June 21 and 27, but said he did not die during this period. They reported his age range and sex in the weekly respiratory surveillance report along with three other COVID-related deaths - a woman in her 80s and two women in their 90s. The deaths were reported last month, a period which recorded the highest monthly COVID activity this year with 844 PCR-confirmed infections.
In the following weekly report, from June 28 to July 4, ACT Health stated two people had died but did not include their age range like it had done in reports published since March 2023. ACT Health was contacted for comment as the report did not state a reason for the lack of age-related information.
A spokesperson told The Canberra Times the Health Directorate was following a new process and the change in reporting aligned "more closely" with the reporting of other notifiable diseases. Influenza and the respiratory syncytial virus (RSV) are examples of other notifiable respiratory diseases.
"ACT Health regularly reviews and updates public reporting processes," they said. "[The change] is consistent with the approach taken nationally and in the majority of other jurisdictions. ACT Health does not publicly report death age range or sex information for any other notifiable conditions."
NSW Health stopped including ages and sexes of COVID-related deaths in May 2023 while Victoria's Department of Health still included age ranges in weekly reports.
Although the World Health Organization continues to classify COVID-19 as a global pandemic, Australia's chief medical officer Professor Paul Kelly declared it was no longer of national significance in October last year. He said it was still "a serious threat" but Australia would manage COVID like other common communicable diseases by focusing on prevention, reducing spread, serious cases, hospitalisations and deaths.
The ACT Health spokesperson said the age and sex of all COVID-19-related deaths were reported, especially during the declared public health emergency, on social media. They said social media updates stopped from March 23 last year because the structure and content of weekly COVID reports were updated as part of "transitional reporting changes".
"These changes reflected the ACT government's transition to managing COVID like other notifiable conditions, and a focus on carefully monitoring the severity of illness and the impact on the health system, rather than overall case numbers," the spokesperson said.
About 200 infections and an estimated eight deaths were reported this month, as of July 12. Before the death of the man in his 40s, the last COVID-related death of a patient under 50 years old reported to ACT Health was in January 2023, the spokesperson said in a statement.
Professor Peter Collignon at the ANU Medical School said not reporting age-related information about COVID deaths "distorted" people's view of the disease.
He said the majority of deaths from COVID and the flu were people over 80 years old with underlying conditions but said it was useful to know when younger people died. He said it would improve public awareness of the risk to age groups.
The infectious diseases expert believed "balanced" public health reporting would share when young people were affected by these diseases, with context. He said governments should report death data annually at the least.
"When [someone young] dies you run the risk of overemphasising their youth, but by the same token, you've got to put a human face on this, and the rare exceptions ... make it real," Professor Collignon said. "I think it's a mistake not to report the ranges."
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There's been another rise in homeschooling in Canberra
Homeschooling continues to grow in popularity with the latest ACT Schools Census showing a 6.5 per cent increase in the amount of students being taught outside traditional schools.
In the year to February 2024, the amount of students being homeschooled increased to 495. In the same period, private school enrolments increased by 2.1 per cent and public school enrolments fell by 0.6 per cent.
An Education Directorate spokesman said the numbers in the ACT reflected nationwide trends, with many jurisdictions experiencing larger increases in homeschooling numbers.
"Families have the choice to enrol in alternative educational pathways outside public/non-public schools," the spokesman said.
"The increased level of enrolment in home education may be attributed to both increased awareness of alternative pathways, as well as ongoing impacts that arose from the pandemic."
Queensland University of Technology education researcher Dr Rebecca English said the ACT's regulatory environment was kind to parents seeking homeschooling options. "It's much easier to homeschool in ACT than NSW or Queensland. Registration is geared towards parents' needs," she said.
"In the ACT because of the way the regulators have worked with advocates it's a really positive environment for homeschooling."
In her home state, by contrast, advocates assume between 50 to 80 per cent of homeschooled children may not be registered.
"[In Queensland] it's just a bit of a blind spot. The government doesn't have a strong relationship with the community."
Dr English said homeschooling could often be a positive option for students. "I think the research shows us that it is at worst benign and at best a better option than traditional schooling, in terms of students' reports of satisfaction with their education and civic engagement," she said, noting that much of the research comes from the United States.
Sydney Home Education Network president Vivienne Fox said conditions for homeschooling in the ACT are hugely favourable.
"The ACT already allows for kids to do part-time homeschooling. The regulatory system is the best in the whole country," she said.
Ms Fox, who homeschooled her five children and has worked with various homeschooling organisations, said the option was growing in popularity even before COVID-19.
"During COVID it got a kick in the pants, so many people got the opportunity to see what their kids were really doing at school," she said.
"I thought schools would become more flexible and there would be more recognition of the value of a tailored form of education but NSW hasn't improved at all in that way.
https://www.canberratimes.com.au/story/8689115/homeschooling-rises-in-canberra-post-covid-pandemic/
********************************************Setka self-destructs
Welcome news.
Employment and Workplace Relations Minister Tony Burke says “everything is on the table,” after the sudden resignation of construction union boss John Setka amid allegations of misconduct.
The Victorian state secretary resigned from the Construction, Forestry and Maritime Employees Union (CFMEU) following 12 years in the top job on Friday, with immediate effect.
It followed allegations in Nine newspapers he had allowed bikies and members of organised crime to act as union delegates, with instances occurring at government-funded projects.
Speaking on ABC’s Insiders, Mr Burke said the alleged actions were “completely unacceptable” and if necessary, he would deregister the CFMEU or appoint administrators to certain branches.
“In the advice I sought from the department, I want to make clear: everything is on the table,” he said.
Mr Burke said he had sought information on the powers he has as the minister. Multiple agencies will also be investigating the claims, including the Fair Work Ombudsman, the Australian Federal Police and state police organisations.
“When I think of union delegates, I think of someone who will serve you on a check-out at Woolworths or Coles, work as a cleaner in a major centre, a highly trained colleague … to see any criminal element, is not just a problem, but completely unacceptable,” he added.
Mr Burke said he had “put the union absolutely on notice,” however said he had no interest in halting infrastructure projects where the alleged actions had occurred.
“I don’t think any has interest in that,” he said.
“I want to make sure that we’re able to deliver a situation where workers are well paid and companies are profitable, taxpayers get value for money and the infrastructure we need is built.”
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The big four bank boss who says there’s more room for risk
ANZ chief executive Shayne Elliott says cautious lending standards are taking a disproportionate toll on younger generations, arguing banks should be allowed to take more risk in their loans to property developers and first home buyers.
ANZ’s largely affluent customer base has mostly muddled through the high-interest rate environment, but Elliott is attuned to the need to make housing more affordable as cost-of-living pressures squeeze many, especially outside the main banks.
If it were up to him, existing regulations would allow banks to take on more risk. But he also acknowledges major banks could rethink their risk appetite within existing bounds. “We have to be more open-minded,” he says.
As house prices grind higher, Elliot is concerned increasing swaths of Australians and New Zealanders are being locked out of the financial system and the housing market.
Speaking in the bank’s head office in Melbourne last week, Elliott argued there’s a case to be made for letting banks take more risk – both in their lending to big business clients, as well as first home buyers.
“If we restrict credit, it does come at a cost,” he says. “Certain parts of the community pay a higher price than others, and one of them is the younger cohort, particularly those who have an aspiration to buy a home.”
The comments on housing and risk – a long-running theme for Elliott – came as the bank also sought to respond to allegations of cultural problems in its markets division.
On Thursday, in an internal note to staff, Elliott said the allegations reported in the media were not new and that the bank was treating them with “utmost seriousness”, including engaging external legal counsel to assist in its investigations.
Elliott flags that one area where the bank could allow more risk is in its institutional bank, where it lends to some of the country’s biggest businesses, therefore having a role in the supply side of housing.
Australian Prudential Regulatory Authority (APRA) chairman John Lonsdale last month said this was not the time to wind back the clock on banking regulation. But at the same time, Lonsdale also said there was scope for banks to increase their own risk appetite.
‘Certain parts of the community pay a higher price than others, and one of them is the younger cohort, particularly those who have an aspiration to buy a home.’
Elliott says the bank could lend money for more affordable housing models such as “build to rent to buy” (BtRtB), where a community housing provider is the developer for a property, charging lower-than-market rent until the tenant has saved enough for a deposit to buy the property they are renting.
UNSW housing research professor Hal Pawson says it’s a model that helps those who earn below a certain income level to save for a deposit through not only lower rent, but also a longer-term contract that eliminates the constant moves often required in the private market.
“The BtRtB model seeks to help potential first home buyers who might otherwise be locked out of the market to transition over a period to full homeownership,” he says.
That model also can reduce the cost of building houses because of the lower financing costs and tax benefits that can be given to not-for-profit community housing developers.
Elliott says the bank is already taking a closer look at this model.
“We can help [builders] drive down the cost of construction, and the way we do that is by taking more risk and being prepared to take different risk,” he says.
This modified risk appetite could also apply to how the bank assesses home loan applicants, Elliott says, although he is wary of acting only on the demand-side, which could worsen housing affordability.
“We have to be thoughtful about how we assess risk for first-home buyers,” he says, noting the current standards are a result of both regulation and prudent thinking by banks.
“If you came into the bank, or any bank, and decided to borrow money, we would look at your income today and assume you never get a pay rise for 30 years, which is kind of a ridiculous assumption,” he says. “We make all sorts of assumptions about your current position that probably aren’t terribly relevant, or terribly true.”
As an example, Elliott says there’s a question around whether banks should be more generous in their assumptions of people’s income and factor in future increases.
But he also thinks there could be a change to the serviceability buffer, a stress test required by APRA that adds a 3 percentage point “buffer” to the rate of a loan to determine eligibility.
Last year, Elliott backed the 3 per cent buffer, saying it “feels about right”. But his views have since changed.
“I’m not sure [the serviceability buffer] makes sense today, given where interest rates are today,” he says. “You would imagine as rates rise, the buffer would come down, and as rates lower, the buffer would go up. I think 3 per cent is probably a bit burdensome at the moment. A number more like two is probably more reasonable.”
Elliott is under no illusion that such a tweak would bring about significant change: “But for some, particularly first home buyers, I think it would make a difference, and I think that’s a reasonable risk to take.”
“Our [retail and small business] customers have definitely increased their savings buffers, which is staggering, actually,” he says. “The big end of town in general is doing really well so we’re seeing remarkably low stress. Where the stress is, is probably more in the middle market, so more private and domestic companies. The obvious ones have been in construction, and the other area is discretionary retail.”
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14 July, 2024
The spoilt generation
I suspect that this story was deliberately designed to stir up oldies like me. When I was young and saving money, I breakfasted regularly on porridge, toast and Weetbix and felt perfectly happy about it. And anybody who is serious about coping with economic hard times would do that to this day.
I do however know what he is talking about. I have breakfast at a cafe or via Doordash most days these days and appreciate it greatly. But I am in my 81st year and lived frugally for many years while I was building up "rainy day" money. And those days have now arrived and I can live a bit indulgently in my old age
The guy below wants to run before he can walk and he is actually eating his own future by his indulgences. I do feel a bit sorry for him. Perhaps he should learn to enjoy a nice bowl of porridge. I still do occasionally. It costs mere cents
Cash-strapped Australians are turning to meal prepping to save money amid the cost of living crisis - but Gen Zers are fuming at being 'robbed' of the simple delight of enjoying brunch at cafés.
A recent Lighthouse 2024 hospitality report found that menu prices have increased by as much as one third in the past 12 months.
'There's something about meal prep,' he said in a video posted to social media. 'I could buy this from a café and be happy as Larry but just because I know that I've made it and I'm doing this to save money, something about it ''icks'' me. 'I don't want it. I want to go and spend $30 on an overpriced meal.
'I hate the economic crisis... this sucks.'
Many others agreed that eating out had become an unaffordable luxury but they were unsatisfied with home-made alternatives.
'I'm the same... I thought I was the only one,' one person said.
'I will literally bring something from home and then go and buy something to eat anyway because my container of food depresses me,' another said.
'I'm so poor but I spent $80 on Door Dash tonight because I wanted cheeseburgers,' a third said.
'Is it too much to ask for just a salmon bagel and almond latte every day?' a fourth said.
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When victimhood is main currency, we’re the ones who will be stuffed
Gemma Tognini
I can’t remember the last time a politician of any ilk said something that made me stop what I was doing and turn around. In a good way, that is.
Oh, there have been plenty of moments where what has come out of the mouths of some MPs has prompted a less than ladylike response from yours truly.
That’s not what I’m talking about here. I’m talking about something said last week that made me stop, listen and, as it happens, start writing.
This week, David Crisafulli, the man who would be Queensland premier, held a media conference to announce the state Liberal National Party’s proposed policy on youth crime should his team be elected in the October poll.
The detail of that policy, which focuses on strengthening penalties and more effective rehabilitation, is actually the supporting act here. Some have criticised it, some say it’s what’s needed. Let others fight that battle. It’s what he said when delivering the policy that I want to pick apart.
Crisafulli declared that soft policing of young people and a dearth of consequences when they committed serious crimes had created “a generation of untouchables”.
A generation of untouchables. What a statement. And broadly, what a truth.
Queensland Opposition Leader David Crisafulli has pledged there will be fewer victims of crime under his leadership.
Crisafulli may have said this in the context of a catastrophic youth crime issue in Queensland, but I want to talk about it more broadly and tease out why any of us should care.
As a starting point, come with me, if you will, to Perth in the early 1980s. I’m in the car with my mum driving past Lake Monger, a large, thriving wetland a few kilometres north of the city.
I don’t know what I did on this occasion to find myself in strife. I was a pretty straitlaced kid, to be honest, so I imagine it was something to do with my unbridled tongue. On this afternoon I was learning a tough lesson in behavioural relativity.
“Hate me all you want, Gem,” Mum said, after delivering the consequences to my actions. “But I’m not here to be your friend, you’ll thank me one day.”
Most of my maligned Generation X peers have similar stories and we laugh about them. The irony, 40-odd years later, is that for the most part our generation produced millennials, which is arguable where the slippery slope started.
Our boomer parents knew a thing or two about cost and value and hard work. They passed that on to us. What did we do? Wrapped our kids in cotton wool and gave them a medal for getting out of bed. The millennials took that baton and ran with it. Next stop Generation Z, custom-made with hides softer than butter on a January afternoon.
Sure, you could dismiss me as an “old lady shakes fist at sky” or similar, but hear me out. There is so much conversation right now about societal decline and the shredding of social cohesion. What happens when we have generational decline? We have entire cohorts who are experts in rights but no clue about responsibilities. Who value victimhood above everything else. And who despite being elected to serve the Australian people in the Senate, complain about not having a “support person” to go and front up to the Prime Minister and explain yourself after launching a missile at him and the party that put you in your $280k a year job in the first place.
Honestly, Fatima Payman is the embodiment of what I’m talking about. Deluded enough to refer to herself as the “voice of West Australians”. Deluded enough to think she is in parliament because she’s special or talented and not because of the machinations of the ALP and the West Australian union movement.
Bet they’re high-fiving themselves now. On behalf of the rest of Australia, go to your room and have a good hard think about what you did.
It gets better (or worse) because this week the ALP’s youth movement publicly threw its support behind Payman. This is the kids telling Mum and Dad to go get stuffed. While this is primarily and for now a problem for the ALP, I want the rest of us to think about why it matters. Why it does, and why it will continue to.
We are running out of time to turn the ship. Ever the optimist, I think there is still time but, when you think about how long it takes for societal erosion, the clock is ticking, loudly.
It’s not just soft policing that has created this. It’s soft parenting. Soft teaching. Soft leading. All of it. And by soft, I don’t mean the alternative is harshness or hardness. What I mean is that you cannot remove consequences, in any context, and expect to produce young people of character and substance.
It’s like anything: you get what you pay for. If a young person knows the worst they’ll face is a Monty Pythonesque you’re not the Messiah, just a very naughty boy or girl, they’ll do what they please. I’m sure I would have.
You can’t fast-track experience and you can’t learn discipline, leadership and sacrifice any other way than being disciplined, led well and having to endure sacrifice. This matters because one day, when members of the generation that are the same age as my niece and nephew are in the Lodge, we want them to be well formed. We don’t want needy brats who were told everything they ever did was spectacular and that microaggression is real (it really is not) and that there is a back door out of every situation because they’ve never had to face or wear a consequence.
The ridiculous charade of Payman’s crusade for self is such a brilliant, helpful and instructive example of what I’m talking about.
Farther afield, another terrifyingly potent example of what I’m talking about. After holding the prestigious Columbia University campus hostage to vile anti-Israel protest for weeks on end, law students petitioned administrators to cancel exams because they were so “irrevocably shaken” by the protests. And they were serious.
Back at home, the pro-Palestine useful idiot student activists from the University of Melbourne’s equivalent who made the campus unsafe for Jewish students and defied administrators for weeks on end look set to escape with a warning. A generation of untouchables, indeed.
Forget the culture wars; perhaps the real battlefield is the generation wars. Perhaps the failure started with us, the Gen-Xers.
Either way, when victimhood is the primary currency of the emerging generation, well, we’re the ones who’ll be stuffed.
We are doing this generation a disservice by allowing this softness to guide, by depriving them of the lessons that can be learned only by going through difficulty.
As for junior Gemma and her education in the area of choice and consequences, well, Mum was right. I did thank her, and have done many times since that day.
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Take note, Libs: UK shows lurch to left is no way to win votes
Peta Credlin
For all the media obsession with the upcoming Trump v Biden contest, the electoral race with the most influence on Australian politics was last weekend’s British general election.
Not only are we both parliamentary democracies but our two major parties have strong historical links with their British counterparts that continue to this day, ensuring shared policy and campaign learning. In the Blair years, a lot of British Labour’s policy initiatives found their way into Labor’s opposition manifestos and, similarly, David Cameron’s climate change rebranding of the Conservatives was picked up here by Liberal moderates.
The new British Labour government has a record majority but a minimal mandate, given that it secured only 34 per cent of the overall vote in an election with a dismal turnout of under 60 per cent of eligible voters. It can’t be good for democracy when 40 per cent of voters don’t turn up and, of those who do, more than 40 per cent vote for neither of the two parties.
Although compulsory voting and the preferential system somewhat mask the public’s disillusionment with politics as usual here, the fact our two main parties now struggle to win two-thirds of the primary vote between them suggests Australian democracy is on a similar path.
With one side obsessing over climate and identity and the other torn between moving left to hug the centre ground or taking risks to run against the zeitgeist, Australians are hardly less likely than Britons to feel let down and politically homeless.
Because of our different electoral system it may take longer but, sooner or later, as in Britain, if the centre left is neglectful of the bread-and-butter concerns of aspirational voters and if the centre right is a weak echo of the other side, there will be an earthquake as voters dump first one party and then the other that has taken them for granted for too long.
Sir Keir Starmer and his team would be too euphoric to feel vulnerable just yet but an electorate fed up with excuses from one government is hardly going to be patient if its successor spends more money and recruits more civil servants without making much practical difference to voters’ lives.
While seismic changes have lessons for both sides, defeat is usually more instructive than success. Sure, part of the Conservatives’ problem was they’d been in office for 14 years and the “it’s time” factor was running against them. Having five prime ministers didn’t help, and neither did making promises about reducing immigration that the government simply wouldn’t or couldn’t keep.
Brexit aside, the basic issue was successive Tory prime ministers have governed more from the left than the right. Under the party’s most recent leader, Rishi Sunak, taxes reached a post-war high. There was some late resistance to peak leftism, such as the trans push, but Sunak continued Boris Johnson’s climate fixations, including bans on fracking, making electric vehicles and heat pumps compulsory, and making Britain’s last coal-fired power station burn wood instead.
The Conservatives promised to reduce illegal migration and stop the boats, but the boats kept coming, migration reached record highs, and no boatpeople were deported to Rwanda. The party even was weak on defence, slashing the British Army to its smallest size in 200 years.
The result of Tories moving to the left was not grateful Labour voters saying “thank God we now have a moderate Tory government”. Left voters kept voting for Labour. But right-wing voters deserted the Tories in droves via the rise of Nigel Farage’s Reform UK party, which claimed to be true conservatives and cannibalised the centre-right vote.
At nearly 40 per cent, the combined Tory-Reform vote would have been enough to succeed in a first-past-the-post system, but a split centre right meant Labour won many seats with scarcely a third of the vote.
Of the 106 electorates where Reform came second, 93 were won by Labour.
