Two good reasons why you should stop buying chocolate, icecream, frozen desserts, biscuits, crisps or soap and shampoo products made with palm oil

According to Barbi this Orangutan mother was captured stealing fruit for her undernourished infant.
You can feel proud the next time you put a chocolate bar, ice cream cone, slice of cheescake, sweet biscuit or handful of crisps in your mouth, shower with a soap bar or shampoo your hair from the usual range of toiletry products.

Abbott & Co.'s sovereign risk claims don't stand up to scrutiny

“Since 1999, the Behre Dolbear Group Inc. has compiled annual political risk assessments of the key

players in the global mining industry.”

In 2010 the Gillard Government announced it was introducing a national price on carbon, the 18 clean energy bills were passed by federal parliament in 2011. The start date for the provisions of most of this new legislation is mid-2012.

This is Australia’s global mining industry risk assessment ranking as one of the international Behre Dolbear Group’s “key players”:

2010 ranked at 61

2011 ranked at 57

2012 ranked at 57

Err, Tones, Uncle Joe, Poodle – what happened to the “sovereign risk” for mining companies you were all shouting about?

Australia’s risk level has gone down and not up since the PM announced the “toxic tax” you’ve been wailing about.

It takes very little effort to correctly fill in the Parliamentary Register of Member's Interests. So why does Tony Abbott continually mess up his form?

Here is the link to the current and updated Register of Member's Interests for Abbott, The Hon Tony, Member for Warringah.

In it he lists his spouse as holding an unspecified number of shares in General Gold Resources Inc. In 2007 he listed these shares as General Gold Resources NL.

However, this WA mining corporation changed its name in July 2002 to General Gold Resources Limited and a month later to Yilgarn Gold Limited. At some later date it again changed its name to Kairiki Energy Limited. The company is currently listed on the Australian Stock Exchange as a petroleum exploration, gold mining, exploration and investment company operating in the Phillipines.

As all shareholders would have been informed of these name changes, one has to wonder why Abbott has not changed the details recorded on his RMI form for at least the last four years.

Given his history in relation to the Register of Member's Interests this current inaccuracy isn't good enough.

Though at least we know that he is still turning up to some doorstop interviews in tailored suits he hasn't paid for.

Wanted: A local hero willing to lay down their life for their council

A North Coast Voices reader contacted me the other day to draw my attention to the fact that Clarence Valley Council was not optimistic about attracting government funding for a roundabout at the intersection of Yamba Road and Treelands Drive, because local residents have been so inconsiderate as to not get themselves killed or injured in high enough numbers to satisfy the NSW Roads and Maritime Service.

Apparently the highest priorities would come from those with 3 casualties or more in the previous 5 years and, so far Yamba has only been able to produce two at that particular intersection and in that time frame.

The local wag suggested that Yamba trawl its 7,000 plus population for someone willing to lay down their life to make up the numbers, so that the roundabout could occur in his lifetime and a reluctant Grafton-centric Council didn’t have to put its hand in its pocket for the full $400,000.

Cartoon from Google Images