Tuesday 19 March 2024

Youth crime and crime generally are always good ways to scare rural and regional communities and a scare campaign has been running hot and cold in 2024

 

Youth crime and crime generally are always good ways to scare rural and regional communities and a scare campaign has been running hot and cold since the NSW Bureau of Crime Statistics and Research (BOSCAR) released the state's 2023 December quarter crime statistics.


The National Party members of the NSW Parliament have been beating up these figures and supporting any group who will drink the political Kool-Aid.


On 23 February 2024 the NSW Police Minister Yasmin Catley in Budget Estimates described the Country Mayors Association calls for an inquiry into regional crime as calling for nothing more than a “talkfest”.


By 14 March 2023 the political situation but not the statistics had changed.


TheCountry Mayors Association of NSW has welcomed the NSW Premier’sannouncement that the NSW Government will implement new initiativesto start to address regional youth crime.


The mayors' law and order concerns were somewhat recent given the last annual survey conducted by the CMA saw the 69 rural and regional local governments who answered this survey placing law and order low on their priority lists.


Readers of Murdoch media and local Northern Rivers newspapers may also have noticed the sudden flurry of journalistic and National Party concern about local crime rates.


The Clarence Valley Independent of 13 March 2024 was a case in point:


News of an escalation in youth crime in the Clarence Valley has gone right to the top of the Coffs Clarence Police District, with the Commander, Superintendent Joanne Schultz involved in implementing prevention and intervention strategies to prevent re-offending....

Last month, Member for Clarence, Richie Williamson joined calls by the Country Mayors Association of NSW for the Minns Labor Government to launch a parliamentary inquiry into rural and regional crime, following a spike in crime in the Clarence and Richmond Valley’s.

The most recent data from the authorities show that youth crime continues to rise, especially for stealing motor vehicles and break and enter offences,” Mr Williamson said.


So what had changed for the Minns Government?


Well, firstly the state electorate is now only six months away from the NSW Local Government elections on Saturday, 14 September 2024 and both incumbent governments and their political opposition like to play the 'laura norder' card in an election year which sees party politics playing a significant but rarely openly stated role in council elections.


Secondly, the NSW Premier has announced new punitive legal measures aimed at youth offenders when it comes to matters like consideration of bail applications and certain increased penalties and, what better way to win support for this move and a policy of "proactive policing" of vulnerable groups than to further demonise young offenders.


Thirdly, a 'helpful' study was released by BOSCAR this month titled "Crime in Regional and Rural NSW in 2023: Trends and Patterns".


While this study openly admitted that in the last 20 years property crime had fallen by 48 per cent in regional NSW, this was seen as deficient because property crime had fallen by 67 per cent in Greater Sydney over the same period and as due to the different rates of decline, in 2023 the rate of recorded property crime was 59 per cent higher in Regional NSW compared to Greater Sydney. A most unfortunate statistical clash.


The study also stated: In 2023 the aggregate rate of recorded violent crime in Regional NSW was equivalent to the recorded rate in 2004. In Greater Sydney, however, violent crime declined significantly in the two decades to 2023 (down 20% from 2004 to 2023). The long-term decline in violence in Sydney and relative stability in Regional NSW has increased the disparity between the rate of violent crime in the regions versus the capital city. In 2023 the rate of recorded violent crime was 57% higher in Regional NSW compared with Greater Sydney.


Leaving a distinct impression that the comparisons being made are beginning to resemble the apple and orange variety and are unhelpful to anyone except state and local government politicians on the make in a local council election year.


The icing on the cake was the following paragraph, which totalled five years of crime statistics to achieve impressive numbers which are broken down in red annotations:


Four major offences, however, significantly increased in Regional NSW over the five years from 2019

to 2023:

o Motor vehicle theft (up 20% or 1,239 additional incidents) An est. average increase of 248 offences per year across 95 regional local government areas. In this category and unspecified number of youth offenders are alleged to be found.

o Non-domestic assault (up 14% or 1,825 additional incidents) An est. average increase of 365 offences per year across 95 regional local government areas. On a yearly average est. 204 were youth offenders.

o Sexual assault (up 47% or 1,505 additional incidents) An est. average increase of 301 offences per year across 95 regional local government areas. In this category it is solely adult offending.

o Domestic violence related assault (up 24% or additional incidents)

An est. average increase of 659 offences per year across 95 regional local government areas. On a yearly average est. 86 were youth offenders.