This is what happens in a first-past-the-post system when centre-right votes are split between the mainstream conservatives and a breakaway party of the right.
And yes, in our preferential system, at least some of those votes would come back to the biggest centre-right party (although never as many as the more disciplined preference flows on the left deliver). That doesn’t alter the fact the British Conservatives made the fundamental mistake of thinking the way to win was to hug the other side rather than to create a contest.
That’s a mistake too many Liberals make in this country. Think Scott Morrison embracing Labor’s net-zero target, even though he’d won his miracle victory in 2019 in part by opposing Labor’s then 45 per cent emissions reduction target as unachievable and ruinously expensive. Think former NSW premier Dom Perrottet whose energy policy, likely driven by Matt Kean, was even more renewables-dependent than federal Labor’s. Ditto Victoria under two-time moderate loser Matthew Guy; the South Australian Liberals who lost government in a term under wet Steven Marshall; and don’t even get me started on Western Australia with Liberal Zak Kirkup trying to out-green the Greens and losing official opposition status to the Nationals.
In Britain, the Liberal Democrats are a bit like our teals, targeting Conservative seats and using Labour supporters to vote tactically to flip them. Last weekend they won 72 seats with just 12 per cent of the national vote. Contrast that with Reform which, from a standing start, garnered a higher national vote at 14 per cent but won just five seats.
And while it has been the Reform insurgency that has grabbed headlines, the rise of “Gaza” candidates on the left – one of whom displaced a Labour shadow cabinet member – has been no less significant. Thanks to Muslim bloc voting, there are now five British MPs who were elected campaigning more about Palestine than their own country.
The London Telegraph reports that in seats where Muslims were more than 10 per cent of the population, Labour’s vote fell by an average of 6.8 per cent. By contrast, it rose by 3.3 per cent in seats where the Muslim population was under 10 per cent. At 6 per cent, Muslims in Britain are about double the percentage here, but a local version of an entity called The Muslim Vote is similarly trying to mobilise voters on the basis of religion and is similarly pushing Labor for pro-Gaza policy change.
If the Tory party is to have any hope of a swift comeback, the first task of the battered survivors will be to heal the breach with Farage and his supporters. And if the Starmer government is to prosper, it will have to curb the green-left enthusiasm of many of its activist MPs and marginalise anyone who wants religion and ethnic tribalism to drive politics. Both sides of politics will need to work out more compelling ways to build a stronger and more cohesive society as well as a stronger economy and to rekindle the enthusiasm once generated by leaders such as Margaret Thatcher and Tony Blair.
In a depressing echo of politics here, no big figures campaigned on a specific plan for more excellence in education, getting better healthcare from the National Health Service, making the military more potent or making energy more affordable and the economy more competitive. It was a campaign based on personalities, trivia and mud-slinging rather than clear competing visions on how to make the country better.
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Senators discover middle Australia set to be hit hard by super bill
Robert Gottliebsen
The infamous superannuation bill which taxes unrealised capital gains for the first time in the western world was expected to be passed through the House of Representatives last week. But strangely it was postponed.
Speculation about a looming deal in the Senate was naturally widely canvassed. That may be right, especially as last week passing the bill became just a little harder.
Until last week the government and the Greens could muster 37 Senate votes so needed only two Senate crossbenchers to pass a bill. Last week Fatima Payman left ALP ranks and became an independent Senator. That means the government now needs three crossbencher votes.
It is highly unlikely that the superannuation legislation has been on Senator Payman’s agenda. It is not seen as a Muslim issue. But like other parts of middle Australia, Senator Payman will discover that many Muslim Australians are set to be hit hard.
Many are shopkeepers, may own their business premises via their superannuation fund and will find themselves paying tax on unrealised capital gains.
The same applies to farmers, including struggling Tasmanian farmers where Jacqui Lambie has a special concern.
When the government first announced the superannuation tax rate would rise from 15 per cent to 30 per cent on income from superannuation savings above $3m, the government’s proposal naturally had its opponents but was widely accepted.
In its original form, plus indexation of the $3m trigger, it would have passed the Senate without a great deal of problem.
I have pointed out previously that the industry funds have antiquated bookkeeping systems and it was discovered that they could not provide the information necessary to levy the proposed tax.
The government didn’t want to back down so used the figure that the industry funds could provide – there would be a tax on gains in the total market value of superannuation funds above $3m including unrealised capital gains. The $3m trigger would not be indexed so quickly it will capture middle income Australia.
It was an outrageous proposition particularly as it will hit farmers, shopkeepers and other families that have their business premises in their superannuation fund.
It was a thinly disguised attack on small and medium sized enterprises – not an area that is high in the government agenda.
Around Canberra last week among the crossbenchers there was discussion about ending indexation, but that was a basic claim.
Many crossbenchers actually want to return to proposals that as far as possible match the government’s initial aim.
Accordingly, one plan was that those who had superannuation funds with modern accounting systems and could provide real earnings for their funds would be taxed at 30 per cent on realised income earned over $3m.
For members in funds that could identify and report actual taxable earnings, the proposed amendments completely removed unrealised capital gains from the tax calculation.
This is also the suggestion made by my readers.
Those that could not provide that data would have their funds above $3m taxed on the basis of a deemed earning rate related to the 90-day bank bill rate.
Those who were in funds that had antiquated accounting systems would not have to pay tax on unrealised gains but would have a deemed earning rate.
But of course, industry and retail funds currently unable to provide the data would almost certainly set up a separate fund that used modern accounting systems and members would then have the same investment choices as are currently available. Relatively few people would be linked to a deemed rate of return.
As I understand it, a number of crossbenchers are looking at a proposal along these lines. Whether they are strong enough to stand up to the government is yet to be seen.
But it will be fascinating to see if the new crossbencher Fatima Payman stands up for middle Australia, including a great many Muslims who aim to be in the middle Australia bracket and don’t want to be smashed.
On the government side my guess is that they will throw in indexation but Treasury see taxing unrealised gains as a huge long term money spinner which will be extended to many asset classes.
In the words of the Self Managed Superannuation Fund Association: “No other pension system in the world taxes unrealised capital gains, and it’s not the way the Australian tax system works either.”
“As soon as you depart from actual taxable earnings as the basis for the calculation, there will be plenty of unintended consequences and unfair outcomes, and that’s exactly how this proposed new tax will play out.”
“The only way to remove unrealised capital gains is to use actual taxable earnings.”
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11 July, 2024
‘Second way to close the gap’: Jacinta Nampijinpa Price outlines her post-voice vision
Jacinta Nampijinpa Price has laid out her vision for an “advancement movement” in Indigenous affairs, in which welfare-dependent Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people do the jobs in their communities currently done by fly-in, fly-out workers, and “meet the standards other Australians are expected to meet”.
The opposition Indigenous affairs spokeswoman also calls for an end to an implied acceptance of cultural payback, arranged marriage, apportioning tragedies and mishaps to sorcery and other practices that are “anathema to modern culture”. As her home base of Alice Springs enters its second curfew this year to curb youth violence, and the nation struggles to find a new policy path after the failure of the voice to parliament referendum, Senator Nampijinpa Price has declared there is a “second way” to close the gap.
“We know where the gap is – it is 20 per cent of the 3 per cent,” the Northern Territory senator writes in an essay on history commissioned for The Australian’s 60th Anniversary Collector’s Edition magazine, published on Saturday.
“It’s remote Indigenous Australians, many of whom do not have English as a first language. We already know that we can either fix or exacerbate that by school attendance.
“There should be no fly-in, fly-out workers in communities with Indigenous Australians on welfare.”
The Australian Senator details her essay on history.
Senator Price – a Warlpiri-Celtic woman from Alice Springs – has set out her arguments for an “advancement movement” and her hope for “real reconciliation and integration”, as she works on the Indigenous affairs policy she and Peter Dutton will take to the next election.
She describes the advancement movement as “a second way”.
“We can continue along the separatist road that sees Indigenous Australians as irrevocably damaged by settlement and wants to keep Aboriginal culture stuck in time like a museum piece,” Senator Nampijinpa Price writes.
“Traditional culture is romanticised by those who do not live it, while reinvention of culture has become an industry in the name of reconciliation for the purpose of political influence.
“This (separatist) way forward leaves negative parts of Indigenous culture alone to grow and fester. Things like violent cultural payback, arranged marriage and apportioning tragedies and mishaps to sorcery, all of which are anathema to modern culture.
“This is a view that lowers standards for Indigenous Australians … This has been the strategy of decades of government agencies and academic activists, and yet they fail to draw the obvious connection between this approach and the failure to make much ground on Closing the Gap.”
Senator Nampijinpa Price has never supported a truth-telling commission as proposed by the Greens in parliament last week. Indigenous Australians Minister Linda Burney on Tuesday said the government would look at the nature of the proposal.
Sources have told The Australian that Labor will block any judicial model that would in any way replicate the Truth and Reconciliation hearings in South Africa. Instead, it has been consulting communities that prefer truth-telling projects potentially overseen by a central body. The Albanese government has left this work to states.
“My personal view is that it needs to be more of a community-led initiative that brings people together,” Ms Burney told ABC on Tuesday.
Senator Nampijinpa Price expresses her concern about truth-telling because, as she tells The Australian in a video interview to be published with her essay, it has been “driven by this notion that somehow modern non-Indigenous Australians have to compensate for what occurred to Aboriginal people in our country’s history”.
But she said Australia needed to understand the atrocities that occurred at and after colonisation, which included the murders of many of her Warlpiri family in the last sanctioned massacre at Coniston in 1928. “Seventy-five years after that we had a commemorative ceremony and invited those descendants of those who killed our family … (we told them) ‘we don’t blame you for what happened in our country’s history’.
“We recognised those were hard times but we are now together as Australians moving forward, and I think that is one of the greatest acts of reconciliation I’ve ever been part of.”
Senator Nampijinpa Price said guilt politics was like racism because “it denies the truth and it doesn’t help anybody progress”.
“We need a second way: the advancement movement. Under this movement, we are all Australians. We can learn and cherish our Indigenous culture while still meeting the same standards that every other Australian is expected to meet,” she writes in her essay.
“Our culture will be respected like never before when Indigenous Australians are making it thrive under their own steam and not as part of a welfare industry. That culture will become part of our national tapestry, rather than a separate story to be fought over.”
Senator Nampijinpa Price was the Coalition’s most potent weapon during the debate that culminated in a failed referendum for an Indigenous voice in October 2023. Her decision to join right-wing activist group Advance in February 23 was a landmark for the No campaign.
She said the nation needed a nuanced understanding of its own history, including what is great about the nation that emerged from it. She said few younger Australians were taught that King George instructed Governor Arthur Phillip to “live in amity and kindness” with Aboriginal people and to punish crimes against them. “Of course, the British settlers did not always live up to King George’s instructions, but that doesn’t change the fact the instructions were given,” she writes.
“Even … when barbaric crimes were committed against Aboriginal Australians, the civilising rule of law often played out. The infamous Myall Creek massacre in 1838 marks a dark and bloody moment in our history, when 28 Indigenous Australians were murdered by British settlers. But the activists have done a good job of playing down what happened after the massacre.
“Contemporary sources indicate that while there were pockets of excuse-making for the perpetrators, there was also clearly an abiding desire of the colony as a whole to do the right thing. The attorney-general, John Plunkett, prosecuted the perpetrators and then – when they were acquitted on a technicality – he prosecuted them again. Seven white men were thus found guilty and hanged.”
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La Trobe Not Planning to Rename University Following ‘Aboriginal Dispossession’ Demands
More than 50 staff and students are calling for a name change at La Trobe University due to the “dispossession of Aboriginal peoples” in colonisation.
The group wrote to Yoorrook Justice Commission proposing the university be renamed due to Charles La Trobe’s role in Victoria’s colonisation.
“Charles La Trobe played an integral role in the dispossession of the Aboriginal peoples of south-Eastern Australia from their lands,” the group argued.
Born in 1801 in London, La Trobe became the first lieutenant governor of the colony of Victoria when it separated from New South Wales in 1851.
A La Trobe University spokesperson told The Epoch Times it has “no current plans to change its name” although it is aware of the petition.
“Although the university has no current plans to change its name, we are always willing to hear feedback from our community, and particularly from First Nations students, staff, and communities that surround our campuses in Melbourne’s north and regional Victoria,” the spokesperson said.
“La Trobe University is aware of a petition to the Yoorrook Justic Commission calling for the university to change its name from ‘La Trobe’ because of Charles La Trobe’s role in the colonisation of Aboriginal lands.”
The group arguing for the change said, “it must be acknowledged that La Trobe was the chief government official in Victoria during a period of genocidal violence.”
They noted the Indigenous population of Victoria declined by 80 percent between 1836 and 1853.
The spokesperson said the university recognises Australia’s colonial history and its ongoing impacts, including the history of the institution’s namesake.
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Concerns Raised Over Extent of Land Transfer Powers Under Aboriginal Land Act
An outback pub manager is calling for action as he fears 95 percent of land in his hometown could be handed to an Aboriginal corporation.
Toobeah business owner Michael Offerdahl says he only found out about the plans from Goondiwindi Regional Council meeting minutes in January, with the Bigambul Native Title Aboriginal Corporation (BNTAC) revealing its master plan for a section of on its website.
The group says it plans to use 210 hectares of the 220-hectare Toobeah Reserve to carry out land management, eco-tourism, and land regeneration.
But Mr. Offerdahl claims no members of the Bigambul people currently lived in the town and didn’t understand why they were being granted “inalienable freehold” over the land.
“None of the people of that tribe live in this town,” he told The Epoch Times.
He said the Indigenous people behind the claim had only been in the region since the 1920s, well after other Indigenous tribes and after the town had been established.
The publican said the origin of the name Toobeah was from the native Gamilaroi word, dhuba-y, meaning “to point,” which Mr. Offerdahl says demonstrates the lack of history the Bigambul people have in the area.
The business owner said he held concerns the move could significantly alter the trajectory of the township and future commercial opportunities, warning more clarity was needed otherwise it could have ramifications across the state.
“If you let them win and this is what they want to do, then this is going to happen all over Queensland.”
15 Towns Under Aboriginal Land Act Applications
One Nation’s Mirani MP Steven Andrew raised the issue in state parliament on May 1, where he questioned the proposed land transfer under the Aboriginal Land Act (ALA) of Queensland.
He asked what steps had been taken to ensure the Toobeah community was included in the decision-making process, what impact the transfer would have on townspeople’s property rights, and its ability to access its treated water and sewerage system.
Another key questions was how many towns were under pending ALA applications.
The Department of Resources responded that the ALA did not require broad community consultation, but that it did hold a community forum in Toobeah on March 4.
Information from Goondiwindi Regional Council also revealed the department would ensure town water and bore facilities remained accessible.
An area of land adjoining the Toobeah township would be used for the community, including for open space, future town expansion, and travelling stock requirements.
The council response said the land subject to the expression of interest was designated as a reserve for camping purposes associated with the stock route network and that would continue over the retained land.
Two lots of land in the community, including rodeo facilities, would remain available for recreational use.
Mr. Andrew’s question of which townships had expressions of interest went unanswered, with only the confirmation that there were 15 sites under consideration.
The Epoch Times understands two of the other areas of interest are Eurong and Happy Valley on Fraser Island.
Indigenous groups have lodged expressions of interest for inalienable freehold handover of those parts of the island.
Land transfers made under the ALA are separate to Native Title.
So far, more than 6 million hectares of state land has been granted to Indigenous Australians in some form.
How the Aboriginal Land Acts Differ From Native Title
The ALAs and Native Title both represent Indigenous claims to land, yet both differ in law and function.
Native Title is a recognition of the rights and interests of Indigenous people in land and waters, according to traditional laws and customs.
For example, the rights to look after sacred sites, camp, hunt and fish and hold ceremonies in areas Indigenous people have a proven connection to. Yet the rights can vary depending on the specific case.
Native Title law was found to exist by the High Court of Australia in the landmark Mabo case in 1992, which overturned the prevailing legal property concept of “terra nullius”—that Australia belonged to no one prior to European settlement.
In contrast, the ALA is an actual grant of land.
The concept originated in 1976 as Commonwealth legislation that provided Indigenous people in the Northern Territory the right to be granted land if they could prove historical and cultural ownership.
Legislated as the Aboriginal Land Act in Queensland in 1991, the law recognises the concept of inalienable freehold title, which means land is handed to Indigenous people indefinitely.
Rights under the act can include ownership, control and management of land, development, lease negotiation and economic activity.
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Women wanted for cybersecurity course, no men allowed
Only women and gender-diverse candidates will be invited to participate in the latest cybersecurity course from one of Australia's largest security providers as part of an effort to address inequality in the sector.
CyberCX launched its first full-time, women-only training course on Monday, offering 40 paid roles that will begin in November.
The announcement comes after research from Per Capita revealed women made up just 21 per cent of Australia's cybersecurity workforce, and a study from Engineers Australia showed only 13 per cent of qualified engineers were female.
The low rates of participation have persisted despite widespread predictions of skills shortages in Australia's technology workforce.
CyberCX Academy director Rosemary Driscoll said the six-month, full-time training course was designed to address the industry's gender imbalance and used feedback from other all-women training courses.
"Australia needs a more diverse cyber security workforce to meet demands of industry and government now and into the future," she said.
"Everyone has a role to play here, from the government to our tertiary institutions and the private sector."
The full-time course comes after Per Capita research found Australia was likely to suffer a skills shortage of up to 30,000 cybersecurity workers by 2026, and women represented just 21 per cent of professionals in the field.
Engineers Australia's report into Women in Engineering also found women made up just 16 per cent of engineering graduates and 13 per cent of the workforce.
Its recommendations to improve gender diversity included addressing a non-inclusive culture, providing greater opportunities for female engineers in workplaces, and offering mentoring programs.
The CyberCX entry-level cybersecurity course will be open to women studying cybersecurity or looking to change careers, and will feature 10 weeks of practice and 12 weeks of on-the-job experience.
https://www.canberratimes.com.au/story/8688492/women-wanted-for-cybersecurity-course-no-men-allowed/
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Despite growing need, psychology ‘almost impossible’ to study at university
This is a bit of a surprise. There are always a LOT of students studying psych at the undergrad level. You would think that would carry over to postgrad. It is however true that modern psychological therapy can be hard work. It is not just sitting and talking these days
University psychology course closures are leaving desperate students – and a nationwide backlog of patients – caught in a bottleneck, as aspiring new clinicians struggle to enter the industry.
Psychology has become the most in-demand postgraduate degree in NSW and the ACT, but 79 of the 187 courses offered nationally have stopped new intakes, the majority shutting all together.
The demand for clinical psychology appointments has steadily risen since the pandemic. The health burden represents a $10bn loss in productivity for employers, as part of the $220bn in losses cited by the Productivity Commission’s mental health inquiry report
Australian Psychological Society president Catriona Davis-McCabe said students were falling victim to an underfunded tertiary sector. “There are thousands of students who want to be psychologists and want to go on and do the training, and they’re being turned away,” Dr Davis-McCabe said.
“It’s a very, very expensive course to run because there are placements and there’s a high lecturer to student ratio.”
According to the APS, Australia meets only 35 per cent of its psychology workforce target.
“When we reduce the training to what we have now, there’s a massive shortage of psychologists,” Dr Davis-McCabe said.
“The government has looked at some really good initiatives, like introducing digital platforms and digital support for people. But that is not going to help people with complex mental health issues.”
In specialised areas of practise like forensic or community psychology, the university offerings are even more dire.
“We’re seeing those programs close one after another. Some of these postgraduate programs only have one left in the country, and we’re losing them,” she said. “It’s almost impossible to get in.”
According to the University Admissions Centre, psychology postgraduate courses topped the preferences in NSW and the ACT, taking five of the top 12 courses. This included the first and second most lucrative offerings.
Provisional psychologist and forensic psychology student Nita Roschanzamir was locked out of her masters and PhD in psychology despite securing dual scholarships for her research.
“I fell in love with psychology in high school, and with what makes people the way they are,” Ms Roschanzamir said.
The 27-year-old successfully enrolled in UNSW’s Bachelor of Psychology, before passing her honours with a 90 per cent assessment average.
When she applied for the Master’s and PhD combined program, she secured both the government Research Training Program scholarship and a Westpac Future Leaders scholarship.
“This was like $200,000 worth of scholarship money. That’s highly competitive to get,” she said. “But when I applied for UNSW, I didn’t get in, because that year, they were only taking six students out of about 800.
“I just had to keep trying year after year. I tried for three years.”
