Did I blog it?

So, I have been completely slack and haven't blogged in ages (except for about 10 minutes ago). 

And now I have about 20 things I want to write about but now I've gone and lost my audience and any repore I had built. I have trashed all expectations of a blog per week, I have let you down and I am sorry!! 

Especially since it was my true entre' to life online; I can't do f/book, I am completely slack on tweets although many thanks to all those who are active, I do enjoy it, for those more old skool I am a pretty responsive emailer.

Hmmmm... I won't despair and relegate myself to finding a Scandanavian pen-pal who wants to practice their already near perfect English and shares blow by blow accounts of chipping snow and ice from car windows and politely tells me of their dog's well-being. I will just push on through, call it a creative hiatus and promise the following:

• Darwin rednecks rage
• The 'new' phenomenon of nothing new
• How we're hangin' post Fed Election
• Colin Barnett turns back his big white clock about 220 years

in a relatively short-  but not too ridiculous so you think i am obsessing over my own blog - timeframe.

It doesn't add up Tony

Abbott has tried to buy Wilke with a billion dollars. That's from the man who claims to stand for economic stability, not wasting money blah blah blah. Now I am not saying that hospital care in Hobart doesn't need funding. But for ***k's sake, a billion dollars on the table before any costing was done, any health professionals consulted, any thought on non-hospital care around Tasmania... need I go on? Not to harp on it, but one final point  - all Abbott would have bought was a number, one closer to 76, not a guarantee that Wilke would support any of his racist, homophobic, fear mongering, climate sceptic policies -  doesn't sound like a smart spend of one billion dollars to me...

None of this is to say I love the other dudes, but I am really tired of Abbott and in fact the Coalition, continuing to play irresponsible point scoring games presuming that the voting public will all just stand by and cop it.

(image credit to David Jackmanson, ta for sharing)

Not even George could find a hero in this dish

Master Chef has changed the shelves of one well known supermarket across the land. Pigeon breast, broccolini, cheeses I can't name, buckets of duck fat, can anyone find the milk -  full cream, from a cow... And then there's the other story from the other parts of the same land - 

Stores where the stock is out of date, prices are on average 4 times higher than what we in our comfy cities on our comfy incomes are used to. Stores that do not sell fresh fruit or vegetables, there is some frozen meat and a lot of sugar, salt and additives. These are the stores in Aboriginal communities across the NT -  and possibly other part of Australia - but it is the NT I know most about. Nutrition and children's health was meant to be a key deliverable of the Government's NT Intervention. So -  Aboriginal people get a BasicsCard to spend in these stores and to apparently take better care of themselves and their children. But the Federal Government has done nothing about subsidising fresh food to reach these stores, regulation for store owners on prices / contents or anything else. The individual has no say in how much of their money goes onto this BasicsCard, whether they even want a BasicsCard or not and not all stores accept the card so too bad -  buy what's on the shelf, oh yeah- and probably what is within reach (the store is a walk away, the supermarket could be 300km away!). 

Perhaps the Federal Government could look at a food revolution outside of Coles.

Citizens assemble, Julia is confused

So, a year long chat about climate change? I am sorry Julia - WTF??? I thought Tony was the sceptic. 

What exactly are you hoping the citizens can tell you? The experts have given you the facts, the people of Australia have told you they want action, the global community kinda sorta tried to tell the world, Scandavia and parts of Europe have been creating positive change for years now, your old boss told you this was 'the greatest moral challenge of our times'. But you reckon door knocking from Broome to Ballina to Bendigo will sort things out?! I'm sorry, won't that add a few more planes, hire cars, phone calls to the tally... and that'll be another year, plus the nine months or so give birth to another long report of in-action. All that when you said through your sparkly eyes last night that 'you believed in climate change'...??

Not that I buy the idea at all. But just incase others do, let's reflect on the last year long consultation your Government embarked on. ummm.... that's right, you asked Australians to comment on how they felt about human rights protection - Australia asked for a Human Rights Act -  your Govt said nope sorry, but thanks for that nice little idea. 

let's tell Julia how it's going to be.

