These days, the economy is run for the benefit of business, not the rest of us.

Picture below is from here.

More shocks with the reporting of some epic results following on the easing of work rights and obligations - this time connected to the 457 visas under which workers are sponsored to work in Australia by employers.  This time it is the 'enlightened' non-feminist firm Thiess which is a subsidiary/partner of its 'enlightened' non-feminist corporate colleague Leightons.  Please note that Leighton Holdings is now known as the CIMIC Group. Those familiar with the old Leightons Holding board will remember year after year of all male boards - but now they have moved on to the token female.  BTW, please note Miss Eagle does not agree with 'the goal' supported by the Workplace Gender Equality Agency (WGEA) and the Australian Institute of Company Directors (AICD) of 30% of boards to be female. 

The Sex Discrimination Act has been in place since 1984.  Introduction of such legislation was part of Australia's obligation when ratifying the United Nations' Convention to Eliminate Discrimination Against Women (CEDAW).  More than 30 years has gone by and corporations are only being pressed for 30% female representation!  But then WGEA - and its predecessors with other nomenclature - has always been a featherduster organisation.  And look where its so-called "carrot and stick" approach has got women.

In 2010 the then EOWA awarded Thiess an EOWA Award as an employer of choice for women.  This was at the time when there were all sorts of shenaningans going on at the site of the Wonthaggi desalination plant construction.  As for women lauding Thiess .... who? Professional women? Women further down the food chain?  With such undemanding standards, will Thiess Services and CIMIC Group end up employers of choice for women?  I don't think there is an award for providing sound workplace practices for migrant workers.  Clearly, if there was an award, I would expect Thiess Services to find themselves ineligible.  I think we could rely on the Electrical Trades Union to see to that. 

Complaints have been around for a long, long time.  Please see these listed in 2013. 

If you want too tickle your funny bone with a sardonic laugh or three, please read this from April last year. Note the panel for this review - a review which had its mind made up long before it began.  It had its goal clearly in view.  Now we are seeing the results of it.

Please note the ministerial responsibility in the review - it is that well known wife of fish, Senator Michaelia Cash.  These days she is the Assistant Minister for Border Protection (the portfolio for being cruel to refugees and asylum seekers, particularly women and their children) and Minister Assisting the Prime Minister for Women. Australia does not have a Minister who only handles the portfolio of women's affairs because of its significance. And, of course, a woman cannot be expected to handle such a portfolio responsibly.  It is essential that the Prime Minister, Tony Abbott - who day-by-day has his credibility leaking as badly as a run down people-smuggling boat - gives significance to the portfolio.  Seems to be that gone are the days when significant women handled this portfolio with great success and benefit to those whom the portfolio served.

What we have found aired to us in recent weeks is that large numbers of men and women in the Australian workforce - particularly if they come from overseas on a 417 working holiday visa or a 457 employer sponsored visa - are treated shoddily.  The Liberal-National Parties currently in government in Australia, together with their corporate mates, are trashing Australia's reputation for fairness and equity.  Australia is becoming yet another rip-off station on the international circuit.

Such practices disadvantage ordinary Australians. How?

1. Can we really trust employers, as a group,  if they say they cannot fill their jobs with Australian employees?  Not all employers using 417s and 457s are bad employers.  However, when major corporations act like Thiess they bring everyone into disrepute.

2.  The enthusiasm with which the Abbott Government and their corporate cronies have adopted the concept - or some of the concept - of overseas working visas is part of an overall objective of driving down wages in Australia, particularly for unskilled or semi-skilled work.  And remember we don't yet know what Australia has signed up to in the Trans-Pacific Partnership Agreement. 

3. Currently, Australian government agencies are not working for all Australians.  As a peep into the WGEA shows, no pressure is being brought to bear on recalcitrant employers and yet, as we saw in last year's Budget, the Abbott Government is prepared to place enormous financial and family pressures on Australian workers. 

4. Is Australia producing a new breed of refugees as people flee from us because of the evil and gross indecency of many employment practices in this country?