For those interested BOSCAR released a set of graphs which breakdown the trends into more specific crime categories at:

https://www.bocsar.nsw.gov.au/Publication%20Supporting%20Documents/RCS-quarterly/Supplementary%20charts%20-%20Recorded%20Crime%20Charts%202019%20to%202023.pdf


As for "stealing motor vehicles and break and enter offences" the Nationals MLA for Clarence points to in relation to youth crime, BOSCAR data for January to December 2023 show NSW Police proceeded against a total of 27 vehicle thefts in the Clarence Valley LGA, with 9 of these thefts alleged to be by young offenders aged between 10-17 years of age. While break and enter offences proceeded against totalled 33 offences, with 9 of these break and enters alleged to be by young offenders aged between 10-17 years of age.


As for motor vehicle theft and break and enter statistics for the Coffs Clarence Police District, BOSCAR shows Coffs-Grafton statistical district was considered "stable' over the last five years. With the change in motor vehicle theft being +113 thefts between 2019 and 2023 totals. While break and enter dwelling fell by -145 incidents and break and enter non-dwelling fell by -9 incidents between 2019 and 2023 totals.


From a personal perspective - yes let's all insist on higher numbers of police in all regional areas to improve crime clear up rates and because police are often spread thin on the ground during emergencies and, in the Northern Rivers region in particular we now have such events far too often.


However, does the desire to have more police in our towns mean that we need to endorse a more punitive response to young offenders by a state government and its police force?


ABC News, 18 March 2024:


Some of the country's top legal and criminal justice experts have written to NSW Premier Chris Minns about proposed bail changes. Sixty organisations signed the letter, including the Aboriginal Legal Service and the Sydney Institute of Criminology....

Amnesty International, Save the Children and the Human Rights Law Centre are also signatories to the letter, which states the premier's bail changes will "make crime worse in regional communities, not better".

"Your new policy to increase youth incarceration is a betrayal of your Closing the Gap commitments," they tell the premier....


Monday 18 March 2024

A brief background on the Morrison Coalition Government's response to its own inquiry into the establishment of a nuclear power industry in Australia


"Australia currently has a moratorium in place that prohibits it from the ‘construction or operation’ of a number of nuclear installations, including nuclear power plants. This moratorium was introduced by Parliament in 1998 during consideration of the legislation to create ARPANSA, and at a time of strong anti-nuclear sentiment in Australia, particularly following French nuclear weapons testing in the Pacific and the ‘Rainbow Warrior’ incident." [Australian Parliament, HoR Standing Committee on the Environment and Energy, December 2019, Not without your approval: a way forward for nuclear technology in Australia, p.4]

During the term of the 46th Australian Parliament with then Prime Minister Scott Morrison leading the federal government, following a referral from the Minister for Energy and Emissions Reduction, Angus Taylor MP, the House of Representatives Standing Committee on the Environment and Energy resolved on 6 August 2019 to conduct an inquiry into the prerequisites for nuclear energy in Australia.


The Committee conducting the Inquiry comprised:


Ted O'Brien Liberal MP for Fairfax - Chair

Josh Wilson Labor MP for Freemantle - Deputy Chair

Members:

Bridget Archer Liberal MP for Bass

Zali Steggall Independent MP

Josh Burns Labor MP for Macnamara

Rick Wilson Liberal MP for O'Connor

David Gillespie Nationals MP for Lyne

Trent Zimmerman Liberal MP for North Sydney

Supplementary Members:

Keith Pitt Nationals MP for Hinkler

(from 20 August 2019)

Fiona Phillips Labor MP for Gilmore

(from 17 September 2019)


In October 2019 the Committee held three consecutive hearings days in Canberra and accepted 309 submissions.


On Friday, 13 December 2019, the Committee presented its report on the Inquiry into the prerequisites for nuclear energy in Australia titled "Not without your approval: a way forward for nuclear technology in Australia" .


