Topic: culture
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SAM publishes below a a revealing email string numbered in chronological order relating to our local Addison Road Community Centre. But first context, context, context. We don't know the sender either by name or otherwise. We do have patchy 'sources' at the Addison Rd Centre, but the significance of this correspondent is we have no idea who they are, where they fit in, any ulterior motives, party affiliations or whatever. Rather they seek to air a grievance about their community centre but are too fearful to speak up in person.
The source claims that a $62,500 job has been given to the husband of ALP figure Yvette Andrews who is General Manager at ARC, co author with ex ALP MP Meredith Burgmann and former political staffer. Here is a picture of the workplace with curator Terry Cutcliffe. (The two giant recycled pots shown were made from old water filters by SAM's editor, and this spot now has an awning again part constructed by the writer as paid work in 2007.) Cutcliffe's friend Burgmann recently failed spectacularly in her bid for the Mayoralty of the Sydney CBD with the ALP left a rump of 1.
Back at Addison Rd is it a legitimate job selection for the Indigenous Arts Officer spouse? Maybe it is? It sure is a coincidence. Here is local Indigenous MP Linda Burney at a function in 2007 at the ARC gallery. Burney's seat of Canterbury neighbours ex premier Morris Iemma..
We have published stories about the ARC and we should declare that we quit our job there in late 2007 due to harrassment and failure to implement their own grievance procedure, as well as (we say) breach of directors duties under the companies code which does apply to non profit incorporations to some degree. True we were just a humble part time gardener and web site builder but then it's surprising how many people you consult in both those roles with our education and skills base. Here are some related SAM links to the ALP performance in this part of the city:
Monday, 20 October 2008 Questions with notice for Addison Rd Community Centre AGM 5 Nov 08
Mood:chatty
Topic: local newsTuesday, 8 July 2008Burgmann's mate in job sinecure at closed shop Addison Rd Centre
Mood:sharp
Topic: nsw govtThursday, 3 April 2008 Addison Road Community Centre board minutes leak out, suggesting more ructions?
Mood:quizzical
Topic: local newsFriday, 14 March 2008 How could ex MP Burgmann have supported Joh style Part 3A repeal of green laws in NSW Planning Act?
Mood:down
Topic: nsw govtThursday, 13 March 2008 The trouble with Meredith Burgmann, career lefty, disaster tourist, feminist
Mood:down
Topic: nsw govtMonday, 10 March 2008 Albanese's asbestos shame in the heart of
Grayndler
Mood:incredulous
Saturday, 16 February 2008 How to get a $65Kpa community sector wage without any open job selection process?
Mood:sharp
Topic: local news
Saturday, 9 February 2008 Addison Rd Centre General Manager 'Job Vacancy' closing date 1st April 2008
Mood:a-ok
Topic: local newsMonday, 14 January 2008 Local ALP shuts down website of 'biggest community centre in Australia'?
Mood:chatty
Topic: nsw govtWednesday, 28 November 2007 Same ol', same ol' for the Addison Rd Centre Annual General Meeting
Mood:sad
Topic: local news
Over to your deep throat and the email string here:
#1 ----- Original Message -----Sent: Tuesday, December 23, 2008 12:06 PMSubject: ARCYou have missed the main story...................................................
#2 Sent: Tuesday, 23 December, 2008 5:53:16 PM
Subject: ? Re: ARC
what is the main story?......................................................
#3 Sent: Tuesday, December 23, 2008 6:06 PMSubject: Re: ? Re: ARC
Who has been given the $62,500 job as the indigenous arts officer without the job advertised. Have a look at the publicity for the latest exhibition...................................................
i??#4 Sent: Tuesday, 23 December, 2008 6:59:36 PM
Subject: ? Re: ? Re: ARC
Okay, who has I wonder. Yvette's husband? Terry Cutcliffe? Natalie McCarthy?The latest show is not on the web as best I can tell, probably a card in envelope PR approach.There is no doubt the governance at ARC is riddled with irregularities. Absolutely nothing would surprise me. All it needs is a good dose of transparency.If you can give me some more verifiable details then as per convention I will respect your source as confidential, as you please. ...Yours trulyTom McLoughlin, editor/lawyer.......................................................
# 5 Sent: Wednesday, December 24, 2008 12:11 AMSubject: Re: ? Re: ? Re: ARCDue process has not been followed for any of the jobs at ARC for over a year. That includes the appointment of the two community board reps. The council rep is the labor mayor. Yvette just appointed her husband to the new position she created and the board must know about it. I know there was no ad for it, or her job, or the admin job.....................................................
# 6 Sent: Wednesday, 24 December, 2008 2:29:43 PM
Subject: legal structure relevant here Re: ? Re: ? Re: ARC
I do agree the indigenous arts officer position should be advertised for open employment good policy.However I can advise what I think will happen with this concern, complaint or grievance:1. I will send preliminary questions to Andrews as GM, Cutcliffe as curator of gallery, and Mayor as rep to ARC board copy to loyal opposition councillors, MP or two. The questions will raise the issue(s) of- was it advertised?,
- who got the job?,
- was there competitive selection process?,
- who was on the panel?,
- was any conflict of interest declared re relations with Andrews?,
- was notice of irregularity of GM appointment with no competitive job selection also constructive notice to get it right for this position? etc
2. There will be stony silence.3. I will publish it .. in the public interest. Those who hate the ALP will be pleased. Those who love the ALP will hate it. I will be further marginalised. Oh well already out here. ..... The Big Media will similarly ignore it as either too small or too compromised themselves. It will be corruption of a lower order that will continue on until something truly scandalous blows the whole place open - perhaps by way of critical mass - say loss of lower house seat to the Greens state or federal - in many years to come.
4. The employment of the Indigenous Arts Officer may well turn on the legal structure of the gallery - it's an incorporated non profit association. It's also a closed shop controlled by the ALP. We have written before:Our advice is that the "Addison Road Gallery Arts Association Inc" no. 9888276 was registered on 15/10/2007 at the height of the scandal and just before the last AGM for the centre and the public officer for this Gallery body is one Rebecca Kaiser, former ALP Deputy Mayor of Marrickville. How unsurprising: [in]Tuesday, 8 July 2008Chances are the grant will be going through this ARGAA Inc with its closed shop governance, closed membership etc - even more so than ARC proper is now. The grant will be coming via ALP ministers state or federal. It will be devilish hard to find out who is administering the grant in order to properly ground a complaint of failure to follow grant guidelines of competitive open job selection process to the non profit, ie free of nepotism etc.5. I need to say that as a lawyer I am bound to report your information to the authorities (ICAC maybe, Ombudsman more like it, local councillors, Dept of Local Govt maybe) but without compromising you as the source which should remain confidential.Who are you by the way? Where do you fit in?Yours truly, Tom McLoughlin, editor/lawyertel. 0410 558838..................................................
# 7 Sent: Thursday, December 25, 2008 12:25 AMSubject: Re: legal structure relevant here Re: ? Re: ? Re: ARC
My interest is that I would like to see the place become a "community Centre" again. That is all. Confidential...................................................
# 8 Sent: Friday, December 26, 2008 6:35 AMSubject: time to publish in edited form I think Re: legal structure relevant here Re: ? Re: ? Re: ARCah yairs, but you see it IS a community centre, just not an honest or equal access one, and ANYONE can be involved as long as you tug the forelock and accept ALP hegemony as a subtext. Probably just like Sydenham or Newtown Neighourhood Centre. None of this is about good governance or fairness, it's about monopolising power on the left side of politics. If one buys into those games rather than say build one's own equity and influence then it becomes a negative corrosive dynamic.As I say what the ARC needs is a good dose of transparency for all concerned and then the place will reach a healthy natural equilibrium.By the by, on reflection my guess is that the grant application for the indigenous arts position may well have been based on the particular namedi??individual being appointed to the position with particular skills and expertise? Even so I think it's selling the Indigenous community short that they don't get a competitive job selection process as well.I've decided to publish this string, rather than waste time getting no answer to a string of questions, with 20K readers per month with name of the source deleted for confidentiality. But given I don't know you or where you fit in to the ARC food chain it's just as much a mystery to me as to the general reader. The protagaonists can answer either in the comments section or by email as they please, or indeed legally if they are foolish enough to waste their money suppressing news and debate on a public interest matter of public land and community assets.Yours truly, Tom editor/lawyer.........................................................[End of email string]
Is it in the newspaper today?
Marg broke the story here as far as I can tell:
Peter Fray to Edit the Sydney Morning Herald
Following Alan Oakley around is getting to be a habit for Peter Fray, who is to be the new editor of the Sydney Morning Herald, replacing Alan Oakley who walked a few weeks ago.
Fray, 46, will start in his new job mid-January. Before editing the Canberra Times - a post he has held for only 10 months - he edited the Sunday Age for two years, succeeding - Alan Oakley.
An email to staff from Lloyd Whish-Wilson, Fairfax Media?s chief executive and publisher, NSW & ACT Metropolitan Publishing, confirmed the appointment today.
The other candidate mentioned in dispatches was Mark Baker, who was Fray?s predecessor as editor of the Canberra Times. Baker was interviewed.
It is not an easy time to be a newspaper editor, and a Fairfax editor in particular.
More on what it means tomorrow.
Would this image of arguable child abuse be filtered by the proposed Australian internet filter? Presumably the intention would be not to. Or maybe it would? It was sent to us by an activist/artist woman in our networks.
Did you laugh? It's a pretty awful series of pics maybe by anti Christmas types. Or anti Coca Cola given Santa used to be in green. Or defiant DINKs? Or just people with a rich sense of humour? On one level the image is a very witty comment on a silly tradition in western society that is seen as harmless and innocent - the cute baby pic of child on Saint Nicholas's knee. Inevitably taken in shopping centres. All part of the Coca Cola consumerist indoctrination from the earliest age one presumes. What could be more western and mainstream than that?
