NSW North Coast Area Health Service tries 'the cheque is in the mail' routine

CEO Chris Crawford and the North Coast Area Health Service are obviously having problems colouring in between the lines of the recent announcement that some public hospital beds would be withdrawn from daily use and nursing shift numbers would be decreased.

 

"AT 5.10pm yesterday members of the New South Wales Nurses Association were still sitting by their fax machine waiting for an explanation from the North Coast Area Health Service on its plans to reallocate 86 North Coast hospital beds, including 12 from Grafton and Maclean, as surge beds.

They didn't get it.

Nurses Association organiser Susan Pearce said she had been told the Health Service had sent the material electronically about 4.45pm, but it hadn't arrived by the 5pm deadline set by a disputes committee.

"They were going to implement this plan on Tuesday, so I wouldn't have thought it would take them that long to send us the material," she said."

The Daily Examiner article on Saturday:

http://www.dailyexaminer.com.au/localnews/storydisplay.cfm?storyid=3762539&thesection=localnews&thesubsection=&thesecondsubsection=

 

Ms. Pearce is being diplomatic here. This was so obviously local health policy on the run, that I doubt whether anything was in place except the most rudimentary moves to close down beds and reduce shift numbers. 

Why is it that only ratepayers and local government are responsible for disposal of all wasteful or inappropriate packaging of consumer goods?

Tinker, tailor, soldier, sailor, rich man, poor man, beggar man, thief. It doesn't matter who buys that soft drink or hamburger on the NSW North Coast. Eventually the throw-away bottle, styrofoam box or paper bag will be disposed of in landfill, using the resources of local government and money collected from local ratepayers.

So why is it that the manufacturers of food and drink are not responsible for the enduring forms of packaging that they use?

That bottle or styrofoam container lasts well beyond its immediate purpose, and either litters our streets or adds to our landfill refuse volume.

 

Clean Up Australia's Ian Keirnan has the right idea when he calls for the introduction of a national drinks container refund scheme.

It has always been frustrating to watch the successful refund scheme operating in South Australia and know that there was no such scheme available to us on the North Coast.

 

"The organisation's annual rubbish report, for 2006-07 "showed nearly 40 per cent of the 8000 tonnes of rubbish collected on Clean Up Australia Day was used drink bottles and cans.

Chairman Ian Kiernan said climate change meant Australia had to change its ways, with recycling reform an important part of that."

 

So how about it, Prime Minister Rudd, are you up to tackling the multinationals over packaging rubbish?

Is there no-one brave enough to send Peter Garrett to the backbenches?

Peter Garrett attracts bad press like a magnet and almost appears to go out of his way to create conditions for the political gaffe.

Under fire for his volte-face agreement with the Coalition on Gunn's pulp mill proposal during the election campaign, he then went on as the new Environment Minister to endorse another disaster in the making - Port Phillip Bay dredging.

In between, he managed a large and very public foot in the mouth over Labor's future policy intentions.

Somewhere in all this he also cocked-up his part in organising Australia's monitoring of this year's Antarctic whaling season.

Now it seems Garrett thinks he can finalise the Bay dredging issues by looking at documents "over the weekend". At the same time putting Gunn's mill to bed by approving the environmental plan in stages, while hoping Australia doesn't notice by announcing it after 5pm on a Friday night.

The man is shaping up as Federal Labor's great galah. Gawd knows what will happen to this minister once February 13 comes around and he has to get to his feet in the House of Reps.

By then he'll have probably brought Labor's entire environmental platform crashing down.

Especially as Rudd has just given him responsibility for community and household climate change action, greenhouse gas abatement and energy efficiency.

What on earth was the Prime Minister thinking?

Morrie wants to sell the farm and Sussex Street gets very nervous

The NSW Labor Government is still pushing ahead with the privatisation of power supplies in the state.

It's rumoured that sitting government MPs are rather irate at the voter flack that Morris Iemma has brought down on their heads.

The Sussex Street party machine is also worried about surviving the next state election, if the voter mood remains the same.

They should all be worried, every man-jack. This has to be the stupidest political move that Iemma and Costa have made, in a growing list of stupid moves.

