Australian Electoral Commission to release 2007-08 political financial disclosure returns on 2 Feburary 2009

The 2007-08 annual financial disclosure returns from political parties, associated entities, donors, and people who engage in political expenditure will be made available for public inspection from 9:00am (AEDST) on Monday 2 February 2009.

The annual returns will be available on the Australian Electoral Commission's (AEC's) website at www.aec.gov.au

North Coast Area Health Service debt in 2009

I guess that we should all be thankful for small mercies on finding that the North Coast Area Health Service debt of $9 million is the fourth lowest across New South Wales.
Still, the total picture clearly shows that it is time for the Commonwealth to resume total responsibility for the provision of public hospitals and health services.
Unfortunately, all Kevin Rudd promised in the lead up to the 2007 federal election was that he would take over the running of public hospitals if the states did not agree to a national reform plan by mid 2009.
Hardly the answer to so mammoth a problem, when the debts keep mounting and the states (especially New South Wales) are so obviously incapable of solving the financial and workforce crises in health services.

Debt List:
Sydney South West Area Health Service $0
Hunter New England Area Health Service $0
Children's Hospital at Westmead $4.5m
North Coast Area Health Service $9m
Greater Western Area Health Service $10m
North Sydney Central Coast Area Health Service $22m
Greater Southern Area Health Service $22m
South East Sydney Illawarra Area Health Service $24m
Sydney West Area Health Service $26m
NSW Health owes $117.5 million to creditors
(Debt figures according to The Sydney Morning Herald, 28 January 2009)

Are we there yet? Senator Conroy's neverending search for an ISP-level filtering trial

It seems that the Minister for Broadband, Communications and the Digital Economy is still having trouble herding enough ISPs into his Internet filtering trial and we are about to enter February without any clear indication of when the trial will actually begin.

An unidentified spokesperson for Senator Conroy reportedly tells us that the trial is imminent, will involve up to 16 applicants and ISPs will be clustered in the trial, which will mean that the original six-week test period is likely to drag on over months.

Along the way the Minister appears to have decided to rename his trial as the ISP-level objectionable content filtering trial, if Suzanne Tindal reporting on ZNet yesterday is any indication.
An obvious expansion of his original title which was the plainer Internet Service Provider level filtering trial.

Meanwhile..........

• GOOGLE has unveiled a plan aimed at letting computer users determine whether ISPs are inappropriately blocking or slowing their work online.
  
  
• On the last day of 2008 the Bergman Institute for Internet & Society at Harvard University released the Final Report Of The Internet Safety Technical Task Force To The Multi-State Working Group On Social Networking Of State Attorneys General Of The United States.
  
  While all investigations of this nature will have flaws, there are three telling statements in the Executive Summary that Senator Stephen Conroy should note as he and the Prime Minister relentlessly drive Australia towards a national Internet censorship scheme.
  
  Bullying and harassment, most often by peers, are the most frequent threats that minors face, both online and offline.
  and
  The Internet increases the availability of harmful, problematic and illegal content, but does not always increase minors' exposure. Unwanted exposure to pornography does occur online, but those most likely to be exposed are those seeking it out, such as older male minors.
  and
  Minors are not equally at risk online. Those who are most at risk often engage in risky behaviors and have difficulties in other parts of their lives. The psychosocial makeup of and family dynamics surrounding particular minors are better predictors of risk than the use of specific media or technologies.

Barnaby Joyce eyes off the seat of Page?

Letter to the Editor published in The Daily Examiner on Thursday 29 January 2009:

So Queensland Liberal National Party Senator, Barnaby Joyce, is considering the poisoned chalice (thrust towards him by John Howard) and may yet abandon the Senate and seek election to the House of Representatives.

If there was one thing pointing to this politician's foolishness it would be the fact that he is reportedly considering such a move with one eye on the seat of Page in the NSW Northern Rivers.

He must have the shortest of memories himself or think that people in the Clarence Valley have such faulty recall that they would fail to remember that he supported the Howard-Turnbull push to dam and divert water from the Clarence River catchment.

Yes, baying at the back of that particular water raider's pack came Senator Joyce, who sat on the Senate RRAT Committee inquiry into additional water supplies for south-east Queensland where he made it plain that he was not adverse to any proposal to steal Clarence freshwater so that his Queensland mates could continue their unsustainable irrigation practices [April-August 2007].

He also voted against The Greens motion in the Senate which read in part:"That the Senate:....(b) calls on the Federal Government to: (i) abandon plans for damming the Clarence, Tweed, Richmond and Mann Rivers;" [C'wealth Hansard,Senate,proof issue,19 August 2007,p.p. 33-34].

As late as the middle of last year he was still including mention of the Clarence catchment in his discussions on water supply:"You can't create water with money. That means you have to think about bringing it from somewhere else, like the Gulf or the Clarence." [The Land, 13 August 2008]

Voting for Barnaby Joyce to fill a federal seat anywhere on the NSW North Coast would be allowing the water raiders to once again get a foot in the door after Northern Rivers communities had so firmly slammed that same door shut in 2007.

Yours faithfully,

JUDITH M. MELVILLE

[Taken from A Clarence Valley Protest]

Oz - a picture of the nation

The Australian Bureau of Statistics has just released its A Picture of the Nation based on the 2006 national census.

Apparently we are smarter, less religious and more likely to live in cities than previous generations of Aussies.

But are we really less religious or do we only appear that way because finally we all feel freer to state facts like that?

Graph from ABS Religion Across Generations PDF

The baby kissing effect begins to fade for Obama?

Thanks to Clarrie Rivers for the photo

US President Barack Obama scored a 68% approval rating for the first three days in office according to Gallup and 69% for the next three days.

John F. Kennedy is the single modern president who appears to have started his presidential life with a higher approval score, but his popularity was not polled so early in his presidency.

However, Obama scored a whopping 83% approval rating during his president-elect transition period so this latest poll (with its 14 to 15 point drop) while clearly showing that his honeymoon with the American people is not yet over does indicate that it may be on the wane.

Strangely the main stream media appear to be largely silent on this rather dramatic plunge in the polls except to characterise it in an historical context or refer to it as normalising the figures.

Only Iran Press TV and The Daily Mail pointed out that the new figure actually represented a decline, though a small number of news blogs also mentioned the percentage as a drop in approval.

In the U.S. Real Clear Politics tells us that across six polls conducted over 11-24 January, between 52-79% of those polled believed America was heading in the wrong direction.

What we need here is Possum Comitatus to decipher the apparent change in voter sentiment after Obama's comfortable election win.

Woodford Dale Public School has a blog!

Woodford Dale Public School seen across a field of cane.

There are over one hundred islands and islets in the mighty Clarence River on the New South Wales North Coast.

Many of these are populated - sometimes by just a single farm house and sometimes by small village communities.

One of the most enduring examples of island life is Woodford Island, home to approximately 6,000 people.

Its school Woodford Dale Primary School (established in 1867) now has a blog.
A very big welcome to the blogosphere to all its teachers and pupils.