States of Destruction

The State Labor Governments of Victoria and New South Wales were kicked out by voters dissatisfied with their performance and buoyed by the promises of the alternative Liberal Governments.  The incoming governments – true to Liberal form – have been quick to murder voter confidence and expectations through the discard of promise after promise.  Those two states are now under destruction.  Will Queensland follow?

This page will be on ongoing thread where we can discuss the rabble these governments have become.

Česky: Demolice budovy v Lipsku. English: Dest...

Destruction Zone

386 comments on “States of Destruction”

  2. THE dramatic cuts to University of Ballarat TAFE courses have been met with concern from key industry bodies. . . . “From a local point of view, we would be disappointed if trades were going to be cut from the University of Ballarat’s TAFE program, especially in areas where it’s going to impact on our members in the region,” she said.

    “Obviously the university attracts apprentices from a wide catchment area around Ballarat and the Wimmera and if particular courses are cut and apprentices have to go to TAFE courses in Melbourne, it adds to the cost of training and the cost to their employer releasing them to go off and study.”

    Victorian TAFE Association executive officer David Williams said that not only would the cuts affect TAFE students, but they could also lead to hundreds of job losses.

    http://www.thecourier.com.au/news/local/news/general/fears-of-skill-shortages-and-job-losses-predicted/2557532.aspx

  4. THE forecasts of cuts associated with the state government’s changes to TAFE program funding were bad but we didn’t expect the extent of what the University of Ballarat delivered yesterday.

    The university says it has no choice but to slash between 50 and 60 VET programs and to make staff redundant. While the physical cuts to programs is disturbing, as is the loss of jobs, what really is concerning is the flow-on impact to the young, and older, people who undertake these courses. These are courses which often provide options for residents who want to learn new skills and fill jobs in areas where industries are desperate for skilled staff. And these programs provide options for many others who do not intend to apply for university courses.

    In reducing funding, the state government has left providers with few options but to undertake quite radical action in dumping these courses. We expect that other TAFE schools will take similar action.

    http://www.thecourier.com.au/news/opinion/editorial/general/tafe-funding-cuts-are-leaving-providers-with-no-option/2557571.aspx

  5. More to thank the Liberals for:

    BALLARAT businesses stand to lose millions of dollars after the company in charge of building the Ararat Prison went bust this morning.

    St Hilliers Ararat Pty Ltd and St Hilliers Construction Pty Ltd have both gone into liquidation, leaving a number of Ballarat companies unaware if they will receive any portion of the millions of dollars they are owed.

    At least five Ballarat-based companies are believed to have been left in the lurch, some of which are owed as much as $500,000.

    It is not yet known if the companies will receive any of the money that is owed to them, as St Hilliers appointed an administrator because it could no longer pay its debts brought upon by the prison.

    In a statement, the company said negotiations for a $150 million bail out from the government, Ararat Prison equity investors, and its bankers, had failed

    One Ballarat business, who had been working on the project since February last year, said it was looking at losing almost half a million dollars that was owed to it.

    “We only had about one month of work to go but now we don’t know if we are going to get any money back at all,” said the company’s owner, who wished to remain anonymous due to confidentiality agreements.

    “We were told last week everything was fine and that we would be okay, but then this happened. We’ve got about 25 workers and we don’t know if we will be able to keep them in jobs.”

    Another smaller sized contractor said it also feared it would not get any of the $200,000 it was owed.

    All Ballarat businesses contact today by The Courier blamed poor management by the company overseeing the project and said there had been whispers the project was set to collapse for weeks.

    Some even walked off the jobsite and took their equipment home last week.

    The Construction, Forestry, Mining and Energy Union’s (CFMEU) Victorian state secretary Bill Oliver blames poor management by the state government.

    “The government have failed to reach an agreement on financing this project and they have failed thousands of contractors and workers, both in Victoria primarily and now around Australia,” he said.

    “This has not come out of the blue. The government have known about this issue for six months, since St Hilliers raised concerns in December 2011.”

    Mr Oliver said the government sourced materials from China which didn’t work.

    The project alone is worth $350 million and was commissioned in 2010 by the Brumby Government.

    http://www.thecourier.com.au/news/local/news/general/ballarat-companies-to-lose-millions-over-ararat-prison-project/2558571.aspx

  7. Migs, where does one start,

    What about sacking hundreds and restructuring the rail system, without any idea of the cost for starters. No idea of what will be saved. What is happening is pure ideology.

    No rationale for their actions, except to claim we will get better service.

    As one who travels regularly on the city and central coast trains, they were not too bad when Labor went out of office.

    It is a shame that the new trains are now coming on line.

    This is no credit to this government.
    That will do for today.

    Maybe tomorrow, education. A better one might be work cover insurance.
    Costs too much.

    The answer is getting people back to work. Funny, I thought that happened now,.

    It is Mr. O’Farrell in my sights.

  9. NSW Unions have launched an $800,0000 television and billboard campaign opposing state government plans to clamp down on workers’ compensation payments.

    Unions NSW secretary Mark Lennon said the advertisements would run for five weeks in metropolitan and regional media from Sunday as part of the biggest industrial campaign in a decade to protect WorkCover entitlements.

    The state government claims that WorkCover payments will blow out by $4 billion without new restrictions.

    http://bigpondnews.com/articles/Finance/2012/05/20/Unions_launch_WorkCover_campaign_752206.html

  10. Catching up at 9.58
    I was last in NSW a couple of years ago, staying at Mittagong & catching trains to Sydney. Every single train arrived on time, was clean with ample seating, & got me to the city on time as well. I didn’t notice anyone on the trains remarking on this, everyone seemed to think it par for the course. I thought the hopeless Labor government was doing pretty well in that regard.

    This thread will run & run, but hopefully only up until the next elections.

  11. This thread will run & run, but hopefully only up until the next elections.

    Bob, BO’F might get a second term, but only because some voters are slow to wake up.

  12. When I worked many years ago, I used to get trains from Liverpool. The filth of them, especially in the afternoons would make one heave.

    The last few years, I use trains from my home on the Central Coast to the Campbelltown and St Mary’s areas.

    I find they run on time and are always clean.

    On top of that, they are slowly been replaced wit new trains.

    Most stations now have lifts. Believe me, when you are older of pushing prams, this is a god send.

    Stations have been upgraded, especially past Liverpool.

    Maybe they are a little crowded,, but on most routes, standing for a little time is not the end of the world.

    What is worse, in my opinion, is being caught in traffic jams driving to work.

    I have had the same opinions with hospitals. That is something I am a expert on. Have had lots to do with them since a child.

    I know I have a great grandson, that should not have lived, thriving because of the standard of care they provide.

    I think people either expect too much, or have no contact with public transport or hospitals.

    I have had three operations in the last few years. I had a partner in and out of hospitals.

    I do not believe that the last government was as bad as portrayed.

    I also believe it might have been time for a change. No governmentshould be in power for too long.

    What I do have problems with,is nursing homes.

    .

  13. BSA. That is a nice little train that goes out there. I caught it once to Picton from Campbelltown.

  15. (Just a round-a-bout way of observing that emergent deployments of interlocking policies appear increasingly (dis)integrated at/through local, State, and Federal levels; the supposed devolutions central to proposed one-stop chop-shops and blue-ribboned tapes-cuttings probably much more organised and/or corporatist than spontaneously (re)aligning.)

  16. Baillieu to probe claim Lib MP rorted car allowance Reid Sexton.

    THE BAILLIEU government has launched an investigation into controversial backbencher Geoff Shaw after damaging allegations staff at his hardware company used his parliamentary car for interstate business trips.

    A government spokeswoman this morning confirmed Premier Ted Baillieu had ordered the Department of Parliamentary Services to probe claims that Mr Shaw directed staff to use the car and taxpayer-funded petrol cards for his private commercial interests.

    The artcle goes on to say that this story was reported by News Ltd, who had been handed evidence against Mr. Shaw, which came as a surprise; no surprise that they’d accept a dump of “evidence” from anyone, but quite astonishing that it’s not another “dump” of ‘stuff’ about a Labor MP. It’s not often that any bad news about any conservative politician makes the news, but in this case it must all be a bit too awkward for the Vic., government.

    The Baillieu government holds power by just one-seat and the seat of Frankston by a majority of just 2.1 per cent.

    If Mr Shaw left office it would spark by-election that could lead to a lower-house deadlock and the need for another state-wide election.

    http://www.theage.com.au/opinion/political-news/baillieu-to-probe-claim-lib-mp-rorted-car-allowance-20120520-1yyl3.html

  18. Yet the latest polls in NSW have O’Farrell’s approval rating ballooning out and State Labor going further behind in what can only be a snow job by the media.

    On every measure, from infrastructure, debt, unemployment, transport, crime, health, education, IR conflicts, business failures and more, his government is doing worse than the previous one and going further backwards.

    On top of this he has broken just about every major and most of his minor promises and has only delivered on one major project that was only done as a show pony. He has reneged on every other promised project pushing one out to 2018 and shoving the rest out to committees that won’t sit until the next election year.

    The media though overwhelmingly shows the O’Farrell government in a positive light and mostly buries bad news stories if they arise at all. Two of his ministers should have been grilled and sacked by now if the media was doing their self professed job of “holding the government accountable”, and another two should be having a lot of questions asked about their poor to dismal performances.

    We all know none of this will happen until another Labor government gets into power. The most disappointing aspect of the media’s soft treatment of O’Farrell is the worst organisation for it is the ABC. Their fawning and positive reporting on the NSW government is in stark contrast to their previous reporting on the Labor government.

  22. I heard Nick Lalich. the Labor member for Cabramatta, this morning raised concerns that Mr. O’Farrell was reassessing the need for commuter parking at Cabramatta and Canley Vale stations.

    Now this was firm promise that was made by this government before the elections.

    Can some one tell me how reassessing a promise and not going ahead, is different to lying or breaking a promise.

    After all, this is what the PM did after the last election. She reassessed the situation and decided to go ahead with the Clean Energy Future Legislation, bringing in a cost on carbon emission, that is only 500 of the big emitters will pay.

  23. BIG businesses are not buying influence when they pay $25,000 a year to be a member of the West Australian Liberal Party’s fundraising club, says Premier Colin Barnett.

    Jesus wept, Min. I bet he said that with a straight face, too.Yeah Mr Barnett and the Tooth Fairy is real and pigs can fly. How long will they get away with this? As long as the wizened foreigner and his spawn are allowed to own even a lolly shop, I guess.

    CU @ 4.31pm, they just are.

  24. Now for months we have been hearing about the poor workers ripped off the HSU.

    So exactly how many mum and dad investors has Liberal MP Geoff shaw ripped off?

    Any way if the ATO is after him, then hopefully the nation will get something out of this crook.

    “BESIEGED Liberal MP Geoff Shaw is facing investigation by the tax office amid claims he underpaid debts to mum-and-dad investors who lost hundreds of thousands of dollars.

    Mr Shaw has been the subject of a 20-month investigation by the Australian Tax Office, which has already established he has short-changed one employee who was paid through a trust fund.”
    http://www.heraldsun.com.au/news/more-news/liberal-mp-probed-over-tax-debt/story-fn7x8me2-1226366235095

  25. TUESDAY, 15 MAY 2012
    Growing dirt pile is getting closer to NSW O’Farrell Government Resources and Energy Minister, Chris Hartcher

    Something which places a different emphasis on Chris Hartcher’s open for business philosophy?

    Sean Nicholls writing in The Sydney Morning Herald on 13 May 2012:

    A SENIOR staff member of the NSW Minister for Resources and Energy, Chris Hartcher, has resigned and his electorate officer has been suspended after election funding authorities launched an investigation into allegations against them.
    Tim Koelma, who had worked for Mr Hartcher for a decade, and Ray Carter, Mr Hartcher’s electorate officer in Terrigal, were suspended in late March after the NSW Liberal Party wrote to the Election Funding Authority alleging they had breached funding laws.
    It is understood political donations to the NSW branch of the party were being sought through a trust connected to Mr Koelma……
    POSTED BY CLARENCEGIRL AT 00:15
    http://northcoastvoices.blogspot.com.au/2012/05/growing-dirt-pile-is-getting-closer-to.html

  26. SATURDAY, 26 MAY 2012
    Growing dirt pile is getting closer to NSW O’Farrell Government Resources and Energy Minister, Chris Hartcher – Part Three

    It would appear that the Ashby virus is spreading……………….

    The Sydney Morning Herald 19 May 2012:

    POLICE are investigating a claim Senator Bill Heffernan assaulted an employee of Chris Hartcher, the NSW Energy Minister, in an alleged homophobic attack at a fractious Liberal Party meeting on the central coast.

    Ray Carter, 67, has accused Senator Heffernan of assaulting him and, according to sources, vilifying him over his sexuality at a gathering of party members in the federal electorate of Robertson.

    Senator Heffernan was acting as an emissary of Tony Abbott at the Breakers Country Club at Wamberal on May 3. A Liberal source said the pair had been seen to physically clash on two occasions during the evening and also alleged that Senator Heffernan had aimed ”homophobic slurs” at Mr Carter. In a statutory declaration, Mr Carter alleges Senator Heffernan hit him on his shoulder, causing him to fall into his seat, and later saying to him: ”I didn’t know you were a poofter.”……..

    Mr Carter, who has been suspended from Mr Hartcher’s electorate office over a donation scandal, waited nearly a fortnight to report the allegation to Gosford police.

    Part One here.

    POSTED BY CLARENCEGIRL AT 00:15
    http://northcoastvoices.blogspot.com.au/2012/05/growing-dirt-pile-is-getting-closer-to_26.html

  27. Mary Jo Fisher here in Adelaide has decided that us taxpayers should fund her defence costs. A judge or somebody is making up his mind about it.
    What I like is their complete confidence that they can run a line like this simultaneously with their attacks on Thomson.

  28. Bob @1.22am, it would be laughable if it weren’t such a shocking abuse of the system. She’s got a house and a well paid job. If she needs money, she should use her assets to pay the costs.

    She got off very lightly, due to Liars Party influence, imo. If it were you or me or some poor schmuck from Salisbury, we’d be in the slammer.

  29. Care2 have a petition regarding residents of a block of units in Sydney who have been waiting since 2009 to be allowed to return to their homes. they are currently housed in government housing.

    New South Wales resident Mark Terry sure didn’t think he would end up homeless when he bought his condominium on Bunn Street. But Terry has been about as displaced as a hurricane victim–even though he is a bona fide homeowner.

    Terry’s apartment building was deemed unsafe for habitation because of fire safety violations, leaks, and inadequate ventilation. NSW’s home warranty insurance program moved the building’s twenty residents to government-subsidized housing. That was back in 2009, and they are still unable to return to their apartments because the necessary repairs have not been made. “We just want to go back into our units and live our lives,” Terry told the Sydney Morning Herald.

    Tell New South Wales to step up action on the building at 16-30 Bunn Street and get homeowners back in their homes!

    http://www.thepetitionsite.com/646/351/258/tell-nsw-to-step-up-for-displaced-sydney-residents/

  30. I’m wracking my brain a bit on this one. Does anyone recall what penalty Fisher was given? IF it was a first offence..and we don’t know whether or not it was..then usual would be a 6 month good behaviour bond, or a fine or both. However, it would still be a conviction recorded against her rather than “no conviction recorded”. I have a feeling that it was no conviction recorded, therefore she was indeed let off very lightly.

    I am thinking of the Aboriginal lad who was sentenced to prison for 3 months for stealing a packet of Timtams under the NT’s mandatory sentencing court system.

  31. Min,

    LIBERAL Senator Mary Jo Fisher has been cleared of shoplifting charges but found guilty of assaulting a Foodland security officer.
    Start of sidebar. Skip to end of sidebar.
    Recommended Coverage.Senator Mary Jo Fisher guilty of assault
    ..End of sidebar. Return to start of sidebar.
    ..Today Magistrate Kym Boxall cleared Fisher of stealing goods from the supermarket at Frewville last year.

    But Mr Boxall said Fisher did use force against store security officer Cathryn Groot.

    He did not record a conviction or impose a penalty.

    http://www.heraldsun.com.au/news/sa-senator/story-e6frf7jo-1226198743946

    in the words of Michael Abbott QC, not Tony…

    Mr Abbott said that, were she convicted of shoplifting, Ms Fisher would have lost her parliamentary seat.

    He said those potentially “grave consequences” elevated the matter beyond a normal magistrate’s court trial and therefore required more involved legal preparation.

    “Given the severity of the consequences that would be visited upon Ms Fisher if she was to be convicted, it was essential that every step be taken for her acquittal on the charge of shop-lifting,” he said.

    The court heard discussions between prosecutors and defence counsel also included the possibility of the charges being discontinued before the trial.

    When the shoplifting occurred . Liberal somebodies visited the supermarket, and for some reason, the video of the event was wiped!!

    Mr Abbott has asked for all costs to be paid by prosecution, but prosecutors argued it was a win-win result for both parties therefore they should pay respective amounts.

    So… Adelaide’s top QC is called upon to represent Ms Fisher and her parliamentary career is saved. Easy.

    http://www.adelaidenow.com.au/news/south-australia/senator-mary-jo-fisher-wants-police-to-pay-her-court-costs/story-e6frea83-1226367152690

  32. So Mary Jo’s important & therefore all the stops should, in fact must, be pulled out to get her off. Someone not so important on the same charge but facing the same possible loss of their job would receive the same consideration?
    Pigs.

  33. It’s sickening isn’t it Bob ?
    Senator Fisher’s political career had to be saved/salvaged/ whatever the cost… to the taxpayer as it turns out.
    ,
    Fisher hired the top QC, now she want the Prosecution/government revenue/ us to pay her legal fees.

    It reads as if she thought that if she did a plea deal,legal that it included the “I don’t have to pay the fees” somewhere in the deal…

    She doesn’t appear to have owned the problem for a second.

    Hypocrisy writ large!

    What a spoilt creature she is.

  34. I am thinking of the Aboriginal lad who was sentenced to prison for 3 months for stealing a packet of Timtams under the NT’s mandatory sentencing court system.

    Yes but Min, he wasn’t a Liars Party Senator, an infinitely more deserving species.

    Mr Abbott said that, were she convicted of shoplifting, Ms Fisher would have lost her parliamentary seat.

    Say no more! Nudge, nudge wink wink!

    F*cken “grave consequences”!!!!! She half inches a trolley load of groceries and goes the biff with the security guard, but an Aboriginal kid who nicks a packet of timtams gets 3 months in chokey without a by-your-leave.

    Bob and Pip, it makes me sick to my stomach that we should have to pay the bitch’s court costs!

  35. “MANY of Victoria’s most disadvantaged schoolchildren will have less funding for uniforms, books and excursions next year, after the Baillieu government slashed an allowance for some of the poorest schools.

    Some principals discovered only last week that they will lose up to $80,000 from government cuts to the education maintenance allowance (EMA), which, combined with the scrapping of the $300 school start bonus, contributed a $19 million saving in the state budget.”

    Read more: http://www.theage.com.au/victoria/poorest-students-to-miss-out-20120526-1zc2v.html#ixzz1w2Vmp7k0

  36. Re Mary Jo
    It’s her lawyer’s remarks that anger me most, I think, that since HER job’s in danger everything sould be done to get her off quicksmart. There’s plenty of jobs- coppers, nurses, social workers, public servants & lots more for whom these charges, if proven, would be career threatening (& ending) issues. That’s their bloody problem, they can get in the queue, stump up for their own lawyer & worry themselves witless while the wheels of “justice” slowly turn.

  37. Sue @2.07pm, it’s the Liars Party way-punish the poorest and most disadvantaged while pampering those who least need it.

    Bob, spot on. As you say, the rest of us would have copped a shoplifting conviction as well as the assault conviction and been slung in gaol.

    No public money to pay our legal costs and no sauntering back to our well paid job and big fat pension.

    More than anything, the hypocrisy gets under my skin.

  38. (Surprise…

    “Premier Campbell Newman has surprised voters with plans to dramatically change Brisbane’s riverfront, but he says the redevelopment won’t mean a sudden sell-off of public property. Mr Newman unveiled his multibillion-dollar CBD master plan on Tuesday, which would see one or two major office towers built on vacant, riverfront crown land on William Street. The office would be built by the private sector and leased back by the state.A number of ageing state buildings would be refurbished, demolished or sold, including the premier’s headquarters in the Executive Building on George Street, as well as 80, 100 and 102 George Street. A new pedestrian plaza, riverside boardwalk with leisure and entertainment facilities, cultural hub and possibly a five-star hotel and casino would bring a new “hum” to the area, he said.The revamp is expected to create 18,000 jobs over five years. Queenslanders were not told of the project during the election campaign, nor was it flagged in the government’s detailed 100-day plan for the state. Mr Newman insists he hatched the project after the election and denies springing an asset sale on voters. The government won’t decide whether to sell the crown land until after the next election, giving voters a say, he says. “We wouldn’t have sold anything off at that stage,” he told reporters in Brisbane.”

    Elsewhere, in other surprising news…

    “Mr Abbott said earlier that he would maintain high parliamentary standards if elected prime minister….“I am not going to break an election promise but if I change my mind and an election commitment needs to be reworked, I would seek a new mandate,” Mr Abbott said. “I will keep commitments and if I change my mind on a big policy matter I will go back to the people and seek a new mandate.”)

  39. Meta, does one think that we are in for many many elections under Abbott.

    I suspect he likes the excitement of elections. What over reason could there be for him being in full election mode.