She now works in provisional psychology, a more restricted profession, and warns aspiring students of the slim prospects.
“It’s just become harder, and harder, and harder to get in,” she said. “I’ve spoken to so many people in the university sector … about this issue, and they’re all on the students’ side.
“They want to admit these students, and they feel like they’re making a decision between a rock and a hard place.”
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Backlash over proposed Tasmanian wind farm’s toll on eagles
Greenies are NOT onservationists. They are just a crazy Leftist religion bent on maximum disruption and destruction
Tasmania’s approval of a major wind farm, despite the proponent’s projections it could kill up to 81 endangered eagles, has prompted calls for federal intervention.
The proposed 300-megawatt St Patricks Plains wind farm – comprising 47 turbines 231m high in Tasmania’s Central Highlands – was on Monday approved by the state’s Environment Protection Authority.
However, opponents on Tuesday flagged a potential legal challenge and urged Environment Minister Tanya Plibersek to block the project, given the likely impact on the endangered Tasmanian wedge-tailed eagle.
According to the EPA, proponent St Patricks Plains Wind Farm, owned by Korea Zinc, estimates the blades will kill on average two eagles a year, or 41 to 81 eagles across the farm’s 30-year lifespan, based on mitigation reducing 58.5 per cent of collisions.
The proponent argues its use of technology to halt turbines when eagles approach could further improve collision reduction to 85 per cent, and the total number of deaths to between 11 and 33.
However, eight eagles have been killed at the neighbouring Cattle Hill Wind Farm in the past four years, despite the use of the same IdentiFlight collision-avoidance technology.
“IdentiFlight represents an unreliable technology,” Victoria Onslow, of the local No Turbines Action Group, told The Australian.
St Patricks Plains project spokeswoman Donna Bolton said “learnings” from Cattle Hill had improved IdentiFlight’s effectiveness, and these would help keep eagle mortalities at her wind farm to “the lower end” of the modelling.
The EPA imposed a $100,000 “offset” to be paid for each eagle fatality, but opponents questioned how many eagles would be found by monitoring, as well as the morality of the arrangement.
“The sacrificial slaughter of birds … is an unethical bounty monetising the environment,” Ms Onslow said. “Developers should instead avoid high-density eagle sites.”
It is a view shared by eagle experts, who have repeatedly called for wind farms to be built in lower-density eagle areas.
The EPA said the St Patricks Plains wind farm site had a “very high” presence of wedge-tailed eagles: about 40 birds, and 17 nests across the site or within 1km of its boundary.
It is estimated only 220 Tasmanian wedge-tailed eagle breeding pairs remain, and there are fewer than 1000 birds overall.
Experts warn there is insufficient consideration for the cumulative impact of multiple wind farms and fear Tasmania’s “wind rush” poses a “major threat” to the species’ survival.
Ms Onslow said a third wind farm for her area – the 58-turbine Bashan Wind Farm – was only 10km away from the St Patricks Plains site.
Ms Bolton said the St Patricks proponent, also known as Ark Energy, had “worked hard to avoid and minimise potential impacts to eagles”, reducing the number of turbines from an original 67 to 47.
“The latest technology and proactive avoidance have been combined to achieve the least impact possible to eagles and other threatened species while still delivering the new renewable energy generation that Tasmania needs,” Ms Bolton said.
The EPA acknowledged cumulative impacts “may be significant” and a lack of certainty over “the number of mortalities that can be considered acceptable”.
“However, the measures and conditions proposed are considered precautionary and sufficient to minimise eagle deaths to a level unlikely to have a significant impact,” it said.
Collision with electricity infrastructure, poisoning and shooting, as well as habitat loss due to logging and land clearing, are blamed for the decline of wedge-tailed eagles.
Ms Plibersek declined to comment but her department said it was reviewing the EPA assessment report. Ms Plibersek is not bound by the state decision and must make her own decision under federal environmental law.
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Reason counts for nothing in Labor’s blitz on international students
Chinese students in particular are gold in many ways so Albanese has been doing a bit of foot-shooting in this matter
If reason counted for anything the Albanese government would pull the political blinkers from its eyes, take a look at the dire economic and educational consequences of its mission to decimate Australia’s international student industry, and rapidly reverse course.
But reason counts for nothing because, instead of examining the issue with a clear mind, it is tripling down, driven by a perceived political need to head off a Coalition attempt to paint Labor as weak on migration in the coming federal election campaign.
Last week came the third major intervention designed to scare away international students. The government raised the student visa application fee from $710 to $1600. The disincentive impact of this 125 per cent fee hike is magnified by the fact that the fee is non-refundable when a visa application is refused.
Since December the government has followed a policy of turning down a higher proportion of student visa applications under criteria that appear arbitrary, rather than using clear guidelines. So for students, the question of whether they are going to have a visa application refused, and lose their $1600 fee, increasingly looks like a lottery.
December’s move was part of the government’s first sally against the education export industry. Apart from upping the rate of visa refusals, the Home Affairs Department also slowed down student visa processing.
The next attack came in the May budget when the government announced it would cap the number of international students and decided to do it in the hardest way possible by applying a different limit to each institution and reserving for itself a power to limit numbers by location of campuses and by individual courses.
Education Minister Jason Clare will only wield this power if the government manages to pass legislation, which is currently before a Senate inquiry and must pass the Senate to be enacted.
At this point we need to remind ourselves of the size of the education export industry. International students spent $49bn in Australia in the year to March 2024.
They not only spend on tuition fees (where it directly supports education jobs) but also on accommodation, food, transport and other living expenses, which directly boosts the economy. The Business Council of Australia pointed out last week that international students were responsible for nearly a quarter of Australia’s economic growth in the year to the March quarter.
The only rational part of the government’s international student policy is the necessary crackdown on dodgy colleges and education agents, which used the return of students after Covid to exploit loopholes in the system to bring in non-genuine students seeking only to work in Australia.
But the rest of it is purely political, placing what Labor sees as an election imperative before responsible policy. It is having a devastating impact on universities. Institutions with high numbers of richer Chinese students, who are of lower visa risk, are relatively protected under the government’s new policies. But other universities are not. “Three-quarters of the sector is seriously underwater,” says RMIT vice-chancellor Alec Cameron.
He says the post-Covid return of international students was very uneven across universities. “Higher enrolment (of international students) is concentrated in a very small number of universities. Most universities are not back to their pre-Covid numbers,” Cameron says.
Much depends now on whether the government’s international student caps legislation passes the Senate.
Trying to apply different caps to different institutions is a cumbersome policy that is administratively nightmarish. As ANU higher education researcher Andrew Norton says in his blog, even the Home Affairs Department and the Australian Skills Quality Authority, which regulates vocational education, are pointing out the difficulties of implementing the caps in their submissions to the Senate inquiry.
It doesn’t look remotely possible to implement caps before the election, after which the political motive for them is lost. For this, and other reasons, the government has to change course.
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Woolworths to stock Aussie flags just months after Australia Day controversy
Woolworths will put Australian flags back on shelves, just months after the supermarket giant chose not to stock Australia Day merchandise.
Woolworths revealed it will make Aussie flags available to customers ahead of the Paris Olympics and Paralympics.
“With the 2024 Paris Olympic Games beginning later this month, and as a proud Australian retailer, we are pleased once again to be the official Fresh Food Partner of the Australian Olympic & Paralympic teams,” Woolworths said in a statement to staff.
“Given the Australian flag is the official flag of the Australian Olympic Committee and of our team competing in Paris, a locally made handheld Australian flag, made from long lasting materials such as timber and polyester, will also be available for customers to purchase across our Supermarkets and selected Metro stores.”
Woolworths went on to announce flags will now be regularly available for customers, with the supermarket deciding to bring the item in “all year round”.
“Once available in store the locally made handheld flag will be available to purchase all year round from the general merchandise section and also online,” the statement said.
“Locally made handheld Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander flags will be available for purchase later this year.”
The move comes six months after Woolworths dumped all Australia Day merchandise from stores across the nation, sparking outrage from customers.
In the statement sent to stores across the country, Woolworths said it acknowledges it “disappointed many” when it chose not to sell Australia Day merchandise in January.
“We have listened and accepted that, as a proud Australian retailer, that many in the community expected us to offer customers the choice of purchasing the nation’s flag when shopping with us,” the statement read.
At the time, a Woolworths Group spokesperson said a “gradual decline” in demand for the merchandise over the years and a “broader discussion” about the January 26 date and “what it means” to different parts of the community.
Woolworths has also revealed it will be releasing a limited edition range of “Green and Gold” bakery products as part of the store’s Olympics festivities.
The range will include yellow doughnuts with green sprinkles, green and gold cupcakes and a “smash cake”.
For every product purchase in the new bakery range, $1 will go towards supporting Paralympics Australia.
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Australia Appoints Jewish ‘Special Envoy’ to Combat Antisemitism Amid Israel-Hamas War
Jillian Segal is an exceptionally distinguished person but one would have thought that someone more neutral than a Jew would be a more effective mediator. Is this just a sop to the Jewish community? Sounds like it. They won't be deceived
The Albanese government has announced a special envoy to combat antisemitism amid the Israel-Hamas war in the Middle East.
The appointment of Jillian Segal comes after months of pressure from the Opposition to do something about antisemitism in Australia.
Since the Israel-Hamas conflict ignited on Oct. 7, Jewish communities in Australia have faced antisemitic phrases at protests, including “From the river to the sea, Palestine will be free.”
The government highlighted that it is continuing to “press for a ceasefire” and has advocated for a two-state solution at the United Nations.
Given the conflict in the Middle East’s deeply affected communities nationwide, the federal government is touting Ms. Segal’s appointment to ensure Australians feel safe and included.
Prime Minister Anthony Albanese and Immigration Minister Andrew Giles noted every Australian, regardless of their race or religion, should feel safe and at home in any community, free from prejudice or discrimination.
Mr. Albanese said there is no place for “violence or hatred” of any kind in Australia.
“Australians are deeply concerned about this conflict, and many are hurting. In times like this, Australians must come together, not be torn apart,” Mr. Albanese said.
“We have built our nation’s social cohesion together over generations, and this is why we all must work together to uphold, defend and preserve it.”
Mr. Albanese added that the appointment is critical to ease tensions in Australia amid the “devastating conflict” in the Middle East.
Albanese Pushes Back on Judicial Inquiry
In response to questions from reporters about the need for a judicial inquiry into antisemitism, Mr. Albanese said, “You don’t need an inquiry to know there has been a rise in antisemitism at some of the universities.”
“What we are doing is acting, appointing an envoy. We are very clearly aware of what has occurred.”
Ms. Segal’s background includes serving as former President of the Executive Council of Australian Jewry (ECAJ) and as chair of the Australia-Israel Chamber of Commerce.
Current ECAJ President Daniel Aghion expressed strong support on an Australian envoy in response to an “unprecedented surge” of antisemitism since Oct. 7, 2023.
“These developments have threatened the safety and security not only of Australia’s Jewish community but also of Australia as a whole and its future as a peaceful, free, cohesive, and tolerant multicultural society,” he said.
“We have seen antisemitism rear its ugly head on Australian campuses, in schools, in the media and social media, in the arts and culture sector and other parts of society.”
He said a special envoy will provide the policies, legislative proposals, and programs to address antisemitism and counteract the harms and social divisions it causes.
“We are delighted that Jillian Segal AO has been appointed to this important position. She will bring deep knowledge of the issues and immense energy to the role, and we are confident that she will carry out her duties with integrity and distinction,” Mr. Aghion said.
Liberal Jewish MP Julian Leeser Calls for Investigation
Jewish Liberal Member for Berowra Julian Leeser said this appointment is the first thing the government has done in a concrete sense on antisemitism since the conflict began. He believes Ms. Segal should support his calls for the government to hold a judicial inquiry into antisemitism at Australian universities.
Mr. Leeser also urged Ms. Segal to launch and investigation into antisemitism at the Australian Human Rights Commission as well as in politics.
He said the “test for the government is whether they will take action following her advice on these matters.”
Ms. Segal said combating antisemitism in Australia has never been more important than it is today.
“Jewish Australians want to feel free to live their day-to-day lives, and also want to feel safe to practice and express their religion without fear. They also want to be able to contribute as they have previously to the vibrant multicultural society that we value in Australia,” she said.
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9 July, 2024
The theology of gas: LNG bad, LPG good
Keeping up with the Greenie religion
It is a little-known fact that liquefied petroleum gas (LPG) is not included in Victoria’s natural gas (LNG) phaseouts, which means the clean, green gas will play a major role in Australia’s pathway towards net zero carbon emissions.
This is why Brett Heffernan, CEO of Gas Energy Australia, was optimistic about the potential of LPG in powering homes across the country.
“From our perspective, there’s nothing but upside,” he told The Epoch Times. “Not a lot of people know what’s happening in Victoria, and it’s fair to say the Victorian government isn’t singing it from the rooftops.
“But in terms of the ban on new gas connections that came into effect from Jan. 1, LPG is exempt.”
According to Gas Energy Australia’s website, “green gases will transform how we work, relax and play, ensuring families and businesses can continue to reliably and affordably use gas—renewable, zero-emitting gases—to 2050 and beyond.”
The industry already generates over $121 billion (US$81 billion) in economic activity, while fuelling 7 million homes.
LPG differs from liquefied natural gas (LNG) in its composition and contains double the energy content of natural gas, making it cheaper in many cases.
Government’s Bid To Phase Out Natural Gas
The CEO added that state governments—particularly the Victorian government—have “made it pretty clear that they see no future for natural gas in residential and commercial settings.”
“They see natural gas being used purely and simply for industrial uses, and as backup for electricity generation.”
Under the Victorian government’s Gas Substitution Plan, natural gas connections are banned in all new estates from Jan. 1 of this year.
However, the state Liberal opposition criticised this restriction as one that would only add to the national cost-of-living crisis.
“Premier Jacinta Allan and Energy Minister Lily D’Ambrosio are oblivious to the pain of Victorians during the cost-of-living crisis that Labor has made worse,” Shadow Minister for Energy David Davis, said as the new law came in.
“Their new gas plan will hit families and small businesses even harder, forcing up energy costs further, as Victorians pay the price for Labor’s mismanagement.”
What Does LPG Do?
LPG is a fuel gas that contains a flammable mixture of hydrocarbon gases, specifically propane, n-butane and isobutane. It is used in heating appliances, cooking equipment, and vehicles.
Clean, odourless, and colourless, LPG is typically 85-90 per cent methane, which contains less carbon than other forms of fossil fuels.
“And what that means is when you burn it, the only C02 that gets emitted is the C02 that you took out of the atmosphere to make it in the first place,” Mr. Heffernan said.
It Does Have Its Critics
Despite being a source of clean energy, not everyone is convinced that LPG is the way forward to power homes or cars.
Environment Victoria CEO Jono La Nauze stands against all forms of gas usage on Australia’s net-zero journey.
“Pretending gas is a climate solution is a throwback to the Scott Morrison era and is straight out of the gas lobby playbook,” he said in a statement.
“Gas is an expensive disaster for our climate and our health. We already know that burning gas at home has health impacts on the level of second-hand smoke and is responsible for 12 percent of all childhood asthma in Australia.”
While the Climate Council has echoed similar figures and has consistently opposed any future gas development in the country.
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High Taxes Slowing Down Housing Construction
If house prices are so high, why aren’t the private developers out there, with or without government help?
Well, some of them are, but not in the numbers we need when we are importing the equivalent of a Canberra each year.
The reason why they aren’t able to cope, apart from the sheer immensity of the task, is the way states have loaded their tax systems onto the housing sector.
They do this via stamp duty, land tax, and infrastructure charges which interact not just with house prices, but with availability as well.
Some states also tax the uplift in value of rezonings, making it unprofitable to develop.
Stamp duty, which is levied on the value of a house when it is sold, makes it harder for people to buy, and less likely to move once they have.
State governments tend to discount stamp duty for first home buyers, then claw the foregone tax back from second and later home buyers and investors. This discourages down-sizing and moving for work.
Land tax has an impact on development and investment.
It’s an efficient tax and Adam Smith, the father of modern economics, favoured it more than other taxes. But we only levy it on investors, and at high rates, starting at some threshold, generally around the median house price.
For investors, this means that the first rental property they own probably falls below the land tax threshold, but the second one will take them above it. This changes the investment math and discourages landlords from owning more than one property.
If people are going to be renters, they need someone to rent from, but this tax structure encourages that potential landlord to invest anywhere but housing after their first housing investment.
It also penalises developers because it makes the cost of holding land more expensive.
State governments also tend to tax overseas investors more heavily than local ones.
Capital only speaks one language, the language of commerce, and penalising it because it comes from overseas is absurd.
Only Big Developers Stand a Chance
But the really big problem is in infrastructure charges. While infill development—development in existing urban areas—can meet some of the demand, broadscale subdivision is where the real grunt comes from.
The land available for this sometimes comes in very large parcels. North Lakes in Brisbane, for example, was a pine plantation. And sometimes it is fragmented amongst a large number of small landowners.
North Lakes needs a very large developer. The original developer wasn’t large enough, went bankrupt, and almost took his financier Elders Lensworth down with him.
They are now the joint venturer in the project with Stocklands, an even larger developer than the first.
One of the reasons it takes a large developer isn’t just the size of the parcel, but the fact that the state government loads all the infrastructure costs onto the developer—things like upgrading highways, road intersections, water, sewerage, electricity, and social infrastructure.
This adds billions to these large developments that have to be outlaid before a single house block has been sold, so only really large developers can undertake the project, and they have to load the costs onto the house buyers.
If the land is not in large parcels, by definition it is fragmented.
Here the problem is that unless you can amalgamate an impossibly large number of properties, no one can afford to pay for the trunk infrastructure required to unlock the land, so it remains sterilised from development.
These infrastructure costs should be regarded as an investment by the state in the development.
As they are currently structured, the developer passes the cost onto the buyer who pays the capital cost upfront for facilities that they will then be charged a fee, incorporating a provision for depreciation of the asset, which means they pay twice over for using infrastructure.
Our States Must Become Competitive Again
What this country desperately needs is for one state government to implement a revised tax system that doesn’t penalise developers or new home buyers, and returns us to the competitive development markets that we had in states like Queensland as little as 30 years ago.
This would re-introduce competition into the market as smaller developers could compete against mega-developers.
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Labor’s FMA gambit nothing more than crony capitalism ‘on steroids’
Judith Sloan
Last week Jim Chalmers introduced the Future Made in Australia Bill into parliament. It is a cross between Trumpian chest-beating and old-style government picking winners. It smacks of crony capitalism cloaked in an unconvincing rationale about the “global economy being transformed by the net-zero opportunity”.
In reality, most of the FMIA is simply repackaged policies jammed into a box with a new title. The political reality is that one of its main components, the National Reconstruction Fund with its $15bn of funding, was not cutting through with the electorate. There has been so little commercial interest in the NRF, notwithstanding the “free” government money on offer, that the understandably infrequent board meetings were not going to meet the required number of meetings under the law.
While there may be general public support for stuff being made in Australia, the actual content and the speed of delivery of this initiative are likely to leave voters feeling dissatisfied. The Treasurer is kidding himself when he talks about Australia’s advantages of “our industrial resources, skills and energy bases and our attractiveness as an investment destination”.
The truth is that we have high labour and energy costs, our electricity system is becoming unreliable and our resources are hardly unique.
One of our key comparative advantages is the extraction of iron ore, coal and gas, but these commodities are of no interest to the government, although it is happy to receive the tax dollars.
Of course, no one would deny that “the world is changing and the pace of change is accelerating”. But Chalmers needs to keep up with the latest developments before he makes unfounded claims about the potential for renewable energy to form the basis of our future industrial development.
The markets for most critical minerals have tanked recently, particularly nickel and lithium. Green hydrogen is going nowhere overseas and even less so here. All that talk about Australia being a renewable energy superpower is just that – talk.
The balance of overseas developments involves a shifting away from net zero, although there is a noticeable uptick in investment in nuclear energy, something the Albanese government simply refuses to acknowledge.
The conservative opposition in Canada is likely to win the next election and is pledging to rescind its carbon tax. If Donald Trump become US president again, he may seek to withdraw from the Paris climate agreement (again). There will be considerable support for the fossil fuel industry in the US, support that was reduced only marginally under the Biden administration.
Post the EU parliament election, climate policies are being furiously adjusted in several countries, including Germany.
