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30 April, 2006

CONSERVATIVE AUSTRALIAN LEFTISTS

Three news items:

Prominent Leftist wants tax cuts

There is a lot more economic rationality in the Australian Left than there is in most Leftist parties



Paul Keating has delivered a scathing assessment of the party he led for four years, saying he doubts Labor can ever recover the reformist zeal it once displayed and criticising its failure to offer a reduction in the top tax rate. The former Labor prime minister has revealed he urged Mark Latham to reduce the top income tax rate from 47 per cent to 39per cent as part of his 2004 election platform, saying it "would drive (John) Howard mad". But Mr Latham ignored the advice. In a rare concession to his opponents, Mr Keating says "the Liberals have actually showed more promise in understanding the need to open (the economy) up than the Labor Party does".

But Mr Keating, who as treasurer delivered the last cut in the top income tax rate in the 1980s when he reduced it from 60 to 47per cent, says both Labor and the Coalition lack the "conscientiousness and urgency" to pursue economic reform. Mr Keating's frank comments were given in an extensive interview with The Weekend Australian journalist George Megalogenis and appear in his book, The Longest Decade, to be published on Monday. Mr Keating describes the party he led as "a pretty modest beast" for most of its history. Although he says he supports current leader Kim Beazley, his remarks will be seen as an attack on his approach at a time when he is vulnerable over low approval ratings in the opinion polls.

Mr Keating says that, since he lost office in 1996, Labor "has gone back to the old anvil". "It's walked away from financial innovation, from the opening up of the economy and the whole meritocracy model of widening its own appeal to single traders, to sole operators of business, small business. "And you may say, 'Well, will we see the likes of the 83-to-96 government again?' Well, maybe, maybe not. Institutionally, you could have no confidence that the Labor Party could now breed it. In fact, it probably never bred it; it was more good luck than good management."

Mr Keating says he rang Mr Latham just before the last election to wish him luck. Mr Latham responded that he expected a struggle but he was happy that he had highlighted during the campaign the need to "ease the squeeze" on families. Mr Keating says he responded: "Listen mate, you know what the squeeze on families is in Sydney, how they move up from a two-bedroom apartment to a terrace house, how they trade in their Commodore for an Audi, that's the squeeze on families." Mr Latham had responded: "You're joking."

Mr Keating says economic conditions have been kind to Peter Costello and John Howard. "It's been too easy," he says. "Let's make this point, this treasurer and this prime minister have never had a quarterly set of national accounts which would have been a disappointment to them. They didn't have to find, or fathom, a way to reduce inflation (like I did)."

The Longest Decade also includes an interview with Mr Howard, who says the previously Labor-voting blue-collar workers who had become self-employed as a result of economic deregulation were "a natural fit for me". "A lot of those people are socially conservative. They don't like all this trendy stuff (such as a republic and Aboriginal reconciliation)," he says....

The book reveals that, despite being antagonists throughout their careers, Mr Howard and Mr Keating share some common views, including on economic reform, their distaste for former Malaysian prime minister Mahathir Mohamad and the republic.

More here



Families: More Left/Right consensus

To a degree

Labor leader Kim Beazley has defended John Howard's tax benefit for stay-at-home mothers, arguing it does not discourage women from working. In the latest in a series of steps to de-Lathamise the Labor Party's policies, Mr Beazley has told The Weekend Australian that lack of childcare was keeping women out of work, rather than government payouts keeping them at home.

"I don't actually think that, while Family Tax Benefit (Part) B is meant to attract women away from the workforce ... compared to the other disincentives it's significant," he said. "If you're going to provide for the next generation you do have to focus on families. There has to be a bias in the system towards families. "The biggest disincentive to women working is access to childcare; that's the biggest problem. The second-biggest problem is reward."

Mr Beazley attacked the Government for allowing millionaire families to get money under the benefit, and called for a $250,000 income limit. "Family tax B ought to have at least the means test applied to it," he said.

Mr Howard accused Labor this month of wanting to take benefits off mothers, in an aggressive speech naming families as the chief tax battleground. The Prime Minister said the ALP in government would dismantle the $13 billion Family Tax Benefit in favour of tax cuts for individuals and said the "people who will suffer most will be Australian women".

Mr Beazley told The Weekend Australian that he did not think the family payments system should be further expanded. "The more effective way of dealing with it may be through reductions in taxation as opposed to increases in family payments," he said.

More here



State Labor leader backs migrant crackdown

More recognition that it is Australian conservatives who now speak for working-class voters

Premier Peter Beattie has backed a Commonwealth proposal for prospective migrants to understand basic English and Australian values before they are allowed into Australia. Mr Beattie said migrants had made a "great contribution" to Australia and the proposal was reasonable to ensure people with the same democratic values entered the country. "I don't think it's unreasonable to expect certain standards . . . I don't think it's unreasonable to ensure that migrants that come here have an ability to understand English . . . Why wouldn't we expect people to be committed to the democratic values that we subscribe."

Federal MP Andrew Robb, parliamentary secretary to Immigration Minister Amanda Vanstone, has said he would consider the introduction of a compulsory citizenship test. Prospective immigrants may have to pass an English test as well as learn Australian values, customs, laws and history. Mr Robb said English-speaking migrants were more likely to find work and this helped them to integrate better into the community and possibly combat problems like terrorism.

Source



Health fund reforms will benefit all Australians

An editorial from "The Australian" newspaper

When it comes to paying for their healthcare, Australians enjoy a system that for the most part strikes a sensible balance between the laissez-faire market of the US, that leaves millions unprotected, and the dangerously bureaucratic and inefficient socialised medicine schemes of nations such as Canada and Britain. But this does not mean there is not room for improvement. When Medibank, which later became Medicare, was first introduced in 1975, it was a breakthrough that provided universal healthcare and cost containment. But its creaky big-government model became as out of date as national wage cases, and led to long queues and rationing, and Australians have since sought - and received - far more choice in their healthcare.

After the policy changes of the late-1990s designed to increase the take-up of private health funds, enrolment numbers are once again flagging with 43 per cent - just under nine million people - of the nation covered by private medical coverage. Sensible reforms, such as those proposed this week by the Howard Government, can help reverse this trend. Scheduling out-patient treatments and preventative as well as lifestyle measures such as gym memberships once considered "extras" under basic hospital cover should reduce hospital admissions while saving money and lives. Diabetes claims 3300 Australian lives a year and costs $1.2 billion a year. Obesity is thought to cost the nation another $1.2 billion. And smoking kills 19,000 Australians a year through various preventable diseases, at a cost of some $21 billion. To save even 10 per cent of these costs and lives would be a boon for the health system and the country.

Other reforms are similarly encouraging. Dropping lifetime health cover penalties for fund members who retain their coverage for more than a decade removes another disincentive to signing up. And greater transparency about out-of-pocket costs is also a big win for consumers. Some 43 per cent of health fund members who stay in a private hospital wind up with a bill averaging $720, often not realising they will be slugged with extra charges. In addition to all this, the Government is also set to put Medibank Private up for sale. This is a sensible move for a host of reasons, not the least of which is that it removes the conflict of interest inherent with having a health insurance policy-maker owning a private insurance company.

With these reforms completed, the next step will be clear - namely, the Government should stop meddling in the rates set by private health funds. The industry is already competitive and price-sensitive, and at least one health fund's current advertising campaign uses its history of modest premium increases as its primary selling point. And given that health fund membership is reasonably elastic, it is in the health funds' interests to stay competitive with one another lest members get fed up with the cost and hop back into the public pool. There is no reason to require private health funds to continue to get approval for their premiums from Canberra.

Source



Catholics prepare for fight on homosexual adoption

A law banning gay and lesbian couples from adopting children will be reviewed by an inquiry into NSW adoption legislation. The Minister for Community Services, Reba Meagher, said individual homosexuals could adopt under current laws but the review would consider proposals to remove a ban on same-sex couples. In the past five years similar bans have been overturned in Western Australia, Tasmania and the ACT. "This is an area of government policy that generates emotion on both sides of the debate," she said. "The review process is a fair way to canvass those views and look at the issue in a systematic way." Ms Meagher said she did not want to pre-empt the review's findings by expressing her opinion on same-sex adoptions.

The Catholic Church is likely to staunchly resist any attempt to endorse gay adoption. The Catholic Archbishop of Sydney, Cardinal George Pell, told the Herald this week that children had a right to a "mother and father". Dr Pell said the church would present the review with "sociological findings" on children who grew up in marriages, de facto heterosexual relationships and same-sex partnerships. He said there was "significant evidence about the benefits of marriage" over same-sex partnerships. Dr Pell said he could "never anticipate" the church's welfare and adoption agency, Centacare, working to place children with same-sex couples.

The Prime Minister, John Howard, also opposes adoptions by same-sex couples. The NSW Government overhauled adoption laws in 2000 but rejected a recommendation by the NSW Law Reform Commission to extend adoption rights to gay couples. The resulting Adoption Act 2000 requires the minister to report to Parliament within six years on whether the law fulfils its aim of serving the best interests of children. The Department of Community Services is conducting the review and will report to Ms Meagher by November. "We want to place as many vulnerable children as possible into homes that are loving and stable," Ms Meagher said. "That is why our policy does not preclude unmarried people in same-sex relationships from adopting if they are able to care for a child and provide a safe, secure and loving environment."

The NSW Gay and Lesbian Rights Lobby is preparing a submission to the inquiry, saying current laws cause uncertainty for families with same-sex parents and prevent homosexual step-parents from making legal decisions about their children's medical condition or inheritance. "The act needs to be modernised and reflect the fact that gays and lesbians are parents and there is no difference between our families and other families in society," said a spokesman, David Scamell.

Source



29 April, 2006

CITIZENSHIP TEST FOR IMMIGRANTS

Comment from the Federal government:

The federal government will consider calls to introduce compulsory citizenship and English tests for prospective immigrants, Attorney-General Philip Ruddock says. Andrew Robb, the parliamentary secretary to Immigration Minister Amanda Vanstone, has flagged the introduction of compulsory tests, which would include quizzes on Australian values, customs, laws and history.

Mr Ruddock said it was important that migrants understood their obligations in Australia. He said when he was immigration minister he introduced an adult migrant English language program that included discussions about citizenship and legal issues. "The process that Andrew is foreshadowing may require some additional commitment of funds, of resources and they're matters that the government will look at," Mr Ruddock told reporters. "He's put the matter on the agenda for us to look at. "But the purpose is a right and proper purpose, given what we understand by what it is to be an Australian and, I think, a broadly universal acceptance that if you settle in Australia you've got a responsibility to respect our constitution, the institutions, our courts, the parliament, the rule of law and what it means."

Source



Greens (really far-Leftists) don't like it

Note the silence from the Labor Party. They cannot afford to lose any more working-class votes

A plan to check English fluency and Australian values as part of a citizenship test for prospective immigrants has been blasted by politicians and ethnic groups. Greens senator Kerry Nettle led the attack today, saying not all native Australians were fluent in English, and not all ministers epitomised Australian values. Ethnic and religious groups were also concerned the tests would unfairly discriminate against some would-be immigrants.

Andrew Robb, the parliamentary secretary to Immigration Minister Amanda Vanstone, last night said he would consider the introduction of a compulsory citizenship test for prospective immigrants. The test would be on the English language and Australia's values, customs, laws and history, he said.