Greens in the Senate and she'll have no choice!

Seeking a policy, somewhere, anywhere

I have been too angry, shocked, frustrated, sad and a million other things to have written a blog about the latest announcements on how Australia's leaders intend to address the human rights issue of seeking asylum.

And in my delay - Julia has been doing a nice job of self-destructing on this issue. Her plans for East Timor seem to be without foundation, Tony's alternate plans for the Defence Force to play decision maker on which boats stay and which boats go also seems to without foundation. Key point for both politicians (in case they were looking here for advice) -  If you are making an announcement that involves 2 parties, get the ok from the other group before you make that announcement!!

So... the facts:

• Australia receives less than 1% of the world's refugees
• In total we are talking about around 3,000 people in one year at most by boat
• of those who arrive by boat, in recent years -  more than 90% were found to be genuine refugees
• There is no queue to jump and there are usually no papers to be thrown over board. Many people in the world never receive a birth certificate, and you try going to a Government office  asking staff there for a passport because you'd like to leave the country - the office is run by the people who killed your mother, or that office is a 200km walk from your home over a hill, past the football field, past a few hundred landmines and through a few groups of rebel fighters keen top recruit you. 

The Government is trying to convince us that a processing centre (I'll call it a detention centre) in East Timor will stop the potentially fatal boat trips that people are making. Ummm.... a bit of geography here, East Timor is an island!! To get there you need a boat, asylum seekers don't pass by the coast of East Timor, decide not to stop and then head on to Australia -  check out a map. They leave Indonesia and head down the Indian Ocean towards Australia's West Coast - not for fun, because that is a navigational route.  

I am all for a regional processing centre -  one where people are detained for the shortest possible time, where they can live in the community, work and have their health and education needs met whilst awaiting assessment. But is a developing nation such as East Timor the best place for this?? Or is it one that needs the money and one where Australia has some influence? The asylum seekers would either continue down the Indian Ocean, be picked up and transferred back across the top of Australia and through the Timor Sea. OR -  they would be taken straight from hiding in Indonesian ports to East Timor.  Indonesia and East Timor are not exactly best friends, I can't see how this plan actually work. This doesn't seem like complex political or logistical information to me, why has our adept, intelligent PM not thought about it or even chatted it through with oh, i don't know, East Timor's PM for one?? No, not Jose, he's the Pres and that's great, but you gotta talk to the PM too Goolia!

Julia says she didn't want a race to the bottom. She says that the debate should be honest and calm. ok... go for it. 

I have just noticed that in my first par of this blog I called these politicians 'leaders'. They are not, they are following an ill-informed, racist and therefore fearful public. Leadership would be to take a stand, announce the facts and state that Australia will uphold its international obligations and be a humane country. That'd get my vote. 

Just for fun, check out this clip, it has no point but i love it.

I can stand it, and more

Koolism's new track 'Can't Stand It' has it right on so many levels. I know it was a long time coming to get to this release, but man... the timing looked scripted. It dropped when A.Johns was all over the news for being a racist idiot. Poignant pen work Hau.

Check out the track

And... still is was Tahu who took a stand not the NRL taking a stand to get rid of Johns...??? why is it so often the case in situations of social injustice that the victim is removed and the perpetrator stays? 

3 beers - that'll be 2 years

A German soccer fan was given a free blanket at a recent World Cup game in South Africa -  I guess that means its getting cold over there in the evenings. After the game his free blanket and 3 beers he had were allegedly stolen from him by a local man. This man was charged and sentenced that day to 2 years in jail. Yep -  two years in prison, he is 21 years old. 

I am going to presume a few things here - 

• There are more blankets being given out to wealthy western soccer fans than to South Africans living in poverty
  
• The German soccer fan reported the 'crime' to authorities
• The local man was treated extremely harshly because his 'crime' involved a foreigner and that just won't do with the cameras rolling

We saw it in Beijing, now we see it in South Africa -  when will the world enter these countries, celebrate sport, bring their cash and actually pay attention to what is happening for locals in these places??? South Africa has established 56 special 'World Cup' courts to deal promptly with matters. Government spokespeople say matters will be dealt with as they always are in the country -  I do not think that a local person would have pressed charges over the theft of a free blankets and some beers in plastic cups (again, I have presumed the plastic bit).