    Personally, I am quite happy with one for both houses in sync, every three years. Would rather a fix term of four years, but this is not to be,”

  40. This makes me feel sick:

    National parks in NSW will be opened up to recreational hunters as part of a deal between the Shooters and Fishers Party and the government to ensure passage of its electricity privatisation bill.

    The decision, announced by the Premier, Barry O’Farrell, this morning, represents a significant backdown by the Premier, who has repeatedly ruled out allowing shooting in national parks.

    The government’s electricity privatisation bill has been stalled in the NSW upper house because of a lack of support from Shooters and Fisher’s Party MPs, who share the balance of power.

    http://www.theage.com.au/environment/conservation/premiers-park-hunting-backdown-the-price-of-power-sale-20120530-1zinf.html#ixzz1wK4MGt00

  42. Miglo, we wait until the first bullet hits a human. How do hikers and shooters keep separated from one another.

    I come from the bush. I have seen shooting expeditions. It is easy for the day to go wrong. I have a picture of a man in uniform, during the great war, holding up the wings of a beautiful eagle. He was shot dead himself a few minutes later.

    This was a group of responsible farmers, bought up with guns.

    It is simply not necessary.

  43. The government in November announced plans to privatise the state’s generators, but keep the poles and wires in public hands.
    The bill has languished in the upper house since March, with the government unable to get the support of the two Shooters and Fishers Party MPs.
    Mr O’Farrell today defended his backdown on the Shooters Party’s push to allow shooting in national parks.
    Under the Shooters Party’s plan, the Game and Feral Animal Act will be amended to allow shooting of feral animals in 79 of the state’s 799 national parks, including Kosciuszko and Dorrigo parks.
    “Understand that what we’re simply doing is allowing licensed shooters to do what is currently undertaken by professional shooters and in some case National Parks and Wildlife staff in a limited number of national parks and reserves across the state,” Mr O’Farrell said.
    “What I’ve said in the past is we wouldn’t allow our national parks to be turned into hunting reserves, and this decision respects that.”
    The Premier acknowledged the government would not have backed shooting in national parks if it was not for the need to get the power privatisation through the upper house.
    But he said the government had to “live with the Parliament that the people of NSW have given us”.
    “Our bigger public interest test here is to unlock the asset value of the generators to assist us in rebuilding the economy by delivering the infrastructure needed to get this state going,” Mr O’Farrell said.
    “It’s about unlocking the proceeds of our generation assets in order to invest in the infrastructure that is critical to get the state’s economy back on track, back booming, to create those jobs, to create those revenues in which to provide services.”

    Read more: http://www.smh.com.au/nsw/nsws-power-generators-to-be-sold-20120530-1zinr.html#ixzz1wKzQ9aHi

  44. “But he said the government had to “live with the Parliament that the people of NSW have given us”.

    Really Barry, may be you should have a word with Tony Abbott.

  45. Sue, fancy Barry saying that. Is not that what we have been saying all along.

    The opposite would mean that one can do nothing when elected, if circumstance change.

    Mr. Abbott’s option of returning the the voters is ludicrous.

    Under a democracy, I do not believe one is elected to carry out promises. It is much more complicated than that.

    One is elected to govern. That means doing what needs to be done for the good of all.

    There is a difference. They are trying to place too much importance on so called promises. Promises are more about what one would like to see happen.

    Mr. Howard felt comfortable bringing WorkChoices, which was not mentioned. He did it, because the numbers delivered to him allowed him too.

  46. But Abbott is being very careful with his words, something he obviously learnt under Howard, the greatest twisters of meanings this country had ever seen.

    “I would seek a new mandate,” Mr Abbott said. “I will keep commitments and if I change my mind on a big policy matter I will go back to the people and seek a new mandate.”

    So what is his definition of a BIG policy matter and does that include breaking a part of the commitment on a BIG policy.

    Of course not. Like Barnett, Baillieu, O’Farrell and soon to follow, who all promised to keep their commitments and be open as well as transparent, Abbott will break commitment after commitment of all sizes. Nothing is surer.

    You only need look at the multitude of commitments he’s already broken only as opposition leader, along with brain farts he had no hope of ever sticking to if in government and then there is the massive funding black hole he’s created for his party if they win government.

    Also remember he was all for a carbon tax (not price but tax) and he’s also stated that circumstances change so commitments can’t always be met.

    I don’t think anybody believes Abbott will move a bees dick towards having an election for breaking any commitment, even if it’s breaking the BIGGEST one he makes at the next election campaign.

  48. Cu and One is elected to govern. That means doing what needs to be done for the good of all. But then Cu, you have a logical brain…

  49. Mobius, the one that I found interesting in Abbott’s statement is if I change my mind So that’s it. It’s just if he changes his mind, then all bets are off.

  50. Personally when I vote, I do it with my fingers crossed, that they will break many of the promises.

    I have never seen a party that I agree with one hundred percent.

    I was disappointed when it looked like the PM was dumping any action on climate change, until I realise she was talking about a tax. not a market base price on carbon emission.

    I was not happy that she intended to put it off, until the latter days of government..

    I do not believe has any effect on the vote. It the truth was known, it would have sent more to the Greens.

    The PM coming live about 8.25 pm.

  51. I have a confession to make. I voted Liberal at our last election (for those who don’t know, I’m in Vic).

    I console myself with the fact that had I not, our brand new special needs school would not be opening next year. As much as I loathe Baillieu, my son needs a place to go to school that won’t see him on a bus for an hour each way without support staff. In my area, lots of families campaigned for this school for a very long time, completely unheard, so when someone listened (and from the Liberal party no less) and promised to help our kids, turned up to almost every rally or community meeting and participated, it’s hard to follow what you think is best for the country. If the ALP don’t get back to what they were best at – grassroots polling and going to battle for the little guy, I worry about their future as a party.

  52. But then you have a LNP government going backwards and doing things like this.

    “Hundreds of gay rights supporters have marched on Parlt House Brisbane over moves by State Govt to repeal civil unions legislation.”

    OK civil unions is not marriage and not real Labor grass roots for the little guy legislation, but it is a step towards that.

    In comes a conservative government and their ingrained 50’s mentality and all the good work undone.

    OK Baillieu did something that Labor should have but then again he has also trashed some good things and rights as well, as O’Farrell has and promises to go even further, and before the people wake up and its too late to stop it, Newman seems hell bent on destroying as much of the environment as he can at the behest of big business.

    So was it worth voting for them?

    Then think of Abbott in power and anything the State Liberals have taken away and destroyed will look like small bikkies in comparison.

  53. Mobius – I certainly agree that the example you’ve given is particularly abhorrent (and not in line with my own beliefs, I strongly support SS marriage), however, one of my even more zealous beliefs is that disabled children deserve some dignity.

    I don’t think it’s fair to have to choose, and nor should I have to. My former local member forced myself and many other families into this position, not the other way around.

  54. NSW More speed cameras. Great growth. Campaign against.

    I would like to add, this is one promise that I do not have any problem with this being broken.

    I do object that they crucified the previous government over them.

  57. A small history lesson *can’t help myself 😉

    Prior to 1856 all marriages were registered by churches. A couple would marry in their parish and the record of the marriage was sent to the Bishops, known as Bishops Transcripts.

    In England it was decided that these registrations marriages (and births & deaths) should all reside with the state. There was a huge outcry of state interference with “God’s laws”. In many areas, especially Catholic Ireland many priests burnt their records rather than hand these over to the state. This occurred in around 1843, but it wasn’t until priests started being imprisoned that state aka civil registrations become the rule and this is usually dated as being in 1856.

    Therefore since 1856 there has been no compulsory religious ceremony, meaning that civil registrations (those registered with the state) have been with us for a very long time. As a consequence, there is no logical impediment to same sex marriage.

  58. Interesting

    http://www.abc.net.au/news/2012-06-01/shooters-and-fishers-gain-access-to-parks/4048318

    NSW Premier Barry O’Farrell has entered into a landmark agreement with the Shooters and Fishers Party to enable the selling off of the State’s remaining power stations. Quentin Dempster talks with the MLC’s of the Shooters and Fishers Party, Robert Borsak and Robert Brown and takes a look at how the deal unfolded.

    http://www.abc.net.au/news/video/2012/06/01/3516635.htm

    Quentin Dempster interviews NSW Premier Barry O’Farrell over his decision to sell off power stations and allow shooters access to national parks.

    Quentin Dempster
    Source: 7.30 New South Wales | Duration: 7min 20sec

  60. Another “tarnish”, “u-turn” (code for lie/ broken promise) in Barrels NSW

    “The pre-election promises included:

    Abolishing the $30 fee for FOI applications.

    Enforced disclosure of government contracts and grants.

    The creation of a ”fully independent Open Government Commissioner” attached to the office of the NSW Ombudsman.

    The Government Information (Public Access) Amendment Act 2012 was passed recently. It contained none of the above.

    Read more: http://www.smh.com.au/opinion/politics/election-uturn-sure-to-have-the-hunters-circling-20120602-1zofw.html#ixzz1wgEEZ4Xj

  61. TROUBLED State MP Geoff Shaw is at the centre of yet another controversy for failing to disclose interests in a private company.

    The Frankston Liberal MP is accused of breaking three of eight conditions of the Members of Parliament (Register of Interests) Act – the critical law Victorian politicians must follow to avoid allegations of insider trading and corruption.

    http://www.heraldsun.com.au/news/geoff-shaw-under-fire-over-another-private-business/story-e6frf7jo-1226381433495

  62. THE Newman Government has ordered police to allow Gold Coast multi-billionaire Clive Palmer to challenge a $333 speeding fine, despite the 28-day appeal period having lapsed.

    Legal sources had earlier indicated that it would be “almost impossible” for the generous LNP donor to appeal against the fine he received in January for allegedly driving his Mercedes-Benz at more than 80km/h in a 60km/h zone on Oxley Drive at Runaway Bay.

    The would-be candidate for the federal seat of Lilley in suburban Brisbane was issued with the ticket and lost four demerit points but, four months later, refused to pay the fine.

    Mr Palmer’s staff told police that he intended to fight the fine and would apply to the courts to have the ticket stayed and the case reopened.

    While the State Government has publicly distanced itself, police have this week been instructed to issue a summons against Mr Palmer to allow him a second chance to appeal. The decision is understood to have been made by government agencies. It allows Mr Palmer to use legislation intended for people “unable” to appeal a ticket.

    Attorney-General and Justice Minister Jarrod Bleijie has refused to comment, with his spokeswoman saying last week: “There will be no comment.”

    http://www.goldcoast.com.au/article/2012/05/30/420071_crime-and-court-news.html

  63. CU, They send Judges to gaol for stuff like that…. wonder how Clive ‘gordon gecko’ Palmer will go… 😕 Makes me sick that he can have that much influence.

  65. How long has Newman been in power? And the corruption has already started. The AG has a name with a familiar flavour. I wonder how long Queenslanders will be happy to put up with this?

  66. Jane
    And Newman’s major infrastructure announcement, Brisbane city redevelopment. You can take the mayor out of the inner city, but you cannot take the inner city out of the premier, and his family companies.

  67. Queensland, perfect one day, backward the next…

    Queensland’s environment minister has confirmed he doubts the role of humans in causing climate change, but says he believes society should act to curb pollution and find renewable power sources.

    Premier Campbell Newman today backed his minister, Andrew Powell, saying it was “refreshing” to have someone in charge of the portfolio who was prepared to tell the truth.

    http://www.brisbanetimes.com.au/queensland/environment-ministers-climate-science-doubts-refreshing-20120605-1zthu.html#ixzz1wtdfE0xp

  68. The Commonwealth is threatening to take back control of major environmental approvals from the Queensland Government, amid a public war of words over a multi-billion dollar mine project.

    The two governments had been working on a single environmental approval process for the Alpha Coal Project in central Queensland.

    But Federal Environment Minister Tony Burke says the Queensland Government has not upheld its end of the deal, because the State Government’s assessment report does not meet Commonwealth standards.

    “I cannot have a situation in front of me where you have thousands of jobs on the line, and the environmental asset at stake is known as the Great Barrier Reef, be subject to this sort of political game,” he said.

    “I want a streamlined approach, I don’t want a shambolic joke, and that is what Queensland is wanting me to accept.

    http://www.abc.net.au/news/2012-06-05/burke-labels-reef-mine-approval-a-shambolic-joke/4053188

  69. PRIME Minister Julia Gillard must pull her “rogue” environment minister into line or risk thousands of Queensland jobs, Premier Campbell Newman says.

    The state and federal governments are at each other’s throats over approval processes for Gina Rinehart’s proposed $6.4 billion Alpha coal mine in central Queensland’s Gallilee Basin.

    Federal Environment Minister Tony Burke has ”stopped the clock” on his assessment of the mine.

    He branded the Queensland government’s approval shambolic and grossly deficient.

    He also threatened to suspend the federal government’s bilateral agreement with Queensland on streamlining major environmental approvals.

    Mr Newman called on Ms Gillard to rein in her wayward minister, and get the approval process started again.

    “I intend to campaign absolutely relentlessly in the next federal election if we do not see the prime minister move in to curb this wayward environment minister,” he told reporters in Brisbane.

    http://www.theaustralian.com.au/national-affairs/state-politics/burke-stops-clock-on-gina-rineharts-alpha-coal-mine-in-gallilee-basin/story-e6frgczx-1226384881449

  70. June 7, 2012 – 13:24 — Admin
    It would appear that nothing can stand in the way of the mining boom, not even the Great Barrier reef. The current Queensland state government of Campbell Newman is all for coal mining development in Queensland’s Galilee Basin in the form of the Alpha Coal mine; the development of Gladstone Harbour to enable liquefaction of CSG and the transfer of LNG to large vessels, and to a strong Coal Seam Gas industry in Queensland.
    If this development impacts negatively on the Great Barrier Reef, then that is the price paid for the rapid coastal development and the economic growth from gas ad coal exports. It doesn’t seem to matter to the Newman state government that Great Barrier Reef as one of Australia’s leading environmental assets and tourist destinations.The rhetoric is that the rapid extraction of minimal resources in this fashion is needed to pay for hospitals and to keep the lights on.
    Although Queensland has jurisdiction over its lands and inshore waters in the case of Gina Rinehart’s Alpha Coal mine the Commonwealth has the final word on development because under the Australian Constitution it has jurisdiction over areas subject to international agreements such as World Heritage sites.

    http://www.blogotariat.com/node/391519

  72. I do not remember this promise.

    Compo benefits: how they will change
    June 13, 2012 – 3:48PM

    Thousands protest against compo cuts
    RAW VISION: Workers march on NSW Parliament to protest against expected cuts to the state’s WorkCover scheme.
    Autoplay OnOffVideo feedbackVideo settings
    Compensation benefits will be slashed under changes to NSW’s WorkCover scheme to be recommended by a parliamentary committee today.

    It is understood a report to be tabled in NSW Parliament will recommend the abolition of journey claims.

    That will mean that workers will no longer be covered for injuries while travelling to and from work.

    Advertisement: Story continues below
    Greens MP David Shoebridge said he had received “very strong reports that the parliamentary committee has signed off on every one of the government’s recommended cuts and this will be a disaster for injured workers”.

    He said workers compensation payments were cut to the bone a decade ago.

    “These further reductions will see many injured workers fall into poverty,” he said.

    “The removal of journey claims means employees are not covered when they travel to and from work but everyone needs to get to their place of work and come home.

    “Journey claims amount to only a tiny proportion of the scheme’s costs and removing these entitlements will leave thousands of workers without any protection when they are injured.”

    Mr Shoebridge said there were 7000 journey claims last year but, because most of the associated costs were recovered from third parties, the financial impact was only 4 per cent of all benefits paid.

    Finance Minister Greg Pearce recently released a paper recommending that journey claims be abolished. It also recommended a cap on payments and the withdrawal of entitlements for nervous shock to family members of people injured or killed on the job.

    Read more: http://www.smh.com.au/nsw/compo-benefits-how-they-will-change-20120613-209n1.html#ixzz1xeqbCURn

  73. NSW Premier Barry O’Farrell wants the federal government to fund the Pacific Highway upgrade from funds earmarked for the Parramatta to Epping rail link.

    A 2016 deadline to turn Australia’s deadliest stretch of road into a dual carriageway appeared to be in jeopardy a day after the NSW budget was unveiled, as NSW and the commonwealth argued over funding and federal Infrastructure Minister Anthony Albanese threatened to divert commonwealth money towards road projects in other states.

    On Wednesday Mr O’Farrell for the first time called on the Gillard government to dump its $2.1 billion election proposal for an Epping to Parramatta rail link, and instead put those funds into finishing the upgrade of the Pacific Highway.

    Mr O’Farrell has previously called for that money to be spent on the North West Rail Link.

    and

    he NSW government’s war with the commonwealth escalated on Tuesday when state Treasurer Mike Baird pledged $1.5 billion over four years to convert the deadly stretch of road in northern NSW to a dual carriageway.

    That was well below the $3.6 billion pledged by the federal government in the May budget on the condition NSW matched its funding commitment dollar for dollar.

    ‘But NSW argues the original agreement with the commonwealth provided for a 20/80 funding split, which would have meant $2.13 billion more.

    Canberra is instead insisting on a 50/50 funding deal, dating back to 1996.

    http://bigpondnews.com/articles/National/2012/06/13/OFarrell_says_Hwy_should_trump_rail_760694.html

    PS. That 80/20 was one off stimulus funding. The Pacific Highway is a state road. In the past, the Nationals demanded the New England Highway, be the Federal Highway.

  74. Mr O’Farrell declined to say where an $1.24 billion in unspecified cutbacks to government programs and services flagged in the budget would be made.

    http://bigpondnews.com/articles/National/2012/06/13/OFarrell_says_Hwy_should_trump_rail_760694.html

    We have just had a new budget. No idea of where the cuts are to be made.

    What does this mean.

    Meanwhile, with the NSW budget proposing 10,000 government job cuts over four years to save $2.2 billion, Mr O’Farrell said public servants would need to prove their worth.

    ‘What directors-general of departments have been asked to do over the next 12 months is identify and eradicate waste and mismanagement within departments and if that means that some public servants are going to have to do more, well that’s real life,’ he said.

  75. So Mr O’Farrell says public servants would need to prove their worth. I say to Mr O’Farrell that he needs to prove his.

  76. I wonder what would be the outcry if Me. Swan had told us in the budget that he was going to make a billion dollars cuts, but he could not tell how, where or when,

  77. So Mr. O’Farrel sees the money given to pensioners to compensate them for electricity rises as income.

    That takes the cake, as far as I am concerned. When has compensation in this country been treated as income.

    Then the minister on the floor of the house put forwarded the argument that they had to provide new housing stock, which would incur a carbon tax rise, therefore they had to get the money from somewhere.

    As welfare housing tenants where playing much less than others on a similar income, they were fair game.

    Problem is that it is not income. It is compensation from the Federal government.

    It is a rip off.

  78. Who would have guessed.

    By the way, it was all caused by spending. The down turn in tourism due to the GFC and the massive flooding they have endured had nothing to do with the problem.

    The Newman government may have to break its promise to return the budget to surplus by 2014/15 after a dire report on the Queensland economy.

    Former federal treasurer Peter Costello will on Friday hand down an interim report showing the state’s debt will hit $92 billion in four years.

    Queensland Treasurer Tim Nicholls said it would hit $100 billion by 2018, and Labor had grossly misrepresented the state’s true financial position before the March election.

    Asked if the LNP government’s timetable to return to surplus by 2014/15 was under threat, Mr Nicholls cited Labor’s failure to fully disclose Queensland’s financial woes.

    He said the picture was much worse than the LNP was told before the election, when it committed to the 2014/15 timetable.

    http://www.skynews.com.au/topstories/article.aspx?id=761200&vId=3323132&cId=Top%20Stories

  79. Mr. Costello is using a different accountancy system to get his results. He is including public works I believe. This is normally not done. It would be like adding NBN outlays to the Federal budget I believe.

    We will have to wait for the experts to tell us what the figures really mean.

    I suspect, they will be as Bligh said.

  80. BULLSHIT

    MORE commuters would have to change trains to get to the city centre under a planned overhaul of Sydney’s train system that will attempt to make trains run more frequently and reliably.
    The overhaul would mean commuters from a clutch of stations in Sydney’s west and north-west would lose direct services to the city, but they would be promised better and more regular services on the express line when they change trains.

    Read more: http://www.smh.com.au/nsw/all-change-new-plan-for-faster-city-trains-20120614-20d5j.html#ixzz1xpa3CiDE

  82. Want a laugh,. watch 7.30. Quentin Dempster interviewing our state treasurer.

    Still no identification od what is going to be cut. I believe that Mr. Baird does not know.

  83. Mr ROBERT FUROLO:……Today we face a new challenge. The decision of this heartless Government to use the Federal Government’s carbon price payment to calculate the rent of public housing tenants is reprehensible. To attack the most vulnerable, the most disadvantaged, the elderly, the sick and the frail and to take their payment designed to offset the impacts of carbon pricing is just plain wrong. What makes this worse is that at the same time as the O’Farrell Liberal Government is hitting the most vulnerable with increased rent for public housing pensioners and families it is cutting the rent for jetties and pontoons for millionaires and their waterfront homes. That is right: hit the pensioners in public housing with a rent increase and cut rent for millionaires in waterfront properties. What kind of topsy-turvy world is this? What does that say about the Government’s values? [my emphasis]

    http://northcoastvoices.blogspot.com.au/2012/06/robin-hood-ofarrell-giving-to-rich-and.html?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=Feed:+blogspot/UtodS+(North+Coast+Voices)

  84. Iain’s hope.

    I hope he realises that Mr. Costello used his own method if auditing to get these figures.