But Senator Nettle said: "A fluent grasp of English is not a prerequisite of being Australian. "Has Mr Robb forgotten that many Indigenous Australians do not speak fluent English? Is he suggesting that they are less Australian? "The truth is that there are no values which are peculiarly Australian, and there are plenty of Australians, some of them ministers, who fail to live up to the universal values of honesty, fairness, and respect which might be part of the test Mr Robb is talking about." She said if Mr Robb really wanted to help immigrants learn English he would be proposing language assistance. "Tests are about exclusion [Sure are!] not inclusion. If Mr Robb were genuine about wanting to help new migrants with their English he would be proposing language assistance not compulsory exams."...

The Australian Democrats said if the Government was serious about the citizenship test it should make everyone take it, not just migrants. "If Andrew Robb is serious about a compulsory citizenship test on Australian history, customs and values, he should have the courage to require all Australians to take the test," Senator Andrew Bartlett said. He said Prime Minister John Howard already had raised concerns about the standard of teaching of history and values in Australian schools. "There are already English requirements before people can take out Australian citizenship and the prime minister himself has acknowledged how poor the teaching of history and values of our country in Australian schools," he said. "Clearly many existing Australians have little understanding of the history and heritage in this country."

Federation of Ethnic Communities' Councils of Australia chair Voula Messimeri said citizenship should not be a matter of passing or failing a test. "Australia has a very long and very proud tradition of accepting people from all around the world and that, by necessity, means that there will be people that arrive, and arrive to the door now, that speak no English now," she said on ABC radio. In particular, many coming from Africa would be unable speak English, she said....

Dr Ameer Ali, president of the Australian Federation of Islamic Councils, said he too had concerns. "We have a peculiar democracy, a peculiar sense of equality, every body is like every body else. So that is the value that is appreciated, that is commendable, this typical unique Australia," he said.

More here



GREENIE VERSUS GREENIE

Feds going cold on windfarms (Hooray!)

Environment Minister Ian Campbell's campaign against unpopular wind farms will include a national code giving him new powers to veto any project facing community opposition. As Senator Campbell used the death of an endangered wedge-tail eagle to support claims that wind farms threatened birds, he vowed to defy threats of a constitutional challenge from Labor states to forge ahead with plans for the code. It would give him new powers to block any wind farm based on community opposition, not just on environmental grounds. Senator Campbell said he was close to securing a national agreement with the states, with the exception of Victoria and Western Australia. If he could not win their backing, he warned last night he would unilaterally extend federal powers as a "last resort". Senator Campbell last month infuriated the Victorian Government by stopping the Bald Hills wind farm project in Gippsland to "save" the endangered orange-bellied parrot. This week, he froze funding for a similar wind farm project on the south coast of Western Australia, which won state government approval but faced opposition from members of the local community. His hardline position came as it emerged yesterday that the rare wedge-tail eagle died after colliding with wind turbines at the Woolnorth Wind Farm in Tasmania's northwest in wind gusts of 140km/h. According to a report, it appears the eagle's wings were severed and the bird was decapitated by the turbines. Senator Campbell said the death sent a message to "those who sneer about me making a decision based on killing birds". "Wind farms kill birds very regularly," he said. "I think all those who snigger about environment ministers trying to protect threatened species - hopefully, this will be a bit of a wake-up call."

More here



Some Greenies applaud Feds on windfarms

For a good part of his life, licensed surveyor Peter Mortimer has plied the waves of the pristine beaches around the idyllic West Australian town of Denmark. "It's one of those special places where you are isolated from anything man-made. It's a totally natural environment," he said. Mr Mortimer surfs one beach in the summer when the wind dies down and another, more sheltered, beach in winter when the fierce gusts blast their way over the southern Indian Ocean. Between the two beaches lies a local landmark, Wilson's Head, and it is there that a group of Denmark locals want to plant two or three turbines to harness the same strong winds. Mr Mortimer does not like the idea of having such machines, with their huge blades spinning away, overlooking him as he's trying to catch a wave. In Denmark, population 5000, it's the battle of who's greenest. Mr Mortimer say he is not against wind farms per se, he just thinks it is idiotic to put such an eyesore in one of the few spots on the state's southeast coast that has not been developed. He says that principle applies not just for locals, but for Perth types who go to Denmark to "wash away the pressures of the built environment". Mr Mortimer is outraged that the state Government overrode the views of the local council and rezoned Wilson's Head to accommodate the proposed wind farm. He is delighted that federal Environment Minister Ian Campbell has said he will block any further federal funding of the project, which received $240,000 for a feasibility study.

More here



IN BRIEF

Africans firebombed in Queensland regional city



Molotov cocktails were thrown at the home of a Sudanese refugee widow and her seven children in Toowoomba early yesterday morning, heightening racial tensions in the city. Khamisa Abui and her children, aged 3 to 16, were sleeping at their rented house in Dalmeny St when they heard thumping on the front door. A neighbour across the road saw the flames just after midnight. "The flames were a metre high on the steps and the front porch and the door mat was alight at the front door," he said. The neighbour, who declined to be named, phoned the fire brigade and ran across the road and banged on the door to wake the family because he knew the children would be asleep. "I pulled the burning mat away from the door and looked for a hose but I couldn't find one in the dark," he said. "You could smell the petrol fumes, and there were soft drink bottles lying on the steps." Once roused, Mrs Abui brought water and the two put out the remains of the crude fire bombs before the fire brigade arrived. The neighbour said the arson attack on a family who had come from a war zone was malicious racism. "There were two adults and seven kids in there - it could have been a disaster," he said. "Those people are coming from war-torn lands. I just put it down to a brain-dead hillbilly mentality." Speaking through an interpreter, Mrs Abui said she and her children had been frightened by the attack and she was mystified as to why her family had been targeted. "I have no enemies with white people. I have no idea why they don't like us here. I came here because Australia is a safe place to be," she said. Mrs Abui was widowed when her husband was killed in Sudan, and she fled with her children to Egypt where she applied to come to Australia.

Source



Govt mulls whistleblower immunity: "Whistleblowers who dob in cartel operators could soon be given immunity from prosecution, Attorney-General Philip Ruddock says. The Australian Competition and Consumer Commission (ACCC) and the Commonwealth Director of Public Prosecutions (DPP) will join forces to decide if a whistleblower should be given immunity under new plans announced by Mr Ruddock today. He said quite often people wanting to blow the whistle on companies which profit from colluding on the prices they charge were usually only willing to come forward if they could be granted immunity from prosecution. "To facilitate this the ACCC and the DPP are developing joint arrangements for consideration of requests for immunity," Mr Ruddock told a conference for anti-trust lawyers today. "Currently the discretion to provide immunity lies with the director of public prosecutions and is to be exercised under guidance provided by Commonwealth prosecution policy. "International experience suggests that offering immunity in the early stages of an investigation is most effective.



Male contraception trial proves successful: "A Sydney scientist working on male contraceptives has found further evidence a hormone based treatment can switch on and switch off sperm production. Doctor Peter Lui conducted a trial of the treatment three years ago in Sydney and has now collated the results of trials from the United Kingdom, United States, China, Indonesia and Melbourne. He has found a 100 per cent success rate with the injections and pills of male hormones, which prevent sperm production. Doctor Lui says all the studies showed male sperm production returned to normal three to four months after the treatment. "The main thing that we worry about long term is the reversibility - so that's no longer an issue," he said. "In terms of acute side effects, there are very few regardless of the formulations. "Now what is unanswered are the long term side effects." Doctor Lui says he hopes the contraceptive will be on the market in five to 10 years."



28 April, 2006

OBESITY STUPIDITY

Two reports:

Experts stunned by tubby tots

Children as young as four are battling obesity, research shows. And children appear to be losing the fat fight as they get older. A Royal Children's Hospital study found almost one in five kindergarten kids (19.5 per cent) are overweight or obese. And just a year later 21.1 per cent were battling the bulge. Dr Joanne Williams, of the hospital's Centre for Community Child Health, said young overweight children were likely to still have weight problems as adults. "We're just watching the rates go up and up and up, and nothing's being done about it," Dr Williams said. "These kids get teased at school, their self-esteem is low, they have a poor quality of life and there are huge consequences later on in life."

Researchers measured the waistline, height and weight of 340 children aged four to six for the study, which has been submitted to the International Journal of Obesity. Dr Williams said advertising led parents to falsely believe they were feeding kids healthy foods when their diet was packed with sugar and fat.

Health Minister Tony Abbott has refused to crack down on junk food ads during children's television hours. He said parents, not the Government, should be responsible for what their children ate. But Deakin University nutrition lecturer Dr Tim Crowe said junk food TV advertising should be outlawed from 4pm-6pm to remove some temptation from households. "We have to acknowledge we are dealing with a health problem so serious that a group of children are not going to outlive their parents," he said.

Many parents did not seem to recognise when children were overweight. "We are not sure of the reasons why. Perhaps it is because they look at other kids and think their own are not fat," he said. [It's because the mothers themselves are fat!]

More here.

OF COURSE kids are getting fatter on average. It is predominantly overweight working class women who are giving birth these days. Huge numbers of slim bourgeois women now consider themselves too grand to have kids. And obesity is highly hereditary. So the increasing prevalence of fat kids is exactly what you expect now that fat women are the main ones having kids. Going on about the evils of junk food or the wickedness of advertisers is flailing at the air.



Schools to put cap back on soft drinks

Water and milk will be the only drinks allowed in some Victorian schools. The primary schools plan to scrap sugary soft drinks this year. Children will be urged to bring water bottles to class in the government-backed trial. Parents will be encouraged to pack only water and milk with lunches. Program co-ordinator and child health researcher Dr Lisa Gibbs said regular water drink breaks would improve students' attention span. Promoting water and milk was also good for teeth, Dr Gibbs said. Six government and private schools in the western and northwestern suburbs will be selected for the trial under the Go For Your Life campaign. The project could spread if successful.

"The idea in the first stage will be that if a student brings a drink into the classroom it can only be water," Dr Gibbs said. "If you have brought a soft drink, it will have to be kept in your bag during class times and only drunk at lunch time. "The eventual aim would be that you would only be allowed to bring water or milk to school." The plan coincides with a ban on sales of high-sugar soft drinks from canteens and vending machines in government primary and secondary schools by year's end.

More here

And what good is that going to do? Milk is extremely calorific and hence fattening. The kids would probably get fewer calories out of drinking fizzy drinks



More dangerous public medicine bungling

Melbourne's busiest trauma hospital is rebuilding its intensive care unit to eradicate a potentially dangerous fungus that has troubled it for four years. Just six years after it was opened, the State Government is spending $20 million upgrading The Alfred's intensive care unit, which the hospital expects to be completed in 2008. The Government initially announced the upgrade in October last year but failed to mention the aspergillus problem of 2002, instead alluding to "a range of challenges", citing emerging infectious diseases.

The airborne aspergillus fungus is no threat to healthy people. But it has the potential to harm people with vulnerable immune systems after a bone marrow, heart or lung transplant. In 2002, the hospital's intensive care unit had levels of aspergillus two to three times higher than acceptable. The hospital said levels were now "acceptable", and no patient was at risk.

The Alfred responded at the time by creating a separate intensive care unit with six beds for patients who had had transplants. Other patients are not believed to be at risk. The Alfred monitors levels of aspergillus each month and has changed the airflow management to increase the pressure within the unit and reduce the entry of outside air which may contain aspergillus.