I don't want to be negative nancy and I get that there are many benefits from hosting globally watched sporting events and I don't think soccer fans should have to become MSF doctors on their days away from the arena. But I do think the international media, national sporting associations and in some ways, high profile players who want to have an obligation to shed some light on the abuses and realities of the country they are in. Images of gorgeous scenery, exotic animals, laughing children playing soccer in the dirt with no shoes and smiling hospitality staff are being beamed into our lounge rooms but I have not seen little to no reporting on poverty, racism, violence, homelessness... A bit of balance please. The Cup should have a positive lasting effect on the country and its people. 

Factions, females, fake?

OK, a more personal, possibly not so coherent blog to come i think...

I am still trying to work out how I feel about living in a country with a female PM, a country where factional bullies can over-rule democracy and choose the PM, a country that was on track to electing a chauvinistic man who doesn't believe in climate change... it's a bit to take in.

The gender issue. I have a sense of relief that Australia is a nation where a woman can be PM and I have a bounce to my step as I think of that in an international context and as a message to my son, to my own career and to young girls. But then  as usual, talk back radio filled my brain with dread and fear, today the airwaves crackled and whined with women espousing how it wasn't really a win for feminism because Julia didn't have children... f*** me how can you even reason with women like that. I don't want Julia to be treated any differently because she is a woman (already suggested as a given by some commentators today) and I don't want to hear for the next month about how we have a female PM. What we have is the person most likely to beat Tony Abbott in a looming election, who was put in the job by a bunch of right wing men. I do not question that she is a terrific politician, an intelligent person and as she reminded us about 15 times in as many minutes, "hard working" but I do not have the sense of elation I think I should.

I really hope that Julia is not beholden to the right and doesn't come out with Abbott like policies and comments. Already today's answer on the asylum seeker question was like a step back to Howard, and actually for me brought back different and frightening red haired memories.  Julia said 'she could understand why Australians were fearful at boat arrivals'. This was a real opportunity for her to show leadership, show that Australia may earn some international respect and she could have dispelled a tonne of myths. I know that voters are fearful and that they think the 2,500 people in detention will take their jobs, kill their babies, kick their cats and ban full strength beer but really... Julia knows better and should have said so. If she felt she had to she could have still given a line about security and border protection - not that the issues are even related in actual fact.  

I have respect for every MP, even if I don't agree with their policies, politics is a shit business to be in. Yes, some must enter for ego but most I would say enter to make a difference and stand up for what they believe in and they work really damn hard. Julia must have a seriously good multi vitamin and make up person on hand because I don't think she would have slept last night and she was looking fine and making complete sense today, not sure I would have!

Bring on the sound bites of Abbott saying "Gillard would make a great PM", let's see Tony squirm and sort of kind of just not get it right because he has no concept of how to handle an intelligent and powerful woman. Let's see the lib's remind us of the un-built but paid for school halls, the combusting roof rafters and tell us it's just a new coat. I hope all those who looked like voting Green are not swayed by the 'first female' angle. More than ever we need their checking and balancing. 

Bring on election weekend!!

Kev, the party's over

WTF ...

Julia being used by the Right to challenge Kevin. Mark Arbib has alot to answer for. Yes, Australia elected the party not just the man but this is ridiculous.

Julia came from the Left of Labor but if it's Arbib and the right faction that gets her the job of PM she will owe them favours and there will be conditions. We will have the most Right Labor Govt possible!! Yes, it will be slightly better than having Abbott in power but F**K shit sandwich vs shit burger. 

These right faction members should remember that Australians vote for leaders not them. 

I agree that sadly the Australian public seem to be complete idiots and Abbott is looking like a possibility for PM and I agree that the ALP must do all it can to avoid that but this is crap.