    He counted in money that no state audited has done before. It would be like adding the NBN to the Federal budget.

    MORE state assets could be privatised in a Newman Government firesale designed to pay down Queensland’s multibillion-dollar debt – but Treasurer Tim Nicholls has promised voters will not be duped into it.

    Cautious of voters who banished the Bligh government over its controversial decision to sell assets soon after winning the 2009 election, Mr Nicholls yesterday flatly ruled out any further privatisation this term.

    He admitted the move was “on the menu for consideration” but said his Government would seek an election mandate before pursing any asset sales, recommended yesterday by a major audit into the state’s finances, which savaged the former Labor government for “masking” major fiscal mismanagement.

    Head auditor and former federal treasurer Peter Costello yesterday insisted privatisation was the only way to rein in state debt – tipped to reach $100 billion by 2018-19 – and win back its AAA credit rating lost in 2009.

    State debt ‘headed for $100b in six years’
    Mining cash, not job losses: public sector
    Public service cuts needed: industry

    Mr Costello’s interim audit report, which comes ahead of a final report next February, also recommended a range of tax hikes, public service cuts and changes to service delivery as the first stage in a two-pronged approach to financial repair.

    Mr Nicholls promptly ruled out a proposed $100-per-property landholder’s levy, which would have proven politically unpopular after the LNP went to the March poll promising to lower the cost of living for families.

    But increases to mining royalties, land and gaming taxes remain on the cards, with the Newman Government to decide which recommendations it will accept when it hands down its first Budget, delayed until September.

    http://www.couriermail.com.au/news/asset-sales-the-only-answer-costello/story-e6freon6-1226397178883

  85. Look at the new government in Queensland. They do not have to win any more votes, and so far the only decisions they have made have been leftie-goading: development against the Barrier Reef, cancelling literary prizes and defunding HIV education programs. No votes lost or won from any of that for Newman, but the difference with Abbott’s crew is they’re not in government. If Abbott creates the impression that he’s going to stuff cronies into every crevice of government and fiddle with a few programs, there’s no incentives for swinging voters to shift their vote from Labor.

    http://andrewelder.blogspot.com.au/2012/06/goading-and-politics.html

  86. Generous Liberal governments.

    Local pensioners are sick and tired of seeing the NSW Government hit pensioners every time the Federal Labor Government gives them a bit of extra support.
    “All pensioners in Page have received a lump sum payment from the Federal Government in recent weeks of $250 for singles and $380 for couples. From next March they will get a permanent boost to their regular payments.
    “But Barry O’Farrell’s decision means a maximum rate single pensioner in public housing will be paying an extra $84.50 in rent a year.
    “Federal Labor is delivering the pension increase as a separate, stand-alone supplement. The accepted practise is to leave pension supplements alone when public housing rents are calculated.

    http://www.blogotariat.com/node/412487

  88. Wow 20,000 people to lose their job on a fudged Peter Costello audit that’s riddled with creative accounting.

    I know the media won’t, but I hope the Queensland people lay the blame right where it belongs at the feet of Costello and Newman as their public services collapse around them.

  90. Sue, speaking of Queensland..

    Integrity Commissioner raises question over Premier Campbell Newman’s appointment of close friend to head ports corporation

    CAMPBELL Newman is facing fresh integrity questions over his appointment of a “close friend” to head a key government-owned corporation.

    The state’s Integrity Commissioner this morning told a parliamentary committee that ministers wanting to appoint close friends to government positions should declare a conflict of interest to Cabinet.

    Opposition leader Annastacia Palaszczuk said it was unclear if Mr Newman had declared his long association with Mark Brodie before installing the LNP supporter as Gladstone Ports Corporation chairman earlier this month.

    http://www.couriermail.com.au/news/integrity-commissioner-raises-question-over-premier-campbell-newmans-appointment-of-close-friend-to-head-ports-corporation/story-e6freon6-1226402933699?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=twitter&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+cmnews+%28The+Courier+Mail+|+News%29

  91. Yes, wonderful talent. Once again no price or how. I thought we had been here under Labor.

    What is new, every new announcement includes, is changing trains.

    Sydney will get a single-decker metro-style train system and a new harbour tunnel in an effort to speed up commuter journeys and ease pressure on the city’s public transport system.

    But the state government admits it has no idea how much the new tunnel will cost and says the work may take 20 years.

    Transport Minister Gladys Berejiklian and Premier Barry O’Farrell unveiled the plans on Wednesday, with the metro system to operate on the planned North West Rail Link to Rouse Hill.

    Passengers travelling from the northwest will have to change trains at Chatswood before arriving in the city.

    http://bigpondnews.com/articles/National/2012/06/20/New_Sydney_metro_train_system_763020.html

  93. One journo hit the NSW Transport Minister with the fact the O’Farrell 20 year rail plan looked very much like the Iemma 20 year rail plan, the one O’Farrell spend a lot of time rubbishing in opposition.

    So when the Transport Minister was quizzed on the points they had rubbished when in opposition the answer was they would manipulate the timetable so it will work.

    Also the rail network doesn’t go all the way into the city, something they heavily criticised Iemma for.

    So I want you to understand how the NSW people have been dudded by O’Farrell on this. After making a lot of brouhaha on how he will have this grand plan for rail that will be better and grander than Labor’s, he comes out with the same plan as Labor’s, but somehow he will magic the things he previously said wouldn’t work with the plan so all of a sudden they work.

    He was too lazy to even try to produce something better than Iemma’s or is it that Iemma’s plan was perfectly sound all along and O’Farrell just did an Abbott to rubbish it when in opposition.

    O’Farrell is treating the NSW people as idiots as well as being a great big fat liar.

  94. Tickler
    This is a real tickler for the government. It would dearly love to ignore this chink in the regulatory framework, and its effect on prices, until it had fetched a handsome price for the state’s electricity silverware.
    It would seem, though, that fulminating voters might disrupt that process first.
    To its credit, the government is doing something about the network industry structure on the cost front. From July, common Chairman, Board and CEO will replace the three Chairs,
    Boards and CEOs of Ausgrid, Endeavour Energy and Essential Energy.
    There is $400 million in savings there. Further, the Treasurer told the SMH yesterday that there would be no increase in dividends “above currently budgeted levels” in its first term of government.
    “The NSW Government recognises the burden increasing power bills are placing on families and will continue to take action to put downward pressure on electricity prices including targeted measures such as the increase to the Low Income Household Rebate,” said the Treasurer Mike Baird in a statement.
    There was a sign of things to come though this week in federal parliament when independent MP Rob Oakeshott lambasted the state government for failing to cap prices as it had said it would.
    The National Electricity Market, said Oakeshott, was the greatest market failure in Australia today, sending cost of living pressures through the roof.
    He has a point.

    Read more: http://www.smh.com.au/business/the-real-culprits-behind-surging-power-bills-20120620-20njs.html#ixzz1yKgiLVOV

  95. ME, at least Labor’s transport went into the city. Yesterday we had the prospect of changing trains at Parramatta, I believe. Today, Chatswood.

    The trains have terminated or gone through Central since the days of Jack Lang.

    No time limited. No cost. No nothing, except if is going to be done by the private sector.

    At least Labor’s effort attempted to link into the city. This seems to go to and from nowhere.

    Last week it was bringing the trams back or light rail.

    All channels seemed to treat the announcement with the contempt, it deserved.

  97. What, a Coalition government using paid advertising. Shock shock.

    Unions are planning their own advertising campaigns after Queensland Premier Campbell Newman made a televised address selling the need for spending cuts.

    During a one-minute advertising broadcast last night, Mr Newman again outlined the need to address the state’s dire finances.

    A spokesman for the Premier says the ad did not cost anything because the airtime had already been paid for by the previous Labor government.

    http://www.abc.net.au/news/2012-06-25/unions-return-fire-after-newmans-budget-ad/4090160

    Oh, I forgot, is is OK for that side of the fence.

  98. “If terraces are so valued and prized, why aren’t developers building more of them?

    The answer turned out to be simple: Current council restrictions make terraces all but unviable. If a developer wishes to build terraces, they will typically require a rezoning and a sub-division application, which often take years to process. Some councils even require terraces to have underground or off-street parking, making them either prohibitively expensive or simply not terraces at all. The result of this baffling approach is that developers end up building either McMansions in sprawling suburbs or high-rise apartments. The former isn’t sustainable and the latter isn’t popular.”

    http://posterous.alexwhite.org/why-dont-we-all-live-in-terrace-houses

    Often wonder about this myself. It came to me while driving through those lovely little villages in Britain. At first I could not understand why they would have rows of terrace houses in little villages.

    It hit home, it was what made these villages so cosy and comfortable.

    The inner suburbs of Sydney are not bad places to live.

    We allow large blocks of high rise units, but ignore terracing housing,

    Why?

  99. The Leader of the NSW Shooters & Fishers Party Robert Borsak has been caught out trying to slip clauses into legislation before the NSW Parliament allowing unsupervised amateur hunters the right to bear semi-automatic weapons.

    So subservient is Barry O’Farrell to this man that it wasn’t until The Greens, the National Coalition for Gun Control and some journalists blew the whistle that he was forced to backtrack and remove some of these ‘rights’ in relation to weapons.

    http://northcoastvoices.blogspot.com.au/2012/06/borsak-baulked.html?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=Feed:+blogspot/UtodS+(North+Coast+Voices)

  100. CU

    I just read that same piece on northcoastvoices and I thought “now that’s so gobsmacking outrageous I better link the article for Mobius”

  101. How remiss of me. I’ve been mostly going on about O’Farrell because I now live in NSW. A little on Baillieu as I lived in Victoria through to my adulthood and have many family and friends there, and some on Barnett as he’s the longest of the current crop of Liberal Premiers and was the fist to break promises and fail in policy implementation.

    I would have thought that Newman being so new to game would have needed some time to catch up to the failures of the other Liberal premiers. Not so.

    Two major broken promises, the sacking of public servants and the freezing of electricity prices behind him after having well and truly smashed them out of the ground he’s now moving on to breaking more and having a good go at destroying the Queensland environment whilst he’s at it.

    To expect Abbott not to be the same as the failing State Liberal premiers is asking to believe a lot. Though if you take that Abbott will be far worse as being different then you can say he won’t be the same.

  102. Newman bumps womens health funding

    “received about $460,000 a year for the women’s reproductive health services.
    This funding will stop in three months.
    Ms Gore said the program was focused on preventative health for women in rural areas, women with disabilities and Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander women.

    Other items on the list of 24 projects to end reliance on grant funding in three months include a sponsorship contribution for Queensland Voice for Mental Health, a group that speaks up for people with mental health issues and their carers and disseminates information.”
    http://www.sunshinecoastdaily.com.au/story/2012/07/01/newman-bumps-womens-health-funding/

    103. What does a Liberal government do. Attack the workers of course. Workers both in the public and private sector.

      f the Queensland government is interested in privatising anything, they could do worse than running their ruler over WorkCover.

      They must be sensitive about their latest price hike – I’ve never before had a phone call from WorkCover to inform me that my premiums are about to rise.

      Perhaps they are super sensitive in that an increase of 23.4% for video stores is well above the 13% average increase, which in itself is quite bracing.

      What is going on here?

      http://www.ambitgambit.com/2012/06/29/newman-hikes-workers-compo-insurance-23-4-for-video-stores/

      I

  104. On Thursday June 21, the New South Wales State Government forced through Parliament a range of changes to the NSW workers’ compensation scheme that have effectively levelled the entire blame for WorkCovers’ $4 billion deficit with injured workers across NSW.
    It is hard to know where to start talking about the deliberate onslaught against workers these changes represent.
    Let’s begin with the fact that a worker’s pain and suffering, yes that strange and unexpected thing that someone suffers when hurt, is now no longer recognised under NSW law. Yes that’s right. Get injured just about anywhere else in Australia and your pain and suffering will be recognised and compensated. Not NSW though.

    http://www.abc.net.au/unleashed/4101118.html?WT.svl=theDrum

  105. Introducing the Qld Treasurer

    The Liberals love rewriting history and making arrogates. One of their most often trotted out is that they are great economic managers, yet any analysis of their economic management shows this is rarely the case.

    Here again we have the 5th Estate doing a fact based analysis of something the 4th Estate should be all over, and were until the advent of the Howard government, where Costello’s arrogant bragging was taken as gospel and an indication of a great Treasurer, even when that Treasurer went to court to have suppressed budgetary information that would have shown otherwise. That sleight of hand was let through without hardly a whimpering protest.

  107. Legal experts are baffled by a NSW Government decision to axe special youth court that sent young offenders to counselling and rehab instead of jail.

    The court was set up 12 years ago after a recommendation of the Drug Summit, but it was closed down at short notice yesterday.

    The Government said the court’s price tag was too much, but the former head of the court has slammed the decision.

    Hillary Hannam ran the court until she was appointed Chief Magistrate of the Northern Territory.

    http://www.abc.net.au/news/2012-07-03/experts-baffled-as-axe-falls-on-youth-drug-court/4108366

  108. As that cartoon I posted on Baillieu so aptly lampooned.

    “Why are making all the massive budget cuts to welfare and social programs?”
    “So I can make massive spending increases to jails.”

    …or words to that effect.

    A good cartoon that sums up Baillieu, and every other Liberal Premier for that matter quite well.

  110. 40 cms too small. sorry Barry but size does matter

    “WHEN the tunnels for the North West Rail Link are finished in just over four years, they will have an internal diameter of about 6.1 metres, too small for the type of trains used in Sydney.
    The project director for the North West Rail Link, Rodd Staples, told an industry briefing last week the tunnels would have an internal diameter of 6.1 metres. This is about 40 centimetres smaller than tunnels bored for the Epping to Chatswood link.

    It is also too small to fit a Sydney double-deck train and its overhead wiring, according to the government and several rail industry sources.”
    http://smh.drive.com.au/roads-and-traffic/tunnel-too-small-could-make-rail-link-a-bridge-too-far-20120703-21fjy.html

    Now this decision should be a doozy for the Federal Infrastructure Committee. The NSW govt should self select for rejection for any federal infrastructure funds for this project.

  112. Sue, a lifetime away, the Libs were voted in because of a campaign against waste in building the Opera House.

    The Libs cut corners and finished the building. The resit, an inferior building, that today’s taxpayer are paying to correct.

    Same will occur with the new proposed tunnels. They will be second rate at the best.

    Jack Lang must have got it right, when he built the electric rail system, during the Great Depression. It has served us well up to now.

    It is now time, to extend the system to meet the needs of this century. The best way to waste money, will be by cutting corners.

    It seems stupid to attempt to save money by making the tunnel a metre of so smaller.

  113. I wonder if the good burghers of WA, Vic, NSW and Qld will be as enamoured of their Liars governments come the federal election next year?

  116. On 7 May, the Sydney Morning Herald’s front page revealed that a NSW bureaucrat had told locals to accept the appointment of a “government mission manager”, or their community would be bulldozed.

    Despite all the upgrade works, children were still living among raw sewage. The street lights weren’t working, the homes were in poor condition and the roads were still paved, but littered with broken glass and rubbish. Crime was a daily occurrence, and sexual abuse of children, according to residents, was rife, with numerous paedophiles living unchecked in the community.

    http://newmatilda.com/2012/07/05/black-blood-mixed-white-trash

  118. Public servants rehired as expensive consultants

    TWO former senior bureaucrats whose positions were axed by the Baillieu Government have returned to work as consultants, costing taxpayers $366,300.

    The officials, who left the Department of Transport at the end of March, were back at the office within two months on contracts.

    http://www.heraldsun.com.au/news/victoria/public-servants-rehired-as-expensive-consultants/story-e6frf7kx-1226420545302

    That’s it Bazza, keep Public Service numbers down.

  119. Quiet death of the youth drug court

    THE speed and stealth with which the NSW government shut down the Youth Drug and Alcohol Court suggest a desire to head off the inevitable chorus of dismay. On the evidence, the program which directed young offenders into intensive treatment and rehabilitation as an alternative to locking them up did valuable work transforming the lives of some of the state’s most troubled youth and their families. That the program was closed with no consultation or any attempt at serious evaluation shows scant regard for due process.

    and

    In a letter to the Herald, the Chief Magistrate of the Northern Territory, Hilary Hannam, who was the court’s presiding magistrate before moving to the territory in 2010, has rejected as offensive the suggestion that the widely admired and imitated program didn’t work to reduce reoffending. On the contrary it changed lives. Youths who would otherwise have been incarcerated got jobs and now make valuable contributions to the community.

    Ms Hannam also states it is “fundamentally incorrect” to suggest that “a number of reviews” found the program wanting. The only one she knew about over the life of the 12-year “pilot” program in 2004 recommended it “should be continued and possibly be expanded to selected other geographical areas”.

  120. I wrote this one earlier this year..

    https://cafewhispers.wordpress.com/2012/02/21/a-stint-in-jail/

    It is often said that it’s time to “come down tough on” juvenile offenders, that a stint in jail would teach these young hooligans a good lesson; that it would teach them respect; that they would learn all about consequences. But has it been considered just which lessons are taught to young offenders while in prison?

    As background:

    There are times when things arise from necessity. In the late 1990s, lawyer David Heilpern was defending a young person and put the argument forward that this young person should not be given a custodial sentence, due to the probability that this young man would be sexually assaulted while in prison.*** The judge requested that Heilpern provide actuarial evidence. No such study then existed for Australia.

    As a consequence David wrote Fear or Favour, this being based on his Honours Thesis. David’s findings included that 1/4 of male prisoners aged 18 – 25 years had been sexually assaulted, half had been threatened with sexual assault, 2/3rds were fearful of sexual assault, younger prisoners were at greater risk; that most sexual assaults were perpetrated by other prisoners; and that the incidents went largely unreported. Approximately 66% of all prisoners are aged between 20 and 39 years.

    These statistics are horrendous enough, but can you imagine if there was a particular demographic within Australia who are imprisoned at a rate 14 times higher than the white population, this demographic comprising less than 5% of the population (estimated).

    David Heilpern was my lecturer in Criminal Law..

  121. “Public servants rehired as expensive consultants”

    Pip, nothing new here. This is the way it always works. Politicians have this funny belief that one can get more for less.

    Labor has been cutting to the bone for years.

    Most state responsibilities leave little room for cutting, especially in areas as child welfare and protection.

    Mr. Abbott will find the same. There is little fat to trim. They have to cut departments and programmes.

  122. Re former public servants being rehired as expensive consultants. I don’t know how “expensive” that might be compared with the hours that they put in and their limited tenure.

  124. Most I know of, do exactly the same job for more money,

    By the way, they were generally the best workers that were first to go.

    If on does not have confidence in their own ability or wider skills, they are going to stay where they are,

  125. NSW whinging because they did not get it. Queensland whinging about the cost. Can one ever win.

    “I can understand that Sydney’s disappointed and that New South Wales is disappointed, but there were a couple of big reasons why Brisbane was selected,” she said.

    “First, the Convention Centre here is ready to go… In Sydney, the major convention centre will be undergoing repairs and renovations at that time. And then secondly, we needed to be reassured about airport capacity.

    “[There will be] lots of planes, lots of pressure on the airport, all in quite a confined period of time. And Sydney Airport does have restrictions and a lot of pressure on it already, whereas Brisbane’s airport can cater for all of that.”

    A G20 Finance Ministers’ meeting will also be held in regional Queensland.

    http://www.abc.net.au/news/2012-07-11/gillards-g20-choice-ruffles-sydneys-feathers/4122900?height=100&ratio=1×1&width=100

  126. Can do, can sure do, and do it in a big way.

    Queensland Premier Campbell Newman must have one hell of a solar hangover today.
    Following his announcement to cut the 44 cent net feed-in tariff, he provided the industry and solar consumers with a window of opportunity to sign up before the scheme was switched to 8 cents – and sign up they did.
    Energex reported this morning that 75,000 applications were received in the 13 days between the 26th of June and the 9th of July.
    Broadly speaking, this is equivalent to around 12 applications per minute and 150MW of new capacity (at an average system size of 2kW).
    Assuming standard eight hour working days, Premier Newman effectively added 1.4MW of generation capacity per hour, to the sunshine state’s energy generation capacity.
    Show me any other generation source that could achieve that, and I’ll eat my solar-powered hat.
    Energex also noted however, that 31,000 (or 62MW) of those applications were received in a single day.
    That is an astonishing 1.07 applications per SECOND or 7.8MW per hour on the final day.
    Of course, it has to be processed and installed and there is up to one year to do that. But my guess is that to maximise economies of scale Queensland installers will gear up and veraciously install the majority of this new capacity within six months or so.
    Put in a state context, he just avoided the need for roughly 3.9TWh of coal fired energy over the next 20 years. At a conservative energy cost of $0.20/kWh, Queensland electricity consumers just started down the road to savings of approximately $39 million per year.
    (Inadvertently) nice work, Premier Newman.
    This article was originally published by SolarBusinessServices. Republished with permission.
    Tags:Australia, Campbell Newman, CleanTech, feed-in tariff, solar PV, Queensland
    Comments on this article
    Assumption of 2KW system size modest. – Reply
    Submitted by Karl Jensen on Wed, 2012-07-11 14:19.
    Given similar terms here in WA with a 5kW inverter limit and no limit on panel capacity a similar up-sizing of systems will occur.
    CEC guidelines encourage 20% more panel capacity than inverter capacity hence estimate may be closer to 300 or even 400MW.
    Significant changes to AS5033 (released yesterday) mean that installation costs on systems will rise by an estimated $500-$1000 or more to account for additional BOS (switchgear and HD conduit) and installation time. This change will become mandatory post 17 October 2012. The industry has potentially sold 12 months of installation capacity at todays prices, thus install by 17th Oct or wear at their own cost the additional requirements. As these costs are significant the installer wont be copping it on the chin and we will see lots of backlash (to the std’s committe)

    http://www.climatespectator.com.au/commentary/newmans-accidental-solar-boom?utm_source=Climate%2BSpectator%2Bdaily&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=Climate%2BSpectator%2Bdaily

  127. Protesters outside Grafton prison say they are disgusted the riot squad has been deployed, as their blockade enters its sixth day.

