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Cathy Wilcox

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David Pope

DHS & Centrelink now threatening clients who expose unfair or inappropriate implementation of social security policy?

Screenshot via @BernardKeane

Political reporter with @abcnews:

Henry Belot Verified account ‏@Henry_Belot

This Department of Human Services has just issued a pretty clear warning to Centrelink clients who want to public criticise #notmydebt.

6:03 PM - 27 Feb 2017

ABC News, 27 February 2017:

Those who publicly criticise Centrelink's automated debt recovery program could have their personal information released to correct the record, the Department of Human Services (DHS) has warned.

Blogger Andie Fox wrote an opinion piece for Fairfax Media earlier this month claiming Centrelink "terrorised" her while chasing her for a debt she believed she did not owe.

On the weekend, Fairfax published an article from the Government's perspective, raising the prospect of Centrelink being "unfairly castigated".

In the article a spokesman for Centrelink commented on Ms Fox's personal information including her history of claiming the Family Tax Benefit and relationship circumstances.

A DHS spokesman said personal information could be released by the Government to correct public statements of complaints.

"Such disclosures are made for the purposes of the social security law or the family assistance law, they do not need to be formally authorised by the secretary," the spokesman said.

"Unfounded allegations unnecessarily undermine confidence and takes staff effort away from dealing with other claims.

"We will continue to correct the record on such occasions."

Labor's Linda Burney accused DHS of "deeply unethical actions" and the Government of seeking "revenge".

"The disclosure has occurred deliberately to smear a private individual who has spoken out about the error prone robo-debt program and the deeply flawed Centrelink debt recovery process," she said.

"Correcting the record is one thing, attempting to smear and discredit opponents is entirely different and far more troubling."

Ms. Fox's response can be found at https://bluemilk.wordpress.com/2017/02/26/is-this-what-happens-when-you-criticise-government/.

However, neither Centrelink nor the Turnbull Government can stop criticism being aired during - the rather wordily titled - Senate Standing Committees on Community Affairs’ Inquiry into Design, scope, cost-benefit analysis, contracts awarded and implementation associated with the Better Management of the Social Welfare System initiative and mainstream media reporting.

The Canberra Times, 28 February 2017:

People pursued by Centrelink over its controversial "robo-debts" are being denied the protection of Australian consumer law, a Parliamentary inquiry has been told.

The welfare agency is exempt from laws and guidelines covering debt collection by private businesses, "even the much maligned banks", according to the chief executive of Victorian community organisation Family Care, David Tennant.

But Centrelink says that is, and the private sector debt collectors hired to pursue its clients, are compliant with legal requirements.

Mr Tennant, who has a background in consumer law, says much of Centrelink's activities in pursuing its millions of dollars in "robo-debt" would be illegal if done by a non-government player.

The legal immunity enjoyed by Centrelink allows it to "pressure people for payment in ways that are objectively unfair," Mr Tennant says in his submission to the Parliamentary inquiry into the robo-debt crisis……

In his submission to the inquiry, Mr Tennant, a former chairman of the national peak body for financial counsellors, say he is surprised by the "lack of commentary about how Centrelink's conduct stacks up against the normal rules applying to the collection of debts in Australia".

"There are significant problems associated with a government department pursing a course of action that would likely be illegal if adopted by a body other than government," Mr Tennant wrote.

"It potentially erodes the confidence of those who rely on the benefit system to treat them fairly, or to recognise them as having the same rights as all citizens.

Although I suspect that one of the reasons behind Centrelink supplying personal and perhaps sensitive client information to the media may be in order to produce a chilling effect on submissions made to this particular Senate inquiry.

This inquiry is accepting written submissions until 22 March 2016.

The inquiry reporting date is 10 May 2017.

The lesson Metgasco learnt over the last ten years is that it needs to bully NSW Police into moving against protestors at its direction

Coal seam and tight gas exploration and wannabee production mining company, Metgasco Limited made a 20 minute speech at the RUI Good Oil Conference in Perth on Wednesday 10 September 2014, complete with a 10 slide power point presentation titled Rosella – lessons learnt.