As you can see below, Networkers, I have included a reading list.  It's a bit of a mixed bag - but it will give you an idea of some of the stuff that is around and a lot of this stuff will have been inserted in the minds of politicians by professional lobbyists.  The last on the list is from one of my favourite economic commentators, Ross Gittins. I conclude this article with A Taste of Gittins from his article which I have included below:

To me the main drawback is not so much that employers may not try hard enough to find local workers to fill jobs, or that the availability of this external supply may limit to some extent the rise in skilled wages, but that it reduces employers' incentive go to the bother of training young workers. 

Still, we mustn't forget that, these days, 

the economy is run for the benefit of business, not the rest of us.

Further reading

Visa holders and migrant workers - workplace rights and entitlements

Compete to prosper

The evidence is tacking up that Australians will earn lower wages in the years ahead

Australian oil and gas workers earning less which may give industry competitive edge

Minimum Wage Review 2014 - Australian Retailers Assocation submission

Immigration to Australia

How Australia's supply of labour is changing

Close the Gap Day - Thursday 20 March 2013 : Rachel Siewert

Rachel Siewerts's Adjournment Address in the Senate yesterday to mark Close the Gap Day - Thursday 21 March 2013.

Picture from here

Rachel Siewert (WA, Australian Greens) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Thursday, 21 March—in other words, the day after tomorrow—is National Close the Gap Day. I would like to acknowledge all of those who have supported and participated in this event, which will happen around the country. However, the evidence is clear that there are still significant differences in health, education, employment and social outcomes between Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islanderpeople and other Australians. National Close the Gap Day is an important opportunity to promote awareness of these issues and take collaborative action towards improving the health and wellbeing of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people. I note also that Close the Gap Day is a community owned initiative, whereas Closing the Gap is the government's program for addressing these issues. It may sound pedantic, but it is important to point out the difference between the two.

The Shadow report 2013: on Australian governments' progress towards closing the gap in life expectancy between Indigenous and non-Indigenous Australians (see below to read and/or download the report) outlines some progress in some areas, such as Indigenous child health. Although there has been some progress, unfortunately there is some plateauing in mortality rates in children under the age of five. There has been some progress in reducing the rates of smoking during pregnancy and increased attendance at antenatal care, at least once during a mother's first trimester. Early data indicates that the tackling Indigenous smoking and Indigenous Chronic Disease package initiatives are showing signs of being beneficial for adult health and life expectancy in the Indigenous population, which is very promising.

However, National Close the Gap Day serves as a reminder that there is still a very long way to go to close the gap between Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islanders and other Australians. Most Australian jurisdictions will not meet the Council of Australian Governments' target to achieve equality in life expectancy of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people living in Australia by 2030. There has been an increasing trend of babies of low birth weight born to Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander mothers. We know low birth weight is associated with later health problems, as well as a greater risk of mortality before the age of five. Funding cuts such as those reported in some states, such as New South Wales and Queensland, will have a potential detrimental effect on any efforts working towards closing the gap. There is also a need for further funding for the National Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Health Plan, which is funded until June this year, but as yet there has been no commitment of funds for the next five-year plan. This is absolutely essential.

One of the issues I have mentioned in this place before, and I believe it is absolutely essential if we are going to close the gap in Aboriginal health expectancy and life outcomes, is to ensure that we deal with otitis media, an ear infection characterised by fluid build-up in the middle ear. Unfortunately, if it is left untreated it results in hearing loss. A lot of work is going on in how to deal with combatting otitis media. I very strongly support that work and the funding for that work, but unfortunately this disease strikes so many Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people, particularly when they are babies. Babies as young as three months old can get otitis media. In some communities, up to 90 per cent of babies are affected by otitis media. So not only do we need to put in the effort to treat and eradicate this disease; we need to put in the funding resources to address the issues of hearing loss and hearing impairment for young Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander children.

If a child starting their first day at school cannot hear because of hearing impairment, they will not be able to participate in class. Evidence shows that, if children are alienated from day one in the classroom, they will not engage in schooling and will be unable to meet education standards. We also know that hearing loss has been associated with a number of people in juvenile detention and in adult prisons. The evidence is there that this problem can have a devastating impact on communities. So as well as funding the health plan we need to put renewed emphasis on early literacy and also on programs to address hearing loss.

Eva Cox to Bill Shorten: stigma, disincentive, ineptitude & nastiness implementing Newstart and parenting payments

Picture at left is from here.

Eva Cox has written to-day to Bill Shorten.  

