Help Yamba Go Plastic Free

Live in Yamba? Visit on weekends? Holiday there?

Then you can help Yamba keep its environment litter free by spurning plastic shopping bags in favour of the environmentally friendly variety. Bring your own or buy them in the town.

Since 2009 the Yamba Chamber of Commerce and a committee of concerned local residents (in conjunction with Clean Up Australia, Australian Retailers Association and the Australian Government) have been promoting sustainable shopping by selling hemp shopping bags.

These large, durable, attractive cloth bags sell for $5 each and, money raised will be used to purchase more of these bags for sale in the town.

For more information email: info@yambaNSW.com.au

SAY NO TO PLASTIC

PCEHR opt-in provision expected to allay privacy concerns. Pull the other one!

Sometimes I wonder exactly where on the globe this LaLa Land pollies live in is to be found.
Because no-one could seriously believe that the e-Health initiative (laughing called the voluntary Personally Controlled Electronic Health Record (PCEHR) System) that Roxon and Co are intent on saddling Australia with is not part of a national database which will be packed with inerasable and sometimes error-riddled records.
A system which will allow every nosey parker, from police through to the local chemist, access to someone else's personal information if they decide to class their data crawl as an 'emergency' request.
To make the entire situation a little more bizarre; it seems that if an emergency request goes in on someone whose does not yet have a digital health record in this system (and perhaps never wanted to opt-in) then one is created without that individual's knowledge or consent.
Once created this new record can be hidden from view but can't be eradicated.
Even death won't see your record disappear; so be prepared for the possibility that eventually these records will turn up in the National Archives for your great-grandkids entertainment. Just as anyone can now find out if their dead Anzac grandpa contracted the clap on the way to the front in WWl by looking at a copy of his military record online.
And apparently this e-Health system can be accessed after July next year by Roxon's nosey parkers on the move using iPhone and Blackberry.
The potential for abuse is enormous.

Dodgy 'carbon tax' claims using the Coalition's favourite North Coast butcher as an example

The one thing about public life that remains constant is that eventually all politicians who purvey dodgy claims get found out – unfortunately it’s not always in their own lifetimes.

However, in this case two Australian politicians – Federal Opposition Leader Tony Abbott and the Nationals MP for Cowper Luke Hartsuyker – have been discovered trying to slap suspect meat on the bones of their argument against putting a price on carbon pollution.

In February 2010 Hartsuyker rose to his feet in Parliament to wail about the sad plight of a Coffs Harbour butcher who paid $7,400 per quarterly electricity bill, which would see his annual power cost coming in at $29,600.

While in April 2011 Abbott fronted the media with the claim that the very same butcher was now paying around $22,000 per year for electricity, which works out at $5,500 each quarter.

Now this would mean either the figures quoted in Parliament by Hartsuyker were blatantly false or that (despite rising electricity costs) the butcher will probably now pay considerably less for electricity this year than he did in the previous year.

If it is the latter, then based on current carbon price rise projections for 2012-14 this butcher would see next year’s electricity bill come in at about $3,600 less than his stated total 2010 power costs for the business.

Couple that with Lenore Taylor’s observation that (using the butcher’s admissions concerning annual turnover) any post-carbon price electricity costs passed on by the butcher in 2012-13 would mean T-bone steak at $22 a kilo would now cost … wait for it … . $22.04. Minced meat at $11 a kilo would now cost $11.02 and the Abbott-Hartsuyker argument about future prices spiraling because of a ‘carbon tax’ falls apart.

Major stuff up by NSW Police a candidate for Ripley's Believe It Or Not

From the pen of The Daily Examiner editor, David Bancroft, on Page 8 of the 12^th April 2011 newspaper issue:

“IT is almost beyond comprehension that no-one has been convicted of anything more serious than a misdemeanour following the Valentine's Day riots in Yamba last year.

It is beyond dispute that a police car, probably worth in excess of $100,000, and another vehicle were set alight and that police from all over the North Coast were pelted with a variety of missiles, including bricks and rocks.

It is conceivable someone could have been asleep in the second car to catch fire, with disastrous consequences.

All this was caught on police video and from the mobile phones of those attending a loud, late night party in the Yamba industrial estate.

Scores of people were there and witnessed the action.

But despite there being enough evidence to keep a trial going for six weeks, no riot convictions were recorded.

In fact, the only charge that stuck was that of failing to comply with a noise abatement order and, because of his previous good record, the occupier of the premises, Craig McNeill, was released on a good behaviour bond. One of the difficulties in prosecuting a case where there are multiple accused is that almost everyone has a different interpretation of what occurred and, in the court's mind, that can be enough to create the reasonable doubt required for acquittal.

