Showing posts with label News Corp. Show all posts
Showing posts with label News Corp. Show all posts
Friday 20 December 2019
Facebook Inc. agrees to pay News Corp millions annually for news service content
Australian Newspaper History
Group Newsletter, No 105,
December 2019, p.6:
105.2.1
Facebook’s news service
The
launch of Facebook’s news service is a “powerful precedent that
will echo around editorial departments”, News Corp chief executive
Robert Thomson has declared (Australian, 28 October 2019). Thomson
said it had been a difficult decade for journalism, but Facebook’s
service was an important step. He said, “Great journalism will only
be sustainable at scale if there is a fundamental change to the
digital ecosystem. This announcement is an important step on the
road.”
News
Corp’s deal with Facebook — which covers the New York Post and
Dow Jones publications such as the Wall Street Journal, MarketWatch
and Barron’s — will generate licence fees reaching into the
double-digit millions of dollars a year, people familiar with the
agreement said. “Of itself, it begins to change the terms of trade
for quality journalism, both in establishing the principle of
payment, and in allowing news organisations a clearer opportunity to
generate advertising revenue on their terms,” Thomson said. He has
led a global battle against Facebook and Google over issues including
opaque algorithms, digital advertising dominance and a failure to pay
for journalists’ work.....
Facebook’s news service launched with a test audience of 200,000 US users, but the platform plans
to roll it out beyond the US early next year. A date for launch in Australia has not been announced.
Sunday 24 November 2019
Very predictably News Corp rolled out a climate change denier to help buttress the Morrison Government's stubborn contrarian stance
Here is mining company director/shareholder and sometimes owner, as well as consultant to industry, Ian Plimer, joining in the Abbott-Turnbull-Morrison-Murdoch Coalition's ongoing attempt to deny anthropomorphic global warming and climate change.
In the opening paragraphs of the article Plimer exceeds his previous infantile opposition to the science of climate change.
The Australian, 22 November 2019, p.12:
Talk of an emergency is ignorant, populist scaremongering
As soon as the words carbon footprint, emissions, pollution, and decarbonisation, climate emergency, extreme weather, unprecedented and extinction are used, I know I am being conned by ignorant activists, populist scaremongering, vote-chasing politicians and rent seekers.
Pollution by plastics, sulphur and nitrogen gases, particulates and chemicals occurs in developing countries. That’s real pollution. The major pollution in advanced economies is the polluting of minds about the role of carbon dioxide. There are no carbon emissions. If there were, we could not see because most carbon is black. Such terms are deliberately misleading, as are many claims...... [my yellow highlighting]
As most high school students would be able to tell Mr. Plimer - not that he needs telling as he was university educated and his purpose here is to obfuscate not inform - "Carbon" is shorthand for "Carbon Dioxide Equivalent" or CO2-e.
These terms covers what are known as "Greenhouse Gases" such as water vapour, carbon dioxide, methane, nitrous oxide, ozone, some artificial chemicals such as chlorofluorocarbons and hydrocarbons.
Again, a high school student would be aware that black carbon is a dangerous air polluting element - mainly produced by the incomplete combustion of oil or coal and the burning of wood. It also contributes to global warming.
However, the reason black carbon has not turned the sky into permanent darkness that Plimer suggests as an outcome is that it has not yet reached saturation levels in the atmosphere.
Though black carbon can lead to very low visibility for prolonged periods as the bushfire smoke over Sydney and rural/regional Australia this month demonstrated and, open-cut coal mining on a weekly basis and city traffic periodically demonstrate throughout the year.
