In the face of Turnbull Government inaction & legal restraints on Sea Shepherd the Government of Japan signals intention to continue whale slaughter in Southern Ocean

The Guardian, 23 January 2018:

Japan is to defy Australia and other nations with plans to replace its whaling fleet’s ageing mother ship, showing its determination to continue its annual expeditions to the Southern Ocean.

The country’s fisheries agency is planning to replace the 30-year-old Nisshin Maru with either a new ship or a refitted one bought overseas, according to the Yomiuri Shimbun.

The newspaper quoted agency officials as saying that a new mother ship was needed to haul whales on board to be butchered during Japan’s controversial “research” hunts in the Antarctic.

Whaling officials have also said they needed a faster ship to evade anti-whaling activists. The marine conservation group Sea Shepherd recently said it was abandoning its pursuit of Japan’s whalers in the Southern Ocean, but has not ruled out a resumption of its campaign.

The group has clashed with the Japanese whaling fleet several times since it started obstructing the vessels in 2005.

The introduction of a new mother ship is expected to anger anti-whaling nations, as it signals Japan’s determination to continue slaughtering hundreds of whales in the Antarctic every winter.

Preying on the vulnerable the Centrelink way

The Guardian, 17 January 2018:

Centrelink has given companies accused of exploitation and misconduct direct access to welfare recipients’ money through its automated debit system.

The companies were granted access to the Centrepay system, which allows Centrelink to deduct money from welfare payments to pay approved businesses early.

The system is designed to ensure rent and power bills are paid by giving government-approved real estate agents and electricity retailers the first bite of social security payments.

But the federal government has long faced criticism for opening up Centrepay to household appliance rental companies, which rent out white goods, mobile phones, laptops and furniture.

A 2015 report from the corporate regulator found the sector was targeting Centrelink recipients and charging exorbitant prices, often more than five times the retail price of the leased goods – the equivalent of a 248% interest rate.

An independent review of Centrepay in 2013 warned the government that lax oversight was giving unscrupulous operators access to the system, raising the risk of exploitation.

More than four years on, those risks appear to still be materialising.

Guardian Australia has found at least four appliance rental companies were granted approval to use Centrepay, despite previously being punished by the corporate regulator or placed on binding agreements to rectify potential legal breaches.

One of the businesses, Amazing Rentals, continued to hold Centrepay approval for more than two years after the Australian Securities and Investments Commission (Asic) raised concerns it had failed to comply with responsible lending obligations. Most of the customers of its Darwin store, including many Indigenous Australians, received government benefits as their only source of income.

The company was renting white goods to people who could not read the contracts and did not understand what they were signing up to.

The corporate regulator accepted an enforceable undertaking from the company in June 2015, which forced it to shut down the store for 12 months, refund customers,

“We had examples of consumers who were on disability pensions or Newstart allowance where they were literally running out of money at the end of the month because of the impact of the repayments that were being made for those consumer lease products,” Asic senior executive Michael Saadat told the ABC at the time.

Amazing Rentals was eventually stripped of Centrepay approval in September last year, about the same time it became embroiled in a massive data breach, which exposed 26,000 documents with the personal details of 4,000 people in the Northern Territory and Queensland.

Other companies still approved for Centrepay include franchise Rent the Roo, which was fined $27,500 by Asic for breaching responsible lending laws in 2013; and Mr Rental Australia, which was found to have imposed a potentially unlawful early termination fee, and was forced by the regulator to refund about 1,560 consumers more than $300,000 in total.

Centrepay approval is also still active for The Rental Guys, a company found to have failed to meet responsible lending obligations to customers mainly from regional Indigenous communities, and not verifying their ability to make the rental payments. The company also placed vulnerable customers on new contracts that imposed higher fees and removed the right to own goods once the rental period was finished.

Rent-to-buy companies approved for the Centrepay system sign contracts with customers knowing they are living on welfare payments.

Knitting Nannas show their teeth?

Given the rumours about Australian Deputy-Prime Minister and Nationals MP for New England Barnaby Joyce's not-so-private life, this tweet probably raised a few quiet chuckles in homes across northern New South Wales.

The Knitting Nannas are making "Booties for Barnaby" to remind him of his responsibility to protect land and water for future generations #CSG pic.twitter.com/rFqPYnnZUi

— Jamieson Murphy (@jamiesonmurph) January 24, 2018

In addition to the unrelenting summer heat, the earth beneath our feet is starting to rumble a bit

Geosciences Australia Earthquakes, 23 January 2018

Right click on table to enlarge

Is the Turnbull Government spending veterans mental health funding wisely?