The thought of net censorship crossed our mind given a controversial case of a guy in the news recently who uploaded a borderline bad taste video of roughhouse 'play' with a child. We really don't approve of that unless like they are world class acrobats or something. It's bound to end in kids getting hurt.
Which brings us to the big serious argument over the management of the web in a civilised society: Here's a good roundup by Glenn Milne of News Corp
Too many holes in Rudd Government internet filter | The Daily ...23 Nov 2008
Received yesterday:
Hi everyone,Sent: Tuesday, December 23, 2008 8:36 PMSubject: The Internet Filter - A Bad Idea.
Normally we do not allow political topics here on the forums as people tend to take sides and it can end in arguments. However on this occasion I think we can *all* agree that the plan to filter the internet is a very bad idea.
If this filter is implemented, it may change the internet as we know it. It may change blogging as we know it. Asher Moses reported - Entire user-generated content sites, such as YouTube and Wikipedia, could be censored over a single suspect posting - this means sites like Blogger and Wordpress.com could also be censored.
There will be no way for people to opt out of the filter, it will slow down the internet significantly, and recently Senator Stephen Conroy has admitted in a blog post that the government intends to use the filter to filter peer to peer and bit torrent traffic as well.
We have a post on the forums with more information and things you can do to express your thoughts and feelings on this subject to politicians. We also suggest writing a blog post to inform your readers about the proposed plans.As I say, normally we do not get political but this is a serious issue that may affect us all, and we feel it is important to inform our forum members of the latest developments, provide a thread where you can discuss it, and provide ways you can take action if you feel as strongly as we do on this topic. The thread can be found here -
http://www.aussiebloggers.com.au/forum/index.php/topic,3604.0.html
Regards,The Aussie Bloggers Forum Team.
http://www.aussiebloggers.com.au/forum/index.php
.......................
Postscript 29th Jan 2008
Up until now SAM hasn't got too exercised about the net filtering plan. We are equally concerned about child safety. And perhaps because there is a critical mass of concern being democratically expressed so we can coast on the issue.
SAM has a longer term concern. Two way cameras as a compulsory installation on home computers or networked through private homes. Just like Orwell's 1984. Interesting to note bus drivers in the last Sunday press reacting industrially to 'spy' cameras on them in their driver's seat as oppressive intrusions, that interferes in their concentration on the road. Mmm. A taste of civil liberties battle to come? Similarly Police reacting to being filmed in high stress raid situations. With reaction to that concern by citizen journalists. It's a very fluid area of public policy with the shadow of prescient George Orwell's 1984. What a man he was. If only medical science had been up to nurturing away from an early death.
It's a bicycle kind of holiday break. We are onto our 3rd new bike project in as many weeks as well as a somewhat oversized bike trailer cut down from old sign board assembly. See picture above. No rego, no petrol, no parking fees. Quite alot of exercise and careful navigation and load management.
With bike trailers 'it's all about articulation". That is where the trailer pivots on the bicycle to steer safely, and sufficiently low centre of gravity to avoid bouncing. This big trailer is surprisingly versatile with small turning circle. This is our third model in 12 months and a serious beast. Children are amused and curious especially with furniture on board. It's a great conversation starter - did you make it (not really it's a conversion), is it heavy (not bad with gears, just take it slow), you could fit a fridge on that etc.
We've made two serious trips from Marrickville to Bondi Junction and back with 'stuff', and the last load was a whopping 46 kg in weight not including the trailer itself. Yes we were tired due to both the heat and weight despite the very low gears making it all doable. On the other hand our fitness is bouncing back after a day or two as well. Also our 5 plus years experience in Sydney delivery driving work has added alot of value - to track the back streets and ridgelines that one ignores in a van but become your life and soul on a bicycle with a heavy load.
We were shocked one early morning with big trailer in tow to find we arrived in Bondi Junction from Marrickville in only an hour with plenty of energy in 'the tank' which is actually quite comparable with car travel time but no petrol costs.
Ideally our trailer would be a foot narrower at the side of the road. Currently it is not at all suitable on main roads with fast traffic. Luckily we are sufficiently knowledgeable of secondary roads, lanes and Centennial Park bike circuit etc to still navigate safely. Since taking the picture above we have added a rear mirror ($3 bargain from The Bower) to the right hand side handle bars which is perfect for managing rear approaching traffic. We have also removed the heavy wire cage replaced with light weight plastic bread trays and milk crates.
We are becoming surprisingly proficient in stripping and rebuilding bikes, learning via the web a shrader (car) versus a presta (high pressure) tyre valve. Also we are becoming quite religious about vitamin E cream on the hands making degreaser and soap that much more effective after every workshop session.
And speaking of workshops there is this great community social capital venue here which we will be checking out in January 2009 called The Bike Club. Their congregating times are Monday evenings apparently with more details here showing their old location in Forbes Ave Newtown and now 1 Phillip St Waterloo:
Nunnery Bike Workshop - Fix, Build, Hang out, or Talk about Bikes at our Workshop!
The Nunnery Community Bike Workshop, at 1 Phillip St, Waterloo, collects abandoned bikes and parts to create working bikes to put back into the community. This bikes are put together by you, the community, with help from others who come. It is also a place to fix up your bikes with the tools and parts available. Come and learn to fix bikes, show us how to fix bikes, fix your bike or a friend?s, or just come and have some tea and coffee. Everyone is welcome!
To see the latest happenings and news at the workshop, go to our Discussions and Events page.
Here are some other successful bike trailer models we've seen around the place. And we understand you can even buy them at K-mart these days. Now that's a surprise.
Picture: Silent vigil outside Sydney Supreme Court 5th Sept 2007 for civil liberties case to rally against W Bush prior to internationally significant Asia Pacific Economic Forum with world leaders attending, and just prior to November 07 federal election in Australia. The politics of terrorism, security and civil liberties were very high during this phase of national politics in parallel with the Dr Haneef Case which hit the news from July 2007.
Story
Where is our celebrity PM Kevin Rudd, who couldn't keep his hands off the climate change white paper to the detriment of Minister Wong? Who gazumped his minister with a pre booked launch at the National Press Club?
In one word Mumbai. That is, Rudd is not there, but it is the terrorist slaughter only weeks ago by Islamist fanatics in India that explains why Rudd is ducking this high profile case of "wrongful arrest" of Indian doctor Haneef to quote Peter Faris QC in the news today. Or was that wrongfully charged (more like it in our view).
In reality despite the large scale of this controversy and the full engagement of relevant Green MP Senator Scott Ludlum on the civil rights aspects, and broadsheet press today, and ABC in all forms, what we are really seeing is a 'take out the trash' form of media management.
Picture: 8th Sept 2007 rally, David Marr journalist for the Sydney Morning Herald front of the paper again today on the Haneef civil liberties case.
This is a phrase borrowed from the West Wing TV series (with link to episode profile to follow asap).
1-13 (13) "Take out the Trash Day" Aaron Sorkin Ken Olin January 26, 2000 Title
The title refers to the Friday press briefing wherein the White House releases information about several sensitive stories, thereby preventing discussion and reducing any probable impact in the media.
Donna: What's take out the trash day?
Josh: Friday.
Donna: I mean, what is it?
Josh: Any stories we have to give the press that we're not wild about, we give all in a lump on Friday.
Donna: Why do you do it in a lump?
Josh: Instead of one at a time?
Donna: I'd think you'd want to spread them out.
Josh: They've got X column inches to fill, right? They're going to fill them no matter what.
Donna: Yes.
Josh: So if we give them one story, that story's X column inches.
Donna: And if we give them five stories ...
Josh: They're a fifth the size.
Donna: Why do you do it on Friday?
Josh: Because no one reads the paper on Saturday.
Donna: You guys are real populists, aren't you?
A clue is found in the high circulation tabloid Sydney Daily Telegraph or rather absence of the story at all. Their front page is a child in a polka dot dress for Christmas. It's the holiday season folks. No one cares. They should but they don't.
Picture: Witty protester asserting right to protest against W Bush 8th Sept 07 rally during APEC, Sydney CBD.
The federal ALP Govt know that people have gone into holiday mode. As do the news savvy tabloid editor. As if to rub salt into the wound of this civil liberties agenda Sydney CBD had a well publicised public safety drill yesterday with an emergency siren around midday amongst festive shopping crowd. The subtext was Mumbai of course. Choreographed by the state arm of the same federal ALP machine in power nationally the day the Haneef report was released.
What we have dear reader is a Haneef report the federal government sat on for a month and released along with a raft of other policies (Education, Homeless, Infrastructure, Afghanistan) all in the wake of the Emissions Trading Scheme White Paper which really did crank public anxiety and will continue to do so.
Picture: A particularly impressive banner at the anti Bush rally 8th Sept 2007 sought to be prevented by NSW security agencies as a potential terrorist threat.
In real politik terms we have the security authorities here doing what appears to all the world as racial and religous profiling of Dr Haneef. Add to that a loose familial or social relation of the hapless Indian to fanatics in Scotland, one of whom died of self inflicted burns in a thankfully incompetent terrorism attempt and you may well have reasonable grounds for arrest or questioning.
And remember all the conventional security agency 'wisdom' about guilt laden middle class Muslim professionals, especially medical folks, over the death rate of 'their people' in various war torn places across the world 'caused by the West'. Not least the 2IC of Al Qaeda, qualified surgeon Dr. Ayman Muhammad Rabaie al-Zawahiri. All egged on by a federal govt led by ex PM John Howard desperate to win an election just as he did with the infamous racialised 'children thrown over board' lie on their record back in 2001.
Picture: Another example of state security arguably going over the top from Sept 2007.
In the innocent Dr Haneef case there is the ongoing detention and charges which were eventually dropped for lack of evidence. Even so in the wake of the slaughter in Mumbai the civil liberties lobby have been overtaken by circumstances. This writer has no doubt Haneef was positioned by the former federal govt in mid 2007 in a racialised white supremacist type appeal to the electorate in the highly politicised lead up to the federal election. A replay of the Tampa/children overboard affair if you like. Dog whistling to the swinging 5% 'One Nation' voter demographic that almost lost PM Howard the election in 1998.