Bushfire smoke over Sydney NSW, 21 November 2019 2GB Image |
Bushfire smoke in Clarence Valley NSW, 22 November 2019 NSWRFS Image |
Air pollution over coal mine, Hunter Valley NSW, circa 2019 The Singleton Argus Image |
Smog in Melbourne Vic, 28 June 2018 ABC News Image
Mr. Plimer makes a fool of himself in his attempt to fool others - when the evidence of black carbon pollution is both before our eyes and in the air quality readings that state governments collect. [See NSW EPA website]
|
Labels:
climate change denialists,
News Corp,
Rupert Murdoch
Sunday 16 June 2019
News Corp columnist's rant runs foul of Australian Press Council standards
Adjudication
1757: Complainant / The Daily Telegraph (June 2019)
Document
Type: Complaints
Outcome:
Adjudications
The
Press Council considered whether its Standards of Practice were breached by an
article published by The Daily Telegraph on 13 September 2017 by The Daily
Telegraph headed in print “An identity crisis” and online “WHAT MADNESS CAN
JUSTIFY MUTILATING OUR CHILDREN” and a Podcast on 16 April 2018 titled “Ryan T.
Anderson joins Miranda Devine live on gender identity”, included as a link in
the online article.
The
article referred to a “pernicious social fad for transgenderism in children
which has been embraced by an activist subset of the medical profession” and
stated that “new laws in Victoria can punish therapists who oppose
transitioning children” and “hundreds of children who say they are trapped in
the body of the opposite sex are being referred to gender clinics in Australia,
with numbers tripling in the past three years at one Sydney clinic.” It
included comments by a named University Professor, who it described as “one of
the few pediatricians courageous enough to speak out against this fashion for
‘child surgical abuse’”. It quoted the Professor saying that “Prepubertal
children have no idea about sexuality and choices of procreation afterwards”
and “We’re messing with their limbic system and expecting them to make this
great evaluation.”
The
article went on to say: “Yet there is no medical evidence to justify the
epidemic of transgender kids. No evidence that changing sex will reduce the
incidence of self-harm or suicide or lessen the impact of other associated
mental states such as depression or autism.” The article concluded: “When they
grow up, surely these children have grounds for a class action against the
hospitals and drug companies which have mounted such a monstrous assault on
their developing bodies.”
The
podcast was referred to as an interview with Ryan T. Anderson to “discuss
recent attempts in Australia and the United States to introduce gender theory
into anti-bullying programs”. The introduction said: “Children are being given
puberty blockers and cross-sex hormones and having their breasts removed at the
age of 14 and 15 with the permission of the Family Court. Yet there is little
medical evidence to justify this experimentation on children, no evidence that
these hormones are safe to be used on kids, no evidence of any reduction in
self-harm or suicide.”
Following
a complaint, the Council asked the publication to comment on whether the
article and podcast complied with its Standards of Practice. In particular, the
Council sought comment on the statement that there is “no evidence” that
“cross-sex hormones are safe to be used on kids, no evidence of any reduction
in self-harm or suicide” or “that changing sex will reduce the incidence of
self-harm or suicide”. The Council referred the publication to a number of
articles identified by the complainant, including one entitled “Endocrine
Treatment of Transsexual Persons: An Endocrine Society Clinical Practice
Guideline” (2009).
In
addition the Council sought comment on whether the article’s statement that
“new laws in Victoria can punish therapists who oppose transitioning their
children”, given the provisions of the new Victorian Health Complaints Act, and
on the descriptions of medical procedures as “mutilation” and “child surgical
abuse” and a “monstrous assault on their developing bodies” were a breach of
the Council’s Standards.
The
publication said the article and the content of the podcast were clearly
identified as opinion and the author was entitled to express her opinion
concerning the medical practices administered to children and adolescents in
gender clinics. It said that in making comments, particularly those concerning
there being “no evidence” of the matters referred to, the author relied on
interviews with medical experts in the field, widespread reading of the
scientific literature and anecdotal evidence of parents and people who regret
childhood hormone or surgical interventions, as well as the experiences of a transgender
friend of the author. The publication identified a number of medical articles
as relevant.
The
publication said the Victorian Health Complaints Act is designed to prevent
conversion therapy of sexual minorities and to provide for a complaints process
about health service provision.