There were two dissenting reports included with the Committees final report - one from Labor and one Independent report.


It is interesting to note that although the final report mentioned difficulties caused in the creation of a nuclear power generation industry in Australia where none existed - including the time required to establish the prerequisite legal framework, the acquiring & training of a nuclear power workforce, the numbers of years between planning, construction & a power station coming on line and the expense of nuclear power supply at 2018 & 2019 prices - overall it was as a government initiative in favour of the establishment of a nuclear power industry.


However, the Morrison Government wrote no response to the report and markedly failed one of the most preliminary steps recommended:

1.145 The Australian Government should commission a readiness assessment.

This requires an expert body such as the Australian Radiation Protection and Nuclear Safety Agency (ARPANSA) to identify the major requirements that would need to be in place before Australia was ready to adopt nuclear energy.


For the next two years and one hundred & sixty days the Morrison Government sat on its hands.


Now four years and around 49 days after the report was left to moulder, in Opposition the rump of that government has decided it will make establishing a nuclear power industry one of its high profile policies.


Rather strangely, these days Opposition MPs rarely mention their own 230 page report as they make the new case for nuclear power.


Sunday 17 March 2024

Liberal MP for Dickson & Leader of the Coalition Opposition Peter Dutton called the CSIRO an unreliable scientific body producing "discredited" work and is now reaping what he has sown


"In the growing heat of debate over Coalition nuclear energy policy, Mr Dutton described the CSIRO’s GenCost report on the cost of electricity generation as “discredited” and “not a genuine piece of work” and suggested it was “well documented” that the CSIRO cannot be relied on." [InnovationAUS, 15 March 2024]





 

Open letter from Dr Doug Hilton, Chief Executive, CSIRO

15 MARCH 2024

NEWS RELEASE


Science is crucial to providing the data and models that allow society to tackle profound challenges; challenges like the COVID-19 pandemic, transition to net zero, keeping Australian industry productive and sustainable, and protecting our unique biodiversity.


For science to be useful and for challenges to be overcome it requires the trust of the community. Maintaining trust requires scientists to act with integrity. Maintaining trust also requires our political leaders to resist the temptation to disparage science.


As Chief Executive of CSIRO, I will staunchly defend our scientists and our organisation against unfounded criticism.


The GenCost report is updated each year and provides the very best estimates for the cost of future new-build electricity generation in Australia. The report is carefully produced, its methodology is clearly articulated, our scientists are open and responsive to feedback, and as is the case for all creditable science, the report is updated regularly as new data comes to hand.


The GenCost report can be trusted by all our elected representatives, irrespective of whether they are advocating for electricity generation by renewables, coal, gas or nuclear energy.


No matter the challenge we are tackling, CSIRO’s scientists and engineers can be relied on by the community to work creatively, assiduously and with integrity.


Dr Douglas Hilton

Chief Executive, CSIRO



Some of the mainstream media headlines generated by Dutton's attempt to deny the considerable downside of introducing nuclear power stations into Australia's energy grid........


The Guardian

CSIRO chief warns against ‘disparaging science’ after Peter Dutton criticises nuclear energy costings

Douglas Hilton says he will 'staunchly defend' scientists as opposition leader repeats incorrect claim that CSIRO report does not accurately...

15.03.24


Australian Broadcasting Corporation

Nation's science agency CSIRO hits back at Dutton claim that nuclear power costings were 'discredited'

The CSIRO has rebuked politicians seeking to undermine its research showing nuclear energy would be much more expensive than solar or wind...

15.03.24


The Sydney Morning Herald

Don’t disparage the science’: CSIRO hits back at Dutton on nuclear energy

Australia's top science agency has made a rare political intervention as CSIRO chief executive Doug Hilton defended his agency's findings on...

15.03.24


News.com.au

Nuclear question Dutton won’t answer

Peter Dutton has failed to answer a key question in a fiery clash with Bill Shorten over nuclear energy.

15.03.24


The New Daily

CSIRO hits back at Dutton's 'unfounded' criticism

Australia's national science agency has taken aim at Liberal leader Peter Dutton in a highly unusual public intervention.

