Fourteen days before the start of Spring and bushfires begin to be reported on the NSW Far North Coast

It might still technically be winter, but bushfire season stops for no one.

These are the scenes currently at Duranbah, on the NSW North Coast, where a 164 hectare 'advice level' bushfire is currently burning out of control.

RFS crews are one scene. #9News pic.twitter.com/hcP1aOaRkM

— Nine News Sydney (@9NewsSyd) August 19, 2020

Advice Level Fires at Whiteman Creek and Duranbah

The Sydney Morning Herald, 19 August 2020:

A fire in the NSW far north-east has triggered the state's first major deployment of water bombers for the 2020-21 bushfire season, with crews battling to keep the flames away from properties and the Pacific Motorway.

The blaze near the town of Duranbah, not far south of the Queensland-NSW border had burnt through about 180 hectares swampland and grass by late Wednesday afternoon, Angela Daly, a NSW Rural Fire Service spokeswoman, said. 

"It's the first response [involving water-bombers] for a fire of a bigger scale," she added. 

At least six trucks and crew joined the fight to keep the flames away from nearby properties. 

Since July 1, the state has recorded 702 bush, grass and scrub fires, with about 10 burning on Wednesday. By contrast, this time last year, NSW had recorded triple that number or 2224 blazes.... 

The cause of the fire near Duranbah was not clear although the RFS suspects it was a fire on private property that the owners had not been able to control. 

Smoke could be seen many kilometres away, including from the popular resort town of Byron Bay....

Perspectives on the Qld-NSW border closure

Perspective One

Echo NetDaily, 18 August 2020:

Queensland is closed. Annastacia is showing us she knows how to deliver some serious borderline discipline. It’s a show of strength – perhaps, some might say, a borderline disorder. There’s a state election around the corner (31 October) and she’s not about to let a few hundred NSW cancer patients in need of treatment soften her public displays of tough love for her Queensland constituents.

There’s been endless stories of seriously ill people who have been severely affected by the sudden border closures and the quarantining requirements. I even heard the heartbreaking story of a very ill man who had received treatment at a Queensland hospital and was made to cross into NSW to meet his wife by foot. At a local doctors surgery as many as ten doctors can no longer attend. Is that a show of strength Ms Palaszczuk?

In the previous border closure earlier this year I knew of people who were able to get border passes for a day trip to IKEA. Just a few months ago we could print a pass and return home with a flat pack. Now we have to beg for chemo. That’s nuts. We don’t even have COVID here. In Northern NSW we’ve become refugees in our own country.

We are standing at the border knocking, ‘Hey Queensland, you’ve been coming down here every weekend for years now, clogging up our roads, swimming at our beaches, enjoying our kooky hippyesque charm… we don’t want to come in for a holiday, we would like to go to hospital.’

Until COVID, borders were something that only meant something in the State of Origin. Or if someone cut you off on the highway and had a Queensland numberplate you mused it was because of their statewide merging disorder. For over half the year they’re an hour behind us because of their silly reluctance to take on daylight savings. But now the Queensland border has been sealed shut. They’re sailing into the distance. Who knows how far behind they may be once the border reopens? Will we need passports to enter?

COVID has carved Australia into a quarantine pie, it has made us separate people. It has made Queenslanders distrustful of us. And here in NSW, it has made us suspicious of Victorians. Every time we see a VIC numberplate we hit down hard on the hand sanitiser. State premiers who previously seemed a tad irrelevant in the big game of politics have become the major players. They get to play Big Daddy or Big Mummy to keep their state safe. I’m not sure what’s happened to Scott Morrison – he appears to have gone to sleep. Every time I turn the telly on, it’s not Scotty’s face I see, it’s Daniel Andrews. And I have to admit I really feel for him. He has to bring the COVID-19 outbreak under control, otherwise the rest of Australia will blame Victoria for their financial ruin. He does look very tired.

The pandemic has ugly impacts. It has made us territorial. We are one country – at least we used to be. Our lockdown has sent us to our burrows – it has made us conspiratorial and suspicious. It is causing us to lose trust. When Annastacia created a travel bubble between Queensland and NSW, she cut Mullumbimby and Byron Bay out. I doubt that was an accident with the protractor in the planning department. ‘We ran out of arc’. It’s because people from Sydney come here. It’s because we’re perceived as loose – after all we’re famous for immunising with a turmeric poultice.

