Cartoon of the Week

 

Mark Knight

Measles infection alert for NSW North Coast, August 2023

Measles was officially declared eliminated from Australia in March 2014, which means that outbreaks in Australia

now start with a single non-immune individual contracting infection while overseas and coming/returning to Australia. [National Centre for Immunisation, Research and Surveillance, Fact Sheet, 2019]

After a two and a half year respite Measles popped up on the public health radar in New South Wales again in February, March, April and July 2023.

With a low number infections being identified on incoming international flights up to late July 2023 and one case with no identified source.

The latest instances triggering limited period alerts for Rose Bay, Randwick, Minnie Waters, Coffs Harbour and Woolgoolga.

Those most likely to be susceptible to measles are infants under 12 months of age who are too young to be vaccinated, anyone who is not fully vaccinated against the disease, which may include some adults, and people with a weakened immune system. [NSW Health, 21 July 2023]

NSW Health, Measles alert for Mid North Cost and Northern NSW, extract, 7 August 2023

The Mid North Coast and Northern NSW Local Health Districts are urging people to be alert for signs and symptoms of measles and to get vaccinated if not up to date, following the notification of a case in the region.

It is likely the case acquired their infection whilst travelling in Bali, where a high number of cases have occurred in recent months. The case visited several locations in NSW while infectious, and contact tracing of potential high risk persons is underway.

Dr Valerie Delpech, Acting Director, Northern NSW Population and Public Health Directorate, said anyone

who was in the same locations as the cases should be alert for signs and symptoms of measles until 18 August, and check their vaccination status.

People may have been exposed to the case in the following locations:

• Coffs Harbour University football field, AFL North Coast under 10 competition – on Sunday 30 July between 9am-10am

• Woolgoolga AFL sports field, AFL North Coast under 12 competition – on Sunday 30 July between 11am-12pm

• Hazard reduction burn, Minnie Water Road, Minnie Water – on Monday 31 July 8.30am-5.30pm

These locations do not pose an ongoing risk to people…..

Tweet of the Week

 

The 'Yes' Voice campaign has tip-toed around the 'No' camp for months, unwilling to take the fight to them. But Uluru Dialogue co-chair @mdavisqlder isn't afraid - scorching statement about a "single No advocate" using her "privileged media platform to confuse mainstream media" pic.twitter.com/ThPPtqjVzi

— James Massola (@jamesmassola) August 9, 2023

The newly created National Anti-Corruption Commission (NACC) currently has 157 referrals in the second stage of assessment in August 2023 with another 87 referrals waiting assessment

 

It seems that the NACC is off and running and its recent media release is of more than passing interest to those into guessing names.

Given that the Report to the Inquiry into the Robodebt Scheme recommended the referral of individuals for civil action or criminal prosecution, with the relevant parts of the additional (sealed) chapter of the report being submitted to heads of various Commonwealth agencies; the Australian Public Service Commissioner, the National Anti-Corruption Commissioner, the President of the Law Society of the Australian Capital Territory and the Australian Federal Police.

Australian Government, National Anti-Corruption Commission (NACC), Media Alert, 8 Aug 2023:

The National Anti-Corruption Commission provides the following update on the number of referrals received to date.

From 1 July to close of business on Monday 7 August 2023, the Commission received 587 referrals.

Approximately 13% of the referrals relate to matters well publicised in the media.

Assessment of referrals

The Commission continues to assess referrals. Assessment is a process by which the Commission considers first whether the referral is in its jurisdiction and raises a corruption issue, and secondly, whether and if so how to investigate the issue raised by the referral.

Since 1 July 2023, the number of referrals assessed to be outside the Commission’s jurisdiction (as they did not involve a Commonwealth public official) is 76. The number of referrals assessed as not raising a corruption issue is 183.

There are currently 157 referrals in the second stage of assessment.

There are 87 referrals waiting to be assessed.

The Commission’s assessment policy is available on its website at How the NACC assesses corruption issues.

The Commission is appreciative of the high level of interest and referrals it has received so far. We will continue to reach out to individual referrers where we need additional information, or to let them know if we have decided not to proceed further.

If you wish to make a report about a corruption issue in the Commonwealth public sector, visit nacc.gov.au or call 1300 489 844. 