PM Rudd and NSW ALP are also mindful of the same redneck swinging vote too. The Haneef stuff up in power politik terms is not really about ABC listeners and watchers, or broadsheet audience generally of a moderate thoughtful disposition. It's all about the politik of terrorism after Mumbai and 'taking out the trash' at Christmas time - no one is to be held responsible career wise for the Dr Haneef farce in any severe way. No apology, rather compo lawyers at 20 paces for damaged reputation. It's also a big win for federal police commissioner Mick Keelty dodging 'a bullet' (metaphorically speaking) to his career.
Barrister Keim has been busy saying in the quality media something like 'its a very bad report for Keelty and the Australian Federal Police'. This may well be true, but it's also a wet lettuce.
Picture: Different Police Force, same story? Here it is NSW not Federal Police, caught deliberately breaching their own rules by failing to wear identity tags, at anti Bush rally APEC 8 Sept 07. A symptom arguably of the same problems of cowboy mismanagement of state power in issues of public safety and perceived terrorism threat.
We notice the letters page in today's Sydney Daily Telegraph building on coverage as per their sister paper here:
Rudd plan makes evictions harder | The Australian 22 Dec 2008
LANDLORDS could find it harder to evict tenants under a Rudd Government plan to combat homelessness.
The Government's $7.3 billion package to halve homelessness by 2020 also includes a brokerage fund to provide mortgage top-ups and extra security for victims of domestic violence.
The joint Commonwealth-state Road Home white paper, released yesterday by Prime Minister Kevin Rudd, sets ambitious legislative reforms and interim targets to 2013.
It aims to reduce the rate of homelessness in 2013 from 53 to 40 per 10,000; more services and specialist workers.
"A country like this should not have this problem. As a nation we can do a lot better than that," Mr Rudd said.
About $6.1 billion of funding was previously announced but Mr Rudd and the states yesterday pledged an extra $1.2 billion over four years - which the Government said would help create up to 10,000 jobs.
A key plank is keeping people connected to family networks and in their homes.
The Government will review the impact of without-grounds termination clauses on homelessness in state legislation and the lack of legislative protection for boarders and lodgers.
Legislation in many states allows landlords to evict tenants even if they have not breached their agreement, which lobby groups argue enables retaliation and discrimination.
"Most state and territory tenancy legislation permits without-grounds termination of a tenancy agreement by a landlord," the white paper said.
"As a result, a tenant may be legally given notice and forced to leave their rented home through no fault of their own.
"In such a circumstance, people become homeless if they are unable to find other housing that is suitable or affordable."
The review has been welcomed by Tenants' Union of Queensland co-ordinator Penny Carr, who said without-grounds evictions would remain in new Queensland legislation to be enacted next year.
"We think the introduction of just-cause evictions would be a major step forward," Ms Carr said.
She denied investors would be markedly impacted by changes.
The Commonwealth and states will also jointly sponsor a brokerage fund to keep victims of domestic violence in their homes.
It will help pay for installing deadlocks, screen doors, security lighting and home alarms, plus fund short-term subsidies or mortgage top-ups.
Well the writer is a renter in Sydney for 18 years already. As a result we don't have any negative equity in a house in a falling market. We don't have any property settlement in a divorce (or a divorce for that matter) and we haven't paid one red cent in oppressive interest under the yoke of a lending institution. Though our credit card debt is another question. As one activist with terminal cancer said once - thank God I didn't waste my time with a mortgage. We also have alot of flexibility and freedom with where we live.
But the thing about this latest legislative stroke to calm the concerns of renter voters by the federal government is that it is the market above all that tends to threaten renters. And given the investment market has just hit a wall with alot less motivation to demolish/renovate and jack up rents, or just churn tenants with an increase in rent with every change over. Literally the global financial crisis, crash in the share market, super savings, and reduction in discretionary spending means that there is a seriously depressed property market. As a result renters are alot less at risk - at least that's our impression. There is significant corroboration here:
financial crisis
21 Oct 2008 Is There a Recession Brewing in Our Housing Bubble? | newmatilda.com
The next phase of the economic crisis could be a crash in Australian property prices, writes Ben Eltham
"Auctions fall despite grant boost" read the banner headline of The Sunday Age."Melbourne's property market yesterday suffered its worst day in at least four years, despite yesterday being the first auction day when prospective buyers had access to the increased first-home buyers grant," wrote Chris Vedelago and Peter Weekes. The Australian reported much the same thing, although there was an increase in Sydney.
Could this be the beginning of the end of Australia's house price bubble? If it is, we should all be pretty concerned.
Paul Sheehan certainly is. In a breathless article for Fairfax, he quoted BNP Paribas strategist Hans Redeker saying that the Australian current account deficit could "spiral out of control".
It couldn't happen here, could it? Well, yes actually. After all, it's happened before: in 19th Century Melbourne.
1880s Melbourne was a wonder of the world. Driven by a booming mining sector and a white-hot property bubble (sound familiar?), the southern city grew into one of the largest metropolises in the British Empire ? and for a time, one of the richest. For a few years, "Marvellous Melbourne" had the world's tallest office building and some of the most expensive real estate on the planet. This was the famous Land Boom of the 1880s, which culminated in a speculative frenzy amazingly similar to the US subprime mortgage bubble of 2002-2006.
As Michael Cannon wrote in his history of the boom, The Land Boomers, "under the loose banking and company laws of the time, [so-called Land Banks] were able to take savings deposits, issue shares, float loans, discount promissory notes and other commercial paper, and in general perform all the functions of an established bank."
Cheap money flooded in from Britain, land prices soared, while rental yields dropped to 2.5 per cent ? in other words, it would take 40 years of rental earnings to pay for a property.
Economic historians today consider the colonial Australian banking system as a model of free market deregulation. In the words of two historians from Belfast University, "it had few legal barriers to entry, no branching restrictions and ... no credible restrictions on assets, liabilities or bank capital, nor legally established price controls."
Surprise, surprise: it turns out that this was not a good thing. The Australian colonies' unregulated banking system produced a property bust and banking crisis that looks eerily familiar in our own time. As land prices plummeted, borrowers defaulted, taking banks and building societies down with them.
Between 1891 and 1892, 20 major financial institutions failed and investors lost more than L20 billion. Confidence in colonial banks collapsed. After a brief respite, a full-scale banking crisis ensued in 1893 when the Federal Bank collapsed, followed a few months later by the Commercial Bank of Australia and 10 other institutions. Of 65 building societies operating in Victoria in 1885, only three survived by 1893.
With no central bank or national government, Australia had few available policy options. The result was a devastating economic depression: Australian GDP fell 17 per cent and it took nine years for the economy to recover to 1891 levels. Some economists think the 1890s depression may have been worse than that of the 1930s.
Could it happen again? Let's hope not. But drawing on the recent experience of other nations' property sectors, a property bust and ensuing recession is all too likely.
As I have remarked here many times before, Australian house prices are highly over-valued. In 2007, house prices in cities like Sydney and Perth briefly reached an astonishing nine times median incomes ? among the most over-valued in the entire world.
You can do the figures yourself: if you're a young couple on a combined income of say $90,000, even a relatively "cheap" house in a capital city ? say $500,000 ? is still going to set you back five and a half years of your total income. Factor in tax and other living expenses and you can see why so many home buyers are experiencing what the Australian Housing and Urban Research Institute calls "housing stress".
The result of this asset price bubble has been unsustainable levels of household debt. The Reserve Bank of Australia's household finance statistics tell us that Australian households now hold debts equal to 160 per cent of disposable income ? higher even than in the US. Unsurprisingly, RBA Governor Glenn Stevens thinks that consumers may be reaching their borrowing limits.
This huge debt burden is one reason why house prices must fall, and soon. Like their US counterparts, Australian households simply can't keep borrowing and spending indefinitely. Inevitably, balance sheets must be repaired as consumers begin to save again. In the long-term, this is a good thing. But in the short-term, this means much lower consumer spending ? something that Gerry Harvey says we're already seeing.
As consumer spending drops, so does growth. The economy slows, and unemployment rises. Higher unemployment eventually means more mortgage defaults.
Another looming problem is directly related to the credit crisis. Houses, remember, are nearly always paid for with mortgages. And some types of mortgages will be harder to get as the international funding sources for non-bank lenders dry up.
The RBA's 1 per cent cut in interest rates and Kevin Rudd's top-up of the first homeowner's grant will loosen the constraints somewhat, but there is already evidence that the credit crunch is constraining housing starts. The Master Builders Association's Wilhelm Harnisch recently told The Australian that "even some of our biggest building members, despite having been major clients of the big banks for many years, are now being told there is just not enough money to go around."
In the long-term, this might help prop up house prices by constraining supply. But in the short term, tight credit will depress house prices because customers who can't get a mortgage will be unable to buy homes. Perhaps this is one reason why Kevin Rudd's economic stimulus package included a special bonus for home-buyers purchasing new constructions.
As we've seen in the US, UK, Spain and Ireland, when property bubbles deflate, they can do so rapidly and damagingly. But here in Australia, the majority of property analysts still believe we will escape the fate of Florida and Nevada. Are they right?
One argument popular among real estate analysts is that there is a still a significant lack of housing supply, which means prices shouldn't fall too much. There is some validity in this point ? Australia built far fewer houses during its property boom than the US did. But even a shortage of properties won't stop house prices declining rapidly if demand drops off a cliff. And if home owners default, foreclosure sales will depress house prices. A vicious cycle can ensue, as the US experience demonstrates.
If Australian house prices do crash, we will certainly have been warned. University of Western Sydney economist Steve Keen is perhaps the most prominent property bear out there ? but not the only one.