So, farewell Queensland. We’ll see you on the other side. Or perhaps, we won’t.

Perspective Two

Yes this border closure can be hard on individuals, families and communities.

For those living in the Northern Rivers region who need to access health services in southern Queensland and medical personnel who can no longer cross the border to work in our hospitals and clinics unless they leave their families and don't return until the border opens, it is more than hard.   

However, the Northern Rivers is part of a state, New South Wales, which allows its residents free movement within its own borders during this global pandemic.

This means that people can freely travel from local government areas where COVID-19 infection growth is active to areas where infection growth is low or where there are no known cases of the virus.

New South Wales has a premier who appears to be in thrall to a prime minister whose constant push to prematurely ease public health order restrictions put in place by the states destabilised the national response to the pandemic.

So here in New South Wales we remain one of only two states with a high cumulative number of confirmed of COVID-19 cases, a relatively high death toll and active community transmission of the virus.

Currently the other six states and territories are managing to keep infection rates very low.

Additionally, we have people travelling within our state who crossed into New South Wales from Victoria which is in the middle of an infection surge and, we are not sending them home. Because quite frankly the Berejiklian Government has no idea where these Victorian travellers are.

Even within our state trust in the 'experts' engaged by the NSW Dept. of Health has taken a battering - given the release of the Commission of Inquiry into the Ruby Princess Report on 14 August 2020.

It is no wonder that the Queensland Government does not trust any assurances given by either Scott Morrison or Gladys Berejiklian that new cases of the virus are unlikely to cross the border if Anastasia Palaszczuk were to reopen Queensland to people from New South Wales right now.

What wages growth in the Australian private sector looked like over the last 20 years

It is noticeable that in the Abbott-Turnbull- Morrison Coalition Government years 2014-2020 private sector wages growth slows markedly.

Graphs: The Guardian, 16 August 2020

Reserve Bank of Australia (RBA), Bulletin- June 2019:

The low wages growth in recent years has contributed to a decline in the growth of household disposable income and consumption, and has been associated with a decline in inflation….. government policies have capped wages growth in most public sector EBAs, while delays in renegotiating some EBAs have resulted in a temporary wage freeze.

Now it is obvious that Scott Morrison intends to gather as much power as possible into his own hands, local government begins to fight back

Australian Prime Minister & Liberal MP for Cook Scott Morrison has chosen a global pandemic as a suitable time to both extinguish the Council of Australian Governments (COAG) and increase the level of secrecy and lack of procedural transparency surrounding decisions and actions of the federal government he leads.

COAG represented all three tiers of Australian governments - federal, state and local - and its role since 1992 was to manage matters of national significance or matters that need co-ordinated action by all Australian governments. 

The President of the Australian Local Government Association had been a member of COAG since it was first convened. It was included because all parties recognised that Australia has three levels of government and that the tier with most impact on people’s daily lives in terms of the provision of local services and infrastructure is Local Government - as well as it being the most accessible form of government for citizens.

In early March 2020 Morrison created the ultra-secret National Cabinet comprising of himself as prime minister, all state premiers and territory chief ministers and, he appears to be the sole spokesperson for this body.

On 29 May 2020 Morrison announced that COAG was indeed dead. That the National Council was now going to be the centre of a new National Federation Reform Council (NFRC) and that the existing Council on Federal Financial Relations (CFFR), consisting of federal and state treasurers, will report to the National Cabinet. 

According to Morrison all these bodies now fall under the confidentiality privileges of the Office of Prime Minister and Cabinet which will also act as meeting coordinator. As will all the previous 8 COAG sub-councils and 32 ministerial forums, in whatever form they take after a planned review.

No minutes of meetings will be available nor will all issues discussed be made public.

According to the Office of Prime Minister and Cabinet the NFRC has been agreed to by Premiers, Chief Ministers and the Prime Minister.

Local government was not consulted and now has no representative on the peak national body, as neither the National Council or the new National Federation Reform Council include a local government member.

Local government is not amused.

Clarence Valley Council. Ordinary Monthly Meeting, Minutes, p. 3, 28 July 2020:

Unless local government has an official seat at the table - in both the National Council and the National Federation Reform Council then neither of these bodies can be, either in name or practice, genuine national councils of Australian governments.

It is not hard to see why Scott Morrison & Co do not want local government included as a member of these two national councils. 