15.03.24


The Canberra Times

CSIRO Chief defends GenCost report from political attack

Dr. Doug Hilton stands by CSIRO's GenCost report findings amidst political criticism from Coalition leader Peter Dutton.

15.03.24


The Age

CSIRO hits back at Dutton attack on its nuclear energy reports

Australia's top science agency has made a rare political intervention, with CSIRO chief executive Douglas Hilton defending his agency's...

15.03.24


Hunter Valley News

CSIRO boss defends scientists after Dutton attack

CSIRO chief executive officer Douglas Hilton has issued a rare public statement to urge politicians to "resist the...

15.03.24


The Wimmera Mail-Times

CSIRO boss defends scientists after Dutton attack

CSIRO chief executive officer Douglas Hilton has issued a rare public statement to urge politicians to "resist the...

15.03.24


Then on the same day the Centre for Independent Studies, a conservative seemingly pro-nuclear 'think tank' which also supported the No position in the 2023 national referendum and whose executive director just happened in 2008 to have been a senior adviser to former federal Liberal Party Leader Brendan Nelson and in 2009 was himself he a candidate to replace Nelson in his northern Sydney electoral seat of Bradfield, attempted to ride to Peter Dutton's rescue on social media with a whitewash of the Opposition Leader's comments and an interesting interpretation of the contents of CSIRO news release.


Centre for Independent Studies @CISOZ

CIS responds to @CSIRO's open letter.


"Not all criticisms are unfounded. If the CEO wants to defend the methods and conclusions of a particular report from criticism, he should do just that, rather than simply asserting that the report can be trusted when serious flaws still exist."

15.03.24


Friday 15 March 2024

Final Report of the Aged Care Taskforce March 2024: "A strong preference for many older people and their families is for them to age in place and remain in their home for as long as they are able. This was reflected in responses to the stakeholder survey, with 90% of respondents supporting the principle."

 

Given the growing number of people over the age of 65 years living in the Northern Rivers region, this may be of some interest to retirees, their families and friends.


Australian Government, Final report of the Aged Care Taskforce, 12 March 2024, excerpt:


Support older people to age in place


______________________________________


Principle 1: The aged care system should support older people to live at home for as long as they wish and can do so safely.

______________________________________


A strong preference for many older people and their families is for them to age in place and remain in their home for as long as they are able. This was reflected in responses to the stakeholder survey, with 90% of respondents supporting the principle.


The decision of whether an older person wishes to remain at home or enter residential aged care is driven by a wide range of factors. Consultation showed the top reasons for preferring to remain at home included comfort and privacy, a desire to remain independent, better mental and physical health outcomes and maintaining connection to community, friends and family. For other reasons, such as social connectedness, increasing clinical care and safety needs, some older people may choose to enter residential aged care sooner. While overall there is a shift towards ageing in place, it is important to meet each person’s preferences for their aged care and provide continuity of care when needs change.


Home care programs need an overhaul to meet future demand


The current home care programs are not ready to meet the needs of a rapidly growing cohort of older people. Home care currently involves 2 programs, the Home Care Packages Program and the Commonwealth Home Support Programme, that have evolved over time and with different design objectives. This has led to a system where:

applicant assessments are inconsistent and not well aligned to actual need

access to services is constrained and inconsistent, and many older people are not receiving an optimal mix of services 

• services are priced and fees are charged inconsistently (see Appendix E for details)

different funding approaches are impeding the sector from scaling up and diversifying

there is a lack of clarity about what services should be available.


Those who can access home care under the current system can leave significant funds unspent, while others can wait for months to access services. This is due to existing program constraints, limited availability of services and appropriately skilled workers, as well as behavioural and attitudinal factors. In the Home Care Packages Program, unspent funds as at 30 June 2022 totalled $2.3 billion.16 Prices across the programs are inconsistent and inefficient due to variable price setting arrangements. This undermines the predictability and sustainability of funding and can cause confusion when comparing packages with other participants.


There are also obvious signs of lack of scale and diversification of providers. As the population ages, these issues will need to be addressed to deliver a rapid scaling up of services to meet demand.