Famous doom merchant Marc Faber said in July that an Australian house price bust "could be larger" than America's. Morgan Stanley economist Gerard Minack has been consistently pessimistic about Australian property all year. As he told Tony Jones on Lateline in March:
"You've got a lot of borrowers out there that have never seen a recession ? they always assume they can service their debt, and they've never seen house prices fall and so they think 'I can make a lot of money by buying a second house or a third house'. Once we see some job loss, once we shatter that illusion that house prices don't fall, then I think you can see substantial losses as indeed you've seen in part of Sydney already."
No wonder the housing industry is "pessimistic". Perhaps we should all be.
It appears the federal government are craftily surfing the market for voter perceptions perhaps more than substance. The one caveat we have on this interpretation is the upward pressure on rental cost of shelter from record levels of immigration in major cities like Sydney. A colourblind observer can easily demonstrate this does make significant pressure on rental accomodation.
There is a significant real politik aspect to the coverage of this issue in the letters page of the notoriously right wing small business/small minded audience of the Sydney Daily Telegraph aka Liberal Party newsletter. It's a lesson the high polling PM Rudd might like to consider - familiarity breeds contempt. Like a popular kid who becomes the butt of jokes for being so narcissistic. Ominiously Rudd was portrayed as Napoleon in a large graphic in the rival Fairfax yesterday.
Rudd is generally thought of as a younger model of ex PM Howard. It's a resonating stereotypical theme in Australian politics not least on the recent emissions trading scheme pre emptive buckle to big dirty business: Highly political, slick, cunning, scattering the critics across the divided spectrum. And maybe unifying them in disgust? One thing about Howard losing the election in November 2007 is that he went from being seen as popular to be seen as a smart arse. Australians are too keen on smart arses. Howard himself was warned about the same phenomena in 2001 about his government being seen as "mean and tricky". Too clever for their own good or ours. Too successful. Too popular. There is a grain of wisdom after all in the 'cutting down the tall poppy syndrome' for failure to grasp everyone is on someone else's shoulders. It's just another good reason why Rudd should take a holiday as superior politician and contemporary Barak Obama is shown playing golf in Hawaii in the press today.
There is a cost in rolling out a new policy every day of a holiday season. Familiarity breeds contempt.
These holidays makes time to catch up on stuff, not just rebuild bicycles using an amalgam of 20 different makes and models.
One such will be via the abc Fora website of the speech by abc retiree and arguably crusty Chris Masters. A guy who sold us this computer reckons he knew Masters from those fraught Qld days. When, legend has it, the ruthless corrupt Nationals under Bjelke Peterson, and their murderous agents, managed to taint the ALP/Liberal Opposition with their own share? This latter aspect is somewhat of a taboo subject which deserves a bit more nuanced and determined resportage of it's own to supplement the now famous "Moonlight State" by esteemed Masters.
Our former tech knew Chris Masters but not in a happy way unfortunately. And we have lost contact with the tech now too for about 2 years now. A bit like the Cable Guy, not that we've seen the movie.
We look forward to the lecture by the miracle that is the internet. Not quite the same as being the audience but nearly as good, as here:
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Chris Masters On Being A Journalist -, 21 November 2008 15:00
At the beginning of this week, veteran journalist Chris Masters filed his final story for Four Corners, the ABC current affairs programme he's worked on for 25 years. In this candid conversation with the ABC's Mark Colvin, he reflects back on an illustrious and award-winning career.
Chris Masters has won many Walkley awards, including the gold for his 1985 story "French Connections", about the sinking of the Rainbow Warrior, but his most famous story is probably 1987's "The Moonlight State", which blew the lid on entrenched corruption in the Queensland police force and government. This report was one of the catalysts of the Fitzgerald Enquiry into police corruption.
He has written three books, the most recent of which, "Jonestown", an unauthorised biography of Alan Jones, became a bestseller in 2006, when it was published by Allen and Unwin.
The topic reminds us of this string by media commentator Marg Simons that we dropped in on there too while crikey.com.au are in recess:
Then we will go searching out First Australians on SBS.
It's summer holiday time in Australia and that means water. Beach recreation. Boating. Even watering the vegetable garden in the cool of evening. Like most coastal Australians this writer has experienced all of these our whole life too.
Appropriately the ABC tv national broadcaster has replaced it's normal Monday night scheduling with outdoorsy shows with one about portraiture of sporting legend "Mr Charlton" , another about wild water rafting and kyaking in Butan.
Andrew 'Boy' Charlton
Screens Monday 22 December
In the summer of 1924, at the age of 16, Andrew Charlton raced and comprehensively beat the then swimming world champion Arne Borg at Sydney's Domain Baths. A young country finally had a world sporting hero to call their own - a 'boy' wonder of the pool.
But as suddenly he had arrived at the peak of world swimming, embarrassed by the adulation, he turned his back on fame and possible fortune to become a jackeroo and realise his dream of being a man of the land.
Through family interviews, historic Newsreel footage and the intimate findings of his biographer, we will uncover the soul of this extraordinary but simple man to paint a portrait that reflects his superhuman physique, yet humble inner self.
There are some really sad aspects to the traverse of 'Boy' Charlton's remarkable life story. One that he died at 68 of a heart attack from emphysema due to a life of cigarette smoking. Another that he shunned his fame and mass media compared to the sporting "heroes" of today. In his day he held many world records. A pool in Sydney is named after him.
But the most sad we suspect was his mother's death when he was only 13 - a long illness that he witnessed. And it's this we suspect that hold's the key to 'Boy' Charlton's personality. The show last night suggested he got solace from swimming. True enough swimming laps or body surfing has the sensuous feel of a woman caressing one's body. Soft, wet, powerful, and yielding. Interesting too that dream analysts refer to the ocean as symbolic of one's emotional world.
What does seeing your mother die slowly do to a young teen? My intuition is that he felt dreadfully powerless. Also that he was grieving his whole teenage years. Poor kid. He certainly doesn't look happy.
The Bill Leak show last night dwelled for a moment on a certain expression of the youth emerging from the victorious race against Arne Borg. It's in the picture 2nd above. He was hearing no doubt the wildly cheering crowd, and his eyes are tracking the camera barrel, with not a hint of celebration or even happiness at beating the best the Old World had to offer. He's not even very puffed. Unlike in the pool in the race it was no doubt an "overpowering" public and media reaction.
Reaction to such celebrity takes many forms. It can be confronting. It can be thrilling and an ego boost. It can bring money and influence and 'friends'.
Apparently he was rowed around the pool on display. He was carried aloft on the shoulders of a crowd at Manly ferry wharf. Literally powerless in the crowd surf. Poor Andrew. A sports reporter said he was deeply embarrassed.
We do wonder if the reaction of the crowd and media may well have felt in his boyish emotional state like another overwhelming force on that scale of life changing events ..... namely loss of his mother. Was it the only other overpowering force he had the emotional equipment to compare with? By some confused cross wire of the emotions the 'joyful' experience reinforcing the grief stricken one? He was only 16 when he beat the world's best. Young men mature slower than girls at that age. If our guess is right then no wonder he never enjoyed the popularity and adulation - because the overpowering aspect bespoke a terrible loss.
So it seems he needed a situation that was in it's way big but different - like jackarooing outback, his own 10,000 hectare farm, or surf swimming - that he could still manage to control. None of the crowd or the adulation would bring back his mother. It was nothing compared to that. Medical science was a long way off yet too.
Poor bastard. It's not an entirely rational response to public acclamation but then high emotion doesn't follow orderly rules either. One hopes that at least in his private moments he felt real pride at his achievements away from the public glare when he had time to reflect on an incredible chapter in the history of the nation. And his role in it.
An aspiring youn bloke, a family friend recounted his dream to an older Mr Charlton - his dream to be an Olympic champion too: "You can't make a living from it" came Charlton's gentle response. Or did he mean: 'You can't make your mother live with it'. No indeed there are some things fame or even money just can't do. Ask the ghost of billionaire Kerry Packer RIP.
Who doubts Andrew Charlton would have traded all the world records and boat trips to Europe and celebrity and adulation in exchange for a hug from his living mother.
Here's to a sporting prodigy and man of the land Andrew Charlton, his mother's son. At least that's our interpretation of a remarkable life.
Dear Tom,
The response has been incredible. Over $120,000 raised in one weekend for our new ad on climate change featuring the return of John Howard.
If we can get to $160,000 we'll be able to buy every available regional market across Australia, and if we get to $200,000 we'll be able to purchase blanket coverage across the nation - and hit Rudd's woeful climate policy for six.
If you haven't seen it yet, it's not too late to be part of this! Check it out and chip in to make waves this summer:
www.getup.org.au/campaign/SpotTheDifference
Our contacts in Canberra tell us this ad is pushing all the right buttons, but that we need to apply pressure in rural and regional areas. It's marginal seats in these areas that play most heavily on the minds of this Government when considering climate change.
A donation of $20, $50 or $100 can help this vital climate message reach every corner of the country. We've pencilled in new slots in Newcastle, Tamworth, the Gold Coast, Lismore, Taree, Coffs Harbour, Canberra, Wollongong, Albury, Shepparton, Ballarat, Bendigo, Gippsland, the Sunshine Coast, Rockhampton, Toowomba, Cairns, Bundaberg, Townsville, Mackay, Launceston and Hobart.
If we hit $160,000 they'll be ours, but the clock is ticking - we have only a few days to put this message on the lips of Australian families as they sit down to discuss the year that was. Can you chip in today?
www.getup.org.au/campaign/SpotTheDifference
It's moments like this when the GetUp movement is at it's best. Not so long ago there were literally only a handful of Australians who had the power and the money to air political TV ads. But together you and I can wield that power. Get behind this ad today and show Kevin Rudd that his meagre 5% climate targets just won't cut it.
If there's one match we must win next year - it's the battle to fight climate change. Help start us off on the right foot today by getting this message out to the nation.
Thanks for making this big,
The GetUp team
PS - If you missed yesterday's cricket, South Africa scored a surprise upset in the first test. This is going to be the most exciting summer cricket series in years and cricket ratings are going through the roof. Help put our ad on air when the whole nation will be watching.
