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May 31, 2005
SA Budget 2005-06
The 2005-06 State budget was released on 26 May SA budget by Treasurer Foley, with all the usual drip feeds during the week before. It continued the standard neo-liberal practice of a small stable budget surpluses with a little money given over to health and welfare to confirm the Rann Government's creditionals as a sound economic manager to the money markets. Unlike the budget's in NSW or Victoria no big money was allocated to infrastructure investment(apart from roads), or to facilitating Adelaide's future as a sustainable solar city.
When is SA going to start to put money where its mouth and acting decisively to stop further environmental decline?
Instead of shifting fiscal policy from the short term to the long term, the budget was an election one, delivered by the law and order Rann Government confident of its return to power in March 2006 in its own right. So no one suffered from excessive budget cuts and we had e the one off rebate for electricity bills for pensioners.
However, I had no sense of the future of the rustbelt state that does not have a mining boom from the budget.Is the rustbelt state throwing off its 'out in the boondocks' or 'retirement village' image? Does the budget indicate that SA has a future for young people. Did the budget suggest a future by providing jobs for its people, or do the intellectually trained middle class still need to continue to leave SA and go to Canberra, Melbourne Sydney to find work? Did the budget help to realize the dreaming in the State Strategic plan:
"...a State that aspires to lead, not follow. A State that is self-confident, not self-conscious. A State that celebrates creativity and innovation. A State that fights above its weight and is a destination again rather than a much-loved home that our young people feel they need to leave to make the most of their abilities."
The answer is no. The 2005-06 Budget was an instrument to get the tough on crime Rann Government re-elected. So SA will continue to have an economy with low growth rates, an ailing manufacturing base, little population growth and outward interstate migration.
SA cannot reinvent itself on its own by pulling itself up by its own boostraps. It is going to have to rely on financial support from the eastern states, such as NSW; and from a planned boosting of regional development by the Commonwealth Government, such as the Adelaide-based,government-owned and soon to sold ASC winning the contract to build the Australian navy's 3 new $6 billion Air Warfare Destroyers (AWDs). Adelaide's future as a high tech city (remember the old, multi-function polis?) really does depend upon it becoming the centre or hub of Australia's defence industry.
Will this development of the naval shipbuilding industry be enough to revitalise SA's manufacturing industry, and provide Adelaide and SA with a future?
Posted by Gary Sauer-Thompson at 03:39 PM | Comments (1) | TrackBack
May 30, 2005
Telstra's joke
When I read in the Australian Financial Review that Telstra is negotiating partnerships with Hollywood film studios and major television studios to deliver television, movies, and interactive services over the internet I thought that it was some kind of joke. I had a good laugh over coffee. Media policy and reform is all about protecting established interests than enhancing the public interest.
I understand that Telstra has big ambitions to transform itself from a telecommunications to a fully fledged media company. I can see a carve up of the media industry happening in the near future, as the new electronic internet media drive change and competition. And the media market needs radical reform to open it up and allow a lot more diversity.
But pay-TV movies over the internet to my computer down a highspeed internet line? You have to laugh at the high tech spin designed to show Testra's high tech creditionals.
Pay-TV movies over the internet is not going to be done with the current top broadband speeds of 1.5 megabits through DSL, with limited downloads and costing $80 upwards a month. Why, it would take those in the capital cites all night to download the movie, and you'd pay excessive fees for exceeding the download limit. That is not affordable access to high speed broadband. Remember, most of the country has no broadband service (they have unreliable dial-up if they are lucky). So who is kidding who here about downloading movies over the Internet?
Australia's broadband infrastructure is, slow, expensive, unplanned and bounded by anti-competitive practices and contraints to protect Telstra's monopoly. And the Howard Government has no intention of ensuring competition by structurally separating or breaking up Telstra.
As far as I can tell Telstra is in no hurry to increase the broadband speed to 8, 12, 26 megabits per second; there is little movement on laying new fibre optic cable; and the Federal government has no e-strategy to deliver high speed broadband to the nation within the next five years. The market, not government, is going to drive the high speed broadband rollout in Australia, and that means minimal services appearing slowly with Telstra working to block all competition.
A reality check is needed to counter the spin of media commentary that is largely driven by commercial self-interest. Some services will not be offered by Telstra: why would they develop cheap high speed broadband when it would lead to the widespread use of internet telephones and thus threaten their landline or voice telephone business? Why would the cable companies offer cheap high speed broadband when online video and movie offerings threaten their core business?
Broadband is doomed to be developed very slowly, with minimal service at great cost. The best you can can get in Australia, with all the constraints on broadband development, is the short jerky video streaming experienced when watching federal Parliament.
Japan and South Korea lead the way in broadband development.They have households linked to high speed broadband (26 megabits per second) for about $US22 per month, and they are moving to have a comprehensive nation-wide ultra high speed (up to 100 megabits per second) by the end of the year. Australia is nowhere near this.
In Australia, from what I can gather, the best that will be offered by Telstra and Optus is DSL broadband (ADSL 2+) at around 5 megabits a second. And that will take around 2 years to come on line.
So Australia is not in a position to reap the benefits the broadband era in terms of increased productivity, technological innovation and economic growth. The jobs and businesses associated with developing new services, products and content will be in North-East Asia. Once again Australia will apply the technology other countries develop.