Although the presentation did not make clear what lessons Metgasco thought it had taken from the sustained community opposition to its aim to establish gas fields on the NSW North Coast, oil & gas industry newspaper Upstream obliging told us on the same day that the answer was increased social media propaganda and more police action on the ground at its Northern Rivers drill sites:

He said there needed to be better education of the community in regards to what the impact the industry will have.

Henderson also echoed the message that is pervasive in the Australian industry, which is that operators need to improve their standing on social media.

“We are being absolutely killed in social media by the greens,” he said. “Too many people in the community have been led to believe that we use old technology and that renewables are ready to step in right now and replace them”.

“Unless we start winning the minds of people in the capital city... we’re going to have government’s putting more stringent regulations on us.”

Henderson said he wished at the time of the protest he had pushed for more police action to cut off the resources of the protestors who at times performed “dangerous” acts.

Yes, it seems that Metgasco still believes that way to win hearts and minds at Bentley is with police baton charges.

McDonalds talks down Australian economy and tells whoppers to save face as sales fall

Don Thompson

Reuters 22 July 2013:

The world's biggest restaurant chain by sales reported a lower-than-expected quarterly profit and said it expects global same-restaurant sales in July to be relatively flat, sending its shares down almost 3 percent in midday trading.

Camden Haven Courier 24 July 2013:

McDonald's, the world's biggest fast-food chain, says sales in Australia are going backwards, citing incorrect figures on the level of youth unemployment to help explain why fewer people are buying its burgers and fries.

Although the introduction of the "Loose Change" menu in 2012 bolstered sales of its food last year, thrifty consumers have withdrawn from even that bargain basement offer and are spending less at the McDonald's counter.

Addressing investors in the US, McDonald's global chief executive and president Don Thompson warned that lower levels of spending in Australia and cut-throat competition among fast-food chains in the region had slashed revenue for the company.

He told the mostly US audience that the economy in Australia had worsened since 2012 and is reported to have said that youth unemployment had hit more than 25 per cent…..

So has Australia's youth unemployment hit more than 25 per cent as Don Thompson asserts?

This is what the International Labour Organisation's report Global Employment Trends For Youth 2013 states:

The weakening of the global recovery in 2012 and 2013 has further aggravated the youth jobs crisis and the queues for available jobs have become longer and longer for some unfortunate young jobseekers. So long, in fact, that many youth are giving up on the job search. The prolonged jobs crisis also forces the current generation of youth to be less selective about the type of job they are prepared to accept, a tendency that was already evident before the crisis. Increasing numbers of youth are now turning to available part time jobs or find themselves stuck in temporary employment. Secure jobs, which were once the norm for previous generations - at least in the advanced economies - have become less easily accessible for today’s youth. The global youth unemployment rate, estimated at 12.6 per cent in 2013,is close to its crisis peak. 73 million young people are estimated to be unemployed in 2013. At the same time, informal employment among young people remains pervasive and transitions to decent work are slow and difficult. The economic and social costs of unemployment, long‐term unemployment, discouragement and widespread low‐quality jobs for young people continue to rise and undermine economies’ growth potential… Since 2009, little progress has been made in reducing youth unemployment in the Developed Economies and European Union as a whole. The youth unemployment rate in 2012 is estimated at 18.1 per cent, the same rate as in 2010 and the highest level in this region in the past two decades. If the 3.1 per cent discouragement rate is taken into account, the discouragement adjusted youth unemployment rate becomes 21.2 per cent. The youth unemployment rate is projected to remain above 17 per cent until 2015, and decrease to 15.9 per cent by 2018….. Regional youth unemployment rates show large variations. In 2012, youth unemployment rates were highest in the Middle East and North Africa, at 28.3 per cent and 23.7 per cent, respectively, and lowest in East Asia (9.5 per cent) and South Asia (9.3 per cent). Between 2011 and 2012, regional youth unemployment rates increased in all regions except in Central and South‐Eastern Europe (non‐EU) and Commonwealth of Independent States (CIS), Latin America and the Caribbean, and South‐East Asia and the Pacific. Encouraging trends of youth unemployment are observed in, for example, Azerbaijan, Indonesia and the Philippines......