The Support at Home Program is an opportunity for generational change in how home care is delivered


It will also be important to make sure home care better meets older people’s needs, while enabling program

scalability and pricing signals that ensure funds are used consistently and in line with program intent. In

addition, home care must provide value for money, transparency and better quality services.


The new Support at Home Program, to be introduced in stages from July 2025, is an opportunity to address

these critical issues in the current home care programs.


As the Support at Home Program is implemented, it will be important to ensure the new arrangements

deliver on the intent of the design and meet the expectations of older people, their families and carers for:

greater choice and control

easier and more timely access

flexibility to adjust services over time as needs change

better value for money through controls on unreasonable administration fees

better clarity and transparency around fees and how funding is used.


It is also important that the new arrangements deliver for providers, acknowledging the need for:

more predictable and sustainable funding that meets the costs of quality service delivery

recognition of the costs associated with complying with regulatory requirements

flexibility to adjust services on the ground as participant needs change

improved use of a qualified and skilled workforce to increase service availability

appropriate and adequate implementation timeframes.


Support at Home Program inclusions and exclusions need to be more clearly defined than under current programs


The Taskforce was asked to provide advice on program inclusions and participant contributions for the

Support at Home Program. In developing this advice, the Taskforce considered the diverse needs, goals and

circumstances of participants, the intent of the program and the role of other service systems. The

importance of prevention, flexibility and reablement also played a key role in discussions.


The Taskforce notes the Support at Home Program needs much clearer specifications than current programs about what it will and will not fund. The lack of clarity and consistency in inclusions and exclusions in current home care programs has led to confusion between providers and participants. This affects participants’ ability to make informed choices about their care, diminishes value for money in the programs, and could also mean that funds are not used according to the policy intent of home care.


Read and download the full report at:

https://www.health.gov.au/sites/default/files/2024-03/final-report-of-the-aged-care-taskforce_0.pdf

With Aging in Place recommendations on pages 16 to 18.


Thursday 14 March 2024

About Peter and David's little plan to put a fast transitioning to renewable energy on the backburner in favour of creating a nuclear power industry in Australia

 

It would appear as though the two Coalition opposition parties are determined to take the creation of a nuclear power industry to the 2025 federal general election.


It is being presented as cost-effective and relatively risk free way to provide for Australia's future energy needs.


So here are some basic facts to consider when evaluating the propaganda beginning to spread across national newspapers and social media.


CAPITOL COSTS





Annual change in capital costs: Across the board, new build costs have generally stabilised as the impacts of inflation ease. However, cost pressure remains on gas, onshore wind and nuclear SMR. [Draft GenCost Report, December 2023]



The CSIRO Draft GenCost Report 2023-24 stated that Nuclear small modular reactors (SMRs) emerged as the highest-cost technology explored in the report. This corresponds with new data from the most advanced SMR project in the US.


SMRs are the type of nuclear power facility favoured by Liberal MP for Dickson & Leader of the Parliamentary Liberal Party, Peter Dutton and Nationals MP for Maranoa and Leader of the Parliamentary National Party, David Littleproud.


SMRs at this stage exist only as either prototype drawings or development projects - appearing at this point in time to be unrealised technology.


According to the current Draft GenCost Report:


Significant increase in nuclear small modular reactor costs

The cost of nuclear small modular reactors (SMR) has been a contentious issue in GenCost for many years with conflicting data published by other groups proposing lower costs than those assumed in GenCost (ES Figure 0-3). UAMPS (Utah Associated Municipal Power Systems) is a US regional coalition that develops local government owned electricity generation projects. Up until the project’s cancellation in November 2023, UAMP was the developer of a nuclear SMR project called the Carbon Free Power Project (CFPP) with a gross capacity of 462MW. It was planned to be fully operational by 2030. After conversion to 2023 Australian dollars, project costs were estimated in 2020 to be $18,200/kW which is only slightly below the level that GenCost had been applying ($19,000kW).


While the EFSC Investment Group states that estimates suggest that the construction cost of a coal-fired thermal power plant can range from less than $1,000 to $4,500 per each kilowatt of installed capacity.


That's a whopping $14,000 difference at the high end of the costing range. Making these boutique smaller nuclear power units very expensive if they can be realised.