Posted by Gary Sauer-Thompson at 11:33 AM | Comments (0) | TrackBack
May 29, 2005
incarceration is the game
Michelle Grattin reckons that recent events in the unravelling of the Howard Government's policy of mandatory detention has turned into quicksand for its political masters. She says:
An appalling litany of maladministration, bungling and traducing of human rights in detention policy and by the Immigration Department generally has been unfolding for months now, and there is much more to come out. At the same time, the Government is belatedly trying to deal with the problems. But the very bungling that caused them is hampering efforts to fix them.
This is well illustrated by Matt Davidson's cartoon:
Grattin's article is a fine grain detailing of the work last week by the Senate Estimates system.
Thanks to their efforts what was exposed through a process of questioning was the remarkable and inexplicable blundering and maladministration by DIMA (the Department of Immigration and Multicultural Affairs).
Is this kind of work the last throw of the dice by the old Senate? Will John Howard allow this kind of democratic process to continue in the new Senate? Or will the Coalition try and close it down so that politics becomes administration? My bet is on the latter.
In this article in New Matilda Julian Burnside outlines the way the traducing of human rights in Australia has happened behind our backs since 2001.
He says that:
Solitary confinement is properly regarded as the worst form of punishment legally permitted in Australia. Although asylum seekers have committed no offence at all, they are regularly subjected to periods of solitary confinement for weeks or months at a time. The Department of Immigration answers this by saying that detention (including solitary confinement) is administrative, not punitive.
What we have is the systematic, unregulated use of solitary confinement in immigration detention centres. Julian then adds
The Department of Immigration can issue its own search warrants. If police want to raid a suspected murderer's house, they must apply to a magistrate for a warrant. If officers of the Department of Immigration want to raid premises, they can get a warrant from another officer in the Department. In early 2002, Department officers raided a house armed with a warrant issued this way. It turned out that the warrant was issued because an anonymous caller had told them that there were 'some Middle Eastern people' in a street in Armadale, one of Melbourne's 'leafy suburbs'.
It is hard to square this with the basic values of liberalism and the rule of law. What it indicates is the national security state's regime of concentration camps, the normalisation of torture, and the erosion of civil and political rights.
Conservatism rules not liberalism.
Posted by Gary Sauer-Thompson at 11:14 AM | Comments (0) | TrackBack
May 28, 2005
deregulating the labour market
The new national system for regulating wages and employment is being heralded as a historic moment in Australian history and the remaking of Australia. It certainly looks that way, as it is the first example of roll back. In this case centralized power is being used to deregulate the labour market.
The rules and regulations of the federal industrial system will be dramatically overhauled; minimum wages will be eased; the safety net underpinning enterprise bargaining will be stripped back; small and medium business will be given free rein to dismiss unwanted workers without challenge from unions and tribunals; the rights of union officals to enter workplaces will be curtailed; there will be tougher sanctions against illegal industrial action and unions will have to hold secret ballots of workers to approve strikes.
Howard now has the numbers in the Senate to make it law.
Rodney Clement
Many of the low paid and vulnerable are going to lose many of the rights and most of the protection of the workplace system built bit by bit over the last last century.
Job security increasingly depends on the booms and busts of the economy as the primary employment relationship is now the individual contracts made between employers and employee, with a far more limited role for trade unions, industrial tribunals and governments.
A downturn in the economy means that the "burden of adjustment" will fall on the workforce, particularly those with limited skills and bargaining power. That is what a deregulated market is for: to enable employers to adjust labour costs and conditions to changes in demand.
Australian business says that this helps them to have a competitive edge at a time when Australia's position in the competitive index is weakening despite a strong and resilent economy. Business then adds there is a long way to go in reforms and the Coaliton cannot afford to lose its nerve as the reform journey has only begin.
That means that the current workplace package does not go far enough. From this economic liberal/free enterprise perspective most of the restrictive employment regulation remains, as does the scope for troublesome judicial interpretation. If those unskilled unemployed Australians who are to be shifted off welfare are to be employed, and poor households an income from enmployment, then the minimum wage needs to be reduced, and preferably abandoned. And the unfair dismissal regime or an award system regime should be wound right back.
For market liberals, such as Des Moore, the primary reason for pushing this kind of labour market reform is a small government philosophy. Their classic liberalism limits the reach of central government so as to expand individual choice, freedom and opportunity. This presupposes that individuals should be able to take care of themselves; and, given this self-reliance, the proportion of the population needing federal welfare and health assistance should fall. If individuals and families assume more responsibility for their own welfare, health and employment, then the nanny state can be wound back,if not abolished.
Posted by Gary Sauer-Thompson at 11:20 AM | Comments (2) | TrackBack
May 27, 2005
it makes sense
Now this article makes a lot of sense. Consider what Sean Barratt says:
People argue about what constitutes the so-called third sector but the truth is that people are putting their time and money where their beliefs are. Membership and support for non-government organisations are increasing; the opposite is the case with traditional political parties.Research continues to show that trust in non-government organisations is greater than in business and politicians. Many activist groups do not have traditional membership structures but coalesce around an issue.
I would argue that with the Howard Government gaining control of the Senate in July federal Parliament is not the place to be. Howard and Costello will rule ruthlessly, the ALP will be mercilessly mocked and taunted, there will be little questioning or revision of government policy, and the theatre of politics will become a farce.