To be sure, the new Labour government in Britain will be full steam ahead with the promotion of renewable energy but the country accounts for an even lower proportion of global emissions than we do.
And, of course, China, India, Russia and most developing countries pay lip service to net zero at best; many simply ignore it. Affordable and reliable energy is a much higher priority than some ephemeral commitment to net zero in several decades.
The Treasurer also appears to be strangely bad at numbers. And the numbers relevant to the FMIA are worth looking at.
For example, in the latest Integrated System Plan released by the Australian Energy Market Operator, it is estimated that an additional 25,000km of high-voltage transmission lines will be required for Australia to become a renewable energy superpower. This is both extraordinarily expensive and impractical.
Then we come to green hydrogen and the scope to make green steel, another pipedream of the government. The numbers simply don’t add up, even though the government has estimated that $6.7bn across 10 years will be spent on production subsidies in addition to $2bn for the “hydrogen headstart” program.
Consider this example. For four million tonnes of green hydrogen to be produced annually at the Gladstone, Queensland hub, 110 gigawatts of renewable energy will be needed. Bear in mind that the total capacity of the entire east coast national electricity market is a tad over 54GW. To achieve this, 10,000 wind turbines will be needed around Gladstone as well as 2500sq km of solar panels. In other words, it ain’t going to happened.
Alan Kohler has also worked the numbers. According to his calculations, “the estimated cost of $670m per year would subsidise 335 million kilograms of hydrogen at $2 per kilogram, which would make five million tonnes of steel requiring eight million tonnes of iron ore. That’s 0.84 per cent of Australia’s iron ore exports … and hardly worth doing.”
The reality is that the early hype of green hydrogen has now died down. The idea that Australia could become a major exporter of green hydrogen is highly unlikely, with the use of intermittent power ill-suited to power expensive equipment 24/7.
The only bit of good news with the FMIA scheme is the expected outlay is just under $23bn across 10 years. By the standards of government programs, this looks relatively modest.
To be sure, there are some serious risks – the uncapped nature of the production subsidies and tax credits is one example.
But the real damage is the message that it sends to investors: don’t bother seeking out profitable opportunities that can meet customers’ needs as well as make money; head for Canberra to seek handouts.
The distortion to the allocation of capital is the real cost of these wrongheaded interventions, a lesson that was learnt in the past (think WA Inc, the Victorian Economic Development Corporation, and so on) but has been unlearnt by the Albanese government.
The initial cabs off the rank under the FMIA are particularly dispiriting, including throwing close to $1bn at a solar panel manufacturing plant in the Hunter Valley. The market for solar panels, which is dominated by China, is extremely competitive and oversupplied, with low or negative returns for operators.
The idea that Australia has a comparative advantage in solar panel manufacturing is completely fanciful.
The decision to spend another $1bn on a US-based infant quantum computing firm is equally depressing. Awarded without any formal competition or explicit guidelines, this grant has all the hallmarks of potential disaster, particularly as we are being told that there may be a few jobs in Queensland but the main benefit will be our right to use the computer, if it ever works.
In a recent article in Nature, it was noted that while “scientists are exploring the potential of quantum machine learning, (it’s unclear) whether there are useful applications”.
The bottom line is that the world may have changed but the economic rules are essentially the same. Offering massive subsidies to selected firms within preferred industries is not a game we should play. The Treasury should be telling the government this, but its officials are strangely silent – even supportive. It is simply not possible for governments to pick winners, but losers are very good at targeting governments.
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‘Curriculum wars’ are distorting history for political advantage
The desecration of the memorials to our fighting men and women in Canberra is a physical manifestation of the broader cultural conflict that is currently afflicting our nation.
The delinquents who committed these acts of vandalism are part of a nihilistic movement that seeks to dismantle the modern state of Australia through activism, statue toppling, and the eradication of a positive narrative about Australia from the history books well as from public consciousness.
One of the main battlegrounds in this conflict is our education system, which has been designed to produce exactly the type of individual who will arm themselves with an angle grinder, don a balaclava and attempt to saw through the ankles of Captain James Cook’s bronze likeness in order to punish him for being a “racist coloniser”.
From childcare onwards, Australian children are being funnelled through a depressing pipeline of propaganda that depicts this country as being racist. Recent research by the Institute of Public Affairs has revealed that the government-mandated Early Learning Framework tells toddlers this nation is so fractured that their role in life is to mend it by being active citizens in the journey of reconciliation.
The Centre for Independent Studies' Peter Kurti says we need to ensure the school curriculum and teaching of history don't try to “sidestep or tear down” our past and identity but help children come to terms with it.
In the syllabus entitled “Belonging, Being & Becoming”, we learn that “early childhood education has a critical role to play in delivering this outcome and advancing Reconciliation in Australia”. It is expected that educators should not only recognise “diversity contributes to the richness of our society and provides a valid evidence base about ways of knowing” but also that “for Australian children it also includes promoting greater understanding of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander ways of knowing and being and actively working towards Reconciliation”.
Educators are also encouraged to decolonise early childhood education. They are to reconsider “education spaces, which focuses on acknowledging colonisation and its continued impacts, while seeking to disrupt and reconceptualise colonial understandings”.
Decolonisation might involve “critically reflecting on existing curriculum, resources and practices, and considering whether they serve to sustain or privilege colonial narratives and how they can be reconsidered to make visible Indigenous and First Nations perspectives”. Toddlers are able to spot the Indigenous and Torres Strait Islander flags at a hundred paces, but they have no idea what that red, white and blue flag is in the corner.
Thanks to the addition of the Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Histories Cross Curriculum Priority in our National Curriculum, the single narrative currently taught to primary and secondary school students is that Australia was founded on racism, and that the arrival of the First Fleet in 1788 resulted in dispossession and genocide.
It is no coincidence that the Acknowledgement of Country ceremonies are becoming more elaborate and increasingly performative by the day. It recently came to light that students in a Sydney primary school start their day by putting their hands on the ground and repeating “always was, always will be Aboriginal land” before each assembly. In a Victorian school it was uncovered that the “Aboriginal national anthem” was being played in lieu of the official version for assemblies.
In our universities, Australian history as a discipline has been enlisted to support political causes by academics. Those who teach at university today seem more concerned with rewriting the past as a way of empowering minorities and the oppressed than they are with constructing a narrative motivated by professional rather than political concerns.
While the abuse of history for political advantage is hardly a new phenomenon, the current movement threatens to destabilise us by undermining our self-confidence. It seeks to divide the community and cast a shadow of doubt about whether we should even exist at all.
There can be no doubt what we are seeing playing out in society is the concerted and energetic efforts of the few to impose their version of history on society. No longer can it be perceived as an expression of concern for the oppressed; the pendulum has now swung too far. Australia is a fundamentally decent and tolerant country, and the narrative of constant racial strife is now being rejected by mainstream Australians who believe there is more that unites us than divides us.
The voice referendum and the backlash against Woolworths’ decision not to stock Australia Day goods earlier this year confirm which side of this conflict the majority of Australians are on. The pushback against the corrosive nature of this movement is only just beginning.
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8 July, 2024
Selective school students were asked if they were satisfied with life. Then they were scored
Hmmm... this is a tricky set of numbers. The first thing you need to know is that happiness levels (aka life-satisfaction) seem to be set at a level which changes little in response to life events -- sometimes amazingly so. To oversimplify a little, you are born sad or born happy and where you are on that continuum never changes much and soon reverts to type. So looking for long-term changes in it is perverse. See:
http://jonjayray.com/happines.html
But what is also true is that amid our general background feelings, we can all experience events which we really like or really dislike. So a much more interesting number would be how many of those events we experience. I think there is no doubt that people from advantagous backgrounds experience many more "like" events and fewer "dislike" events.It's complicated but that's people
Sending a child to selective school makes little difference to their life satisfaction, employment and educational outcomes by the time they reach 25, a major study of Australian pupils has found.
The findings have triggered concerns about the academic segregation of students in selective schools and raised the prospect of rolling them back in a push to make the education system more inclusive and equitable.
The Victoria University study tracked 3000 students over 11 years at three stages, starting when they were 15. It included non-selective and selective school students across a mix of sectors.
Selective school graduates recorded a 0.19 point increase in general life satisfaction at age 25, a figure the report authors deemed insignificant.
“These very modest findings indicate that attending an academically selective school does not appear to pay off in large benefits for individuals,” the report said.
At age 19, 77.6 per cent of non-selective school-educated graduates were either employed or in education, compared to 81 per cent of selective school graduates– but that difference disappeared by age 25. Individuals used for comparison in the study were matched to peers who attended a different type of school but came from a similar social background.
Other research into UK selective grammar schools found employment and life benefits may emerge after age 25, with students who graduate from a selective school more likely to work in a job with higher occupational status, obtain higher level educational qualifications, earn higher incomes and own a home at age 42 compared to government school students.
The research did not measure the prestige of their subsequent university degree, other training or the quality of their employment.
NSW is the selective school capital of Australia, with 21 fully selective and 26 partially selective schools. By comparison, Victoria has four while Queensland and Western Australia have one. Previous research has found selective schools in NSW are dominated by children who come from the country’s most educationally advantaged homes.
The report’s findings prompted the researchers to call for further examination of selective schools in Australia.
“Rather than tweak some aspects of the enrolment processes, we see greater value in conducting a thorough and critical examination of fully and partially selective schools, and scaling back selectivity if the supposed benefits are not found,” it said.
Report author Melissa Tham said applications for selective schools were increasing every year.
“We need a full review of selective education, and we need a critical examination of whether these schools actually improve our students,” Tham said.
“Some could get into a selective school, and then they could go on to get a great ATAR and go on and become a doctor. But you just don’t know whether they would have been able to achieve that if they just went to a regular school.”
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University of Sydney students and staff blast new ‘draconian’ protest crackdown
Academics and students at the University of Sydney have blasted the vice-chancellor for a “draconian” protest crackdown that requires explicit permission for megaphones to be used or posters to be put up on campus.
The policy, quietly introduced last week, demands three days’ notice for demonstrations to be held and approval for putting up “materials, banners or structures” on campus, using megaphones or amplifiers, erecting temporary structures and using cooking equipment.
It follows last month’s dissolution of the university’s pro-Palestine encampment, which was the longest running in Australia and faced sustained criticism from some Jewish groups and the Coalition.
In an email sent to staff on 4 July after the changes were implemented, the vice-chancellor, Mark Scott, said the encampment had “challenged” the university in many ways and ensuring campus was a safe environment was his “top priority”.
“At its core – this policy upholds our commitment to free speech – while recognising we need to be able to manage our environment for the safety and security of all,” he wrote.
“As we engage with each other during times of great challenge and polarity in broader society, it’s important we have the right settings in place.
“The university … will of course continue to support and give permission to activities that contribute to our campus life, including stalls run by USU clubs and societies.”
Open fires, camping, and demonstrations without notice were also banned, as was “any activity that presents an unacceptable health or safety risk” and indoor demonstrations.
Students and staff faced removal from campus or disciplinary action if they didn’t comply with the measures.
President of the university’s branch of the National Tertiary Education Union (NTEU), Nick Riemer wrote to Scott on Saturday warning the branch committee would be meeting imminently to decide ways to respond until the policy was rescinded, adding preliminary advice suggested it may be illegal.
He told Guardian Australia the university was mirroring crackdown on speech that was associated with “authoritarian regimes”.
“Open and unobstructed protest is essential to any functional democratic community, particularly one which is oriented to the creation and promotion of knowledge,” the letter read. “The casualness with which you have just attempted to repress it is, frankly, extraordinary.
“I am giving you notice now that, in the name of the defence of elementary civil liberties, I refuse to be bound by the policy and will ignore it, regardless of the consequences. I know I am far from alone.”
A spokesperson for the University of Sydney told Guardian Australia the institution had a rich history of activism and protest but the campus was “not a camping ground”.
“All students and staff have the right to express themselves freely as long as it’s done safely and in accordance with our policies and the law,” they said.
“We uphold our students’ right to express their opinions in a respectful way and safe demonstrations are still very supported, but this policy makes it clear that our campus is not a camping ground.”
The spokesperson said the university “considered relevant legislation in the updating of this policy which still protects the legal right to protest. We consider the policy to be lawful and appropriate.”
A student at the University of Sydney and member of Students Against War, Jacob Starling, said Scott was “waging a war” on the democratic right to protest and would be challenged.
“This policy must be withdrawn immediately, and if it isn’t withdrawn it must be defied,” he said.
“Students and staff will not be silenced and we will continue to stand in solidarity with Palestine, no matter what draconian policy the university introduces.”
Student Representative Council (SRC) president at the University of Sydney, Harrison Brennan, said the policy was a direct response to the sustained campaign against the university’s ties to weapons manufacturers and Israeli academic institutions.
The university’s encampment was peacefully disbanded last month with some concessions agreed to by Scott. Multiple students were facing disciplinary action for participating in protests, including suspensions for interrupting classes.
Brennan said university campuses “must be places for students to exercise their democratic right to peaceful, lawful protest”.
“This is a repulsive full-scale offensive on the right to protest at the University of Sydney,” he said.
“Students shouldn’t need permission to protest on their own campus. Students shouldn’t need permission to use a megaphone or set up a stall, and students absolutely shouldn’t need permission to challenge their university’s connection to genocide.”
David Brophy, historian of China and Inner Asia at the University of Sydney, said the policy was adopted “without any notice or consultation”.
“[The] new policy … is an astonishing attack on political freedom at the university,” he posted on X.
Greens deputy leader and higher education spokesperson, senator Mehreen Faruqi, called on Scott to reverse the policy.
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A Labor party minister who wants a radical cutback in spending
"Strange new respect" for Bill Shorten
An insurgent campaign by Bill Shorten to repair the National Disability Insurance Scheme has featured Pauline Hanson in a federal minister’s office and the second-ever reference to sex toys in the House of Representatives.
A two-month delay to new laws governing the NDIS stands to cost taxpayers at least $1 billion, with Shorten using his electoral experience to target the Coalition with methods more commonly deployed by an opposition trying to hammer a government.
And it’s a campaign gaining interest from fellow Labor ministers who see it as an alternative way to push back against Peter Dutton and the Greens while achieving their legislative aims.
As MPs and senators left Canberra airport on Thursday night, they caught sight of a truck emblazoned with “Save the NDIS: Put participants first, senators”. It also featured images of Greens leader Adam Bandt, one of his senators, Jordon Steele-John, and Liberal upper house members Linda Reynolds and Maria Kovacic.
The truck, which had driven laps around Parliament House in the morning, capped off Shorten’s week-long effort to get the Senate to consider and pass his bill to overhaul key parts of the NDIS.
The upper house’s community affairs committee earlier this year spent three months examining Shorten’s proposals, which aim to restrict expenditure within the NDIS in areas of questionable merit or for the automatic top-up of support packages.
But in June, thanks to Coalition and Greens senators, another inquiry into the same proposals by the same committee was set up and is not due to report until early next month.
On Monday, he received a formal confirmation note from NDIS actuary David Gifford, noting that by pushing back the new laws until at least August, the cost of the scheme would be $1.06 billion.
Shorten has used that $1 billion cost blowout to target both the Coalition and Greens with methods normally used by an opposition during an election campaign.
That included bringing Hanson, who once declared she did not trust Shorten, to do a joint press conference in his office to press the Senate to pass the NDIS reforms.
“Changes (are) needed to be done and it needs to be cleaned up. And that’s why I’m here talking today and I’m supporting Mr Shorten on this legislation that’s been put forward,” Hanson declared.
Bringing Hanson into the parliament’s ministerial wing was one thing. In the house, Shorten went even harder, explaining the type of services and goods his proposals would stop being funded under the NDIS.
“At the moment, we want to rule out the payment of strata fees; fines; steam rooms; gambling; legal cannabis; cruises; trips to Japan; non-assistance animals; taxidermy; weddings; gift cards; the Liberal favourite, sex toys; crystal therapy; cuddle therapy; clairvoyance and tarot (readings),” he told the parliament.
It was the second time since parliament sat in 1901 that sex toys have been referenced in the House of Representatives. Crystal therapy and taxidermy also debuted because of Shorten’s commentary.
He has also hit the phones of people outside the parliament who hold sway within the Liberal Party, to effectively embarrass their elected representatives into changing tack.
Shorten’s main message is about the cost of a program that threatens to overwhelm the budget.
The NDIS is expected to cost taxpayers $48 billion this financial year, the budget’s third-largest expense behind GST grants to the states and the age pension. Shorten’s measures are aimed at bringing down the annual increase in the cost of the scheme from around 14 per cent to 8 per cent.
If that rate of growth is not reduced, or savings are delayed, there is a substantial future hit to the budget.
The Parliamentary Budget Office has estimated if the cost of the NDIS grows at 9 per cent, rather than 8 per cent, the scheme will cost an extra $19 billion annually by 2034-35.
Shorten says if it continues to grow at 14 per cent, the cumulative total hit to the budget over the next decade will be around $250 billion.
He argues bringing the NDIS under control not only helps the budget, but is a form of micro-economic reform that will deliver benefits to taxpayers, recipients and the broader community.
If he is successful, it also means he has shown parts of the Cabinet that there are different ways to publicly push the government’s agenda.
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Wind droughts
Rafe Champion
Severe wind droughts are prolonged spells with next to no wind across continental areas. They also exist offshore as any sailor who has been becalmed knows full well. Wind droughts will kill the green-power fantasy, and they have the potential to deal a massive blow to our lifestyle, depending as we do on abundant, reliable and affordable power. While meteorologists don’t mention them, independent Australian observers discovered wind droughts over a decade ago but nobody took any notice. We may pay a bitter price for this neglect.
Serious questions have to be asked about the silence of meteorologists on wind droughts. At the same time the responsible authorities should be called to account for their failure to check the wind supply before connecting intermittent energy to the grid.
Why wind won’t work
Wind and solar cannot provide reliable power at grid-scale and the reason is as simple as ABC: Input to the grid must continuously match the demand, and the continuity of wind and solar input fails on nights with little or no wind.
The amount of storage required to bridge the gaps is not feasible or affordable.
Supporters of the transition to intermittent energy invoke a “holy trinity” of strategies to ride through wind drought. These are (1) long-distance transmission lines to shift power from areas of plenty to drought zones, (2) pumped hydro storage, and (3) battery storage.
Long distance transmission lines will not help because wind droughts can extend across the whole of SE Australia. On the other side of the world they have been known to extend across all of western Europe.
Pumped hydro at the scale required appears to be out of the question. There is no substantial pumped hydro scheme in the world that runs on wind and solar power alone.
As for batteries, we read practically every day that more “big batteries” are coming but “big” is an abuse of language in this context because the capacity of even the biggest batteries, like the 1.4GWh Waratah Super Battery in NSW, is negligible compared with the power required in a single night in the grid. That is in the order of 300GWh, while the total capacity of all the battery projects in the pipeline amount to some 60GWh and the batteries at work in the system at present can deliver only 3GWh.
The plan devised by the market operator (AEMO) calls for a ninefold increase in the amount of installed wind and solar capacity, but all that capacity will deliver a pitifully small amount of power on nights with little or no wind. Such nights are the limiting factor for the whole system like the slowest ship in a convoy or weakest link in a chain.
The threat of wind droughts
Subsidised and mandated intermittent energy providers drive out conventional power plants because they can make money when the market price is too low for conventional providers to run profitably. The unreliables can displace conventional power but they can’t replace it! Eventually there will not be enough reliable (dispatchable) power to meet 100 per cent of the demand. At that point, the power supply will be compromised whenever the wind is low overnight.
The day of reckoning has been delayed by the modest increase in demand in recent years due to creeping deindustrialization — directly caused by the increasing cost of power. As the coal generating capacity runs down, the pinch will first occur for a few hours at the dinnertime peak of demand. That can be met using the deceptively named Reliability and Emergency Reserve Trader Scheme (RETS). This sounds like a reserve supply, but it functions by diverting power from major users (with compensation) to protect the integrity of the grid and avoid inconvenience for the community at large. In other words, industrial production stops so he the community’s lights stay on!
If the RETS diversions of supply is not enough, rolling blackouts can be organized to handle the shortfall. As the process goes on, there will eventually not be enough conventional power to service the base load, the minimum that is required day and night. At that point, whenever the wind is low overnight there will be blackouts, and we will officially achieve the status of a Third World country.
Since 2012, 12 coal power stations have closed in South-Eastern Australia, taking out some 8GW of capacity, which in total is down to 22GW. We are now only one coal station closure away from a power crisis whenever the wind is low overnight. The problem surfaced in June 2022 when outages in some coal stations created a crisis that was met by using gas, which spiked the price of gas, and hence the wholesale price of power.