In June 2013 Forbes, The Centre for American Progress and Armstrong Economics were reported that youth unemployment in the USA has hit 16.2 per cent.

While the Australian Bureau of Statistics's 6202.0 Labour Force Australia states that in June 2013 the unemployment rate for people looking for full-time work in the 15-24 year old age group was 11.2 per cent and the unemployment rate for those looking for part-time work in that age group was 11.7 per cent. Australia's overall unemployment rate is currently 5.7 per cent.

So it seems that Mr. Thompson might be searching just a little to hard for excuses and, if he were to look at McDonalds history in Australia of poor workplace practices and equally poor corporate behaviour he might find the real answer as to why its 'burger and fries' sales are falling in this country.

Background:

McDonalds on the NSW North Coast

McDonalds in Tecoma, Victoria - BurgerOff, Tecoma Village Action Group, Tecoma Petition, NO McDonalds in The Dandenong Ranges

Welcome to the wonderful world of residential electricity supply pricing on the NSW North Coast

Click on image to enlarge

Origin-Country Energy price increases came into effect on 1 July 2011 just in time to greet another spell of low night time temperatures (around 10C or under) and wintry daytime temperatures in the low 20s if one is lucky - accompanied by wind, rain and fog in some areas of the NSW North Coast.

On average these are the differences between the last bill received for electricity consumption in the home and the final 63 days or so of the next bill:
* Residential light and power now costs an extra 4.106 cents per kilowatt hour plus GST.
* Off-peak hot water has risen by 1.566 cents per kilowatt hour plus GST.
* Supply charges on the former are up by 1.566 cents and on the latter by 1.299 cents without GST included.

According to IPART this round of price rises represents an average increase of 18.1% for Country Energy customers.
While Integral Energy customers will experience a 16.4% hike and EnergyAustralia customers will see their bills rise by 17.9%.

Welcome to the world of miserable heating choices until Spring arrives.

Conroy gives Australia one more reason to rue a conservative, blinkered and backward Labor Government

Next month Telstra, Optus and two other ISPs begin kowtowing to Communications Minister Stephen Conroy and the ultra-rigid right within the Gillard Government by so-called voluntarily filtering the Australian Internet.
Every time I find my PC returning a cannot access notice (and it will be doing so because there is no way that innocent domains and IPs will not get dragged into this censorship black hole) I will be bombarding the entire government with my emailed complaints.
I suggest that everyone who signed up to these ISPs before they declared they were going to censor the Internet should switch carriers as soon as their current contracts expire.

Logos from NCV and Google Images

In defence of free speech and the rights of First Peoples

On 8 April 2011 North Coast Voices embedded a Vimeo video made by the Yindjibarndi Aboriginal Corporation here on our blog.

Since then Crikey has published this:
Lawyers representing Fortescue Metal Group (FMG) and CEO Andrew Forrest have sent legal letters to a video hosting website requesting they take down a controversial clip of a native title meeting held in Roebourne last month despite issuing a denial to Crikey yesterday that they'd been in touch with Vimeo.
In an email from FMG's legal team to Vimeo, Fortescue say the video is defamatory, misleading, "incites racial hatred" and is "designed to intimidate."
Uploaded by Yindjibarndi Aboriginal Corporation, the video attracted 12,000 plays in nine days before being removed on Tuesday by the New York-based video hosting site in response to the threats.
The video has since been uploaded to YouTube and has been the subject of heated discussion on social media sites like Twitter and Facebook.
A spokesperson for Vimeo confirmed that the videos had been taken down for legal reasons. Fortescue spokesman Cameron Morse told Crikey yesterday his company had not had any contact with Vimeo about the controversial video. When contacted by Crikey this morning, Morse declined to clarify his comments.
Michael Cheah, legal counsel representing Vimeo, says the video was removed after the hosting site received correspondence from lawyers for FMG and Forrest alleging that the video contained defamatory and misleading statements about them.

So in the interests of free speech, North Coast Voices again embeds the video - this time in two parts from YouTube.





YINDJIBARNDI PRESS RELEASE: Vimeo forced to delete “FMG’s Great Native Title Swindle” video after legal threats from FMG and CEO Andrew Forrest.