This trial has already cost taxpayers tens of thousands of dollars for no result, but that figure could climb substantially higher if those who have now been released (remember some spent months in jail) pursue compensation.”

The Daily Examiner article “Yamba riot accused set free” on Page 1 of the 12^th April 2011 issue:

“In handing down his findings, Mr Andrews questioned why police held a debrief on February 17 before they prepared their statements.

“It is difficult to believe why experienced police officers would undertake a process that would lead to their evidence being criticised by the defence,” he said.

He then went on to question the honesty of police evidence.

“If police are prepared not to be honest in such matters, how can a court be prepared to consider their evidence seriously?” he said.

“There is little doubt that the various police witnesses have collaborated with their evidence.”

NSW Northern Rivers region one of the tourism industry's solid earners

Joint media release from Federal Minister for Tourism Martin Ferguson, Justine Elliott MP for Richmond and Janelle Saffin MP for Page on 12 April 2011:

The Economic Importance of Tourism in Australia’s Regions report released today by the Federal Minister for Tourism, Martin Ferguson reveals the Northern Rivers economy is one of the largest tourism earners as well as one of the most tourism dependent regional economies in Australia.

The value of the tourism output to the Northern Rivers in 2007/08 was $1.2 billion. This was 6.1 percent of the overall output from the region, making it the fourteenth largest tourism earner and twentieth most tourism dependent region in Australia.

“Tourism is the lifeblood of many regional areas; it creates jobs where people live. Tourism is a source of employment in the Northern Rivers for many people including hospitality professionals, uni students, travellers, and older Australia’s looking for part-time employment,” said the Minister for Tourism, Martin Ferguson.

Page MP Janelle Saffin said the Northern Rivers is rightly proud of its tourism industry.

“We know regional areas see 46 cents in every dollar of tourism spending. So our local industry isn’t just important to the people who work in it – it’s important to everyone who lives here.

“Government is working across ministerial portfolios to strengthen the tourism industry. Employer Brokers is a good example, operating across the Richmond-Tweed and Clarence Valley areas. This scheme helps hotel and catering managers to find the staff they need,” Ms Saffin said.

“The Northern Rivers region has a great tourism story to tell,” said Justine Elliot MP. “We’re part of the Legendary Pacific Coast Tourism Initiative, an Australian Government TQUAL Grants project which stretches from Sydney to the Queensland border. It includes signposting, website development, branding, innovation and project management. It aims to encourage visitors to stay longer and to spend more widely across the region.”

Tourism ministers from all jurisdictions meet in Darwin later this week to discuss a two-year work program to drive greater regional tourism resilience under the National Long-Term Tourism Strategy.

The Economic Importance of Tourism in Australia’s Regions is at http://www.ret.gov.au/tourism/tra/Pages/default.aspx

A 'man drought' is declared? It must have been a slow news day.

Jules Faber cartoon, The Daily Examiner 6 April 2011

At 30 June 2010, the sex ratio of the total population for Australia was 99.2 males per 100 females. At age 0, the sex ratio for Australia in 2010 was 105.3 males per 100 females. This excess of males in the earlier years contrasts with the opposite situation in the older years and for the total population which can be attributed to female longevity. [Australian Bureau of Statistics, 21 December 2010]

According to the Australian Bureau of Statistics in the 2006 Census (held on 8 August 2006) there were 48,146 persons usually resident in Clarence Valley Local Government Area, of which 49.6% were males and 50.4% were females or in raw numbers 23,875 were male and 24,271 were female.

That represented an undifferentiated gender imbalance of 396 more females than males spatially distributed across 44 towns, villages and city environs over approximately 10,440 sq. kms.

Of the 38,597 residents 15 years of age and over; 51.4% were married, 26.8% never married, 13.8% separated or divorced, 8.1% widowed and about 4,893 stated they lived alone.

A fairly typical regional profile in the coastal sea-change cum tree-change belt I would have thought and one that was not all that remarkable. So imagine my surprise when I woke one day last week to find that there was a ‘man drought’ occurring in Grafton which is the main commercial centre in the Clarence Valley.

On the basis of a newspaper table showing that for every 95 Grafton men aged 20-29 there are 100 females in the same age bracket and for every 80 Grafton men aged 30-39 there are 100 similarly aged females, an unidentified local journalist has stoutly issued the drought declaration.

Now I’d be the first to admit that in 2006 the Grafton statistical area showed the resident population was 48.9% male and 51.1% female.

