Will Clarence Valley Council follow where Coffs Harbour City leads?

MINUTES OF COFFS HARBOUR CITY COUNCIL ORDINARY MEETING June 14, 2012:

NOM12/2 GAME AND FERAL ANIMAL CONTROL

131 RESOLVED (Graham/Knight) that:

Council note that:

1. The NSW government has a proposal on the table which would see children

as young as 12, with their parents' permission, able to hunt unsupervised on

public land in NSW.

2. This would see children able to hunt using bows and arrows, pig dogs, and

bowie knives without any adult supervision.

3. Hunting wild pigs using dogs and knives is considered, even for adults, to be dangerous for the hunter and the dogs, and an unnecessarily stressful death for the animal.

4. It is irresponsible for any government to be proposing an activity which will be

dangerous for the children involved and others who use public land for

recreational purposes.

5. While feral animal control is an important activity, it is best done professionally and as humanely as possible for the animals involved.

Council:

1. Oppose this dangerous proposal by the NSW government; and

2. Make a submission to the Department of Primary Industries voicing that

opposition.

NOM12/3 OPPOSITION TO PRIVATE SHOOTING IN NATIONAL PARKS

132 RESOLVED (Graham/Arkan) that:

Council note:

1. The NSW Government is seeking to allow private shooting in national parks

and other conservation reserves.

2. The NSW Government proposes to allow private shooting in conservation

reserves in the Coffs Harbour Local Government Area.

3. It is irresponsible for any government to be proposing an activity which will be

dangerous to members of the public and others who use conservation

reserves for recreational purposes.

4. While feral animal control is an important activity, it is only safe and effective

when undertaken professionally and as humanely as possible. This can only

be achieved through the resourcing of professional control programs

implemented by state conservation agencies.

Council:

1. Oppose this dangerous proposal by the NSW government; and

2. Write to the Premier and the Environment Minister in opposition to the

proposal to allow private shooting in conservation reserves.

ALL BUT 48 of the state's almost 800 national parks could eventually be opened up to recreational hunters, according to a Shooters and Fishers MP.
In a video posted online, Robert Borsak said hunting would ''eventually'' be declared in 751 parks.
''There are 780, 790 national parks in NSW, all of which, except about 40, will be eventually declared for hunting,'' Mr Borsak said in the interview, conducted at the government-sponsored Shot Expo for shooters and hunters.

O'Farrell, Stoner and Gulaptis to cut new Grafton Remand Centre staffing numbers

After closing Grafton Gaol ealier this month and removing prisioners, the notorious cost-cutting threesome NSW Premier Barry O'Farrell, Deputy-Premier and National Party Leader Andrew Stoner and Nationals MP for Clarence Chris Gulaptis have decided to reduce the new remand centre staffing numbers to just twenty-eight positions.

Disgusted Clarence Valley voters are now waiting for the other shoe to drop with an announcement that this remand centre will be privatised.

Moving Grafton Town

I may have a cunning plan to save Grafton before the NSW Government closes us down altogether; it came to me while watching an old episode of Monster Moves.

Why don’t we pack up the city and move it into Kuring-Gai National Park (on the northern border of Sydney).

This has many advantages:

·    Coalition politicians may know where this is, therefore they may visit and listen to us;

·    when the rest of the services in Grafton are shut down (public hospital etc.) we will already be living near alternative facilities;

·    when more jobs leave the town, we will all be closer to new sources of employment;

·    the state government saves money by not having to build a new bridge across the Clarence River, if in fact they ever were;

·    moving into such a centrally positioned park will create a great place for a new call centre or gaol to replace the latest jobs lost;

·    it opens the current site of Grafton for coal seam gas production, and as more and more people left the Clarence Valley there would be no-one to object to heavy metal contamination from antimony mining;

·    those now unemployed Grafton Gaol warders could collect bush tucker and hunt feral animals for food;

·     we would be in the electorate of the Premier of NSW Hon. Barry Robert O’Farrell and therefore(unlike our current member Mr Chris Gulaptis) it would be impossible for him to say that he didn’t know what was happening to us;

AND the very best thing

·    we could then vote Mr. O’Farrell out of office if he refused to notice our concerns.

U.N. Committee on the Rights of the Child looks at Australia in 2012

 

The Committee considered the fourth periodic report of Australia (CRC/C/AUS/3-4) at its 1707th and 1708th meetings (see CRC/C/SR.1707 and 1708), held on 4 and 5 June 2012, and adopted, at its 1725th meeting, held on 15 June 2012 (see CRC/C/SR.1725), the following concluding observations.

See the full report here.

Some of the concerns expressed:

Preservation of identity

37. The Committee is concerned at the large numbers of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander children being separated from their homes and communities and placed into care that, inter alia, does not adequately facilitate the preservation of their cultural and linguistic identity. The Committee further notes that a child‟s citizenship can be revoked where a parent renounces or loses citizenship in the State party.