I guess the only thing to do now is for voters in every seat to actually do some research and ensure that we get the right out of the ALP - but not to put lib's or nationals in their place!! We need to get more Greens in everywhere to keep the government, whomever that might be, in check. 

I know I should be here standing proud that we may be about to get our first female PM. And yes, there is an element of pride and respect there but not if that female is a puppet to the right. 

And i didn't think Abbott's smirk could get any more smug... just wait for that doorstop tomorrow. So I guess all I can do is say c'mon Julia c'mon.

This is a sad day for Australia and Australian politics and it is fear, narrow mindedness and racism that got us here.

Mark your terrritory

I have just come back from the NT, and I will get to all the amazing and amazingly shocking stuff later but one thing I didn't know was that personalised number plates must be super cheap, that or people really, really like them. here's a few of my favourites, there'd be more, but you don't read a lot traveling at 160km/hr!!

There was the dude apparently looking for the NT Police (and they're never that far away) -  DOOBIE

My personal favourite: the fishing 4wd enthusiast (no shortage of those) - WHO RAY

Abode -  i know its the name of a company, but really who wants to send the public a message that their home is a kermit green V8?? 

Then there was the town that said ***k you to feminism, the flashest car parked in the main street with plates reading: 'WIFES'. 

hmmm... it is a big and diverse country this wide brown land.

Temporary Insanity

I have been putting off writing this blog because i really don't want to give Abbott and his shit ideas any more volume. But people have been asking me about temporary protection visas (TPVs), what it all means and why the fuss...

well, essentially its crap and has been proven to cause mental anguish, exacerbate trauma and most people who were given TPVs in the past were eventually granted full protection to remain in Australia permanently. It involves assessing an asylum seeker, finding that they meet the criteria of being a refugee but then suggesting, just in case things get better in your country of origin we will only give you a 3 year visa and at that point, we'll re-assess to check whether you are still a refugee WTF ?!?!?!

TPVs were introduced in 1999 under Howard. Psychologists, doctors, experts, refugees and Australians who cared campaigned hard and they were abolished in 2008 by the Rudd Government.

The people I knew on TPVs told me they couldn't enrol in a degree as they may not be around to finish it, they were hard to employ because they couldn't guarantee how long they would be in the country, they found it very hard to start relationships because there was every possibility they would be removed from Australia. They were living their lives in limbo, feeling insecure, unsafe, finding it hard to have hope and not trusting of Australian authorities. 

Frighteningly these people were trapped -  many were men who had made the dangerous journey here by sea -  they were not entitled to apply for their family to be reunited with them in Australia and they had no rights to re-enter Australia if they left. So we saw young children and wives commonly separated from their father / husband. And now Abbott, who is apparently a man of faith, of family values, who believes in the "Aussie spirit" is suggesting this is a good way to treat people. ABSURD

more info

Check out a fantastic film, Molly and Mabarek - set in Young when the abbatoir there was open and when Afghan refugees found a real home. 

what would you do with $5.8million

Now, it might be a bit nerdy I know, but I actually don't mind looking into Federal budgets!

When you look past the massive figures that really don't make any sense to me -  you can see where policy really is heading. Fairly simple; if an issue has f***all funding -  mental health in 2010/11 for example -  it is quite clear that when the Government craps on about 'being committed to tackling mental health issues in Australia, having an agenda for change, looking to the future' etc etc it's empty rhetoric because there are no $$ set aside to actually make anything happen. 

My favourite treasure from this recently announced budget... 

$5.8million for 2 staff to go to Afghanistan and stop asylum seekers from coming here to seek protection. 

I shit you not. 

This is not something out of Monty Python -  although I do have some great visuals on 2 Aussie dudes all kitted out making mad dashes over mountain passes a-la-roadrunner, standing on street corners in dusty towns showing locals pictures of Australia's bushfires, snakes and crocodiles -  DONT GO - you think the Taliban is bad...