But now the hospital wants to operate a single intensive care unit, bringing patients in from the secondary unit. The hospital's chief executive, Jennifer Williams, said a series of reviews had recommended that the safest solution was to rebuild it. "We very much want to get back to the situation we were in in 2002, where we had one intensive care unit," she said. "We don't want to put at risk those particularly sick patients in case the levels were to go up again, but they haven't gone up again. There have been no aspergillus infections since 2002 and we want this to continue."

Canberra Hospital director of infectious diseases, Peter Collignon, said aspergillus affected people when they breathed it in. It can often then form a lung infection and sometimes via the blood go to other parts of the body, but that only occurs in people who are very immuno-suppressed," he said. He said most major hospitals that cared for people with damaged immune systems would have infections caused by aspergillus, but it was difficult to know whether they picked it up in hospital or elsewhere.

Ms Williams said the unit would be built on the same site as the existing one. Planning is under way and the hospital will relocate patients when construction begins. She said it would be designed to minimise the chances of aspergillus entering the unit. "It's a matter of ensuring that the roof and the perimeter walls are completely sealed and the air-conditioning system is replaced with increased levels of air filtration capability," she said. The redesign will also boost the hospital's capacity to treat more patients, with more beds and facilities to deal with infection control, and new technology.

The Alfred acknowledged the elevated levels of aspergillus in 2002 when a patient with a compromised immune system died of aspergillus pneumonia. But it cannot be determined whether the patient contracted it in hospital or in the community. The fungus was also found in 41 other patients, but they were not infected with it. There have been no deaths or infections since.

Ben Hart, spokesman for Health Minister Bronwyn Pike, said The Alfred had tried a number of measures to solve the aspergillus problem, including building works to the air-conditioning and the roof. "But following that, it became apparent after a number of years that those measures weren't solving the problem and so therefore expert consultants were brought in to provide advice on what was the best course of action and The Alfred formed a view that the best course of action was a total rebuild," he said.

Source



Paternity fraud under legal test

Comment by Janet Albrechtsen:

Some issues are so fraught with emotion and hurt, they don't bear thinking about. It's tempting to put paternity fraud in that basket. But science is putting pressure on the law to confront this vexed issue. When a woman dupes a man into believing he is the father of a child she conceived with another man, increasingly, DNA tests end up delivering the shattering news. A father loses a child he thought was his, one he raised, loved and cared for as his own. A child loses a father and a family collapses. When that happens, what is the law to do?

The High Court is confronting that issue right now. Liam and Meredith Magill were married in April 1988. A son was born in April 1989. Unknown to her husband, a few months later Meredith began an affair with a man, having unprotected sex until early 1995. In July 1990 a second son was born. Then, the next year, a daughter. After separating, Meredith admitted to Liam her concerns over paternity. A few years later she agreed to DNA tests. Liam learned that the two younger children were not his.

He was left devastated, suffered chronic depression and was unable to work. He sued Meredith for the tort of deceit, claiming financial compensation for his pain and suffering, but not for money spent on the upbringing and maintenance of the children.

While the Victorian County Court found that Meredith had deceived Liam when she nominated him as the father on birth registration notices, that was overturned last year by the Victorian Court of Appeal. The High Court will now decide whether the tort of deceit will hold Meredith accountable for her actions.

There are few hints as to which way the High Court will go. But few will be surprised to hear that at the hearing a few weeks back, Justice Michael Kirby pointed to international law as the guiding light. He cited Article 3 of the Convention on the Rights of the Child and said it means that the starting point in any matter that comes before the court must be determining what is in the best interests of the child.

Up in the rarefied atmosphere of international law, it's a neat sounding slogan. But down in the trenches, trying to apply it to the specifics of a case like this is another matter. Kirby suggests that the "best interests of the child" test applies for the simple reason that this case involves the depletion of family income: were Liam Magill to win, Meredith Magill would be forced to pay. It's a novel argument. Taken to its logical conclusion, it would prevent any legal action against any person who also happens to be a parent. After all, any legal payout drains the family income to the detriment of a child.

Note that Kirby's focus on the best interests of the child did not extend to a child knowing their biological father. Given that adoption laws are now premised on this rationale, one might think it should also apply here.

In any event, the High Court will need to probe a little deeper than the fine sounding but vacuous provisions of international law. And the question is simple: should the law of deceit apply where a mother and wife has deceived a husband into believing he is the father of a child? The court need not mess with the law of deceit. The principles are clear. Only the facts are new because science - DNA testing - is now revealing the deceit.

Those who claim there is a public policy argument in letting sleeping dogs lie assume that preventing litigation of this kind will make for happy families. It will do no such thing. It will only encourage women to perpetrate fraud in an age when science can uncover the truth. And there is no turning science back. Legal disputes over paternity fraud do not create the unhappiness. They are merely the aftermath of mothers deceiving men.

As in every other sphere of life, the only way to encourage responsibility is to make people accountable for their actions. The law has an important role in sending powerful messages capable of shaping behaviour in the future. Far from creating more unhappiness, legal sanctions for paternity fraud will, in the long run, encourage mothers to be honest about paternity.

That is why, if the High Court decides that the laws of deceit do not apply, in effect allowing women to engage in paternity fraud at will, parliament will need to step in. As the Australian Medical Association has said, this is a time bomb ready to explode; the AMA suggests that in Australia there are 200,000 families where the "presumptive father is not the biological father".

Unfortunately some feminists refuse to acknowledge the reality of paternity fraud. Following the Victorian Court of Appeal's decision against Liam Magill, the former Victorian convener of the Women's Electoral Lobby, Lisa Solomon, announced: "Women are moral, reasonable, rational beings. It would be a very rare instance where a woman would name someone who wasn't the father of the child."

For Solomon, it was about vindictive men using DNA tests to avoid paying for children. Get the picture? Women, good. Men, bad. Phew. Nothing like a little sex stereotyping when it suits. Leave aside the rank hypocrisy of feminists resorting to the kind of sweeping generalisations that would send them ballistic if made in the reverse. The real problem is that gender-blinkered statements get us nowhere in sorting out what to do when paternity fraud happens.

If a mother gives birth to a child and is negligently given the wrong baby in hospital, no one would question her right to claim damages. Deliberate paternity fraud should be no different. It's not a person's sex that matters. It's the damage caused by another that counts.

One suggestion is that paternity testing be made mandatory whenever a birth is registered. A correspondent from University College in London emailed during the week with the following idea: "As long as BDM [Births, Deaths and Marriages] registries are kept, they might as well be kept accurately. I would give about 10 months' notice before the new regulation or legislation takes effect. That's enough time for people to adjust their behaviour (or improve their contraceptive methods). With complete transparency and accountability, responsible adults will be better empowered." It's an interesting idea. Short of that happening, paternity fraud is here to stay. And so the question is whether we condone it or condemn it. If the High Court or parliament shies away from the issue, that will amount to society, in effect, condoning fatherhood founded on fraud. And that has to be the worst of two difficult options.

Source



IN BRIEF

More from Australian fashion week:



More than you ever wanted to know about it here



Dog nabs cop!

A detective accused of stealing bags of drugs from a house he was investigating was nabbed running from the scene by a police dog, a court heard yesterday. Sen-Det David Miechel, 36, allegedly robbed an Oakleigh drug house with informer Terrence Hodson on Grand Final day 2003. The Supreme Court heard a neighbour of the Dublin St house called police after seeing men dressed in dark clothing approach the front door and smash the porch light. The pair are accused of packing bags of drugs, mainly ecstasy and throwing them over the back fence to be collected later.

Prosecutor Chris Ryan told the jury a video surveillance system allegedly caught the pair entering and leaving the house. Sen-Det Miechel has pleaded not guilty to eight charges, including trafficking a large commercial quantity of drugs, burglary and assaulting police. Mr Ryan said neighbours noticed Sen-Det Miechel and Hodson walking towards a nearby school after the burglary. Police arrived soon after and set two dogs out to track them. The court heard one of the dog handlers saw Sen-Det Miechel running from the school and gave chase. Sen-Det Miechel allegedly scaled fences trying to evade the dog and assaulted Sen-Constable Harold Boniwell when he was caught.

More here



27 April, 2006

A very dubious ID card plan announced

Australia is going to have a "Clayton's" ID card -- the ID card you have when you are not having an ID card



Prime Minister John Howard has announced the Federal Government would not proceed with a national identity card. But the Government would go ahead with an access card - generally referred to as a smart card - for health and welfare services, Mr Howard said. "The savings will be significant in relation to fraud." The new card would cost about $1 billion to introduce, Mr Howard said. Mr Howard said the card would eventually save up to $3bn a year.

But there would be a cost with its introduction. "I'd be surprised if you had any change out of $1 billion over a period of four years for its introduction," he said. Mr Howard said the new card will have enhanced security features, such as a biometric photograph on the front - but it will not contain fingerprints. "It will be necessary for everybody who needs a card to apply for one," he said. "It will not be compulsory to have the card."

Mr Howard said the Government had sought to strike the balance between ease of access, enhanced identity security and personal privacy. "There is no model around the world that immediately hits us in the face as being the perfect answer to this, and we have looked around the world," he said. "After a very good discussion I think we have struck a very good balance."

Attorney-General Philip Ruddock said cabinet had conducted a full and complete discussion of the proposal. "These are not simple issues. They require developing a balanced approach, which weighs up all of the issues," he said. "In terms of the advice that was given to us, the appropriate balance is that which we have struck." Mr Ruddock said there was a national identity fraud strategy and today's announcement reflected ongoing work on better ensuring people's identities remained secure. "It will give our agencies who need to be able to make appropriate inquiries, within the framework in which data sharing is possible, a proper capacity and an enhanced capacity to be able to do their work," he said.

Source



School assessment goes full circle in Queensland

Back to the old ways

The report cards of almost all Queensland students will use an A to E grading system from the end of this year. An overhaul of the school reporting system will give parents of all students in Years 1 to 10 twice-yearly assessments in plain English and access to two parent/teacher interviews a year. Education Minister Rod Welford said the changes meant that all students from Years 1 to 10, but not Prep, would be graded from A to E in each subject, with clear explanations of what each grade meant. Year 11 and 12 students are already assessed on a five-tier rating system (Very High Achievement ranging to Very Low Achievement) as part of the Overall Position (OP) process. The measures will apply to state, Catholic and independent schools and take effect at the end of this year in many schools and in all by the start of 2008.

"We want clarity and consistency so parents can understand their child's progress," Mr Welford said. "The reports will be more understandable." The Minister said reports had become too confusing with wide variations in styles. Some schools grade students by numbers such as 1 to 7 or 1 to 5, others use measures such as VHA (very high achievement) or SA (satisfactory achievement), while others use codes such as AV (achieving well) or ED (experiencing difficulties). Some schools assess students according to three different grades, others four and some five. And while some schools offer two parent/teacher interviews a year, many offer only one.

Queensland Council of Parents and Citizens Association spokeswoman Wanda Lambert said it was vital that gradings were consistent between schools. "We need to feel confident that . . . an A in Cape York is worth the same as an A for someone of the same age in Burpengary," she said. Queensland Teachers Union President Steve Ryan said teachers had no problem using the A to E grading system in most year levels. But he said the union did have problems with its use in early primary years. "We believe it could be categorising children very early," Mr Ryan said.