    Public Service Australia (PSA) assistant general secretary Shane O’Brien said he expected police would soon decide on a course of action.

    ‘We’re expecting them to make a fairly substantial move in the next 24 hours,’ he told AAP

    http://bigpondnews.com/articles/TopStories/2012/07/11/Riot_police_eye_Grafton_jail_protesters_770526.html

  128. Opposition Leader John Robertson says confidential NSW Treasury documents show an estimated 881 jobs will be cut from prisons and courts.

    Opposition Leader John Robertson said confidential NSW Treasury documents showed an estimated 881 jobs would be cut from the sector over the next four years.

    ‘These job cuts will impact on security, they will reduce safety and they will diminish services in towns and suburbs across the state,’ he said in a statement.

    Mr Robertson is visiting Grafton prison on Wednesday to join protesters who have been blockading the facility since Friday over plans to downsize it from a 250-bed jail to a transient court facility.

    http://bigpondnews.com/articles/National/2012/07/11/900_court_prison_jobs_to_go_770650.html

    They are also handing over all foster care to the charities. it is over a decade since I left the industry. There have been numerous attempts to do this. It leads to a two tier system for the kids. The better behaved and easy to manage end up in agency care, at exorbitant cost.

    The Department is left with the hard cases and little money to care for them.

    I will be surprise if anything has changed today. Some of the quotes given were in cuckoo land.

    It is NSW, I am talking about.

  129. It’s great to have your insight into these issues CU. Those of us in the big wide world appreciate the experience you bring to enhance our understanding of this area of society.

  130. Bacchus, I could be wrong on this one but my gut feeling after sitting through too may case conferences, is that I am not.

    It is no different from other areas where the are private competing with public. Same for schools. Who gets the delinquents and those with problems.

    How many urgent illnesses do private hospitals deal with. How many very poor disadvantage, find private rental.

    There is only one that the Department can rely on, to take the worse at reasonable cost.is a certain priest, that many in the industry do not like.

    Some cannot come to turns with his methods. I am one of his admirers. I will never forget what he did for my son.

    Have we yet seen the number of people this government intends to sack. Is it still a big secret.

    It looks like Mr. O’Farrell will have to deal with that airport. I did not realise it was third of the size of the one in Brisbane.

    I think that Sydney barely coped with Howard’s effort of hosting big events. Closing the whole of the Sydney business down for so long, is just not on.

    The reaction of the NSW mob is infantile. Sydney is not Australia.

    Maybe the message might be, if they continue to treat the PM with contempt, there is nothing stopping her returning the favour.

    At the end of the day, she controls the purse strings.

    For the first time, we have seen Abbott talking with passion. Pity it is about removing the rights of workers. He is getting desperate.

  131. Bacchus, I should add something over time I forgot. The welfare and care side of the department needs to be separated from the child protection side. I believe there may have been some movement down this path.

    A District Officer in may day, had three roles at the same time. Investigate and take the matter to court, while working with the family as welfare worker. Often supervising the child in care.

    it is like saying to the police, if you arrest the father, you are responsible for caring for his family, while finding accommodation, because they can no longer afford where they live. Most would find this ridiculous.

    One can add to the DO workload the fact that they prepare, lodge and prosecute the case. The solicitor comes in when the work is done. All court papers are prepared by the DO. Imagine the holdups, if this fell to police as well.

    Then they wonder why the system does not work.

  132. Liberal government in decline in WA, which is not a surprise seeing how badly they’re doing, but I guess they are a little better than their Eastern cousins who stumble from one disaster after another and one broken promise after another.

    The big surprise is the Nationals only polling 2% with the Greens on their normal 8%.

    Seems the deal the Nationals did with the Liberals over royalties distribution has backfired big time. People are seeing it for the massive wasteful pork barrel it was.

    If you want to see a real python squeezing the life out of a sector then you need look no further than what the Liberals are doing to the Nationals. The day they take the last seat off them will be celebration time for the Liberals.

  133. A great big new tax for NSW residents.
    “Tim Moore and Ron Dyer, both former state ministers, say a new tax is the only way to fund the significant gap between the amount that could be charged to developers without damaging the cost of housing affordability, particularly for first home buyers in greenfield estates, and the cost of the necessary local infrastructure required for the new areas.

    ”We propose that the settled areas of our community that have had the benefit, in the past, of their infrastructure being funded through general revenue streams rather than by specific development charges should bear part of the cost for new local infrastructure,” they say in the report.

    Read more: http://www.smh.com.au/nsw/tax-plan-for-new-housing-20120714-222s4.html#ixzz20f59Yl1S

  134. ………She said Labor’s review of the Fair Work Act would “lock in fairness, to lock in bargaining in good faith, to lock them in for the future”.
    Ms Gillard attacked the NSW Liberals as “a lazy party with small ideas” and renewed her challenged to the Premier, Barry O’Farrell, to accept her offer of infrastructure funding.
    Ms Gillard has offered $2.1 billion to fund construction of the Parramatta to Epping rail link but Mr O’Farrell has said the money should be directed to his preferred option, the north-west rail link……….

    Read more: http://www.smh.com.au/nsw/gillard-labor-not-done-yet-20120715-223rh.html#ixzz20fhdp3zP

  135. It goes on and on and on.

    This development would also be completed over a decade before the proposed North West Rail Link became operational. “State Government, it seems, is keen to send people to the area on mass, but has no plans to increase or improve public transport or roads before the rail link is complete” one resident pointed out.

    Residents have also noted that the flood zone, which the site stands upon, was important enough for the State Government to be “forced” to impose a Skytrain on the area, rather than underground as per resident’s wishes. However this flood zone has not stopped the planned construction of residential properties, and plans for these properties include underground car parking.
    http://wixxy.wordpress.com/2012/07/16/welcome-to-the-jungle/#comments

  136. BE WARNED. COMPLAIN AND MORE WILL GO. Is that not called bullying.

    By the way do we have a number for how many O’Farrell intends to sack?

    NSW Premier Barry O’Farrell has warned that more public services could be outsourced if public sector workers engage in ‘industrial thuggery’ by going on more strikes.

    The warning comes less than two weeks after 1000 employees of Sydney Water held a rally in Parramatta against 300 job cuts.

    ‘What I’m saying to them, what I’m saying to others, is be careful about what you’re doing because if the private sector can deliver it at a better standard, or the same standard, at a cheaper price we are duty-bound as a government to consider that,’ Mr O’Farrell told reporters on Monday.

    ‘Don’t engage in industrial thuggery and think there are no consequences.’
    ……………………..

    http://bigpondnews.com/articles/National/2012/07/16/OFarrell_warns_public_sector_workers_772350.html

  137. Cu, while the conservative Premiers are busily sacking public servants, Can do Newman is looking after his MPs.

    Premier Campbell Newman wants ban on ministers trading shares lifted

    MINISTERS in the Newman Government could soon return to dabbling in the share market.

    Premier Campbell Newman yesterday released advice recommending the ban on ministers trading shares be lifted.

    “I recently committed to releasing the advice that I received from the Integrity Commissioner and the Clerk of the Parliament on an updated Ministerial Code of Conduct,” he said.

    “The independent advice is now available for public comment on the Queensland Government website and feedback will be used to help formulate the finalised draft of the Ministerial Code of Conduct.”

    The share ban, along with restrictions on swapping assets into the name of spouses and children, was introduced by former premier Peter Beattie after a number of incidents.

  138. Pip, don’t you just love the use of “updated” to refer to a return to the Joh years wrt a Ministerial Code of Conduct?

    Couple that with the proposed ban on teaching climate SCIENCE in schools and Queensland education should plummet to the bottom of the education class in no time.

    The joys of a Tory government.

  139. Jane, it seems the Tory version of things “scientific” must originate in the rw think tanks which are funded by vested interests – interested only in non-renewables…

  140. Just so every public servant knows why there has to be cuts to jobs in Qld

    THE son of a Newman Government minister was handed a temporary contract while thousands of public servants without permanent positions were being terminated.

    The Courier-Mail can reveal that Ben Gommers, son of Arts Minister Ros Bates, was given a 12-month contract as a departmental liaison officer.

    Sources within the department said Mr Gommers was employed on May 10 on a contract that will expire on May 24 next year. They also said Mr Gommers was contracted an A08 salary level, meaning he would earn up to $103,000″
    http://www.couriermail.com.au/news/arts-minister-ros-bates-son-gets-contract-while-thousands-of-public-servants-lose-jobs/story-e6freon6-1226430381222

    $103,000 not a bad wage, for a minister’s child.

    “A spokesman for Transport Minister Scott Emerson told AAP Mr Gommers’ appointment was not run past the premier because DLO staff numbers were being reduced, not added.

    “DLO numbers were reduced from four under Labor to three,”

    So at least 2 people got the sack so the Gommers could get a job

  141. From Queensland…

    Agriculture minister John McVeigh under presure to reveal cuts to department

    Robyn Ironside, Courier Mail, 20 July 2012

    Agriculture Minister John McVeigh is under pressure to reveal how many jobs are going from his department with around 550 positions tipped to disappear in the name of cost cutting.

    Story continues: http://www.couriermail.com.au/news/agriculture-minister-john-mcveigh-under-presure-to-reveal-cuts-to-department/story-e6freon6-1226430631406

  143. We have already seen Abbott do this in opposition. Say one thing to a domestic audience and something else entirely to a foreign one or to investors.

    Newman and Treasurer Nicholls in Queensland are also engaging in it. Bullshitting Queenslanders whilst telling foreign investors something else entirely.

    Telling Qld one thing, foreign investors another.

    They only get away with it because it’s only blogs and an online community that raise and highlight these practices the Liberals constantly engage in whilst the MSM not only ignores it but openly makes excuses for and talks up the Liberal governments.

  144. Another example of MSM failure to hold a Liberal State government to account is the spate of shootings in NSW, of a far greater number under O’Farrell than they ever were in a decade plus of the previous Labor State government.

    Now this might be passable as there may be a bunch of unknown to us complicated circumstances that are different now than they were in the year or two before O’Farrell took office, when shootings and crime in general were going down in those years, but are now increasing.

    Why it should not be passed by and ignored by the media is that during Labor’s time in office every time the crime statistics came out, no matter what the figures showed, decline or improvement, there was O’Farrell or one of his shadow ministers on TV, the radio and in the press bagging the government, and not just once but in a constant cycle until another item came out they bagged the State government on.

    But the worse, alongside a death or maltreatment in hospital, was whenever there was a shooting. The shock jocks went into outrage and there was O’Farrell and at least one of his shadow ministers appearing on every media outlet possible and often many times a day, lambasting the government for all they were worth in how they had lost control of the streets and Law and Order had failed completely.

    Fast forward to now when by every measure crime is worse, as are hospital avoidable deaths and maltreatment, especially shootings, but no outrage from the shock jocks, not front page decrying lawless streets and a government that had handed over our State to criminals and so on. On the latest shootings this weekend, yep another lot, something that is becoming a regular occurrence just about every weekend in Sydney now, the only thing I saw was a short five second cut off grab from Robertson criticising O’Farrell for not doing enough, but the whole of the report was couched in a way as to not put the blame on O’Farrell at all but on circumstances beyond his control.

    Why the complete difference in reporting from before O’Farrell took office to now?

    Why is a significant increase in shooting in NSW somehow not the government’s fault now but was all the government’s fault before O’Farrell?

    Why aren’t the opposition given the media time to highlight the O’Farrell government’s failings as O’Farrell was given when he was in opposition, ostensibly to highlight the government’s failings?

  147. More “jobs for the boys” under a conservative government…

    Queensland jobs rewarded to the LNP faithful

    Key postings worth millions of dollars are being handed to party associates and executives linked to the Premier.

    An analysis by The Courier-Mail has revealed that more than $3.5 million in taxpayer funds is being paid to LNP identities appointed to Government corporations, departments and as consultants.

    http://www.couriermail.com.au/news/queensland-jobs-rewarded-to-the-lnp-faithful/story-e6freon6-1226433329273

  149. Cuppa, the blatant “jobs for the boys” is breathtaking.

    My son deserves his job: Qld minister

    A Queensland minister says her son deserves the lucrative government job he landed while other public servants were facing the dole queue.

    Ben Gommers, the 25-year-old son of Arts Minister Ros Bates, was given a temporary contract in the Department of Transport and Main Roads in May, at a time when 3000 public-sector workers on temporary contracts were under the axe.

    http://news.smh.com.au/breaking-news-national/my-son-deserves-his-job-qld-minister-20120720-22dqw.html

  150. Pip @ 10.49

    An $103,000 job at that. And 2 people got the sack so he could get his. How do I know this, the Minister said overall job numbers in that area reduced.

  152. It appears that Queensland spends the less on disabilities. Did not even bother to put up a worthwhile offer.

    It is not about not having money. It is about priorities.

    I was under that impression that states are already responsible for the disabled. What is being propose will take into account monies already spent.

    Yes, it will cost more, but it will meet the essential needs of these people.

    The present way of funding is not productive and inequitable.

    Many are looked after, their needs being met. Many more are left in poverty.

    What is being attempted, bringing many in from the cold and ensuring the same standards across the nation.

    Is one saying, this great country with one of the best economies in the world cannot look after their disabled, that the best we can do, is having them live in poverty and squalor.

    The NDIS is about people. People. People. People who also have a right to a decent life, as you and everyone else has.

  153. Sue, it is not about job numbers being reduced. The need, especially in the states for fewer workers does not hold water. States provide most opf the direct services people need and use. Things such as police, nurses, bridge builders and teachers, etc.

    What they are saying, it is not PS we need. They are not even saying in most cases, that the private sector can provide.

    What they are replacing the PS with, are contractors. Contractors which history shown are more expensive and does not deliver quality services.

    Contractors, that in Queensland is closely connected to politicians.

    The funny part is, these contractors will still need PS to hire and supervise what they do,

  154. Inflation at long time low. 1.1 over the year. 0.5 in last period.

    Another good figure.

  156. My son deserves his job: Qld minister

    Because……..

    Pip, Can Do is behaving like Joh did well into his reign. It wouldn’t surprise me if Qlders deliver a landslide against him at their next election.

    Come what may after nearly 2 years of this behaviour, I doubt they’ll be too eager to have more of the same at a federal level. Same could go for the other Liars states, quite possibly. Could be quite interesting by this time next year.

  158. CU
    Vasta is one of the Liberals investigated for rorting his parliamentary printing allowances a couple of years ago. But this time the Federal police are not investigating him on issues dealing with his parliamentaary duties just his private emails to and an ex girlfriend.

  159. Sue, it is that they just keep coming. It started before the elections were held.

    I believe Cando is not finding it as easy as he thought.

    The gang of four look a little ridiculous. They were asked for a small sum on the table to be top up by many rimes more.

    O’Farrell’s body language said it all. He could not bring himself to look at the PM.
    forwarded to see how the two get out of the wedge when they come to the party tomorrow.

    The PM looked very relaxed with the situation. The trials are going ahead.

  160. Methinks O’Farrell’s reign might be shorter than he was planning on going the pasting he got on the news tonight over the Caltex refinery closure.

    For once there was no blame laid at the federal government’s feet though Gillard got a bit of beating over her new fence, but O’Farrell got a real mouthful as the workers and spokesperson went on about him swanning around in media stunts instead of supporting NSW industries and workers. The News wasn’t kind to him either using words like “missing in action”, “stunts” and “uncaring”.

    Never takes long for Liberal State governments to start losing their shine and then you have the supporters wondering why their darling supposedly do no wrong Liberals get turfed out as happened with Kennett. Kennett was no surprise to those who were not one eyed Liberal ideologues, and you could see it coming in the term before.

    O’Farrell is heading the same way and will be very lucky to win a third term at the current rate he’s racking up black marks and strings of failures.

  161. MO, the cuts to Workers Compensation appears to be getting traction among those who show little interest in politics.

    That along with NDIS.

  162. The Can Do way or just what every Australian lived when Howard and Abbott ran the nations Health budget,

    “Surgery on hold as Campbell Newman cost cuts slow major Queensland hospitals

    QUEENSLAND’S biggest hospital is facing a $50 million budget cut while others have wound back critical elective surgery amid financial stress.

    The Royal Brisbane and Women’s Hospital will lose funding of almost $1 million a week while Metro North district faces an $80 million cut.

    The cost-cutting comes as new figures show Queensland’s hospitals wound back elective surgery by as much as 19 per cent last month.”
    http://www.couriermail.com.au/news/surgery-on-hold-as-campbell-newman-cost-cuts-slow-major-queensland-hospitals/story-e6freon6-1226436198212

    How quickly Australians have forgotten the massive injection of funds that were needed and delivered, by the incoming Labor govt in 2007, to save our hospitals from collapse. Still Howard had a large surplus that the Coalition still long for and Abbott is determined to get back to. Abbott has at least declared that cuts will have to be made to get back the surplus, and cuts to public health is something he knows.

  165. Thanks Eddie. I like the work Wixxy is doing. Many right-wingers don’t, which is a fair indication he must be asking the right questions.

  169. O’Farrell got a bit of a pasting on the 7.30 Report. One a side swipe on him not doing anything about the abuse and cover up of abuse by the Catholic Church in NSW when another State is.

    Dempster also hoed into the minister and O’Farrell on their reluctance to bring in a State wide scheme to cut alcohol fuelled violence that has proven successful in a Newcastle trial with the intimation by Dempster that O’Farrell is in the pockets of the Clubs and Pubs as they were significant in getting him into power.

    By the way the police are asking that something be done as the alcohol fuelled violence late at night is out of hand.

    Yet another thing O’Farrell was quick to get media attention on when in opposition and now he’s nowhere to be seen as he swans around getting media attention for stunts and fluff pieces.

  170. ME, nice to see someone at the ABC is taking their job seriously for a change and putting the pressure on the Liars Party instead of spinning them out of trouble.

    I believe someone (I forget who) commented on O’Farrell’s abandonment of the very successful Labor youth intervention scheme, citing lack of money, while simultaneously cutting state taxes on big gambling and giving them other concessions.

    So much for their banging on about having to make savings. They neglect to mention that the “savings’ are nothing to do with reducing the mythical “debt”, but to hand over to their mates in big gambling etc. And the rest can go to hell!

  171. Yes, they will learn that money spent on welfare, leads to money saved.

    Welfare should be made up of two components.

    One that provides a safety net under the disadvantaged and the vulnerable.

    One that aims at prevention. Ensuring that people have the wherewithal not to slip down that slope to destruction and disadvantage.

    Education, training and health, in many ways, can be used as assisting welfare.

    Yes, it saves money for a government to ensure the welfare system is adequate .

    It is not spending and changing programmes without proper research but on the grounds of ideology that cost money and creates waste.

  174. Closing fire stations ‘risk to community’

    $70 million from Fire and Rescue services! How can that be justified, especially since Fire and Rescue fought hard against the previous Labor government to get increased funding?

    Now all those hard fought gains are wiped out and more is taken away at the stroke of stuntman O’Farrell’s pen.

    What is it with Liberal governments that they savagely make cuts to the areas where the most social and community good is enacted but don’t have any trouble giving huge chunks of tax payers money to well off vested lobby groups and big private enterprises.

  175. Mobius

    check out this article. has the NSW govt conspired to STOP Armidale hospital getting federal govt funding from the Health and Hospital Fund during the regional round. Windsor is on the case but it makes you wonder if the NSW govt would prefer it if Windsor’s voters appeared to miss out on funding from the minority govt Windsor assisted into govt. Anything to assist Torbay over Windsor, methinks
    http://www.armidaleexpress.com.au/news/local/news/general/silence-on-why-armidale-hospital-missed-funding/2638095.aspx

  176. That’s the Liberals in a nutshell. Cannot win on honesty and integrity so resort to the worst of underhanded tactics to undermine the opposition and feather their own nests.

    Also says a lot about their supporters that allows this type of behaviour from their Party to go on, and more than that, openly endorse and cheer it on.

  178. Chinese investment OK for Barry. By the way, Barry is considering putting off the sales until after the Federal elections. Believe they might be more valuable if there is no carbon tax, Has ask for a study to be done into this aspect. It could be, due to the uncertainty, the return in the sale might be lower.

    …INFRASTRUCTURE assets worth more than $40 billion will be available to Chinese government companies under NSW plans to lure investors, heightening the political row over foreign ownership in the wake of Tony Abbott’s warning last week against state enterprises.

