RT english language news from RussiaWho won?!!
Or how this household is beginning to feel as US election mania saturates the MSM and blogsphere.
Tuesday 4 November 2008
Rees & Roozendaal cut costs at the wrong end
COFFS Coast mother Maureen McDermot thought education was free in Australia, but news that the State Government is planning to axe free school travel for students makes her wonder just how free it really is.
Changes to the School Student Transport Scheme, which has subsidised student travel to and from school for more than 40 years, are expected to cost parents almost $400 a child each year....
Treasurer Eric Roozendaal said reform was essential due to NSW's financial situation.
"It will be a tough process but tough economic times require tough decisions," Mr Roozendaal said.
"The government rightly subsidises the cost of public transport, but we also have to be realistic about what we can afford."
The changes are expected to be unveiled in the State mini-budget by NSW Treasurer Eric Roozendaal on November 11.
I think that quite a few people on the NSW North Coast can empathise with Maureen.
With many students having to travel more than average distances to local schools and with no real railway travel alternative to the school bus or family car, the high cost of unsubsidised bus travel or heavy fuel costs may just see more than one child forced to miss school because there is no money left in the family purse that week for bus fares or petrol.
Premier Rees is being remarkably short-sighted in even thinking of applying his cost-cutting to rural or regional areas.
His understanding of non-metropolitan issues is sadly wanting - the Northern Rivers has some of the lowest family incomes in the state.
Changes to the School Student Transport Scheme, which has subsidised student travel to and from school for more than 40 years, are expected to cost parents almost $400 a child each year....
Treasurer Eric Roozendaal said reform was essential due to NSW's financial situation.
"It will be a tough process but tough economic times require tough decisions," Mr Roozendaal said.
"The government rightly subsidises the cost of public transport, but we also have to be realistic about what we can afford."
The changes are expected to be unveiled in the State mini-budget by NSW Treasurer Eric Roozendaal on November 11.
I think that quite a few people on the NSW North Coast can empathise with Maureen.
With many students having to travel more than average distances to local schools and with no real railway travel alternative to the school bus or family car, the high cost of unsubsidised bus travel or heavy fuel costs may just see more than one child forced to miss school because there is no money left in the family purse that week for bus fares or petrol.
Premier Rees is being remarkably short-sighted in even thinking of applying his cost-cutting to rural or regional areas.
His understanding of non-metropolitan issues is sadly wanting - the Northern Rivers has some of the lowest family incomes in the state.
A rogue's gallery perspective on the Rudd-Conroy plan to censor Australian access to the Internet
"The state must declare the child to be the most precious treasure of the people. As long as the government is perceived as working for the benefit of the children, the people will happily endure almost any curtailment of liberty and almost any deprivation.""The National Government will regard it as its first and foremost duty to revive in the nation the spirit of unity and cooperation. It will preserve and defend those basic principles on which our nation has been built. It regards Christianity as the foundation of our national morality, and the family as the basis of national life."
Adolph Hitler (from Proclamation to the German Nation in Berlin, February 1, 1933)
Picture of Kevin Rudd found at the ABC website
Monday 3 November 2008
The Howard Years: why am I not surprised?
The Australian yesterday:
THREE of the biggest decisions of the Howard years - the GST, the intervention in East Timor and the Pacific solution - were decided with virtually no consultation with cabinet, it can be revealed for the first time.
THREE of the biggest decisions of the Howard years - the GST, the intervention in East Timor and the Pacific solution - were decided with virtually no consultation with cabinet, it can be revealed for the first time.
A new television documentary, which is based on more than 20 hours of interviews with John Howard and 180 hours of interviews with key players in Australia and overseas, confirms how dominant the former prime minister was in running the affairs of the nation for almost 12 years.
Former foreign minister Alexander Downer reveals how one of the most controversial policies of the Howard years - the so-called Pacific solution under which asylum-seekers from Australia were moved to neighbouring island nations - was devised.
Mr Howard had told him: "Go and find someone who will take them."
Mr Downer said: "So I went back up to my office and got my staff together there and said: 'Well, now we are literally going to have to think up a country to send these people, that'll take them.'
Let us hope that the Australian Broadcasting Commission really has solidly tackled its subject. Time is well overdue for Australian citizens to hear more of the details of what was done in their name (though it is a certainty that all the usual suspects kept very quiet when in front of the cameras about their parts in the AWB scandal, just in case any documentary viewer actually recalls details of previous 'evidence' presented to Commissioner Cole).
Given that Howard stacked the ABC board with neo-con sympathizers during his almost eleven years in office, I expect that a genuine exposé is out of the question and what we will be treated to is a watered down version of events and reams of self-serving footage of the former prime minister.
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