Why bother working in such a climate when the policy work is going to be done by the ngo's? Given the Howard-Costello onslaught against the ALP--eg over the budget tax cuts---the political parties will increasingly be run by the political operatives in search of clever tactics, images, headlines, wedge politics and a clever line for the media.
The muscles are being flexed whilst the buying of influence, favour and access to ministers at those expensive fundraising dinners will only increase. Parliament becomes a political market.
Posted by Gary Sauer-Thompson at 03:43 PM | Comments (0) | TrackBack
May 26, 2005
changing times
John Quiggin has an op. ed. in the Australian Financial Review on water and federalism. He argues for a more co-operative federalism. He says:
...when we combine the confrontational centralism that has characterised the Howard Government lately---particularly as its dominance of the Senate approaches--- with specific instances in which the water initiative has been used as a political football, it seems unlikely that much will be left of the spirit of co-operative federalism before long.
That is pretty true. Last years National Water Initiative appears to be increasingly to a different time. Before the states needed to be pressured by the Commonwealth for their slowness in water reform to return over-allocated water systems to sustainable levels. Now pressure has given way to confrontation and takover.
Today the Commonwealth is engaged in a sustained attack on the states that goes beyond the conflict of the federal politics of ALP states v a Coalition commonwealth. What we have is a power grab the commonwealth.
Quiggin acknowledges the inevitablity of conflict in the current politically divided federalism, then he adds that:
"....water is too important to be held hostage to conflicts over industrial relations or intergovernmental financial relations. A renewed outbreak of co-operation is required."
So true. And we can always hope for better days ahead in our federal polity.
Me thinks the whole environmental reform process around water and biodiversity will be slowly closed down, whilst some of the older reforms will rolled back. After all most of what we think as the environment has been reclassified as natural resources and this has been given to the Nationals to administer. That darkens the skies somewhat doesn't it.
Posted by Gary Sauer-Thompson at 02:10 PM | Comments (0) | TrackBack
May 25, 2005
Queensland medical crisis
The Queensland health system is in crisis. The suspected number of deaths at the hands of Dr. Jayant Patel (Dr Death) at Bundaberg Hospital is now estimated to be around 87 along with a further 20 cases of patients suffering complications.
Giving evidence at the commission of inquiry into the events surrounding Dr Patel's activities at the Bundaberg Hospital, Toni Hoffman, the nurse in charge of the hospital's intensive care unit, said:
"It came to a point when we discussed all of the things we'd done, all the people we'd been to and we just thought, 'What on earth can we do to stop this man?'.We'd taken to hiding patients, we'd taken to telling patients they should ask for a transfer, we were doing all sorts of things we shouldn't have been doing."
Toni Hoffman is a whistleblower nurse. It appears that the hospital administration sided with, and protected, Dr. Jayant Patel. Why did they do nothing to stop him? Aren't hospitals meant to be about saving people's lives not killing people? Why did hospital and health department management ignore the gross surgical incompetence of Dr Patel, when it was reported by staff?
The response by the Beattie Government to this medical malpractice crisis is an interesting one. It has decided to split the health department into two:--into a hospitals department and a department of primary care and health service integration. The aim is to break the traditional power bases in the state's health bureaucracy. About time this happened.
This provides the opportunity for the government to control the funding balance between health prevention and treatment. Everyone says that health prevention, or primary health care,is a good idea but it has little policy substance in Canberra. It will be interesting to see what Beattie does with it.Will health prevention continue to be the poor cousin to hospitals?
Posted by Gary Sauer-Thompson at 03:25 PM | Comments (1) | TrackBack
May 24, 2005
ABC on journalism v blogging
I haven't been watching the ABC's Media Watch of late. I've often found its critique of the media to be thin, conservative, narrow and nitpicky. It rarely uses its research resources to engage with, and help us to understand, the deeper currents transforming the media in Australia. Though their watchdog ethos promises a lot, the show delivers little of substance by way of a critical reading of the connections between the media and democracy.
I scolled through the newly designed Media Watch website this morning because I wanted to have a look see, as I'd missed the show last night. Surfing around I came across this post on blogging credibility. Now I only vaguely know the background to the tiff Media Watch is having with Janet Albrechtsen. Then I noticed this statement:
"The Australian newspaper thinks we have been unfair to Janet, but we think it's important to distinguish between blogging and journalism, and we've called in someone they know to explain it."
Yes there is a distinction between journalism and blogging and the distinction is important. So how does Media Watch understand this distinction?
They tell us by introducing a section from Rupert Murdoch's speech, rather than argue their case in their own words. Fair enough. It is a good and interesting speech. Murdoch says:
"...we may want to experiment with the concept of using bloggers to supplement our daily coverage of news on the net. There are of course inherent risks in this strategy —— chief among them maintaining our standards for accuracy and reliability ... But they may still serve a valuable purpose; broadening our coverage of the news; giving us new and fresh perspectives to issues; deepening our relationship to the communities we serve, so long as our readers understand the clear distinction between bloggers and our journalists.
What is most suprising is Media Watch's comment-- a minimal "Absolutely Rupert". That little remark amounts to an appeal to authority, as we are not even given an argument about the distinction between journalism and blogging. "Absolutely Rupert" functions to close the debate as it provides no space for us to engage.
What then is Media Watch saying is the clear distinction between bloggers and journalism? It's not clear. We have to dig. What does the "absolutely" refer to? We have to reconstruct their argument.
