NSW North Coast a winner in 2010 WetlandCare Australia National Art and Photography Competition

Nicholas Duckworth, Grafton - Open Photography Prize

Other North Coast winners were:
Anna Jackowiak-Hoare, Bonalbo - Open Art Prize
Oliver Lifford, Teven - Children’s Art Senior Prize
Isabella Laura Jones, Ballina - merit award Children’s Art Senior Prize
Blair Trigger, Byron Bay - merit award Children’s Photography

The winning works from the WetlandCare Australia National Art Competition 2009... are now on display at the Cooee Heritage Centre in Gilgandra, central west NSW. The Heritage Centre doubles as the information centre for Gilgandra, so there are plenty of visitors passing through who will get to enjoy the artworks.
The exhibition is hosted and sponsored by the Central West Catchment Management Authority, who sponsored the Children's Art Senior Category in the 2009 competition.
The works will be on display until August 31.

Congratulations to everyone who took part in the competition.

Abbott leaves himself exposed by choice of shadow ministers

It was not a good week for Leader of the Opposition Tony Abbott.

Former Liberal Party leader Malcolm Turnbull rises to his feet and takes a scalpel to the Coalition's greenwash climate change policy and, in full election mode, Shadow Treasurer Joe Hockey declares to anyone who would listen;"There is a very clear message to the Rudd Government from the Reserve Bank: Stop spending so much money (or) interest rates will rise" only to be knocked down by every blogger capable of reading what the Reserve Bank had really said.

Tony Abbott weathered the very public Turnbull defection and that whopper from his #1 protegee only to be faced with this:

Let me see if I'm getting this right because, you know, things move by at pace. First up, shadow treasury spokesman Joe Hockey took the obvious course when confronted by a growing perception that the conservatives were losing ground in the revered 'preferred economic manager' category of the national polls: He appeared on commercial television clutching a pink tutu and a magic wand. This was an approach clearly designed to offer a point of colourful comparison that made 'maverick' opposition finance spokesman Barnaby Joyce look a little more greyly bankerish and restrained.

Just after Shadow Minister Finance and #2 boy Barnaby Joyce, red faced and almost incoherent, came out with a real jaw dropper when he claimed that Australia was in danger of not being able to meet its sovereign debt leading to this online new excerpt:
Economists have joined the Federal Government in branding Senator Joyce's comments irresponsible, especially at a time when financial markets are jittery and overseas investors might take his comments seriously.
Credit ratings agencies that monitor sovereign risk say the Opposition finance spokesman's assessment is nonsense.Brendan Flynn, who analyses sovereign risk for Standard and Poor's, gives the Federal Government the highest triple-A credit rating.......
"With the triple-A rating, that's indicative of the extremely strong ability to meet financial obligations and therefore in our opinion, very little chance of defaulting on debt," Mr Flynn said.
"We rate all of the Australian states triple A or double A-plus, and the double A-plus is our second-highest rating - our opinion of a very strong ability to meet debt obligation."

A number of voters are not amused with this from rod3000 out in the Twitterverse; "Sir Barney Bjelke-Petersen" I like it Emmo :-) #qt and this from no_filter_Yamba; Why is it that Queensland seems to throw up politicians with serious neurological deficits? Barnaby Joyce needs to be retired pronto!

UPDATE:

Another Hockey moment to make Abbott cringe; Coalition treasury spokesman Joe Hockey called for an end to the stimulus, saying the big issue was no longer unemployment but interest rates. ''It's time for the government to explain how spending money on school halls in 2012 is going to create jobs and help address the economic downturn in 2008,'' he said.
In the same The Age article Deutsche Bank answered his question; Since mid last year almost 8000 primary schools have been building halls and computer labs and libraries with $14 billion [of stimulus funding] … It looks as if in January, with school about to return, the tradies put on more blokes. ''It has to be the stimulus. Private non-residential construction is flat, private industry isn't investing outside the mining sector.''

Peter Martin laid it out in pictures for the economic theory-challenged Shadow Treasurer:

Hard to get the Premier's attention? Well life's like that in regional New South Wales

On 5 February 2010 The Daily Examiner proudly announced:

TODAY four North Coast mayors and the region's three main newspapers start a combined campaign to get much-needed improvements to the Pacific Highway accelerated. Clarence Valley Mayor Richie Williamson, Coffs Harbour Mayor Keith Rhoades, Richmond Valley Mayor Col Sullivan and Ballina Mayor Phil Silver yesterday sent letters to the NSW Premier Kristina Keneally and Opposition Leader Barry O'Farrell inviting them on a highway road trip between Coffs Harbour and Ballina - a road most of us travel regularly.
It is the first step in what is likely to be an ongoing campaign to get the government to rethink its highway priorities and it is a campaign that has the strong support of this newspaper, the Coffs Harbour-based Coffs Coast Advocate and the Lismore-based Northern Star.
It is rare - most likely unprecedented - that four mayors and three daily newspapers have banded together to support a single issue and illustrates the level of concern in the region about preventable highway deaths.
Late last year the NSW Government told us there were no major upgrades planned for the area between just north of Coffs Harbour and just south of Ballina for at least the next five years because it was focusing on areas with higher traffic volumes and where pre-planning work had been done.