38. The Committee recommends that the State party review its progress in the implementation of the recommendations of its Bringing Them Home Report, including as recommended by the United Nations Human Rights Committee and the UN Special Rapporteur on the Situation of Human Rights and Fundamental Freedoms of Indigenous People to ensure full respect for the rights of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander children to their identity, name, culture, language and family relationships. With reference to article 8 of the Convention, the Committee further recommends that the State party undertake measures to ensure that no child be deprived of citizenship on any ground regardless of the status of his/her parents.

Protection of privacy

41. The Committee notes as positive that the Office of the Australian Information Commissioner has issued guidelines on the application of the Australian Privacy Act on handling the personal information of children. However, the Committee is concerned that the State party does not have comprehensive legislation protecting the right to privacy of children. Furthermore, while noting that the Office of the Australian Information Commissioner is empowered to hear complaints about breaches of privacy rights under the Privacy Act 1998 (Cth), it is concerned that there are no child-specific and child-friendly mechanisms and those available are limited to complaints made against government agencies and officers and large private organisations. The Committee is also concerned at the inadequacy of privacy protection of children involved in penal proceedings, including legislation in Western Australia and the Northern Territory permitting the publication of personal details of a person, including minors, who has carried-out ¨anti-social behaviour‟. Furthermore, the Committee is concerned that children receiving health services, particularly sexual and reproductive health, are not ensured their right to privacy.

Violence against children and women

45. The Committee is gravely concerned at the high levels of violence against women and children prevailing in the country and notes that there is an inherent risk that the co-existence of domestic violence, lawful corporal punishment, bullying, and other forms of violence in the society are inter-linked, conducing to an escalation and exacerbation of the situation. The Committee is particularly concerned that:

(a) Women and children of Aboriginal origin are particularly affected;

(b) Sterilisation of women and girls with disabilities continues;

(c) Programmes for the reintegration of child victims of domestic violence remain inadequate including because of the absence of monitoring systems of children victims who are reintegrated with their families;

(d) There is a lack of attention and specific procedures in cases where family members are the perpetrators of violence and/or women are perpetrators rather than victims; and

(e) There are no regular and systematic evaluations of the existing measures addressing violence against children in the school, Internet and other contexts.

Children with disabilities

56. The Committee appreciates the State party‟s assessment of its disability support system with its Productivity Commission in July2011. However, taking note of the findings of the Commission, the Committee shares the concerns that the current disability support system is "under-funded, unfair, fragmented and inefficient, and gives people with a disability little choice and no certainty of access to appropriate supports, with children with disabilities frequently failing to receive crucial and timely early intervention services, support for life transitions, and adequate support for the prevention of family or carer crisis and breakdown." Furthermore, while noting the State party‟s five-year implementation of its Disability Standards for Education 2005, the Committee remains concerned that a significant disparity remains between educational attainments for children with disabilities compared to children without disabilities. Further elaborating on its concerns on the non-therapeutic sterilization stated earlier in this report, the Committee is seriously concerned that the absence of legislation prohibiting such sterilisation is discriminatory and in contravention of article 23(c) of the Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities. Furthermore, the Committee is concerned that the State party‟s legislation allows for disability to be the basis for rejecting an immigration request.

Carbonageddon: nobody believes Tony

 

Stock and  Land on 16^th July 2012:

“VOTERS believe that the carbon tax will not be scrapped by a Coalition government despite Opposition Leader Tony Abbott's "pledge in blood" to move on his first day as prime minister to repeal it, private polling by the major parties has found.

Focus group research, which both major parties have conducted since the carbon tax started on July 1, has found that voters are highly sceptical that the tax will ever be dumped.

Details of the focus group research conducted by the Labor Party indicate that voters believe Mr Abbott's "blood pledge" is a political tactic and that he would find a reason to abandon it after he became prime minister, The Australian Financial Review reports.

Coalition sources confirm that Mr Abbott's pledge is doubted by voters who have become even more sceptical about promises made by political leaders in the wake of Labor's broken promises not to introduce a carbon tax. According to Labor sources, focus group participants believe overwhelmingly that once a new tax is in place it is there to stay.

When Mr Abbott's promise is put to them, typical responses are "he would say that, wouldn't he", "he's just saying that to win the election" and "when has a new tax ever been scrapped?"  

Anybody else smell a whiff of McDonalds 'greasy PR?

 

This was up on The Daily Examiner website on 13^th July 2012:

“Can Maccas come back?

IT WAS a Whopper of an argument that may have been solved by a Big Mac.

Police have responded to a call about a dispute over the price of a Whopper burger at a Hungry Jacks store in Rockhampton.

Initial reports indicate the issue was resolved by the aggrieved customer going to a nearby McDonald's store.”

The one thing I smell is APN head office doing a transfat-laden Clayton’s advertising deal with Maccas Australia.

 

U.S. Presidential Election 2012: Mitt Romney Skewered

http://youtu.be/Ud3mMj0AZZk