It
said the columnist was entitled to express her views on the appropriateness of
how sections of the medical profession are treating children who they believe
are transgender and to express her view that it is wrong for a child as young
as 15 years to be receiving medically unnecessary double mastectomies.
Conclusion
The
Council’s Standards of Practice applicable in this matter require that
publications take reasonable steps to ensure that factual material is accurate
and not misleading and is distinguishable from other material such as opinion
(General Principle 1), and presented with reasonable fairness and balance, and
that writers’ expressions of opinion are not based on significantly inaccurate
factual material or omission of key facts (General Principle 3). If the
material is significantly inaccurate or misleading, or unfair or
unbalanced, publications must take reasonable steps to provide adequate
remedial action or an opportunity for a response to be published (General
Principles 2 and 4). The Standards of Practice also require that
publications take reasonable steps to avoid causing or contributing materially
to substantial offence, distress or prejudice, or to a substantial risk to
health or safety, unless doing so is sufficiently in the public interest
(General Principle 6).
The
Council notes that the article and the podcast contain expressions of the
author’s opinion. However, the Council considers they also contain material
presented as facts, including the statement in the article that there is “No
evidence that changing sex will reduce the incidence of self-harm or suicide or
lessen the impact of other associated mental states such as depression or
autism” and in the podcast that there is “no evidence that these hormones are
safe to be used on kids, no evidence of any reduction in self-harm or
suicide”.
The
Council accepts that it is open to an author to question the appropriateness of
particular medical treatments and procedures. There may be conflicting evidence
in support of, or opposition to, such treatments which the Council will not be
in a position to resolve. However the statements that there was “no evidence”
was not qualified in any way, such as asserting that there was no reliable
evidence. The Council notes that the publication did not rely on any particular
article as supporting a statement that there was “no evidence”. The Council
considers that, given the existence of medical guidelines which recommend
various treatments and procedures to assist transitioning children and
adolescents, the statement that there was “no evidence” was made in such
absolute terms that it was inaccurate and misleading. The Council
considers the publication failed to take reasonable steps to ensure these
statements were accurate and not misleading.
Accordingly,
the Council finds that the publication breached General Principles 1 and 3 in
these respects. This conclusion does not amount to a finding on the
appropriateness of the medical treatments available.
As
to the new laws in Victoria, the Council considers that the broad term
‘therapists’ could include persons who, if providing a general health service,
may fall under the remit of the new Victorian Health Complaints Act and
therefore be subject to penalties under the Act. The Council is satisfied on
the material available to it that the statement “... new laws in Victoria can
punish therapists who oppose transitioning children …” is not inaccurate or
misleading. Accordingly, the Council does not consider that General Principles
1 and 3 were breached in this respect.
As
the publication was not approached for a correction or right of reply, the
Council considers there was no breach of General Principles 2 and 4.
The
Council accepts that the columnist’s descriptions of medical procedures as
“mutilation”, “child surgical abuse” and a “monstrous assault on their
developing bodies” were likely to cause offence and distress amongst those
undergoing such treatment and amongst their families, and were also likely to
cause or exacerbate prejudice. However, the Council considers there is public
interest in vigorous public debate about the issue, even when an argument is
expressed in very strong terms, as is the case here. The Council considers that
to the extent there was substantial offence, distress and prejudice, it was
justified in the public interest. Accordingly, General Principle 6 was not
breached.
Relevant
Council Standards (not required for publication)
This
Adjudication applies the following General Principles of the Council.
Publications
must take reasonable steps to:
General
Principle 1 – Ensure that factual material in news reports and elsewhere is
accurate and not misleading, and is distinguishable from other material such as
opinion.
General
Principle 2 – Provide a correction or other adequate remedial action if
published material is significantly inaccurate or misleading.
General
Principle 3 – Ensure that factual material is presented with reasonable
fairness and balance, and that writers’ expressions of opinion are not based on
significantly inaccurate factual material or omission of key facts.