Source



New dams at last

It looks like the water shortage in Queensland has finally trumped the dam-hating Greenies. NSW take note



The $1 billion the Queensland government expects to earn from the sale of its power retailers will be used to build two new dams and set up a special infrastructure fund. Premier Peter Beattie said today his government would sell the retail arms of its power suppliers Energex and Ergon Energy, in a trade sale expected to earn more than $1 billion. The sale will take place in several tranches before the end of the year, ensuring the state market is ready for full retail contestability from July 1 next year.

Deputy Premier and Treasurer Anna Bligh said the sale would not influence the government's Budget, which was in good shape and expected to deliver a "very healthy surplus" when brought down on June 6. Instead, the expected $1 billion windfall would be ploughed into a Queensland Future Growth Fund, to be managed by Treasury, with legislation ensuring proceeds are spent solely on infrastructure needs. The fund's first projects include financing two new dams, located along the Mary and Logan rivers in south-east Queensland, to be built by 2011.

The Mary River dam, north of Brisbane, will service Gympie and the Sunshine Coast - it will rival the size of Brisbane's Wivenhoe Dam. A second dam would also be built along the upper reaches of the Logan River, either at the already-proposed Wyaralong Dam site or at Tilleys Bridge, near Rathdowney, providing water to western areas including Ipswich, Springfield and Beenleigh. Two new weirs will also be built in central Queensland and $300 million invested in clean coal technology.

Opposition leader Lawrence Springborg said while he approved of the decision in principle, the government's move was a "fire sale" to cover up black holes in its next budget

Source



Australian fashion week kicked off yesterday

And, for once, some of the fashions don't look too bad



Paris, Milan, New York ... and now, Sydney. Organisers of Sydney's Mercedes Australian Fashion Week (MAFW) say the annual event has surpassed London's rival fashion festival. "We have eclipsed London in terms of size, participation and attendance," MAFW founder Simon Lock said. "So on the ladder of fashion weeks, we could probably put ourselves at number four at the moment." MAFW, Australia's single largest fashion event, was founded in 1996 to bring local designers to world attention and is credited with launching labels such as Collette Dinnigan and Sass and Bide overseas.

Slideshow here. More here



Boob job quarrel



Women aged under 20 should not be allowed to have breast implants, health experts claim. With more young women opting for cosmetic surgery, they say 18, the age at which doctors can approve requests for implants, is too young. This is also the message from a national cosmetic surgery conference being held in Adelaide today, where women in their 20s can have half-priced breast implants. Patients will get the usual $8000-$12,000 price tag halved as their surgery is in front of an audience of medical professionals in workshops at the Norwood Day Surgery. Australian Medical Association state branch president Chris Cain has criticised a Big Brother housemate for getting breast implants at age 19 and flaunting them on national television. Sydney retail manager Krystal revealed on the Channel 10 reality show that she had had breast augmentation a few months ago.



Her mother and fellow housemate, postal worker Karen, 36, had the same surgery done at the same time.

More here



26 April, 2006

The one day of the year



Playing of the Last Post at dawn services in cities and country towns around the nation to mark Anzac Day will have special poignancy this morning. Just one Australian World War I veteran survives. John Campbell Ross, 107, a Victorian, enlisted in the army in February 1918 but did not serve overseas. Mr Ross was 18 when he joined up, and is now the last link with a war that saw nearly 62,000 killed and 137,000 wounded. But while the 421,802 Diggers who fought at Gallipoli, on the Western Front and in the Middle East have now all died, the place names where they saw bloody battle and fell in their tens of thousands remain very much alive for younger generations. Anzac Cove, Lone Pine, the Nek, the Somme, Bullecourt, Villers-Bretonneux, Pozieres, Ypres, Amiens and many more battlefields are ingrained in the national consciousness. The fact that Australian Diggers are on duty in Iraq, Afghanistan and the Solomons adds a sombre note to the marking of this year's Anzac Day. As Australians reflect today on the commitment and sacrifice involved in serving one's country, they will be thinking of the families of the nine Australian service people who died serving humanity in the Sea King helicopter crash in Indonesia in March last year, of Australian Protective Services officer Adam Dunning, 26, who was shot on patrol in Honiara in December 2004 and of Private Jake Kovco, 25, who died of a gunshot wound in Baghdad on Friday, the first Digger to fall in the Iraq conflict.

Concerns expressed recently about the tradition of observing Anzac Day fading with the passing of Australia's World War II veterans, who are now approaching their nineties, are unfounded. It is true that in the aftermath of the anti-war demonstrations over Australian involvement in the Vietnam War, interest in Anzac Day, mainly among among baby boomers, reached its nadir. On April 26, 1975, The Australian covered the marking of Anzac Day in a single story; in 1985, reports of anti-war protests were included in its coverage. Two decades later, however, disdain for Anzac Day among the young is a thing of the past. Thousands of young Australians flock to Anzac Cove on April 25 every year, while enthusiasm is increasing for revisiting other legendary battlefields such as France, Tobruk and the Kokoda Track, and for paying homage at sites such as Sandakan in North Borneo, where hundreds of Australian prisoners of war perished in death marches forced by the Japanese.

Record crowds line the streets for Anzac parades and increasing numbers of children are joining the thinning ranks of veterans, donning their grandfathers' service medals with pride. It is understandable that some Diggers are unsettled by the involvement of children, fearing their participation injects a carnival element into what is traditionally a solemn occasion for remembering fallen mates. These concerns must be taken seriously and handled sensitively. At the same time, Anzac Day has broadened in recent years into an occasion honouring not only the contribution of Australian servicemen and women overseas and on the home front in the world wars, but in a range of conflicts going back to the Sudan war of 1885. Few today would be aware that more than 16,000 Australians fought in the Boer War from 1899-1902, nearly as many as served in Korea in 1950-53. Even fewer would be aware of Australia's role in the 1962-66 confrontation, or Konfrontasi, between Malaysia and Indonesia over the future of Borneo. Australians have also served in conflicts in Korea, Malaya, Vietnam, Afghanistan and in both Gulf wars, and in peacekeeping missions such as the present assignment in Solomon Islands and the recently completed one to East Timor.

The tally of more than 100,000 Australians killed in the 1914-18 and 1939-45 wars dwarfs the 1,500 killed in action in less epic battles. But if the younger generation sees embodied in the 8,000 Diggers who fell at Gallipoli the core Australian ideals of equality, mateship, a fair go and refusing to be bound mindlessly by hierarchy and tradition, these characteristics equally flourished among Australians on other battlefields. Maintaining the Anzac Day tradition will require participation by veterans' descendants. It is up to the Returned Services League to negotiate their involvement in a way that does not turn the occasion into a lighthearted family outing.

The enthusiasm of Australia's young for commemorating the sacrifices of previous generations of Diggers has not translated into long queues at army recruitment offices. Last year, the defence force missed its recruitment goal by 1000. If current trends continue, the defence force will fall to 48,500 personnel by 2010. This presents a real challenge to planners looking to bulk up the already-stretched Australian military to 55,000 personnel. To stem the tide, military planners have discussed loosening entry standards, including fitness requirements and the barring of potential recruits who admit to having tried illegal drugs in the past. The ADF also appears poised to take greater advantage of the Australian Defence Force Cadets program after internal studies found the Cadets to be an under-utilised resource. The Howard Government is also poised to return to the old days of the Ready Reserve, which it scrapped 10 years ago. In a tacit admission that ditching the elite force was a mistake, next month's federal budget is expected to include funds for a 3000-member "High Readiness Reserve". Reservists in this group will receive higher pay and better training and will, in return, be expected to be able to deploy to trouble spots within 30 days.

April 25 is not just about commemorating a disastrously managed landing by raw Australian recruits on the coast of Turkey. And it is not about glorifying war. It is, rather, about reflecting on the spirit of Anzac that lives on and inspires Australians. Diggers and Turkish soldiers sharing rations between trenches in 1915 exemplified this humanity, which has engendered a close relationship between Australians and Turkish people. More than 86,000 Turks died at Gallipoli, yet Kemal Ataturk, the Turkish commander and founder of modern Turkey, pledged that the Australians who died at Anzac Cove would lie there in honour. It remains, quite simply, the one day of the year.

Source

Note: "The One Day of the Year" is the name of a play by Alan Seymour that was intended to deride Anzac Day. But the term has since been adopted as expressing the importance of Anzac day. Similarly, Donald Horne's book "The Lucky Country" was intended as derision of Australia but the term has now been adopted as a term expressing happiness with Australia and pride in its achievements.



Big crowd in Brisbane



(Note that the Union Jack is quartered in the Australian flag. Slideshow of the march here)



Thousands attended Brisbane's ANZAC Day service held at the Shrine of Remembrance. Former soldiers, and thousands of young and old alike, and hundreds of schoolchildren filled Anzac Square to overflowing before 4am. As the service approached, a party of ex-servicemen marched through the city to the Shrine of Remembrance. The service began at 4.28am, the time of the Gallipoli landing.

In Canberra, principal Air Force chaplain (Anglican) Royce Thompson used his address to more than 20,000 people in the pre-dawn darkness to draw on the Anzac legend. Reverend Thompson said the thousands of Australian men and women serving overseas were continuing the Anzac tradition by facing evil at every turn. "It is a time to be inspired by their sacrifice and courage, so that we might play our part in seeking to confront the evil in our world," he said.

In Sydney, Air Vice-Marshall John Quaife said that while today paid respect to the events of 1915, those who fought and died in subsequent conflicts would never be forgotten. A special thought should especially be given to those in service now, he said. "Today our thoughts should be with those young men and women in the Solomon Islands, in the Middle East, in Timor, in Iraq and Afghanistan," he told the service.

Source



Semi-urgent patients missing out in Victoria's hospitals

One in four patients waiting for surgery is not treated within the Government's benchmark times, according to the Australian Medical Association. AMA state vice-president Dr Doug Travis said doctors were tired of telling patients their surgery had been postponed or they would have to wait months for an operation because of a shortage of hospital beds and doctors. Dr Travis, a surgeon in the public hospital system, claimed analysis of the State Government's Your Hospitals report released last week showed the Government aimed to treat only 80 per cent of semi-urgent patients within 90 days compared with the national benchmark of treating 100 per cent within 90 days. But he said the Your Hospitals report showed only 73 per cent of patients were treated within 90 days. "Doctors list patients as semi-urgent because they need to have their surgery within 90 days, but the Government does not seem to care that more than one in five people can't access the surgery they need in the time frame they need," he said. Dr Travis said it seemed the Government had decided to lower the benchmark to make the figures look good instead of investing in more doctors, nurses and beds.

The AMA has asked the State Government to include an extra $100 million in Victoria's 2006-07 health budget to pay for 300 extra beds and help ease demand in emergency waiting rooms and minimise elective surgery cancellations. Opposition health spokeswoman Helen Shardey said the report's presentation was dishonest. "If you're going to have a performance indicator, that's what you need to report on," she said.

Source



Another stupid windfarm bites the dust

Federal Environment Minister Ian Campbell infuriated another state government yesterday by overriding plans to build a wind farm. Less than a month after he blocked a wind farm in Victoria to "save" the orange-bellied parrot, Senator Campbell froze funding yesterday for a similar project near Denmark on the south coast of Western Australia. The minister said he had written to Regional Services Minister Warren Truss asking him to refuse further requests for funding for the project. "Senator Campbell strongly opposes further funding for the Denmark Community Windfarm group until the expressed wishes of the local community are taken into account through the introduction of a national wind farm code," Senator Campbell's spokeswoman said.