I receive the Aged Pension.  I am about to get a rise in the pension.  I can do with it.  However, I am embarrassed and sad.  As I get more, the Newstart people get a rise that borders on the infinitesimal and single mothers who are not in the workforce (as if it is so darn easy to park the kids and get off to work!) will have money taken away from them when the children reach a particular age to 'encourage' them to work.  I'm old enough to remember the outcry from women in this country that single mothers - women with children unsupported by a male bread-winner - be allowed to receive social security payments.  

My mother-in-law was widowed twice by the time she way 38 years of age - and each marriage produced two children.  My husband was the eldest.  His mother used to make pies and my husband used to sell them door to door getting around on a push bike.  There was real poverty in this household.  A household with a working mother, undoubtedly.  

Anyway, let's hear from Eva.....

18 Mar 2013

Dear Bill Shorten

By Eva Cox

Bill Shorten

Is Bill Shorten sincere about addressing changes to a welfare system "so stupid" that it can't support payments for sole parents? Eva Cox suggests that the policy itself is what's causing the grief

Dear Bill,

When Wendy Tucker asked you on Q and A whether sole parents’ benefits were targeted because single mums are "simply the easiest to take down", your apparent sincerity suggested that you might take the problem seriously. "I cannot believe that … this system is so stupid we can’t alleviate your concerns," you said.

However, your best efforts so far suggest that you haven’t recognised that the policy itself, not its implementation, is the cause of sole parents’ dismay.

To quote from your staffer, Steve Michelson’s letter to a constituent:

"I appreciate the time you have taken to bring your concerns to the Australian Government’s attention. The Government understands the difficulty many parents, especially single parents, face caring for their children while on income support."

No, your government doesn’t, or you wouldn’t have brought in the appallingly designed cuts to sole parent payments, which are not able to meet the intentions you claim below:

"Newstart Allowance is designed to provide a balance between financial support and incentives to find and maintain employment. Transitioning parents onto Newstart Allowance creates better incentives for parents, including single parents, to return to the workforce and recognises that most parents’ capacity to undertake work or other activities increases as their children get older."

There are two assumptions in this claim. First, that Newstart offers adequate support — an idea considered laughable by almost everyone but Cabinet. Second, that Newstart offers better incentives to return to the workforce.

The basic payment is considerably lower; the allowable earnings before a 40c withdrawal rate is applied are much less than on parenting payments; and most of the obligations on recipients and support on offer were there before the change. You have also cut support for new studies!

"Better incentives" ignores your own DEEWR statistic that 60 per cent of the transferred sole parents already were in paid work. Most lost over $100 per week and some lost all support, because they were earning too much. For some of them, the incentive was perverse; to give up employment because the loss of weekly income and valuable concessions made it even harder to balance time and money demands.

To say sole parents will be able to earn $400 more a fortnight is again misleading. It does not refer to parenting payment earnings but the appallingly mean means test for other Newstart recipients — which does discourage employment.

In fact, your own statistics show fewer people on Newstart are earning than those on parenting payment. This would suggest that Newstart itself is a disincentive. Perhaps starving people into paid jobs doesn’t work after all!

The new benefits are available to all allowance recipients, not just sole parents, as is the tax free threshold and other payments and services you mention. $4 per week does not compensate for losing $62.

"Parents can meet their participation requirements in several ways, including by looking for part-time work of at least 15 hours per week or by undertaking part-time employment, study or voluntary work (in some circumstances) for 30 hours per fortnight. Parents are also able to undertake a combination of activities, for example part-time work and study, to meet their participation requirements."

Two basic facts are ignored here. The first is that parents on parenting payments who had complied by taking on 30 hours paid work per fortnight now have had substantial cuts to their income.

Some now find their net income doesn’t cover basic expenses of going to work plus weekly spending but they are no longer eligible to be registered as job seekers. This makes no sense. Neither does including another nearly 20,000 sole parents who are again not registered to look for jobs because of other reasons, as will be shown below.

The Government removed this arbitrary distinction from 1 January 2013 to provide greater equity and consistency in the Parenting Payment eligibility rules by ensuring that all parents are assessed the same, regardless of when they first claimed income support.