General
Principle 4 – Ensure that where material refers adversely to a person, a fair
opportunity is given for subsequent publication of a reply if that is
reasonably necessary to address a possible breach of General Principle 3.
General
Principle 6 - Avoid causing or contributing materiality to substantial offence,
distress or prejudice, or a substantial risk to health or safety, unless doing
so is sufficiently in the public interest.
Labels:
adjudication,
News Corp,
The Daily Telegraph
Tuesday 4 June 2019
On 4 June 2019 federal police raided home of Newscorp journalist over story detailing an alleged government proposal to spy on Australians
It seems that someone in the Morrison Government may have laid a complaint........
Braidwood
Times, 4 June
2019:
Federal police have
raided the home of a journalist over a 2018 story detailing an alleged
government proposal to spy on Australians.
Australian Federal
Police officers produced a warrant to search the home, computer and mobile
phone of Canberra-based News Corp Australia journalist Annika Smethurst, The
Daily Telegraph reports.
The story in question
had included images of letters between the heads of the Home Affairs and
Defence departments, discussing potential new powers for the Australian Signals
Directorate (ASD).
The powers would have
allowed the ASD's cyber sleuths to monitor Australian citizens and businesses
on home soil, rather than being limited to gathering intelligence on
foreigners, the story said.
The AFP said the raid is
in relation to "alleged unauthorised disclosure of national security
information" and that no arrests are expected on Tuesday.
"Police will allege
the unauthorised disclosure of these specific documents undermines Australia's
national security," the agency said in a statement…...
BACKGROUND
Sunday Tasmanian, 6 May 2018, p.13:
The Federal Government
has “war-gamed” scenarios where our cyber spy agency needed to be
given the power to investigate Australian citizens.
Last week the Sunday
Tasmanian revealed a secret plan to increase the Australian Signals
Directorate’s powers to allow them to spy on Aussies.
Department bosses
claimed there was “no proposal to increase the ASD’s powers to collect intelligence
on Australians”. But letters between Home Affairs secretary Mike Pezzullo and
Defence Secretary Greg Moriarty reveal the departments of Home Affairs and
Defence allocated staff to war game a raft of scenarios where the ASD would
need to spy on Australians.
The list of scenarios
were compiled in two attachments and sent to the heads of both departments
under the headline “scenarios proposed by Home Affairs”.
The document explains
how ASD could be used to disrupt “onshore and offshore online threats” such as
“disrupting child exploitation networks and terrorist networks” and “illicit
drug importation, money laundering and serious crimes”.
Last week’s Sunday
Tasmanian exclusive has prompted calls for MPs to have greater oversight of
Australia’s intelligence agencies…..
Sunday Telegraph, 29 April 2018, p.5:
Australia’s intelligence
watchdog has warned the Australian Signals Directorate against any moves that
would change the agency’s focus “to people and organisations inside Australia”
instead of focusing on activities overseas.
The veiled warning came
in March during a review into new laws which established the ASD as a statutory
body.
In her submission,
Inspector-General of Intelligence and Security (IGIS) Margaret Stone, a former
Federal Court judge, said under the current laws ASD is not permitted to access
digital information located inside Australia.
“Accessing data located
inside Australia is properly an action that requires an ASIO or police
warrant,” she said in her submission.
“Nothing in the
Intelligence Services Act would allow ASD to access restricted data on a
computer physically located inside Australia — even where doing so would assist
in gathering intelligence or disrupting crime,” she said…..
Sunday Telegraph, 29 April 2018, p.4:
Two powerful government
agencies are discussing radical new espionage powers that would see Australia’s
cyber spy agency monitor Australian citizens for the first time.
Under the plan, emails,
bank records and text messages of Australians could be secretly accessed by
digital spies without a trace, provided the Defence and Home Affairs
ministers approved.