__________________________
GetUp is an independent, not-for-profit community campaigning group. We use new technology to empower Australians to have their say on important national issues. We receive no political party or government funding, and every campaign we run is entirely supported by voluntary donations. If you'd like to contribute to help fund GetUp's work, please donate now! If you have trouble with any links in this email, please go directly to www.getup.org.au. To unsubscribe from GetUp, please click here.
Authorised by Simon Sheikh, Level 2, 294 Pitt St, Sydney NSW 2000
As much as the PM Rudd and his government roll out education, shelter for the poor, and defence announcements (no increase in soldiers to Afghanistan) it is clear from today's broadsheet press that prominent opinion continues to address the flawed Emissions Trading Scheme. No doubt the global financial crisis alters both the rate of emissions and the Australian govt priorities in terms of preserving employment but that doesn't change the reality of an irresistible political pressure to effectively address climate change and the immovable object of heavy industry intransigence.
Here are a few articles today:
* [Fairfax] Sheehan: Rudd's posturing gives polluters green light.
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* [The Australian, sledging the green movement and yet still on topic] Muddle-headed greens channelling Thoreau David Burchell Today's protesters see themselves as part of a noble tradition of civil disobedience, regardless of the issues.
A political discussion covering this can also be heard here:
* Saturday 20 December 2008 Political Panel Geoff Gallop Director, Graduate School of Government University of Sydney Dr Sharman Stone Member for the federal seat of Murray Shadow Minister, Immigration and Citizenship Max Walsh Deputy Chairman Dixon Associates
A perspective from business (including guy from my old firm Baker & McKenzie a long long time ago):
* Saturday 13 December 2008 The business of climate change As the UN Climate Change conference draws to a close, the Rudd government is expected to announce its emissions target for 2020 early next week. What will the emissions trading scheme planned for 2010 mean for business, and how is the global credit crunch affecting green investment?
Martijn Wilder Partner, Baker & McKenzie Responsible for the Australasian arm of the Firm's Climate Change and Emissions Trading Practice Andrew Grant Chief Executive, C02 Australia
Quality science discussions on the global warming issue can also be found on abc radio national here:
* Saturday 06 December 2008 [audio and transcript here] Solar variability and climate What do we know about the cycles of the Sun and what does that tell us about climate change and global warming? / Professor Marvin A. Geller Atmospheric Scientist Stony Brook University, New York.
[Prof Geller was brought out to Australia to address the National Conference of the Australian Institute of Physicists]
* Terrestrial Carbon Terrestrial carbon is found in trees, soil, and peat and the vast majority of terrestrial carbon emissions come from deforestation and the degradation of forests and peatlands in the tropics of developing nations.
The Terrestrial Carbon Group is working on an innovative plan to make terrestrial carbon economically appealing to these nations./
Ralph Ashton
Chair, Terrestrial Carbon Group, Further Information For a link to the Terrestrial Carbon Group, For a link to a presentation by Ralph Ashton, and Warwick McKibbin at the Lowy Institute
..........................
No doubt there is more solid science on the abc science show of recent times too:
20 Dec 2008 Steven Chu energy secretary for Obama Steven Chu, Nobel Prize winner in 1997, director of the Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory has been chosen as President elect Obama's energy secretary. He spoke with Robyn Williams in 2007 on implications of the growing climate problem. Guest Steven Chu Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory
http://www.lbl.gov/13 Dec 2008 The question of global warming, Boost for biodiesel potential,
Whether by design or coincidence the Sunday press coverage of PM Rudd's 'white paper' on homelessness means his government sounds like Bob Hawke in 1990 making his famous and wrong claim 'no child will live in poverty' by from memory 10 years timeline. Echoes of the same egotistical assertions and hubris?
One recalls wearily that any government funding package sounds big over 12 years - in this case $6.1 billion on this social welfare policy as per page 1 Sydney SunHerald (Fairfax).
What we believe is going on, right or wrong, is that the Rudd Govt are piling on any number of potential PR announcements to offset and drown out the widespread condemnation of the emission trading scheme (ETS) policy. This was the most sensitive election related posture and will cause the most serious backlash. Both broadsheets here in Sydney - The Sydney Morning Herald and The Australian - on Saturday led with the Govt's own policy architect Professor Ross Garnaut rejecting two major planks being unjustified bailouts to dirty industry, and a weak target setting a poor example to other countries. One only needs to recall that 193 other countries have similar or even smaller total emissions as Australia, and will see 5% as both pathetic, and a useful excuse too.
The great irony is that with security experts across the developed world agreeing that climate refugees will become the biggest concern in the future - imagine Shanghai or Bangladesh being swamped with tens of millions on the move - Rudd promising anything on homelessness by 2015 let alone 2020 is a tragic joke. Just last week some 70,000 PNG nationals were made homeless on the northern side of the country by big seas and king tides. That's a foretaste of the homelessness to come under dangerous climate change.
But still the Rudd Govt piles on seemingly more desperate or gimmicky PR. We notice the Naked Eye (Fairfax) yesterday column again with a "daisycutter theme" coming through. That is PM Rudd 'stealing' the limelight off Minister Penny Wong on the ETS. Of even more staff from his office and other ministerial offices bailing out as worn out cannon fodder.
It does seem that the history of politics is speeding up in this internet age. Rudd is already at the phase of NSW Premier Carr in 2003 after 8 years in government where his green credentials had turned biege, only to retire under force of devastating polls by 2005. And Bob Hawke in 1990 with his infamous and arrogant 'no child in poverty' speech after 7 years in power. Rudd has been in harness as PM for 12 months. And things are only getting harder, not easier like the climate. Just ask the insurance industry.
This is the Green Party MP Milne with some chapter and verse:
Saturday, 20th December 2008
Rudd Carbon Plan Unravelling: Urgent Review NeededThe Australian Greens say the growing discontent over the Government's
carbon trading scheme - including the Government's own advisor Professor
Ross Garnaut - now means it's imperative that an immediate review be
held of the scheme's targets and design.Australian Greens Climate Spokesperson and Deputy Leader, Senator
Christine Milne, said today's blunt assessment by Prof. Garnaut
condemning compensation for big polluters as 'over the top', echoed
other damning assessments from economists, scientists and
environmentalists.
"The scheme is unravelling rapidly as the experts assess the detail and
find it to be environmentally irresponsible, economically inefficient
and actually disastrous for Australia."
"When the Prime Minister announced the scheme it was not only scientists
who were aghast but economists who couldn't understand why the
government would reward the biggest polluters with 'over the top'
compensation that will end up costing taxpayers unlimited amounts into
the future.""Australians want to know why the government has decided that
multi-nationals like Rio Tinto and Blue Scope Steel deserve this level
of corporate welfare.""They also want to know how Woodside's Don Veolte managed to persuade
the government to be so generous to the LNG industry when, as Prof.
Garnaut says, there appeared to be no clear principles or criteria
behind the decision.""The whole point of an Emissions Trading Scheme is to reduce emissions
by putting a price on carbon to drive a change in consumer behaviour at
the lowest possible cost. But by giving away 97% of the funds in
compensation, the government has dampened the price signal."
"To drive a clean energy revolution we need not only to roll our
renewable energy but also to strengthen the existing grid, improve its
efficiency by making it an 'intelligent grid', and to extend it to areas
where geothermal, solar thermal, large solar arrays and wind, can be
located. Under the government's scheme there is no money to transform
the grid."
"Equally concerning is that the proposed cash compensation to households
will not be a sufficient driver to boost the manufacturing of renewable
energy and energy efficiency technologies, or to encourage the hundreds
of thousands of green-collar jobs needed for this transformation.""This flawed scheme will instead lock-in the coal industry and lock-out
the renewable energy sector until well after 2020, when it is clear that
the government is pinning all its hopes on its pipe-dream of carbon
capture and storage.""With the Climate Institute and the Australian Conservation Foundation
joining the Greens in condemnation of the scheme, and with the growing
concern among economists, it is essential that the government admits
that it has got the scheme completely wrong and immediately review its
weak targets, and its shocking bias and generosity to the big
polluters."
Picture: This image lifted from local ABC video feed played on most commercial and public television coverage yesterday in Sydney. It echoes the profound symbolism of shoes launched at President Bush by an Iraqi journalist 2 days ago (we say journalist because though a massive departure from protocol, control of Q&A in presidential press conferences are notoriously choreographed making his action fairly arguable or provoked). Profound echo here too because ex defence minister Brendan Nelson in Australia in 2007 noted it was 'a war for oil': Fossil fuel causing global warming. Now PM Rudd won't favour being positioned as the same as oil man George Bush Jnr (junior in so many ways). Sure it's only satire but the best satire can be very dangerous to a politician's reputation.
We noticed a disjunction this morning in the ABC local radio in their always interesting political and journalism interviews. We were motivated to offer this on the topic of the now fairly stale chestnut of traditional media tension with sunrise web based media:
Fowler [abce 4 Corners] and Ryle [Sydney Morning Herald] handwringing is justified no doubt.
Cameron's adjusted agnostic tone on the value of the change is also noted.
Disaggregation is the process of democracy which the internet in large part is about. It grows because democracy is so intoxicating.
A practical example from your cross to Kieran Gilbert at Sky: No one commented that the Education Paper is a Rudd Govt controlled timing. Gillard said on [ABC AM show earlier today] she wouldn't respond till Feb or March [2009]. Clearly it was released to guillotine (!) the deep reach of the protest against the weak emission targets: My media monitoring indicates the priority and wit given to the protest of the Greens for instance especially on commercial tv and front pages would have scared the federal govt. There was some real damage to 'green' ALP [brand] yesterday.
True The Oz front page today suggests traffic both ways as [so called balanced] 'Capt Reasonable' PM Rudd claims but [big media coverage has been] mostly adverse and pro Green Party. The Govt needed a bait and switch. Cue Education paper of no real policy bite as such. Unis want more money - derr.