Here the letter raises the equity issue. Some 40,000 sole parents had already been transferred from parenting payment to Newstart since the change came in July 2006. So equity for your government means reducing all sole parents with children older than eight to the lowest common denominator.

As there is no clear evidence that earlier changes increased the workforce participation of sole parents affected, this is impossible to justify. The most recent ABS data showed the annual employment rates of sole parents from 2005-2011, which rise and fall in ways that cannot be correlated with the policy changes, let alone validate any claim for causality.

A fairer equity policy would be to move the 40,000 sole parents who have been on Newstart longer back onto Parenting Payments as well as the 67,000 who have more recently been cut. Then they would have a basic frugal income that recognised their important job of caring and would be effectively encouraged to engage in job seeking and training.

These sole parents were obliged to look for paid work when on parenting payment as their child turned six, so there was no change when they were transferred to Newstart. The 40 per cent who have not been successful in finding appropriate jobs that fit around school hours are facing the job scarcity, longer commutes, biased employers and wider prejudices based on age and lack of recent experience.

Probably close to 20,000 sole parents have additional carer responsibilities for children or other adults, or significant health and personal problems. There are also some older recipients and others who are doing voluntary work as they are having particular difficulties even applying for jobs.

It is inept at best and nasty at worst to push all of these diverse groups onto a payment that is widely seen as inadequate and that does not, according to available evidence, encourage or sustain additional workforce participation.

Sole parents should be entitled to income support payments that allow an appropriate mix of adequate paid working time and time to be a good sole parent. Workforce data show that as their children get older, sole parents do re-enter the workforce for longer hours. It is not necessary to persecute them in this way to save limited funds at the expense of an already stigmatised group.

I hope that this policy isn’t just another silent dog whistle to tout conservative tendencies.

Swanny - our champion Treasurer - delivers the 2012 John Button Lecture with a pastiche of Springsteen & The Chisels thrown in

Well, Networkers, I certainly won't be there -

in spite of being a major Swanny fan.

The price is way beyond the bounds of an Aged Pension budget.

I assume it is thoroughly booked out by now.

This,  however, will give a taste.

And, if  you want to really pretend you are there,

sit back with a cuppa and a bikky and read this:

Further reading:

I have a right to express my views: Clive Palmer

The 0.01 Per Cent: The Rising Influence of Vested Interests in Australia

Sorry Clive Palmer, Wayne Swan's vision is better for Australia

What was missing from Wayne Swan's essay in  The Monthly

Wayne Swan and the E Street Brand

Swan songs and the  quest for boomer cred  in the heart of the Boss' fan belt

Related articles

• Swan takes a fresh dig at magnates
• Born to run the country: Swan channels the Boss

A new social contract for Australia?

Further reading:

The Social Contract by Jean-Jacques Rousseau (free e-book  for reading or download)

Religion, welfare and the new social  contract in Australia - Paul Smyth (headline  discussion points)

Assessing the social contract equilibrium in a Post 9/11 world: An Australian perspective by Robyn Cooper.(2011Honours thesis, Murdoch University)

Sustainability and the Social Contract with Australia’s Country Towns - Prof John Martin, La Trobe University

Prosperity for all Australians   - 2011 Brotherhood of Saint Laurence Sambell Oration by Jennifer Westacott, CEO of the Business Council of Australia

With capital punishment, you're not hung until the appeal process is exhausted. Bankruptcy is different ...

I meant to write this post yesterday.  But I dragged my heels.  I knew what I wanted to say. But still I dragged my heels.  Why? The previous two days had been busy. I'm not as young as once I was so I need a longer recovery period than once I did.  But I don't think that was the whole story.  I think it was a mix of sadness, frustration, and outrage.  Perhaps when I get to the end of this post you might share those feelings with me.

Regular readers of The Network may have taken time to read of the Tess Lawrence battle against injustice. Tess's battle continued on Tuesday in the jurisdiction of the Federal Bankruptcy Court of Australia. Tess was in court to plead for an extension of time to appeal against orders declaring her bankrupt.  It is difficult to write about the numerous proceedings arising out of Tess's plight because the words I write might not be intelligible amidst the complexity of what has been going on.

In short, Tess's bankruptcy has come about because of proceedings brought about by McKean Park Lawyers. The reasons for this take many twists and turns which include a threat to Tess's life which left her incapacitated with Post Traumatic Stress Disorder (PSTD).


