Cartoons of the Week

 

Cathy Wilcox

David Pope

David Rowe

Tweet of the Week

Today a dozen dancing dinosaurs descended on the Coffs Harbour office of @PatConaghanMP warning him of the risk of extinction for #FossilFools 🦖 It ended with 2 good dinosaurs being arrested for peacefully demanding action on the #ClimateCrisis. Enjoy the highlights video 👀 pic.twitter.com/aNx5dHmmK2

— Coffs Coast Climate Action (@CoffsCoastCAG) November 5, 2021

Well done, Clarence Coast Climate Action! 

So what do you know about the people behind management of the Morrison Government's punitive Cashless Debit Card? Perhaps it's time to meet Indue Limited's board of directors & their industry partners

 

IMAGE: news.com.au, 30.01.2019

Just as night follows day, if Scott John Morrison and the Liberal-Nationals Coalition win the federal government election, by the last quarter of 2022 he will announce all government cash transfers to citizens will in future come via the highly restrictive and punitive cashless debit card scheme.

So who has been milking the cash cow as they constructed the mechanism for Morrison's dream of a frightened, deprived and suppressed working class he could strut before?

Well that an easy question to answer - just hit this link 

https://www2.indue.com.au/wp-content/uploads/2021/10/J0982-Indue-Annual-Report-2021_WEB.pdf  and scroll down to pages 14-15 to see their six self-satisfied faces along with a brief bio.

A bit of background......

Sometime in early 2016 the Australian Government through its agency the Dept. of Social Services entered into a contract with Indue Limited, currently valued at $70,340,628.60 (original value: $7,859,509). This contract period now extends from 26-Feb-2016 to 31-Dec-2022.

Indue Limited documents clearly state that its investors-shareholders are “the owners of the company” and that those who contract the company’s services are its “clients” or “customers”.

In relation to the cashless debit card scheme it administers, it appears that the relatively large class of mandatory users of this card during this extended trial period & the somewhat smaller number of voluntary users are simply end product consumers.

How Indue Limited sees itself:……..

Indue Limited ABN 97 087 822 464 (“Indue”) is a bank and Authorised Deposit-Taking Institution (“ADI”) that is regulated by the Australian Prudential Regulation Authority. Indue is owned by financial institutions, each of which is also an ADI. Indue provides transaction processing and settlement services to credit unions, building societies, church funds, mortgage originators, commercial clients and the Australian government. Many clients would be too small individually to be able to provide a competitive alternative financial services offering without Indue.

Indue has over 40 years’ experience in the payments industry and as a financial product issuer since 1992. Indue is a principal member of Visa, MasterCard and eftpos, and holds an Australian Financial Services Licence (AFSL). It is also a reporting entity pursuant to the Anti-Money Laundering (AML)/Counter-Terrorism Financing (CTF) legislation. [Submission to the Australian Treasury. 7 September 2018, excerpt]

Indue Limited has 7 major partners which includes it being a principal member of Visa licensed to issue all Visa card products including credit, debit, prepaid, commercial and premium cards; ia member of eftpos and licensed to issue eftpos card products. These cards may be used in ATMs and eftpos terminals throughout the domestic Australian eftpos network; and, ia member of BPAY allowing us to offer both payer and biller facilities to clients.

2019-20

Indue’s vision is to be the leading partner of payment solutions to our customers. Indue’s mission is to drive competitive advantage for our customers by helping people pay….

Wholly owned Group

The Company does not have significant restrictions on its ability to access or use its assets and settle its liabilities other than those resulting from the supervisory frameworks within which Authorised Deposit-taking Institutions operate.

Transactions with related parties are conducted on an arm’s length basis….

Against this backdrop [global COVID-19 pandemic] Indue delivered a before tax profit of $3.127 million, a solid result given the prevailing headwinds…..

Events Subsequent to Balance Date

At the date of approving these financial statements, the Directors are of the view the effects of COVID-19 do not change the significant estimates, judgements and assumptions in the preparation of the financial statement…..

Likely Developments

Information on likely developments in the operations of the Company and the expected results of operations have not been included in this annual financial report because the Directors believe it would be likely to result in unreasonable prejudice to the Company. [NOTE: Likely relying on s299A(3) of the Corporations Act 2001 in order to conceal expected future progression of the federal government cashless debit card scheme]

[Indue Limited, Annual Report 2019-2020]

2020-21

It is pleasing to report a lift in profit, despite the ongoing influence of the COVID-19 pandemic. ….

A more positive outlook has contributed to our improved performance, with a Profit Before Tax (PBT) result of $3.6 million, an increase of 24% over the previous year….

An operating profit after tax of $2.583 million (2020: $2.091 million) was achieved this year….