This was seen as a problem with the price of gas, to be solved by government intervention and a price cap. It should have been seen as an early warning of what was coming if the capacity of coal power continued to run down. Gas is too expensive to be used outside peak periods. In addition, there are serious concerns about the availability of gas going forward.
https://quadrant.org.au/opinion/doomed-planet/2024/06/things-that-go-slump-in-the-night/
************************************7 July, 2024
Sex assault law reforms a ‘kangaroo court’ nightmare
Mordecai Bromberg being destructive again
Just when you thought we might not hear any more about the Higgins-Lehrmann scandal, like a bad dream it has come back to haunt us, and if the consequences of the latest episode succeed it will be a real nightmare scenario. There are attempts afoot to drastically change the onus of proof in sexual assault cases, so the defendant’s right to a fair trial will be compromised. As reported in The Australian (25/6), Australian Law Reform Commission president Mordecai Bromberg and commissioner Marcia Neave announced that the wide-ranging ALRC inquiry instigated by Attorney-General Mark Dreyfus into sexual assault laws might “deal with every issue” arising from the Higgins-Lehrmann case and “examine using” ‘civil remedies’ with a lower standard of proof” to satisfy complainants in rape and sexual assault cases.
This is a disastrous idea. It would result not only in negation of the rights of the accused but also no real justice for the complainant, who deserves to have rape treated as what it is: a serious crime. As Chris Merritt said on Sky News last week: “Rape is not simply a dispute between two individuals”, as is a civil case. Inevitably, using a civil standard of proof will result in unsatisfactory outcomes, as it has for Bruce Lehrmann, now branded a rapist after a defamation trial. Without the thorough standard of proof required in a criminal trial we can expect more people to be branded guilty of rape and sexual assault.
Dreyfus’s inquiry has been largely kept under the public radar. However, there are some genuine questions to be asked about whether the conviction rate in rape is too low and whether complainants are treated fairly. As for numbers of convictions, we also see the number of poor cases and false accusations. Five NSW judges have complained about the numbers of hopeless cases coming before them. Of course, one way to have few convictions is to run hopeless cases, especially in sex assault.
The report of a national ministerial-level roundtable meeting on justice responses to sexual assault convened by Dreyfus last August canvassed these issues, and features prominently in the inquiry’s terms of reference. Attendees included ministers Katy Gallagher, Amanda Rishworth and 22 non-government organisations, all from the feminist spectrum; throughout the report complainants, even future notional complainants, are referred to as “victims and survivors”.
The roundtable had some radical, even bizarre recommendations for “reform” in matters ranging from the treatment of complainants before trial to the rules of evidence in a trial. Some of the more outlandish suggestions include women-only police stations, police investigations to be “victim-led”; that is, where the investigation is driven by what “justice” looks like for the complainant – apparently, not the accused. The participants also called for the establishment of an independent civil body that conducts investigations and may reinterrogate investigations conducted by police. The treatment of defendants was also discussed, with the suggestion that the possibility of not just good character references for defendants to be produced, but bad character references too.
However, the most radical proposition is this: “The need for the inquiry to consider overhauling longstanding legal principles where needed.” This includes the defendant’s right to silence. It also includes “special” courts or tribunals for sex assault cases, which would do away with a jury and replace it with a judge and a person with “expertise” in the area. Is this the civil model – or a kangaroo court? None of this can be taken lightly given the weight Dreyfus has placed on the roundtable.
Despite the relentless left-wing, feminist, almost 50-year push to change the nature of procedure and evidence in rape trials to get more convictions, many procedurals and some difficult evidentiary issues arising from rape and sexual assault have already been dealt with. For example, much of a woman’s past sexual history, once used to besmirch her reputation and downgrade her complaint, is now inadmissable. The brutality of cross-examination has been softened and some suggestions at the roundtable would soften it further.
Some of the changes, such as the watering down of consent to the point that no one is sure if or how consent can be confirmed, are simply useless. Saxon Mullins is a director at Rape and Sexual Assault Research and Advocacy, a group represented at the roundtable. Mullins was a complainant in a high-profile rape case that ultimately failed at appeal over the issue of consent. Mullins’ views on “genuine” and “not genuine” victims are instructive. According to her, it is a false idea. “I find that so offensive … If somebody feels that they are a victim of sexual violence, they are.” And as for false claims of sexual assault: “I think this idea of false claims is so overblown. They are tiny when compared to the actual number of people who experience sexual violence in Australia.”
Feminists don’t do their cause much good to downgrade a crime by denying false or exaggerated claims or making up statistics. Nor is downgrading of evidentiary standards and the presumption of innocence for the accused a good idea. Yet feminists are not worried that this will corrupt the right to a fair trial for any crime, not only rape. The erosion of the presumption of innocence is an important issue, no matter who you are. For that reason, a public conference will be held in Sydney in August, hosted by Australians for Science and Freedom:
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The payoff from Payman
I don’t care about the political future of Fatima Payman. She’s a nobody junior senator from Western Australia, was third on the Labor ticket for that state, whom most of us had never heard of before she quit in a storm of teary petulance over the issue of Palestinian statehood.
Now? She’s launched an almighty rocket into the ALP and its parliamentary agenda, returning the gift of preselection with both the destabilisation of the government’s agenda and the spectacular undermining of an already weak Prime Minister. Add to that, her name is stuck in my head like the theme song from The Love Boat. Honestly? I could do without that.
While others are dissecting the politics of what’s happened and what her stunt means for the government and for the Labor Party, I want us to consider what this little episode in self-indulgent petulance means for the rest of us.
Payman was elected to represent the people of Western Australia and advance their cause in our federal parliament. She is an elected and paid public servant (like the rest of them) of the people of Australia. Would that they all remember this.
She tearfully told the media that she is “the true voice of West Australians”. That she is speaking for them. The chutzpah of such a statement? Senator Payman, where were you during the vote on the live export industry this week, the results of which will spell disaster for much of rural WA? That’s right, you were missing in action. You didn’t vote. You abstained. So the people of Western Australia were without your apparently indispensable voice this week.
Senator Payman’s behaviour is a great example of what happens when you don’t discipline kids. It’s also an example of what happens when you preselect kids. She spoke of not having a “support person” when going to see the Prime Minister. The embarrassing immaturity of such a statement.
Payman chooses to come in on a wrecking ball over an issue about foreign statehood for a people that has no bearing or relevance to the day-to-day lives of the people she is paid to serve.
I will labour that point, because it’s the substantive one.
Her role is not to enjoy flights of fancy on single issues on foreign soil. He role isn’t to attempt to make a name for herself politically, consulting as it’s been reported that she has with so-called preference whisperer Glenn Druery in order to seek more influence than she deserves or should carry.
Again, this is all about an attempt to engineer a policy outcome that has zero impact or benefit for the people of Western Australia, or the rest of us.
Whether or not you like the government’s agenda (and spoiler alert, I’m not a huge fan), they were voted in to do a job. And now, that job is parked out the back while a baby senator has her moment in the sun.
As an aside, Labor’s response was entirely expected if not so late as to be damaging. You join a party that has bonded voting? Then you know the rules of the game. Payman has cried victim. They’re freezing me out, it’s because I’m a woman of colour.
Her posture and her comments are an insult to every one of us whose families have fled other countries to start a new life in Australia, who came here with nothing. Spare us, senator. You are no victim. If you can’t take the hits, get out of the game.
For the rest of us, frustrated, maligned voters, increasingly weighed down with the cost of living and by the apparent indifference to all of this carry-on, high levels of political disengagement make sense.
But that doesn’t mean it makes good sense for us. There is a price for everything. There is just as much a cost for inaction as there is for the decisions we make. Possibly more. Evil flourishes when good people do nothing.
People are talking a lot about the Quiet Australians; maybe you consider yourself one of them. But is being quiet the answer this hour requires?
I don’t think it is.
I think now is the time to be heard. I have stirring inside me the belief that now, more than ever, those of us who might have previously tuned in, turned on and dropped out need to do the opposite.
When you take a step back and consider some of the absolute nonsense that gets tolerated simply because most of us just want to go about our days and our lives, it’s almost a collective dereliction of duty.
It might surprise you to know that I’m not a member of any political party. I’d never been to a rally of any kind until October 7. That was my tipping point. The burning Israeli flag and chants of what many still believe was “gas the Jews” on the steps of the Opera House. It was the full revelation of the depth of anti-Semitism in academia and sections of politics and media. The hate-filled terror apologists who crawled out like cockroaches from under rocks. That was my tipping point. That was what prompted me to step up and speak out. What’s yours? Find it before it’s too late.
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Media Watch Dog: ABC’s lack of viewpoint diversity – another blatant example
As avid Media Watch Dog readers know, the ABC is a Conservative Free Zone without one conservative presenter, producer or editor for any of its main news and current affairs programs. ABC management denies this – but no one has been able to name even one conservative in such a role.
By and large it is producers, not presenters, who determine what talent will be invited onto ABC programs. Take ABC TV News Breakfast, for example. It runs a Newspapers segment which is devoid of input from political conservatives while finding time to hear from many left-of-centre types.
For example, personnel from the avowedly leftist Guardian Australia get a gig along with personnel from the avowedly leftist The Australia Institute. But conservative types from the Menzies Research Centre, the Institute of Public Affairs and the Robert Menzies Institute are not invited.
The leftist Australia Institute/ABC Entente was in action again on Friday 5 July when Ebony Bennett, the Australia Institute deputy director, commented on the morning’s print and online newspapers.
As is her wont, she said what should be in the newspapers – rather than commenting on what was in them.
Early on, Comrade Bennett re-interpreted an article in the Courier Mail to bag its story on the importance of the coal industry to the Australian national economy. She declared it was a “puff piece” and blamed the Queensland coal industry for extreme weather in Queensland. Ignoring the fact that Australia is responsible for just over one per cent of global emissions.
Then Comrade Bennett commented that Senator Fatima Payman was “resigning from the Labor Party really over the issue of genocide in Gaza as she described it”. Ms Bennett provided no evidence of genocide in Gaza.
Then co-presenter Michael Rowland felt it was time to declare that News Corp newspapers certainly do not have the influence they had years ago. Whereupon Comrade Bennett concurred “That’s absolutely right”. Which make you wonder why she bothers to get up early in the morning to discuss newspapers on the taxpayer funded public broadcaster.
MWD has no problem with Comrade Bennett running political lines on the ABC. The problem is that the ABC does not provide alternative views. This is another example of the ABC’s lack of viewpoint diversity.
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Private hospitals in trouble
The country’s largest operator of non-profit private hospitals has declared the crisis in private health is crippling its ability to care for patients as it threatens to walk away from negotiations with one of Australia’s biggest health funds.
St Vincent’s Health Australia blindsided health insurance giant NIB on Thursday when it took its contract fight to the public arena and warned that the health fund’s 1.3 million members may no longer be able to use their hospital cover for surgery at the non-profit group’s 10 hospitals across NSW, Victoria and Queensland.
The unprecedented move would leave those with NIB hospital cover unable to use their policy to cover the costs of surgery at 10 private hospitals operated by St Vincent’s after October unless the stalemate can be resolved.
Many of the hospitals, including St Vincent’s Private in inner Sydney, the Mater on Sydney’s north shore, St Vincent’s Private Hospitals in Fitzroy in East Melbourne, and St Vincent’s Private Hospitals at Kangaroo Point and Northside in Brisbane, are well-known as facilities of excellence where some of the country’s most skilled and in-demand surgeons run operating lists.
Amid crumbling viability in the private health sector, St Vincent’s Health Australia chief executive Chris Blake said the group had asked NIB for a fair funding agreement that recognised the rising costs of providing private hospital care but alleged it had been rebuffed.
“NIB has not put a fair offer on the table and has closed the door on any reasonable proposal from St Vincent’s,” Mr Blake said.
If the stalemate cannot be resolved, after October NIB members having surgery at St Vincent’s hospitals will fall under the second-tier default benefits scheme, in which NIB would only have to fund 85 per cent of the patient’s hospital costs. That could leave the average hip replacement patient having to pay a bill of more than $4000.
The stoush comes as the sustainability of private hospitals is currently being examined by a federal health department rapid viability review. About 70 private hospitals have closed over the past five years, many private maternity and psychiatric wards are currently sitting idle, rehab facilities have closed, and many more entire hospitals are on the brink of bankruptcy.
“There is a crisis in private healthcare in Australia,” Mr Blake said. “The reality is private hospitals are failing.
“The long-term issue is that the system itself is within years of being unfundable. If one part of the system fails, we all fail. The last thing St Vincent’s wants to do is end up in a situation where we are going out of contract with insurers, it’s an absolute last resort, and the proof of that is that we’ve never done it before. But the best outcome for us in this negotiation doesn’t even cover our costs.”
If the contract lapses, it will not be the first time customers of a health fund have had to rely on the default benefit scheme safety net because their insurer’s agreement with a hospital has been ripped up.
But it is an extremely concerning development for the industry that a not-for-profit hospitals provider – which is attempting only to cover its costs where making a profit is not a consideration – should deem the contract negotiations so unfair it was willing to abandon them.
NIB chief executive Mark Fitzgibbon issued a short statement in response to St Vincent’s position, saying “NIB has a long partnership with St Vincent’s, is sympathetic to St Vincent’s financial position, and that of other private hospitals, and has made a very fair and reasonable offer to St Vincent’s”.
“It’s disappointing they have elected to argue their position publicly,” Mr Fitzgibbon said. “But we will continue discussions with them, noting that our partnership has several months remaining.”
The Australian Medical Association said the dispute highlighted the need for an independent regulator for the private health system.
“Disputes like this should never be allowed to happen,” said AMA president Steve Robson.
“Australians pay their health insurance premiums in good faith and rightly expect to be able to use their policies when they need them.”
Private Healthcare Australia chief executive Rachel David warned against that call and criticised the tactic of taking the negotiations public.
“There’s no suggestion that patients are going to be penalised at any level,” Dr David said.
“I think part of this is designed to put some political pressure on the government to undertake some kind of intervention. I also don’t think that’s appropriate. I think the sector needs to show that it can manage within its means and deliver a product that’s value for money for consumers.”
Private hospitals have not yet recovered from the severe impacts of the Covid-19 pandemic, with the benefit payments being provided to operators under contracts with private health insurers lagging well below health inflation and the rising costs of staff and equipment.
The private hospitals industry as a whole is operating on a profit margin of just 1 per cent while insurer profits have been rising year on year.
Newcastle Business School professor Francesco Paolucci, an expert in healthcare systems, said the breakdown in a crucial contract negotiation between a big insurer and private hospitals operator was predictable amid the multiple pressures on Australia’s public-private health system model.
“This outcome is not surprising,” Professor Paolucci said. “We are going to see more of this. The problem that we currently have is we have a system that is fragmented, with a number of stakeholders involved in funding something that needs co-ordination and integration, which is the purchasing of healthcare.”
Parties to contract negotiations never reveal the numbers on the table, but a general guide is that offers by insurers often tend to broadly align with their latest approved premium increase.
For NIB, that was 4.1 per cent, one of the largest increases of all funds, and well above the industry average rate rise of 3.03 per cent. The health fund paid out only 79 per cent of its premium revenue of $1.9bn in the 2022-23 financial year, and its management expenses were 12.3 per cent.
Catholic Healthcare Australia’s director of health policy, Katharine Bassett, said St Vincent’s was justified in its stance.
“It is totally unacceptable for insurers to put the squeeze on patients and hospitals while increasing their large profit margins and bank balances,” Dr Bassett said.
“Today, St Vincent’s is rightly taking a stand against insurer power and greed. Other hospitals may need to do the same.
“While it’s St Vincent’s and NIB today, it could be another hospital and insurer tomorrow as funding from insurers has not kept pace with the rising costs of delivering care.
“Insurers have been banking record profits while returning less to patients and hospitals. We’ve reached the breaking point.”
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4 July, 2024
Single happy photo of freed Jarryd Hayne posing with his wife and lawyers sparks a furious war of words - as his high-profile barrister staunchly defends her client
I am glad to see a high profile defence of the man. Ever since the Barry Mannix case in 1984, I have always taken a particular interest in miscarriages of justice and false accusations. I have previously argued that Hayne was a victim of a false rape accusation:
https://australian-politics.blogspot.com/2024/06/was-footballer-jarryd-hayne-victim-of.html
Jarryd Hayne's barrister has become embroiled in a furious LinkedIn row where she launched an extraordinary attack on his rape accuser and defended the rugby league star's character.
Margaret Cunneen SC shared a celebratory image of Hayne, 36, with his wife Amellia Bonnici and solicitor Lauren McDougall to LinkedIn last week, with the group posing in front of the Sydney Harbour Bridge.
In her caption, Ms Cunneen celebrated 'justice at last' - after the NSW Court of Criminal Appeal quashed his rape conviction - and described the freed former Parramatta Eels star as a 'fine and decent man'.
But that did not go down well among some members of Ms Cunneen's professional network, with another senior lawyer, former barrister Michael McDonald, furiously objecting to the veteran barrister's characterisation of Hayne.
Mr McDonald said that he was pleased Hayne's 'appeal has been upheld and hope the persecution of him is finally over.'
But, he added: 'Respectfully, 'fine and decent' men do not engage in the type of conduct in which Jarryd Hayne engaged.'
Ms Cunneen fired back: 'You don't know what happened'.
She then went on to claim the footballer's trousers were unopened during his ill-fated encounter with his female accuser at New Lambton, in Newcastle, in 2018.
Mr McDonald was referring to Hayne's conduct on the night which resulted in his being charged with rape.
Hayne's criminal trials were told that he paid a taxi driver $550 to wait 46 minutes while he went into a house to have sex with a young woman.
The encounter resulted in three rape trials, two convictions and 23 months' jail time. Both convictions were eventually overturned, the latest last month.
One of the three NSW Criminal Court of Appeal judges who heard Hayne's appeal, Justice Deborah Sweeney, was opposed to putting the case before another jury, arguing a fourth trial 'would not be in the interests of justice'.
The DPP decided against running a fourth trial on June 25.
Ms Cunneen specifically thanked Justice Sweeney in her photo, saying Hayne was celebrating 'justice at last'.
But she took a different tone with Mr McDonald. 'You have not seen (the accuser's) fingernails - filed to points more than a bishop's mitre. Total 2 years? Please.'
During Hayne's trials it was alleged the woman was left bleeding after the sexual encounter, and when she complained via text she was 'hurting really badly', Hayne texted back 'go doctor tomorrow'.
Mr McDonald then replied, 'my comment comprises two sentences, let me reverse their order'.
'To be clear, his prosecution has been an absolute travesty and, like in the late Cardinal Pell's case, I was confident that he would eventually be cleared on appeal.
'However, in my humble opinion, a 'fine and decent man'; especially when he is married, and a father, would not have placed himself and his relationship with his wife and children in the place that Jarryd did.'
Hayne was not married to Amellia Bonnici in September 2018 when the 26-year-old woman who accused him of the Newcastle rape claimed she had been sexually assaulted. They were, however, already a couple.
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After A Trillion Tons Of CO2, The Great Barrier Reef Hits Record Coral Cover Third Year In A Row
Written by Jo Nova
Sixty Percent Of All Human CO2 Emissions Have Been Emitted Since 1985 But Today The Corals Are Healthier Than Ever.
In 1985 humans were emitting only 19.6 billion tons of CO2 each year, and now we emit 37 billion tons. In the meantime AIMS have been dragging divers thousands of kilometers over the reefs to inspect the coral cover.
These are the most detailed underwater surveys on the largest reef system in the world, and they show that far from being bleached to hell, the corals are more abundant than we have ever seen them.
As Peter Ridd points out, when the reef was doing badly, AIMS was happy to combine the data on the whole reef, so we could lament its demise.
But lately AIMS splits it into separate sections and if Peter Ridd didn’t check the numbers, who would know it was a record across the full 2,300 kilometer length of the reef?
And that may be exactly the point. As Ridd reminds us, in 2012 the AIMS team predicted the coral cover in the central and southern regions would decline to 5 – 10 percent cover by 2022. Instead the whole reef is thriving at 30 percent.
Meanwhile Preposterous Power Games Continue
UNESCO has been threatening to slap an endangered label on the reef for years. They would have looked ridiculous if they had done this whilst corals were at a record high.