My interpretation of Media Watch's argument buried in its interpretation of the Murdoch paragraph is this: professional journalism operates within the values of accuracy and reliability and amateur bloggers do not. Therefore, journalism is good because it is accurate and reliable, whilst blogging is bad because bloggers are inaccurate and unreliable.
Consequently, blogs do not deserve journalistic credibility. Since blogs should not have journalistic credibility conferred upon them, it is wrong to do so. That means bloggers must work to become worthy of the same journalistic standards.
Is this plausible account of the distinction? Tim Dunlop, for one, is not convinced. I'm not persuaded either as it does not make sense of what is actually happening in the media world.
In appealing to authority--the owner of The Australian and Fox Television--to make their case for them, Media Watch shows no awareness how that appeal contradicts their "absolutely". It is well known that Fox has broken with the objectivity of reportage to embrace a partisan conservative commentary. Their coverage of the Iraq war was not known for its accuracy or reliability.
So what does accuracy or reliability mean in the light of that?
Presumably, Media Watch still thinks that journalism is reportage (mirrors the facts) whilst blogging is deception (opinionated prejudice). That claim ignores how a lot of print journalism is commentary on, not a reportage of, public issues; it ignores the way that Media Watch is a commentary on media events (interpretation) and not a reportage of them; and it overlooks the way that bloggers, as citizens, are engaged in a critical interpretation of public issues that concern them from their different perspectives or point of view.
What does accuracy and reliability mean in the light of all that interpretation? Should accuracy and reliability be the only values when a lot of journalism is interpretation?
You have to admire Media Watch's lack of self-awareness about their understanding of the media. What this episode illustrates is the deskilling and intellectual poverty of journalists. When are they going to become more critical of the gap between their positivist ideal and their actual interpretive practice?
Posted by Gary Sauer-Thompson at 12:13 PM | Comments (4) | TrackBack
May 23, 2005
perspectives on global economic imbalances
Nouriel Roubini has a good and useful account of the different perspectives that are bought to bear to interpret the global imbalances and suggest solutions. He states the situation:
"...the basic facts are known: the US is running large fiscal and current account deficits while the rest of the world is running large current account surpluses. The flow of capital that is financing these US twin deficits is mostly (three quarters or so) coming from foreign central banks - mostly in Asia but not exclusively - that are aggressively intervening to prevent an appreciation of their currencies.While the basic facts are undisputed, the causes of such imbalances, which country is at fault and the policy solutions to such imbalances are much disputed."
He mentions five perspectives on the causes of such imbalances. The perspective of public opinion follows those who express:
"...serious concerns about the U.S. "twin deficits" (the sustainability of the U.S. public and external debt accumulation) and the risks deriving from the reliance on foreign central bank financing of these twin imbalances. An orderly global rebalancing requires both "expenditure switching" via a Chinese/Asian appreciation relative to the US dollar and other floating currencies and, at the same time, "expenditure reduction" via a meaningful reduction of the US fiscal deficit that will require some increases in taxes."
What is the perspective of Treasury and the Reserve Bank of Australia on this? I'm not sure. Judging from this speech the RBA says that we do not have to worry about the US fiscal deficit or we do not have to worry about the US current account deficit. As I understand it Treasury disagrees.
I'm having trouble understanding with the RBA stance. Would not the absence of currency adjustment in China and East Asia mean that the US has to address its fiscal deficits? Is not a reduced foreign financing of the trade deficit already happening with East Asia? Is not the possibility of sharply higher real interest rates and negative wealth effect mean reduced private consumption and investment in the US. Does this not bode poorly for Australian exports?
Does this mean that the RBA reckons it is okay for the US to run budget deficits and current account deficits? That it sees these to be temporary imbalances? That there is no problem to solve? Does the RBA work from this Panglossian account?
Posted by Gary Sauer-Thompson at 05:08 PM | Comments (1) | TrackBack
May 22, 2005
waiting for the rains
The rains have not been falling in southern Australia and the country continues to be in the grip of drought. The media flows last week were full of pictures of starving stock, dusty paddocks and despairing farmers. The politics is one of the farmers wanting the government to help them through the hard times until the rains come.
Geoff Pryor
Those living in the inner city of Sydney would not know all that much of the dustbowl conditions in Eyre Peninsula in South Australia, northern Victoria or western NSW. The glittering appearances of the spectacle of a global city at work and play suggests that it operates as if the economy is disconnected from its roots in ecological life.
What the urbanites saw last week was the farmers with the welfare mentality with their hands out. As Philippa Murray writes:
The sound of wailing farmers reached a near deafening roar last week as drought tightened its grip on huge tracts of eastern Australia. The loudest cries were for government to ease the plight of the rural sector with more cash and assistance.
This is short term thinking.
Maybe many of the farms are no longer viable? Maybe flogging the land to the last blade of grass makes no sense anymore. Maybe drought, which was once considered a natural disaster, is now a common occurrence? Maybe the way agriculture is being done needs re-thinking.
What we do know is the pressure needs to be taken off the land. One way to do that is to enable the farmers to leave their land with dignity as some land should not be farmed. Another way is for farmers to be paid for providing environmental services to the community: eg., planting trees, reducing erosion, improving water quality and rivers,and protecting and increasing biodiversity so that the community reaped the benefits of clean air and water.
Will that happen? That implies long term strategies to reduce the impacts of drought and climate change. There is little evidence of that coming from Canberra at the moment.