Honestly, the Rudd Government is sending '2 staff for 2 years to stop asylum seekers at the source' and the total cost is 5.8 million Australian taxpayer dollars. Most of course will go on security (unless those 2 guys are paid around $1.5 million/yr each) -  but that doesn't make sense because why would 2 guys need so much security in a country that is safe and from where people don't need to flee?? (according to the Rudd Government, this is the case and that's why they are not processing the asylum applications of the Afghans on Christmas Island who came after 9 April).  These 2 guys 'stopping the flow of asylum seekers' will no doubt employ local interpreters, fixers and guides -  these locals will be relatively well paid and so will take the job which at the same time puts their life at risk. The whole situation is just so bizarre I can't quite believe someone sitting in Canberra thunk it up and it got past a senior desk, into the budget and out to the public! Not to mention the mathematicians, this year around 1200 Afghans have asked Australia for protection - back when we used to process claims from these people, over 90% were found to be genuine refugees. Do these numbers warrant the spend?

5.8 million dollars - imagine the indigenous housing, the remote health care centre, the refuge for homeless youth, the renewable energy rebates for homes, the dignified care of seniors - allocating the budget is about making choices, its where the Government firmly puts its priorities on paper and this government is choosing to spend our money on 2 guys running around in fatigues having no f***ing impact whatsoever trying to stop people from doing what they can to get their family to a place where they won't be raped, shot or tortured. Nice one Rudd.

This bit is not for everyone I know, but go on.. it won't make you a crazed political activist, just an engaged citizen!

Senate Estimates Committees meet in the next few weeks. Its where we say thank goodness for minor parties and independents, and at times even the opposition -  each committee deals with certain portfolio spending and those Senators not in Government hold the Govt representatives to account on why, how, what. 

I know it's not for everyone but on any issue you can Get in touch with your Senator, it's their job to represent us and we have every right to ask them to be checking on what the hell the Government is up to, its our money they are spending. If they are not on a particular estimates committee, ask them to send your query to their party colleague who is. 

It's the Aussie way

A boat... about 45 adults and 15 children on board. They're Australian they are sailing around the world (not after a world record so any distance above the equator will do) and their next stop is Faro, Portugal. 

Portugese Customs received a distress call from the boat 10 days ago. One of the trip organisers got things a bit wrong, the boat is nearly out of food, water and fuel. Hungry teenagers, unwell uncles, it's not going so well !! A U.S ship passes by the Aussies -  reports that all is ok, the Portugese still know where the boat is and that it's on it's way to their shores. No further checks are carried out, they'll arrive in about a week. 

They don't arrive.

Things on board are bad, the young children really need food, the boat will drift off course without fuel, they've been at sea for weeks -  people are feeling weak, tired, sick. Some people on board have had bad experiences in the past this boat trip is bringing back all sorts of horrendous nightmares. Some of the men can't take it anymore, on board are their children, wives, sisters, uncles, friends -  they construct a raft of sorts and head off on the expanse of blue, grey choppy water to find help. What else could they do. Is it a choice -  you are the strongest on board, you have to try and help the others, don't you? Besides, the captain made that distress call over a week ago, the Portugese will be on their way to check on the boat... won't they. 

The 5 men don't make it back to the boat, no other vessel picks them up -  the remainder of the Aussies don't make it to shore. The Portugese officials eventually go to boat's aid and take the passengers to a remote island that is not Portugese territory and then locks them up in detention. 

Furious at Portugal? Think they should have done more? Do you feel for those 5 brave men, do you worry about the other passengers who are now detained with no idea when they will get off the remote island or where they will be sent -  they have just lost 5 of their fellow travellers, they are tired and scared. 

I can't even begin to imagine the emotion, fear, physical sickness that these people would have been feeling. Compound that with the fact that they are not Australian -  they are Sri Lankan, they are fleeing war, their homes have been destroyed, family members killed, it is not safe to send their children to school in the town they grew up in -  this boat trip was a chance at a safe, new beginning. 

Just imagine for a moment if this story was actually about 60 Aussies sailing around Europe. Six Aussie families who'd saved for the trip, Michelle's 50th, Sam's 21st, it would reunite all the Thompson kids who have been living all around the world, Faro was to to be the last port, from there people were going to fly off to other destinations or home - they were due to land on Tom and Sarah's third wedding anniversary -  Tom was one of the five men... 