Piggy-backing on this was a sequestration order issued in October in favour of the National Bank of Australia (NAB) as the priority creditor.

What left me frustrated and outraged were what I consider to be two systemic flaws in operations of the bankruptcy proceedings which militate against defendants, particularly people like Tess who are self-representing litigants, and favour plaintiffs, legal professionals, and bankruptcy trustees.  These three categories comprise a powerful phalanx against those who can't afford legal representation.

It might be one thing for the bigger or more corporate fish such as Alan Bond to appear as a defendant and perhaps laws and systems have been put in place to deal with such people and/or corporations.  However, I believe - from what I saw on Tuesday - that there is no justice for the minnows trying to find their way in this legal and financial ocean.

Tess has missed out on at least one important hearing - and the really important one was the October one where Justice North handed down his sequestration order.  Tess missed out for two reasons.

1. For a lot of the past few months or so, Tess has not been functioning well because of the PSTD which is a direct result of adverse treatment by a particular person in the legal profession on court premises at the time of an earlier hearing and the failure of the judiciary and the legal system to take any action in the matter.  In fact, it was only due to accessing effective psycho-therapeutic treatment that Tess was on her feet stating her case and defending herself on Tuesday.  
2. She did not know the hearing was on.  That's right she received no notice, no documents telling her that her case was being heard on a particular day.  Nor - and this is where the legal system disadvantages people other than those making their living from or attached to the legal profession - is there any need for proof of service (by affidavit or any other means) that the defendant has been advised of the forthcoming legal proceedings.  The only obligation is that, at the very beginning of what can be quite protracted and continuing proceedings, there is a requirement for proof of service at the first hearing. After that, the legal system doesn't require anyone to even bother!

I was amazed at the energy and intelligence and sheer fight with which Tess put her case on Tuesday.  I am not a lawyer but I have worked in and around the law for a substantial part of my working life.  As a union official, I had to prosecute many cases within the Industrial Relations Commission and the Industrial Magistrates Courts.  Didn't lose any of those cases.  So I was quite satisfied with the way in which Tess acquitted herself on Tuesday.  I was more than satisfied since I knew the distress she has been in for some considerable time.  At one stage, I thought there might have been a 60-40 chance of Tess succeeding but as the hours passed this optimism receded.

As the morning's hearing proceeded to a dismal end one fact - which outrages me more than words can express - became clear.  There is an appeal process available following the declaration of bankruptcy and the sequestration order.  Now when capital punishment was still in operation, the powers-that-be couldn't hang a person until the very last possibility of appeal was exhausted.  Not so, it appears, in bankruptcy proceedings.  The Federal Bankruptcy Court appoints a trustee to carry out all the disposition of property and so on.  To put it not so nicely, the trustee picks over the financial bones of the defendant.  However, the trustee does not have to wait until the appeals process is exhausted before doing this.  They take up their tasks immediately if not sooner!

From what was said in court, I understand that the reason that the trustee does not wait for the appeals process to be exhausted is that there are so few appeals.  For all intents and purposes, it appears the general intent is to allow the trustee to go and get on with whatever is necessary to do.  And there are consequences from this attitude, this system of legal convenience.  

Because work has already begun, because costs are thereby incurred by the trustee, and because the trustee has priority in any costs awarded by the court, there is a hesitancy - because then things would get really complicated - by the presiding judge to allow the appeal to succeed.  Because if the appeal was allowed to succeed, how would the already scrambled eggs be unscrambled? If they could be unscrambled, what costs would be incurred - not to mention red faces and inconvenience - in so doing.

• As the priority creditor, NAB (NAB by name, nab by nature?) has long since repossessed Tess's home at Daylesford.  NAB - or those acting on its behalf - have changed the locks and incurred much destruction to Tess's personal belongings; her tools of trade as a working journalist and media analyst; and made the pursuance of her rights difficult insofar as all her files relating to the bankruptcy were taken.  
• Tess brought forward in court that she had placed a number of files and documents - some relating to the bankruptcy case and others of no concern to the case whatsoever - in the custody of a lawyer friend whose offices were subsequently visited by personnel acting for the Law Institute of Victoria who proceeded to take her files.  She has not seen or had access to those files and documents from that day to this.
• Tess made clear to the court that those who were prosecuting her have now taken to persecuting her.