The power grab is
detailed in top secret letters between the heads of the Department of Home
Affairs and Defence, seen by The Sunday Telegraph, which outline proposed new
powers for Australia’s electronic spy agency — the Australian Signals
Directorate (ASD).
The Sunday Telegraph can
reveal the Secretary of the Department of Home Affairs Mike Pezzullo first
wrote to the Defence Secretary Greg Moriarty in February outlining the plan to
potentially allow government hackers to “proactively disrupt and covertly
remove” onshore cyber threats by “hacking into critical infrastructure”.
Under current laws the
ASD — whose mission statement is “Reveal Their Secrets — Protect Our Own” —
must not conduct an activity to produce intelligence on an Australian.
Instead, the Australian
Federal Police and domestic spy agency ASIO have the power to
investigate Australians with a warrant and can ask ASD for technical advice if
they don’t have the capabilities they need.
The Attorney-General is
responsible for issuing ASIO warrants, but the agency’s operations will fall
under the umbrella of Home Affairs.
Under the proposal, seen
by The Sunday Telegraph, Home Affairs Minister Peter Dutton and Defence
Minister Marise Payne would tick off on orders allowing cyber spooks to target
onshore threats without the country’s top law officer knowing.
Last month the proposal
was compiled in a top secret ministerial submission signed by ASD boss Mike
Burgess. The proposal outlines scenarios where Canberra-based cyber spies would
use offensive tactics to “counter or disrupt cyber-enabled criminals both
onshore and offshore”.
“The Department of Home
Affairs advises that it is briefing the Minister for Home Affairs to write to
you (Ms Payne) seeking your support for a further tranche of legislative reform
to enable ASD to better support a range of Home Affairs priorities.”
But The
Sunday Telegraph understands Mr Dutton has not written to Minister Payne and no
formal proposal for leglslative amendments have been presented to Government.
“The Australian Signals
Directorate has not prepared ministerial advice seeking permissions to allow
ASD to counter or disrupt cyber-enabled criminals onshore,” a spokesman for Ms
Payne said.
An intelligence source
said such reforms would allow cyber spies to secretly access
digital information on Australians without detection, including financial
transactions, health data and phone records.
“It would give the most
powerful cyber spies the power to turn on its own citizens,” the
source said.
The letter also details
a proposal for coercive “step-in” powers, meaning the intelligence agency could
force government agencies and private businesses to “comply with security
measures”.
The intelligence source
said ASD could be able to compel companies and government agencies to hand over
data or security information…… [my yellow highlighting]
The
Guardian, 25
January 2018:
Proposed changes to
Australia’s national security laws that could see journalists and
whistleblowers jailed for up to 20 years will “criminalise” reporting and
undermine the media’s ability to act in the public interest, the nation’s major
news outlets have warned.
In a joint
submission, 14 major media outlets including the ABC, Fairfax Media and
News Corp said sweeping changes to national security laws proposed by the
federal government would place journalists at “significant risk of jail time”
for doing their jobs.
The reforms,
tabled just hours after marriage equality became law in December, would
increase tenfold the maximum penalty for anyone who communicates or “deals
with” information which could potentially “cause harm to Australia’s
interests,” where that information is obtained via a government official
without authorisation.
Labels:
AFP,
intelligence,
journalists,
media,
national security,
News Corp,
spies
Friday 17 May 2019
Has U.S. citizen and media mogul Rupert Murdoch overplayed his hand in this Australian federal election cycle?
“It sounds unreal to
say that News Corp is not a media organisation. It sounds outré to say that it
is instead a political propaganda entity of a kind perhaps not seen since the
19th century, one that has climbed to its pedestal through regulatory
capture, governmental favours and menace, and is now applying its energies to
the promotion of white nationalism, even as white nationalists commit scores of
murders.” [Journalist Richard Cooke wiring in The Monthly,
May 2019],
It is your judgement that counts because the right and responsibility to elect the next Australian Government rests with you, the Australian voter, not with an elderly authoritarian U.S. billionaire who rarely visits this country.