It can be seen in the titles of the six new National Cabinet Reform Committees created on 12 June 2020 as part of the NRFC-National Council: 

• Rural and Regional Australia 
• Skills 
• Energy 
• Infrastructure and Transport 
• Population and Migration 
• Health

Federal and state governments are not enamoured with the planning & decision-making powers which still remain with local government - only finding local councils useful as a vehicle to cost shift their own financial obligations onto ratepayers.

Mining companies, heavy industry and property developers in particular would like to see local government sidelined at policy level and, it appears that Scott Morrison is willing to oblige groups which include the Coalition's largest and most consistent political donors.

When it docked in Sydney, NSW, cruise ship "Ruby Princess" & its more than 4,000 passengers and crew were primarily the responsibility of the federal Morrison Coalition Government - but almost no-one gets off unscathed in recently published NSW Commission of Inquiry report

"The human consequences of the scattering upon disembarkation have not yet played out. That is the salient feature of an uneliminated infectious pandemic." [Report: Special Commission of Inquiry into the Ruby Princess, 14 August 2020]

Evidence of human-to-human transmission of SARS-CoV-2 (as COVID-19) emerged almost immediately following the discovery of the virus in Wuhan, China in early January 2020.

On 6 January 2020 a traveler returning by air from China arrived in Sydney, New South Wales, carrying the COVID-19 viral infection.

As the global pandemic grew so did the number of factors to be considered when implementing infection controls.

By early February 2020 concerns were being raised around the world concerning the number of international cruise ships which potentially might be carrying infected passengers.

As of 19 March 2020 the number of confirmed COVID19 cases in the NSW totaled 307 and community concern was mounting.

The “Ruby Princess” - a foreign-owned cruise ship which has capacity for 3,080 passengers and 1,200 crew members - docked in Sydney to board and disembark passengers from its 24 February to 8 March 2020 and 8 March to 19 March 2020 voyages. 

When it entered Sydney Harbour it became a Commonwealth responsibility under federal statutes; Customs Act 1901, Migration Act 1958, Australian Border Force Act 2015 and Biosecurity Act 2015 (an act which in part addresses human biosecurity and whose provisions are administer by the federal departments of Health & Agriculture, Water and the Environment).

By 19 March it was suspected that a number of passengers and crew might possibly have contracted the highly virulent COVID-19 infection.

Five days before the ship's docking Australian Prime Minister & Liberal MP for Cook Scott Morrison had informed the general public that Border Force had implemented measures to screen incoming cruise ships for the coronavirus - "In specific cases where we have Australians on cruise ships then there will be some bespoke arrangements that will be put in place directly under the command of the Australian Border Force to ensure the relevant protections are put in place".

However, it seems that the "Ruby Princess" was exempt from some of Morrison's so-called "bespoke arrangements", in that it had permission to come into Sydney when as a safety measure it should have been refused permission until after 15 April 2020.  It was exempt because it had departed a port outside of Australian waters before midnight on 15 March 2020. 

So, despite the prime minister’s statement on the morning of 19 March 2020 at least 2,700 passengers – a mix of Australian nationals and overseas visitors - were allowed to disembark in Sydney without being screened for the virus.

This mass disembarkation was the direct result of the NSW Dept. of Health Expert Panel classifying the "Ruby Princess" as 'low risk', together with an ongoing failure of a federal department to fully perform its legislated biosecurity functions and, finally verbal permission being given by an unauthorised Border Force official for all passengers to leave the ship on that morning.

With Border Force refusing to release cruise passenger details to airlines, there was no way of tracking passengers once they had left the ship and so infected passengers spread out across the state, across Australia and then by air across the world as oveseas travellers returned home.

Ruby Princess passengers dispersed around the world in the days after it docked. Some of them later displayed coronavirus symptoms.(ABC News: Emma Machan) 

It has been calculated that at least 662 "Ruby Princess" passengers contracted COVID-19 and over time 26 of these died.

By the time the "Ruby Princess" sailed out of Sydney on 23 April 2020 it was thought to be responsible for about one in every ten existing COVID-19 cases in Australia.

An est. 183 crew members were also thought to have become infected.

On 15 April 2020 the NSW Berejiklian Government created a Special Commission of Inquiry into the Ruby Princess.

The Morrison Government did not assist the Inquiry in that it refused to allow a federal bureaucrat to answer any summons received from the Inquiry.

