Australian Federal Election 2016: Ooopps!

Receiving an honourable mention on the slippery slope of media attention are; a missing rare coin, Liberal MP for Corangamite Sarah Henderson's election campaign corflutes, the Liberal Party of Australia, Liberal Senator for Victoria and Australian Minister for Vocational Education & Skills Scott Ryan, along with Prime Minister Malcolm Bligh Turnbull's failure to notice the homophobe and 457 visas.

Crikey.com.au, 14 April 2016:

It has the hallmarks of an episode of The West Wing: the Prime Minister was given a rare and precious artefact. The artefact went missing. And now the staffer who was supposed to have been looking after the artefact is gone.

Electrical Trades Union on Twitter, 14 April 2016:

Herald Sun, 12 April 2016:

ACCESS to a confidential database that holds federal Cabinet ministers’ personal contact details was issued to a non-government employee because he shared the name of a current political staffer.

In an embarrassing breach of the Liberal Party’s “secure” website protocols ahead of this year’s federal election, an adviser to a crossbench senator was issued with personal login details to the site that contains confidential internal government documents and policy briefing notes.

An email sent on behalf of Liberal Party federal director Tony Nutt provided Chris Evans, an adviser to independent Victorian senator John Madigan, with a password to the site while it also outlined security protocols around its strict access.

Government sources yesterday told the Herald Sun it should be viewed as potentially a “serious security breach” and labelled it “incredibly sloppy”.

Approved access to the site known as Jeparit Town, a reference to the rural Victorian birthplace of Australia’s longest-serving prime minister, Sir Robert Menzies, is reserved for “approved personnel” including Liberal MPs and senators, candidates and senior staff.

It is viewed as an important source of information that also includes “talking points” for media interviews, personal phone numbers of parliamentarians and staff, political artwork, and training materials.

The Canberra Times, 12 April 2016:

Vocational Education Minister Scott Ryan has been left red faced for giving a speech to a national training organisation that not only lifted – without attribution – quotes directly from the association's own journal, but also praised the "current" work of an entity that no longer exists.

Last Thursday Senator Ryan delivered the keynote address to Group Training Australia's national conference in Adelaide.

GTA is the body representing Australia's largest employer network of apprentices and trainees.

In his address the minister lauded the work of a Charters Towers based trainer Rural Industry and Extension, or RITE, for providing training right across northern Australia.

He spoke of RITE being both a Registered Training Organisation (RTO) and an official Group Training Organisation (GTO) "responsible for one of the largest regions in the world, extending across Queensland, the Northern Territory, Western Australia and South Australia".

By this point, eyebrows were already being raised in the audience…...

Geelong Advertiser, 11 April 2016:

A FORMER Victorian Liberal candidate who was once disowned by his party over homophobic comments has been awarded the party’s most prestigious award for young members.

Aaron Lane was given the meritorious youth award at the party’s state council in Victoria on Saturday.

The award was presented by Foreign Minister Julie Bishop and Prime Minister Malcolm Turnbull, who news.com.au understands was not aware of the 2014 controversy.

The honour comes less than two years after Mr Lane was forced to resign his candidacy in the upper house Western Victorian Region over a series of derogatory tweets.

Mr Lane published tweets including the word “faggot” and saying, “The problem is (IMO) many homos make their sexuality a defining aspect of their being.”

He also called Labor figures Simon Crean and former speaker Peter Slipper “a giant C”…..

7 News, 5 Februrary 2016:

7 News can reveal a truck driver who sparked traffic chaos, shutting down the M5 East on Friday, is here working on a 457 visa. The driver is so inexperienced that he couldn't reverse after realising his truck was too tall to enter the airport tunnel. Chris Reason reports.

UPDATE

https%3A//vine.co/033764db-60af-4224-b97f-499d87506030

18 April 2016

Global corruption of democracy in the 21st Century

The Guardian UK, 11 April 2016:

Because at root, the Panama Papers are not about tax. They’re not even about money. What the Panama Papers really depict is the corruption of our democracy.

Following on from LuxLeaks, the Panama Papers confirm that the super-rich have effectively exited the economic system the rest of us have to live in. Thirty years of runaway incomes for those at the top, and the full armoury of expensive financial sophistication, mean they no longer play by the same rules the rest of us have to follow. Tax havens are simply one reflection of that reality. Discussion of offshore centres can get bogged down in technicalities, but the best definition I’ve found comes from expert Nicholas Shaxson who sums them up as: “You take your money elsewhere, to another country, in order to escape the rules and laws of the society in which you operate.” In so doing, you rob your own society of cash for hospitals, schools, roads…

“Those who exited our societies are now also exercising their voice to set the rules by which the rest of us live”

But those who exited our societies are now also exercising their voice to set the rules by which the rest of us live. The 1% are buying political influence as never before. Think of the billionaire Koch brothers, whose fortunes will shape this year’s US presidential elections. In Britain, remember the hedge fund and private equity barons, who in 2010 contributed half of all the Conservative party’s election funds – and so effectively bought the Tories their first taste of government in 18 years.

To flesh out the corrosion of democracy that is happening, you need to go to a Berlin-born economist called Albert Hirschman, a giant in modern economic thinking. Hirschman died in 2012 at the age of 97, but it’s his concepts that really set in context what’s so disturbing about the Panama Papers.

Hirschman argued that citizens could protest against a system in one of two ways: voice or exit. Fed up with your local school? Then you can exercise your voice and take it up with the headteacher. Alternatively, you can exit and take your child to a private school.