Indue’s capital position remains sound. Our Tier 1 ratio rose to 15.5% at the end of FY21, an increase of 35 basis points on last year.

In relation to dividends, we have a good record of rewarding owners for providing investment capital. With an improved economic outlook and stronger financial performance, we are pleased to be able to declare a fully franked dividend of $7.50 per share for FY22….

After nearly 50 years, our partnership with Westpac is coming to an end in 2022. We are moving to become a Tier 1 provider for Direct Entry services, which is well-aligned to our strategy. We look forward to continuing to support our clients in this important payment channel.

Our core focus continues to be delivering sustainable value for our clients and shareholders….

We will continue to support our clients, so they can focus on growing their businesses – while we navigate the changed world of payments on their behalf….

The constitution of the Company provides for two Groups of Directors, both elected in accordance with the constitution. Group One Directors, referred to as ‘Industry Directors’, must be officers, employees or associates of a member. Group Two Directors, referred to as ‘Independent Directors’ must not be officers, employees or associates of a member. Industry Directors are not remunerated by the Company. Independent Directors are remunerated by the Company, with shareholders determining the maximum annual aggregate amount of remuneration that may be provided to them ….

The following persons were Directors of Indue Ltd during the financial year:

Chair – Non executive [Independent]

F[rank] Gullone (appointed 28 August 2020)

R Burns (resigned 27 November 2020)

Non executive Directors [Independent]

S Collier (resigned 27 November 2020)

M[ichael Francis] Currie

P[eter Robert] Townsend

P[eter Hooper] Wright

A[nthony] De Fazio

S[usan] Rix (appointed 8 January 2021) [my yellow highlighting]

A Cheadle (appointed 8 January 2021, resigned 27 May 2021)....

The Company’s Authorised Share Capital is $17.265 million. All issued shares [total of 126,182] are fully paid ….

In August 2021 Indue entered into a share buyback arrangement for a small number of issued shares….

Total Contributed Equity, Reserves, Retained Earnings, Balance at 30 June 2021 = $58,650,000 ” …..

Government grants

Government grants, including JobKeeper, are recognised when there is a reasonable assurance that the Company will comply with the conditions attached to the grant, and the grant will be received.

The Company became eligible for JobKeeper in June 2020 after meeting the specific obligations, and remained eligible until September 2020. All expected grant payments were received by October 2020…...

[Indue Limited, Annual Report 2020-2021, excerpts]

The Guardian, 4 November 2021:

*The company contracted by the federal government to run the controversial cashless debit card claimed $2m in jobkeeper payments before increasing its revenues during the pandemic.

Payments firm Indue, which was handed a $26m, two-year extension to its contract to keep running the scheme late last year, received about $2.1m in jobkeeper wage subsidies in total. That comprised $632,700 in June 2020 and $1.49m between July and September 2020, according to its annual report.

The company’s revenue increased in 2019-20 and 2020-21, leading to profit of $2.1m and $2.5m, the report shows.

Under the jobkeeper program, businesses were required to estimate whether their turnover would decrease by 30-50% when compared to the previous year, depending on their size. There is no suggestion Indue did not qualify for the payments under the rules of the scheme.

Controversially, the government elected not to include a clawback provision to recoup money from those companies that outperformed expectations…..

https://www.scribd.com/document/538531113/INDUE-LIMITED-Current-Historical-Company-Extract

Lismore's unwelcome invasive pest has surfaced once more - the Yellow Crazy Ant

 

IMAGE: Qld Wet Tropics Management Authority

"The yellow crazy ant is listed as one of the top 100 worst invasive species by the IUCN and the Global Invasive Species Database. They are a category three restricted pest under the Biosecurity Act 2014. As such, all citizens have a general biosecurity obligation to minimise the risk of further infestation." [https://www.wettropics.gov.au/yellow-crazy-ants]

"...form huge super-colonies containing thousands of queens and have worker densities reaching up to 20 million ants per hectare." [CSIRO, retrieved 10 November 2021]

Invasive Species Council:

Yellow crazy ants are a highly aggressive tramp ant that made it into Australia through our ports. In a suitable climate such as that of the Queensland Wet Tropics they can form super colonies over vast areas and have huge environmental, social and economic impacts.

Yellow crazy ants do not bite, but spray formic acid to blind and kill their prey.

Once the ants reach super colony levels they can become a severe threat to people, especially children and the elderly, as well as pets. They can damage household electrical appliances and wiring.

One man in Australia has already suffered serious injury from yellow crazy ants. While sleeping at his home in Edmonton, Queensland, the ants swarmed all over Frank Teodo’s face, burning his eyes badly with their acid. And he’s not alone, people’s pets have been sprayed by the ants’ acid, injuring their eyes, mouth and paws. The ants can also kill small and young animals including chickens and native animals.