    NSW Liberal Premier Barry O’Farrell revealed the plans in the Chinese city of Guangzhou, telling The Australian that state-owned companies would be free to bid in asset sales expected to be outlined in an infrastructure blueprint due in September.

    “I have said you could spend $40bn in Sydney without touching the sides,” he said, adding that existing rules allowed Chinese companies to buy NSW electricity assets and ports….

    http://www.theaustralian.com.au/national-affairs/state-politics/chinese-invited-to-bid-for-our-assets/story-e6frgczx-1226438976006

  179. Looks as though Queenslanders believe thier Premier when he says the State is broke. Queenslanders are so worried they are not buying new homes and with all those public servants being sacked, some more ho,mes may come on the for sale market.
    “Optimism fades as new home sales plunge
    Queensland builders may have expected a revival in the housing sector, but they have been left shocked and dismayed at the 21 per cent slump in new home sales over the June quarter.

    New house sales fell 11 per cent in Queensland in the month of June and 21.1 per cent over the June quarter, according to the latest seasonally adjusted figures released by the Housing Industry Association yesterday.

    Read more: http://www.brisbanetimes.com.au/business/property/optimism-fades-as-new-home-sales-plunge-20120731-23cct.html#ixzz22BJc00WI

  180. And this story was before the latest 2000 sackings were announced

    “Job cuts leave Brisbane’s CBD businesses hurting and carparks empty
    HUGE cutbacks to Queensland’s public service are draining Brisbane’s CBD, leaving entire floors of carparks empty and retailers struggling to stay open.
    People aren’t going to see that lawyer or architect or engineer, and they’re not going to government offices because there’s no new projects happening,” Mr Knight said. “It all dominoes right through the economy.”

    National Retail Association spokesman Gary Black said CBD retailers had been doing it tough since late 2009 and many were now on death row.

    “You would expect the public service job cuts to have some impact (on retailers),” he said.”
    http://www.couriermail.com.au/news/queensland/job-cuts-leave-brisbanes-cbd-like-a-ghost-town-and-carparks-empty/story-e6freoof-1226438915435

    Oh dear what a shame. And one other thing to think about when the statistics say 4400 full time equivalent job cuts, it doen’t take into account the actual numbers of workers involved.

  181. Sue, heard on ABC news that business owners in central Brisbane was complaining about the lack of customers. It appear the car parks in nearby business premises are half empty because of the number of PS sacked.

    Does anyone yet have a number that are to go in NSW and Queensland. Are the numbers still a secret. Can do seems to be talking a bout 20.000. That is a lot of workers.

  182. Sorry Sue, did not see the second story. Was going to write earlier but did not get around to it.

  183. Cu
    yes i heard about it this morning, but was busy earlier. it was only on reading about the extra 2000 jobs that i remembered. What i found slightly odd was one of the first published comments, where the person was happy that all those now ex-public servants won’t be wasting time shopping. Shows the stupidity of the idealists who think sacking people won’t affect the economy. There is going to be a lot of pain for small businesses.

  184. How fucked is this.

    Newman is giving $80 million to the greyhound industry.

    Nothing to disabilities, has just crippled the transport system with cutbacks and has caused more unemployment in a single swipe than the GFC did.

  185. MO, how many go to the dogs now, I say that coming from a family where my grand dad owned dogs.

    I do not seem to know many now that even go to the TAB.

    I suspect it is a dying industry.

    It is not about being able to afford. It is about making priorities.

    I still cannot comprehend how putting people out of work leads to a better economy and a balanced budget.

    All I see is reduced receipts that out do the expenditures that believe they save.

    I love the one of cutting rail service staff, to be replaced with police and security.

    Like the club that cuts back in bar staff, that leads to poorer services, angry drinkers, that is solved by putting on the same number of security. boffins.

    Would have been better to leave the bar staff and good service in place, that led to happy people..

  186. TV news here in S.A. with leadership destabilising stories about our local liberal opposition leader Isobel Redmond. The usual stuff if you disregard that for once it’s not the ALP. I’m not well versed but I’d thought Redmond, with the aid of the usual partisan media, was doing a depressingly competent job of sliding into government next time round. My gut feeiling is that, with big wins on their radar, the national liberal controllers are purging anyone but the total bastards. I don’t know which corner of the party Redmond’s from but her public persona is by & large what was once known as “wet”, at least that’s the way I read it.

  187. Good point, Bob. The only problem I have with it personally is that based on your logic, Abbott doesn’t look like being challenged at the national level. His saving grace is that he’s a total bastard.

  188. Miglo
    Being a broad brush hater of things liberal I don’t know much about the finer details. It seems to me that when given unfettered power the bastard right of the liberals takes aim at what are risibly called “moderates” (risibly indeed considering Whiney P comes into this category). Howard’s efforts in state N.S.W. spring to mind.
    This does have unfortunate implications at a federal level. I think that while Abbott’s winning he’ll be kept in his present position as his natural bastardry seems to be working. He’d make an effective punch out artist for those who called the shots at a policy level. Howard thought so.
    But this gets back to a morbidly interesting question; who’d call the shots if he were PM? Initially, & for a time, I think he would. Hero & all that. But this could only last so long as the consequences of his decisions bit. My overall opinion (most days) is that he’d be allowed to amuse himself picking fights while the serious money outside the party made the decisions.

    The only certanty that I see is that he’d need money & lots of it.

  189. Sue @5.18pm, I read the comments (all 201) on that story. I was gobsmacked at the number of commenters who kept banging on about the cost of parking in Brisbane and how sacking public servants will make parking cheaper.

    Then there was the general wah wah about how lazy public servants are by the ignorant and how brilliant it will be when tens of thousands of them are sacked, which will save bazillions of taxpayers money.

    Obviously these morons have never considered that the public servants getting the chop will be nurses, cops and firies who are not at the top of the salary tree.

    One sacked PS who was paid $85/hr had been rehired @$250/hr and was giggling. Believe it or not, there was a sizable number of financial geniuses who reckoned this was a brilliant stroke.

    Sounds like a Milo Minderbinder deal to me, but accordijng to the barrackers it made good economic sense to sack and then rehire someone at 3x their former salary. apparently the money to pay this salary was coming from the sky.

    And then there were the doom sayers who claim the whole country is in recession.

    Needless to say, the barrackers think Newman is a financial genius. i wonder if they’ll still think so when they start losing their jobs.

    CU, some of the commenters were gleefully talking about a further 20,000 job cuts in the PS, by the economic giant running the state. One commenter warned about the multiplier effect, but was largely ignored.

    These twats don’t seem to have the wit to understand that one unemployed person can have a flow on effect for up to 10 others. Oh well, when they lose their jobs, they might realise what it means.

    Bob, I thought she was doing an O’Barrell-keeping a low profile. Too low, it seems. I don’t know that the Liars will just walk in as more depressing evidence about the incompetence of the Liars state governments starts to waft about.

  190. Some how when I hear PS being put down, I wonder if some believe they are inhuman species that only role is to soak up taxes with giving nothing in return.

    The likes of the three Coalition premiers are not sacking people, they are taking away services that one relies on.

    These leaders still intend to spend your hard earned taxes, just not on the services you rely on.

    Maybe Miglo can give us his view from that of the humble PS.

    These hated people are those that :-

    teach your children
    nurse your babies
    make the trains run on time
    clean away your filth
    drive that ambulance
    turn up id the fire engine
    ensure the house you buy does not belong to anyone else
    police your suburb
    ensure regular water supply
    the list goes on and on and on

    yes and they treat that sewerage that flows from your pipes

  191. I believe that in Howard’s day, and Costello’s assistance the city of Canberra was nearly bought to a standstill and near bankruptcy.

  192. SIGNATURE wild river preservation laws blamed for putting vast tracts of Queensland in economic mothballs are to be scrapped in favour of a regime that encourages mining and development.

    Campbell Newman’s Liberal National Party government will begin the process of repealing the laws on Cape York Peninsula, the scene of a bitter dispute between environmentalists who backed the measures and indigenous interests that claimed they strangled the economic life of local communities.

    Deputy Premier Jeff Seeney said wild river declarations covering the Archer, Wenlock, Lockhart and Stewart basins would be replaced by a new regional plan to designate discrete environmental no-go zones and “unashamedly” fast-track development on Cape York.

    “When this plan is put in place for that region, the wild rivers declarations will be revoked,” he told The Australian………………

    http://www.theaustralian.com.au/national-affairs/state-politics/lnp-promises-to-develop-cape-york-as-wild-rivers-laws-buried/story-e6frgczx-1226439878891

  193. Latest in Queensland. Order by the government to literally ignore agreements. Was ordered by the IR court to consult.

    In other words, they will do as they like.

  195. Thanks to Jenny M for this little piece:

    DINNER at Paris Hilton’s favourite LA restaurant, limousines and five-star hotels are among the expenses NSW ministers and their staff are charging to their taxpayer-funded credit cards.

    Credit card statements obtained by the State opposition show ministers and their staff have spent almost $1 million on airfares, hotels, food and laundry in the year since the O’Farrell government came to office.

    http://www.heraldsun.com.au/news/national/nsw-premier-barry-ofarrells-mps-run-up-1m-party-bill/story-fndo317g-1226419774700

  197. Campbell Newman’s hyperbolic claims that Queensland is on the verge of becoming the “Spain of Australia”, is on a “slide into bankruptcy” and about to execute a “power dive into the abyss” have been rightly derided. Queensland has a strongly growing economy, unemployment rates at near 40-year lows and a budget that is close to balance, and likely to return to surplus, even without drastic cuts.

    Credit ratings agencies are overrated, but they are paid to estimate the likelihood that a given bond will go into default as a result of corporate or state bankruptcy. Despite some egregious failures, they are more often right than wrong. The comparison between Queensland’s AA+ ranking (the same as that of US Treasury bonds) and Spain’s BB- speaks for itself.

    Unfortunately, Newman’s silliness is an echo of the interim report of the Commission of Audit, headed by Peter Costello, which the Liberal-National Party government commissioned on taking office. The recommendations of the commission are drafted as if Queensland is facing a Spanish-style crisis, and propose austerity measures similar to those adopted in Spain.

    http://johnquiggin.com/2012/08/01/queensland-isnt-greece-or-spain-crosspost-from-crikey/#comments

  198. I was on Steve Austin’s radio program today, talking about my critique of Campbell Newman’s claim that Queensland was on the verge of the kind of debt crisis we have seen in Greece and Spain. At the end, Steve threw me a question I hadn’t prepared for, about a couple of claims made by Newman in the last day or so. These were

    * Job cuts would not be needed if the unions would agree to a wage freeze
    * Every 0.1 per cent wage increase implies the loss of 800 jobs.

    Newman didn’t spell out his reasoning, but it seems clear that he is assuming a fixed fund available to pay wages. Given this assumption, any increase in wages implies a proportionately equal reduction in employment. So, we can easily check his arithmetic, starting from an estimate supplied by his own office that Queensland currently has just under 200 000 (full-time equivalent) public servants (using the term in the broad sense to cover teachers, firefighters and so on, in addition to administrative workers

    http://johnquiggin.com/2012/08/02/job-cuts-and-wage-cuts/

    We have the Opposition whining about a few job losses. At the same time we have their like in the three major states, sacking PS in tens of thousands,

    Why is a PS job of lesser value than those in the private sector.

    We will now hear of the terrible FWA and the rise in in disputes. By the way caused by the actions of premiers ignoring workers tights, and naught to do with FWA.

  200. Migs @11.54am 1/8, This is the same O’Barrell who was crying poormouth about sharing the funding of the NDIS. I bet there’s a few disabled people who wouldn’t have minded having a meal at Paris Hilton’s favourite eatery.

    CU @5.00pm, the private sector will feel the impact of PS sackings soon enough. The irony is that now Can’t do has confessed that he didn’t need to sack all those people, but that he would have had to impose a wage freeze on PS employees and POLITICIANS if he hadn’t axed them.

    And that says it all really. He obviously couldn’t give a toss about either the people whose lives he’s wrecking as long as he and his fellow oinkers have their undeserving snouts planted firmly in the public money trough.

    And it shows in spades how little he understands ANYTHING about how to manage an economy. And just like all his fellow gobsmackingly ignorant, duplicitous Liars Party cohorts, he thinks his stupid plan will reflect badly on the PM.

    BSA Bob, I reckon that O’Barrell and Newman’s appalling performance will give all but rusted on barrackers a very nasty case of heartburn and make it much harder for Redmond and Liealot to sail under the radar or be seen as honest or credible.

    Can’t Do promised hand-on-heart that he would not do precisely what he IS doing, As, I believe, O’Barrell did. I’d say that their performance will ensure that Liealot will wear the backlash.

  202. Migs Jane and CU, I posted this little ditty on TPS, Abbott and the Goebbels factor, yesterday, called “King can but WON’T do Camp Bell” under my other blog name “Truth Seeker”
    Thought it might be pertinent here as well.

    He won the poll he beat the odds
    And rode the wave of victory sweet
    “I’m humbled”, he said, “by your trust in me”
    Then he humbly scoffed at Blighs defeat

    “We’ll be more transparent” was his pledge
    As he sought to bypass the watchdogs role
    Then employed Costello, his liberal mate
    To fudge the books, to support his goal

    To slash and burn the public sector
    Sacking all that he could see
    Cutting funding to hospitals
    And support for disability

    He said “I’m sorry if this causes pain
    But cos of debt this needs to be.
    Go whinge to those that lost their seats,
    It’s all their fault…you can’t blame me.”

    As Mayor of Brissy, his mates got rich
    And his family business truly thrived
    And though his stage is bigger now
    His nepotism’s kept alive

    The legacies from his Mayoral tenure
    Expensive bikes and the great Clem seven
    And now he’ll visit this upon us
    In his own sad version of right wing heaven

    So for those who wish to see our country
    In the incompetent hands of the rabid right
    Then look to Baillieu, O’Farrell and Newman
    And ponder on our country’s plight.

    For all these “leaders?”…. lies and backflips
    Are their proven stock in trade
    Supported by self serving interests
    With billions they’ve already made

    So open eyes and ears and minds
    To what is really being said
    Ignore the slogans and the spin
    Or by the nose you will be led

    To hand the keys of this great nation
    To the Abbott’s vacuous team
    To rape and pillage our economy
    And realise a nightmare… from the dream.

    Cheers

  206. Shhhhhhhh don’t tell Tony Abbott but Barry O’Farrell is considering selling power infrastructure to the Chinese, the state-owned.companies that is.

    “The NSW Liberal government is devising a plan to attract greater foreign investment in the state’s assets that will see more than $40 billion worth of infrastructure assets made available to Chinese state-owned companies,”

    http://www.businessspectator.com.au/bs.nsf/Article/NSW-to-invite-Chinese-bids-on-infrastructure-asset-pd20120730-WPPNP?OpenDocument&src=rab

    “One 26 July 2012 Nationals MP for Clarence Chris Would I Lie To You? Gulaptis told The Daily Examiner that there are no plans to sell poles and wires as part of the O’Farrell Government’s plan to fully privatize the NSW power industry.

    Yet government is in the process of consolidating all poles and wires networks into a single corporation and, on 26 October last year the Premier told a Budget Estimates committee hearing that there had been no election promise to retain poles and wires in public ownership.”

    http://northcoastvoices.blogspot.com.au/2012/08/will-chinese-government-eventually.html

  207. The lost of twenty thousand workers leads to the lost of twenty thousand customers.

    I get the feeling Can’t do is either too moronic or just doesn’t give a sh*t because he thinks he’ll never be voted out. Judging by the comments I’ve been reading, he’d be wise to pull his head in.

  208. ACTU statistics compiled at time Jeff Kennett slashed the Victorian public service, targetting teachers, nurses, electricity workers and public transport were
    – for every 100 people made redundant, 5 got better jobs, 10 get equivalent jobs, 35 got worse jobs or part time work and 55 never worked again
    I feel very sorry for Queensland with Jeff Kennett and Peter Costello helping CanDo helm the ship of state onto Palmer Reef

    http://johnquiggin.com/2012/08/02/job-cuts-and-wage-cuts/comment-page-1/#comment-177921

  211. Huge handouts to the pokies of course, as O’Farrell did in NSW when cutting services.

    I see that Newman has stuffed up so many press interviews he like Abbott has cut back on them and only does ones with set pieces then cuts them short if they questioning goes outside the known pieces.

    Also Newman is going to charge the media $33,000 to report from Queensland parliament.

    He has lots to hide methinks and already sees the writing on the wall of not being in it for the long haul.

  213. Local grassroots backlash against Newman growing, the very people who voted him in after only a few months are not happy with his stewardship.

    Political commentators saying he’s clueless and doesn’t know policy outside of what he thinks will make make good media opinion.

  214. In terms of destructiveness, it would be difficult to outdo this one..on Campbell Newman’s intention to dismantle BreastScreen Queensland.

    It means BreastScreen Queensland, which has been operating for more than 20 years and last year had a budget of almost $44 million, will no longer centrally control mobile breast screening vans or radiographer staff relief pools.

    http://www.couriermail.com.au/news/queensland/no-one-to-lose-in-breastscreen-change/story-e6freoof-1226442891276?sv=a2ce590a71eb14a111f908c8035cf038

  215. Local grassroots backlash against Newman growing, the very people who voted him in after only a few months are not happy with his stewardship.

    Political commentators saying he’s clueless and doesn’t know policy outside of what he thinks will make make good media opinion.

    I’m certain we’ll see the same with Abbott. You can bet London to a brick on that.

  216. Queensland is being destroyed in order to save it.
    There are federal implications here.
    The joint doesn’t need saving, at least that’s the opinion in most other lands.

  219. Nothing is more certain Skeptical.

    And what a hatchet job it was. There are several online all over it and the errors, double accounting and misleading figures can only be deliberate or Costello has always been the economic dunderhead he was called out for when he was Treasurer.

    And the most telling thing is of Newman telling overseas investors (the ones Abbott wants to clamp down on) how great Queensland is and giving them one set of figures whilst giving the Queenslanders the bogus Costello ones, and they’re nothing alike on the same items.

    This is the type of government conservative supporters condone and they will do the same for Abbott as he screws up and fudges the figures and economy.

  221. Although, ME, he doesn’t really need Costello as he already has the completely incompetent Hockey on board.
    On second thoughts though hockey is so incompetent that I doubt that he could fudge the books as much as completely screw them.

  223. From En Passant..

    What would a Tony Abbott government be like. What would it do?

    I think you can find the general answers in the Liberal National Party government of Campbell Newman in Queensland.

    What has it done and what is it proposing to do?

    Sacking thousands of public servants with devastating consequences for services, families and employment.
    Refusing to guarantee job security in negotiations with its own workers over new enterprise agreements and offering 2.2% pay increases. There may be strikes as early as Friday in response.
    Refusing to negotiate with teachers over class sizes. There are threatened strikes in October as a result.
    Abolishing the Tenants Advice Service so poor people can be screwed even more by their landlords.
    Abolishing the Premier’s Literary Awards.
    Abolishing state-sanctioned ceremonies for same-sex couples.
    Banning gay couples from using a surrogate mother to have a child.
    Cutting back the Family Support Program.
    Dismantling the statewide cancer service BreastScreen Queensland.

    All of this in only 100 days. The racism and misogyny are just waiting to explode.

    http://enpassant.com.au/2012/08/06/what-would-an-abbott-government-look-like-campbell-newman/

  224. Min,
    Just watched QandA, and despite Tony Jones’s efforts saw King Camp Bell and Brandis get an absolute flogging.
    The truth of Costello’s audit fudging and the bloody minded LNP cuts revealed for the Bullshit that they are.
    One questioner asked the same question that you asked, if Newmans style could be a taste of what to expect if Abbott gets into government, and despite Brandis’s efforts to state otherwise, the overwhelming reaction from the tweets and the audience indicated that many are asking the same question.
    Katie Noonan finished with a beautiful song.

    Worth watching for a change

    Cheers

  225. I enjoyed QandA tonight. I do not think Brandis enjoyed the experience.

    I love the cando and willdo quips.

    I like the finished,, when the song for Queensland was Highway to Hell.

    If Labor is on the nose in the northern state, the audience did not back up that belief.

    What was also a pleasure to see that most condemned the treatment our PM gets. Of course Brandis did not agree.

  226. enpassant didn’t mention the environmental destruction Newman has unleashed like allowing unfettered development of Gladstone Harbour, which is a heritage listed area and feeds onto the GBR.

    And his recent announcement of allowing unfettered development of Cape York Peninsula and the canning of the Wild Rivers act.

    Seems Newman is determined to enact as much destruction across Queensland and to Queensland in as short a time as possible.

    I think he will try a Jeff Kennett and be savage now and get all the unpopular stuff through this first term then at the next election, knowing he has such a large number of seats, will promise to be more benevolent in his second term and may even put a fraction back of what he took away, But like Kennett, and unless Queenslanders are less political savvy than Victorians, then Newman will be quickly gone.

    Baillieu looks like being a one term wonder and O’Farrell thought he could sail through by engaging in lots of media stunts and being a small do nothing target, but that might be failing.

    Though Barnett is also a failing Liberal premier I’m not certain how he’s standing in WA, but he’s certainly broken many of promises and not fixed the things he said he would, which so far has been the same for the other Liberal Premiers.

  228. Mobius, over in WA it was always the wealth crazed pr*ck theme..we’re all a’goin’ to be rich. West Australians are now a wake up that the major beneficiaries are the mega miners and the fly in/fly out workers. The evidence for the gloom is the fall in house prices with the majority of people realizing that they are not going to be making a motza on the mining boom.