The fact neither Cameron or Gilbert noted this obvious Govt media manipulation - and the fact both of you are sharp observers shows the systemic bias - dependent on govt funding (abc), or access (Gilbert) for your meal ticket. This cramps your ability and skill and why the 'consumers are increasingly doing it for themselves'.
No doubt there are bigger implications for society in all this from disaggregation but it's spilt milk really.
Here is the man throwing his shoe at the President. Not recommended for media practitioners - likely to end up dead.
The fact he got his second shoe off was an even bigger breach of security and a serious failure of the president's protection services. On the other hand it all ended innocently and Bush was right to treat it like free speech as per his visit to the Australian Parliament and taking Green Party MP protests. In fact the presidential shoe thrower as he will remain for all history now has probably done the security service a big favour exposing another loose end to sort out.
As federal Climate Change Minister Wong here quietly sledges the notion of the Australian Greens seeking carbon neutrality by say 2050, it seems a big corporation with its local headquarters a stone's throw from the Sydney Opera House is also aiming for "neutrality". Only in Coca Cola's case it is the consumption of water for its drinks products.
So who is right to claim the concept of neutrality? The corporation but not the Greens. Or are both wrong? Or both right? It's very confusing Minister!
Here is a critic of Coca Cola in correspondence to SAM recently:
Sent: Monday, December 08, 2008 5:09 PMSubject: Coca-Cola's Latest Scam - Water NeutralityCoca-Cola's Latest Scam - Water Neutrality
http://www.indiaresource.org/campaigns/coke/2008/neutrality.html
by Amit Srivastava
India Resource Center
November 25, 2008
The Coca-Cola company is up to its old tricks again.
The company, which is under fire for its mismanagement of water resources in India, has gone all out to manufacture an image of itself as a global leader in water conservation. Sections of Coca-Cola's website, for example, read like a proposal that a non-governmental organization (NGO) working on water issues may write.
Now, in an attempt to position itself as "aggressively" tackling the world's water problems, the Coca-Cola company has come up with a new Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR) initiative - water neutrality.
The company has already announced that it will become water neutral in India by the end of 2009 and that it has plans to do so in its global operations as well.
Sure, it all sounds good and who could object to water conservation measures in an increasingly water scarce world?
But just what does becoming water neutral mean?
In a concept paper on water neutrality developed by the Coca-Cola company, the World Business Council on Sustainable Development, World Wildlife Fund and others in November 2007, it reads:
"In a strict sense, the term 'water neutral' is troublesome and even may be misleading. It is often possible to reduce a water footprint, but it is generally impossible to bring it down to zero."
I see. Troublesome and misleading.
The concept paper also notes:
"After having done everything that was technically possible and economically feasible, individuals, communities and businesses will always have a residual water footprint. In that sense, they can never become water neutral"
In other words, becoming water neutral is impossible.
And finally, the concept paper on water neutrality offers this:
"Alternative names to 'water neutral' that have been suggested include water offset, water stewardship, and water use reduction and reuse. However none of these other terms seem to have the same gravity or resonance (inspiration) with the media, officials or NGO's as the term neutrality. For pragmatic reasons it may therefore be attractive to use the term 'water neutral', but there is a definite need to be clear about precisely what it entails if reduction of water use to zero is not possible."
Just to be clear, we want to summarize what the concept paper on water neutrality has to say on the use of the term water neutrality.
It is pragmatic to use a troublesome and misleading (but attractive) term like water neutrality i?? which is impossible to achieve i?? because it resonates well with the media, officials and NGO's.
Welcome to Coca-Cola's world.
It doesn't really matter what the facts and reality may be. As long as it sounds good, no matter how misleading or troublesome the concept, they will market it to forge public opinion with the use of their mighty public relations apparatus.
The Coca-Cola company will be announcing its "water neutrality" goals later this week in London and in San Francisco on December 2, 2008.
Little Drops of Misery
The International Campaign to Hold Coca-Cola Accountable for its abuses in India has been frustrated with Coca-Cola's increased public relations, under the guise of Corporate Social Responsibility, to respond to the crisis that Coca-Cola has created in India.
Communities living around some of Coca-Cola's bottling plants in India are experiencing severe water shortages - due to Coca-Cola's extraction of water from the groundwater resource as well as pollution by the company's plants. Located primarily in rural areas, the hardest hit have been farmers who have seen significant declines in crop production as well as women who now have to walk longer to access potable water.
A study funded by Coca-Cola - which the campaign forced it to agree to - confirmed that Coca-Cola is a significant contributor to the water crises and one of its key recommendations is that Coca-Cola shut down its bottling plant - in Kala Dera in the state of Rajasthan - where the community has been campaigning against Coca-Cola.
The study - a damning indictment of Coca-Cola's water management practices in India - concluded that the Coca-Cola company had sited its bottling plants in India from strictly a "business continuity" perspective that has not taken the wider context into perspective. It also warned Coca-Cola of worsening water conditions around its bottling plants, found an alarming increase in pollution as one got closer to Coca-Cola bottling plants and faulted the company on pollution prevention measures, among others.
In typical fashion, the Coca-Cola company has chosen to ignore the findings of the study - which it paid for and even participated in - and is now insisting that shutting down the Kala Dera plant and leaving is not an option because the responsible thing to do is to stay and solve the problem because they are "problem solvers"!
Lies and Half-Truths- Coca-Cola's CSR
Last month, the Coca-Cola company released its 2007/2008 Sustainability Review, and surprisingly, critical issues facing the company's operations in India do not find mention in the review. Needless to say, the company gives itself high marks in its sustainability report.
We can understand that mentioning the company's atrocious record in India would not look good for a company that is on a fast track towards manufacturing a green image of itself. But surely a company cannot just choose to ignore the fiercest battleground it faces when it comes to measuring Coca-Cola's sustainability?
Evidently, if you are Coca-Cola, you can conveniently choose to omit the most critical issues facing the company's use - or abuse - of water. The sustainability report must look good, and facts do not matter.
One of Coca-Cola's champion projects in India to deflect attention away from the water crises it causes is rainwater harvesting, a traditional Indian practice. Although the company started operations in India in 1993, it only had four rainwater harvesting structures in 2001 - definitely not a priority for the company.
As the community-led campaign against Coca-Cola's water abuses spread around India, so did Coca-Cola's championing of rainwater harvesting. Today, the company claims to have over 200 rainwater harvesting structures.
Along with the massive publicity of their rainwater harvesting structures (which, incidentally, the Coca-Cola funded study found to be in "dilapidated" conditions), Coca-Cola also started making fantastical claims.
In Kala Dera, for example, the Coca-Cola company claims to recharge (through rainwater harvesting) five times the water they use from the groundwater resource. In other words, they claim that they put back fives times as much water they use back into the groundwater resource. Forget water neutral, this would be water positive!
Yet, while they make this claim in a letter to the University of Michigan, they also note that they do not have any metering mechanisms in place to measure how much water is being recharged.If you don't have measuring devices in place to measure the recharge, how can one claim that they recharge five times the amount of water they use?
If you are Coca-Cola, you just make it up. And the University of Michigan officials never even bothered to clarify this point. It sure resonates well with the media, officials and NGOs. And evidently, it seems to work.
Last month, the Coca-Cola Company extended its partnership with the World Wildlife Fund (WWF) to conserve freshwater river basins around the world, except India. Announced originally with much fanfare in Beijing in July 2007 as part of their Olympics presence, the partnership with the WWF is yet another attempt to deflect attention away from the real crises that the company creates in India. The Coca-Cola company regularly highlights the partnership when responding to the issues in India. While we welcome any initiatives on water conservation, it makes no difference to the communities in India who are reeling from water shortages - courtesy Coca-Cola.
Conserving freshwater river basins in China and Guatemala do absolutely nothing to impact the depleted groundwater in Kala Dera and other Coca-Cola bottling plants in India. Water issues are local issues.
The list of Coca-Cola's initiatives to mislead the public is long and is well documented by the India Resource Center. The company has repeatedly publicized the Golden Peacock Awards that it has received for "environmental excellence" in India, for example. What the company does not tell you is that Coca-Cola is the primary sponsor of the organization that gives out the awards.
Water Neutrality - A Scam
The Coca-Cola company is now embarking on their latest initiative to mislead the public - announcing its water neutrality goals.
Becoming water neutral is impossible, and Coca-Cola is very well aware of this. But matters like that have never stopped the company from making preposterous claims, however misleading and troublesome they may be.
What is surprising, however, is the complete lack of scrutiny that Coca-Cola is subject to by the corporate social responsibility community and the media. Allowing Coca-Cola to get away with such a disingenuous plan significantly weakens the core aims of corporate social responsibility as well as objective reporting and makes CSR nothing more than an extension of public relations for companies.
If the Coca-Cola company were serious about being a good corporate citizen, it is well advised to begin by meeting the key recommendations of the study it paid for, and shutting down its plant in Kala Dera would be a positive first step.
Coming up with misleading and absurd terms like water neutrality is not going to make the difficulties of the communities in India go away. We need genuine changes in the manner in which Coca-Cola does business in India, not public relations initiatives like water neutrality.
On December 2, 2008, the Coca-Cola company and other water intensive companies will be meeting in San Francisco to ostensibly outline strategies for sustainable use of water.
Coca-Cola will be leading the session on water neutrality.
The India Resource Center has joined with The Blue Planet Project, Council of Canadians, Food and Water Watch, Indigenous Environmental Network and a host of local groups to organize a counter-conference to highlight the greenwashing efforts by Coca-Cola and other companies such as Pepsico and Nestle Waters. http://www.indiaresource.org/campaigns/coke/2008/Waterconference.pdf
Amit Srivastava is the Coordinator of India Resource Center, an international campaigning organization based in San Francisco, USA.
Colleague and role model Bob Walshe, author and environmentalist, now 85 years old sends on this speech read for him at the above function, attended by the Victorian Community Cabinet and local worthies in Ballarat 7th December 2008. Notice the typo in the first line of the local newspaper, 154th not 54th anniversary. Bob was present at the 100th anniversary as well as indicated below held at the Sydney Domain. This event probably should have been covered by the ABC in its Fora ABC2 and web based service, and maybe it was (?).