Earlier this month, the minister set off a war between Canberra and Victoria when he invoked rarely used federal powers to block the $220 million Bald Hills wind farm in Gippsland on the grounds it could kill one rare orange-bellied parrot a year. The Victorian Government has demanded he reconsider.

Last night, West Australian Planning Minister Alannah MacTiernan described Senator Campbell's latest decision as tragic. "It is a joke that at a time when we have got some really hard issues to deal with, we've got an environment minister who has no interest in sustainability, that at a national level we are not only getting zero leadership, we're getting minus zero leadership," she said. "These are big issues. We need leadership at a national level and Campbell is as much a joke as (Denmark area MP) Wilson Tuckey is as an environment minister. Other than going around and doing a bit of bashing of the Japanese on whales, he hasn't shown any capacity to deal whatsoever with the big issues we are facing."

Ms MacTiernan has been accused of ignoring advice from a state government planning committee that voted three to two against the proposed wind farm. But she said a departmental report prepared on the project was "substandard and flawed". The report excluded information from Western Power recommending the wind farm site, and ignored advice from its own department that the farm was not visually obtrusive, she said. "This has got nothing to do with this report, because Campbell, well before he had ever seen this report, had been down there (at the proposed site) with Wilson Tuckey trying to stir the possum," she said. She said the project was formally opposed by only about 60 families, including many who did not live at Denmark.

Senator Campbell will also have the final say in the development of a new iron ore mine in northern Western Australia, which yesterday won state government approval despite the possible presence of a bird even rarer than the orange-bellied parrot - the night parrot. The West Australian Government gave its final environmental approval for Fortescue Metals Group's iron ore mine at Cloud Break in the Pilbara, part of a $1.8billion development stalled by sightings last year of three night parrots, which were once thought to have been extinct.

State Environment Minister Mark McGowan was critical yesterday of Senator Campbell's decision to block the Bald Hills wind farm on environmental grounds, saying it had been possible to approve the Pilbara mine by imposing strict conditions. "I would be surprised if Senator Campbell was to knock back this (iron ore mine). I'm positive he won't knock it back. His decision in Victoria was based on it being a marginal seat - it was not environmental," he said.

Source



25 April, 2006

ANZAC day today

Australia's only real national day more popular than ever

Nearly 90 years ago in London, a young Winston Churchill spoke presciently about how future generations of Australians would likely remember the original Anzacs. Churchill looked forward to a time 100 years in the future when the movements of "every battalion, of every company" would be elaborately unfolded and their descendants would seek to trace some connection with "the heroes who landed on the Gallipoli peninsula, or fought on the Somme, or in the great battles of France". Australians in the 21st century and beyond would look back on the earth-shaking World War I and preserve as "sacred memories" the names of the original Anzacs, Churchill predicted in 1918.

Nearly a century later, popular interest in the Anzac legend is at an all-time high. Thousands of young Australians will flock to Gallipoli's shores on Tuesday for the 91st anniversary of the 1915 landing. Anzac Day is now firmly entrenched as Australia's one true national day and the dawn service of April 25 has all the feeling of a civic religious ritual.

As official war historian Charles Bean correctly foretold long ago, the World War I Australian Imperial Force is not dead. "That famous army of generous men marches still down the long lane of its country's history, with band playing and rifles slung, with packs on shoulders, white dust on boots and bayonet scabbards and entrenching tools flapping on countless thighs -- as the French countryfolk and fellaheen of Egypt knew it," Bean wrote on the final page of his epic official history, published in 1941.

But with the 100th anniversary of the original Anzac Day just over the horizon in 2015, the centrepiece of the April 25 commemorations, the traditional Anzac Day march, faces new challenges. The last of the 330,000 men of the First AIF [Australian Imperial Force] who went overseas in 1914-18 have all gone. Now Australia's greatest fighting generation - the nearly one million veterans who served in World War II - is also rapidly fading away. According to the Department of Veterans Affairs, there are now about 467,000 defence veterans in Australia, including 161,000 World WarII servicemen and women and 49,500 Vietnam veterans. By 2015 that number will drop by about 40 per cent to an estimated 287,000. Of these, 35,000 will be survivors from World War II and 42,000 Vietnam veterans.

For the Returned and Services League - the organiser of the Anzac Day marches since its inception in the 1920s - the demographic shift promises to provide a new dimension to the ever-changing cultural phenomenon that April 25 has become. Much will depend on the future of the 170,000-strong RSL as it struggles to retain a strong and vibrant national membership. As the number of war veterans falls away, the RSL and individual commemoration committees across Australia confront a new, multifaceted debate about the future character of the march: who else should be permitted to take part and how flexible the rules should be? In Melbourne, the RSL wants to ensure the march remains protest and toddler-free and wants a ban on Diggers' photographs being carried by their descendants.

Since the '30s, the pessimists have been predicting the demise of the Anzac Day march as veteran numbers declined and public interest waxed and waned. The first marches were in 1916 on the anniversary of the Gallipoli landing. In London, 2000 Diggers marched to a rapturous reception and in Australian cities smaller numbers of servicemen took part. On Anzac Day in 1919, in London, 5000 Australian soldiers led by general John Monash marched past Australia House in the Strand, with the salute taken by the prince of Wales and the British commander, field marshal Douglas Haig.

In the '20s, the march became the principal focus of Anzac Day celebrations, with the dawn service generally attended only by veterans. In 1927, 28,000 veterans marched in Melbourne. Twenty years after the landing, the big city marches had become huge events. Their numbers grew steadily following the influx of World War II veterans. Since the '90s, the resurgence of interest in Anzac Day has drawn bigger crowds on to the streets of Sydney and Melbourne even as the ranks of veterans have thinned.

In recent decades, many Allied veterans from World War II and later conflicts - among them French, Dutch, Poles, Greeks, Russians and Vietnamese - have been included in Anzac Day marches. The ranks have also been augmented by school cadet units; other youth and community groups, such as guides and scouts; and, particularly in country towns, many descendants of veterans who served in both world wars and Korea and Vietnam.

The RSL's national president, Bill Crews, is unfazed by suggestions the Anzac Day march may one day be a historical memory. He points out Vietnam veterans will still be marching and will be joined by thousands of other ex-servicemen and women who have served in dozens of recent peace-keeping operations, including Iraq and Afghanistan. "There is still a large number of ex-servicemen and women who will be out there to maintain the commemoration of Anzac," he says. "Beyond 2015 it depends largely on the extent to which the defence force is committed to operations over the next 10 years and beyond. That, of course, is the only source of new veterans."

Crews notes the Anzac Day marches are now scattered with non-veterans but says the RSL remains cautious about opening the march to all comers such as family groups, noting that the main city marches still last several hours. Adrian Clunies-Ross, chairman of the Australian War Memorial and a retired general, says even if there aren't sufficient veterans, Anzac Day ceremonies will endure. There is now far more interest in Australia's military history in schools, he says. "The people who are very enthusiastic about it these days are the young. It's going to be a viable concern for a long time to come." Clunies-Ross also points to the soaring numbers attending dawn services as a good omen. In Canberra last year, about 25,000 people attended, a huge increase on a generation ago when a few hundred gathered.

As author George Johnston observed, the Anzac legend derives from something almost unique in the Australian psyche which "instinctively seems to transmit itself to Australian character". In words written nearly half a century ago, which still resonate today, Johnston concluded: "Anzac is the closest we have ever come to a national-religious feeling, to finding a symbol of the human, perhaps even of the particularly Australian spirit."

Source



Crooked Australian Leftist historians again

The history wars are still simmering at the controversial National Museum of Australia, with the recent $30,000 acquisition of a painting, Mistake Creek Massacre, being rejected by the collection committee of the museum's governing council at its last meeting. The painting, by the Aboriginal artist Queenie McKenzie, depicting a contested frontier event, was bought by the museum's collections division in November, but will not be included in the museum's National Historical Collection. Instead it will be relegated to deep storage along with Bill Leak's Holocaust cartoon, never to be seen again, at least under the present council and Federal Government.

The fact the painting was bought when the cash-strapped museum is supposed to be relinquishing its politically correct black-armband view of Australia's history could be seen as an embarrassment for its newish director, Craddock Morton. But Morton justifies the purchase as a "very useful historical artefact" by a well-regarded artist, and, even if it "shows an event that didn't happen, it raises the general question, what is evidence?" In the archives it is still available "under some council in the future". Morton stresses his commitment to the recommendations of a 2003 review by a Government-appointed panel led by the sociologist John Carroll, and vows the collection must adhere to "scrupulous historical accuracy".

Few historical facts in Australia were as hotly contested as those of the Mistake Creek massacre in which several Aborigines were shot dead. In 2001, three months after the museum opened, the outgoing governor-general, Sir William Deane, travelled to the East Kimberley with ABC TV's 7.30 Report and famously apologised to the Kija people. He said the massacre occurred "over a mistaken belief that they were eating a stolen cow . Underlying the whole story, as underlying the discredited notion of terra nullius, was the approach that our Aboriginal fellow Australians were somehow subhuman . "I'd like to say to the Kija people how profoundly sorry I personally am that such events defaced our land, this beautiful land."

But the historian Keith Windschuttle disputed the story Deane was promoting. He found the massacre took place on March 30, 1915, not in the 1930s, and was not a reprisal attack by whites over a cow, but "an internal feud between Aboriginal station hands" over a woman. "No Europeans were responsible. There was no dispute over a stolen cow, and it had nothing to do with theories about terra nullius or of Aborigines being subhuman." Deane, while later admitting he had the date of the killings wrong by 15 years or more, stated: "One cannot simply ignore the indigenous oral history [which] is remarkably strong."

So the Mistake Creek Massacre painting secreted in the bowels of the National Museum neatly symbolises the history wars that have riven Australia since the 1990s. The year McKenzie painted it, 1997, was the year Sir Ronald Wilson, in his Bringing Them Home report, said government policies of removing Aboriginal children from their families between 1946 and 1970 "amount to genocide". "Genocide is genocide," he said, setting off a rush of academic historians trying to prove him right. The report led to a National Sorry Day and a new front in the war against John Howard, who refused to say "sorry" for a genocide he did not believe had occurred.

In 2001, when Howard opened the National Museum on Canberra's Acton Peninsula in front of assembled dignitaries, what a hoot it was for his enemies. The design by architect Howard Raggatt contained subversive messages aimed at embarrassing the Howard Government, which had footed the $155 million bill with taxpayers' money. There were giant braille symbols pressed into the anodised aluminium cladding which were revealed this month to have spelled "Forgive us our genocide" and "Sorry", but which were quietly covered or rearranged by Craddock. Equating the white treatment of Aborigines with the Nazi genocide of the Jews, the design of the First Australians gallery was modelled on Daniel Libeskind's Jewish museum in Berlin, in which he used a broken Star of David to form the Nazi SS symbol.

Of course, 2001 marked the highpoint of hysteria for academic historians in their portrayal of white Australia's treatment of Aborigines as "worse" than the Jewish Holocaust, containing perhaps four different kinds of genocide, deliberate and systematic killing. Australians were being asked to believe that the relatively benign and tolerant society they lived in was rooted in the worst of all evils.