Indeed a summons to a Commonwealth officer to attend and give evidence about the grant of pratique for the "Ruby Princess" resulted in steps being taken towards proceedings in the High Court of Australia.

The Inquiry was due to report the the NSW Governor and Premier by 14 August 2020.

Report: Special Commission of Inquiry into the Ruby Princess, 14 August 2020, can be read and downloaded at:

https://www.dpc.nsw.gov.au/assets/dpc-nsw-gov-au/publications/The-Special-Commission-of-Inquiry-into-the-Ruby-Princess-Listing-1628/Report-of-the-Special-Commission-of-Inquiry-into-the-Ruby-Princess.pdf.

This report contains a litany of errors at federal, state and cruise ship operator level, as well as uncovering deficiencies in current legislation and regulations.

Indigenous academic women are in high demand but are often positioned as ‘black performer’ by their fellow academics and colleagues

@IndigenousX, 12 August 2020:

In recent decades it has become increasingly common for higher education institutions in so-called Australia to engage in institutional branding and marketing which position their organisations as ‘inclusive’, ‘equitable’ and committed to ‘indigenising’ their curriculums and research practice. Goals of increased Indigenous engagement, consultation, staffing, course content, and student enrolment and completion rates are often noted within formal institutional documents such as Reconciliation Action Plans (RAP). They may also be noted in speeches performed by executive members of the university, commitments made within Ethics applications as part of research project and grant applications; and communicated via the university’s online and community presence through social media and marketing campaigns. However, this study reveals that how and by whom such institutional goals and commitments are actually enacted within the academy remains an ongoing point of tension, and one which produces a significant burden on a minuscule workforce of Indigenous academics.

It is undeniable that Indigenous academics are in high demand, but with less than 430 Indigenous academics currently employed within Australian higher education institutions, and 69% of that cohort identified as female, what does it look like to experience this demand as an Indigenous academic woman? In 2019 I travelled this continent and spoke with Indigenous women who are presently employed within academic roles in Australian higher education institutions. Due to their belonging to a small, highly identifiable workforce, in order to ensure their anonymity, I cannot share the specific institutions they work in or identifying features such as which Nation group they belong to.

A novel finding of this study, and the focus of this article, is that despite being highly qualified within the academic system, and sovereign beings of these unceded lands, Indigenous academic women are often positioned as ‘black performer’ by their fellow academics and colleagues…..

Read full article here.

BACKGROUND

Academic Paper

‘Don’t make me play house -n***er’: Indigenous academic women treated as ‘black performer’ within higher education

Amy Thunig  Tiffany Jones

Received: 20 February 2020 / Accepted: 24 July 2020 © The Australian Association for Research in Education, Inc. 2020

Abstract

In an era where higher education institutions appear increasingly committed to what Sara Ahmed calls ‘speech acts’ whereby declared goodwill, through stated commitments to diversity, equity, and increasing Indigenous student enrolment and completion have been made; it is undeniable that Indigenous academics are in high demand. With fewer than 430 Indigenous academics currently employed here on the continent now commonly referred to as ‘Australia’, and 69% of that cohort identifying as female, what does it look like to experience this demand as an Indigenous academic woman? Drawing on data collected from a Nation-wide study in 2019 of 17 one-on-one, face-to-face interviews with Indigenous academic women, using Indigenous research methodologies and poetic transcription, this paper explores the experiences and relational aspects of Indigenous academic women’s roles in Australian higher education.

Shortage of doctors at Lismore Base Hospital due to Queensland-NSW border closure

Life during the COVID-19 pandemic has become a little harder across the NSW Northern River region......

ABC News, 12 August 2020:

A senior doctor at a major hospital on the New South Wales north coast says the closure of the Queensland border is a "political stunt".

Chris Ingall, an executive on the Medical Staff Council at the Lismore Base Hospital, said the health service was "scrambling" to cope with the effects on patients & staff, who must quarantine for 14 days if they enter Queensland from outside the so-called border bubble in the Tweed Shire.

"You've got over 100 doctors that work at Lismore Base Hospital that live in Queensland; they are no longer available to us because they don't want to leave their families & not get back," he said.

"So we are scrambling for doctors, anaesthetists, emergency doctors, a lot of the frontline doctors who are no longer going to be able to support Lismore Base Hospital."