I hear that the Opposition is down on its knees every night praying that privatisation goes ahead, as they see it delivering votes and cash when they win government.

  

Bundjalung artists exhibit this month at Ballina

Two Catfish Nesting by Noel Kenneth Caldwell. Photograph from The Northern Rivers Echo.

Indigenous artists from the Jambama Art Shed in Casino are taking their art to the coast for a special exhibition at the Northern Rivers Community Gallery in Ballina, aptly titled Branching Out.
As well as traditional canvas paintings, there are painted boomerangs, clap sticks, sculptures, pyrographic pieces and designer wall hangings. There are also sewn items including bags, place mats and cushion covers, all with original hand printed designs.
Branching Out opens at the Northern Rivers Community Gallery in Ballina on Friday, February 1, and runs until February 24. Artworks are also on display at the Jambama Art Shed Gallery Space in Casino, which is open to the public Monday to Friday from 9am to 4pm."

The other side of the 'sorry' coin: bitter bile spews forth

This swam across my screen yesterday from a site describing itself as " Australia's eminent source of news, politics and commentary. Make iServ your trusted resource for accuracy and the good old Aussie fair go!"

It seems this blog has been swallowing Liberal Party memos whole for breakfast, with disastrous results.

 

"Prime Minister, Kevin Rudd, is about to say sorry to the alleged stolen generation, a generation of people who in reality simply don't understand that they all would have probably been dead by now if it wasn't for them being placed in foster homes - a bunch of ungrateful, resentful brats who are keen on big payouts at the hands of bleeding hearted do-gooders in one of the greatest displays of double standards the current generation of Australians will witness."

Found at http://iserv.com.au/default.asp?t=485 

The National Indigenous Times on the 'sorry' question

The National Indigenous Times January 2008 editorial.

"The Rudd government's handling of the sorry saga over an apology and payment of compensation to members of the Stolen Generation represents both a step forward and a step backward.
And as any fifth grader will tell you, that adds up to not much progress at all.
The step forward is that a national apology will be delivered. Granted, for Indigenous Australians extracting the word 'sorry' must feel like drawing blood from a stone. But a belated apology is better than no apology at all.
The step backward is that Prime Minister Kevin Rudd and his Indigenous affairs minister, Jenny Macklin have decided that no compensation will be forthcoming. That is deeply disappointing.
Of course, the practice of removal was primarily committed by state governments, so it is not the federal government's responsibility to compensate ALL Aboriginal people for the Stolen Generations outrage, even though some leadership from federal Labor on the issue would have been welcome.
But it is most certainly the federal government's responsibility in relation to the Northern Territory, which was under Commonwealth control until the late 1970s.
Sadly, politics got in the way of progress again.
Rudd simply did not want his Prime Ministership defined by an early act of 'generosity' towards 'the blacks'. While it may well have been the 'right thing to do', politics is about pragmatism and populism, not principle and leadership."
National Indigenous Times editorial in full:

http://www.nit.com.au/opinion/story.aspx?id=13781

 

The Australian legal system has recognised that compensation is due to individuals from the Stolen Generation.

 

"THE first stolen generation Aborigine to be given compensation has been awarded another $250,000 by a South Australian court.

Bruce Trevorrow was awarded $525,000 in compensation in August last year after a South Australian judge ruled the state falsely imprisoned him as a child and owed him a duty of care for pain and suffering.
Lawyers for Mr Trevorrow then returned to court seeking 50 years of interest on the compensation payment.
The lawyers argued Mr Trevorrow should receive an extra $800,000 but the SA Supreme Court, civil jurisdiction, today awarded him $250,000 in interest.
Mr Trevorrow was 13 months old in 1957 when a neighbour drove him from his Coorong family home, south-east of Adelaide, to Adelaide's Children's Hospital with stomach pains.
Two weeks later, under the authority of the Aborigines Protection Board, he was given to a woman, who later became his foster parent, without the permission of his natural parents.

He did not see his family again for 10 years--- "

News.com.au article yesterday:

http://www.news.com.au/story/0,23599,23143865-29277,00.html