A previous NAAC media release dated 5 July 2023 had informed that:

This broad scope to make referrals has meant the following matters have already been referred to the NACC for possible investigation:

• PwC’s recent tax leaks scandal involving their government consulting arm

• referrals resulting from the Robodebt Royal Commission after Commissioner Catherine Holmes requested a one-week extension for the inquiry’s reporting date to enable her to make a direct referral to the NAAC [my yellow highlighting]

• Stuart Robert and his alleged involvement in the Synergy 360 misappropriation of taxpayer funds

• Scott Morrison and the secret ministries he swore himself into

• the Defence Department’s Hunter-class frigate program

• the former Morrison government and the funding of the Community Health and Hospitals Program

• former cabinet minister, Bridget McKenzie, and her handling of the Community Sport Infrastructure Grant Program.

PARLIAMENT OF AUSTRALIA 2023: a short tale of Kevin and his misleading prop

 

The moment Deputy Manager of Opposition Business & Nationals MP for Page Kevin Hogan shamed the rank and file of his party, shamed the people of his electorate and deeply shamed himself.

Kevin Hogan MP at 2:44pm during House of Representatives scheduled Question Time on 8 August 2023. Snapshot from official parliamentary digital live broadcast.

House of Representatives, Hansard, on Tuesday 8 August 2023 at the point Mr. Hogan deliberately and knowingly misrepresented the pages he held in his hand:

The SPEAKER: I'll hear from the member for Page, who is seeking leave.

Mr Hogan: I thank the Prime Minister for earlier tabling page 1 of the document, Uluru Statement from the

Heart. I seek leave to table the full 26-page document, Uluru Statement from the Heart.

The SPEAKER: Is leave granted?

Mr Burke: Leave is not granted.

The SPEAKER: The member for Page will put away his prop.

How do I know that what he held in his hand was not the Uluru Statement From The Heart?

Original Uluru Statement from the Heart. IMAGE: J-Wire, 6 March 2019

Because it is a very specific document created in keeping with the tradition of the Yirrkala bark petitions and the Barunga statement, the Uluru Statement From the Heart was made in the form of a work of art on canvas which in this instance included approx. 444 words in the text. It was signed by over 250 First Nations people representing approx.1,200 delegates who participated in the regional dialogues and conferences which reached consensus, with 100 signatures including the name of their nation. The artwork was painted by Maruku artist and Uluru traditional owner Rene Kulitja and Mutitjulu artists Christine Brumby, Charmaine Kulitja and Happy Reid [The Monthly, May 2019].

What Hogan knowingly held in his hand appeared to be an extract from a 112 page compilation document created with a "3/8/23, 1:10:26 PM" date stamp, which contains copies of the records of many of the regional dialogues as well as a document which includes "Our Story" & a plain text transcript of the wording on the original signed Uluru Statement From The Heart canvas.

A best he perpetrated an infantile stunt that day, at worst he attempted to both mislead the Parliament and the Australian people.

Federal parliamentary inquiry into insurer response to the 2022 floods & other matters gets the go ahead on 7 August 2023

Hon Stephen Jones MP, Assistant Treasurer and Minister for Financial Services, media release, 3 August 2023:

Insurance claims handling under the microscope in parliamentary inquiry into insurer responses to the 2022 floods

Today, the Assistant Treasurer will give notice to the House of Representatives tabling a motion to establish a Parliamentary Inquiry into insurer responses to the 2022 floods. The motion will be presented to the house on the next day of sitting, Monday 7 August.

The inquiry will take a whole of economy view of the ongoing challenges faced by intense and frequent flood events.

It is consumer focussed - investigating land use planning, affordability of coverage, supply chain issues, labour shortages, claims handling, and dispute resolution processes.

The February-March 2022 floods in South‑East Queensland and NSW are the costliest natural disaster for insurance costs, totalling around $5.87 billion, in Australian history.

The Assistant Treasurer has visited the communities impacted by floods in Southeast Queensland with Graham Perrett MP and the Northern Rivers with Janelle Saffin MP; and following a visit to flood ravaged towns in Central West NSW last month announced the inquiry alongside Member for Calare, Andrew Gee MP.

Today, the Albanese Government has released the terms of reference.

The committee will hear directly from affected communities, holding public hearings across the country in regions affected by the 2022 floods. A final report will be handed down during the third quarter of 2024.

The Inquiry will inform the Albanese Government’s broader program of work to address insurance access and affordability. This includes up to $1 billion over five years from 2023-24 (up to $200 million per year) to invest in measures that better protect homes and communities from extreme weather through the flagship Disaster Ready Fund.

The Government is taking proactive steps to mitigate disaster risk and build climate resilient communities. Currently, 97% of disaster funding is going toward recovery and only 3% toward risk mitigation. We want to flip that on its head.

The terms of reference for the inquiry are below.