Dr Ingall said it was having a significant impact on the risk posed to residents in the Northern Rivers.

"This doesn't need to happen at all from a medical perspective because there is no community transmission in the Northern Rivers," he said.....

Queensland has relaxed its border restrictions for people "entering to obtain specialist health care, or as a support person to a person obtaining specialist health care, that cannot be obtained at their place of residence".

But those entering from beyond the border bubble will have to go into government-provided quarantine for 14 days.

The cost for an adult is $2,800; one adult and one child is $3,255.

People classified as vulnerable or who can prove financial hardship can apply to have the fees waived.....

Australian Defence Force in 2020

The Australian, 11 August 2020:

The Defence Force has asked an independent expert to examine cultural and leadership failings involving Australia’s special forces ahead of a war crimes report on dozens of alleged murders of prisoners and civilians by the elite units in Afghanistan.

The study will look at the ethical standards and command culture of the secretive Special Air Service and Commando regiments from 1999 to the present day, with a focus on their deployment to Afghanistan in the war against al-Qa’ida and the Taliban.

The Australian can reveal that Chief of the Defence Force Angus Campbell has commissioned former naval officer and Anglican bishop Tom Frame to undertake the study, to be released in mid-2022.

The move comes as the government prepares for the release of a report by the Inspector-General of the Australian Defence Force into at least 55 alleged breaches of the laws of war by Australian personnel during the nation’s 13-year on-the-ground commitment in Afghanistan.

The alleged crimes are expected to include the killing of unarmed men and children, and the mistreatment and execution of Taliban prisoners who posed no threat to their captors.

The IGADF report, by NSW Supreme Court judge Major General Paul Brereton, will rock the nation’s military establishment and tarnish community perceptions of the nation’s most revered warriors.

Professor Frame, a respected military historian with the University of NSW, will examine the wider context of the alleged crimes, including actions of senior ADF leaders and Australia’s military strategy in Afghanistan.

His study will be used as a basis for further reforms to the SAS and Commando regiments, and in planning military operations.

One former SAS officer spoken to by The Australian on condition of anonymity said by 2010, special forces operators on the ground in Afghanistan had lost faith in the strategy and “the whole thing was just starting to unravel”.

He said mentally ill soldiers were regularly sent on to the battlefield, and commanders -allowed a culture where lower ranked soldiers became more influential than their officers. “You’ve got guys doing six or seven tours. Think about what that does — six or seven tours with heavy combat,” the officer said.

He said “wild swings in roles and strategy” also took their toll, along with the intensity of the fighting.

“All these things led to a culture and an environment where I think there was a degree of impunity,” he said.

“The only thing that was important to us was our own tribe. We didn’t trust anyone. We didn’t think necessarily we were being supported by some of the leadership.”

Another former SAS officer, Liberal MP Andrew Hastie, said the Australian people needed an explanation of the war in Afghanistan that went beyond individual cases of wrongdoing....

Meme of the Week

Jasenberg

Tweets of the Week

This TIME cover is something else. pic.twitter.com/fn406fSVrA

— Amy Siskind 🏳️‍🌈 (@Amy_Siskind) August 7, 2020

Remarkable. The Federal Govt is threatening to take the NSW #RubyPrincess Inquiry to the High Court.

Why? ⁦@ScottMorrisonMP⁩ doesn’t want federal officials to give evidence.

⁦@LucyHughesJones⁩ with the story ⁦@dailytelegraph⁩ 👇#auspol https://t.co/GdeOzy2Ujx

— Kristina Keneally (@KKeneally) August 12, 2020

A conga line of #COVIDIOTS - Part 3

NSW Police, News, 12 August 2020:

• A 23-year-old man was issued a $1000 PIN by officers from Murray River Police District after attempting to enter NSW for the third time without a valid permit.

• A 65-year-old man was issued a $1000 PIN by officers from Barrier Police District after continuing through the Buronga border checkpoint despite being denied entry due to not having a valid permit.

• A 58-year-old man was issued a $1000 PIN by officers from Murray River Police District after entering NSW without a valid permit. The man was stopped on the Hume Highway at Woomargama for the purposes of a Random Breath Test yesterday (Tuesday 11 August 2020). When spoken to by officers, he produced a Victorian licence and an invalid NSW border entry permit. He was issued a $1000 PIN, directed to leave NSW and escorted back to the Victorian border.