We won't hear the personal stories from the real life version, we won't see the colour photographs from the couple's wedding, the interviews with the 9 year olds who are worried about their classmate who was on board, the neighbour who remembers the good deeds of those on board. These Sri Lankan asylum seekers will remain labeled as the latest "illegal boat arrival" -  the boat gets named by Australia "SIEV #whatever" (suspected illegal entry vessel). 

It is not illegal to seek asylum, it is illegal for Australia to deny these people the right to have their story heard (we are not processing claims from Sri Lankans at the moment!). And surely it is against the law of the sea to leave a boat like this unchecked. 

A policy where inhumane treatment is the benchmark will only lead to more deaths. A population who cannot see asylum seekers as individual humans will continue to let Governments do this. 

If you think I made it up -  read this

(apologies to Portugal, no reason for picking you in this scenario!!)

Image by Katyousha from a Dec, 2005 refugee action. Published in UTS mag. 

walking, tweeting, talking ashtrays

Now that I am back in the world of paid work, I am also back on public transport!! When did ashtrays have 16 legs, loads of big hair, short navy skirts and untucked white shirts??? 8 teenagers boarded a bus I was happily sitting on yesterday afternoon and I honestly thought the person next to me had hypnotised me and made me lick the inside of an ashtray. Not just any ashtray, the one from the front bar of an average pub at 4pm -  back when you could smoke in bars, opening time was 8am and the men in the front bar lit their second cigarette from their still burning first one. 

And this was after the Government's election, I mean health, tax - increasing the price of cigarettes. 

I am no psychologist and I am sure there have been plenty of studies but perhaps cost is not such a big factor in getting these kids to stop or not take up smoking?? It is cool to smoke. OK, I don't agree with that statement, but it just is!! and i can admit that i am not part of gen Y's coolness. Now, I don't want to just teenage bash. Smoking is really stupid, teenager's don't think of the health risks, 40 is soooo far away and whatever, they'll quit when they're older, it'll all be fine! I don't quite know how we get across the risk message -  how do we smoking completely uncool?? there have been sports stars in expensive ad campaigns, there have been muso's sprouting the benefits of tar free lungs... and still, swarms of school uniforms go on stinking like a gutter outside a great bar (now that smoking is banned inside!). Perhaps its about finding cool young people to spread the message that they don't want to kiss someone who smells worse than their aunt's potato bake left on the back table until the day after boxing day. People whom kids see as just like them, not an athlete that most kids are never even aspiring to be, not an outdated TV celeb and certainly not a health minister, school principal or parent.

Teenagers seem to get the idea of longevity when it comes to climate change but not when it comes to their own bodies and health risks. Is that a basic psychology of - you adults are getting this wrong even we can see that vs it can't happen to me, don't tell me what to do??

hmmm.... pictures of gangrene toes, $25 packets, 'hidden' cabinets at the newsagent, age restrictions... still at every bus stop are armies of walking ashtrays -  pumping i-tunes simultaneously into one ear and out in to the traffic through the dangling second earpiece to nowhere, tweeting from their phones and ready to assault your bus with stench. 

Perhaps it's all ok and the stench is worse than the bite because they don't actually inhale?!

thanks BuNika on flickr for the pic.

A light shower or a hurricane?

When did "sex scandal" become the term for "rape"? 

Not since Skase and Bond has white collar crime hit the papers and caused so much public kerfuffle. One paper told me today this was "league's darkest hour". I'm sorry, some crap accounting was done, a good auditor found it, some bosses made some crap decisions. Who was gang raped? Who was made example of for being a woman? Who was demeaned, belittled and ignored by the media and "the game"? ummm... no-one. 

