Oh, the gall of the man!

"Legislation to cap public sector wage increases at 2.5 per cent passed the Upper House yesterday and is expected to be finalised in the Lower House this afternoon."
Premier Barry O'Farrell's announced "the cap will also apply to him and all other state MPs."
Yeah, and pigs will take to the air in squadrons.
Does the Grand Poo Bah of the State Coalition Government think that we eejit voters don't realise that an act of Parliament sets NSW MPs basic wage at $500 less than that awarded to Federal MPs and that these two wages rise in tandem.
I'm sure we've not forgotten that the cream in these remuneration packages are in the extra salaries for offices held (along with expense allowances) which in Bazza's case tops up his $136,140 basic parliamentary salary by at least another $189k. And that's without his electoral allowance thrown in.
Just as I'm sure that the average public hospital nurse, teacher, ambulance officer or fireman will be most unimpressed by this hypocritical 'wage restraint' of Bazza's part.
How much does a full-time registered nurse earn again? That's right - around $72k per year. Public school teachers get a bit less.
And a full-time assistant in nursing? Well he or she gets about $45,445 annually.
Somehow I think pegging their wage increases will have more effect on their personal hopes and dreams than Bazza's pretend salary cap on have on his life after politics in the private sector.

Pic from ABC NEWS

Where's the blinkin' taxi stand at Yamba Fair?

If you happen to shop regularly at the Westlawn Property Trust’s Yamba Fair shopping centre(the only one of its kind in the Lower Clarence)one of the first things you notice is the number of people who arrive at its front door on foot and also the number of people who wait outside for a taxi to take them and their many shopping bags home.

It’s bad enough that over the years Westlawn’s attempts to upgrade the centre has seen verandas installed which neither shade nor shelter and one walkway with such a slope to the parking lot surface that shopping trolleys develop a will of their own and drag older shoppers into the path of moving cars; but what really irks is the lack of a dedicated taxi putdown and pickup space.

Trying to load the family shopping into the boot of a taxi while keeping an eye out for cars impatiently nudging past the stationary cab is one stressor too many on a busy day.

When is Westlawn going to consider the needs of regular Yamba Fair patrons? After all they contribute to the fact that the Trust draws at least $1.9 million in rent annually from the shopping centre.

Anony-mice

Yamba

Coal Seam Gas Exploration in Australia 2011

http://youtu.be/smP9tL_e3U8

Abandoned Metgasco coal seam gas exploration site in June 2011 – waste water storage leaking and overflowing at Dobie’s Bight Road in the Dyraaba area on the NSW North Coast.

From coalseamgasnews:
Update; So two days later they have cleaned this up after me making a complaint, I happened to visit it again while they where there. They just filled it in, covered it all with dirt without removing the water. So I'm not sure how effective that was. Like I said I don't know what was in these ponds, produced water, drilling fluid, rainwater, whatever it was at some point chemicals or toxic water were probably stored in those ponds and even if they pumped it out and what I'm looking at is rainwater, you'd think they'd also remove the contaminated plastic liner when they pumped it out? Instead, now they let it flush out for months and have just buried it. The nearby creek runs into he Richmond River.

Cracking Telstra's code and speaking to an Aussie Telstra staffer

This Telstra customer, like millions of others, has had a gutful of phoning Telstra about a fault with its service (I'm not sure that "service" is the correct term, it probably should be referred to as a "disservice") and having the call relayed offshore to someone in the Philippines with the stupid notion they'll be able to understand what the problem is AND be able to do something about addressing the problem.

Hey, let it be known from the outset that this has nothing to do with racism, if that's what readers are starting to think. It's a simple matter of Telstra's very dubious policy of employing cheap, inefficient, unqualified persons who are far removed from the situation and have no idea about fixing a problem that a staff member whose feet are on the ground in Australia can address in a matter of minutes.

Last week I spoke with four persons in the Philippines on three occasions (calls were made to Telstra on Wednesday, Thursday and Friday and each was diverted to the Philippines). On Wednesday I was told that Telstra would have my problem remedied within 4 hours. By Thursday, the problem still existed - Telstra said it would now be fixed in 4-12 hours. Friday, still no resolution - Telstra said it would now be fixed within 24 hours.

Clever me says, "I've had enough. Put me through to your supervisor". Supervisor reviews the case notes and admits all three employees (that's a dead-set misnomer, I suspect they're really contractors or sweat shoppers) were wrong. It would take ... wait for this ... five, yes F - I - V - E, 5 working days to have the problem addressed. That was on Friday, so I pointed out to the supervisor that I live in eastern Australia where Monday 13th June was a public holiday. "No worries", says supervisor, "the complaints section works on Monday and I'll make sure your matter is being followed-up by having Telstra ring you on Monday. What's a good time for Telstra to ring you?" I answer, "After 8.30am."

Monday, 4.55pm and still no call from Telstra so this litle black duck rings Telstra and when the computerised answering system asked what my call was about  I smartly said "Complaints about Telstra."

Well, knock me down with a feather, because a real live Aussie took my call in far-flung Perth. Yep, you guessed right - Telstra in the eastern states were enjoying their public holiday but it wasn't a holiday in the west. See here for WA's public holidays. WA celebrates the Queen's Birthday on 28th October.

A quick review of my case notes confirmed my worst fears. Yes, my small problem which was entirely of Telstra's doing, would take up to five working days to resolve AND I should have been told that if the first person had logged my complaint correctly and initiated proper action to have it addressed.

Where did my problem begin? Yes, in the Philippines when I spoke with someone at Telstra (in the Philippines, of course) about my phone connection two months ago. When did it come to my attention? When the bill from Telstra arrived via Australia Post and I noticed I was being billed for something I never sought nor wanted.

I still cannot work out the 5 business days bit. Perhaps Telstra uses carrier pigeons to send messages from the Philippines to its workers in Australia who actually do the work and fix up their stuff-ups.

Perhaps we could revisit the good old days when the PMG Department had carriage for all these matters.

The Twitterverse luvs Kev.......and Jools

Australian MP Tweets sez of the 99 Aussie pollies who tweet:
"Note that Kevin Rudd (@KRuddMP) has over 940,000 followers and 220,000 friends, and as such has been excluded from this chart – his significantly higher figures makes it difficult to see the detail for the remaining members."
Rudd's twitterverse popularity comes off a total of only 1,178 tweets.
At around 4pm on 11th June 2011 Australian Prime Minister Julia Gillard was coming in second to the Foreign Minister with 106,696 followers, Malcolm Turnbull was firmly in third place at 56,038 and Opposition Leader Tony Abbott trailed a poor fourth at 34,762 tweeters interested enough to click the +Follow button.

Click on image to enlarge

McDonald's Yamba's spin machine revs up

                 Where there's smoke there's fire.

The franchisee of McDonald's Yamba must live in some parallel universe. In today's Daily Examiner the franchisee says the only negative reaction to the restaurant (that's his description of the dump, not mine) since its opening has been damage done to four of the five signs on bus shelters in Yamba that carry its advertising.

“I haven’t had any problems since we opened other than that,” the franchisee told the Examiner.

That's strange because word on the streets of Yamba is the place is doing so poorly Head Office has taken a very keen interest in the figures appearing in the hamburger joint's financial books.

 Source: The Daily Examiner, 13/6/11