In awe of the strength of first peoples protecting land

Sometimes two sentences hold a wealth of meaning.....

Post on the Facebook page No Yamba Mega Port announcing that the corporation which manages the two Native Titles over the Clarence River on behalf of the Yaegl People will not support Australian Infrastructure Development's scheme to industrialize the high environmental and cultural value Clarence River estuary.

Shop at Woolworths on the NSW North Coast? You need to read this

Fair Work Ombudsman

Trolley collection services procurement by Woolworths Limited,  media release date June 2016: 

In June 2014 we commenced an Inquiry into Woolworths’ procurement of trolley collection services.

For nearly a decade before this, we'd been investigating allegations of serious non-compliance with workplace laws involving businesses providing trolley collection services to Woolworths Limited (Woolworths).

In response to a perceived lack of improvement in compliance and disturbing allegations of violence towards workers at some Woolworths' sites, we started an Inquiry into their procurement of trolley collection services. It aimed to comprehensively identify and address the levels and drivers of non-compliance with Australian workplace laws by businesses involved in Woolworths' labour supply chains.

We examined around 130 Woolworths' supermarket sites across Australia and found indications of some form of non-compliance at 79% of them. The findings of this report indicate an entrenched culture of non-compliance in the Woolworths trolley collection supply chain.

At the time of publishing, as a result of the Inquiry, we've taken enforcement action against a number of businesses (and their Directors) involved in various Woolworths' labour supply chains, including:

commencing legal action against 2 businesses and their Directors, one of which we believe provided us with false and misleading records and the other for allegedly underpaying over $25 000 in wages

issuing 9 letters of caution for various Award contraventions, failing to adequately keep records, and misclassifying employment as an independent contracting arrangement.

We are also considering future legal proceedings against a number of other businesses providing labour to Woolworths for similar alleged contraventions.

Download the full report on our Inquiry into trolley collection services procurement by Woolworths Limited (PDF 1.1MB).

EXCERPTS

Examining 130 (or 13.5%) of Woolworths’ supermarket sites across Australia , the Inquiry found:

n more than 3 in every 4 (79%) of sites visited had indications of some form of non-compliance with workplace laws

n almost 1 in every 2 (49%) of sites visited presented serious issues, that is multiple indicators of non-compliance

n deficient governance arrangements contributing to a lack of Award knowledge and substandard record keeping

n false, inaccurate or misleading records

n failure to issue pay slips to workers

n workers being paid rates as low as $10 an hour

n cash payments which disguised the true identities of workers and actual amounts paid to workers

n manipulation of the identity card system implemented by Woolworths

n workers vulnerable to exploitation and often complicit in acts of non-compliance

n complex labour supply chains with networks of corporate structures and intermediaries to facilitate cash payments, recruitment of vulnerable workers and production of false records.

These characteristics are indicative of an entrenched culture of non-compliance in the Woolworths trolley collection supply chain......

We examined correspondence and the Trolley Collection Service Agreement from 2011 relating to 17 NSW and ACT supermarket sites. By dividing the agreed price by the weekly labour hours required to deliver the service, we found the cost per labour hour was below minimum pay rates at 15 of the 17 sites.

The casual cruelty of the Turnbull Government can leave one speechless

@bamboozled3 tweeted this snapshot on 24 July 2016 from Sue Robinson's Facebook page entry of 21 July:

The Australian Health Minister is reported as stating that we are now working through her situation in a bid to address her concerns.

A statement which does not deny that Ms. Robinson was refused this diagnostic test on the basis that she had no money to pay upfront.

News.com.au reported on 25 July 2015:

On Monday afternoon, Ms Robinson posted an update to say thank you for the support and revealed Ms Ley had made contact.

“It looks as if there might be some action on it, and that is a direct result of your response,” she wrote.

“As a result of the number of ‘shares’ and responses, the office of the Federal Health minister, Sussan Ley posted with contact details asking me to call.

“I did and was put through to a young man called Alex. We established two things. Alex assures me that the guidelines for bone scans haven’t changed since the election (I didn’t think they had, but I thought they might have since the last budget).

“He says there should have been no recent changes at all, and if I was eligible, for example, last year, I should still be eligible as I am still on the meds that compromise my bone density.

“However, according to the Medicare website I was shown this weekend my meds are on the list of those for which a bone scan is recommended, but not one for which it is reimbursed.

“There doesn’t seem to be any justification for this and it does specifically exclude cancer patients because the meds concerned are for cancer.

“I also asked Alex why are there guidelines at all? Surely if a cancer specialist regards such a test as necessary for a patient, that should be enough? After all, every case is different and the referring doctors are the only ones who can really know what is required in each case. Alex said that was a good question, but didn’t answer it, though he did tell me that these exclusions are worked out by a medical services advisory committee.

“We agreed that he would investigate further and I am sending him a link to the Medicare website so he may check the guidelines for himself.

“I also have a little more information on the charging system being used for these tests. I called other local practices who do such scans here and asked about bulk billing. They all had the same reply ... It’s complicated. It seems they can’t tell if you are eligible until you go in and then fill in a form.