I'm sure a resounding cheer went up at breafast tables all over the North Coast that morning.

Five days later Premier Keneally had passed the ball to one of her ministers and the editor was reporting:

THIS is a transcript of part of a conversation yesterday between a Daily Examiner journalist and a representative of the NSW Minister for State and Regional Development, Ian Macdonald.
The representative was responding to an invitation the mayors of Coffs Harbour, Clarence Valley, Richmond Valley and Ballina sent to the Premier, Kristina Keneally, to travel the Pacific Highway between Coffs Harbour and Ballina to see its condition for themselves.
Mr Macdonald was responding on behalf of the premier.
Reporter: "And he'll do the tour?"
Spokesperson: "He'll be doing that with the mayors, wouldn't he?"
Reporter: "Yeah, they're doing a drive from Coffs to Ballina. That's the idea, to highlight the problem areas."
Spokesperson: "Coffs to Ballina, that's, what, 18km?"
Reporter: "No, it's a reasonable drive ... about two-and-a-half hours. That was the thrust of the invitation, so they (the leaders) can see for themselves how bad it is."
Spokesperson: "Oh, it's a drive."
We don't want to crucify this spokesperson; they were trying to do their best to answer our inquiries. They may have just moved from interstate with little knowledge of the region.
Certainly the minister has a better understanding of the geography of the area after being here a number of times
But the exchange helps illustrate how difficult it can be to get the message across to political leaders about what is needed on the highway.
And it also illustrates why it is so important to get ministers and the premier here first hand to see the highway's condition and not rely on the advice of staffers.
'Coffs to Ballina, that's, what, 18km?'

According to yet another article it appears that the NSW Leader of the Opposition is overseas at present - what is your excuse for staying away Ms. Keneally?

Wibbling widgets, Clarencegirl!

Sometimes the moon and stars just don't align and blogging becomes an obstacle race rather than a pleasant ride through cyberspace.

This is one of those times.

Most of North Coast Voices' regular contributors are down for the count at present due to injury or illness and, that leaves me holding the fort for the next week or so.

However, my PC has taken full advantage of this opportunity to create mischief and become highly dysfunctional - my apologies in advance for any spotty postings over the next few days.

When politicians take to writing lines.....

Snapshot from Google Trends Australia for last 12 months at 9 February 2010

Click to enlarge

Blue CPRS

Red ETS

Yellow carbon tax

Green great big new tax

The phrase "great big new tax" is being used frequently by Coalition politicians and the media but doesn't appear to be cutting through on the Internet.
Google only lists it occurring 206,000 times world-wide and Google Trends has it running a very poor last in search terms across Australia over the last twelve months.

Australian Leader of the Opposition Tony Abbott is particularly fond of the phrase, but is it his own?

How about a great big new tax, to keep Earth cool, and government absolutely swimming in cash to spread around?

The highlighted phrasing sound familiar?

No, it's not Mr. Abbott speaking in parliament, talking with the media or posting on his website (where he remains strangely coy about using those exact words).
This quote comes from a post discussing U.S.cap and trade on an anti-climate change blog in April 2009 at a time when Abbott was more concerned with participating in Pollie Pedal for charity and discussing the appropriateness of the earlier national apology to the Stolen Generation.

Seems that Tony might have borrowed the phrase.
Anyone else come across an earlier use of great big new tax?

The news just keeps getting worse for Senator Conroy

First it was the U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton speaking out against the evils of Internet censorship in January and now it seems the U.S. courts are expressing a view on censorship by government.

From Australia Uncensored in Stephen Conroy swims against the tide:

"When Government seeks to use its full power, including the criminal law, to command where a person may get his or her information or what distrusted source he or she may not hear, it uses censorship to control thought." (U.S. Supreme Court on 21.01.2010)

I am confused about Federal Opposition policies

I am confused about the federal opposition policies and I hope someone, anyone can clarify them for me.

Mr Abbott is talking about being tough on boat people. It is as if one day the future refugee wakes up and thinks : “I am going to put my life into the hands of people smugglers where I'll be at their tender mercy to be ripped off, crowded onto unseaworthy boats, packed into airless shipping containers and have a very high chance of dying and for this privilege my parents are going to sell close to everything they own so I can have my great adventure.”

I know what I would say to any of my kids who suggested this to me.

If parents are willing to do this it makes me think these people are fleeing a very bad situation; no-one in their right mind would do this for fun. No parent worth their salt is going to place a child in danger.

If the indigenous population had been tough on boat people back in 1788 and employed the Opposition's policy, where would we be today?

Then I hear from Mr Barnaby Joyce that he would cut the amount of overseas aid Australia provides.
This is stupid in my mind, I would much rather money was spent overseas to help those countries that have a high refugee outpouring to fix their own problems at home.
Then perhaps their populations will not have to flee their countries and travel to mine.

Federal Election 2010: only women iron

A chapeau flourish to Malcolm Farnsworth at AustralianPolitics for uploading and Possum at Pollytics for spreading around this audio example of Tony Abbott's unrepentant chauvinism, which I cheerfully dedicate to all those Northern Rivers female free spirits who never iron!

Download Patriarchal Tony here.