Then there is the limited service area of nuclear small module reactors (SMRs). Based on the U.S. Carbon Free Power Project SMR with a proposed gross capacity of 462MW, such an SMR would be able to supply a mere est. 31,862 residential households according to Ausgrid 2022-23 electricity consumption figures. Hardly value for money given the high cost to Treasury and Australian taxpayers of building and bringing online these small power plants, by CSIRO estimates around $8.7 billion per SMR.


Lake Macquarie City Library reveals that: The total cost of the Eraring Power Station, built by the NSW Electricity Commission was $1.653 billion. Work commenced with the earthworks on the site in 1976, followed by construction of the station beginning in 1977. Several of the larger components of the station were shipped through the Swansea channel, up Lake Macquarie to the Eraring site. The first generating unit was brought into service in March, 1982, the second and third units in 1983 and the fourth unit in 1984.


The Coalition Shadow Minister for Climate Change and Energy is fond of tossing out timescales for nuclear power stations builds - from around 5 years to complete construction of an small modular reactor (SMR) to 10-12 years for a large-scale nuclear power plant.


In the first instance it's hard to assign a build timeline to an SMR because one hasn't actually been built yet.

In the second instance, the build time lines for existing large-scale nuclear reactors ranging from 1,000MW-e to 1,350MW-e capacity is fairly well known and historically construction completion took between 19.66 to 25.08 years. These days the optimistic theoretical time given for completed construction of a 1,000MW-e nuclear power station is seven and a half years.


In the case of a nuclear power plant with the same capacity as the Eraring coal-fired power station, without factoring in the long lead-in years of legislative framing, planning and approval processes, actual construction could be expected to be completed in 18 years at the earliest. While the World Nuclear Organisation figures would put the overnight cost of this nuclear power plant in Australian dollars at $9,115 per KW-e as a starting point which comes in at over $17.6 million overnight or $6.4 billion over 365 nights.


So if Dutton & Co were to form government in 2025 and hit the ground running - by my reckoning they might, just might, have one solitary nuclear power station built and online by 2058 at a cost on current pricing in the vicinity of $21 billion. Having achieved nothing nuclear towards the net zero by 2050 policy


It is interesting to note that the Coalition parties see coal-fired generation as remaining critical to Australia's electricity supply and the Liberal Party makes a point of saying so in its 2025 re-election plan for the resources sector. A plan that doesn't even include the words "nuclear power stations" Indeed one might suspect Dutton and Littleproud of raising the possibility of future nuclear energy as an excuse to maintain all existing coal-fired power stations should they win government again and, that it what makes this particular energy option so attractive a proposition.


Dutton & his nuclear cheer squad are also saying that if elected to federal government that they will not be ruling out including in Coalition policy a crossover to large-scale nuclear power generation on retired or soon to be retired coal-fired power station sites.


A fact that should give communities in places like the Lake Macquarie region reason to pause and consider, given Eraring Power Station is due for retirement soon.


The risks involved with a 2,922MW capacity coal-fired power station already drawing 11 billion litres of salt water a day from Lake Macquarie and returning it after cooling, is a different proposition to a full-scale nuclear power plant of similar capacity drawing at least 7.9 million litres of water a day from an as yet unidentified source, contaminating an unknown percentage of that water with radionuclides – unstable atoms with excess energy – and then seeking to return supposedly 'cleaned' water to the lake.


Given uncontrolled water and liquid effluent releases from nuclear power stations have occurred in the past, some contaminating groundwater, this is one more worry our regional communities do not need.


Wednesday 13 March 2024

CLARENCE VALLEY CONSERVATION COALITION'S VOICES FOR THE EARTH "EARTH MATTERS" SESSIONS START AGAIN ON 18 MARCH 2024

 








Clarence Valley Independent, 6 March 2024:


VOICES FOR THE EARTH

EARTH MATTERS SESSIONS START IN MARCH



The Clarence Valley Conservation Coalition (CVCC) is restarting its Earth Matters environmental information sessions on March 18 after a break in 2020 following the advent of covid.


