Sunday 15 July 2012
Saturday 14 July 2012
NRMA's Open Road: dodgy promotions
Australian Government now has full responsibility for Home and Community Care (HACC) services
Department of Health and Ageing media release 1 July 2012:
From 1 July 2012 the Australian Government has full responsibility for Home and Community Care (HACC) services that support more than 500,000 older Australians to live independently in their own homes and communities.
Minister for Ageing, Mark Butler said the transfer of responsibility for HACC services for older people to the Australian Government rationalises the system and paves the way for the reforms outlined in Living Longer Living Better.
“Supporting older Australians to remain living in their own home is a key focus of our recently unveiled Living Longer Living Better aged care reform package.”
“We’re investing an extra $880 million over the next 5 years for 40,000 new home care packages to help older people stay living at home,” Mr Butler said.
“The HACC Program provides a foundation for future aged care reforms and is one of the first steps in the development of a consistent aged care system covering basic care at home through to high-level care in aged care facilities.”
The Commonwealth HACC program replaces the former joint Australian Government and state government-funded HACC program in all states and territories except Victoria and Western Australia, where basic community care services will continue to be delivered under the old arrangements.
State and territory governments will continue to fund HACC services for people under 65 (or under 50 for Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people).
HACC consumers will continue to receive services from their current provider and remain in the most appropriate care setting regardless of their age.
The Australian Government has allocated more than $1 billion for the Commonwealth HACC program and will continue to support the joint HACC program in Victoria and Western Australia.
More information on the Commonwealth HACC program is available at: www.health.gov.au/hacc
Fast food franchisee to stand against Elliot in Richmond
Friday 13 July 2012
Darrell Lea Remembered
They were year-round collectors items for Aussie kids under seven lucky enough to be visited by an Easter Bunny who lived within travelling distance of a store.
We knew nothing, nothing! Honestly?
[http://www.scmagazine.com.au/News/305928,telstra-says-its-not-spying-on-users.aspx]……
Days after suspicions of Telstra's networking monitoring activity was first aroused, the telco has revealed it captures web addresses visited by millions of subscribers on its Next G network.
The addresses are compared to a blacklist of criminal sites curated by web filtering company Netsweeper, and held both in Australia and the US.
[http://www.scmagazine.com.au/News/306441,telstra-tracks-users-to-build-web-filter.aspx]
I want to talk to you about why customer privacy is not negotiable.
Last week, the media ran with a story that Telstra was sending information about the web browsing activity of Next G customers to a third party company in North America. We were collecting this information to classify Internet sites for a new cyber-safety tool called Smart Controls.
We stopped the program immediately, as this was the right thing to do. We informed the media and briefed the Privacy Commission and other regulatory bodies. But by then, the damage to our reputation was already done.
Some of our customers may feel we have broken their trust, and, frankly, they are entitled to feel that way.
The hard reality is it will take months of hard work to win back that trust.
I am also concerned that this incident occurred in the same week that the Australian Communications and Media Authority and the Privacy Commissioner handed down their findings on a privacy breach last December, when customer records were exposed on the Internet.
Judging by media reports, the Privacy Commissioner, Timothy Pilgrim, is also concerned. He told The Australian last Friday that he was now on the lookout for systematic privacy weaknesses in our operational culture.
It’s not hard to see why. These incidents and investigations create an impression that Telstra does not care enough about the privacy of our customers. Not only that, they undermine the great work we have done to improve customer satisfaction and change the way our customers talk about us.
Of course, the truth is we care deeply about customer privacy.
That’s why I want to remind everyone that privacy is not an aspiration at Telstra – it is an essential requirement and our license to operate.
Privacy at Telstra is everyone’s responsibility. We have to do better.
If you have concerns with anything that threatens the privacy of our customers, then raise the issue with your manager as a matter of urgency.
Our customers’ trust is a commodity that’s both precious and fragile. It takes months and years to build, but can be broken in one day.
That’s what happened last week. It must not happen again.
David