Picture: Plenary of senior panel first morning of 3 day Solar Energy Conference 25 tp 28 November 2008 in Sydney. This blurry slide is data 4 years old and shows Australia at number 4 in per capita greenhouse gas emissions behind United States, Canada, Norway and just ahead of Falkland Islands with alot of belching sheep.
The Rudd Govt in Australia has just announced some kind of '5-15% target by 2020'. Like most people we don't really understand what that means: Is it 5% reduction on emissions level as at 2000 by 2020, regardless of population increase?
Why does Australian Industry Group rep Heather Ridout argue just now on ABC radio here that it means' reduction of emission by 1 in 5 per capita' and that '15% reduction means reduction of emissions by 1 in 3'. Yes we are confused about it all. But we will digest the diverse analysis over the next few days and get back to the reader on that.
Picture: PV is photo voltaic solar energy for running household gadgets compared with solar thermal which is for water heating. An example of each is pictured below, solar thermal being the cylindrical one.
What we do find very probitive is this risposte to the old chestnut about Australia being relatively insignificant at only 1.22% (or is it 1.4%) of global emissions:
Dr Monica Oliphant (shown immediately above at 3rd from left, seated on the main senior panel day 1 Sydney Solar Conference Nov 2008) daughter in law of famous scientist Sir Mark Oliphant (both on Wikipedia) is President of the International Solar Energy Society - and an Australian by the sounds of her accent (?).
She told a big Solar conference 2 weeks ago here in Sydney that: Australia is ahead of 193 other countries with the same or less emissions [when measured as a country as compared to per capita above where we are fourth in 2004]. We trail another 15 countries which are bigger than us in emissions. So our 1.22% is a very big symbol to those 193 other mostly undeveloped countries on what we do. All up the 194 including Australia make up 30% of total emissions in the global budget.
Author's general introductory note
This is not a well packaged story. It?s a contemporaneous traverse of the Sunday television free to air political talkies indicating the agenda of Establishment interests: Better to know ones rivals and allies in Big Politics and Big Media.
For actual transcripts and/or video feeds go to the programme web sites quoted including Riley Diary on 7. And note transcripts don?t really give you the image content value.
Media backgrounders
* Sad story of Oz mountaineer who died on Mt Cook, Dr from Perth. This is the real Mt Cook tragedy compared with the ridiculous trekker/Mt Sealy Range story a few months back, about 5 to 10 km from Mt Cook, mis-described.
* Leading story about Mr Madoff fraud of $50 BILLION alleged in USA founder/chair NASDAQ. Based on pyramid selling called Ponzi scheme. Real head shaking stuff as per Syriana soliloquy .... "corruption"
* SAM's editor has discovered blogging tool software which is a free download for our server. This means no more clunky frustrated willful blindness at typos and poor sentence construction. Also faster upload of edits and pics and spellchecking (like 'spell checking'). It also means ominiously much easier understanding of html advertising inserts from Google Adsense and other companies that do that kind of thing. Sorry folks. We are likely to be blighted by adverts. But as minimal as financially viable.
10 Meet the Press: 8- 8-30 am
No show, summer break
Meet The Press - Watch Political Video Online - Channel TEN.
Riley Diary 7, from 8.30am
In recess for summer holidays. Sunday Sunrise last show of the year.
http://www.seven.com.au/sunrise/weekend
9 Sunday newshour Laurie Oakes interview 8.40 am
Leading story about Mr Madoff fraud of $50 BILLION alleged in USA founder/chair NASDAQ. Based on pyramid selling called Ponzi scheme. Real head shaking stuff as per Syriana soliloquy ... "corruption"
Ross Greenwood does round up of the GFC in impacting way re corporates and currency here etc. Good story, should go back to it.
Kevin Wilde does interview with newish Premier Rees. First 100 days. Ministerial embarrassments. Not Joan Kirner he reckons. Pushes greenest state in Australia and smartest. Presents well [compared with disgrace of guns everywhere front page Sunday Telegraph ? all about courting the old `One Nation? vote.
Laurie Oakes with Opposition Tony Abbott. Intro adverse for re "very bad" newspoll. Abbott has to wrangle LO who is getting cranky (and with Ramsey bailing the notable crusty) with the Opposition and quite chummy with the Rudd Govt.
Joyce as maverick. Says he?s a decent bloke and learnt his lesson to work as a team.
Costello waits as potential leader ..."sick of this stuff as I am" as per column in Daily Telegraph yesterday. Joke? Says in the main game or not, his talent shouldn't be on back bench. Peter's time never came and happens in politics. Offers high praise for 11 years service.
Re Joyce ? mix ups last sitting night ? was "one crazy night". Learning experience.
Confused about unfair dismissal in demise of Work Choices compared to leader Turnbull. "No no no" exhorts TA all a matter of careful consideration ? maybe.
LO tone gets testy on 3 occasions plus. Real dentist drilling session here.
...........................
Great story follow up train ride in South America re The Devil's Nose in Ecuador 9000 feet, [air thins at about 6000?]. Tourists on roof, wave to children and children wave too. Lovely. Rotting wooden slats. Rails are 100 years old. A lot of tracks. Not dangerous. Only goes at 20 to 30 km. Train derails. Well practised routine. Great story.
3 train derailments. Buses in Egypt just as bad, philosophical attitude. Train staff are frustrated with lack of investment too.
http://news.ninemsn.com.au/oakes
Insiders 2: 9 to 10am
Run Talkie show ? Q&A
"Debating all the big issues are former Foreign Minister Alexander Downer; author David Marr (Fairfax); columnist Angela Shanahan (News Corp); Finance Minister Lindsay Tanner; and Young Labor's Rose Jackson." Rose is typically wordy and a bit shallow, daughter of Liz Jackson, but very telegenic.
Lindsay Tanner "I'm not really religious, I'm Anglican" and "I'm not really spiritual ....[I'm in the Labor Party ... obsessed with power and spoils of same over principle!?]".
Home page is http://www.abc.net.au/insiders/
Inside Business, 2 at 10am
In summer recess ? check this for a chunky wrap from Alan Kohler from last week
2008 an extraodinary year in finance
Alan Kohler gives a final summary of what happened in finance in 2008.
Refer http://www.abc.net.au/insidebusiness/
We thought to share this idea in frugal times. Ever had damn comfortable once expensive highly cushioned runners that are also getting so tatty it's embarrassing? A new pair of really good shock absorbers would be Australian $150 probably. We do especially with pedal stirrups on our bike which greatly increase efficiency but tend to abraid your footwear.
Truth is ours were already in pretty rough shape recycled via the washing machine and disinfectant powers of the sun out of a builder's dumpster.
But they are ugly even while doing our old football left hip alot of good on those morning walks etc. So we thought about painting them. Just like those days as a kid before mass produced cheap runners with the white sponge thing on the old fashioned sandshoes for cricket or tennis. White, flat as a pancake jarring little numbers on young joints.
Well we couldn't find any water based white paint in the shed, nor the yellow paint used on a friend's kitchen. It was either green or blue. Remove laces beforehand. No paint on the insides at all either. This really should be a before and after kind of picture story but too late. Actually we found some white water based paint so this is an After 1 and After 2 story:
The paint does seem to bond quite okay with the leather (?), vinyl upper and spongy rubber upper. It took 3 coats, quick drying between each coat, to really get a regular finish. No cracking of the surface so far. We do love water based paint compared to the other.
Anyway it postpones a $150 expenditure. We might try orange next time.
We posted last week on various speculations of PR management of the big Dick Pratt criminal case over price fixing.
We left out Dick Pratt's reported ill health. Serious ill health in fact. We have added a postscript today as follows:
Postscript #1 13 December 2008
i??There is an extra aspect to the big media coverage that we didn't appreciate at the time of writing this above. We feel obliged both for fairness and balance to add: Either geniunely or again as a PR gambit or both, billionaire Mr Pratt has been presented as suffering prostrate cancer and having a spine operation as well related to the treatment. This appeared on crikey ezine about 2 weeks back we recall, and again in the press early this week - that we read late this week:
9 December 2008 Ill health throws doubt on Dick Pratt case | The Australian
All of this is in the balance along with Alan Bond getting an easier run because of his health when he crashed and went to gaol for 4 years. We will post separately on this transcript from Denton's Enough Rope interview with Bond.
Here's a tough appraisal of Dick Pratt:
8 Oct 2008 Crikey - Pratt 2: proof that the rich are indeed different - Pratt ...
12 Dec 2008 Richard Pratt denied cartel scam to John Howard | The Australian
Now we add some very juicy exchanges with Andrew Denton by another (once) billionaire Alan Bond who suffered ill health in a court case. We know enough as a lawyer that has never been sued for defamation to ever suggest that Pratt can be considered in anyway the same as Alan Bond. As far as we know Dick Pratt is really a very sick man and should be treated compassionately for that reason. Over to Alan Bond and Andrew Denton here (when it might be said Enough Rope really kicked butt):
Andrew Denton: Whenever I mention to people, "I'm interviewing Alan Bond," they say, "Oh, has he got his memory back?" Because they remember you from those court cases in 1994 where you were apparently very, very sick. How sick were you?
Alan Bond: I was very, very ill. I was in a very deep state of depression and I just couldn't remember anything. I mean, I couldn't even remember two hours before. It wouldi??just wenti??it just went blank. And I had an infection of the kidneys and I was in no position to actually attend anything.
Andrew Denton: The court had you examined by some neurological experts and they found differently, didn't they? They found that they could see noi??that they could see some physical problems but they could see no indication of memory loss.
Alan Bond: Do you know, that's, umi??not right either. Um, but that doesn't surprise me. That's not in the book, buti??thei??
Andrew Denton: Is it possible that things happened that weren't in the book, Alan?
Alan Bond: Well, I could fill five books. I could fill five books.