On the Line Limited state that it is a professional social health business that provides counselling support, anywhere and anytime, primarily via telephone, web chat and online support through the rather bluntly named  MensLine Australia, Suicide Call Back Service, SuicideLine Victoria, a Department of Defence All Hours Support Line After Hours Service and other geographically specific services.

On the Line Limited also provides tailored counselling services for corporate, member and community organisations.

According to its 2016-17 Annual Report On the Line Limited is doing very nicely thank you, with an income of over $11.3 million and $6.2m in new tenders, grants, and business opportunities.

However, it appears that this company may be falling down on the job……

The New Daily, 9 January 2018:

The government is refusing to reveal how often vulnerable veterans are unable to reach its crisis helpline for ex-service members in order to protect the bottom line of a private contractor, The New Daily can exclusively reveal.

The refusal comes as veterans’ advocates warn of a suicide epidemic among ex-service members, with support group Warrior’s Return estimating at least 84 veterans took their own lives in 2017.

The Department of Veterans Affairs claims that disclosing the call abandonment rates and wait times for the Veterans and Veterans Families Counselling Service would adversely impact the company that manages the service outside of normal business hours.

In response to a freedom of information request by The New Daily, the DVA said the disclosure would give the contractor’s business rivals information that could be used to out-compete the company.

The New Daily has appealed the decision on public interest grounds.

The DVA has awarded Melbourne-based company On the Line contracts worth at least $2 million to operate the after-hours counselling service since 2010, according to government procurement website AusTender.

The department also revealed to The New Daily that it does not collect data on the call abandonment rates and wait times for its regular hours service, which is managed in-house.

Doug Steley, an ex-service member who works with a number of veterans’ advocacy groups, said the department’s attitude was “totally unacceptable” and typical of its lack of transparency.

“Their service should be so excellent that they should be willing to boast about how good it is, and they should have absolutely no fear that a private contractor would be able to match the service to those who served Australia,” he said.

“There is no transparency in this department,” he added. “It operates on secrecy and hiding everything from the public.”

The DVA has faced repeated controversy over its treatment of veterans, with an official inquiry last year ruling it had failed to provide adequate support to 32-year-old Afghan war veteran Jesse Bird before he took his own life last June. In August, more than 100 people protested outside DVA headquarters in Melbourne to call for the establishment of a royal commission into the department’s failure to halt suicides among ex-service members.

Opposition spokeswoman for veterans’ affairs Amanda Rishworth accused the department of putting the welfare of a private firm above that of veterans.

“We expect DVA to act in the best interest of veterans – and not in the best interest of a private contractor,” Ms Rishworth told The New Daily.

“Labor thinks it is unacceptable that DVA is withholding any information that will provide greater transparency on services which directly affect those veterans and family members. It is also deeply concerning that DVA is not even collecting data on how the VVCS is performing during business hours.”

This highlighted health statistic would come as no surprise to people living in rural and regional Australia

The Sydney Moring Herald, 18 January 2018:

NSW has been ranked the worst for healthcare affordability among older patients in the latest survey that pits Australia's most populous state against international health systems.

The results released on Thursday showed a larger proportion of NSW patients 65 and older struggled with their medical costs than their counterparts in Australia overall and 10 other OECD countries.

NSW fared worst when it came to the percentage of respondent who said they had problems paying their medical bills (15 per cent), compared to just 1 per cent in Sweden and 10 per cent in the US, found the survey of 24,000 people including 1175 in NSW.

More than one in five (22 per cent) reported spending $1000 or more in out-of-pocket healthcare costs, the third largest proportion after Switzerland (53 per cent) and the US (37 per cent), and well behind the top performer France (3 per cent), according to the 2017 Commonwealth Fund International Health survey findings released by the Bureau of Health Information (BHI)…..

Over 20 per cent of older people in NSW said they had skipped a dentist visit when they needed it due to the cost, tying with the US for the poorest result after Australia (23 per cent).

A total of 14 per cent of NSW respondents said they had skipped prescriptions, consultations or treatments due to cost in the previous year, the second lowest score after the US.

One in four NSW respondents said they found it "very difficult" to access medical care after hours without going to a hospital emergency department, trailing the US and seven other countries. [my yellow highlighting]

Next time you use a plastic bag or throwaway cups and utensils - think about this

A sea of plastic bottles, cutlery and polystyrene plates has been found floating in the Caribbean.
A New Year’s resolution to all of us - cut down on plastic.
Via @bbc5live. #plasticfree #plastic #ThursdayThoughts pic.twitter.com/2sarVxHTOn

— James Melville (@JamesMelville) January 11, 2018