In Britain and in America, the super-rich have broken Hirschman’s law – they are at one and the same time exercising economic exit and political voice. They can have their tax-free cake and eat it……

Hon. Bronwyn Bishop MP is no more

The Sydney Morning Herald: Bronwyn Bishop as Speaker

Come federal polling day this year Australia will see the last of the Hon. Bronwyn Kathleen Bishop - Senator for NSW for six and a half years, Member for Mackellar for twenty-two years and Speaker of the House of Representatives from 12 November 2013 to 2 August 2015 when her forced resignation from that post resulted in an ignominious return to the government backbench.

The 73 year-old Ms. Bishop was dumped by the Liberal Party as its endorsed candidate in Mackellar on 16 April 2016 after a long but lacklustre political career spiked by periods of controversy.

Most notably when:

in 1990 when she breached Liberal Party conditions that said neither members of parliament nor candidates could accept money on the party’s behalf for their own campaigning;

in 1994 she breached parliamentary funding guidelines in relation to a researcher she had employed who was being paid by FAI Insurance;

her three-year stint as Minister for Aging saw her become known as the Minister for Kerosene Baths after mistreatment of the elderly in nursing homes came to light in 2000;
based on alleged security concerns she ordered that women wearing the burqa or niqab be segregated from others in the visitors' gallery of Parliament House in 2014;

as probably the most-biased politician to have ever occupied the Speaker’s chair she removed MPs from the House of Representatives chamber 400 times over 18 months with 393 of these instances involving Labor MPs (as well as condoning the Liberal Leader of the House openly calling the Leader of the Opposition a c*unt); and finally,

her excessive use and alleged abuse of parliamentary travel entitlements became public knowledge culminating in Choppergate in 2015.

Described as the “unacceptable face of the Liberal Party” and widely disliked both within and without the party, it is unlikely that she will be missed when the 45^th Australian Parliament is formed.

Counting Dead Women 2016: violent death toll reaches 23

Destroy the Joint list of dead women up to 14 April 2016

One violent death every five days

Special Broadcasting Services Corporation (SBS) not trailing clouds of glory on settlement of unfair dismissal dispute

mUmBRELLA, 11 April 2016:

Multicultural broadcaster SBS has reached a confidential settlement with its former sports reporter Scott McIntyre after he launched legal action against the broadcaster claiming it did “not follow due process” when it fired him…..

Asked what he meant by the phrase “vigilantes & hypocrites” Bornstein accused former Communications Minister and now Prime Minister Malcolm Turnbull, News Corp columnist Chris Kenny and former Human Rights Commissioner Tim Wilson of seeking to “crush” free speech.

“The vigilantes & hypocrites who sought to have Scott sacked and his freedom of speech suppressed after the event included (then Communications Minister) Malcolm Turnbull, (News Corp columnist) Chris Kenny and (Australia’s Human Rights Commissioner) Tim Wilson,” said Bornstein.

“These are people who speak loftily about freedom of speech and when it is inconvenient to them ditch it and try and crush someone whose views they disagree with. They should be ashamed of themselves.”…..

JOINT STATEMENT BY SBS AND SCOTT MCINTYRE

11 April 2016

SBS and Mr McIntyre have now resolved their dispute over the termination of his employment on 26 April 2015.

SBS acknowledges that Mr McIntyre was a well respected sports reporter with SBS for a period spanning over a decade, and SBS is disappointed that it was unable to continue with his services following his Tweets.

Mr McIntyre acknowledges that the views expressed in his Tweets on 25 April 2015 were his views and that they were contentious. Mr McIntyre regrets any attribution of his views to SBS and acknowledges that SBS was drawn into controversy following the expression of his views.

BACKGROUND

McIntyre v Special Broadcasting Services Corporation [2015] FWC 6768 (1 October 2015) – Fair Work Commission Decision:

Conclusion

[43] In this instance the respondent employer, SBS, has made a challenge to an application for unlawful termination of employment which was taken under s. 773 of the Act. The applicant had made a previous general protections application under s. 365 of the Act. The challenge to the application made by SBS relies upon the purported operation of s. 723 of the Act.

[44] I have concluded that in the particular circumstances of this case, s. 723 of the Act does not operate as a jurisdictional bar to the application, as the applicant is not a person who is entitled to make a general protections court application in relation to the conduct that he complains of. Further, I have decided that exceptional circumstances exist such that the time for the making of the application should be extended and the application permitted to proceed accordingly.

[45] My conclusions have been broadly drawn from a purposive interpretation of the Act cognisant that it is beneficial legislation. In simple terms, I believe that the Act, and s. 723 in particular, should not be interpreted in a manner which would deprive an individual of access to a fair hearing or, as may be euphemistically described, a person’s “day in court”. In the circumstances of this case the applicant does not seek multiple proceedings or remedies but simply seeks to have his day in court.

[46] It is perhaps sadly ironic that many members of the Australian Defence Force lost their lives in the earnest pursuit of the protection of rights and freedoms such as the access to a fair hearing which the applicant is entitled to obtain.

[47] The jurisdictional objection raised by SBS is dismissed, the extension of time for the application to have been made is granted and a certificate shall be issued pursuant to subsection 776 (3) of the Act.

COMMISSIONER

Oh dear........

ABC News, 12 April 2016:

Basic design artwork for the signature side of the new Australian $5 banknote.