Andrew Denton: I'm sure you could.
Alan Bond: So is it practicali??how far you go into everything? But what you're talking about now was in a different time in the sense that I'd had open-heart surgery and I had some embolisms and the embolisms showed on them that there was somei?? I had some minori??strokes during the period of that open-heart surgery. And you could go to 10 heart specialists and they'd tell you in 10% of cases little air bubbles get ini??
Andrew Denton: But what I'm talking about wasn't a different time, this was when your doctors told the court you were too sick to testify. They had you examined and they found you weren't.
Alan Bond: That's not true either. They didn't. The court never did an examination.
Andrew Denton: Two neurological experts?
Alan Bond: They did not do an examination. They examinedi??they examined the X-rays. I was never given an examination other than by our own independent doci??independent doctor. I was very ill. I mean, the reality is if anybody's been in deep depression, you can attest to iti??i?? you either were or you weren't. And I really was in a very, very difficult position. Um, you know, it was life-threatening, really. So I can only leave it at that.
Andrew Denton: I don't reckon most people believe you. Why do you think that is?
Alan Bond: Well, I think a lot of people do believe it, quite frankly.
Andrew Denton: It's just that I'm going on the reactioni?? It's always the same. "Has he got his memory back?"
Alan Bond: That's a standard joke around town. "Got your memory back?" But the reality is that I was, and I'd had enormous pressure and the system wasi??er, had stopped. I was on heavy medication. Um, I wasi??I had been in a, umi??in with a psychologist and I'd been hospitalised for a week prior to this and I was in a pretty difficult position, quite frankly.
Andrew Denton: Let's talk about something else that's not in the book. I'm sorry about this, but the receiver that was taking you to court at this time, when you were too ill to remember, subpoenaed the phone records from the hotel you were staying at during the court case. And according to the phone records, you would be in the stand, not being able to remember much, if anything, then you'd go home and you'd make calls to Switzerland, USA, UK, India, Pakistan, Singapore, also 24 calls to a businessman in Australia with whom you were setting up a gold deal, that you went on to send faxes, 65 international calls, including one to a phone box at Zurich railway station, six to the Zurich Hilton and one to a number Swiss authorities identified as the Zuger Kantonalbank. How could that have happened?
Alan Bond: You know, when you're at the point of a nervous breakdown, um, you do silly things. You ring everybody and you don't even know what you're doing.
Andrew Denton: You were just ringing the Swiss bank toi??"I'm whooooo!"
Alan Bond: I never made a call to a Swiss bank. I mean, that's ridiculous to say that, 'cause it's not true. But the bottom line of it is, though, that I made lots of calls, but it's like a person's having a nervous breakdowni??i?? you're hyperactive, you're beingi??I was on huge medication. And you come out of the court, you can hardly stand, you get back to the hotel, and then your mind is just racing, and you just ring everybody that you can think of and you're doing calls and you're making silly conversations. And that's what occurred.
Andrew Denton: So it was a cry for help?
Alan Bond: Um, it was on the verge of a nervous breakdown to such an extent that, um, there was no logic to what I was doing. There was just no logic at all.
Andrew Denton: Later that year you took the stand again. You actually collapsed on the first day in court. Do you remember that?
Alan Bond: Um, I was very ill.
Andrew Denton: Mm.
Alan Bond: Umi??
Andrew Denton: You actually had to physically excuse yourself.
Alan Bond: Well, that wasi??that happened a couple of times, actually, but, eri??
Andrew Denton: Because that same day you collapsed in court, three businessmen on St Bees Island in the Whitsundays saw you, and they came over to Perth and gave secret testimony, and the testimony was that that very weekend, 48 hours beforehand, you'd been with them, snorkelling and walking and conducting business deals, and were in rude good health. Now, how do we explain that?
Alan Bond: Well, that's not true. I wasn't in good health at all. I'd gone to the Whii?? I'd gone to St Bees Island to try and have a rest. And the mind was still very active. It was like, umi?? It was like a hyperactive situation. You can't sleep, you're constantly awake, and you're physically exhausted and you talk about things. Um, and we were talking about all sorts of things that when you look back on it now, they just didn't make any sense at all.
Andrew Denton: Should you have been up for a Logie, really, Alan?
Alan Bond: Umi?? Er, no, I should have had a lot more compassion. And people who've had depression that will watch this program will understand, and those who haven't had it, er, hope they never do get it.
Andrew Denton: It's a hideous disease and I couldn't agree with that more. In the booki??i?? in this book, which I've read, you, umi??
Alan Bond: Partially read it. Perhaps you didn't understand it.
Andrew Denton: You're right. There were a whole lot of things I didn't understand. And that's why it's great we have a chance to chat. In the book, you suggest that there was a conspiracy to get you to court, to bring you down, that people in power wanted to see you brought down.
Alan Bond: Yes.
.
This post is not a comprehensive survey of federal or NSW Govt policy and performance. Rather an activist wannabe politician's intuition and insight into some evolutions in the last several days.
* We called Bob Walshe OAM yesterday as friend, colleague, role model.
Now 85 years old, joint founder of Total Environment Centre in 1972 when he gathered 12 people together and asked Milo Dunphy to be the director. Also founder of Sutherland Shire Environment Centre. He's been known to wear bad brown suits and is a wiry bright eyed intrepid thinker. However he is not so well at the moment but still loved and respected in that part of the world for being so real. Last year he had us loading boxes of leaflets and distributing my share of 10,000 or so.
Our excuse was to congratulate him on being recognised as one of 100 top "most influential people" in Sydney in 2008 in the Sydney Morning Herald colour magazine. This guy is green. The Herald story didn't have a picture of the man in action because he has been resting at home. We've been searching for a picture at a recent rally outside Macquarie St where Bob was present and we might find it yet. Here he is in a related newspaper:
* The same day we heard Nathan Rees as new Premier on abc radio refer to NSW as smart, energetic (or something like that) "and green". Well we wonder.You can say it Mr Rees. But it's going to take alot more than a few solar panels to change the real record. It's a good thing you are young - it's a long long journey ahead champ. The trouble with ALP politicians is that when the heat is on they tend to melt like chocolate figures. We reached a different conclusion about the real ALP years ago as the loggers won 20 year resource guarantees from the then Carr Govt in 1999 - in effect just as intense level of logging in the public's estate for private profit.
* Just recently the Rudd Govt, which is indeed close to the Rees NSW Govt, was on front of The Australian newspaper being pressured by other world leaders like Nobel Prize winner Al Gore, former US Vice President, and Prime Minister of the UK Gordon Brown. Their concern was Australia backsliding on commitments to the next round of treaty negotiations on climate change emissions. Recently Monica Oliphant an Australian from the International Solar Energy Society noted 193 countries of smaller emissions than us are watching our efforts in Australia as a symbolic indicator of the real intentions of the developed world. These 194 countries in total comprise 30% of global emissions.
Not surprisingly The Greens, with their official party status in Federal Parliament now see an opportunity to further shift the whole political spectrum despite sledges by PM Rudd on 7.30 recently about aggrieved "radicals" and preferring the middle path. Al Gore? Gordon Brown? 193 countries that expect better? Mmm. Here are The Greens in a Media Release recently:
Wong's Howard game at climate talks will send voters to the GreensSent: Wednesday, December 10, 2008 10:06 AM
Hobart, Wednesday 10 December 2008
The electorate will not forgive the Rudd Government for holding back
global progress towards responsible emissions reductions, the Australian
Greens today.
Climate Change Minister Penny Wong is taking the Howard Government's
negotiating tactics to the Poznan meeting, adopting the same positions
and even flying the same negotiators, led by Jan Adams and Robert Owen
Jones, to the conference. The Greens now provide the only real
alternative for voters who want to see action to protect the climate.
"Australians who voted last year to end the Howard decade of climate
denial will be deeply troubled by what the Rudd Government is doing,"
Australian Greens Deputy Leader and Climate Change Spokesperson, Senator
Christine Milne, said.
"As Minister Wong prepares to deliver plans for Australia which will
refuse to grapple seriously with the problem, she is laying the
groundwork in Poznan by help to hold back global progress.
"The clear reports from Poznan are that Australia is still blocking the
25-40% negotiating range in order to justify what it plans to do next
week.
"There is no way that Penny Wong will allow the rest of the world to
show up Australia's backwardness by adopting a 25-40% negotiating range.
"Nobody should be in any doubt that the Rudd Government is intent on
trying to save its own image at the expense of people and ecosystems
from the poverty-stricken in Bangladesh to Queensland's coastal
communities to farmers in the Murray-Darling."
Australia won runner up "Fossil of the Day" award from the Climate
Action Network yesterday for supporting Japan's move to shift the agreed
emissions baseline from 1990 to 2000.
The Rudd Government is also playing a dangerous game over forestry
negotiations.
"The hypocrisy of continuing to log our own tremendous carbon stores in
Tasmania and Victoria while lecturing Indonesia and PNG on protecting
their own forests is beginning to provoke angry responses.
"It is utterly reprehensible that the Rudd Government will not take on
the State Governments and require them to stop logging these magnificent
stores of carbon and biodiversity that are our beautiful forests.
"Australians voted 12 months ago to move on from Howard-era climate
politics, and they will be deeply troubled to see that very little has
changed under Kevin Rudd."
Come join the conversation at GreensBlog <http://greensmps.org.au/blog>
* Forests of course are greatly related to climate regulation because of the "green carbon" not only above ground but in massive quantities in the soil of a living healthy forest according to ground breaking research by CRES at Australian National University. Which makes the ALP's evil attitude to destruction of forests so disgusting. We have written often of this over the last 2 years. Here are some reminders and some other issues that show the theme of "beige" ALP:
Picture above and more below: Community rally at Botany Bay Beach off Foreshore Rd, Botany Saturday 3rd March 2007, against expansion of Port Botany guaranteed to increase toxic transport congestioni??in most of southern metropolitan Sydney. Shade was a premium under the burning late summer day.