These public events, introduced in 2004, were held every two months between March and November and were conducted by a range of people from the community, or from government or local environment groups. Sometimes the goal was acquiring information about an issue while at other times it involved exploration of an idea, the seeking of a solution or celebrating the wonders of the natural world.


The range of subjects over the years has included sustainable farming, climate change, the impact of light at night, flying fox ecology, cane toads in the Clarence Valley, Grafton’s tree heritage, riparian vegetation on the floodplain, native bees, waste management and recycling, inspiration for your town garden, conservation in north-west Tasmania, national parks in India and Bhutan, and restoring rainforest.


Recently the CVCC decided to restart these public information sessions. The new venue is the Joan Muir Community Centre in Turf Street, Grafton. Sessions will be held between 6 and 8 pm on the third Monday of the month in March, May, July, September and November. The events will generally consist of a presentation by one or more speakers for an hour, followed by a short question and discussion session and light refreshments. Those attending will be asked to contribute a gold coin to assist with expenses.


The first two presentations have been arranged and the CVCC is looking forward to providing the community with information on a range of important environmental matters from March onwards.


Proposed Mineral Mining in the Clarence Catchment is the subject of the first Earth Matters session on March 18. Shae Fleming, Clarence Catchment Alliance Coordinator (CCA), will discuss the current situation on mining in the Clarence Catchment, CCA's role, the community campaign's aim and progress to date, the threat of mineral mining to our local water, species, environment, social, cultural and economic wellbeing and how you can help.


  • Leonie Blain


Tuesday 12 March 2024

NSW Minister for Finance Courtney Houssos has written to 128 councils urging those who use ticketless parking fines to address shortcoming in their approach. Requests councils to provide an on the spot, written notification to drivers

 

9 News, 11 March 2024






ECHO, 11 March 2024:


The days of receiving ticketless council parking fines in NSW are to end thanks to new directions from the Labor state government.


Half of all fines processed by Revenue NSW are reportedly council parking fines, with 48 councils issuing ticketless fines including the Tweed, Ballina and Lismore local government areas (LGAs).


Some councils have abandoned the use of on-the-spot paper fines altogether.


The former coalition state government introduced the ticketless scheme as a trial in May 2020 before expanding it to more councils in December 2020.


Local governments included in the scheme can lodge parking infringements directly with Revenue NSW, along with photographic evidence, rather than by leaving a ticket on the offending car.


Drivers are in most cases unaware they’ve received a fine until it arrives by mail or the Service NSW app.


NSW Minister for Finance Courtney Houssos says the scheme has eroded trust in the state’s parking fine system.


Minister pushes for photographic evidence in parking fines


The minister on Sunday issued a media release saying she’d written to all 128 councils across the state asking them to return to the practice of issuing on-the-spot written notifications, such as small pre-printed cards left on the windscreen.


While leaving a note isn’t mandatory under state regulations, the minister says drivers who know they’ve been booked may want to collect evidence such as photos and details of where they parked in case they want to seek a review.


This note does not necessarily need to form part of the infringement notice but at a minimum it should inform the driver they will soon receive an infringement notice via post or the Service NSW app,’ Ms Houssos wrote in her letter, included in Sunday’s media release.


The minister also requested councils using ticketless fines to review processes to make sure photographic evidence is captured and sent to Revenue NSW.


Lismore council issues nearly $130K in ticketless parking fines


Concerns were also raised about the timeliness of notifications to drivers, with some people said to have received multiple ticketless fines before being told.


The scheme is further accused of having a reduced impact in terms of immediate parking offence deterrence and driver behaviour influence.


On the Northern Rivers, the Lismore City Council is recorded as issuing the most ticketless parking fines in 2023 at 898, followed by the Ballina Shire Council at 473 and the Tweed Shire Council at two.


Ticketless fines in the Lismore LGA were valued at more than $127,000.


The local figures paled in comparison to some metropolitan councils, where fines in the tens of thousands were recorded.


The North Sydney Council issued 52,251 ticketless fines, for example.


The Byron Shire Council wasn’t included in the list.....



NSW Government, Minister for Finance, 10 March 2024 media release at:

https://www.nsw.gov.au/media-releases/ticketless-parking-fines-must-meet-community-expectations