“It is your answers in this form, and not the referral, which determine if you are eligible, so they say. They can’t tell you before you arrive whether or not you will be asked to pay. But if you are, the charges vary from practice to practice.

“For those of you who posted saying you are in the same boat, here are the costs you might have to pay if you are excluded from bulk billing. PRP will charge a $60 fee, Erina Radiology charges $85. Medical Imaging at Erina charges $50 for pensioners and $100 for the employed, but also states that they do whatever they can to bulk bill you. This practice was also recommended by one of my Facebook friends Maryellen Golden who said she had been bulk billed for a bone scan there herself. (Thank you Maryellen)

“I guess this isn’t unaffordable (unless you are on a limited income like a pension), and as long as you know it, you can save up. But I can’t help but wonder why it should be costed at all. I’m hoping this will be treated by the government as an unfortunate oversight that will be corrected.

And if it is, it will be your overwhelming response that brought it to their attention. Thank you again.”

For all low-income patients there are other pitfalls awaiting the unwary no matter what the diagnosis.

The Medicare website states; If you have more than one service during the same visit you may not be bulk billed for every service.

What it does not state is that the Medicare treats a patient’s claim involving multiple services differently from a claim involving a single health item and therefore the dollar amount a patient is reimbursed can be much lower.

As much as $65 lower in the instance of which I am aware, leaving the pensioner $125 out-of-pocket in total.

One of the more bizarre positions that the federal government takes is that the patient (or presumably the patient's estate if they left one) is responsible for the cost of the death certificate issued by an attending doctor - Medicare specifically includes this certificate in items not eligible for a rebate.

"Although Medicare benefits are not payable for the issue of a death certificate, an attendance on a patient at which it is determined that life is extinct can be claimed under the appropriate attendance item. The outcome of the attendance may be that a death certificate is issued, however, Medicare benefits are only payable for the attendance component of the service."

Medicare Benefits Schedules (Complete MBS and MBS by Category) operating from 1 July 2016 can be found here.

Another blow for Australian Infrastructure Developments: ACCC Chair reveals port privatisations not in the nation's best interests

Australian Infrastructure Developments Pty Ltd and its shadowy backers face more than a Lower Clarence community determined to fight its scheme to industrialise Port of Yamba situated in the high environmental value Clarence River estuary.

Now it has been revealed that its desire to extensively expand and privatise this small domestic port will in all likelihood increase freight costs for the Murray-Darling Basin farmers, graziers, agri-businesses and mining corporations that are supposed to be its future customers.

Financial Review, 26 July 2016:

The head of the competition regulator has called out governments for blatantly structuring asset sales to maximise profits at the expense of consumers and businesses.

Australian Competition and Consumer Commission chairman Rod Sims said he had been a strong advocate of privatisation for 30 years because he believed it enhanced economic efficiency but he now believed "people in the street" who oppose privatisation because it raises prices had it right based on recent port sales in NSW. 

He said he was now "almost at the point of opposing privatisation" because state and federal governments were becoming increasingly blatant about structuring sales to maximise proceeds at the expense of competition.

"I am getting more exasperated. I just think governments are more explicitly now privatising to maximise the proceeds - including the Commonwealth," he said. 

"They are explicitly saying the reason they don't want to do this or this is that it'll damage the proceeds they are getting. They're not even playing the rhetorical game anymore. 

"I see it getting worse. I think a sharp upper cut is needed in this area. That's why I am saying, 'let's just stop the privatisations'. It is increasing prices - let's just call it out." …..

Mr Sims said ports privatisation was the best example of the approach that had turned him off privatisation as a policy. 

The ports of Botany and Kembla had been privatised together to limit competition, a big debate was under way in Victoria about making sure the Port of Hastings would be a competitor to a privatised Port of Melbourne in future, and "the same battle" was being waged over the Port of Fremantle, where  the WA government wants to give the buyer a right of first refusal over a future outer harbour port. 

The ACCC chairman last month criticised the way Port Botany was privatised, saying price monitoring of unregulated monopolies was ineffective. But this is the first time he has gone so far as the call a halt to sales of public assets. 

Mr Sims said he was less concerned about the NSW government's power poles and wires privatisations because the state has an independent pricing regulator. The NSW government has applied to the Australian Energy Markets Commission to draw out until 2024 an annual price hike of up to $520 per household that was scheduled take effect from July 2017 to avoid a "price shock" for consumers. 

Mr Sims said he was also concerned that monopoly ports were being privatised without any pricing regulation, leading to "lovely headlines in the Financial Review saying 'gosh what successful sales, look at the multiples they achieved'."

"Of course they bloody well did. The owners have factored in very large price rises because there's no regulation of how they set the prices of a monopoly. How dopey is that?" he said.  

'It's damaging our cost structure'

"I think it's a serious issue facing Australia. I think it's damaging our cost structure considerably. 

"And when you meet people in the street and they say, 'I don't like privatisation because it boosts the prices', and you dismiss them, no no, they're right. Recent examples suggest they're right."