At last - a more balanced look at effects of the Howard-Rudd NT Intervention

Finally the long-awaited Northern Territory Emergency Response Review Report has been released.

It tells us what most sensible people predicted when John Howard announced he implementing a fascist and racist approach to indigenous communities in the Top End.

The Executive Summary to the report states:

In many communities there is a deep belief that the measures introduced by the Australian Government under the NTER were a collective imposition based on race.

There is a strong sense of injustice that Aboriginal people and their culture have been seen as exclusively responsible for problems within their communities that have arisen from decades of cumulative neglect by governments in failing to provide the most basic standards of health, housing, education and ancillary services enjoyed by the wider Australian community.

Support for the positive potential of NTER measures has been dampened and delayed by the manner in which they were imposed.

The Intervention diminished its own effectiveness through its failure to engage constructively with the Aboriginal people it was intended to help.......

The benefits of income management are being increasingly experienced. Its compulsory, blanket imposition continues to be resisted, but the measure is capable of being reformed and improved......

If the various NTER measures are to operate as a genuine suite of measures there needs to be adjustments in the machinery of government enabling better coordination of services, greater responsiveness to the unique characteristics of each community and higher levels of community participation in the design and delivery of services.

People who do not wish to participate should be free to leave the scheme. It should be available on a voluntary basis and imposed only as a precise part of child protection measures or where specified by statute, subject to independent review. In both cases it should be supported by services to improve financial literacy.

Income management is in many respects representative of other NTER measures. If it is modified and improved, then the resistance to its original imposition might be negated.

When specifically addressing the selective quashing of the Racial Discrimination Act 1975, the report itself stated:

Not surprisingly, there was a convergence among
official commentaries and submissions to the Board
around the fundamental principle of international
human rights law that different classes of rights
cannot be traded off against each other. This
principle is captured in article 5 of the Vienna
Declaration on Human Rights (1993).

It is important to note that criticisms over the
exclusion of the RDA do not simply reflect an
‘academic’ debate. Throughout the Board’s
community visits and consultations with various
organisations and representatives, it was made
abundantly clear that people in Aboriginal
communities felt humiliated and shamed by the
imposition of measures that marked them out as
less worthy of the legislative protections afforded
other Australians.

These concerns were most palpable in the context
of comments and submissions relating to the
compulsory acquisition of land41 and the exclusion
of external merits review in the income management
scheme applied in the Northern Territory.42.....

In the Board’s view, there are no convincing
arguments for excluding human rights principles
and the RDA. Consistent with a key theme of the
review the Board believes the re-engagement
process has to be underpinned by acknowledgment
of the informed consent principle and human
rights provisions.

Predictably Howard's leftovers still on the Opposition front bench oppose any change to the Intervention.

One suspects their objections are based on a fear that human rights may be restored to indigenous communities covered by the Intervention.

If the Prime Minister and Cabinet have any moral courage whatsoever, they will scrap Howard's legislation completely and start again.

Full report can be found here.
The Canberra Times on the subject here.

Sol Trujillo fails to come up trumps again

Remember the fanfare about Next G by Telstra being the next generation mobile network, bringing high-speed, wireless broadband internet to mobile phones and laptops across Australia?

Maud up the Street tells me that in Yamba at the mouth of the Clarence River there are places where you still have to sit out in the front yard if you want to use your Telstra mobile for even the simplest functions.
Does Sol care?

Original pic found at The Age

Proud moment for the family of Yamba's Jim Agnew

The Warren Advocate (15/10/2008) reports that the family of Yamba's Jim Agnew enjoyed a "proud occasion" on Friday September 19 when Jim was presented with his Order of Australia Medal by the Governor of NSW Marie Bashir.

Mr Agnew’s OAM was announced in the Queen’s Birthday Honours list in June and he received his medal on Friday September 19.

His wife Grace, sister Gwen Morrisey (Canberra) and daughter Jan accompanied him.

Jim's daughter, Jan Wilde, who represented family members at the Government House ceremony said, “I’m very proud of Dad and it was a lovely day.”

Mr Agnew left Warren 31 years ago but is best remembered by the community as being the proprietor of Agnews Motors, a local shire councillor, bowling club president and founding president of Macquarie/Bogan District Bowling Club as well as the Warren Trotting Club.

Mr Agnew was awarded the medal for service to the Clarence Valley community where he has lived for the past 20 years. His long list of achievements includes successful lobbying for an ambulance station at Yamba and the widening of the Oyster Channel Bridge. Aged 82, he continues to chair and work on various health and community committees and auxiliaries.

Pictures -

Above: Jim Agnew OAM with his wife Grace and daughter Jan Wilde
Below: Grace and Jim Agnew OAM and his sister Gwen Morrisey (Canberra)

CONGRATULATIONS JIM!

Clarrie expresses his appreciation of the Warren Advocate for this news and the accompanying photographs.

US 08: LOLs go feral and a billboard snarls

From Pundit Kitchen

Click any LOL to enlarge.

Billboard pic found at Current.com

And if you thought these examples were getting rather basic, take a look at this T-shirt.

Aye, aye, Cap'n [Malcolm] Bligh!

Poor Malcolm Bligh Turnbull, erstwhile Federal Leader of the Opposition.
Nothing is really going his way these days when when it comes to the economy.

Rudders has stolen thunder from The Cap'n when it comes to pensioners, low income families and first homebuyers.
He has given them at least 1,400 reasons why he and not the Coalition will be remembered this Christmas when the one-off lumpsum payments flow through the system.
Turnbull is also left with a poor selection of milksop responses like 'I thoughta it furst', as Rudd and Swan don gravitas cloaks and sally forth to head off domestic impacts of the global economic crisis.