However in 2006 when it came to Graftonian adults in the 20-29 age range there was only one more female than there were males and, in the 30-39 range there was only 41 more females in total than males. Making the overall gender imbalance between 20 and 39 years of age in Grafton City and environs a mere 42 extra females.

When looking at presumed ‘availability’ of the unmarried then there were 2 more females who had never married than total males in that same category and, probably around 11 more "not married" women between 20 and 34 than there were men of the same age who had no wife or de-facto partner.

However, if a man drought is really occurring then Grafton women have to have lost the ability to socialise outside city boundaries because there are 10,000 plus people without spouses or partners living in the Clarence Valley local government area and some of those have to be males of the species.

Of course the possibility exists that many of those 20 to 39 year-old women mentioned in the newspaper article are quite happy being footloose and fancy free and, are chortling over the idea that a ‘man drought’ is something to seriously worry about.

A little background on the MSM's love of the notion of a man drought.

Taking Australia's temperature

Aussies don’t live as long as people in Hong Kong, Singapore, Macau, Japan, San Marrino or Andorra but we’re doing way better than the Yanks, the poor regularly fall off the perch sooner than silvertails and swells, Aboriginal babies die often and early, living in the bush is a health hazard for many, there are more of us 'enjoying' a spell in hospital, we gobble down anti-depressants while a heck of a lot of us are obviously topping ourselves - but she’ll be right mate. Last year, after asking the nation to “Say Aarrh, stick out your tongue, turn your head and cough” the Australian Institute of Health and Welfare released its rather self-congratulatory bi-annual report card and here are the key points :

General

Life expectancy and death

• Australia’s life expectancy at birth continues to rise and is among the highest in the world—almost 84 years for females and 79 years for males.


• Death rates are falling for many of our major health problems such as cancer, cardiovascular disease, chronic obstructive pulmonary disease, asthma and injuries.


• Coronary heart disease causes the largest number of ‘lost years’ through death among males aged under 75 years, and breast cancer causes the most among females.

Diseases

• Cancer is Australia’s leading broad cause of disease burden (19% of the total), followed by cardiovascular disease (16%) and mental disorders (13%).


• The rate of heart attacks continues to fall, and survival from them continues to improve.


• Around 1 in 5 Australians aged 16–85 years has a mental disorder at some time in a 12-month period, including 1 in 4 of those aged 16–24 years.


• The burden of Type 2 diabetes is increasing and it is expected to become the leading cause of disease burden by 2023.


• The incidence of treated end-stage kidney disease is increasing, with diabetes as the main cause.

Health risks

• Risk factors contribute to over 30% of Australia’s total burden of death, disease and disability.


• Tobacco smoking is the single most preventable cause of ill health and death in Australia.


• However, Australia’s level of smoking continues to fall and is among the lowest for OECD countries, with a daily smoking rate of about 1 in 6 adults in 2007.


• Three in 5 adults (61%) were either overweight or obese in 2007–08.


• One in 4 children (25%) aged 5–17 years were overweight or obese in 2007–08.


• Of Australians aged 15–74 years in 2006–2007, less than half (41%) had an adequate or better level of health literacy.


• Rates of sexually transmissible infections continue to increase, particularly among young people.


• Use of illicit drugs has generally declined in Australia, including the use of methamphetamines (the drug group that includes ‘ice’).

Life stages

Mothers and babies

• The proportion of females having caesarean sections has continued to increase over the latest decade, from 21% in 1998 to 31% in 2007.


• The perinatal death rate of babies born to Indigenous mothers in 2007 was twice that of other babies.

Children and young Australians

• Death rates among children and young people halved in the two decades to 2007, largely due to fewer deaths from transport accidents.


• More children are being vaccinated against major preventable childhood diseases, with 91% (the target level) being fully vaccinated at 2 years of age—but only 82% of 5 year olds are covered.


• Land transport accidents and intentional self-harm accounted for 2 in every 5 deaths (42%) among young Australians (aged 15–24 years) in 2007.

People aged 25–64 years

• The main causes of death in this age group in 2007 were coronary heart disease for males (14% of their deaths) and breast cancer for females (12%).

Older Australians

• For older people, the main causes of death are heart disease, stroke and cancer.


• At age 65, Australian males can now expect to live a further 19 years to almost 84 years of age, and females a further 22 years to almost 87.

Groups of special interest

• People with disability are more likely than others to have poor physical and mental health, and higher rates of risk factors such as smoking and overweight.