Into the middle of this happy academic consensus stomped Windschuttle with The Fabrication of Australian History, published in December 2002. The first of three books forensically analysing the evidence of Aboriginal deaths in early Australia, it caught out some famous historians in, at best, sloppiness and, at worst, deliberate falsification in their enthusiasm to have a home-grown holocaust.

In an article in this month's Quadrant, Windschuttle runs through some of the ad hominem attacks that ensued, including an accusation in an academic journal by the historian Dirk Moses that he suffered from "castration anxiety". A "little exercise in left-wing McCarthyism" by the historian Bain Atwood to investigate Windschuttle's past employed two research assistants and was funded by Monash University. Windschuttle records the astonishing turnaround, between about 2000 and 2005, by historians he targeted, how they at first denied having used the terms genocide and holocaust and then, when caught out with their own published words, tried to use postmodern definitions of "truth" to redefine the terms. "How to explain such contortions?" asks Windschuttle. "Short-term memory loss? Incapacity to recognise self-contradiction? Wilful dishonesty to deflect criticism? A postmodernist ploy that allows words to mean whatever their users choose?"

Nevertheless, Windschuttle has stopped the genocide juggernaut in its tracks. No historian engages in such pre-2002 exaggeration anymore, which is to the benefit of Aborigines, for whom the semantic debate diverted attention from the real issues of dysfunctional communities, alcohol and drug addiction, child abuse, poor health and education outcomes. Truth has triumphed, if only momentarily. This is already being lamented, by those rendered deaf, dumb and blind by ideology, as evidence of a dreaded New Conservatism that has infected the land.

Source



Rigid Victorian "sex offender" policy partially circumvented at last

An Orbost teacher who lost his job under controversial "zero-tolerance" laws for sexual offences has reached a financial settlement with the State government. The Age believes the confidential settlement is worth about $100,000 and will involve the teacher dropping legal action against the Department of Education and Training and Victoria's teacher registration body. Former Orbost Secondary College teacher Andrew Phillips was forced to resign in February last year after a compulsory police check revealed a prior sexual offence with a minor. As a 20-year-old, Mr Phillips pleaded guilty to the sexual assault of a 15-year-old girl, in 1992. No conviction was recorded and he received a good behaviour bond. The incident was consensual and the complaint was made by a third party. Under the laws, teachers convicted or found guilty of a sex offence involving a minor face mandatory dismissal.

Mr Phillips' case sparked fierce debate, with many in the community - including state and federal Labor and conservative politicians and teacher unions - calling for the laws to include ministerial discretion or an appeals process. But Premier Steve Bracks and Education Minister Lynne Kosky have maintained their zero-tolerance approach to offenders. The stance is supported by Parents Victoria and the State Opposition. Yesterday, Ms Kosky said the matters involved complex legal action and the decision took into account "the most appropriate use of taxpayers' funds" - meaning it is cheaper to settle than defend cases.

The Government stands by its legislation and policy for teachers and staff found guilty or convicted of child sex offences, she said. "The Government has acted and will continue to act in the best interests of children and places the protection of students in schools as its highest priority," Ms Kosky said. As part of the settlement, Mr Phillips, 35, will drop court action against the Government, Education Department and the Victorian Institute of Teaching as well an unfair-dismissal claim in the Industrial Relations Commission.

In his first public comment on the controversy, Mr Phillips thanked the community for their support. "I will not be returning to teaching, but the resolution of my case enables me and my family to move forward with greater confidence and security," he said in a statement to The Age.

Orbost Secondary College principal John Brazier said the settlement brought closure to what he called the worst miscarriage of justice in his 35 years of teaching. "Retrospective legislation supporting 'double jeopardy' and leading to the dismissal of outstanding teachers is not what I would expect of governments in the 21st century," he said.

The Australian Education Union, which represents Mr Phillips, said the education system had lost a good and passionate teacher because of the laws. "The union will continue to press for discretion to be included in the legislation so that more good teachers are not needlessly lost to Victorian schools," AEU president Mary Bluett said.

But Opposition education spokesman Martin Dixon said the decision to pay Mr Phillips out sent a mixed message to the community. He reiterated his opposition to discretion. "On the one hand, this sort of case involving a teacher was black-and-white and teachers with these convictions shouldn't be allowed in our schools," he said. "Yet when the community reads of the Government giving him a payout it's almost a watering down of that strong line."

Victorian Principals Association Fred Ackerman repeated calls for an appeals process in such cases. "Any process of natural justice must have an appeals process," he said.

Source



Aboriginal genetics

The uniqueness of Australian Aboriginal people and their long association with the continent has been revealed in a landmark genetic study. Researchers analysed the DNA of more than 120 Aboriginal people and compared it with the DNA of indigenous people in the region, including Papua New Guinea, Malaysia and the Andaman Islands off the coast of India.

A Sydney scientist, Sheila van Holst Pellekaan, said her team found the Aboriginal people could be grouped into five genetic haplogroups, or super families, that were very distinct from their regional neighbours. "Australian super families are unique. This confirms they have been here a very long time," said Dr van Holst Pellekaan, formerly of the University of Sydney and now at the University of NSW.

The researchers calculated that Aboriginal people were spread widely across the continent by at least 40,000 years ago. This fits with archaeological evidence that the first people arrived here between 45,000 and 60,000 years ago.

Identification of one of the Aboriginal haplogroups also supported a genetic study last year that concluded a group of modern humans who left Africa more than 65,000 years ago and eventually populated the globe were beachcombers, moving very rapidly around the coast of India and down to Australia, long before Europe was colonised. However, the presence of the other four haplogroups could indicate a different dispersal history for these people's ancestors, Dr van Holst Pellekaan said.

Her team studied DNA in the mitochondria, or energy producing parts of the cell, which is inherited maternally. The amount of variation in the mitochondrial DNA sequence between different groups reflects the amount of time since they diverged from each other. Wiimpatja people from the Darling River area of western NSW and Walbiri people from Yuendumu in central Australia were the main participants in the study, which is published in the American Journal of Physical Anthropology.

The most ancient lineages, two super families dubbed A and B, were widespread across Australia. People living in western NSW and the north of the country belonged to super family C, while people in central Australia belonged to the D and E groups. As expected, very ancient connections with people in India, South-East Asia and PNG were evident in the DNA of the Aboriginal people. The C and E groups, for example, shared a genetic similarity with a super family in PNG known as P. Dr van Holst Pellekaan said this was probably because they had all descended from one original population that moved into both countries long ago.

The study also supported research published last year suggesting a super family known as Q had evolved in PNG in isolation from Australia. "On current evidence, genetic exchange across the Torres Strait subsequent to initial colonisation appears to have been surprisingly limited," she said. It found no evidence for a recent scientific claim that Indian people had migrated to Australia about 10,000 years ago.

Dr van Holst Pellekaan said the forced relocation of Aboriginal people by European colonists had complicated this kind of research in Australia, because people were not always aware of their traditional affiliations. Participants in the study could learn valuable information about their maternal history, but it was only an adjunct to their oral and written histories, she said. "I have to be careful to explain it's another bit of information. It's not your full story."

Source



24 April, 2006

Bizarre! Australia welcomes Al Qa'ida fellow-travellers

Australia has granted asylum to five men who claim their membership of an organisation accused of ties to al-Qa'ida would expose them to persecution in their home countries. The men from Syria, Egypt and India sought protection on the basis of their membership of the Muslim Brotherhood, which has been banned in Syria and is considered the father of terrorist groups including al-Qa'ida. Osama bin Laden's right-hand man Ayman al-Zawahiri adopted the organisation. And earlier this month, The Weekend Australian revealed that one of the five asylum-seekers, Ahmad al-Hamwi, who arrived in Australia 10 years ago, was a senior al-Qa'ida bagman linked to 1993 World Trade Centre bomber Ramzi Yousef.

US terror expert Steven Emerson said the practice of allowing Muslim Brotherhood members into Australia was "extremely dangerous". Mr Emerson, credited with being the first expert to warn about al-Qa'ida, said Britain had a similar policy to Australia, which had led to a "high concentration of radicals" and the establishment of extremist networks there. "I am astounded at such a policy ... there is no doubt that there are ties between the Muslim Brotherhood and al-Qa'ida," Mr Emerson said.

The five cases, which went before the Refugee Review Tribunal and the Federal Magistrates Court between 1996 and 2002, revealed the applicants had sought protection on the grounds they were members or associates of the Brotherhood. Two men were given protection in 2002, after the September 11 attacks in the US. The Syrian arm of the Brotherhood has been linked to the al-Qa'ida members involved in planning the attacks. In one case that went before the RRT, a Syrian revealed how he had been recruiting members to the Brotherhood without specifically mentioning the group. He said he tried to attract recruits by speaking about the aims of the group to overthrow the Syrian Government and usher in an Islamic society.

The former head of security with the French secret service, Alain Chouet, has this month written a briefing for the European Strategic Intelligence and Security Centre, warning that the Muslim Brotherhood should not be underestimated. "Like every fascist movement on the trail of power, the Brotherhood has achieved perfect fluency in doublespeak," Mr Chouet wrote. Tzvi Fleischer, an analyst with the Australia-Israel Jewish Affairs Council, said: "While only parts of the Muslim Brotherhood are terrorists, the rest are cheerleaders or apologists for terrorism."



But federal Attorney-General Philip Ruddock said the Muslim Brotherhood was not a listed terrorist organisation in Australia or in any of its allied countries. "It would be a flawed view to assume a person was a security risk simply because they had a link to an organisation of this name," he said. Mr Ruddock said anyone wanting to come to Australia was checked by intelligence agencies but the Government would be concerned if any new information came to light linking them to terrorist organisations. Mr al-Hamwi was, by his own admission to the RRT, a member of the Muslim Brotherhood.

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THREE RECENT INSTALLMENTS IN THE BIG AUSTRALIAN EDUCATION DEBATE:

Far-Left education bureaucrats are finally being called to account

The muffled canon

Kevin Donnelly deplores the way literature is being swamped by an 'it's all good' attitude in our high schools

What do the works of Shakespeare and the television talent quest Australian Idol have in common? For most, especially Prime Minister John Howard, who argued this week that teaching of great literature is being destroyed by postmodernism and outcomes-based education, the answer is: nothing.

Shakespeare's works, as Harold Bloom argues in The Western Canon, represent literature at its most sublime and suggest something profound and moving about what it means to be human. Australian Idol, by comparison, deals with human nature in a superficial and predictable way and, although entertaining to some, lacks the enduring and universal quality of great literature.

Not so according to Paul Sommer, president of the Australian Association for the Teaching of English. In defending the idea that in English classrooms across Australia everything from graffiti and SMS messages to weblogs and computer games is a worthwhile "text" for study, Sommer says: "We want them [students] to be confident with a range of computer literacies and we want them to understand that texts from Shakespeare to Australian Idol are profoundly shaped by contexts and open to a range of understandings." Two teacher-academics, in a paper delivered at a 2005 national English teachers conference, also argue that Australian Idol should be included in the classroom and provide a lesson plan showing students how to analyse a judge's comments that one of the singers was overweight.

Welcome to the brave new world of "critical literacy". The Tasmanian Education Department defines critical literacy as "the analysis and critique of the relationships among texts, language, power, social groups and social practices. It shows us ways of looking at texts to question and challenge the attitudes, values and beliefs that lie beneath the surface."