Update: 24 May 2004
Peter Cullen, writing in The Age, supports the above argument. He says that:
"....some areas of Australia were looking like "basket cases" and should no longer be farmed. We should stop hoping for rain in these areas and realise that with climate change it is just going to get tougher. Up to 10 per cent of farming land was now unsustainable. It is no point throwing money at people. We need to work out how to get them off the land with dignity."
And the former head of the CSIRO's land and water division, John Williams, said Australians had forgotten the variability of the nation's climate and started farming land that previous generations would not have farmed.
Unsustainable areas included parts of the Mallee across Victoria, NSW and South Australia; SA's Eyre Peninsula; and some parts of western NSW and central Queensland.
Posted by Gary Sauer-Thompson at 11:16 PM | Comments (7) | TrackBack
May 21, 2005
Governing Sydney town
I'm in Sydney for the weekend for some meetings and a new job. I've a few hours off this afternoon so checked out Glebe Books and Fish Records. I'm currently working from an internet cafe in Glebe.
These headlines hit me when I saw them over breakfast at the Novotel in Darling Harbour. The piece says:
Faced with surging demand for power-hungry air-conditioners, the NSW Government is preparing to approve the extension of a coal-fired electricity plant near Lithgow and has cleared the way for more coal power stations.
They are doing the same as Victoria: reassuringly talking about climate change and the need for environmental sustainability whilst doing the very opposite on the ground.
The skyscraper skyline of Sydney, as seen from my room in the Novotel, indicates a very wealthy global city booming from the financial flows of international finance capital. NSW is the premier state in Australia because of its financial power. This is the driver of the new capitalism that is rebuilding Sydney.
Though it will probably run out of water in the near future, there is no sense here that there are ecological limits to economic growth. What is Sydney going to do about its long-term water shortage? Wait until it runs out of water?
This coming up against the limits of growth is not due to the booming population--many people are leaving Sydney because of a lack of quality of life: it is too expensive to live there and the traffic flows are too clogged. You need to be a millionare to have a quality life in Sydney.
Sydney just refuses to recycle its storm and waste water--it still all flows into the sea. This refusal by Sydney Water suggests that the Carr ALP Government lacks the courage and political will to engage in infrastructure reform. You get the sense that things are drifting along in terms of governance, with the government reacting to each crisis in education, health, transport and water as it happens.
Update: 23 May 2005
This cartoon captures the contradiction of the Carr Government's governance of NSW:
Cathy Wilcox
Posted by Gary Sauer-Thompson at 04:40 PM | Comments (0) | TrackBack
May 20, 2005
centralism
We live in a very different political climate these days to those of the last decade. As George Williams observes:
Australia's federal system is going through change and turmoil like we have not seen since the Whitlam government of the 1970s.The Federal Government will soon outline its plan to take over the field of industrial relations. It continues to debate the states on their share of GST revenue and it has now said it will seize control of the nation's ports.
Bill Leak
Memebers of the Howard Government,such as John Anderson the Deputy Prime Minister, cannot even be bothered consulting or negotiating with the states over the proposed federal takeover of port infrastructure. The strategy is to coerce the states to hand over their powers to gain access to federal money. The states learnt about the proposals through the media.
Canberra has become hostile to the states. It's that simple.
Update: May 22nd
The above argument is supported. It highlights the wider use of national regulation to progressively push into state areas. The spread of regulatory regimes is the new way of Australian national politics that restrains what the states can do in areas such as electricity, water industrial regulation, education etc.
Posted by Gary Sauer-Thompson at 07:14 AM | Comments (0) | TrackBack
May 19, 2005
buried budget cuts
The cartoon captures the way the Howard Government's welfare-to-work package is going to impact heavily on those who are sick or disabled. They are being directed into low paid unskilled work.The implication is that the policy is not one of fairness or justice.
True, the Job Network agencies will gain an extra $516 million in funding to help the disabled, single mums and mature aged unemployed prepare for work. However, there is also the ($490 million) cuts to the funding of the Job Network agencies. The effect of the Treasury's cost saving is to make it harder for unemployed people to gain access to resources that would enable them to overcome the barriers to finding work.
Rodney Clement
The historically underfunded Job Network agencies are also facing requirements that they--not CentreLink---suspend welfare payments to people deemed to be "shirking" their obligations to find a job. What will they do when the contracts come to be renewed?
The implication?
The privatisation of the delivery and surveillance of welfare. Laura Tingle, writing in Tuesday's Australian Financial Review, says the assessment of work capacity of the unemployed and disabled would be outsourced: put out to tender to private sector agencies not to comonwealth agencies. Once the work and health assessments are done Centrelink would use the assessment to determine a job seekers obligation and support payment.
Does the federal government still have a welfare department? It does look as if it has been whittled away.
Another implication is that around 40,000 people will go onto Newstart rather than the Disability Pension and Single Parent Pension after July 2006.That will impact on unskilled labour market when the deregulation of the industrial relations system will put downward pressure on the minimium wage. So we have a pool of cheap labor for the lower pay for unskilled work.
Who is to regulate this? Well the powers of the Australian Industrial Relations Commission to regulate and make rules on the basic working conditions and minimum wages is going to be removed.