  229. CU, Q&A was quite a revelation. Can’t Do is well on the nose judging by the audience. Not too many were buying into the bullshit that to restore an economy you have to wreck it. In fact most seemed unconvinced that Qld is in all that much trouble.

    Can’t Do is turning out to be a great publicity agent for the ALP. I thought it would take a little longer for disillusion to set in, but good ol’ Can’t Do has delivered much faster than even I thought.

    D’you think he’s secretly an ALP plant?

    I read at TPS, that Can’t Do’s ratings have fallen 9% in his seat, which if an alection were held today would mean the LNP government would be wiped out. However, an election won’t be held for some considerable time.

    I don’t think all the people Can’t Do is chucking out of work will feel very warmly toward him come the next election, nor the disabled and their carers, hospital staff and all the other workers he’s destroying.

    Min, seems reality strikes in Gina’s home town.

  231. The Queensland government will stop funding the Heart Foundation’s popular walking program.

    The program costs $700,000 over three years and supports about 5000 walkers each year.

    Sport and Recreation Minister Steve Dickson says he will stop funding the program at the end of the year.

    He blamed the previous government for failing to provide a proper funding stream for the program.

  232. Oh failing to provide a proper funding stream for a beneficial program is solved by stopping the funding completely instead of fixing the funding stream.

    This Queensland State government will only be surpassed in comedic ineptitude by a National Abbott one.

  234. What does one say..not that long ago I had to explain to a JP that there was a difference between federal and state legislation..

    JUSTICES of the Peace with no legal training will take the place of lawyers and magistrates under a plan to clear case backlogs clogging Queensland’s key tribunal.

    With many JPs now only witnessing signatures on documents in shopping centres, the “major reform” has alarmed lawyers.

    JPs, with only a few weeks’ training, now will decide some of the most contentious Queensland Civil and Administrative Tribunal civil disputes over debts, dividing fences, property damage, residential tenancy, and consumer and trader disputes.

    http://www.couriermail.com.au/news/queensland/justices-of-the-peace-to-replace-lawyers-and-magistrates-in-plan-to-clear-backlog-of-queensland-civil-and-administrative-tribunal-civil-disputes/story-e6freoof-1226448211190

  235. More broken promises.

    BARRY O’Farrell’s government will squeeze $1 billion from the state’s battered electricity consumers despite promising to do everything possible to keep down bills.

    This means the average NSW household will this year pay an extra $120 to state government coffers this year on top of soaring prices from the federal government’s carbon tax, green schemes and network upgrade charges.

    Read more: http://www.news.com.au/money/money-matters/barrys-rip-off-a-1bn-broken-power-promise/story-e6frfmd9-1226448236998#ixzz23Ko3NXuF

  236. Miglo, was reading the article on the tele, the comments section is quite interesting, most are against the Liberal Govt and blaming O’barrel for the problem, some blaming the carbon price but not that many.

  239. ……………..And then there was George Megalogenis’s comments on Insiders today 12 August. Mega noted that a key turning point in the Hewson-Keating rivalry leading up to the 1993 Keating Federal victory was that the arrogant Kennett Liberal government was elected in Victoria. Within a few weeks of Kennett’s confrontational budget-slashing start to its term voters turned on Hewson fearing the duplication and amplification of Kennett’s style and policies by Hewson at the Federal level.
    Personally, watching Newman in action in the first months of his term, I am myself thinking: “This is Abbott Jr. in action”, including the mean-spirited and petty elimination of the Qld ‘Premiers Literary Awards’ and the gob-smacking arrogance of the removal of the paltry $6.50 allowance paid to Taxi Drivers for picking up and attending to disabled persons.
    Mega said:
    “[the fear of the combination of] Campbell Newman and Tony Abbott are starting to flip Queenslanders out”
    And Queensland is currently the key Federal battleground with the ALP facing a wipeout and consequently having the most and quickest gains to be made from any turn-around in voting intentions. If anyone has a handle of emerging polling trends, its Mega.
    By the way great to see Mega get the gloves off on Insiders when discussing the barbarian know-nothings currently offering themselves as Australia’s next government.
    So, those three streams of confluence, namely reduced antipathy to the Carbon Tax, the perhaps-related ALP poll bounce and the gestational horror in Queensland at a Campbell-Abbott axis providing their governance may have in part or combination produced that whiff of panic enervating Mr. Abbott’s interview performance on AM last Thursday.
    To which I say: GO CAMPBELL!!

    http://www.blogotariat.com/node/515477

  240. I have no doubt just before the next Federal election Newman will promise to be generous in his 2014 State budget and he will ease up in next year’s budget, all of a sudden finding out that things aren’t as bad as the fudged Costello audit indicated.

    Kennett did a similar thing, but apart from throwing out some crumbs, reneged on that commitment whilst swanning it up with the elite and giving generous concessions to the casino and wealthy mates. The people didn’t fall for his promise of benevolence a second time though and booted him out.

    Conservative State governments are unbelievably predicable in the way they do business, and then wonder why they are replaced with long term average performing Labor governments.

  241. ME, the flaw I see in your prediction, is the fact because of the actions taken by eastern seaboard Premiers, the economy will be in dire state, as they are predicting.

    One cannot cut so rashly and without a justifiable reason, without destroying what we have now.

    For every action, there is a reaction.

    Cutting expenditure in this way, leads to waste and reduction in receipts.

    It will also harm the federal economy in the process.

    Much of government spending,, especially that of the states, save money, not the reverse.

    This is true in such areas as health, education and affordable housing.

    More true in providing infrastructure needed for future industry and business.

  242. THE Newman Government razor gang is seeking to slice up to 4000 employees from Queensland Health.

    The Courier-Mail has been told the Government believes it can achieve the extraordinary target figure without affecting frontline services.

    Employees in areas such as preventative health as well as others in non-clinical and administrative positions are in the Government’s crosshairs as it seeks to reduce the department’s $18 million-a-day wages bill.

    More than 7000 job cuts have already been identified by the Government across the entire public service.

    However, large cuts in Health are needed to achieve the Newman Government’s 20,000 target, a figure that emerged out of the Commission of Audit report into the state’s finances.

    http://www.couriermail.com.au/news/queensland/more-public-servants-face-sack-as-newman-governments-lnp-razor-gang-sets-its-sights-on-queensland-health/story-e6freoof-1226448742332

  244. Fudging the thin blue line numbers

    O’Farrell has gone missing for a bit and this maybe why.

    As yet another home was sprayed by bullets last night in what is tragically becoming a way to frequent occurrence in NSW. it seems the police numbers are being fudged in yet another in a long line of O’Farrell broken promises.

    Increased police numbers was one thing O’Farrell went very hard on when in opposition and throughout the election campaign, and now he’s fudging it.

    And ask yourself why so many officers were being moved to a new transport command and away from crime areas. What brings in revenue and what doesn’t?

    Ask yourself why O’Farrell has bought in more speed cameras, not less as he promised and something he heavily railed against in opposition. What brings in revenue?

    All signs the O’Farrell government is not doing well fiscally.

  245. South East NSW very angry at O’Farrell’s broken promise of reducing red tape, instead facing increased complexity in red tape. They are being very vocal and they overwhelmingly voted for O’Farrell.

    Bit by bit the Liberal States are unraveling as not only do they continue to break promise after promise but also fail to deliver basic good governance.

  246. Same as they did back in the mid 1990’s, saving Mr. Keating’s bacon, and Hewson losing the unlosable election.

  249. Sue, perhaps it will look something like this..

    The Royal Brisbane and Women’s Hospital will lose funding of almost $1 million a week while Metro North district faces an $80 million cut…..

    One worker said the 30 beds slashed at Prince Charles had previously been used to care for elderly people as they negotiated placement in nursing homes, which could take up to two months.

    “We do open heart surgery here, that would equate to eight or 10 surgeries not being able to go ahead because there’s no access to the ward beds,” the worker, who did not wish to be named, said. “So if you multiply that by 30 bodies, it equates to a lot of blocked access.

    http://www.dailytelegraph.com.au/news/national/surgery-on-hold-as-campbell-newman-cost-cuts-slow-major-queensland-hospitals/story-fndo2iwh-1226436198212

  251. Skeptical, youngest daughter Erin and partner R* live in Ashgrove. 😀 The good news is that the good folk of Ashgrove know when they’ve made a mistake and the latest poll indicates that Campbell Newman would lost his seat…

    **Disclaimer: No Min relative has ever voted for Howard (well, maybe a 2nd cousin) nor for Campbell Newman.

  252. On the news that ex- premier Bligh was moving to Sydney, I heard Cando Campbell say that many Queenslanders would have loved to run Bligh out of Queensland.

    Has this little man have no grace, or is this as good as it gets from Cando. For Queensland’s sake I hope they never have the devastating floods plus cyclone, while Newman is in charge. I doubt he could cope.

    And if running Bligh out of Queensland is a wide held belief, don’t come asking for help if you do face multiple disasters.
    http://www.news.com.au/national/former-premier-anna-bligh-turns-her-back-on-queensland-to-move-to-sydney/story-fncynjr2-1226451289741

  254. John Brumby botched TAFE reform, and now it’s Ted Baillieu’s turn. As staff and students rally today, Ben Eltham talks to experts on what has gone wrong with Victorian vocational education

    The Victorian vocational and education training sector (universally abbreviated by those in the sector as “VET”) has been going through some tough times of late. After a blow-out in funding costs under a system brought in by the Brumby government, Ted Ballieu’s Coalition government has been clamping down on VET sector funding.

    The response has seen $40 million dollars cut from the sector last year, with another $290 million in budget cuts this year. Despite the funding blow-out largely arising from the private sector, it is government institutions, particularly TAFEs, that are bearing the brunt of the cuts. Some reports estimate that

    http://newmatilda.com/2012/08/16/bailleu-takes-axe-tafe

  255. Nah the Liberals are not controlled by big business and vested interests, putting their needs ahead of the health and welfare of ordinary citizens.

    James Packer visited NSW parliament today ahead of the opposition parties seeking to remove the exemption for high rollers in the casino being allowed to smoke.

    The Liberal government is going to keep the exemption.

  257. But they’re not “nanny laws” if you’re handing public money over to the wealthy, ME, ‘cos they work hard and should be rewarded by encouraging them to stick their bloated snouts in the welfare trough.

  258. Min, by self serving swingers, I was referring to swinging voters, I know that King Camp Bell did not romp it in in Ashgrove, and from what I heard the sitting ALP member was a good local member.
    I can say that even in our blue ribbon LNP seat in SEQ, there are some whisperings of discontent with Newman.
    He must be going for some sort of record for most despised in the least amount of time.
    I think he’ll get it. 👿

  259. With thanks to Jenny M for the link..

    Environment Victoria CEO Kelly O’Shanassy, who commissioned the report, said a public poll of over one thousand Victorians shows the government’s decisions are not aligned with the aspirations of the community.

    “The report shows that Victoria is heading down the wrong path when it comes to keeping Victorians’ power and water costs down, ensuring we have a liveable city and clean and efficient power production and a healthy environment.

    “Our research shows that the majority of Victorians think the environment is getting worse under the Baillieu Government.

    “Victorians want more efficient and less polluting energy, cleaner rivers, and more efficient water use.

    “The polling found that Victorians are proud of their environment and the benefits it provides to their lives.

    “Interestingly, many Victorians do not know about some of the damaging decisions made by the Baillieu Government such as making new wind farms difficult to build and reducing support for solar power. When they learned about the actions of the Baillieu Government they didn’t support those actions.

  262. Note taken. Thirty-Year Plan For Queensland = obliteration of last 30 years of progress + frustration of next 30 years salvage/rebuild from wreckage = intergenerational attack on republic = minarchist idyll = golden age of public austerity + platinum age of neoliberal privatisation.

  265. Big O’Farrell backdown on something he’s been passionate on for a long time and promised he would implement in government, cracking down on graffiti. Shooters Party wouldn’t back it but O’Farrell rolled over and wimped like an Abbott.

    O’Farrell again did a runaway, like an Abbott, and left a minister to confront the press over his backdown.

    Saw O’Farrell in action in NSW parliament for the first time and what an arrogant arsehole. Right wing leaders sure are ungracious in both winning and losing that’s for sure.

  268. Come back Joh all is forgiven.

    Wash your mouth out ME 👿

    Joh’s current incarnations are still apprentices Min – give them time though…

  274. Don’t laugh, Bacchus, but I was at Dan Murphy’s the other day and noticed someone pay $5 for two bottles of red.

    He must have been from interstate.

  281. Are there any public services left in Queensland?

    Imagine the pressure this must put the Commonwealth Government under.

  282. What it the biggest scandal, many like the NGO would not save the budget that much money.

    I can only assume it is more about ideology than saving money.

  285. Barry O’Farrell’s Health Minister lies to Armidale on federal hospital funding.
    “NSW HEALTH blocked a $50 million funding application to the Federal Government for the redevelopment of Armidale Hospital, according to documents obtained under Freedom of Information.

    Federal Member for New England Tony Windsor made the Freedom of Information request in order to discover why the Armidale Hospital upgrade was not submitted to round four of the Commonwealth Government’s Health and Hospital Fund (HHF)
    Health Minister Jillian Skinner told Parliament in September last year that the application was not lodged as the Commonwealth had not given HNEH the opportunity to resubmit.

    Mrs Skinner made similar comments during a recent visit to Armidale.

    “There was a submission put together for round three before I was the Minister,” she said. “The Commonwealth ruled that it didn’t meet the criteria for the fund and so it didn’t proceed. Other projects on that round didn’t meet the criteria either and they were invited to resubmit; this wasn’t.”

    Mr Windsor accused Mrs Skinner of playing politics with the hospital redevelopment and said the public deserved answers.

    “The people of Armidale deserve to know the truth about why the ball was dropped and by whom,” he said.

    “Mrs Skinner and the NSW Government need to be held to account for their behaviour and I trust that all community representatives will pursue the truth.”
    http://www.armidaleexpress.com.au/story/241884/state-blocked-hospital-upgrade-funding-windsor/?cs=469

  286. Possum is Twitting a lot about Queensland parliament. Apparently Newman is behaving like a petulant child as polls are coming in that show a large swing towards Labor. I’m not sure but I think there are also moves towards Labor Federally.

    Newman is shirty having this pointed out to him so is throwing immature hissy fits.

    He inferred public servants are dog shit.

    A taste of Abbott to come if he gets into power. Newman State government introduced legislation to avoid Supreme Court considering unlawful directives.

    That’s about as bad as it gets in undermining a democracy.

  287. Mobius Ecko

    this in the story about Newman changing the laws to remove job security in current contracts
    “Voters, as well as the Liberal National Party’s (LNP) major donor Clive Palmer, appear to have turned against the government and its jobs and services purge.

    A ReachTel poll of 1200 Queenslanders, commissioned by the public service union, found on average 60 per cent thought the cuts had gone too far.

    Only 38 per cent said they would put the LNP as their first preference, and 56 per cent said they were now less likely to vote for the party at the next election.

    “These polls are a clear wake-up call for the government,” Mr Scott told reporters in Brisbane.

    Mr Scott also confirmed rumours that Mr Palmer had approached the union to donate to its counselling and advice service for public servants whose jobs are cut.

    Mr Palmer distanced himself further from the LNP on Thursday after a fortnight of public stoushes, announcing he would no longer seek preselection for the party in the next federal election.

    The premier suggested Mr Palmer is the Labor Party’s “new best friend” and would start donating to them instead.
    http://news.smh.com.au/breaking-news-national/qld-to-change-law-to-remove-job-security-20120823-24orv.html

  288. Mobius Ecko

    Apparently the Cando statement on doggy do is being attributed to Cando having a hangover. The wednesday night dinner for back benches had a lot of scotch flowing.
    “The Queensland Premier’s performances of late have fallen well short of the standard he set for himself. Maybe it was the supposed late-night session on the scotch in Parliament’s Lucinda Bar on Wednesday that some were talking about
    The next time Newman holds one of his regular dinners with backbenchers he might want to consider skipping the scotch.

    Instead, a three-course meal of dignity, grace and humility needs to be on the Parliament menu.”
    http://www.couriermail.com.au/news/opinion/campbell-newmans-pooper-scooper-comment-shows-his-snarky-side/story-e6frerc6-1226457682645

  290. Climbing … Labor’s popularity has increased by 5.5 per cent in the latest poll. Above, NSW Labor leader John Robertson. Photo: Adam McLean
    It has gone largely unnoticed but the beleaguered NSW Labor Party recently got a rare shot in the arm courtesy of an unexpected bounce in the polls.
    A Roy Morgan survey taken over six days in July and August found Labor’s primary vote has risen to 27 per cent. On a two party-preferred basis, Labor’s vote was recorded at 40.5 per cent compared with the Coalition’s 59.5 per cent.

    Read more: http://www.smh.com.au/opinion/politics/signs-of-life-for-labor-despite-electoral-death-20120824-24rks.html#ixzz24Wpc6LWu

  292. PRIME Minister Julia Gillard says the Baillieu Government has “betrayed” Victorians by cutting TAFE funding.

    In a blistering attack, Ms Gillard said the $300 million a year cut was a particularly “heavy blow” for towns such as Warrnambool, Morwell and Mildura where local TAFEs were part of the “social fabric”.

    The PM said the decision would harm Victoria’s economic future and was “just crazy”.

    “A complete betrayal of every Victorian who wants to get ahead,” she said.

    Ms Gillard delivered the spray as she gave an upbeat speech about Victoria’s future at a conference called Victoria at the Crossroads hosted by Victoria University.

    http://www.heraldsun.com.au/news/victoria/prime-minister-julia-gillard-slams-baillieu-government-for-cutting-tafe-funding-in-victoria/story-e6frf7kx-1226457652235

  293. State Liberal governments just don’t stop their long term destruction do they?

  294. Heard on the radio this morning on the back of the conservatives celebrating their win in the NT, with the reason being more complicated than they will admit, that according to a Newspoll support for and satisfaction in both Baillieu and O’Farrell has collapsed.

    They said O’Farrell is in a good position no matter how much the people turn against his government because of his failures as he has such a massive majority, the largest swing in Australian history, that he can walk to the next election. I don’t give much hope for his chances after that, and that is if the State Libs keep him on as leader for his performance as Premier has been less than ordinary to say the least.

  295. Sounds ominous.

    STATE POLITICS
    Secret government plan to end big bureaucracy
    BY: DAVID UREN, ECONOMICS EDITOR From: The Australian August 28, 2012 12:00AM
    Increase Text Size
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    Print

    A SECRET audit commission report calls for a revolution in the way government services are delivered, with charities and private businesses taking responsibility from bureaucrats.

    The report to the Victorian government details budget savings of at least 2 1/2 times the size of the $2.2 billion Ted Baillieu’s Coalition has so far announced to stabilise the state’s finances.

    http://www.theaustralian.com.au/national-affairs/state-politics/secret-government-plan-to-end-big-bureaucracy/story-e6frgczx-1226459386354

  296. he NSW business lobby says the state government’s plans for Sydney’s train network could threaten the future of a high-speed rail network.

    It says meshing high-speed trains into Sydney’s system is the best way to curb the cost of building a high-speed network linking Newcastle, Sydney, Canberra, Melbourne and Brisbane.

    A report commissioned by the NSW and Sydney Business Chambers says the NSW government’s plan to run only rapid transit trains on the North West Rail Link and a second Sydney Harbour crossing could lock out cost-effective delivery of high-speed trains through the city…..
    http://bigpondnews.com/articles/Finance/2012/08/28/Business_slams_Sydney_rail_plan_788597.html

    The State Premiers just keep on giving with their haste to bring in their ideology of small government, where all is handed over to the market system. Where it becomes the survival of the fittest. If one does not survive, that is the way it should be and bad luck.

    It is little about budgeting. Ken Henry has pointed out, that government cannot continue with lowering taxes and trimming programmes, and deliver the responsibilities of government.

    it is about making priories and what the voter expects from their governments.

    It is not about being broke. It is not about not having the money. It is about what we should expect from out government.

  297. That’s not ending big bureaucracy but just shoving it elsewhere.

    And what happens with the outsourcing is that the government barely, if at all, reduces in size as it needs to oversight and manage the outsourcing whilst the private entities seek to gain as much public money for the least amount of work possible.

    Kennett attempted, and in part succeeded, in handing off State government services to volunteers. As a veneer of acting for the good of the State he heavily promoted volunteering and gave token resources and support to it, but whilst he was doing that he was cutting real government services to the areas he was promoting for volunteer work.

    Seems as though Baillieu will do a similar thing by handing out government services to private entities and those will be the ones who do it for the least amount of money, namely charities who rely on volunteers for a good deal of their work.

    All for this blown out of all proportion excuse of having budget surpluses.

  298. But Queensland is getting rid of the NGO and volunteers funding. I would like to know, who is to do the work. None I suspect.

  299. This is pretty low. Armidale residents collateral damage in petty politics

    NSW HEALTH blocked a $50 million funding application to the Federal Government for the redevelopment of Armidale Hospital, according to documents obtained under Freedom of Information.

    Federal Member for New England Tony Windsor made the Freedom of Information request in order to discover why the Armidale Hospital upgrade was not submitted to round four of the Commonwealth Government’s Health and Hospital Fund (HHF).

    http://www.armidaleexpress.com.au/story/241884/state-blocked-hospital-upgrade-funding-windsor/?cs=471

  301. NSW Premier Barry O’Farrell is making no apologies for trimming the public service after being accused of a ‘disgraceful attack’ on state workers.