The president of the ACT Association for the Teaching of English, Rita van Haren, describes teaching critical literacy as getting students to ask the following questions: "Who is in the text? Who is missing? Whose voices are represented? Whose voices are marginalised or discounted? What are the intentions of the author/speaker? What does the author/speaker want the audience to think? What would an alternative text say? How can the audience use this information to promote equity?" The task is no longer to read with sensitivity and discrimination what is written and to value what a literary work tells us about what D.H. Lawrence terms "the relation between man and his circumambient universe at the living moment".

The result? Whereas the Western canon, defined as works that best exemplify our creative urge to give shape and meaning to experience through the use of imaginative language, once held centre stage in the English classroom, the sad fact is that literature is no longer privileged. Not only are great works such as Hamlet reduced to being one cultural artefact among many, along with The Terminator and Australian Idol, but the moral and aesthetic value of literature is ignored as students are taught to analyse texts as examples of how dominant groups in society oppress and marginalise others.

As borne out by the example of SCEGGS in Sydney, where Year11 students are taught to deconstruct Othello from a Marxist, a feminist and a racial perspective, the joy of reading is reduced to a sterile and formulaic exercise in political correctness. Further evidence that the culture warriors of the Left have won the day is the way Tim Winton's Cloudstreet is taught in NSW senior English classes. In notes given to Year 12 students, they are asked to analyse Winton's book in terms of each of the following perspectives: gender (feminist), socio-political (Marxist), cultural, post-colonial, spiritual and psychological.

Across Australia, the reality is that critical literacy reigns supreme. The South Australian curriculum asks teachers to develop in students "the capability to critically analyse texts in relation to personal experiences, the experiences of local and global communities and the social constructs of advantage/disadvantage in order to imagine more just futures". In Western Australia, the new Texts, Traditions and Cultures program for Year 12 argues there is nothing universal or profound about the literary canon, as "the concept of the literary is socially and historically constructed, rather than objective or self-evident". Teachers are told they must teach that reading is ideological on the basis that "texts and reading practices enact particular ideologies, playing an important role in the production and maintenance of social identities and reinforcing or contesting dominant ideological understandings".

In opposition to critical literacy, it is possible to argue a case for the pre-eminent position of literature. One of the defining characteristics of literature is that it deals with those existential and moral dilemmas that define what it is to be human. Literature, unlike a computer manual, also uses language in a unique way. Reading involves what Coleridge termed a "willing suspension of disbelief" as the reader enters an imaginative world that has the power to shock, to awe and speak to one's inner self. Emotions such as love, despair, ambition, grief and joy are universal and, as suggested by Jung, there are symbols and archetypes that recur across cultures and across time. One only needs to read Greek tragedies such as Medea and Oedipus to realise that, notwithstanding all the cliches about millennial change, human nature is constant.

No amount of cant about readers as "meaning makers", texts as "socio-cultural constructions" and the purpose of reading being to "deconstruct texts in terms of dominant ideologies that disempower the marginalised and dispossessed" can disguise the fact that most of us read for more mundane reasons. As S.L. Goldberg said, "People are more likely than not to go on being interested in people, as much as they are in abstract theories and ideologies, or impersonal forces, or structural systems, or historical information, or even the play of signifiers. "So it is more likely than not, I'd say, that people will go on valuing those writings that they judge best help them to realise what the world is and what people are, and to live with both as realistically and as fully as they can."

Source



Noted playwright backs PM's attack on current teaching



The celebrated playwright David Williamson, a fierce critic of John Howard, has joined the Prime Minister's attack on English literature study based on postmodern ideology. The left-leaning Williamson, whose plays are studied by Year 12 students, said that despite Mr Howard's criticism of English teaching this week there was nothing wrong with "pointing out to students that literature has an ideological content". "But to treat our best literature as being nothing more than ideology would seem to be abandoning our greatest repository of human wisdom," he said.

On Thursday, Mr Howard labelled the postmodern approach to literature in schools as "rubbish" and lashed out at Western Australia's outcomes-based education system, dismissing it as "gobbledegook". His attack follows reports that top Sydney school SCEGGS Darlinghurst had asked students to interpret Shakespeare's Othello from Marxist, feminist and racial perspectives.

Williamson, who has defended the arts against perceived attacks from Mr Howard's Government, dismissed as "nonsense" the postmodernist principle that people are merely creatures of their immediate society and its ideologies. "We have a universal set of human emotions that vary little between cultures and which drive us to universally exhibit egocentricity, tribal affiliation, susceptibility to charisma, nepotism, sensitivity to social pressure, altruism, excessive fear of threat, pair bonding and other deep-rooted tendencies that literature has identified as 'human nature' for thousands of years," he wrote on the Crikey website. "What great writing does is identify the enduring truths about human nature that cross time and culture."

Writing in The Weekend Australian today, education expert Kevin Donnelly says forcing high school students to "regurgitate" English literature through the prism of often left-leaning critical perspectives leaves them with little interest in the discipline at university level. Mr Donnelly is executive director of the Education Strategies consulting group. He says that in recent years Cloudstreet, a novel by Australia's Tim Winton, has been taught to Year 12 NSW students, who have had to analyse it through gender, socio-political, post-colonial and spiritual perspectives. He said the limitation inhibited the students' understanding of the text. "Students tell me they dropped literature after Year 12 because it's such a boring exercise," he said. "They really had to jump through hoops in terms of regurgitating the critical response required, whether that is feminist, Marxist and so on."

Despite his criticisms, Mr Howard was reluctant yesterday to tie federal school funding to English programs that he thought were appropriate. "I'd be reluctant to do that because I do believe that if the states are to have sensible functions on their own, setting the syllabus and so forth for the teaching of English ought to be one of them," he said.

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Education: Trendy "isms" are incompatible with lasting knowledge

Below is an editorial from "The Australian"

What is the best way to introduce young people to literature? Is it to reveal to them the joy of reading great writing, and how themes and plots developed even centuries ago can be an anchor for their lives in the modern world? Or is it to treat every work as a "text" no better than any other, dissect them all ruthlessly and examine the entrails for political, sexual and racial bias? This debate has flared up again this week, sparked both by John Howard's comments on the "gobbledegook" taught in Australian English classrooms, and the defence of postmodernism mounted by the likes of the principal of exclusive Sydney girls school SCEGGS Darlinghurst, Jenny Allum, whose Year 11 students have their first encounter with Shakespeare's Othello when they are thrown into the postmodern deep end and told to analyse the play through the prisms of racism, sexism, and feminism. While many arguments can be made against this postmodern approach, the strongest one is that it does not belong in a high school classroom. If a graduate student who is well-versed in the Western canon and understands 5000 years of social and political thought from Plato and Aristotle through to John Stuart Mill, Karl Marx and Jean-Jacques Rousseau wants to deconstruct an author through a philosophical prism, then fine. But forcing dull formulas of race, sex and class on unsuspecting Year 11 students is unfair - not so much because it dumbs down the curriculum, but because it introduces the concept at the wrong time. Neither high school students nor their teachers are equipped with the base knowledge of literature, history and politics to do justice to such an enterprise. No wonder educationalists are tossing out Beowulf for Buffy the Vampire Slayer and claiming that students are bored by the classics.

The Australian strongly believes there is much more to life than race, sex and class, and that literature is a great way to understand the transcendant themes of human existence. Love, hate, war, jealousy, greed, charity, faith, hope, despair: these are the universals of human experience, and great and ancient literature speaks to us about these themes from across the years. Sadly, a small-mindedness has infected Australia's education system, producing an obsession with politics and power relationships that has infected the nation's classrooms like a mould. Those who defend current teaching methods by setting up a straw-man argument - "all we're trying to do is teach students that there are different points of view" - are being disingenuous. For, in forcing students to accept dull interpretations of "texts" in which everything becomes political, the postmodernists exhibit the worst sort of narrow-mindedness. The first job of teachers introducing students to the works of any great writer should be to instill a love of literature and learning. And English teachers everywhere must focus more on basics such as spelling, punctuation and grammar, all of which lose out to trendy theories like critical literacy and outcomes-based education. Those who are so inclined can always study the gobbledegook later.

One of the more bizarre aspects of the controversy is the postmodern fixation on Karl Marx as an appropriate filter through which to examine literature. For one thing, he was an economist, not a literary critic. For another, his writings inspired the deaths of perhaps 100 million people around the world, and this tragedy is better learned about in history classroom. And teaching high school students to interpret literature through ephemeral "isms" is, by definition, a way to produce students with dated knowledge. While the likes of Ms Allum may hopefully believe they are teaching students to "understand what (great authors) said in the context of their day and what it is they say to us today", it is tragically obvious what this obsession with Marx leads to - namely, students with poor skills who have had the love of books beaten out of them.



IN BRIEF

Your bureaucracy will protect you: "Children trapped in Victoria's most depraved family have suffered 17 years of horrendous abuse under the noses of authorities. One of the five siblings is forced to live with an elder brother accused of sexually assaulting and bashing him. The Department of Human Services has known about the "house of hell", in country Victoria, since 1989. But its file on the family has been stamped "case closed" or "no further action" 10 times since then. Department documents, sighted by the Sunday Herald Sun, admit welfare workers have been made aware of "extreme patterns of sexualised behaviour over a long period within the family". The youngest child in the family is aged less than 10, while two boys still live together though the elder has been accused of abusing his younger sibling. "Whether (the pair) would be able to have a relationship without sexual abuse occurring is doubtful," the documents state.... A member of the community where the family lives described it as a "house of hell". "Life for these kids has been a nightmare," the person said."





Conservative Anglicans thrive: "Moore Theological College, which trains clergy for the Anglican Diocese of Sydney, is expanding so quickly it will soon outgrow its Newtown premises. The college's director of property planning, Doug Marr, said the rapid growth in trainee minister numbers had forced a search for new premises. The preferred option is the Lindfield campus of the University of Technology, Sydney. There have been discussions about the college buying it, although it would need to sell its premises on Carillon Avenue. "We've had huge growth in the last 20 years," Mr Marr said. "The number of ministers in training has grown enormously . . . we're running out of space." The number of full-time, undergraduate students this year is 314. That has grown from 303 last year, 287 in 2004 and 235 in 2001. Strong demand for training at the college comes as other denominations find it difficult to attract people to vocations. The state's biggest Catholic seminary, The Seminary of the Good Shepherd, at Homebush, has 42 seminarians"





Another pro-baby initiative: "Federal Treasurer Peter Costello plans to fund 100,000 new childcare places in the May 9 Budget. With the Government's surplus now tipped to reach $14 billion, all spending on the additional childcare places will be new money - not diverted from existing programs. The ambitious plan means childcare will take its place alongside tax cuts as the centrepiece of what could be Mr Costello's last Budget. In a recent speech setting out his vision for the future, Mr Costello declared he wanted to make Australia "the most female-friendly country in the world". The Budget plan is a substantial downpayment on that ambition, but some critics would say it is still not enough. The Government created 50,000 childcare places last year but lobby groups argue that the real shortfall is still 175,000 places. They say the Budget will still come up short by 75,000 places. Mr Costello's package is intended to bring working mothers back to the Coalition and head off Labor, which is expected to promise a major childcare boost at the next election.