Australian society is not as tolerant of Murdoch's sense of entitlement as it once may have been......
— 💧🐟 Lotta Cheek (@lottacheek) May 11, 2019
March 2018 to March 2019 year-to-year data shows News Corp's principal mastheads are losing readership over the 7 day circulation period, according to Roy Morgan.
By its own admission News Corp has been lobbying local government to keep its community papers afloat in South Australia.
Monday 13 May 2019
This move by Murdoch’s News Corp has Scott Morrison’s political paw prints all over it
Standing in
the shadows pulling the strings of those willing to make spurious or defamatory
claims about a political opponent worked so well for the interim Prime Minister
and Liberal MP for Cook Scott Morrison
in the past that he appears to be doing it again.
Last time the
efforts of his political puppets cost News
Corp tens of thousands of dollars in legal costs and like last time The Daily Telegraph is the
Liberals vehicle of choice.
The smear campaign
revealed……..
The
Saturday Paper,
11 May 2019, excerpt:
Midweek, Murdoch’s
Sydney tabloid The Daily Telegraph went for broke. On page one, it
ran a story under the headline “Mother of invention”, and set out to destroy
what it said was hailed as Shorten’s “election-winning moment”. It accused him
of omitting the fact his mother went on to enjoy an illustrious career as a
barrister. The paper said he had failed to disclose that his mother graduated
law later in life “and [practised] at the bar for six years”. It said the Labor
chief had only told half the family story. If that were the case, however, he
left out the half that gives even more potency to his mother’s legacy.
One senior Liberal wondered who was the genius on their
side who thought it a good idea to prompt the Telegraph’s ill-considered
and cockamamie attack. Gallery journalists confirm the “Libs were shopping the
story around on Tuesday”.
Melbourne’s Herald Sun, unlike its Brisbane
stablemate, The Courier-Mail, refused to take it. Scott Morrison played
the innocent bystander.
He told reporters it was a “very upsetting story” and he can understand that
Shorten would have been “very hurt by it”. That was an understatement. The
opposition leader was furious.
For 10 minutes during a
half-hour press conference on Wednesday, Shorten spoke of his mother’s
achievements. Fighting back tears, he told of a woman in her 50s with grey
hair, who, even though she topped her law school, could not get a law firm to
take her on for articles. When she eventually got to the bar, she struggled for
briefs – “she got about nine briefs in her time”. Far from fulfilling her
dream, as the Murdoch hatchet job claimed, she went back to education. The
partisan attack on the Labor leader opened the way for him to hit back at one
of the Liberals’ biggest vulnerabilities: their failure to promote more women
through their parliamentary ranks. Their most high-profile and credible woman,
Julie Bishop, has quit. She won’t be at the party’s Mother’s Day launch on
Sunday to support Morrison, the man who blocked her run for the leadership.
Shorten says the experience of his mother – “the smartest woman I’ve ever
known” – is why he believes in the equal treatment of women.
News Corp sources say the Tele has another
story on their news file to throw at Shorten. It is highly defamatory and
legally dubious.
The desperation that led to the attack on Shorten and his mother’s memory may
give them pause to think about running it. As one Labor campaign worker says,
“It’s difficult to know where the government ends and News Corp begins.” [my
yellow highlighting]
Phase Two of the smear campaign.......
A scurrilous, below-the-radar whispering campaign has broken through onto social media.
News Corp cries poor - wants local government funding
The comment of tweeter @Greg_MarineLab says it all:
"How very NewsCorp!
Begging for a taxpayer handout while never paying any tax & subverting
democracy...."
News Corp unsuccessfully lobbied a number of South Australian councils and, like the City of Tea Tree, Campbelltown, Playford and Salisbury councils didn't want to prop the Murdochs up when in all probability it would mean raising rates.