    Public Service Association (PSA) general secretary John Cahill says the union will fight government plans that could strip salary benefits and conditions from up to 100,000 public servants.

    The government has applied to the state’s Industrial Commission to change conditions in 98 awards including leave loading, penalty payments for shift workers and allowances for living in remote areas.

    http://bigpondnews.com/articles/Politics/2012/08/29/OFarrell_makes_no_apologies_for_cuts_789113.html

  302. I remember when leave loading came in. It has nothing to do with helping to pay for holidays. That is a furthy that the right is attempting to spread.

    I was working in factories at the time. I was on the woman;s low wage.

    For most of the year, we were doing up to twenty hours overtime, to make ends meet.

    Why does a boss continue with overtime, penalty rates and not increase staff.

    One and only reason, it is cheaper this way for them.

    When we went on leave, our pay dropped to normal rates. Non of the3 overtime hours were taken into account.

    That is why Annual Leave loading came into being. It was to alleviate an injustice.

  303. Exactly right CU…

    Annual leave loading of 17.5 per cent in Metal Trades Award – 1970
    Getting a bonus in your pay for going on holidays probably sounds like a good lurk but it resulted from some pretty sound 1970s logic. In May 1974 the leave loading was granted to those under the Metal Industry Award in addition to them winning a claim for four weeks annual leave. The theory was that workers were entitled to the loading; because they were on holidays they wouldn’t get their normal pay which included extra for working on shifts and weekends. (Hagan 1981: p. 280, Commonwealth Bureau of Census and Statistics 1907)

    http://www.worksite.actu.org.au/fact-sheets/unions—history-1960-2000.aspx

  304. That is the award and the time. I t was not handed to us on silver platter either.

    There were many stop works and a couple of strikes. On this one, the employers struck together.

    Most penalty rates are there for good reasons, There was another fight at the time. That of equal pay. Sadly we still do not have that.

    Some of us still remember, I see.

    These rights were hard fought for. Why should one give them up without a fight.

    Another difference today, is I believe in those days, wages were a greater percentage of their costs. Sometimes, the biggest. Not so today.

  305. The employers could have demanded that the overtime and allowances be added up. The levy is what they agreed to. I assume that those working overtime and outside normal hours were still getting diddled.

  306. How pathetic is Cando Campbell. His ego has taken a battering with the poll slump, so what does he do? He goes on the radio having a whinge that “a couple of weeks ago his wife was abused in a Subway shop over his job cuts”. What a pathetic attempt at sympathy!

    Go on Cando have a cry, I am sure the listeners will “believe” you.

    Oh and by the way, if true, are you sure it was the franchisee that saved your wife or maybe it was the franchisee doing the abuse. Afterall I am sure with all the sackings just maybe sandwich sales are dropping.
    http://www.brisbanetimes.com.au/national/newmans-wife-abused-over-his-job-cuts-20120830-251zm.html

  307. Tony Abbott did you here the one about your mate Campbell Newman. I expect you to go before the cameras and proclaim:

    CandoLIES

    “THE Queensland Government will break a pre-election promise not to replace wild rivers protection of the historic Cooper Creek and Diamantina and Georgina rivers.

    Mines Minister Andrew Cripps yesterday said he was investigating alternative strategies for the Lake Eyre Basin rivers.”
    http://www.couriermail.com.au/news/national/queensland-government-backflips-on-wild-rivers-promise/story-fndo1yus-1226461134571

  308. 97th shooting in Sydney this year. This time two men shot dead in a quiet Western suburb.

    News report was not kind to O’Farrell saying he’s in hiding and won’t come out to answer questions on the regular shootings in Sydney. One spokesperson was left to take the heat and circuitously blamed the Federal government for not curbing the number of firearms coming into the country.

    O’Farrell’s hiding because he made a huge deal out of every shooting that happened when he was opposition leader. He went as far as to rant about the Labor State government losing control of the streets and the blood was on their hands.

    Well the shootings and blood have exponentially increased under him, as has most crime statistics. So I guess he’s with his spin doctors attempting to make excuses and shift blame to the Federal and previous Labor government. It’s what conservative government’s do when they fail, which is often, announce responsibility but take none.

  309. “dead in a quiet Western suburb.”

    Indeed, one of the better streets in this suburbs. Very wide, but short. Lived there from the late 1950’s.

    Many of the houses, on big blocks have been replaced by town houses.

    Agree with the woman about cars do not travel slowly in the street. The wide retreat, and Tuttle hills seems to bring out the worse in drivers.

  311. NOT even halfway through its first term in office, the O’Farrell government clearly believes it remains entitled to be cut a bit of slack.
    But as it discovered yesterday, when it comes to transport policy in NSW, that’s a very dangerous assumption to make.
    During yesterday’s unveiling of their draft transport master plan the Premier, Barry O’Farrell, the Transport Minister, Gladys Berejiklian and the Roads Minister, Duncan Gay, took turns to remind those present of the sins of past Labor governments.
    While Labor’s approach had been to do ”back of the envelope” calculations for plans that were never followed through on, this government was embarking on ”never before attempted” master planning that would ”stand the test of time”.
    Advertisement
    A pity, then, that once details were requested, the whole charade fell apart.
    Asked to commit to a trial of distance-based tolling for the motorway network, the closest Gay could come was to say it would ”probably” happen ”in the future, if it adds up”.
    This is despite the master plan clearly stating the government will ”investigate, develop and test” such a regime.
    Confusion about the value of the plan was increased when O’Farrell was asked if he expected the projects identified in it would be started within its 20-year time frame.
    ”That’s not what I’m saying,” he responded. ”Just as J.J.C. Bradfield travelled the world and changed what he thought would be the design for the Sydney Harbour Bridge, there may well be changes within the confines of this master plan.”
    The comparison with Bradfield is strained when the Premier is unable or unwilling to commit to even a single project on day one of his transport master plan’s release.
    Clearly, planning is a sensible thing for a government to be doing, and after 16 years of Labor, the Coalition government is probably entitled to be cut some slack.
    But there is also a good lesson to be heeded here: the usual approach of announcing grand plans without time frames or dollars attached no longer cuts it with the NSW electorate, no matter how large your mandate.
    Voters have heard it all before, and the O’Farrell government’s cautious approach means it has yet to convince them it will be any different to the previous lot.

    Read more: http://www.smh.com.au/opinion/ofarrell-is-a-man-with-a-plan-but-electorate-wants-an-action-figure-20120904-25coj.html#ixzz25Y4HonYC

  312. We need a States of Destruction II.

    A bit early for monument building …

    Anyhow Newman is at it again. Breaking a major election promise and fiddling figures.

    Anyone who can’t see that Abbott will be a Newman of a much grander must be ideologically blind. Turnbull has it sussed and the portents are all there with the opposition having already stated it will setup a Queensland style audit commission.

  313. And Newman’s environmental destruction of Queensland continues apace.

    7000 truckloads of rubbish heading our way

    As an aside. I see the Right jumping in and defending or excusing Abbott at nearly every turn, often lying, throwing up straw men and look over there in their lame attempts, but rarely if at all do they jump in and defend the Liberal State governments. Neil made a half arsed attempt at defending O’Farrell once, but when the pile of lies became too much to fob off with the most feeble of excuses, he’s gave up.

  316. Beat me to it Bacchus. Was just about to post those links myself.

    Newman is being heavily, and rightly, canned from several fronts at the moment. He has an IR minister that doesn’t understand the IR process and is screwing up basics and he’s giving reasons for sacking public servants that are not based on any sound logic or reasoning.

    In other words Newman and his government are just making things up as they go.

    But the stripping of Costello’s expertise in what was supposed to be a professional audit is dismayingly fascinating to read, and proves what most of us were saying about Costello throughout the Howard years.

    But this episode of abecedarian hamartias from Newman is important for what it signifies at the Federal level.

    Abbott, who it can be argued is every bit as imbecilic policy wise, is planning in following Newman’s footsteps with Hockey already flagging an audit commission was soon as they win government, and I for one would not be surprised if Costello was the one who undertook the audit.

  317. Seems all liberals are trashing their own brand in an attempt to try and trash Labors brand.

    Interesting how the media is finally starting to wake up to this? After ignoring it for so long

  318. Tom I think, at least in part, that the sheer weight of online information out there being discussed and facts being thrown up make it difficult for the MSM to try to pull the wool over their subscribers eyes and to keep wrapping Abbott in cotton wool.

  320. Trapped in the travelling circus that is Sydney

    Well O’Farrell promised to fix this and instead he’s going to do… well nothing, at least not for such a long time it has become meaningless and in the meantime he’s going to slug New South Wales with new taxes and levies to pay for something that is so far away that most will be lucky if their yet to be procreated grand kids will see a fraction of it.

    The thing is this has got to be one of the greatest disappointments of a new government in a long long time. In opposition O’Farrell or one of his cronies was almost daily on TV, the radio or in the press going on about how bad transport is and lambasting Labor at every turn, for every traffic jam, every major accident, every train delay, every bus breakdown and every ferry kerfuffle.

    He then went into the election going heavy on transport and how he would fix it. He wasn’t a Newman Can-do but an O’Farrell Will-fixit. Instead like Newman really turning out to be a No-do or Can’t-do, O’Farrell has turned out to be Won’t-fixit or Can’t-fixit.

    Failure doesn’t get close to describing the O’Farrell government and O’Farrell himself.

  321. OMG, the Campbell Newman government has got something right..

    FIRST-home buyers purchasing established properties will be stripped of the long-running $7000 grant.

    The Courier-Mail can reveal the Newman Government will replace the grant with a $15,000 handout to first-time buyers purchasing newly-constructed properties.

    The first home buyers grant’s original intention was to not only provide assistance in purchasing one’s first home, but to encourage NEW homes to be built. However, the latter never happened and the grant was never changed to reflect this.

    http://www.couriermail.com.au/news/first-home-buyers-told-to-build-or-miss-out-on-first-home-buyers-grant/story-e6freon6-1226470661174

  322. Another broken promise in NSW as the list of them must be reaching record proportions.

    The independent price regulator has recommended Ferry fare increase 20% over four years because of improvements to the service.

    Now O’Farrell promised there would be no rises above CPI. It was another of his strident promises.

    Today out steps his transport minister whilst the up until now O’Farrell is feigning outrage elsewhere (explained later in this post). And then the broken promise segued perfectly from the IPART recommendation, my bold.

    “NSW Transport Minister Gladys Berejiklian said the government would not support such steep fare increases or deregulation of the Manly ferry route.”

    Good that was what was promised.

    “The government has been clear on fares for ferry customers – we will not increase fares above CPI unless services improve,” Ms Berejiklian said in a statement.

    Hang on that wasn’t in the original promise made by O’Farrell. And double hang on, what did IPART just say, “…because of improvements to the service”.

    So people you can bet your bottom dollar at least a 20% fare rise coming up in November in yet another O’Farrell broken promise that he will rewrite history on.

    As to where the up until now missing O’Farrell was.

    Almost daily shootings, frequent stabbings and deaths and injuries due to criminal activities O’Farrell is missing in action. After all it was his second most favoured attack point against the previous government after transport. His missing in action was beginning to make the media and voila out comes O’Farrell, all outraged, all aghast and demanding that the Federal government immediately take action over the greatest crime to befall this country the way he was carrying on.

    So what has him so riled he had to come out of hiding to vent his rage?

    Regular shootings, sometimes causing death. No.
    The frequent stabbings and bashings also occasionally causing death. No
    Rapes, break-ins, robberies, muggings, domestic violence, child abuse. No, no, no, no, no. no.
    The unnecessary deaths in the hospital system he promised to fix but has gotten worse. No.
    The road system he so often attacked in opposition that is daily getting much worse. No
    The crumbling public transport system that was his pet attack point. No.

    He was outraged at Twitter trolls because one tiny minded arsehole had dared abuse a rugby league footballer.

    Yes it was bad and deserved condemnation, but of all the things that got you in front of the media to rail in outrage, a Twitter troll? Please get your priorities into order O’Farrell, you are currently a disgrace as a Premier.

  326. Yes, can do is still in the business of giving out goodies without any targeting and means testing. I suspect, the aim here is to break the PS and their unions. Comment made, that it would not affect the unemployment figures. Interesting how they are going to get the work done. Farmed out to the private sector, I suspect. I expect a blow out in contract workers.

    Queensland Treasurer Tim Nicholls has just brought down his first budget, following the announcement by Premier Campbell Newman of massive public service job cuts justified by apocalyptic rhetoric. Yet apart from those job cuts, the budget (in combination with measures announced previously) doesn’t show much in the way of fiscal discipline. Among the most glaring examples

    * An $80 handout to all households, with no targeting, nominally to offset water bills
    * A previously announced freeze on electricity prices for households, paid for out of general revenue
    * The replacement of the $7000 first home buyers grant with a $15 000 grant for buyers of new homes
    * Handouts to tourism, racing and other sectors

    Measures like this are par for the course for state budgets, but not what you’d expect from a government faced with a fiscal crisis, comparable to Greece or Spain.

    The government has fiddled at the edges on revenue, but is doing nothing (or even adding to the distortionary concessions) on payroll tax and land tax.

    In essence, the government is relying almost entirely on cuts to the public service, focused on the health sector. This is a high-risk strategy to put it mildly. It may well be that the health bureaucracy is bloated and inefficient, but that doesn’t mean that creating a new layer of regional management is going to improve things, especially when their first task is to implement arbitary cuts in the number of nurses and other employees. Campbell Newman says his promise that “frontline jobs are safe” now means “frontline services won’t be affected by job cuts” but this is just wishful thinking. There hasn’t been any analysis of how to improve efficiency, just an edict that numbers need to be cut.

    In these circumstances, it’s virtually inevitable that waiting lists will blow out. And inevitably, when you have long waiting lists, people will die waiting. At that point, the question will be whether the government can hold its nerve and admit that it was lying about the frontline services, or whether we’ll see expensive panic measures to fix the problem.

    http://johnquiggin.com/

  327. The miners have inform him, he could send mining into the ground. The so called dreaded MRRT is based on profits. Mining royalties are not.

    That is why many actually supported Rudd, then Gillard. They would like to see royalties discarded.

  328. Barry O’Farrell has cut $1.7 billion over four years from education. Yep, that figure is correct, $1.7 billion. The biggest cuts to NSW education in over 20 years, and no guess what party cut that deep last time.

    But again we see how cowardly the Liberal leaders are, Abbott top and foremost of course.

    Three days ago O’Farrell swanning around opening a water slide.
    Yesterday angrily railing against online trolls.
    Today, no media could find him anywhere, and they weren’t happy about that.

    His education minister had to face the firing line and even he wimped out and ran away as soon as the questions got a little in depth.

    Are Liberal ministers trained in this tactic, running away.

    On another attack on O’Farrell the media had a go at the trains overcrowding, something O’Farrell promised to fix.

    One media commentator even said that he thinks O’Farrell is doing this now hoping people will forget by the next election.

  329. Education spending in NSW will be slashed by $1.7 billion with independent schools expected to share the pain with the public system.
    Premier Barry O’Farrell has described the cuts as “difficult but necessary”.
    The Education Minister, Adrian Piccoli, said he would cap per capita funding for independent schools at the current level, which will save the government $116 million over four years. Public schools would lose $201 million from their budgets.

    TAFE cuts … NSW Education Minister Adrian Piccoli in a file picture. Photo: Quentin Jones
    “It will not be capped forever and the cap won’t come into affect until the first of July 2013,” Mr Piccoli said.
    Advertisement
    “The intention of these changes is that the impact on non-government schools is the same as government schools of around 3 per cent.”
    The government sector would be expected to shed 600 staff in state and regional offices over four years – as part of a total cut of 1800 from the Department of Educatio

    Read more: http://www.smh.com.au/nsw/nsw-to-slash-17b-from-education-funding-20120911-25ps9.html#ixzz269CCHTLf

  331. Yep and Liberals dumb down the population in the belief that they can pull the wool over under educated voters.

    After the last savage cuts by a State Liberal government it took well over a decade to build up the education and skills level to a low base level. All gone again and it will take much more than a decade to undo the damage again.

    All for the myth of the holy grail of a surplus. That was O’Farrell’s words, we must get the budget back in the black.

    Doesn’t matter that it destroys the State for that short sighted goal, but that’s the Liberals for you.

  332. Cu, from your link,

    While Mr Piccoli said no teachers would lose their jobs, the independent school sector said it would lose teacher numbers as a result of the funding cuts.

    Ok Mr Piccoli, then where are the savings going to be coming from? Clearly if education spending in NSW is to be slashed by $1.7 billion then this must mean something..but what is it? Does it mean bigger class sizes (teachers lose their jobs), less variety of subjects taught (teachers lose their jobs), cutbacks on special teachers/teachers aids for the disabled (people lose their jobs).

  333. Will Newman end up not getting federal health funding and help wayne with the budget?
    “Dig into the health budget out-years and you can see where Tim Nicholls is saving his money. While the overall health budget will continue to grow, the state will actually spend less money on health and hospitals.

    Ironically, the magic pudding is actually Kevin Rudd’s health reform money. In 2011-12, the state estimates it will appropriate $11.223 billion for Queensland Health. In 2012-13, it will appropriate only $9.107 billion. Instead of increasing health outcomes in line with the 2010 health and hospitals reforms, Queensland is taking the extra money from Canberra and banking the savings. As I read it, that might even be a breach of the National Health Reform Agreement that the states signed up to in 2011.”
    http://www.abc.net.au/unleashed/4256116.html

  334. Sue, I suspect some premiers may be in for a rude awakening, Attacking schools and health does not appear wise to me.

    Garrett said that he had a hook-up with state education ministers on Friday. All said they were willing to get on board with Gonski. On Tuesday, they cut. Does not make sense.

    Personally, I believe that the present system of funding doers not work. States are responsible for basic services. The4y should also be responsible for raising the money. What I believe, the states should be handed back their personal income taxing powers, they gave to the Federal government during the great war.

    The Federal government should get out the area of funding states altogether. This is the way, the Founding Fathers meant the Constitution to work..

    Income tax is at least a progressive tax, unlike most others, such as GST, which is regressive.

    If this was not possible, we need to look at more aggressive solutions, such as getting rid of the states altogether, and upgrading local government, who act as a arm or agency of the Federal government in providing basic services.

    I believe the way our political has evolved, has led to it being broken. What has evolved, is the Federal controlling the money that the states have access too, while the states being responsible for providing the services. It has led to a duplication of much of government. It has led to waste.

    Not many see things as I do.

    Personally, I would like to see the states to survive, as they were originally seen in the Constitution.

  335. Swan apparently told Queensland that increased mining royalties will equal reductions in federal grants. He must follow through on this threat and when he announces it produce the documentation to support the case – before Newman does a bit of good old Canberra bashing (and don’t you worry about that!)

  336. Only in Liberal pollie land is this true.

    First it was O’Farrell.

    $1.7 billion cut from education is… wait for it, an increase in spending for education.

    Yep, you read that right. His reasoning goes that since he got into power he increased spending in education by a percent or so and in the next budget he will increase it by another percent or so. So if you completely ignore the $1.7 billion cut from education and just look at the annual percentage increases, I have increased spending on education.

    Right out of the John Howard book of claiming cut backs as increases.

    Not to be outdone, none other than fiscally challenged Newman.

    According to him today he has increased funding to health… wait for it… using the same Howard and now O’Farrell method of counting. Ignore the cuts and only count the increase I put into the budget that I will increase every year.

    Hang on Barry, hang on Campbell, you both have just cut a huge swath from those departments, so much that a piddling increase each year will take decades to make up for the huge amount taken away.

    Didn’t we tell you to ignore the cut?

  337. In a brain fart of stunning magnitude our S.A. opposition leader Isobel Redmond spent some of today throwing around numbers outlining the total of public service jobs that would go under a state liberal government. On the television she was with figures equating to roughly a 25% cut in the state public service. To be done within a few years. She’s since contacted media outlets to explain it’s not policy or anything like that, why bless you no she was just answering questions incorrectly. The numbers, it seems, don’t mean a thing even though she spent a fair amount of time reciting them. Dadaist poetry perhaps.
    As I type this, some liberal minder is sinking drink after drink, wailing “Why?? WHY????”.

  338. ” Campbell Newman’s detractors call him that (Noddy) for his perceived resemblance to the Enid Blyton character as well as his misadventures, such as an expedition he led across the Tanami Desert, in northern Australia, in which his party had no fewer than 199 flat tyres.” – The Age, Nov 18, 2007.

  339. Redmond won’t last until the next election down here BSA Bob. Unfortunately, as she is the best thing the Labor party has going for them.

  343. Fair ???????

    It appears that all that this and the previous Rudd government is being dismantled before Abbott gets into power, by the state Coalition governments.