Posted by Gary Sauer-Thompson at 02:01 PM | Comments (0) | TrackBack
May 18, 2005
Mr Galloway Goes To Washington
It's good to see a feisty, lefty British MP serve up some political stick to the Senate Homeland Security and Government Affairs subcommittee and to the Republican administration. Galloway had some fighting words for the Republicans:
I gave my heart and soul to stop you committing the disaster that you did commit in invading Iraq. And I told the world that the case for invading was a pack of lies..... Senator, in everything I said about Iraq I turned out to be right and you turned out to be wrong, and 100,000 have paid with their lives — 1,600 of them American soldiers, sent to their death on a pack of lies.
The permanent Senate subcommittee on investigations accused Galloway of receiving 20 million barrels of "oil allocations" from Saddam. It suggested that he might have used his anti-sanctions campaign, the Mariam Appeal, to "conceal payments".
Galloway returned the charge with interest. The BBC has some footage
Posted by Gary Sauer-Thompson at 12:00 AM | Comments (0) | TrackBack
May 16, 2005
Forum on the media
Jay Rosen, who runs PressThink, was in Australia recently to participate in the 2005 Alfred Deakin Innovation Lectures in Melbourne. He joined Lance Knobel on the May 11th program, 'Reporting Change: the media and innovation' at the Melbourne Town Hall.
Lance argued that something fundamental has changed in the media world. Lance says that the media finds itself in a period of rapid, dramatic change. He charts this change in terms of the new tools such as blogging, google, the wiki and RSS feeds. This is a description of the tools. Lance calls them the tools of media democracy as they enable more of us to become users rather than consumers or managers of news.
So what are people doing with these tools?
Lance says they hold out the prospect of users moving in a more creative direction. How so? He describes this trajectory in term of weblogs being information nodes that actively filter and retransmit knowledge. This gives them the potential to enable citizens to navigate through the thicket of information. So webloggers are in a position to become trusted intermediaries for diverse consumers of information.
Fair enough. It is nice reporting of the changes that are happening in the mediascape. But we kinda knew that already. Moreover, webloggers do not just filter and retransmit what is provided by the corporate media. They also comment and interpret, shape the public conversation on issues the corporate media ignores, and often send that conversation in different directions.
What did Jay Rosen say?
He talked about each nation having its own press and the press as a circulator of public argument, pushing ideas against events to create editorial traction and grab attention. He says that the great migration to a new platform, the Internet, is being made. This means that the very media tools once commandeered by professionals fall into public hands and that the technology platform on which mainstream journalism has rested for so long---the "one to many" media system---has ended. Jay adds:
Many sharp people have noticed that we are living today in a great era of pamphleteering made possible by the Internet, along with one of its native forms and most powerful inventions-- the modern weblog, which is only an aspect of an even more powerful invention: the interconnected sphere of weblogs.
Okay we know that too. It is the corporate press who are slow on the uptake in Australia.
Jay point that:
..each nation will shortly have a chance to re-establish or overhaul its own press. Or to create one anew.
is a good one. However, he doesn't say how is Australia doing that. Presumably that is up to Australians.
Alas few are considering thisas the corporate media is not very self-reflective. Even Hugh Martin offers little on this, as he just reports and links.
Posted by Gary Sauer-Thompson at 10:27 AM | Comments (3) | TrackBack
May 15, 2005
yesterday's man
Politics is a tough business. There today, gone tomorrow. And so it will be for Tony Blair. The curtain is due to come down on his act.
He has had his fifteen minutes of fame. Tis time to leave. Blair has acknowledged this by conceding the need for a stable and orderly handover.
Blair has been damaged by Iraq---especially by the way he decided to go along with President Bush on invading Iraq eight months before the Iraq War commenced. As in Australia, the decision to invade Iraq was made, without significant consultation, reasonable intelligence on Iraq, or any desire to explore ways to avoid war, and well before seeking a parliamentary or United Nations mandate of any sort.
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May 14, 2005
a big dry
The south east and western parts of Australia are currently enjoying unseasonably warm weather with temperatures about 2C to 3C above the average. The autumn rains are late in this part of Australia, very late. There have been no rains as we begin to move into winter.
Australia is vulnerable to the increases in temperature and decreases in rainfall projected for the next 50 to 100 years, because it already has extensive arid and semi-arid areas, relatively high rainfall variability from year to year, and existing pressures on water supply in many areas.
This is not good news for those parts of the parched southeast of Australia with their low water supplies due to what many say is the ongoing drought.
When I was having a drink in Manuka last Monday night after flying into Canberra I read an article in the Canberra Times about drought, lack of water and the town of Goulburn. Goulburn lies between Sydney and Canberra, and it is close to running out of water for its inhabitants. This situation of a big dry formed the core of my conversation with the waitresses, and again in the context of climate change with friends late Thursday afternoon, when we were waiting at the airport to fly back to Adelaide.
I remembered reading CSIRO modelling that says Australia's continental-average temperature has risen by about 0.7°C from 1910-1999, with most of this increase occurring after 1950. This increase will continue: by 2030, annual average temperatures wll be from 0.4 to 2.0°C higher over most of Australia; and by 2070, annual average temperatures will increase by 1.0 to 6.0°C over most of Australia with spatial variation.
The Canberra Times had a photo of a some water in a cracked and dried-out dam bed that once held a vast depth of water.This is the last of the drinking water, the shower water, the water to wash the dishes and laundry for the people of Goulburn.