I want to record the appreciation of myself and of Tess to Keith Kaulfuss for his support at court on Tuesday. Keith is a faithful fighter against injustice and, even though he had never met Tess, he was prepared to spend time in court in support.  

The saga continues.  Tess is taking every avenue open to her to pursue her case.  The next episode will be in the Supreme Court of Victoria.

• If you wish to be kept informed so that you too, dear Networkers, can support Tess, please email me at misseaglesnetwork(at)gmail(com).
• If you have a similar story, please be in touch at the aforementioned email address. I am particularly interested in cases which demonstrate, as Tess's does, legal/systemic flaws and inequities which might be able to be addressed by lobbying governments and other jurisdictions for change.  Please keep your story brief and clear.

Tess Lawrence and The Victorian Injustice System - Part 2: Tess tries to get her house back

I first published the material below on 14 January 2012.  Tess has published this piece in the journal for which she writes, Independent Australia, to-day 30 January 2012.  It gives great insight into the effects of this crisis on one individual. 


2 February 2012.  I have posted to-day here on Tess's appearance in court to get an extension of her appeal against bankruptcy.  Please go to the post to see a description of the systemic flaws which work against self-representing litigants.

You may recall this post about Tess Lawrence and her battle with the National Australia Bank.  Tess has sent me this video about the current status of her plight. Tess says:

Dear Brigid, 


Could you please help and circulate this far and wide. I am still trying to find out
where my belongings are - and the police won't help me.

kind regards,
tess

A Labor Govt belittles Aboriginal Australians. The NT Intervention, now AIATSIS. What next?

From renowned NT journalist, Bob Gosford

The slow death of Aboriginal Research?

AIATSIS suspends research grants

The Australian Institute of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Studies (AIATSIS) website says that it is:

…the world’s premier institution for information and research about the cultures and lifestyles of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoples, past and present.

The Institute undertakes and encourages scholarly, ethical community-based research, holds a priceless collection of films, photographs, video and audio recordings and the world’s largest collections of printed and other resource materials for Indigenous Studies, and has its own publishing house.

Its activities affirm and raise awareness among all Australians, and people of other nations, of the richness and diversity of Australian Indigenous cultures and histories.

Fine words and noble ambitions that AIATSIS has strived to fulfill over the past 50 or so years. From my own research on Aboriginal bird knowledge I found the resources in the AIATSIS library and archives an great source of information and inspiration.

But more than a few in the fields of research – anthropology, linguistics, law and archaeology – central to the very fine work that AIATSIS has sponsored over the years are dismayed at this recent announcement in the AIATSIS Grants page:

With the greatest reluctance, the AIATSIS Council has decided that applications for research grants will not be invited for the 2012 year. Although an important discretionary program, this will be the first time in over 20 years that grants will not be available.

AIATSIS funding from Government has fallen steadily over the past decade, in inflation-adjusted terms. Submissions to Government for increased base funding, or exemption from the efficiency dividend, have been unsuccessful. We have now passed the point where all legislated functions can be delivered, and in this context Council took the view that decisive action was called for.

Whilst Council noted, and appreciates, the Government’s decision to exempt AIATSIS from the additional 2.5% efficiency dividend in 2012-13, this will have no positive impact on ongoing funding.

An internal review of the grants program found that it isn’t meeting the intended purposes.

It has been substantially unchanged for over a decade, and would need to be redesigned to meet current expectations from Indigenous communities, researchers and AIATSIS priorities. In addition, the grants program is no longer eligible for inclusion in the Australian Competitive Grants Register, due to a Government policy decision in 2010.

For these reasons, Council reluctantly decided that the grants program could not be funded next year. Instead, the funds will be used to bolster research in priority areas which are critically short of resources.

In the overall scheme of research in Australia the AIATSIS small grants certainly provided bang for the public’s buck. A quick look at the grants over the past few years reveals the depth and breadth of the research funded by these grants – which at about $680,000 per year are pretty modest. Follow the highlighted links for the 2011, 2010 and 2009 research projects and see the breadth, depth and quality of the research for yourself.

Does any of this matter?

For mine it does. Very much.