Yellow crazy ants are a huge threat to agriculture in Australia’s warmer regions. By farming sugar-secreting scale insects and encouraging sooty moulds they can dramatically reduce the productivity of crops such as fruit trees and sugar cane.....

And now this ant has returned to the Lismore local government area in the NSW Northern Rivers region.

EchoNetDaily, 10 November 2021:

Yellow Crazy Ant (Anoplolepis gracilipes) has been confirmed in Lismore.
 Photo supplied.

Yellow Crazy Ants (Anoplolepis gracilipes) have been threatening the Lismore area since 2018 when they were detected in the Lismore CBD. Another colony has been detected in Lismore recently.

‘A small surviving colony of yellow crazy ants was recently detected in Lismore after an astute resident spotted them in his garden,’ said a spokesperson for Lismore City Council (LCC)…..

NSW Department of Primary Industries (DPI) is monitoring and controlling the surviving ants through targeted treatments approved for use in urban and residential areas. ‘Lismore City Council and the DPI are grateful for the continued support of the Lismore community in the management of yellow crazy ants,’ said LCC spokesperson......

You can help stop their spread by checking outdoor areas for ants with:

• slender yellow to brownish bodies about 5mm long

• dark brown abdomens, sometimes striped

• very long legs and antennae

• an erratic walking style

If you spot any suspicious ants:

• collect them in a container

• freeze them for 15 minutes, then photograph them against a white background

• call the Biosecurity Helpline on 1800 680 244 or email species@dpi.nsw.gov.au

Good quality photos and videos of the ants will help with initial identification. For more information about yellow crazy ants visit www.dpi.nsw.gov.au/yca …..

Delta Variant Outbreak 2021: Community transmission in Northern NSW as of Monday 8 November 2021

Depiction of SARS-CoV-2 Delta Variant
BBC News online. Getty Images

In the 24 hours up to 8pm on Monday 8 November 2021 there were 3 locally acquired COVID-19 cases in the Grafton area of Clarence Valley Local Government Area (LGA) and one case is in the Lismore LGA.  All 4 cases are linked to known cases.

By 8 November the total number of confirmed COVID-19 cases in Northern NSW had reached 153 people, since SARS-CoV-2 Delta Variant first entered the region on 13 September 2021 and began to spread.

THE CONFIRMED LOCALLY ACQUIRED COVID-19 CASE LOCATION BREAKDOWN IN NORTHERN NSW BETWEEN 13 SEPTEMBER & 8 NOVEMBER 2021 APPEARS TO BE:

Tweed Shire - 6 cases + 1 infection contracted elsewhere in NSW

Byron Bay - 7 cases + 2 confirmed infections within the LGA not entered into NNSWLHD records as these people were no longer in the region.

Ballina - 13 cases

Kyogle - 17 cases

Richmond Valley - 25 cases

Lismore City - 35 cases

Clarence Valley - 50 cases.

Ranging wider, New South Wales recorded 222 new locally acquired cases of COVID-19 in the 24 hours to 8pm on 8 November 2021, including 3 deaths.

There are currently 254 people infected with COVID-19 in public hospital beds, with 42 people in intensive care, 20 of whom require ventilation.

The total number of people infected since SARS-CoV-2 first entered the state in January 2020 now stands at 77,081 cases with 607 individuals dead. The overwhelming majority of those infected or dead (> 90% to date) contracted the virus since the Delta Variant Outbreak began on 16 June 2021. 

The Abbott-Turnbull- Morrison Coalition Government's approach to creative accounting in national climate change ledgers has been receiving some attention since the Prime Minister's attendance at UN COP26

 

The Saturday Paper, Post, 9 November 2021:

Multiple investigations indicate Australia is significantly underreporting its emissions, as COP26 organisers ramp up pressure on the nation to strengthen its 2030 emissions target.

What we know:

• Australia is among of a host of countries systematically underreporting emissions to the UN, including the removal of substantial emissions from megafires fanned by climate change (The Washington Post); 

• Separate analysis of satellite imagery of land clearing indicates Australia is also probably understating emissions from deforestation (The Guardian); 

• Resources Minister Keith Pitt made international headlines for his promise that Australia will continue exporting coal “for decades to come” (France 24); 

• Analysis by Global Witness finds there “there are more delegates at COP26 associated with the fossil fuel industry than from any single country” (BBC); 

• COP26 organisers are working out a plan to pressure countries like Australia that have not strengthened their 2030 targets at the summit to do so in 2022 (The Guardian); 

• The Morrison government has unveiled a plan to partner with the private sector to fund 50,000 electric vehicle charging stations (ABC); 

• Industry groups criticised the electric vehicle plan for failing to include subsidies, tax incentives, sales targets or minimum fuel emission standards.