But that didn’t stop them demanding tribute and conditions anyway, as if Australia can’t manage the reef by itself. Our Prime Minister should have laughed at them and cut UN funding until they start making sense.
The UNESCO recommendation that the World Heritage Committee not prescribe the reef as “in danger” at its meeting next month no doubt has come as a big relief for government but it still has plenty of strings attached.
To keep favour with UNESCO, governments must ban all gillnet fishing by mid-2027 and more closely supervise land activities stretching hundreds of kilometres inland from the coastline, and further still from the reef itself. It must also keep the billions of dollars flowing for research and reef management.
Who runs the country, is it our elected government or a foreign committee at the service of third world dictators?
The Greens, unfortunately, still struggle with big-numbers, or any numbers at all:
The Greens say the UNESCO decision is a “triumph of lobbying and spin over science”. “The burning of fossil fuels is literally cooking our oceans and degrading marine ecosystems across the globe, and nowhere else has this been more politicised than on the Great Barrier Reef,” says Greens spokesman Senator Peter Whish-Wilson.
And who is politicizing The Great Barrier Reef more than The hyperbolic Greens themselves? No wonder Greens voters were the most confused in the AEF survey.
Ten years after our corals hit a record low, our survey showed that half the country didn’t realize the reef has recovered. Only 3% knew the corals were at a record high, and nearly half the Green voters were as wrong as they possibly could be — they thought coral cover was at a record low.
The full AIMS report will be released in August. There have been some bleaching events both before and after the survey, and as is normal, we won’t know for months whether any corals actually died or whether it was just the normal home renovation that corals go through when they get stressed.
It’s common for corals to throw out the zooanthellae as temperatures change and let in newer house-guests that are better acclimatized. Since sea levels near Queensland were 1 -2 meters higher 6,000 years ago, and the world was a lot warmer, corals can clearly look after themselves.
As Peter Ridd says the biggest threats to the reef are cyclones and crown-of-thorns starfish plagues, neither of which appear to be any worse now than they were years ago.
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Serious concerns about competence and character of top Aboriginal legal agent
Amid all the concern about domestic violence, he gets convicted of it but with no conviction recorded
The head of Australia’s largest Aboriginal legal service has been condemned by a judge for failing to hold down a job, sparking fresh criticism of his appointment, and raising serious concerns about his competence.
North Australian Aboriginal Justice Agency chair Hugh Woodbury has faced growing calls to step down after The Australian revealed he bashed his pregnant partner by standing on her stomach, pushing her to the ground, slamming her arm in a door and calling her a “c..t” in front of their two-year-old child.
Coalition MPs have also raised questions over whether Mr Woodbury, who handles about $30m in federal government funding a year despite having no official legal qualifications, has the appropriate background to restore the embattled organisation after it was last year forced to suspend services in Alice Springs due to a staff exodus.
In sentencing remarks during Mr Woodbury’s abuse proceedings, Northern Territory local court judge Greg Borchers described Mr Woodbury as “someone who doesn’t stick at jobs”.
“I am not sure how I am to consider that you have had so many jobs, but you have never stayed at one,” Judge Borchers said when sentencing Mr Woodbury in October 2020.
“You come to this courthouse, as you have, Mr Woodbury, almost each and every legal practitioner in this court house has one job, as a legal practitioner. You have had so many jobs and you have never stuck with any, apart from a long period of time with Parks and Wildlife.”
Before working at NAAJA he had spent time managing Aboriginal hostels, working as a fencing contractor, labouring, working in a bank, and held positions within the Federal Circuit and Family Court and the Central Australian Aboriginal Legal Aid Service.
“I don’t know why, but that’s a record of someone who doesn’t stick at jobs,” Judge Borchers said.
Mr Woodbury was fined $200 and sentenced to a 12-month good behaviour bond. No conviction was recorded.
The sentencing remarks revealed Judge Borchers was hesitant to convict Mr Woodbury because “a conviction in itself is a serious sanction and it does have an effect upon people’s futures”.
“I do accept that you may, at some stage, wish to consider entering a legal course,” he said.
He also did not convict Mr Woodbury “because of the attitude to your wife, who says that you are very supportive of her”.
“You are a good father and that you need some help,” he said.
South Australian Liberal senator Kerrynne Liddle criticised the appointment of Mr Woodbury, and said there was an issue within community-controlled organisations where senior management are appointed because of their heritage.
“Indigeneity cannot be the only thing on their CV, or they can’t be appointed just because they happen to be interested in the job or are available,” she said.
“This is about an organisation who is supposed to be helping the most vulnerable people, and they are failing in doing that.”
Senator Liddle called on both the Territory and federal governments to strip funding from the organisation, especially if the current board remained.
“They (the governments) hold the keys to the money, and keep handing over taxpayer money to the organisation,” she said. “Surely in the legislation they have smart enough people to try and find a way to stop taxpayer’s money being handed over to an organisation where there have been issues being raised for long periods of time.”
A NAAJA spokesperson said Mr Woodbury “understands the needs of our communities”.
“He is young, smart, and passionate about empowering Aboriginal communities. We need more young Aboriginal people in leadership roles, not less,” the spokesperson said.
The spokesperson said Mr Woodbury has “extensive experience in the legal and community service sectors in the Territory, having worked as an Indigenous family liaison officer for the Federal Circuit and Family Court of Australia and as a welfare rights officer for the then Central Australian Legal Service”.
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Going AWOL at RIMPAC bares our lack of fight-readiness
The collapse of Australia’s military contribution to the world’s largest maritime exercise has laid bare just how woefully unprepared our current Defence Force is for any serious conflict in the region.
This is a fundamental failure of national security that Australians will have to live with for the next decade. If a conflict should arise in that period, we don’t have enough warships or submarines that work or enough personnel to crew them.
Nothing could more starkly illustrate this new reality than the government’s inability to send more than a single ship, a plane and a handful of personnel to the most critical US-led maritime exercise in our region.
The biennial RIMPAC exercise, which runs for the next month, is by some distance the most important military exercise Australia participates in. Involving 29 nations, 40 surface ships, 150 aircraft and some 25,000 personnel, it is an exercise that China truly hates because it does more than any other to prepare countries across the region to repel any military adventurism from Beijing.
China’s state-run mouthpiece the Global Times fumes that this year’s RIMPAC will “sabotage, not safeguard, peace and stability in the region” because the exercise will practise drills aimed at sinking a Chinese aircraft carrier.
Yet at a time when the Albanese government claims the rise of China has delivered the most frightening strategic outlook in a generation, Australia cannot muster more than symbolic military support for this year’s RIMPAC.
At the last RIMPAC in 2022, we sent 1600 personnel, three warships, a Collins-class submarine, two P-8A Poseidon aircraft and an army amphibious combat group, together with mine warfare and clearance diving teams.
This year we are sending 320 personnel, a single warship, and a single air force P-8A Poseidon maritime reconnaissance aircraft.
In other words, Australia is providing one of the 40 surface ships involved in RIMPAC, just one of the 150 aircraft involved and just 1.29 per cent of the personnel.
It is a shamefully microscopic contribution for a supposed middle power that spends $55bn on defence a year and harbours ambitions to become an operator of nuclear-powered submarines.
When the government was criticised late last year for refusing a US Navy request to send a warship to help defend the Red Sea from attacks by Houthi rebels, it claimed the decision was made because it wanted to focus on security in our immediate region.
No military exercise focuses more specifically on regional security than RIMPAC and Australia is all but AWOL. This is the result of a decade of neglect on defence that has been blighted by inadequate funding, botched projects, delayed decisions on replacing warships and subs and a failure to recruit personnel.
Australia cannot send a sub to RIMPAC because corrosion problems have sidelined three of the navy’s six ageing Collins-class submarines for the rest of the year.
It cannot send an Anzac frigate because they are ageing quickly, forcing the government to mothball one and a second ship in 2026.
The situation will become worse before it becomes better because although the government has announced grand plans for its new AUKUS nuclear-powered submarines and a new fleet of general purpose frigates, none of these will arrive this decade.
Australia has to hold its breath and hope a conflict does not break out soon. Our token contribution to RIMPAC tells regional neighbours we are struggling to pull our weight in our own backyard.
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3 July, 2024
"Divestiture" craziness
Coles and Woolworths are big because they are good at what they do. Nobody forces anybody to walk through their doors. And there is plenty of competition to keep them on their toes in the form of Aldi, IGA, Harris Farms etc
And a split would require two management teams instead of one -- with an increase in costs and a reduction in competence. How is that a win for anyone?
One hopes that these proposals are just hot air. Any political party trying to implement them would make enemies of two very large companies with stores and a voice all over the place. No wonder the ALP is shying away from the idea
Coles and Woolworths would not even have to pay for advertising to voice any concerns they may have. They could just put up signs in their stores! They could reach (say) 90% of voters that way
Peter Dutton and David Littleproud have flicked the switch to the kind of junk policy you’ll usually only find in the Greens’ box of free-market atrocities.
Divestiture – allowing the courts to forcibly break up large corporations or forcing them to sell parts of their business – is really a last-resort option for the worst offences under competition law. Sure, it may grab the headlines and scream “we feel your pain” at the checkout, but it is regulatory overkill and weird for the alleged friends of business.
Last term the Coalition flirted with the populist “big stick” to bring energy companies to heel. The nation needs effective competition policy, not look-at-me populism and big swinging sticks that should be beneath parties that want to form government.
Even those supposedly crazy interventionists in Labor, wanting to pick industry winners and increase the size of Canberra’s footprint in the economy, have been wise to steer clear of such heavy-handed measures.
In this season of persistent high inflation and living-cost squeezes, big retailers, especially Coles and Woolworths, are on the nose, and have been accused of price gouging. Their chief executives have been dragged before show-trial parliamentary inquiries that have been little more than grandstanding opportunities for antagonists such as Greens senator Nick McKim. He has pushed hard for divestiture powers and has even garnered expert opinion and trade unionists to support his case. At the Greens-instigated inquiry into supermarkets in April, former prices and competition tsar Allan Fels backed the introduction of divestiture laws as “sensible” to stop powerful companies misusing market power.
The Coalition has proposed legislation to break up major supermarkets if they seriously break competition laws, according to Sky News Business Editor Ross Greenwood.
“Felsie”, who still loves a camera as much as he adores a stoush with Big Anything, had conducted an inquiry for the ACTU on price gouging and unfair pricing practices. In his report, the former Australian Competition & Consumer Commission chief recommended a power to force divestiture to address market power issues. And it’s true our supermarket sector, with Aldi and Metcash making up the big four, is not as competitive as in larger US and British markets.
But the ACCC is conducting a far-reaching inquiry into the sector and it would have been prudent for the Coalition to wait to see what current trading tsarina Gina Cass-Gottlieb’s troops had recommended.
Labor’s hand-picked expert to review the grocery code of conduct Craig Emerson argued that forced divestiture in the supermarket sector would bring a range of other problems, including even greater market concentration and store closures. The former Labor minister said forced closures could see workers having to find new jobs and lead to inconvenience for shoppers.
For forced divestiture to work as an effective deterrent to anti-competitive behaviour by supermarket chains, the threat would need to be credible.
The pitfalls, as outlined by Emerson, mean divestiture would lack credibility.
Which is the danger Dutton and Littleproud, too, now face with this policy overreach.
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The hidden story behind strong job numbers
Robert Gottliebsen
There is a hidden story behind the surprisingly strong 2024 employment numbers — the driving force behind the vast majority of jobs created is government money rather than private capital.
As I pointed out yesterday, in the US the one constant in the Trump-Biden clash is the days of small government appear to be over — whoever emerges victorious in November.
We might be seeing the same trend developing in Australia and may be looking at the beginning of a fundamental change in western democracies.
I checked the employment trends with one of Australia’s leading employment economists Callam Pickering, the Asia Pacific economist for job site Indeed.
Pickering tells me the number of jobs in Australia has increased by 2.4 per cent over the past year, which is a really strong number at this point in the economic cycle.
The problem is government-aligned industries — namely, healthcare and social assistance; education and training; and public administration and safety — account for around 83 per cent of the increase.
Government-aligned industries aren’t necessarily the public sector, but they all tend to benefit greatly from public spending. It often leaves them less sensitive to market forces than privately funded industries.
And this can make some participants much less motivated by productivity.
Pickering says private sector trading conditions have deteriorated but the deterioration is being hidden to some extent by ongoing strength in government-aligned industries.
To illustrate, the ANZ-Indeed job advertisements index fell 2.2 per cent in June and is down 17.6 per cent over the year.
Job advertisements dropped in June on the back of lower demand for cleaners, tradies and food service workers — all occupations dominated by the private sector.
Large and small corporations around Australia have been looking very hard at their cost structures and many have started, or are planning, major restructures to reduce costs.
In the private sector there is still widespread ignorance about the enormous changes required to implement the industrial relations act, which comes into operation on August 26.
Given the looming Federal election, unions may restrain their greatly increased powers until after the polls
One of the biggest changes to the rules covers casual labour and will impact both employers and employees.
Pickering says around three-quarters of the jobs which make up the rise in employment over the past year have involved part-time employment. In 2022, the jobs boom was full-time driven.
So, while the Australian economy continues to create a lot of jobs and overall employment growth is still strong, it isn’t necessarily creating the same high-quality jobs as earlier in the pandemic recovery.
The figures do not differentiate between casual work and part-time employment.
In the case of casual work, employees do not get holiday pay and a number of other benefits, but to compensate they receive a 25 per cent premium on their take-home pay.
With so many Australians under mortgage and rent stress the 25 per cent cash premium has caused many to shift to casual work — it’s the only way they can meet their rent and mortgage obligations. And, of course, many have taken on a second job on a casual basis.
The industrial relations act has a long, complex definition setting out the circumstances which give rise to a person being entitled to take casual work.
After August 26 most employers will continue the casual employment relationship because it boosts productivity by providing flexibility — and employees need the cash.
But, employers are taking a big risk because if it is found their employee did not fit the complex definition to gain a casual employment entitlement, there will be employer penalties.
At this stage it is not known what those penalties will be and how the courts will interpret the act. But, employing people on a casual basis after August 26 will be a very high risk activity. Those who are struggling to pay their mortgage or rent will not be happy if they discover an ALP Prime Minister has forced them to take less cash each week.
They will probably blame their employer.
Some of the anger may erupt before the election and it may even impact the result, although in this area the Coalition are asleep at the wheel.
Meanwhile, in the US and Australia, we are watching a society unfold which has a much greater government sector and the sector might be a lot less productive than in previous generations.
It will mean interest rates are likely to stay higher longer than many economists are forecasting.
The potential game changer is, of course, artificial intelligence, which if developed correctly will create skills which replace large areas of ‘white collar’ jobs.
Artificial intelligence is not there yet, but it has the potential to reverse the current employment trend and lower inflation and interest rates. But, this will come with a nasty impact on many parts of the population.
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Unvaccinated Police In Australia Fired Two Years After Covid Mandates Dropped
Two years after the Covid mandates ended, the West Australian Police Force has fired nearly 20 unvaccinated police officers and public servants for refusing to get the jabs.
A legal challenge against the mandates, brought by WA Police officer Ben Falconer and staff member Les Finlay, had previously secured an injunction preventing the force from firing unvaccinated staff until the matter had been settled in the courts.
However, a Supreme Court ruling that then-WA Police Commissioner Chris Dawson’s Covid vaccination directive was “valid and lawful” brought an end to the injunction in April. WA Police announced the resumption of disciplinary action against 17 affected employees immediately after the hearing, with all 12 police officers and five staff having now been sacked.
Falconer was the last to be formally notified of his dismissal on Friday, for disobeying the Commissioner’s vaccination directive. Despite no prior history of disobedience, Falconer refused the jabs due to his concerns over the safety and efficacy of the Covid vaccines and the way in which mandates violated the bodily integrity of officers and staff.
While Deputy Commissioner Allan Adams said that Falconer’s dismissal was “regretful”, Falconer maintains that refusing Covid vaccination is the “best decision I’ve ever made”. Falconer, a Senior Constable who served in the force for 15 years, says that the sacked police officers had over 150 years of policing experience combined.
The firings come amid staffing shortages and low morale, with WA Police turning to overseas recruitment to prop up its frontline forces.
In April this year it was reported that WA Police was well short of its target of recruiting 950 new frontline officers by mid-year, with only 450-500 having signed on.
Opposition leader Libby Mettam (Liberal) said that in the past four years, there has been a “mass exodus of police with nearly 1,000 officers resigning” from the roughly 7,000 strong force.
Police Commissioner Col Blanch admitted that the force saw a “significant” reduction in police numbers after the Covid pandemic, with 570 officers leaving the force in 2022, of which 473 were resignations and 97 retirements.
WA Police was asked to provide comment along with up-to-date recruitment, resignation and retirement figures, but did not respond prior to publication deadline.
The Labour Government has blamed market forces for WA Police’s struggles with retention and recruitment. However survey data collected by the WA Police Union in 2022 showed that 77% of staff exiting the force claim poor work culture and dissatisfaction with management as their reasons for quitting.
Another union survey of members conducted in 2022 found that morale in the force is at an “all-time-low”, with almost two thirds (64.6%) of respondents describing morale as “poor”. This is more than double 28.2% who said the same in the last poll in 2017. None of the 1,966 respondents described morale as “excellent”.
A majority of respondents complained that their workload had increased, and half or more complained of fatigue, management problems, unpaid overtime and rostering issues.
Nearly three quarters (71.4%) of respondents said they’d used the WA Police mental health services, with 36.6% of service users reporting their experience was “very negative” or “negative”.
Public sector census data obtained under Freedom of Information by the Liberal opposition showed that in 2023, less than half (47.1%) would recommend their agency as a workplace, compared to almost 70% for the public sector overall.
Some of this discontent appears to be driven by the force’s Covid response. In an unauthorised survey of WA Police staff initiated by former officer Jordan McDonald, who resigned over vaccine mandates, employees said they felt “bullied” into getting vaccinated and complained about resources being diverted away from traditional policing towards the state’s Covid response.
In 2022, WA Police began an international recruitment drive to fill vacant frontline positions, with the aim of recruiting 750 officers from the United Kingdom, the Republic of Ireland and New Zealand over a five-year period. WA Police has also been creative with its recruitment campaign at home, appealing to lonely hearts on hookup app Tinder.
The WA Police Union said it supports the overseas recruitment drive but characterised it as a “band-aid solution”.
“It’s only a matter of time before these new recruits obtain permanent residency and become familiar with the many cultural and organisational issues in WA Police,” the union said in a media statement.
The WA Police Union was approached by unvaccinated members for assistance with their industrial action resisting the mandates, but Falconer, who was a member, says the union’s response was “hostile”. The union also declined to provide information and comment for this article.
Unvaccinated WA Police staff had been on paid leave since the Covid vaccine mandate came into effect in December 2021 until their recent dismissals, an arrangement that Falconer has called “fiscally irresponsible”.
In an essay posted to social media platform X, Falconer said that the South Australian Police Force responded to the situation better. Unvaccinated SA Police officers were allowed to use accrued leave until the mandates dropped, after which they were allowed back to work “without ever being stood down and no disciplinary action taken whatsoever”, he said.
“I could have been back at work from June 2022 [when the mandates were dropped] and there were plenty of administrative tasks that could have been done with remote access to police systems if allowed to work from home,” said Falconer, who said he informed WA Police more than 30 times of his willingness to return to work.
Former police officer of 27 years Lance French, who was also fired this month for not complying with the Police Commissioner’s 2021 Covid vaccination directive, said that he too had informed WA Police numerous times that he wanted to return to work since the mandates were dropped.
Now that his two-and-a-half year legal fight has come to an end, Falconer said that he will take some time out to consider his next career move.
French expressed gratitude for the support of his wife, family and colleagues, opining on social media that while “the trajectory we are heading (as a society) is not good,” he was appreciative for “the legislative and judicial structures enabling our lawful challenge of Commissioner Dawson’s… draconian order to undergo a medical procedure”.
WA Police officers and staff are not the only Australian workers still experiencing repercussions from the Covid mandates, even after most of the public have well and truly moved on.
In January of this year, Queensland Health was criticised for continuing to discipline and fire healthcare workers for failing to comply with vaccination directives issued in late 2021.
More than 50 unvaccinated firefighters remain banned from returning to work in Victoria despite critical staffing shortages, and mandates remain in place for some nurses, midwives and doctors around the country.
The Australian state and territory governments’ coercive Covid vaccination mandates have come under fire recently with AstraZeneca’s admission that its vaccine can cause deadly blood clots, and with mounting vaccine injury claims.