I agree with the commentator who noted that:

…for very little money AIATSIS was able to tap into some of the latest research and then ensure that outcomes were returned to the institution: manuscripts / audio / visual etc.

This wonderful repository will no longer be fed by this emerging research. While the networks and loyalties of researchers who are funded (such as myself for my PhD field research in the mid 1990′s) will no longer be developed.

The fact that AIATSIS has to manage with dwindling government funding cannot alone explain this action. It is extremely disappointing.

Your thoughts are welcome.

The right side of history? No, the best side of the future.

Picture from here

The phrase about being on the right side of history is often heard.  In my view, it is a passive statement often said in the consolation of loss i.e. we might have lost this round but we know we are on the right side of history.  Howsabout we turn this stuff on its head and make it a more active adage - we are working to place us on the best side of the future.

I am brought to this type of thinking by musing on Prime Minister Julia Gillard's authoritative stamp on a ministry reshuffle yesterday. Yes, I do mean to use the word authoritative in spite of what the media pundits may be saying.

There has been nothing but carping beyond measure since Julia Gillard the unmarried, living in sin, childless atheist inherited The Lodge in Canberra.  Some of it is, it could be said, in the realm of the usual political argy-bargy...although even some of this is at the higher margins of extreme.  Some of it borders on the dangerous. Where does violent language end and actual violence begin?  I hope we, in Australia, never have to answer that question...although, come to think of it,  we did have to after certain events at Cronulla, didn't we?

There seems to be little doubt that Julia Gillard is copping more than her fair share of slings and arrows whether fortune is outrageous or not.  The language is fed by and is an appeal to an Ocker machismo.  This is exhibited by men of the right, and, more correctly, the extreme right - and women (yes I do say women) who thoughtlessly follow behind - who don't like equity with women;  who have grave difficulty when a woman is not only superior by position but by intellect, grace, and goodwill as well.  

Reports are coming through from those who have had personal dealings or social engagements with the Australian Prime Minister.  They report her as warm, gracious, witty, and a wonderful dinner companion.  Those with whom she negotiated in the tense days immediately following the 2010 Federal election bring good reports and contrast the performance of Tony Abbott in negotiations in a way which reflects adversely on the Leader of the Opposition.

Abbott has been a cheerleader of negativity which has brought out the worst in so many Australians high, middle, and low.  The Labor wits of the Twitterverse now refer to the Liberal/National Parties in the Federal Parliament as the No-alition.  

Added to this are the arguments about marriage equality and that the definition of marriage is one between a man and a woman.  The Prime Minister herself, some sections of the Labor Government, and the conservative political parties support this proposition and are loudly supported by the Catholic and Evangelical Christian churches.  

We are living in a time, though, when old shibboleths are falling away.  Societies across the planet are forming new moralities, new adherences, new ways of being community and culture.  This is part of the nature of humanity.  It is an ever evolving story - whether we like it or not.  The Global Financial Crisis will be sand in the oyster of this process. Whether it will produce a decent pearl, we know not.

One of my strengths and, at the same time, one of my problems is that I am glass half-full girl.  Ever the optimist. We have put men on the moon, therefore we can do just about anything.  I think that both history and the future are looking good for equity amongst peoples.  Certainly, not everyone in the world has joined the journey yet but this year has seen many advances which are as startling as cherry blossom in Japan.

So let's work together without animosity to be on the best side of the future.  As a foundation stone for this work, let's get vocal and make it clear from communities across Australia that the sort of negative behaviour I have described is NOT acceptable.

Tess Lawrence and The Victorian Injustice System: how the NAB wins friends and influences people

Follow-up 2 February 2012:
Please go to this post to find an up to date report of Tess's appearance in the Federal Bankruptcy Court to seek an extension of time to appeal the bankruptcy decision.

Bureaucracies, legal or corporate wait for no-one.  They, on the surface at least, appear to be no respecter of persons.  They are certainly not treating Tess Lawrence of Independent Australia with any respect.  Tess, who has been severely traumatised by what is occurring, has - nevertheless - written of the experience in The Victorian Injustice System.