The Standing Committee on Economics for inquiry and report by quarter 3, 2024:

1. response of insurers to the claims resulting from major 2022 floods, including:

(i) south-east Queensland and northern New South Wales (NSW) floods of February and March 2022;

(ii) Hunter and greater Sydney floods of July 2022;

(iii)Victorian, NSW and Tasmanian floods of October 2022; and

(iv) central west NSW floods of November and December 2022;

2. the inquiry shall have regard to the following matters in respect of the aforementioned floods

(i) the experiences of policyholders before, during and after making claims;

(ii) the different types of insurance contracts offered by insurers and held by policy holders;

(iii) timeframes for resolving claims;

(iv) obstacles to resolving claims, including factors internal to insurers and external, such as access to disaster hit regions, temporary accommodation, labour market conditions and supply chains;

(v) insurer communication with policyholders;

(vi) accessibility and affordability of hydrology reports and assessments to policy holders;

(vii) affordability of insurance coverage to policy holders;

(viii) claimants’ and insurers’ experience of internal dispute resolution processes; and

(ix) the impact of land use planning decisions and disaster mitigation efforts on the availability and affordability of insurance.

3. the inquiry shall also have regard to insurer preparedness for future flood events

4. the inquiry will take into consideration findings from other reports such as Deloitte’s external review of insurers’ responses to the 2022 floods, and ASICs Claims Handling review. 

The House of Representatives agreed to the creation of this inquiry on the afternoon of Monday 7 August 2023.

Tweed Shire Mayor Chris Cherry: "I think that [the 2022 flooding] has been a big wake up call for all of us."

 

IMAGE: Google Earth snapshot showing 40 Creek Street, Hastings Point & environs. Retrieved 7 August 2023. Click on image to enlarge.

In the matter of Development Application DA20/0386 for a 13 lot subdivision (11 residential lots, 1 drainage lot and 1 residual dedicated riparian lot) at Lot 156 DP 628026 No. 40 Creek Street, Hastings Point made on behalf of Queensland-based Palm Lakes Works Pty Ltd on est. 17.77 ha of flood prone, environmentally sensitive, estuary land which includes preferred koala habitat and SEPP14 wetland.

The Tweed Shire Council meeting which refused development consent saw councillors cast their votes 6 to 1. The sole councillor in support of the DA, was former National Party campaign director and former mayor Cr. Warren Polglase, who in speaking to the motion was moved to utter words to the effect that he did not believe that climate change was occurring here not having seen it with his own eyes. 

Echo, 7 August 2023:

Click on image to enlarge

The Tweed Shire Council has refused a development application (DA) for an 11-lot subdivision at the site of 40 Creek Street, Hastings Point.

The site is zoned residential but ‘has significant environmental constraints as well as being flood prone’ according to the staff report. Despite that, Council staff recommended approval of the DA.

Mayor Chris Cherry told the Council meeting (3 August) that in 2019 she had been one of the councillors to propose ‘in-principle support’ of the subdivision.

‘Looking through that and looking at what that support was based on, it was conditional support based on this application not increasing its development footprint. It was based on it complying with a number of different conditions that were very important to the council of the day and the community.’

Councillor Cherry said point six of the in-principle support stated that:

‘Any future development application that proposes to increase the number of lots, reduce the size of lots or vary any other developments controls to intensify yield or the development footprint or further impact on the buffer or environmental areas will not be looked on favourably by Council.’

Cherry went on to detail a number of ways that the current DA went beyond the basis of the in-principle support, saying that in ‘the proposal in 2019 only three of the lots were intercepting into the 75m ecological buffer zone. Now most of them are, I think seven of them now [are] into that 75m buffer zone. So the developable footprint has increased.

‘The lot for the existing house was 800 square metres in the plan in 2019. It is now 1,470 metres square.

2022 flood

‘There are a lot of changes that have been made that increased the impact of this development. But the biggest thing that has happened in the time since the in-principle support was given is the 2022 floods. I think that has been such a big wake up call for all of us. And we’ve heard today from the flooding experts, from Floodplain Management Australia and the planning expert who came forward, just how much consideration we should be giving to the location, to the impact of storm surge in a climate change future that we are most definitely going to see. And I think it is imperative that we take this very seriously. [my yellow highlighting]

‘Most of you would have seen the article in the Sydney Morning Herald [saying] that it is inexplicable that Hawkesbury Council keeps approving developments of a floodplain when they have gone through such a massive flood. It is the same for us. We can’t keep repeating the same mistakes. We can’t keep saying it will be okay. To put 2.2m of fill across this site to get flood immunity for the new residents is simply not the way. That’s not good planning. That’s not the way we need to go forward as a community…..

Full article here.