The Australian has picked up the story. Amanda Hodge says:
With less than 2000 megalitres of water - less than eight months' supply - left in store, the town's situation is critical. And the drought has already played havoc with Goulburn's social fabric...This year, cherished public and private gardens are dead, the public swimming pool is about to close and footballers of all ages and codes are having to share the few rock-hard grounds still open.
Goulburn has few options to find more water. It can tap into a broken acquifer to would give it a few more months. It is unlikely to be able to build an emergency 8km pipeline to pump water back upstream from the Wollondilly River as Goulburn lies within Sydney's Warragamba Dam catchment area, and Sydney is also caught up in averting its looming water crisis.
So Goulburn will have truck water in for 22,000 people. That is expensive--too expensive for many. Presumably Goulburn is not recycling water and is not using treated effluent produced from wastewater plants. Time to become a little smarter.
Is it just the drought or natural variability?
The increase in termperature, lack of rain in winter, decreasing water and reluctance to shift to recycling is a familar story across parts of southern Australia. People continue to rely on the rains as the climate changes around them, even though Australia is heading into its third drought run, with 45 per cent of the nation drought-declared even before the large winter cereal crop is sown.
Climate change should be a dominant issue in planning Australia's medium and long-term future as Australia is 'vulnerable' since global warming will enhance the drying associated with El Niño events. Areas, such as WA's fast-growing Southwest Region, are places where significant impacts from global warming can be expected. The decrease in rainfall in WA's Southwest together with similar reductions on the southeast mainland, will lead to a further drying out across the country between now and 2070.
Posted by Gary Sauer-Thompson at 10:19 AM | Comments (8) | TrackBack
May 13, 2005
questionable tactics
Not many in Canberra were impressed by the clever parliamentary political tactics to oppose and seek to defeat in the Senate the Costello budget's $21.7billion tax cut for all income earners. These tactics, devised by the glimmer twins (the duo of Wayne Swan and Stephen Smith), were premised on negative rhetoric.
If the glimmer twins political tactics were meant to provide a platform in the media from which to launch a critique of the Costello's budget policy, then they sure backfired. The ALP ended up on the ropes from the Howard/Costello body blows landed throughout Wednesday.
I reckon it was a case of bad political lines that lacked punch and bad political judgement to go along with the oh so clever tactics. The ALP ended up looking vulnerable, bloodied and inept. It failed to use question time on Thursday to attack the Howard government's soft underbelly in its welfare-to work reforms---eg., the inadequate training places for the unemployed and those on welfare, and the shortages of childcare places. Instead of a public debate about the punitive politics of the welfare reforms the debate was about the ALP's blocking of tax cuts.
That meant Kim Beazley's budget speech-in-reply, had to make up the lost ground, with its alternative tax cuts plan and new policy initiatives on infrastructure and skills training.
New policy initiatives? Did not Kim Beazley say in April (The National Press Club speech in April) say that the ALP was going to focus on attacking the Howard Government in the House of Representatives so as to make them accountable, rather than putting forward alternative policies?
I thought that the newly-elected Beazley was on a promise to deliver a more policy orientated approach? Does that mean we should put the Press Club speech to one side? Do we then concentrate on ideas and policies?
So what happened to the ALP's care and compassion for those who were negatively affected by the work-to-welfare reforms at a time of a tax revenue surge from supercharged company profits? There was no mention of this in the budget reply speech.
I thought the ALP was drawing a line in the sand that demarcated a fairer and more equitable Australia. The line was to be used to enable Labor to define itself against Howard as the party of fairness and equity. So what happened to the tough critique of the punitive work-to-welfare reforms, that are the first step in dismantling the welfare system.
What is going on with the ALP? Does anybody have any ideas why it is all over the place?
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May 12, 2005
the media's budget
The media's representation of the Costello budget is all about the tax cuts and the politics of the ALP not passing the Government's legislation. This representation is marked by gaps and silences.
One silence is the way the media has ignored strategic economic policy. The basis for any meaningful expansion of Australia's export capacity lies in the shift to a services and information economy from one based on physical goods. Should not facilitating this shift be important, when Australia continues to run a huge current account deficit at a time of record high commodity prices and increasing mineral exports to a booming Chinese economy? What happens when there is a slowing of growth, or a slump in demand for our mineral exports? Silence.
A gap exists in the politics of cutting welfare dependancy:
Behind this lies another strategy to reduce the welfare state because it is outdated. This is Peter Saunder's argument. He, is from the Centre of Independent Studies, and he is a long time advocate of welfare reform--kicking the welfare habit--and he usually wears the mask of a social policy intellectual fighting the lefty academic welfare establishment's defence of the welfare state.
In his op.ed. in the Australian Financial Review strange Saunders welcomes the government's welfare reforms as a necessary step in cutting welfare dependency, reducing the welfare rolls, and creating a self-reliant society.
He says that:
Single-parent lobby groups have predictably attacked the changes, but requiring parents of school-age children to look for part-time work is asking no more than is expected of anyone else, and it promises to improve the quality of their lives as well as benefiting their children.
This is strange response. Single-parents are not opposed to working part time to earn extra money. They want to work but they require childcare places to enable them to do so.
Child care is a key, not the "shirking" by dependent welfare dependents. Saunders is silent about the need for childcare. He is also silent about employers not really willing to employ single mothers who are available only part-time and constantly worried about their children because they have no childcare. By not mentioning this Saunders is implying that single parents have a shirker character: "needy" addicted people who refuse to pay their own way and demand the government provides them with an income.