It sort of makes nonsense of all that braying Turnbull was doing less than three weeks ago:
"Malcolm Turnbull: I move: That so much of the standing and sessional orders be suspended as would prevent the Leader of the Opposition moving immediately— That the Rudd Government be condemned for being out of touch, out of its depth and out of the country. In particular:(1)that the Government be condemned for its complete indifference to the plight of Australian pensioners who are struggling on a daily basis to meet the rising costs of petrol, groceries and rent;....
That this House condemns the Treasurer for his complete lack of understanding about the domestic impact of the global financial crisis and his inability to understand the impact it will have on Australian families, their jobs and their mortgages."

And last fortnight's effort:

"Mr Turnbull said Mr Rudd "should not constitute himself as the leader of the big bank protection association. The banks are big enough to make their own case."

But what I enjoyed most was reading about The Cap'n taking Rudd to task over the effect that the one-off payments might have on Australia's rate of inflation.

Wasn't that long ago that Turnbull treated the notion of inflation with a dismissive joke.

The Cap'ns feeble effort on Monday, "What we hear is that at long last they're going to provide some additional resources to pensioners," only served to remind many on the NSW North Coast that when in government the Coalition resisted raising the base pension and firmly set its face against any fair go for disability support pensioners.

Now if he wanted to talk about the Rees-Rudd community housing rental policy debacle...

The Good Oil about Rudd's $4 billion support for rural and regional Australia

Because some of the media articles today, about the Rudd Government's announced one-off payments to assist welfare recipients, low-income families and first home buyers, are not always clearly worded - here is the Prime Minister's media release.

 

Joint Media Release with the
Minister for Agriculture, Tony Burke
2.9 Million Regional and Rural Australians to Benefit from $4 Billion of Support

14 October 2008

The Rudd Government is providing 2.9 million Australians in regional and rural areas with around $4 billion in extra support to help with cost of living pressures and sustain economic growth.

The initiative is part of the Rudd Government's $10.4 billion Economic Security Strategy that will strengthen regional economies and households, given the risk of a deep and prolonged global economic slowdown.

Pensioners, carers and families living in rural and regional Australia will benefit from additional financial assistance from 8 December.

Almost one million families in regional and rural Australia who receive Family Tax Benefit A will receive a lump sum payment of $1,000 in respect of each eligible child in their care.

The payment will also be made for each dependent child who attracts Youth Allowance, Abstudy, or a Veteran's Children's Education Scheme payment.

Around 1.9 million pensioners living in regional and rural Australia will get a down payment on longer term reforms because we recognise their need for early support.

Pensioners living in regional and rural communities will receive a one-off payment of $1,400 if they are single or $2,100 if they are a couple.

Recipients of the following payment will be eligible:

• Age Pension;
• Carer Payment;
• Disability Support Pension;
• Bereavement Allowance, Wife Pension, Widow B Pension, Partner Allowance, Widow Allowance;
• Special Benefit;
• Veterans' Affairs Service Pension; and
• Veterans Income Support Supplement.

As well, those receiving Carer Allowance will receive $1,000 for each eligible person in their care.

The Government's economic package also includes help for self funded retirees in regional and rural areas seriously affected by the decline in the value of their investments.

In all 130,500 Commonwealth Seniors Health Card holders living in regional and rural Australia will receive a payment of $1,400 if they are single or $2,100 if they are a couple.

For the first time, lump sum payments are being extended to include 391,000 Disability Support Pensioners under the age of 65 living in non-metropolitan areas.

All payments will be tax exempt and not included for income-testing purposes.

Thousands of Australians in regional Australia will also benefit from the Rudd Government First Home Owners Boost.

• First home buyers who purchase established homes will have their grant doubled from $7,000 to $14,000;
• First home buyers who purchase a newly constructed home will receive an extra $14,000 to take their grant to $21,000.

The Rudd Government initiative is designed to stimulate housing activity and give first home buyers a better chance in the housing market.

** I'll refrain from wondering what inventive methods private landlords and community housing companies will employ to part single pensioner and lone parent tenants from part or all of this money.

Living life on your uppers in the Northern Rivers

I've just received the October newsletter from my community housing company which contains mind boggling information.
It informs me that my entire rent assistance will be taken by North Coast Community Housing Company Ltd and that this will go towards a rent increase.

In this newsletter a member of the Tenant Council also tells me that "While $50 a fortnight is a lot to lose out of our income, Housing NSW and the Community Housing Companies have agreed that no more than $10 per week increase will be taken out in the 1st year. That means that $10 per week will come out in the 1st year, $20 per week in the 2nd year, $30 per week in the third year. Most, if not all of this will be covered by CPI increases."

Where on earth did this nonsense come from?
"Most, if not all of this will be covered by CPI increases" - who on earth lives in a world where the Commonwealth Government gives pension CPI rises which amount to $60 a fortnight?
And what about all the other cost increases, like groceries and transport, that are also supposedly covered by the real minuscule pension increases? Also, why on earth assume that every tenant gets $50 in rent assistance because many don't, and why does the letter which came in the same envelope say that money from my "own pocket" might also be needed to meet the rent increase? What pocket would that be I wonder and where can I find it?

This is a blatant rip-off!!

Disgruntled Pensioner
Grafton NSW

* GuestSpeak is a feature of North Coast Voices allowing Northern Rivers residents to make satirical or serious comment on issues that concern them. Posts of 250-300 words or less can be submitted to ncvguestspeak@live.com.au for consideration.