And look, I know there are fans of the Storm who will be rightly pissed off. But c'mon, lead news story for 2 days, the ABC devoting over 5 minutes of national news coverage to the issue, people acting like some huge injustice has been done to the nation (or Victoria, NSW and QLD at least) as a whole. Why do the people of this country not feel as passionately annoyed when we lock children in detention centres, or when a young girl in QLD has no choice but to grow up in a house with a blocked sewage and only occasional running water (just because she is black). 

Government says no to our human rights

Today our Attorney General, Robert McClelland announced that Australia would not have a Human Rights Act. 

so... why am I UNHAPPY ROB... 

Well -  remember that thing called the 2020 summit -  the invited participants called for a Human Rights Act. Then in 2009 the Federal Government - well you and I and all our fellow Australians -  paid for a national consultation on what we thought about human rights in Australia. The outcome -  a 4 member independent panel held 65 community roundtables in 52 locations, conducted expert hearings and presented a report to the Government stating that Australia should have a Human Rights Act. 

And, if its not enough to ask Australians and get an answer from them.. there's the international and domestic learnings on human rights legislation. Australia is the only liberal democracy in the world without national human rights protection. Victoria has a human rights Charter, so does the A.C.T. The UK, NZ, Canada and so many other nations we conveniently align ourselves with on other issues all have federal human rights legislation. 

So, short article but let's recap -  Australia said give us a Human Rights Act, the independent panel said Let's have a Human Rights Act, the rest of the world we look to has a Human Rights Act -  and today the Government says we don't need one. 

Robert McClelland presented a  "human rights framework", have you seen Hollow Men - its a great Australian show that takes the piss out of Canberra, it takes the piss out of non-government organisations, it takes the piss out of the process or lack of it, it takes the piss out of crafted media statements and today McClelland gave us all the lines, the pamphlet with lame graph, lame image only it was depressing not funny and he wasn't taking the piss. 

In reality what McClelland announced today was more review, more discussion, more Committees, more brochures and no legislation, no change to the lives of Australians, and no Human Rights Act. 

It's beyond disappointing, it's flabbergasting -  how can the Government ignore so many reasons to go forward? And what is the reason? This issue is not a vote winner, its not an election loser, it was a chance to stand up for human rights, a chance to show that this government will stand by the vulnerable people of this country. Instead this Government chose to turn its back. 

What would a Human Rights Act mean.. I will have to go into that in another blog, I am too sad, too mad, too disappointed and I am not taking the piss. 

It's your income, just don't choose how it goes out

Today I came across a campaign to ensure that Aboriginal people remained in control of their own income. A campaign that pointed out it was unjust for someone to have to ask for permission to spend their own money because they were indigenous. I was shocked to discover that the campaign ran in Australia in 1961.

Reg Jonhston of Broad Arrow, W.A  wrote a letter to the Council for Aborignal Rights stating that his mother was able to manage her own pension and asking why she needed to go and see a 'warrantee' who held her money and tell him what she wished to spend her money on. Shirley Andrews talks of Aboriginal girl she knew at the time:

I was very affronted to hear the story about this lass. She was a teenager, she had gone and asked the policeman to buy, she wanted to buy another petticoat, and he said she had one; that was enough. And you know, I was really shocked at that and it was her own money, and what did he think she was going to do when it was in the wash?

Shirley may not have used human rights terminology, she didn't talk about the teenager's dignity or her right to privacy. But Shirley knew it was wrong. And today in Australia our Government calls it 'income management'. Aren't we meant to learn from history, not let it repeat and all that??? Tell that to the Aboriginal person who in 2010 has a BasicsCard that they did not request, who lives 280km from the office that tells them how much money they have and who can "choose" from 2 local stores that accept the BasicsCard.  

There's a daily spending limit of $800, but you think about it - 

How often do you want to make the 280km bus ride (where the driver has to check you don't have alcohol on board), there's 3 of the kids' birthdays coming up, it's time for a big grocery shop, there are a few things you need from the pharmacy - looks like you're going to exceed the limit, but it's "your choice". 

I hope that we can start to become as outraged as Shirley was. I hope that we stop making the same mistakes. hope...