• Compared with those who have social and economic advantages, disadvantaged Australians are more likely to have shorter lives.


• Indigenous people are generally less healthy than other Australians, die at much younger ages, and have more disability and a lower quality of life.


• People living in rural and remote areas tend to have higher levels of disease risk factors and illness than those in major cities.


• Compared with the general community, prisoners have significantly worse health, with generally higher levels of diseases, mental illness and illicit drug use than Australians overall.


• Most migrants enjoy health that is equal to or better than that of the Australian-born population—often with lower rates of death, mental illness and disease risk factors.


• Compared with those in the general community, Defence Force members have better health, although their work can place them at higher risk of injury.


• The veteran community is less likely than the general community to report being in very good or excellent health.

Health services

• In 2007–08, just over 2% of total health expenditure was for preventive services or health promotion.


• Between 1998–99 and 2008–09, there was an increase in general practitioners’ management of some chronic diseases, including hypertension, diabetes and depression.


• Ambulances attended 2.9 million incidents in 2008–09, of which 39% were emergencies.


• The number of hospital admissions rose by 37% in the decade to 2007–08.


• Over half of the hospital admissions (56%) in 2007–08 were same-day admissions, compared with 48% in 1998–99.


• In 2008–09, about 1 in 9 of all prescriptions under the Pharmaceutical Benefits Scheme and Repatriation Pharmaceutical Benefits Scheme were for a mental health-related medication.

Health workforce

• Employment in health occupations is still growing—23% growth between 2003 and 2008, almost double that across all occupations (13%).


• Between 2002 and 2007, there was a 26% increase in people completing health occupation university courses.


• The mix of the medical workforce changed between 1997 and 2007


• the supply of primary care doctors (in ‘full-time equivalent’ numbers per 100,000 population) has decreased


• the supply of specialists, specialists-in-training and hospital-based non-specialists has increased.

Health expenditure

• Health expenditure during 2007–08 was $103.6 billion, exceeding $100 billion for the first time.


• Health expenditure in 2007–08 equaled 9.1% of gross domestic product (GDP).


• As a share of its GDP, Australia spent more than the United Kingdom in 2007–08 (8.4%), a similar amount to the OECD median (8.9%) and much less than the United States (16%).


• Governments funded almost 70% of health expenditure in 2007–08.


• For Indigenous Australians in 2006–07, spending per person on health and high-level residential aged care was 25% higher than for other Australians.

When a Christian church decides that direct access to government funding allows it to disregard the basic tenets of public education

In this case it was the Living Waters (Uniting) Church which decided that it knew best and appears to have misunderstood and then exceeded its role in the National School Chaplaincy Program famously instigated by former Prime Minister John Howard and continued to this day by the Gillard Government.

A 2010 investigation by the Northern Territory Ombudsman revealed that:

· There was insufficient consultation with community before the chaplaincy services were implemented at specific NT rural public schools and, in at least one school all students were automatically included in what should have been an opt-in voluntary chaplaincy service

· The National School Chaplaincy Code of Conduct was breached by at least one chaplain

· One chaplain allegedly attempted to contact the parents of children on the opt-out list of students who would not be accessing these services

· Inappropriate one-on-one counselling was undertaken by unqualified chaplains, with regard to students' behavioural and emotional problems amongst other matters

· Private and unsecured records of students were kept by at least one chaplain and, in one instance these same records were initially denied to a psychologist treating the student in question

· Conflicts of interest arose and there were perceived problems with duty of care on the part of chaplains

· Proselytising religious beliefs appears to have occurred at times

· In at least one instance there was failure to disclose to a relevant government authority

· There were allegations of improper payments being made to the chaplaincy services

· Chaplains had access to intimate personal information re certain students even when schools were in receipt of ‘no contact’ letters from parents

· In one instance there was defiance of a DET Executive directive in relation to the continued provision of services to one child

· Complaints concerning chaplaincy services or the conduct of specific chaplains were often inadequately handled by both schools and DET/ DEEWR

· The Church permanently housed a convicted paedophile (at least 20 counts of offences against minors recorded) within a building complex also used as emergency accommodation for families with children and in close proximity to a school and park

This is not an exclusive list of problems encountered in the National School Chaplaincy Program and, the fact that there was such a hasty national implementation of this school program and that funding flows directly to the religious organisation (by-passing state eduction authorities) has led to a service which is apparently wide open to abuse.

NT Ombudsman’s 2010 Investigation Report On The Operation of the Chaplaincy Service Within Five Government Rural Schools of the Northern Territory [162 page PDF file]