    …..The Queensland Competition Authority (QCA), in a recently released issues paper, has suggested that solar PV owners only be paid the wholesale market value of electricity for all generation their systems produce.
    Through the introduction of “gross metering” owners of PV systems would have to export all their generation to the grid, receiving around 8 cents per kilowatt-hour. They could not use the generation from their systems to meet their own consumption needs thereby avoiding purchasing electricity from their electricity retailer, which is charged at a price of around 20 to 30 cents per kilowatt-hour.
    According to Matthew Wright of Beyond Zero Emissions,
    “This is like telling someone they aren’t allowed to eat the fruit and vegetables grown in their own backyard and must sell it to the local Coles or Woolworths where they’ll then have to buy it back at a substantial mark-up. This will kill the solar PV sector.”………
    http://www.climatespectator.com.au/commentary/qld-govt-force-pv-owners-sell-all-their-electricity-retailers?utm_source=Climate%2BSpectator%2Bdaily&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=Climate%2BSpectator%2Bdaily

  347. …Explaining the government’s cuts to the health portfolio yesterday, Ms Skinner said that “most of the money” saved would be through “better models of care, through, for example, not keeping patients in hospital as long as they should be”.
    “I think a lot of people are very pleased not to be kept in hospital longer than they need to,” Ms Skinner said.
    “I have a brand new granddaughter. Her mother was in hospital for two nights, she spent the next two nights in a five-star hotel room. This is a private hospital, this is what they do now … It’s actually better for the mum … and more efficient for the hospital to pay for a five-star hotel room than a $2000-$3000 acute bed.” …

    http://www.blogotariat.com/node/582869

    I have been in hospital a few times in the last couple of years. I fail to she how Ms. Skinner believes one could have a shorter stay.

    New mothers out there, how long has been your stay. A couple of days seem to be the norm. Maybe Private Funds should cut there payments to what occurs in public hospitals.

  348. Four in 10 voters in New South Wales don’t know Barry O’Farrell is the state’s premier, according to a new poll.

    The Galaxy poll published by News Limited has also found there’s been a six per cent swing against the coalition government since its thumping victory 18 months ago.

    However, the Coalition still retains a commanding lead on a two party-preferred basis over State Labor – 58 per cent to 42 per cent.

    It found 38 per cent of respondents couldn’t identify Mr O’Farrell when asked to name the Premier.

    It also revealed only 15 per..

    http://bigpondnews.com/articles/TopStories/2012/09/19/NSW_voters_dont_know_whos_Premier_796493.html

  349. Beat me to it Cu. Just saw the story on that on early morning news.

    This is hideaway O’Farrell who only appears in fluff piece stunts and chest thumping outbursts against Muslim protesters.

    Another shooting last night in Sydney, with a family in a home being shot at the night before and a ute going up a driveway the same night.

    Daily shootings and stabbings, shootings and stabbings at a less frequency he railed against in the strongest terms when opposition leader, but now he’s nowhere to be seen.

    O’Farrell’s decline hasn’t been as spectacular as Bailieu’s and nothing on the planet can match Newman’s vertical plunge downwards in such a short time, but it’s still a significant decline in just 18 months, and that was before the $1.7 billion in education cuts along with big cuts into health.

  351. INCREASES in royalties charged by conservative state governments will cost many mining companies more in the short term than the minerals resource rent tax, the industry’s peak body says.

    The prediction raises serious questions, both for the federal government’s budget estimates and the opposition’s argument that Labor’s new taxes are to blame for mining’s waning international competitiveness.

    Read more: http://www.smh.com.au/opinion/political-news/state-royalties-to-cost-more-than-mining-tax–report-20120917-262on.html#ixzz26rNe6Mpf

    I’m not sure if it raises too many questions about the budget, From my understanding, didn’t the Government say something along the lines that all increases in royalties will be offset by reductions in GST payments? I can’t recall exactly, given the obfuscation when it comes to reporting these things accurately.

  352. Had a good chuckle Tom.

    News piece this morning had a story on the latest hundreds of job cuts from a coal mine in Queensland. Can’t remember the exact reason the mining company gave but MRRT and Carbon Price wasn’t mentioned anywhere in those reasons.

    They interviewed a sacked miner leaving work and he immediately said he lost his job because of the Carbon Price but the off camera reporter prompted, “State Royalties”, and the miner hesitantly rejoined, yes and State Royalties.

    Yes reporter. More of this please.

  353. Yes, royalties, which the miners pay, whether they make a profit or not. The so called carbon tax, they probably do not pay. The MRRT only when they have made a profit.

    Of course lower ore prices would have anything to do with it.

    And maybe one of those mines, at the end of their life and no longer viable.

    It would be funny, if that court case led to the decision that there is only one crown, and that belongs to the Commonwealth. Which would make sense. Maybe the state crowns where distinguished at Federation.

    That would certainly put the cat among the pigeons.

  355. What is with Liberals and their warped priorities.

    After slashing thousands of jobs, essential services and public infrastructure, Newman yesterday announced the building of a publicly subsidised casino for Queensland that “will be bigger than Crown”.

    In the presser announcing the casino he was challenged and immediately jumped in waving his arm across the audience asking who doesn’t want major infrastructure building in Queensland, and before anyone could say a thing he dismissively said, “I didn’t think so”.

    Kennett did the same thing, severely slashing government services and infrastructure whilst pouring large sums into horse racing, car racing and a casino, and was rightly booted out.

    It seems Newman is determined to go the way of Kennett and ensure another long term Labor government for Queensland.

  356. After seeing candoes performance ME, all I can say is, ‘thank god for isobelle’

    They are never in for long down here in SA, but they leave a terrible legacy (privatisation of everything, pokies in every pub)

  359. OK O’Farrell this is becoming beyond a joke.

    After a media absence as questions were being asked on the number of shooting and stabbing during the recent Muslim radicals rioting you stood up in front of the media all hairy chested decrying the violence and how you won’t tolerate it.

    When in opposition you stood up in front of the media decrying every stabbing and shooting as a failure of the government.

    Last night there was another drive by shooting into a home with a mother and four children. The night before there were two shootings, again one involved shooting into a home where there was a mother and children. There was also a savage stabbing.

    Where are you now O’Farrell? Why aren’t you fronting the media all hairy chested and telling us how you will not tolerate the daily shootings and stabbings, or is it you are working on more cuts, maybe this time to Law and Order? Maybe like those cuts to health you only just foisted on us, cuts to a system that had already gone backwards under your stewardship. Do you remember when in opposition standing in front of the media all hairy chested decrying every hospital tragedy and lapse as a complete failure of the government?

    Where are you now O’Farrell all hairy chested to tell us you won’t tolerate any more shootings, stabbings, hospital failures, major traffic jams, public transport setbacks and education shortcomings, all things you stood in front of the media all hairy chested on when in opposition?

    Where are you O’Farrell.

  361. “and it’s unencumbered by evidence or sound planning”

    C.U, that’s a funny line.
    Any S.A. locals (or others) with an opinion on the Fib’s leadership issues here? I don’t follow it closely but on balance I’d like Redmond gone. To me she seemed to be making progress as the nice lady we were all expected to vote for next time round. None of the pack of fellas baying at her heels seem me to be cut-throughers.

  363. Welcome to Liberal rule, and most especially Queensland LNP rule.

    After the corruption of the QUT elections by the Liberal supporting Right they have gone around threatening violence against Left women in the university. After all they had a perfect role model in Abbott.

    So have the police arrested those in threatening violence against women, no, they arrested Left wing students distributing leaflets against Newman. It is apparently illegal to peacefully criticise Newman, I didn’t know that.

    Now I want you remember that Abbott has fully endorsed Newman and everything he is doing, so ergo will do the same things if in power, in other words undermine democracy.

  367. A bashed Sydney bus driver on the evening prime time news.

    “Bashings everyday, stabbings everyday, shootings everyday, you’re not doing a good job Barry.”

  368. Bigpond news tonight.

    An international developer has blacklisted Queensland, saying Premier Campbell Newman can’t be trusted with its money.

    Singapore-based company Sembawang has cited the Newman government’s job cuts in the public sector as part of the reason it won’t consider any future investment in the state.

    Another example of Newman Killing QLD.
    $5 b investment gone forever… good one Newman.

  369. As MJ keeps saying savage cuts, mass sackings and wage cuts are counter intuitive in attempting to increase economic growth.

    Apart from the many reasons already espoused Newman, and as will the other Liberal State Premiers, has found another reason. Investors will lose trust in those government that undertake savage unreasonable slash and burn policies as they are a sign of an incompetent investment manager. Slash and burn is an incompetent easy way of economic management and an indication of someone who has no idea of sound economic policy.

    Why would you invest with someone who is so bad at managing an economy.

  371. The O’Farrell government will take an axe to workers compensation, slashing lump-sum payments for the injured and removing long-term recipients of weekly benefits from the scheme after a set period.
    Workplace lawyers said the changes, if delivered, would transform NSW into ”the meanest system in the country”.
    The government has flagged its intention to overhaul the $13 billion WorkCover system, which faces a deficit of up to $5 billion. An announcement is expected as early as Tuesday.
    The Sun-Herald has spoken to some lawyers and union representatives who are aware of the reforms being driven by the Minister for Finance, Greg Pearce. They estimate half of the 28,000 workers who currently receive benefits and medical expenses would no longer receive a cent under the new scheme.
    Advertisement
    Barrister Bruce McManamey, a spokesman for the Australian Lawyers Alliance, said: ”It’s the kind of stuff that will result in injured workers losing their homes.”
    The changes, according to sources, would include:
    ABOLISHING lump-sum payments for injured workers with ”less than 10 per cent whole-body impairment” (and therefore excluding payment for injuries such as a fused ankle or back and neck injuries not requiring surgery).
    A CUT-OFF after 2½ years (or 130 weeks) for weekly payments for those considered to be partially injured.
    A LIMIT of nine years for all entitlements except for people who are ”totally incapacitated”.
    At present, injured workers receive 100 per cent of their ordinary pay for the first 26 weeks off work. A scaffolder without dependents receives $1100-$1500 a week for 26 weeks, for example, before dropping to the ”statutory rate” of $432 a week if they are off work for longer.
    Under the new reforms, there would be a sliding scale under which the most an injured worker could collect is 90 per cent of their wage.
    After the 13 weeks, that would fall to 80 per cent before reverting to the statutory rate. The Sun-Herald put the proposed changes to Mr Pearce’s office in writing and the minister declined to rule any of them out. A spokesman said: ”We are committed to improving rehabilitation outcomes, better rates of return to work and better management of the scheme.”
    Mr McManamey said NSW currently had one of the better schemes, but ”if they go through with these changes, NSW will have the meanest system in the country.
    ”It’s the kind of stuff that will result in injured workers losing their homes. People lose the ability to repay mortgages when they are thrown back on to social security.”
    He said the majority of lump-sum payments were between $6000 and $13,000. ”If they abolish lump sums for injuries less than 10 per cent, I think it falls into the category of mean and petty,” Mr McManamey said.
    The secretary of Unions NSW, Mark Lennon, also a director of WorkCover, said: “This state government is preparing to abandon workers and make their lives even harder.”
    In February, The Sun-Herald revealed WorkCover was lurching towards a $5 billion deficit. . Lawyers believe the hit to WorkCover is about protecting NSW’s AAA credit rating.
    One recipient, parole officer Grant Casey, 42, was forced off work in 2009. He suffered a disc prolapse after moving a table at work. Mr Casey said WorkCover’s ”slow-moving bureaucracy” allowed the damage to worsen. After two months, he returned to work on light duties but since has had major back surgery and a knee reconstruction and his pain medication has triggered irreversible bowel issues…………..

    Read more: http://www.smh.com.au/nsw/injured-workers-face-savage-compo-cut-20120421-1xdq0.html#ixzz27eMdwVhJ

  372. This is just so wrong and the sooner Newman and his government is held to account the better.

    Premier Campbell Newman has announced plans to demolish the Executive Building (where he and his Ministers have their headquarters) and Public Works Building, to replace them with new ones.

    He apparently is going to do this in such a way through PPP so as to hide the true cost and debt he needs to go into to accomplish it.

  373. Former NSW premier Nick Greiner is set to recommend a second Sydney airport be built at Badgerys Creek in a long-awaited infrastructure report.

    Mr Greiner, who heads Infrastructure NSW (INSW), will reportedly call for the new site to be operational at Badgerys Creek within 20 years when the INSW report is released on Wednesday.

    The report will support a recent joint state-federal study that recommended planning on the second airport start immediately and should be built by 2027, The Daily Telegraph reports.

    The recommendation puts Mr Greiner on a collision course with NSW Premier Barry O’Farrell, who has ruled out another Sydney airport.

    http://bigpondnews.com/articles/TopStories/2012/10/02/Greiner_to_call_for_second_Syd_airport_801170.html?cid=ZBP_NEWS_L_L1_Greiner_to_call_for_second_Syd_airport_021012

  374. Albanese is out and about, talking about the much needed second airport for Sydney.

    Whatever the noise that is created by the Opposition, the government gets on with governing.

  375. RUSH hour commuters will be forced to wait for at least two crowded trains to go through Chatswood station before being able to continue their journey to the city, under the O’Farrell government’s centrepiece $9 billion transport project.

    The government’s decision to build the north-west rail link as a shuttle between Epping and Chatswood, breaking its promise to allow trains to run all the way to the city, will lead to potential chaos for many north shore and Hills district commuters.

    Thousands of commuters disembarking at Chatswood will be unable to get on city-bound trains already operating at capacity. And passengers getting off the north-west trains may struggle to fit on the crowded platform at Chatswood.

    With an ”optimised” timetable for the north-west rail link, more than 40 per cent of peak-hour passengers transferring to the city at Chatswood will be unable to get on the next service because it will be too crowded, according to analysis commissioned by Transport for NSW and obtained by the Herald.

    Advertisement
    Further, more than 15 per cent of them will be unable to fit on the next two citybound trains on the north shore line.

    The analysis was commissioned and done just before the Premier, Barry O’Farrell, and the Transport Minister, Gladys Berejiklian, announced the new model for the north-west rail link on June 20.
    http://www.smh.com.au/nsw/crush-hour-9b-rail-link-flaw-20121001-26vkt.html

  376. Newman at Abbott’s request has removed Climate Change from Queensland schools, you know the Abbott who said it was crap and then said he believes in it and a price should be put on carbon as the most effective way to abate it.

    So in other words one of those has to be a lie.

    Newman is also scrapping cycle lanes to make way for roads.

    And so the destruction of Queensland continues unabated.

  377. How Newman is screwing the country and wrecking Queensland.

    Queensland unemployment rate jumped from 5.3% to 6.3% in just 4 months. All the job losses nationally accounted for by the drop in employment in Queensland.

  378. Vic Liberal MP breaks rules but blames ombudsman. If police investigate Bailleau will lose 1 seat majority. So suppose the police won’t be called in.

    ‘Mr Brouwer found that Mr Shaw used his parliamentary car for a trip to Sale in the state’s east to collect stock for his hardware business on April 22, 2011.

    He also said Mr Shaw also used his parliamentary fuel card and it was probable he knew his employees were using the car for other business trips around Victoria, NSW and South Australia.

    “I consider that a breach of the plan may constitute a contempt or breach of parliamentary privilege or a breach of the code of conduct established by the Register of Interests Act,” Mr Brouwer said his report.

    “In response to my draft report, Mr Shaw disagreed with my conclusion that, as a member of parliament, he is obliged to comply with the plan.”

    Mr Shaw also disagreed with the ombudsman that flouting the plan may constitute a contempt of parliament.’

    Read more: http://www.theage.com.au/victoria/mp-breached-rules-by-lending-car-ombudsman-finds-20121011-27efv.html#ixzz28uv3pnlL

  379. QLD govt has deliberately gone out of it’s way to stuff up the unemployment figures…it knows it hasn’t got an election for a few years…but federal election coming up…but this will backfire…furthermore, we wrote that Peter Costello’s Reserve Bank picks held rates too high for too long…and bank types like Liberal supporting CEO Mike Smith of ANZ went out of their way to ignore eventual moves:
    It is the state’s worst unemployment outcome since September 2009 and harks back to 2003, when the Queensland economy was shaking off double-digit unemployment figures.

    Read more: http://www.brisbanetimes.com.au/queensland/queenslands-worst-unemployment-rate-for-three-years-20121011-27exm.html#ixzz28xX8exgw

    N’

  380. The unemployment rate going up would only have been a negative for the Federal government if it had gone up across most of the States.

    That Queensland stands out in contrast and the National rate can be attributed to Queensland’s sacking of 12,000 public servants and the flow on from that lands the bad figure right in the lap of Newman.

  381. Mobius, when Obama put thru his stimulus plenty of Republican states misused and redirected moneys…

    and then started laying off public servants bigtime…pushing up the unemployment rates….

    some Republican corporations also sacked workers…or would not hire.

    Plenty of the scum banks would not lend to help start up businesses…preventing some job growth.

    The libor rate was manipulated which saw local communities who had money tied into rates lose heaps of revenue…

    School jobs money in America is linked to local community taxes, including generating money from property taxes…

    This meant broke communities were forced to layoff teachers fullbore, firemen etc…

    SABOTAGE.

    Why do you think Abbott keeps talking about linking education and health to local communities.

    Sus.

    N’

  382. Mobius Ecko
    Union says public service redundancies not fully in unemployment number

    ‘Queensland Council of Unions president John Battams said it was clear the state government was contributing to the increasing unemployment problem.

    “The LNP is only part way through the 14,000 jobs it wants to cut from the Queensland public sector,” Mr Battams said.

    “Figures this week showed that 3400 public sector workers had lost their jobs – there are thousands more to go across the state.”

    Read more: http://www.brisbanetimes.com.au/queensland/queenslands-worst-unemployment-rate-for-three-years-20121011-27exm.html#ixzz28vKUx9ft

  384. Well this should help NSW

    ‘THE wife of NSW Deputy Premier Andrew Stoner has been accused of Twitter trolling after her attack on the US first lady Michelle Obama’s religious beliefs while her Trade Minister husband tries to woo business from around the world.

    Mrs Stoner went on to question Mrs Obama’s membership of a pro-choice US political group for women at the same time she prays to God.

    “How does Michelle Obama, who is a member of Emily’s List, say God Bless and mean it…,” she tweeted

    Mr Oakeshott said he could handle being trolled by anyone but he was surprised by the comments about mocking god and the attack on Mrs Obama from the spouse of a senior political leader.

    “When people associated with high office in Australia and the trade and investment portfolios in NSW, start trolling the first lady of the United States, the debate in Australia has gone off the page,” Mr Oakeshott said.

    “I don’t know whether she truly believes that god doesn’t like Michelle Obama or me but I look forward to her explanation.”
    http://www.dailytelegraph.com.au/news/wife-of-nsw-deputy-premier-andrew-stoner-accused-of-twitter-trolling-attacking-us-michelle-obamas-religious-beliefs/story-e6freuy9-1226494084225

  385. Abbott Mini-Me of Queensland has done it again, cutting vital funding to a much needed and successful program to a group that cannot fight back.

    Newman is cutting funding to a program that instructs teachers of handicapped children how to help those children transit into mainstream education.

    Yep another attack on the handicapped and disadvantaged in Queensland.

    But as Abbott wrote about his concern for the Iraqis who were dying despite his government aiding an illegal invasion that caused those deaths, Newman has come out and said he is deeply concerned for the handicapped children of Queensland.

    What is this huge disconnect between what conservatives say and what they actually do? We see it in the litany of lies from the Liberal Premiers who promised so much before they were elected and then immediately began breaking every promise made after they were elected.

    Follow Newman closely and observe his destruction of Queensland and the slow dismantling of its State democracy, like the scrapping of the corruption watchdog. For where goes Newman there will go Abbott on a greater scale.

  386. Cannot but help, that it should be this story that is leading the headlines, not that of the PM.

    The retweet on Cathy Stoner’s Twitter page.
    THE wife of the Deputy Premier, Andrew Stoner, posted a series of anti-Muslim messages on social media during the September race riot in Sydney.

    The divisive retweets by Cathy Stoner included: ”A MESSAGE TO ALL MUSLIMS THAT THREATEN AUSSIES?! If you don’t like our freedom/democracy GO BACK TO WHERE U CAME FROM!!!!”

    Another stated: ”Muslims can have 4 wives, stoning, beheading, genital mutilation, honour killings all in the name of Allah? Yep, religion of peace, I get it.”

    Tweet nothings … Cathy Stoner has now closed her Twitter account. Photo: Kate Geraghty
    A separate message on her Twitter feed declared the ”Multiculturalism experiment is dead”.

    Mrs Stoner closed her account last week after a bizarre exchange with the federal independent MP Rob Oakeshott, whom she accused of having ”abused the trust of your constituents” by choosing not to vote against the then speaker Peter Slipper on the floor of Parliament.

    It was Mr Oakeshott, whose electorate of Lyne overlaps Mr Stoner’s state seat of Oxley, and the independent Tony Windsor, who cut a deal in which Mr Slipper would survive the opposition motion to dump him if he agreed to quit.

    ”You were put there for a reason. God will not be mocked,” Mrs Stoner told Mr Oakeshott.

    Mr Stoner said his wife was not a public figure but a private individual who was entitled to her opinions.

    ”She should not be wrung out by the media as she has been for the past two days, just because she contacted Rob Oakeshott as a constituent about his support for Peter Slipper,” he said.

    ”I am a public figure and will defend what I say and do, but she will not be commenting.”

    Despite having deleted her account, a cache of tweets by Mrs Stoner was obtained by The Sun-Herald.

    She has also weighed strongly into the refugee and Catholic priest paedophilia debates. On August 12, she tweeted: ”Six boats this weekend … Needs no comment.”

    ”The church thinks to DEFROCK a priest for rape of a child is justice? NO IT IS NOT. JAIL is what he deserves!!” was posted on September 10.

    http://www.smh.com.au/opinion/political-news/politicians-wife-retweeted-antimuslim-tirades-20121013-27jo7.html

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