InDaily, 3 May 2019:
InDaily has confirmed with several sources a senior delegation of
News Corp executives, including South Australian executive general manager Ish
Davies and Messenger Newspapers editor-in-chief Nadja Fleet,
approached four north-eastern councils in March requesting significant
investment – totalling at least $1.6 million over two years – to keep the print
run of the local North Eastern Weekly afloat.
It has only taken the Murdoch's 32 years to run this once independent group of community newspapers into the ground.
Labels:
begging letter,
funding,
local government,
News Corp
Saturday 11 May 2019
Bypass the Murdoch press and read Labor's policy costings for yourself
Going on the behaviour of Murdoch's News Corp mastheads during the 2019 federal election campaign to date, by 6am the headlines will be misleading at best.
Scott Morrison & Co have already begun their scare campaign in response to the policy costings Labor released yesterday.
Therefore I invite readers to bypass political posturing by both the Coalition and a large section of the media and look at the policy document for yourselves.
It is your judgement that counts because the responsibility to elect the next Australian Government rests with you, not with an elderly U.S. billionaire who rarely visits this country.
2019 Labor Fiscal Plan by clarencegirl on Scribd
Monday 29 April 2019
Scott Morrison and News Corp need fact checking - again!
The Australian Labor Party released its
dividend
imputation policy in 2018 and began to come under sustained political
attack by the Morrison Government and News Corp with claims that there was a
$10 billion dollar hole in Labor’s costing of its policy.
On 18 June
2018 the Parliamentary Budget Office issued
a media release:
Imputation
credits policy costing
Earlier today, comments
have been made about the Parliamentary Budget Office (PBO) estimates of the
gains to revenue that may flow from the Australian Labor Party’s (ALP’s) policy
to make imputation credits non-refundable.
“The PBO brings our best
professional judgement to the independent policy costing advice we
provide. We have access to the same data
and economic parameters as The Treasury and draw upon similar information in
forming our judgements,” Parliamentary Budget Officer Jenny Wilkinson stated
today.
“We stand behind the PBO
estimates that have been published by the ALP in relation to this policy,
noting that all policy costings, no matter who they are prepared by, are
subject to uncertainty.” In its advice,
the PBO is explicit about the judgements and uncertainties associated with
individual policy costings.
The PBO confirms that it
always takes into account current and future policy commitments, as well as
behavioural changes, in its policy costings.
In this case, as outlined at the recent Senate Estimates hearings, these
included the superannuation changes announced in the 2016–17 Budget and the
scheduled company tax cuts. In addition,
the PBO explicitly assumed that there would be significant behavioural changes
that would flow from this policy, particularly for trustees of self-managed
superannuation funds.
The PBO was established
as an independent institution in 2012 with broad support from the
Parliament. A key rationale for the
formation of the PBO was to develop a more level playing field, by providing
independent and unbiased advice to all parliamentarians about the estimated
fiscal cost of policy proposals. The
purpose of establishing the PBO was to improve the public’s understanding of,
and confidence in, policy costings and enable policy debates to focus on the
merits of alternative policy proposals.
Ten months later on 25 April
2019 News Corp’s The Daily Examiner ran an article on page 8 concerning Labor’s
dividend imputation policy which stated:
The independent
Parliamentary Budget Office has estimated Labor’s plan would save $7 billion
less over a decade than the party expects and that it would affect 840,000
individuals, 210,000 self-managed super funds (SMSFs) plus some bigger funds.
Now the
Parliamentary Budget Office publishes
the requests for information it receives, including requests for policy implications and
costings, however there appears to be no new request for information and
costings on Labor’s dividend imputation policy on its website.
Morrison
& Co have been caught out misrepresenting the source of their costings
before and even flat out lying on occasion, so one has to suspect the veracity
of their latest attack on this particular policy.
It's just as likely costings and other figures were done on the back of an envelope by Morrison or Frydenberg.