Its a floodgate... of votes

So, we voted Howard out. The Herd warned we could be wearing rose coloured glasses -  it seems the tint has worn off and someone has handed out those aeroplane eye masks that don't quite fit and have a slightly odd smell.

Immigration Minister Chris Evans has announced that Sri Lanka and Afghanistan are safe countries to live and that Australia will no longer be processing asylum seekers from these countries. Umm... is that the same Afghanistan where  DFAT says don't go  and where Australian troops are presently 'keeping the peace'? And is that the same Sri Lanka where DFAT says to reconsider travel due to political tension?

And what the hell happened to assessing asylum seekers as individuals? That is Australian law, that is international law? Have all the Government's legal advisers taken leave at once or has this Government re-employed Howard's team.

Almost 100% of recent asylum seekers to Australia from Afghanistan and Sri Lanka have been found by our already rigorous system to be genuine refugees -  but to Evans this does not matter.

What benefit is there is grouping asylum seekers together in regional bundles. Just ask talk-back radio and tabloid press: fear. It's "them", "they" are illegal. Call them all one big unlawful group and you remove the mother, the teenager, the father trying to protect his family in the only way left  - it's simple, remove the human and its much easier to have inhumane policy.

I am appalled to be living in a country that has reverted to racism, that lacks compassion, that has complete disregard for international law and where the Government can get away with using people's trauma and despair to gain votes from a public who don't bother to think about the reality.
Getting on a boat and trying to seek aslyum in a country so foreign to your own is not a choice -  its a matter of survival.

Composting the norm

Matt Preston

Costa Georgiadis

to me these are the most unlikely pillars of popular culture and I LOVE THEM. It gives me some hope in 'the public' that a man who can sit in lotus whilst wearing blundstones can be 'cool'. The other coolness is an educated man who doesn't seek to break people down in the interests of reality tv, who wears a cravat and has more tertiary degrees than hats most of us have dined under.

well done to some tv producers and network heads. 

now let the culling begin

Aussies fall louder than the rest

We want our figs from Turkey

Our salmon from Alaska

We read blogs from Brooklyn

Wear fashion from Milan made in Pakistan. We even eat Israeli couscous without a thought of where our political views lie -  it is really fluffy and more versatile than that 'ordinary' couscous. 

Our news -  only local will do.

 

When a plane crashes in the fog of Papua New Guinea we give faces and names to those Aussies who died. When a wave crashes over our Pacific neighbours the Aussies missing are given voices, faces, beamed into our lives. The locals who hosted these Aussies are left without names, they are presented as statistics and so the news reel moves on, as easy as a shake a sauce bottle. 

In this increasingly interconnected world why do we disconnect from humans born in other lands. Why is an Aussie life more deserving of dignity than any other. Where is our own dignity in that? 

An Aussie solider dies after choosing to 'serve', his mates carry him, the Government sends a plane and a flag to bring him home, the PM puts aside shit-storms and the opposition "leader" rises from his burning bed to solemnly comment on the loss.

The Afghan mother buries another child, sometimes in the very spot where the child fell. Her pain is given no face but that seen by her palms as she cradles her head. Her dignity is not shown to the world another 'casualty' in a war she did not choose to live amongst, cannot escape from and goes on living within. 

2nd Nov 09 - the Viking doesn't sail

Today 78 Sri Lankan asylum seekers are stranded / imprisoned / given no choice -  on board an Australian Customs ship at an Indonesian port. Australia doesn't want to 'deal with' these people, little matter they are scared, desperate and being in Indonesia could mean years in squalor with no certainty of where they would end up. 

Today the PM's $100 000 literary award was presented to Nam Le. His story - 'The Boat' - his journey to Australia fleeing the shores of his native Vietnam.. by what means of transport? 

The PM's non-fiction award today went to an historical book comparing White Australia Policy to present day attitudes and policies towards those arriving by boat. 

A handshake from Arts Minister (longer title not listed here) Garrett, large cheques, photo opportunities. So, those who takes journeys out of desperation, those in search of hope create art that the PM's office sees worthy of prizes. Why do these human actions not result in the creation of policy we could stand and call 'humane'?