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Young Australians Even More Unenthusiastic About Going to School: Research
As anxiety and psychological distress levels are increasing among young people, which was accelerated by COVID-19 lockdown measures, a phenomenon of school refusal has also become more prevalent.
Data collected by the Australian Curriculum, Assessment and Reporting Authority shows the national attendance rate for students in Years 1 to 10 had dropped from 91.4 percent in 2019 to 86.5 percent in 2022.
The figures for attendance level—percentage of students whose attendance rate was 90 percent or higher—saw an even more dramatic drop from 71.2 percent in 2021 to 50 percent in 2022.
However, rather than going to class less often, Australia is seeing an increasing number of children and teenagers distressed at the mere thought of attending school—called school refusal.
Shannon Clark, senior researcher at the Department of Parliamentary Services, explained that school refusal was difference to truancy and exclusion.
“It differs from other forms of school attendance problems in terms of the distress experienced, and in that parents and carers typically know about their child’s absence from school and have tried to get them to attend,” she wrote in a 2023 parliamentary paper on the issue.
“Young people with school refusal are often diagnosed with anxiety disorders.”
Students who experience school refusal are at higher risk of dropping out of school early, and it can also negatively impact their social and emotional development into adulthood.
A spokesperson from the Department of Education told The Epoch Times in an email that every day of school missed, is a day of learning lost.
“Regular school attendance is critical to successful student outcomes and engagement,” the spokesperson said.
Impact of COVID-19 Pandemic
Professor Marie Yap from Monash University’s Turner Institute for Brain and Mental Health said student mental health and coping skills, parent-child relationship, supportive teaching staff, and bullying all have an effect on school attendance.
“The COVID pandemic impacted many of these factors for children across the world, with some being disproportionately affected,” she told The Epoch Times in an email.
In particular, neurodivergent children are more sensitive to routine disruption, so switching between online and face-to-face schooling may have tarnished their school experience.
Ms. Yap said the switch may have overwhelmed the coping capacity of neurodivergent children, increasing their distress about attending school.
Additionally, parents whose jobs and financial security were impacted by the pandemic may have struggled to also support their child’s mental health and learning.
The ongoing teacher shortage and high turnover rates are also causing disruptions to the supportive teaching environment students thrive in.
Advice for Parents
Ms. Yap said parents should look for early signs of their child not wanting to attend school and respond as promptly and supportively as possible. She recommends that parents validate their child’s distress about attending school, even if they don’t understand it.
Ms. Yap said parents should try creative ways to help their children express themselves such as drawing or writing.
“Parents need a good understanding of the reasons behind their child’s distress about school—this is important for identifying what types of support and responses would be most helpful for their child.”
Parents should also assure their child that they will help them overcome issues about school.
Meanwhile, Matthew Bach, teacher and former Victorian shadow education minister, believes school refusers need more “tough love” from parents.
“It may ruffle some feathers to say so, but it is the responsibility of parents, not governments, to fix [school refusal],” Mr. Bach wrote in an opinion piece in 2023.
He noted that he saw an increasing number of parents who wanted to be their child’s friend, rather than their guide and corrector.
“School refusal stems from anxiety, which—as we know—is a serious mental health condition. And because of this, parents naturally empathise deeply with their children,” he said.
“Yet what the growing number of children who refuse to attend school need most is tough love. Going to school must simply be non-negotiable.”
Getting Support
Meanwhile, Ms. Yap said parents should record concerns and absences, and communicate these with the school to understand non-attendance patterns, for example, a common day or time of absence.
She said that once they better understand the underlying causes of their child’s distress, parents can work with their child, the school, and other involved professionals to develop a supportive plan.
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Battery baloney, hydrogen hype, and green fairy tales
Viv Forbes is is usual incisive self below
How low Australia has fallen… Our once-great BHP now has a ‘Vice President for Sustainability and Climate Change’, the number of Australian students choosing physics at high school is collapsing, and our government opposes nuclear energy while pretending we can build and operate nuclear submarines.
Our Green politicians want: ‘No Coal, No Gas, No Nuclear!’ while Our ABC, Our CSIRO, and Our Australian Energy Market Operator (AEMO) are telling us that wind and solar energy (plus a bit of standby gas, heaps of batteries, and new power lines) can power our homes, industries and the mass electrification of our vehicle fleet. This sounds like Australia’s very own great leap backwards.
There are two troublesome Green Energy Unions: the Solar Workers down tools every night and cloudy day, and the Turbine Crews stop work if winds are too weak or too strong. And wind droughts can last for days. The reliable Coal and Gas Crews spend sunny days playing cards, but are expected to keep their turbines revving up and down to keep stable power in the lines.
Magical things are also expected from more rooftop solar. But panel-power has four huge problems:
Zero solar energy is generated to meet peak demand at breakfast and dinner times.
Piddling solar power is produced from many poorly oriented roof panels or from the weak sunshine anywhere south of Sydney.
If too much solar energy pours into the network (say at noon on a quiet sunny Sunday), the grid becomes unstable. Our green engineers have the solution – be ready to charge people for unwanted power they export to the grid, or just use ‘smart meters’ to turn them off.
More rooftop solar means less income and more instability for power utilities so they have to raise electricity charges. This cost falls heaviest on those with no solar panels, or no homes.
Magical things are also expected from batteries.
When I was a kid on a dairy farm in Queensland, I saw our kerosene lamps and beeswax candles replaced by electric lights. We had 16 X 2 volt batteries on the verandah and a big thumping diesel generator in the dairy.
It was a huge relief, years later, when power poles bringing reliable electricity marched up the lane to our house. All those batteries disappeared with the introduction of 24/7 coal power.
Batteries are never a net generator of power – they store energy generated elsewhere, incurring losses on charging and discharging.
There has to be sufficient generating capacity to meet current demand while also recharging those batteries. What provides electricity to power homes, lifts, hospitals, and trains and to recharge all those vehicle batteries after sundown on a still winter night? (Hint: Call the reliable coal/gas/nuclear crews.)
The same remorseless equations apply to all the pumped hydro schemes being dreamed up – everyone is a net consumer of power once losses are covered and the water is pumped back up the hill.
Yet AEMO hopes we will install 16 times our current capacity of batteries and pumped hydro by 2050 – sounds like the backyard steel plans of Chairman Mao or the Soviet Gosplan that constipated initiative in USSR for 70 years. Who needs several Snowy 2 fiascos running simultaneously?
Mother Nature has created the perfect solar battery which holds the energy of sunlight for millions of years. When it releases that energy for enterprising humans, it returns CO2 for plants to the atmosphere from whence it came. It is called ‘Coal’.
‘Hydrogen’ gets a lot of hype, but it is an elusive and dangerous gas that is rarely found naturally. To use solar energy to generate hydrogen and to then use that hydrogen as a power source is just another silly scheme to waste water and solar energy. It always takes more energy to produce hydrogen than it gives back. Let green billionaires, not taxpayers, spend their money on this merry-go-round.
Who is counting the energy and capital consumed, and the emissions generated, to manufacture, transport, and install a continent being covered by ugly solar panels, bird slicers, high voltage power lines, access roads, and hydro schemes? Now they want to invade our shallow seas. Who is going to clean up this mess in a few years’ time?
As Jo Nova says:
‘No one wants industrial plants in their backyard, but when we have to build 10,000 km of high voltage towers, 40 million solar panels, and 2,500 bird-killing turbines – it’s in everyone’s backyard.’
With all of this planned and managed by the same people who gave us Pink Batts, Snowy 2 hydro, and the NBN/NDIS fiascoes, what could possibly go wrong?
Another big problem is emerging – country people don’t want power lines across their paddocks, whining wind turbines on their hills, and glittering solar panels smothering their flats. And seaside dwellers don’t want to hear or see wind turbines off their beaches. Even whales are confused.
The solution is obvious – build all wind and solar facilities in electorates that vote Green, Teal, and Labor. Those good citizens can then listen to the turbines turning in the night breezes and look out their windows to see shiny solar panels on every roof. This will make them feel good that they are preventing man-made global warming. Those electorates who oppose this silly green agenda should get their electricity from local coal, gas or nuclear plants.
What about the Net Zero targets?
At the same time as Australia struggles to generate enough reliable power for today, governments keep welcoming more migrants, more tourists, more foreign students and planning yet more stadiums, games, and circuses. None of this is compatible with their demand for Net Zero emissions.
Unlike Europe, the Americas, and Asia, Australia has no extension cords to neighbours with reliable power from nuclear, hydro, coal, or gas – we are on our own.
Australia has abundant resources of coal and uranium – we mine and export these energy minerals but Mr Bowen, our Minister for Blackouts, says we may not use our own coal and uranium to generate future electricity here. Someone needs to tell him that no country in the world relies solely on wind, solar, and pumped hydro. Germany tried but soon found they needed French nuclear, Scandinavian hydro, imported gas, and at least 20 coal-fired German power plants are being resurrected or extended past their closing dates to ensure Germans have enough energy to get through the winter.
Australia is the only G20 country in which nuclear power is illegal (maybe no one has told green regulators that we have had a nuclear reactor at Lucas Heights in Sydney since 1958). Australia is prepared to lock navy personnel beside nuclear power plants in our new nuclear-powered submarines but our politicians forbid nuclear power stations in our wide open countryside.
More CO2 in the atmosphere brings great benefits to life on Earth. If man adds to it, the oceans dissolve a swag of it, and what stays in the atmosphere is gratefully welcomed by all plant life.
In 2023, Australia added just 0.025 ppm to the 420 ppm in today’s atmosphere. Most of this probably dissolved in the oceans. If we in Australia turned everything off tomorrow, the climate wouldn’t notice, but our plant life would, especially those growing near power stations burning coal or gas and spreading plant food.
Climate has always changed and a warm climate has never been a problem on Earth.
It is cold that kills. Especially during blackouts.
https://www.spectator.com.au/2024/07/battery-baloney-hydrogen-hype-and-green-fairy-tales/
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Another problem prosecutor
In the ACT, Shane Drumgold created still ongoing problems for many people by prosecuting Bruce Lehrmann against police advice. He took the feminist "believe the woman" approach instead of a proper judicial stance.
It now seems that NSW has a similar problem with prosecutor Sally Dowling. Launching a prosecution against someone can itself be a form of punishment so launching a prosection against someone on flimsy grounds in an extremeny irresponsible and reprehensible act. No wonder that even female judges are critical of her
NSW District Court judge Penelope Wass has taken the extraordinary step of making a formal complaint against chief prosecutor Sally Dowling SC, after Ms Dowling raised secret grievances about her to the court’s chief judge in the middle of a criminal hearing.
Judge Wass told the Taree District Court on Tuesday morning that she had made the complaint to the Office of the NSW Legal Services Commissioner, telling counsel she was disclosing it in case they thought it was grounds for her to withdraw from any matters before her currently.
The Australian understands the complaint was filed on Friday.
Last month this masthead revealed Ms Dowling made a complaint about Judge Wass during a sexual assault prosecution, alleging the judge was jeopardising the right to a fair trial by directing witnesses to present their phones as evidence, and threatened in correspondence with Chief Judge Sarah Huggett to “take the matter further” if the directions continued. The communications were not disclosed to the defence.
That was interpreted as a “warning” by Judge Wass, who in the past has criticised Ms Dowling’s office for shepherding “incredible and dishonest allegations of sexual assault” through NSW courts amid ongoing tension between Ms Dowling and the state’s judges.
Ms Dowling’s complaint at the time became the latest missile thrown in a war between Ms Dowling and the judiciary, after five judges complained about processes governing rape complaints, with some believing a pattern is emerging in which prosecutors prefer to take a “believe the victim” stance and push a matter before a jury, rather than dropping impossible cases.
Judge Wass disclosed Ms Dowling’s complaint to Judge Huggett the matter in an interlocutory judgment for R v SF, delivered on May 27.
According to the judgment, Ms Dowling emailed Chief Judge Huggett on May 22 “without the knowledge or consent of the other party of the Crown briefed in the trial” to make the complaint about Judge Wass directing witnesses in three separate matters to hand up their phones and, at times, their passcodes.
“The terms of the correspondence, the fact that it came from Ms Dowling who prosecutes on behalf of the Crown, a party to this litigation, the fact that it was sent to the chief judge only days before I was due to give judgment in two of the three cases mentioned, and because it contains an express warning to me, has meant that, at the very least, I am required to disclose it to the parties in those two cases, and I do so now in respect of this case,” she wrote in the interlocutory judgment.
“The content and the timing of the complaint is a relevant matter. The comments made by Ms Dowling were conveyed to me by the chief judge shortly after they were received, as was in my view appropriate. Indeed, the final remarks by Ms Dowling, as they contained a warning to me, made clear that they needed to be conveyed to me forthwith.”
The three matters were R v Chambers in 2021, R v Stenner-Wall in 2023 and R v SF.Judge Wass, in the interlocutory judgment, noted Ms Dowling did not make any complaint or comment in the Chambers or Stenner-Wall cases when the direction was made for a witness to hand up their phone.
Judge Wass, at the time, said she was preparing a sentence for the Stenner-Wall matter.
She said the direction to have a witness hand up their phone “resulted in a proper disclosure being made to both parties (that had not been made to or by the Crown) and the subsequent entry of a plea of guilty to the relevant counts on the indictment”.
In the Chambers matter, she said, the direction stopped a witness taking her phone to the bathroom with her when she sought an unscheduled toilet break during cross-examination.
Judge Wass said Ms Dowling had included a “warning” that she would “consider steps she considers to be properly available to her to seek judicial review should further directions of this nature” be made in the future.“
I regard such a warning of the contemplated judicial review, although delphic as to what form it might take, as extremely serious, particularly as it was delivered during the course of my consideration of two of the three cases at hand and where it sought to have me take that matter into account in my determination of future cases,” she said.
“Had this opinion been conveyed directly to me at any time, but particularly at this time, I would have regarded it as being highly inappropriate, particularly from an experienced Senior Counsel … particularly when I am so obviously part heard. I wish to say no more about that at present.”
The Australian has in recent months revealed Ms Dowling is facing a bitter dispute with sitting judges and members of her own staff, some of whom say her office consistently puts accused rapists on trial for crimes that will never secure a conviction.
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Tax cuts, bill relief and more on offer, but Anthony Albanese and Jim Chalmers just can’t sell it
Reducing inflation now only to make it worse later on is incredibly stupid and counter-productive but typically Leftist. Our best hope is that the voters suss that out
Anthony Albanese and Jim Chalmers couldn’t sell water to a dying man in the desert.
From this week, wage rises, tax cuts and energy subsidies are all going to put more money in people’s pockets.
Yet since the budget, Labor’s primary vote has gone only one way – down.
Either voters don’t buy the bull or Labor’s proclivity for political felo-de-se has deafened the electorate to its more boastful claims on the economy.
And hanging over all this is the spectre of what may be coming. Don’t underestimate the electorate’s ability to sift the flour.
Publicly, the Treasurer is on a positive spin over his cost-of-living relief. Privately, however, he will be sweating bricks for the next six weeks, gripped by fear over what the central bank may or may not do in August.
Treasurer Jim Chalmers says the Albanese Labor government’s cost of living relief, which comes out today, is “substantial, it is meaningful, and it is responsible”.
This is now looming as the central test for Chalmers and the government – both economically and politically.
It will be the pivotal moment that will decide the course of the contest until the next election.
If the key selling point is that people are better off thanks to Chalmers, the underlying truth is that nothing has actually changed. The pain has just been rearranged.
The key question now is not whether more pain is to come or whether the current pain is prolonged. And Labor has clearly identified borrowers as the guinea pigs. This says a lot about its strategic posture.
If the RBA keeps rates on hold, as will be its inclination, then the pain can be blamed on the RBA. This is the political upside for Chalmers.
But if all the state and federal government spending does lead to a rate rise, then it will be Chalmers who owns it. He will have inflicted more pain.
More likely than not, the RBA doesn’t hike. But this will be a close-run thing. And if even if it doesn’t, Michelle Bullock is likely to rattle the sabre.
This doesn’t give Chalmers the clear air he will be seeking.
The political stakes couldn’t be higher for Chalmers or Albanese. And this all feeds into election timing.
If rates don’t rise in August Chalmers gets over a crucial hump.
With the energy rebates from the commonwealth and state coffers feeding into the price index, there is every chance the Treasurer meets his promised target of getting headline inflation back within the 2-3 per cent band.
He will have bought himself a cut in headline inflation with the assistance of state Labor mates.
This is where the political narrative and economic reality collide. From a political perspective, it will be a great story to tell.
People will expect that if headline rates look good, why doesn’t the RBA cut rates.
But as we know, the headline rate is not the determining factor. And this is the nuanced debate Chalmers is clearly happy to have.
It won’t be Chalmers that has to make the argument, the talking points to every other Labor minister and backbencher will do the work.
If it hasn’t dawned on Michele Bullock yet, it soon will. Chalmers is setting her up. Bullock has so far given Chalmers rhetorical cover in her public statements about inflation and the budget.
The RBA board’s statement, however, tells a different story.
There is no equivocation about its view that state and federal government spending is adding to the problem.
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Albanese greatly weakened by the Fatima Payman affair
Anthony Albanese is reaping the Fatima Payman whirlwind as he sowed: an initial weak reaction to the junior WA Senator’s defiant crossing of the floor and the snubbing of her ALP colleagues has only been made worse by a late, frustrated penalty that has gifted the two-year senator enhanced power.
Payman can now dictate terms to the Prime Minister on every vote from a ban on live-sheep exports to Palestine and govern the extent of the damage and distraction Labor is suffering.
Labor’s entire economic re-election plan and answer to the supreme political priority of easing the cost-of-living pressure on households is now being publicly sidetracked and downgraded.
Albanese’s authority, already diminished, is captive to Payman and the Greens who can further undermine Labor unity with a cheap trick any hour in the Senate and is also being challenged by union leaders.
Instead of confronting the Payman problem last week when the 28-year old Muslim Senator crossed the Senate floor to vote with the Greens on a motion contradicting Labor policy on Israel and Palestine Albanese let her off with a slap on the wrist only to face a defiant declaration she would do it all again.
Thus, a political dust-up of lesser import would have been finished by the end of last week, instead it has redoubled its momentum and dramatically spread the fallout.
In Albanese’s first media interview on July 1 he was wished “a happy new financial year” on tax Independence Day when everyone gets a tax cut and the cost-of-living pressure is eased.
But, the ABC wellwishing lasted about 20 seconds before the PM was challenged over the indefinite suspension of the rogue Payman, what it meant for Labor’s Muslim vote, what it meant for a young Muslim woman simply following her heart, what was the impact on diversity within the ALP and the power of the Greens.
Albanese, not wanting to put Muslim voters off-side, said the suspension was not about voting against Labor’s two-state policy on Israel-Palestine but the distraction she was creating about tax policy.
“Well, let’s be very clear. It’s not because of her support for a policy position that she’s advocated,” Albanese said.
“It’s because … today is July 1. It’s a day where we want to talk about tax cuts. We want to talk about our economic support for providing that cost of living relief without putting pressure on inflation,” he said.
“What we have is a process where people participate, people respect each other and people don’t engage in indulgence, such as the decision last week,” he said.
There’s no doubt that on this question Albanese is 100 per cent dead right: in his own interview the PM spent more time talking about Payman, Labor rules and his dog Toto, than tax cuts; every minister who appeared in the media was asked about Payman and; as a clearly frustrated Treasurer Jim Chalmers said “my focus is not typically on internal issues like these, as important as they are – I’m focused on cost-of-living and inflation and the economy”.
Chalmers’ Budget partner, Finance Minister Katy Gallagher, expressed the hope Payman would be returned to the Labor fold as others said it was better to work from within and raise concerns in caucus meetings – as Payman hasn’t – than break Labor pledges of loyalty.
Every vote in the Senate gives Payman an opportunity to enhance her authority at the cost of Albanese, further divide Labor’s position over Israel-Palestine, gift the Greens propaganda and detract from the ALP’s entire economic re-election strategy.
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‘Green lawfare’ is now the weapon of choice for Australia's activist class
The anti-industry industry has come a long way from its humble origins in the late 1970s, when Bob Brown went to his local St Vincent de Paul and bought himself a suit. The transition from a gaggle of amateur nature lovers to a professional organisation with salaried staff was a giant evolutionary leap for the environmental movement.