23 April, 2006

Sydney Hospital on life support

Historic Sydney Hospital is sitting on some of the most valuable real estate in the heart of Sydney. Work out for yourself what the gleam in the eye of the NSW government might be



Sydney hospital's capacity has been run down to the point where half-a-million people living and working in the city have been left far more exposed to the consequences of a terrorist attack or a bird flu outbreak, a hospital administrator has warned. The chairman of the Department of Medicine at Sydney Hospital, John Graham, told a biosecurity workshop last week that he had appealed to the Federal Government to remove the hospital from state control and declare it a "national security hospital". He said there was consensus among intelligence experts that the No. 1 terrorist target in Australia was the Sydney CBD. The first case of avian flu in Australia was also likely to walk through the doors of Sydney Hospital, most probably in the form of a visitor staying in a hotel.

Yet the state's health administration had run the hospital down to the point where it had only 100 beds left from an original 550, while its general and orthopedic surgeons had been ordered to work elsewhere. Dr Graham said the hospital needed an extra 100 beds, the restoration of its intensive care unit and the rehiring of up to 20 general and orthopedic surgeons to handle a terrorist attack or big infectious diseases outbreak. "I am the canary down the coalmine and I am asphyxiating," Dr Graham told the Herald yesterday. "It doesn't matter if I fall off my perch, but it matters if the half-a-million who come into the Sydney CBD every day have their health jeopardised. I, for one, am not prepared to let the NSW Health Department sit back and do the wrong thing."

A discussion paper on Dr Graham's proposals has been sent to the Prime Minister, and Dr Graham said he had met the federal Minister for Health, Tony Abbott, late last year to discuss the issue. A briefing note seen by the Herald from Dr Graham to the Deputy Commissioner of NSW Police Andrew Scipione says some senior NSW health officers privately agree that Sydney Hospital in its present state cannot adequately deal with a disaster in the city. However, the head of the NSW Health Counter Disaster Unit, David Cooper, said yesterday that state planning was "not about one hospital; it's about the whole network".

The biosecurity workshop, which looked at threats from infectious diseases and bioterrorism, was sponsored by the University of Sydney. A workshop speaker from the Prime Minister's Department, who did not want to be named, said the likelihood of a terrorist attack involving biological agents was low, but could not be ruled out. The former federal co-ordinator of emergency services David Templeman issued a warning about the ageing of the 500,000 volunteers whom the emergency services rely on. The average age of volunteers had risen to 47, from about 37 10 to 15 years ago. This was due not just to an ageing population and declining birthrate, but to a decline in the volunteering tradition among younger people.

Source



Top Marx for Australia's educators

John Howard is absolutely correct in seeing post-modernist influence behind the dumbing-down of the English syllabus and in the growing disrespect shown for significant literature. But does he - or most parents - appreciate fully the extent to which Marxist ideology hides behind the mask of postmodernism?

Communism has never achieved even 2 per cent of the total vote in Australian federal elections. In the sphere of public education, however, the grip of ideas that have their origin in Marxist theory has never been greater. Children are now regularly indoctrinated in Australia's public schools with political ideology that is the opposite of that supported by their parents. Add to this an accelerating decline in quantifiable standards of learning and achievement and you see why a sizeable migration to private education has been taking place for years.

If parents were offered a totally depoliticised system of public education - even one approximating to a classical model from 50 years ago, which emphasises the acquisition of skills rather than of attitudes - I have no doubt that many would embrace it with enthusiasm. In terms of measurable academic standards, hopes for worthwhile future employment, ability to cope with tertiary courses and the development of genuinely independent, educationally informed minds, such an alternative could not help being an improvement on the present, covertly politicised and academically disastrous model. Such an alternative would, of course, be resisted to the death by those who now dictate educational policy. Such educationalists invariably claim - in spite of overwhelming evidence to the contrary - to know best what is most beneficial and desirable for those in their power.

Does such a claim to omniscience sound familiar? It certainly should to anyone who has ever lived for any length of time under a communist regime. Under such regimes even abject failure was always represented as triumph or impending triumph. Regular observers of our educational scene should have realised by now that wherever radical educational initiatives - generally of postmodernist and thus Marxist origins - appear to create chaos or failure such shortcomings find themselves twisted through 180 degrees to re-emerge as triumphant vindications of doctrine: "Our children may not be able to read, spell, punctuate, add or subtract or show even the slightest grasp of the pleasures and purposes of significant literature but what they have been forced to recognise are the power structures concealed in educated discourse. Access to the mysteries of such recognition will make them the true world citizens of the future." What I am referring to here obliquely is the brave new world of what is termed critical literacy.

It may be instructive for parents who remain understandably in the dark about any supposed need to analyse language largely or solely in terms of power relationships to understand why their children should be obliged to view the written word in this one-eyed fashion. The originator of these ideas was a French Marxist historian/philosopher who died 22 years ago and whose entire life was consumed by a corrosive hatred of the kind of conventional, middle-class, "bourgeois" values that tend to obtain in modern Western democracies such as Australia. The man in question was Michel Foucault. Was this paragon truly the possessor of an exceptional, visionary and supremely balanced mind whose theories of life and society should be accepted by the rest of us - including parents of hundreds of thousands of children now attending Australian schools - without question?

When not exercising his supposedly superior vision of the true nature of bourgeois Western societies, Foucault was a promiscuous masochist whose areas of interest were in torture, drug-use and totally anonymous sex. His spiritual hero was the Marquis de Sade. As well as seeking the destruction of conventional Western capitalist societies, the admired philosopher had a parallel penchant for destroying himself, attempting suicide a number of times and finally succeeding in dying prematurely at the age of 57 from a sexually transmitted disease.

Whether any of these acknowledged facts fitted him supremely to be a posthumous arbiter in the way our children and university students are taught is not for me to say. These personal details of Foucault's life are, incidentally, freely available, being discussed in disturbing detail in a biography written by James Miller, The Passion of Michel Foucault (Simon & Schuster 1993).

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Wind energy drops off the perch

Never mind the orange-bellied parrot. Wind energy, one of the ethical investment sector's great success stories over the past decade, has passed its peak. "It's not only peaked, it's stopped," says Garry Weaven, Australia's biggest wind farmer. Weaven chairs Industry Funds Management, which last year paid a hefty $788 million for the formerly-listed Pacific Hydro energy company. Weaven blames the federal Government, "so clearly operating at the behest of the aluminium and coal lobbies".

Wind currently supplies about 2 per cent of our annual electricity generation. That share was growing until late 2004, when the federal Government rejected calls to extend the national mandatory renewable energy (MRET) subsidy scheme beyond 2020. According to Babcock & Brown wind executive Miles George, it takes two years to build a wind farm and the 12 years left until 2020 simply aren't enough to make a return on investment. The climate change debate has shifted dramatically, with the focus now on nuclear rather than renewable energy.

Former NSW premier Bob Carr commented darkly last year: "You could have a wind farm across all of outback NSW that would kill every kookaburra but it wouldn't provide the base-load power we need." A fortnight ago federal Environment Minister Ian Campbell sparked a media frenzy when he blocked a proposed $220 million wind farm at Bald Hills in Victoria's Gippsland - ostensibly because it threatened the endangered orange-bellied parrot. That decision has called into question a $12 billion pipeline of wind projects proposed by companies including ANZ, Alinta, AGL, Pacific Hydro and various state utilities including the Tasmanian Government's Roaring 40s wind business.

You can almost hear John Howard laughing as greenies are forced to choose between climate change and protection of endangered species. But it's a false opposition. Weaven contrasts the destruction of 25 per cent of all species over the next 50 years under current climate change scenarios, with "killing the odd bird". He says there have been no endangered birds killed at Pacific Hydro wind farms and there are ways to reduce birdkill, like removing animal carcasses where birds of prey are present. The Australian Greens environment spokesman, WA Senator Rachel Siewert, cautiously agrees. "My understanding is it's not as much of an issue as was first thought."

Investors can still do well out of wind energy but all the growth is offshore. Babcock's $830 million Wind Partners vehicle has risen 31.6 per cent since it listed on 27 October 2005, from its $1.40 issue price per cent to $1.68 yesterday. Not a bad return, although the stock is well off its December $1.93 peak. Weaven says Pacific Hydro is also trading profitably and will deliver a return to its owner, the $1.9 billion IFM Australian Infrastructure Fund - in turn owned by about 2.5 million industry super fund members. He denies it overpaid: "Not one dollar in our valuation was based on new projects in Australia." But since the sale, according to AMP Capital Investors sustainability research manager Ian Woods, there is "no growth story" for investors looking for an Australian wind play. State governments - especially Victoria, South Australia and Tasmania - are promising support but that will be irrelevant if the federal Government steps in to block new wind farms, on whatever grounds.

Source



IN BRIEF



Elle finds a new man: "You might call him one of the luckiest men alive - Sydney man-about-town David Evans has snared the big one in supermodel Elle Macpherson. The Body is believed to be off the market again after sharing a romantic two weeks down under with the Hugo's co-owner including intimate dinners together, shopping and yesterday a day at the Royal Easter show with Macpherson's sons, Flynn, 8, and 3-year-old Aurelius Cy. The 42-year-old, who split from her partner of nine years, Swiss financier Arpad "Arkie" Busson in June last year, spent Easter Sunday night with Evans at his Hugo's Bar Pizza restaurant in King Cross. They were "looking very coupley" while shopping in Woollahra on Tuesday and again on Wednesday in George St in the city...."



Leftist racism?: "The Federal opposition was trying to resurrect the White Australia policy by banning foreign apprenticeship visas, the Federal Government claims. Federal Opposition Leader Kim Beazley today said a Labor government would abolish a scheme that brings young people from overseas to train as apprentices in regional Australia. The scheme was ruining the job prospects of young Australians, he said. But Immigration Minister Amanda Vanstone accused Mr Beazley of advocating "naked prejudice". "Mr Beazley needs to be pulled into line by all community leaders who support a non-discriminatory migration program," Senator Vanstone said. "Most Australians do not share his prejudices." A spokesman for Mr Beazley would not directly respond to Senator Vanstone's comments. But he said the Howard Government had turned away 300,000 young Australians from TAFE in recent years. "It's a national disgrace, a Beazley Labor government will be training Australians first," the spokesman said."





Motorists opt for economy: High petrol prices have boosted sales of bicycles, scooters and fuel-efficient vehicles. John Pittendreigh, owner of Epic Cycles at Paddington, said he had noticed increased interest in bikes for recreation and commuter use. "Increased interest in bike commuting does seem to be driven in part by the increase in cost of commuting by car," Mr Pittendreigh said. "There has also been significant increase in recreational riding down to the local cafe or riding around the river and that in itself is another driver of people riding to work," he said. Brisbane's Scooters Scooters co-owner Peter Moody said the market had increased by up to a quarter in the past year. "It cost about $6 to fill a tank and that can do between 150km and 300km," he said. He said fuel prices had played a big factor in people switching to scooters to commute to work.... Commuters were also choosing to drive more fuel efficient cars like the Smart cars and the hybrid cars like the Toyota Prius. Year to date, Sales of fuel-efficient "Smart" cars and hybrids such as the Toyota Prius are up 12.9 per cent. Smart Centre Brisbane manager Tom Bebbington said: "We have sold a lot more cars in the last quarter and petrol prices and safety are big concerns for buyers." "We also are planting seven trees a year for people who buy smart cars and they have have very low fuel consumption." "They even use less fuel than Toyota Prius, which is electric and fuel."