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Know thy enemy is an old saying.  This is an abbreviation from The Art of War by Sun -tzu.  At the end of Chapter 3, Sun-tzu says:

Thus it is said that one who knows the enemy and knows himself will not be endangered in a hundred engagements. One who does not know the enemy but knows himself will sometimes be victorious, sometimes meet with defeat.  One who know neither the enemy nor himself will invariably be defeated in every engagement. 

p. 179 in the Ralph D. Sawyer translation

published in 1994 by Barnes and Noble Books

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In the interests of Knowing Thy Enemy, here is a link to the board of The NAB (National Australia Bank), here is how corporate governance works at The NAB.  Here is the Board of Directors.  Here is more about Michael Chaney.  Perhaps Michael Chaney may have learned a little of loss and trauma of late. 

In terms of The Art of War, Michael Chaney could be seen as the Emperor in Council.  The Field Marshall who gives instruction to and authorises the actions of the troops in the field is the CEO, Cameron Clyne.

With this knowledge, Networkers, 

are we able to go into battle on behalf of Tess Lawrence?

A two-speed tax system? Let's keep equity and stimulus front and centre in the discussion on business taxation reform

There is a working group looking at a radical new way of taxing business in Australia. I am sure this proposal has a great capacity to stir up all sorts of ignorant, arrogant, self-centred political debate and special pleading.

I, for one, am very interested in listening to the argument for introducing such a tax.  I am particularly interested in hearing arguments based on equity and stimulus of, in particular, two segments of the economy which are languishing - namely, small business and manufacturing.

I'm with the sentiments of Kevin Rudd when he said he didn't want to be "Prime Minister of a country that doesn't make things anymore".  Small business covers a great variety of categories yet quite often manufacturing across the country is in the realm of small business.  Small business is defined by the Australian Bureau of Statistics as those businesses with less than 20 employees. Sometimes it is defined as businesses with 100 employees or less. Under the Income Tax Assessment Act 1997, the definition of a "small business entity" can be found here.

In terms of the global economic situation, business taxation should be looked at in the light of stimulus of business activity and investment and the ability of business to take on a fair share of national employment responsibility and goals.  The arguments in favour of equity for smaller business against giant wealthy corporations are many.  They include:

• Managing a two-speed economy
• Managing equity in the employment sector: the resources sector is draining some parts of the job market; skills development in the Australian labour market needs to be diverse and widespread; safeguarding against distortions in the price for labor in the marketplace
• Managing equity across rural and regional Australia so that we don't continue to hollow out the demographic spread across the continent
• Encouraging the ability to innovate particularly in small business start-ups.

I hope the working party can continue to keep the Australian public informed.  

The Story of Broke - a critique

I have written to-day, in the post below,  on this blog about the Story of Broke and, over at Miss Eagle's Garage Sale there is this post and this post.  My blogging friend, Leanne, from across The Ditch who writes at Hazeltree Farm has left a comment here.  Leanne's comment is a brief critique of the Story of Broke and the shortcomings Leanne sees in it.  Annie Leonard's work is brilliant - in its own context.  When applying its concepts outside its home country of the United States of America, we must consider our own individual contexts for the kernel of Annie's stories to have impact internationally.  The Story of Stuff ran well across the globe because so many of us in developed economies are consumers busily consuming.  The Story of Broke is about economics - and everywhere is not identical to the USA.  Certainly, I believe I can confidently say that Australia, Canada and New Zealand are not.  So here are Leanne's points.....

Leanne Daharja Veitch

As much as I liked the Story of Stuff, I couldn't help but see that the Story of Broke was full of holes. It didn't even cover the whole bubble economy that has occurred on a lesser level since the 1940s and spiralled since the 1980s, and completely failed to mention, for example, that US citizens (even ordinary ones) pay much lower rates of tax than pretty much any other developed country.   

It did, accurately, mention the issue of military spending, unbalanced taxation, lobbying etc., but from what I can see, focusing on only half the story isn't really accurate reporting. The ordinary Joes and Janes of the US (just like here and in Australia) also bought up big, went into debt, and supported the bubble we're now seeing crash all over.  

We can't entirely blame the wealthiest 1%, even though that seems like a convenient thing to do. We've all been asleep at the wheel - or most of us have - and now is payment time.  

I think this was just a nice, glossy, "let's blame the system" presentation. It's nice to blame others, and "the system", but at some point we also have to point the finger at ourselves too.