It was the precursor to blocking the Franklin Dam and the first tentative steps into politics and the law. Today, green activism in Australia is a quarter-billion-dollar business that employs hundreds of people. Research published this week by the Menzies Research Centre shows the combined revenue of the top 25 green advocacy groups was $275m last year. The revenue has more than doubled from $113m in 2015. The number of staff on their books has increased from 374 to 880.
Ironically, the report finds that the green activist industry is growing faster than the primary industries and resource sectors it targets. Its goal is not to create wealth but to destroy it. It forms part of the NGO-corporate-industrial complex that has discovered how to profit from the war on carbon, aided and abetted by the government through subsidies and regulation.
The environmental juggernaut of today bears little comparison with the green movement that began in Tasmania almost half a century ago. Its focus has changed from conservation to the ideology of climate change. The movement has become remote and insensitive to the natural environment and developed a narrow-minded obsession with carbon emissions from coal and gas combustion.
The big environmental groups are wholly committed to renewable energy and dogmatically opposed to nuclear power. To the extent that we’re able to trace the source of their funding, much of it flows from investors in the renewables sector whose portfolios would be instantly devalued by the entry of nuclear power.
Activist organisations have become so dependent on green corporatism that they are willing to ignore the destruction of broad acres of natural vegetation for the construction of wind turbines, industrial solar plants, energy storage infrastructure and associated transmission lines.
Climate warriors are more likely to be found in the courts these days rather than tied to the front of a bulldozer in the tropical forests of the Upper Burdekin in far north Queensland. Environment Minister Tanya Plibersek’s approval of the Upper Burdekin/Gawara Baya wind development last month came despite a damning report that warned of “unavoidable significant impacts” on the endangered Sharman’s rock wallaby, the koala, the greater glider, the red goshawk and the masked owl.
Nowadays, lawyers perform much of the heavy lifting for climate activism. The MRC’s research found that Australia is the second-largest forum for environmental lawfare after the US. There are more climate lawsuits per capita in Australia than anywhere else in the world, thanks to a rich array of resource sector targets and an obliging legal system.
The bar for launching court actions in Australia is low for those with funds. Every dollar spent by legal activists is a drain on the profits of businesses forced to defend themselves against adventurous and vexatious claims. The biggest cost to the resource sector is not legal fees, punishing as they are. It is the mounting cost of interest on borrowed money that sits idle while the legal process drags on.
The MRC calculates that in past two years $17.48bn in industrial output has been frozen by legal action. Whether investors will see a return on their capital is at the mercy of the courts. The damage is compounded by the damage to the broader economy.
The MRC calculates 29,784 Australian jobs are at risk in cases before the courts. The loss of taxes and mining royalties will make it harder to fund roads, schools and hospitals and support our health and education systems.
The fiscal impact alone would prompt a clear-thinking government to step in and clean up this mess. The Albanese government, however, is anything but hard-headed about anything related to the environment. It refuses to countenance any reform that might give the Greens party an edge in quinoa-chomping enclaves such as the seat of Grayndler, the fate of which is of more than passing interest to our PM.
It gets worse. In an act of fiscal self-harm, the government is subsidising legal activism that eats into the profits it likes to milk. The 2022 budget included $10m in funding for the Environmental Defenders Office and Environmental Justice Australia, the two bodies responsible for most environmental lawfare in Australia.
In 2015, the EDO had 14 staff and a $3m budget. By 2023, it had grown to a team of 105 staff and a budget of $13.3m. It measures success with a perverse set of metrics. Its 2022 annual report boasts of providing 11,587 legal hours and spending 134 days in court.
In January, the EDO’s tactics were heavily criticised by Federal Court Justice Natalie Charlesworth, who reversed an order preventing Santos from building a pipeline allowing the $5.8bn development of the offshore Barossa gas field. She rejected assertions by three Tiwi Islanders that the pipeline posed a risk to intangible underwater heritage, including Crocodile Man song lines and an area of significance for the rainbow serpent Ampiji, and was not “broadly representative” of the beliefs of Tiwi people who would be affected by the pipeline.
Charlesworth found the EDO had engaged in dishonest “coaching” tactics and the misrepresentation of local Indigenous knowledge. Charlesworth dismissed evidence from the EDO’s expert witness about potential impacts on underwater archaeological sites, finding there was a “negligible chance” of a significant impact on tangible cultural heritage. Charlesworth found a cultural mapping exercise undertaken by an expert witness for the applicants and “the related opinions expressed about it are so lacking in integrity that no weight can be placed on them”.
“I am satisfied that this aspect of the case does indeed involve ‘confection’ or ‘construction’, at least in part, and that it cannot be an adapted account of the kind discussed by the anthropologists,” the judgment states.
Yet despite the loss of the case, the activists are winning. The global demand for liquid natural gas has never been higher, and is forecast to continue to rise until the 2040s. Yet oil and gas exploration activities in Australia have been falling significantly over the past two decades. The number of new offshore wells has fallen from over 50 in 2010 wells to just three in 2023. When your aim is to frustrate and delay, there is no such thing as a wasted day in court.
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1 July, 2024
Science pushed aside as media backs renewables
How can journalists claim Coalition support for nuclear power is “Trumpian”, or part of a conservative “culture war”, when 32 countries use nuclear energy?
How do media critics of nuclear power explain commitments by more than 20 countries from four continents to treble their nuclear power generation capacity in the wake of warnings at the COP28 climate meeting in Dubai last year that the world is falling behind in its emissions-reduction targets?
It is, of course, incumbent on political reporters to demand details from Opposition Leader Peter Dutton about his nuclear power announcement of June 18. Yet many journalists have for years been incurious about details of the renewables rollout preferred by the government of Prime Minister Anthony Albanese and the previous Coalition government of Scott Morrison.
Aren’t the actual culture warriors the journalists who refuse to ask questions about problems in the renewables rollout, flagged publicly last August and again in May by the Grattan Institute, a strong renewables backer? Problems with the speed of the rollout were again admitted last week in the Australian Energy Market Operator’s 2024 Integrated System Plan. Yet to read or listen to reporters from the ABC, the Guardian and The New Daily, you would think the entire world was following Australia down the road to 100 per cent renewables, problem free.
The truth is the renewables rollout is in trouble across the northern hemisphere and particularly in Europe. And emissions are rising in China, India, Russia, most of Asia and much of South America.
Countries with higher percentages of renewables than the 82 per cent by 2030 policy target of Climate Change and Energy Minister Chris Bowen depend on hydro-electric power generation because of their abundant water resources.
This column has quoted the International Energy Agency saying the technology to reach 100 per cent renewables is not yet available. On November 14, 2022, this column quoted former Energy Security Board chair Kerry Schott telling ABC Radio National’s breakfast program host Patricia Karvelas about the scale of the energy transition and switching off coal. “Well, I think it may not be possible but I think we’ve got to try,” she said.
An ordinary listener might have expected RN to follow up that line. But no.
Critics on the right have often argued environmentalism, and particularly belief in renewables, has become a matter of quasi-religious fervour. Yet there are facts about power generation and grid stability that stubbornly refuse to evaporate in the face of the climate beliefs of left-wing journalists and Greens voters.
Chris Uhlmann, now with The Australian, felt the full fury of the pro-renewables camp when he wrote about the potential for high levels of renewables to destabilise the South Australian electricity grid after a statewide blackout on September 28, 2016. Critics accused Uhlmann of being a closet climate denier and insisting the blackout was entirely down to a storm.
They were – and largely remain – oblivious to Uhlmann’s central point about the engineering parameters needed to provide stability in all electricity grids. This is not just about the intermittent nature of wind and solar power, but about the effects of asynchronous renewables in synchronous power distribution systems.
This column, a fan of contributions by power generation specialists to Professor Judith Curry’s Climate Etc blog, recommends a three-part series by US “planning engineer” Russ Schussler, retired vice-president of system planning for the Georgia Transmission Corporation.
Schussler rates hydro as the best renewable resource for grid stability but also criticises the focus by critics of renewables on the intermittency of wind and solar.
“The major challenges associated with increased penetration of wind and solar … are not caused by intermittency, but rather from how the energy is injected into the grid,” he said. “The electric energy produced by wind and solar is transformed by a power converter using inverters in order to synchronise with the oscillating grid. In terms of reliability, resources that spin in synchronism with the grid as electricity is produced are much better for the grid than those resources which use inverter-based technology to convert for grid injection.”
This is the science: using asynchronous power from wind and solar in a synchronous system is a much bigger problem than environmentalists understand.
Power engineers say that as renewables penetration increases, so does the grid stability problem. This is the big “82 per cent renewables” question.
Add to that the ecological damage done to large areas of mainland Australia by building out 10,000km of new power lines, millions of solar panels and tens of thousands of wind turbines. All this as the rest of the world continues to increase CO2 emissions. Yet Bowen and others believe our comparative advantage in wind and sun will make Australia a green energy superpower.
Much of their optimism flows from predictions about the potential for exports of green hydrogen, a technology yet to be developed economically.
Even Grattan has sounded a warning about hydrogen, suggesting the extent of our comparative advantage might be limited to green steel and green fertiliser. There is another hint in the latest AEMO ISP as to why Labor’s green industry ambitions may falter. Page seven of the AEMO plan says “renewables accounted for almost 40 per cent of the electricity market” in 2023.
“Rooftop solar alone contributed more electricity to the grid in the first quarter of 2024 (13 per cent) than did grid-scale solar, wind, hydro or gas.” That’s right – suburban homes are generating much of our new renewable power. What does this mean for the government’s “future made in Australia” plans?
This column on May 5 analysed the draft ISP, the latest Grattan warnings on the slow pace of the renewables rollout, and a critique by the Centre for Independent Studies. The CIS goes to the heart of the point about rooftop solar.
Why does AEMO acknowledge the importance of rooftop solar as well as the future role for home batteries but not cost their installation? That is, this major cost is not included in the $122bn figure Bowen used to fob off ABC 7.30 host Sarah Ferguson last Monday.
The CIS study said rooftop solar and home batteries would have cost $360bn at today’s prices by 2050. And the latest ISP press material on the AEMO website specifically acknowledges Bowen’s $122bn figure “does NOT include the cost of commissioned, committed or anticipated projects, consumer energy resources, distribution network upgrades”.
This column on March 17 was sceptical the Coalition would actually take a nuclear policy to the next election. Maybe that was wrong. Such a policy would be subject to the mother of all scare campaigns by the Greens and Labor.
All that political risk would be for a generation system that could have no influence on power prices or system reliability until the late 2030s when the first reactor came on stream.
Yet even if Dutton is writing the longest political suicide note since John Hewson’s Fightback, surely journalists owe the public genuine scrutiny of the costs, risks and benefits of both nuclear and renewables.
Especially since AEMO itself acknowledges Bowen’s $122bn figure is not the total cost of the renewables path.
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Queensland's first Safe Active Street puts bikes front and centre in Toowoomba
This is a lot of nonsense. Bikes are unsafe, usable only by fit people and disastrous in wet weather. Many elderly NEED a car to get around
On Pierce Street in Toowoomba, at the edge of the CBD, the blatant, bold surface markings leave no doubt that this quiet, tree-lined road is unlike any other.
"To me, as a cyclist, it tells me quite clearly that's where I should be cycling — right in the middle of the road," said Hugh Wilson, the president of the Toowoomba Bicycles Users Group.
"It's a symbol that bicycles are 'it' for the street."
An idea five years in the making, Queensland's first "Safe Active Street" prioritises cyclists, allowing them to ride in the centre of the road.
The 30-kilometre-per-hour speed limit applies to all vehicles: cars, bicycles, electric bikes, and scooters.
Part of the Principal Cycle Network, the small suburban street links two of Toowoomba's major bike paths, and the council hopes it will lead to an increase in cycling activity.
Councillor Carol Taylor said the inspiration came from Denmark.
"We want it to be a place people can take their children and know they're going to be safe as they become used to travelling on roads and cycleways," she said.
For Mr Wilson, an experienced cyclist, the idea that, even for only 500 metres, a car should give way to a bicycle on a Queensland road is radical.
"In that sense, the council should be congratulated, but we'll see how it goes beyond this street," he said.
"Unfortunately, not many drivers come down Pierce Street, but it's a start."
Irrespective of its size, the road has gained the attention of urban planners.
"Cycling is a mode of transport that's incredibly beneficial to broader society," said Mark Limb, senior lecturer in urban and regional planning at QUT.
Dr Limb believed linking established bike paths with Safe Active Streets to form transport corridors will benefit all road users.
"I think those who are upset about cyclists blocking their way should also be celebrating this sort of thing because every cyclist doing a trip, like going to work or to the shops, means a car off the road — so that's less traffic," he said.
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New Brisbane school to focus on classics
The Power family, whose father, James snr, established Campion College, Australia’s first liberal arts tertiary institution, is behind the launch of new school in Brisbane next week.
St John Henry Newman College, initially catering from Prep to Year 3, will be built at Tarragindi, on Brisbane’s southside next year, to open in 2026. One class will be added each year, with a separate campus, later, for secondary school in 2030.
Inaugural chairman and managing director of the Power group of companies, James Power, said expressions of interest from parents were strong.
The school would be geared to the classical, Western tradition, an emphasis in the early years on direct instruction, numeracy and literacy (including phonics), encouraging reading and no devices in the classroom. When history and geography were introduced the subjects would be taught factually, not laced with ideology.
Kenneth Crowther, a teacher at Toowoomba Christian College, who has been appointed principal and is completing his PhD in Shakespeare said classical schools emphasised on introducing students to the “great books’’ – from Dante to Dostoevsky.
“For the juniors, that’ll be Aesop’s fables, Beatrix Potter, Winnie the Pooh and Wind in the Willows, C.S. Lewis’s Narnia and Tolkien,’’ Mr Crowther said.
In recent years, many parents have been disappointed to find traditional favourites missing in school reading and English lessons.
As a Catholic school, religion will be part of the curriculum, with the priests of the Brisbane Oratory to serve as chaplains.
The establishment of classical schools by communities concerned about education standards has become a major trend in the US.
Australia’s first classical Orthodox school, the St John of Kronstadt Academy, opened on Brisbane’s southside this year for Prep to Year 3 and will also add a grade a year. Its stated aims are “to provide our children with a classical Orthodox curriculum that will nurture the child’s soul, mind and body, develop Orthodox wisdom and virtue and will be steeped in Orthodox faith and liturgical tradition”.
In Melbourne, the principal of St Philip’s Catholic Primary School, Blackburn North, Michelle Worcester and Parish Priest Fr Nicholas Dillon will oversee the transformation of the local Catholic school to a classical model next year and in 2026. The change has the support of Melbourne Archdiocese Catholic Schools authorities and will be first of its kind under the system.
Based on parental interest and inquiries, which have come from as far away as country Victoria, Fr Dillon expects to the school numbers, which have fallen to 29, to double in the first year.
Similar transformations of schools in the US over the past 40 years had seen small enrolments expand to 300. “Parents are looking for a quality back-to-basics approach and want their children introduced to classical literature and Western civilisation,’’ Fr Dillon said.
St John Henry Newman College will be launched at the Brisbane Oratory on Thursday, July 11. Its patrons include businessman and Brisbane Broncos chairman Karl Morris and retired computer scientist, businessman and former Dean of Bond University business school and author Ashley Goldsworthy.
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The Australian Education Union is miffed about phonics
Kevin Andrews
One of my earliest memories is sitting on the front verandah of my parents’ farmhouse. My two younger brothers and I were sunning ourselves along with my mother. In the years well before the ‘slip, slop, slap’ campaign, she had rubbed olive oil into our skin so that we would tan. She believed – like many others in the late 50s and early 60s – that a tan would prevent sunburn. It was before I attended the local primary school, so I must have been about four years of age.
In addition to the small trikes we rode around the verandah, my parents had purchased a blackboard on which we could draw. It had the letters of the alphabet along the top and bottom of the board, and the numbers from 1 – 20 down the sides. My mother would help us to write words, sounding out the appropriate letters from the alphabet on the board. By the time I attended school, I could read and write basic sentences. I took to reading books with alacrity, reading to my parents each night. Not having a television until I was about 15 also spurred an interest in reading. It is perhaps little wonder that I chose occupations that have required copious reading.
These early experiences were reinforced at school. In addition to reading, we learnt the times tables by rote. I recall chanting the times tables as a class each morning. ‘One two is two, two twos are four, three twos are six’ and so on. It was fun and effective. Legible writing was encouraged. The cursive script of earlier generations had been dispatched, but neat, readable letters and sentences were practised daily. Parents placed great emphasis on their children being able to read, write, and count as the most important skills to master at primary school. I believe that is what most parents still desire.
This is not to deny that many children have difficulties in learning to read and write. Several of my own children were dyslexic. This was a significant challenge which required extra tuition and support, mostly by their mother, with the backup of remedial programs in schools and learning specialists. Phonics played a significant role.
These reflections came to mind as I read that Victoria has finally accepted that phonics should be taught in schools. The state’s Deputy Premier, Ben Carroll, who is also Education Minister, announced that the explicit learning method would be reintroduced into the state’s schools next year. The Catholic system in Victoria has already adopted the changes.
The Australian Education Union has opposed the changes, urging teachers to reject the new approach. ‘The AEU Joint Primary and Secondary Sector Council views with significant dismay the policy announcement by Victorian Education Minister, Ben Carroll, on the misnamed Making Best Practice Common Practice in The Education State, without proper consultation with the profession and the AEU.’ Instead, the Union demanded additional funding to the sector. Moreover, the minister should support teachers to ‘make professional decisions about the content and pedagogies appropriate for the learning programs in their classrooms and schools.’ In other words, teachers should decide what is taught, not the duly elected government.
The Union was clearly miffed that Mr Carroll would make a decision not proposed or endorsed by its members. How dare a minister do his job and a government govern! No wonder it has taken years for Victoria to follow other states and jurisdictions to introduce the changes, despite studies demonstrating the advantages of phonics. Indeed, the statement failed to even use the word phonics!
This is a union steeped in Marxist-inspired ideology. It opposes the funding of non-government schools, opposes any ranking of academic performance and has subscribed to every cause in the modern zeitgeist, ranging from global warming to multi-gender recognition. The AEU and other teacher organisations rail at any suggestion that literacy standards have fallen. Perhaps the fact that Mr Carroll is from Labor’s right faction partially explains the antipathy of the AEU towards his education policies.
Why would the Union oppose the use of phonics when English is a phonetic language? Apart from the ideological nonsense pedalled by the Union, there is a suspicion that some teachers are the victims of the approach to learning that has been favoured for the past few decades. Will the reinstatement of phonics expose the inadequacy of the educational methods, possibly the deficiency of some teachers themselves?
The falling standards of English language are evident everywhere. How many times do you hear someone pronounce ‘nothing’ as ‘nothink’, even some otherwise well-educated people? My wife constantly points out grammar errors in newspapers, such as using an incorrect verb with a collective noun, for example ‘the government are…’
Union chagrin wasn’t confined to the AEU this past week. John Setka, the firebrand secretary of the CFMEU, attracted widespread criticism for his proposal to slow down work on construction sites associated with the Australian Football League while they employed the former Building and Construction Commissioner, Stephen McBurney. Mr McBurney, a distinguished AFL umpire officiating at four grand finals, is now head of umpiring for the League.
His previous employment, as a public official, under legislation passed by the Parliament, should not be subject to intimidation. Thankfully the AFL has rejected the comments, despite its endorsement of Woke culture generally. But the ambivalent response by many Labor MPs and ministers was less robust. Instead of stating clearly that such comments are unacceptable, many dodged the issue, saying that Setka was an effective Union representative. Perhaps the millions that his Union has donated to the Labor Party, and the support for various Labor candidates, influenced their muted response. They could learn something from Mr Carroll, who was prepared to ignore the AEU’s bleating and act in the best interests of the state’s schoolchildren.
https://www.spectator.com.au/2024/06/the-australian-education-union-is-miffed-about-phonics/
**********************************************Also see my other blogs. Main ones below:
http://dissectleft.blogspot.com (DISSECTING LEFTISM -- daily)
http://antigreen.blogspot.com (GREENIE WATCH)
http://pcwatch.blogspot.com (POLITICAL CORRECTNESS WATCH)
http://edwatch.blogspot.com (EDUCATION WATCH)
http://snorphty.blogspot.com/ (TONGUE-TIED)
https://immigwatch.blogspot.com (IMMIGRATION WATCH)
https://awesternheart.blogspot.com (THE PSYCHOLOGIST)
http://jonjayray.com/blogall.html More blogs
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