Monday 22 April 2019
News Corp mastheads back Big Coal during 2019 federal election campaign
These were News
Corp mastheads on 18 April 2019.
Images found @JennaCairney1 on Twitter |
Apparently we
voters don’t understand the role mining has in our country and Murdoch journalists
are eager to pressure politicians on the subject of mining jobs and
taxation revenue which they fear are on the line because these same
politicians might “go weak-kneed at the sight of Stop
Adani hashtags, earrings or stage invasions” [Townsville Bulletin, 18 April 2019, p.2].
I on the
other hand think rural and regional areas know the mining industry rather well
when it comes to jobs and taxes.
According
to the Australian Government Labour
Market Information Portal as of February 2019 the Mining Industry in this country“employs approximately 251,700 persons (ABS
trend data), which accounts for 2.0 per cent of the total workforce. Over the past five
years, employment in the industry has decreased by 5.4 per cent”.
Employment
growth in the industry in the five years to February 2019 was in fact minus
14,400 employees.
Projected
employment growth in the five years to May 2023 is predicted to be 2.4 per
cent.
Not
all mining industry employment is new jobs created by a mining venture either. The
Australia Institute points to the fact that economic modelling done by
Waratah Coal in 2011 found that a single Qld mine would displace 3,000 jobs in
other industries and crowd out $1.2 billion in manufacturing activity.
Australian
Tax Office (ATO) data
for 2013-14 to 2015-16 show that almost 60 percent of corporations in
the energy and resources sector paid zero tax in that period.
This
percentage appears to be something of an industry norm as in 2007-08 ATO data indicated there were
4,290 mining companies operating in Australia and 68.3pc of all these companies
paid no tax.
It is worth
noting that in 2007 the Business Council
of Australia (BCA) calculated corporate tax (as a percentage of profit) at
20pc for the mining industry.
Interestingly,
BCA also stated “taxes collected are negative for the mining industry group
because as major exporters survey participants reported a significant GST
refund which more than offset other taxes collected”.
In 2016-17 BHP Billiton Aluminium Australia Pty Ltd with a total income $1.81 billion for that year paid no tax. Neither did Whitehaven Coal Limited with a total income of $2.39 billion, Claremont Coal Mines Ltd with a total income of $1.01 billion and Ulan Coal Mines Limited with a total income of $1.03 billion - to name just a few examples for that financial year.
In 2016-17 BHP Billiton Aluminium Australia Pty Ltd with a total income $1.81 billion for that year paid no tax. Neither did Whitehaven Coal Limited with a total income of $2.39 billion, Claremont Coal Mines Ltd with a total income of $1.01 billion and Ulan Coal Mines Limited with a total income of $1.03 billion - to name just a few examples for that financial year.
So there we
have it.
An
Australia-wide industry sector which in February 2019 employed less people than
sectors such as Health & Social Assistance (est.1,702,700 persons), Retail
(est.1,284,700 persons), Education & Training (est,1,032,400 persons) and Manufacturing
(est. 872,500 persons) and, has a future growth
projection which makes it unlikely to return even 2015 employment levels.
A sector which also regularly takes tax minimisation to an extreme.
Yet for some
reason voters are supposed to ignore the ramifications of continuing to allow open slather to fossil
fuel mining corporations as climate change impacts begin to bite.
The mining
industry has pulled this sort of stunt before when it fought the proposed Resource Super
Profits Tax which would have applied to mining companies involved in the
extraction of non-renewable resources. It talked up inflated figures for mining employment and tax revenue and quoted the same in industry media releases.
The stakes
for present and future generations were not quite as high nor as urgent then as they are now and it’s time the rapacious mining industry is firmly put in its place by concerned
voters on 18 May 2019 – right at the back of the queue along with those political parties and candidates who blindly support Big Coal and Big Oil.
Australia can't afford politicians of that ilk anymore.
Labels:
coal,
election campaigns,
elections 2019,
mining industry,
News Corp
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