Saunders, in tactily implying that the single parents are shirkers, is wearing the mask of an idealogue. The mask of the public intellectual has slipped.
Posted by Gary Sauer-Thompson at 08:26 AM | Comments (0) | TrackBack
May 11, 2005
Costello's budget politics
Costello's good news 10th budget, which was sold as being about the future, is primarily about a new round of tax cuts for 9 million Australians worth $21.7 billion over four years. That largess to the top end of the salary range results from a windfall arising from a resources boom and mining company profits. As the government has collected far more revenue from the minerals boom than it had anticipated, so it is giving some of it back.
How will the Reserve Bank judge that in terms of the inflationary presssure on interest rates? With a bit of belt-tightening?
Is not the assumption by the economists one of limitless economic expansion in a finite world, and the unleashing of boundless human desire upon a dwindling resource base?
The other face of the Costello budget is that of welfare reform:
As the leaks indicated it is sticks and carrots to cajole those going onto welfare in 2006 into casual unskilled work, with few measures tossed in to improve their job skills and ease them into a job. Are the jobs there in the regions?
Or will those on Newstart (unemployment benefit) after 2006 go out the front door of the Job Network agencies and round to the charities?
The scenario is a very simple one: the disabled and mentally ill trip on the rules and are automatically breached under a tighter compliance regime; they find they have no money coming into the bank account; and so they go around to the soup kitchens for food, and to the charities for help to pay the rent and electricity bill until they can get back on Newstart. Then they will be assessed, trained, offered pre-vocational assistance (for their bad backs and depression)and managed in a rudimentary way by the private sector employment agencies in the Job Network. To avoid losing the dole for 8 weeks with repeated breaches they could try and access a new training place to help them get back to work.
The lack of giving back here ($3.5billion) does make Costello and Howard look mean. They are basically cutting the welfare bill by moving the 700,000 on the disability support pension into work. But where will the 300,000 or who are over 55, with bad backs and unemployed for a year find work? Who will employ them? What are they being trained for? Hospitality, tourism, supermarkets? The problem here is less older workers being shirkers reluctant to supply their labour and more that employers are reluctant to employ those with a disability.
Tim Colebatch says that the government is not doing those on welfare a favour by ordering them "to start looking for jobs while doing nothing to help them tackle the shortfalls in basic skills, qualifications, attitude, whatever stopped them having a job in the first place." He says that true welfare reform is expensive as any savings from pushing some new applicants for disability or sole-parent benefits onto the cheaper unemployment benefit are far outweighed by the cost of support measures with which the Government plans to help them back into work, rising to $250 million a year by 2008-09.
He adds:
Australia's welfare safety net has not been acting as a springboard because we have not invested the money to make it work that way. In its small way, this welfare reform is a breakthrough, and hopefully a step to a new future where we will train our own workers rather than leaving 15 per cent of prime working-age men without a job and pinching skilled workers from poor countries.
Costello and Howard's basic politics is about addressing the concerns of the middle class--Menzies' forgotten people. But they lacked the courage to resolutely address the long-term structural reforms needed to deal with a slowing world economy, burgeoning current account deficits, capacity constraints and slowing economic growth.
What then is Costello doing to make the Australian economy more productive, more resilent to future overseas shocks, better able to deal with the problems of an aging population and more ecologically sustainable?
Posted by Gary Sauer-Thompson at 08:58 AM | Comments (3) | TrackBack
May 10, 2005
Costello's Budget no.10
I flew into Canberra last night on the shuttle service. I go into budget lockup early this afternoon and stay there until 7.30 pm. So I will be spending the next 6 hours working my way through the documents of the 10th Costello Budget.
In that time I will try to make sense of the volumes of documents, probe the ways that the surplus will be spent on facilitating the long-term reform agenda, and analyze the Treasury's economic strategy on economic governance.
There's lots of money to play with. Will it be spent on the homeless and the vulnerable?
The economic back drop to the budget strategy is 3-4 years of big trade deficits in spite of a strong global economy and good commodity prices for Australian producers. This is a woeful trade performance which cannot be dismissed as a short-term glitch. So how will they tackle it?
My other question going into the lockup: is the Howard Government serious about welfare-to-work reform, given all the rhetoric about the Costello Budget helping get people get off welfare and back into the workforce. As Andrew Bartlett rightly observes:
This aim is something that virtually no Australian has a problem with. The trouble is that this Government's record shows much more of an emphasis on 'getting people off welfare' without worrying so much about first making sure those same people are getting 'back into work.'
I concur. So:is the reform thrust going to be more about crime and punishment (harsh welfare penalties), or a big investment in providing disabled and unemployed people with real opportunites for the training, education and employment they need. Will the reforms go beyond forcing people to do work-for-the dole programs that have little or no skills or training components?
The budget is a chance to assess whether the Howard Government can overcome its reform fatigue, given a strongly growing economy and the big demographic changes of an ageing population that are already beginning to bite.
Posted by Gary Sauer-Thompson at 01:08 PM | Comments (1) | TrackBack
May 09, 2005
Victoria's green wash?
One consequence of the Howard Government gaining control of the Senate is the closing down of environmental politics and policy and a roll back of the environmental state that had been created by a reformist Senate over the last ten years.
So the environmental action shifts to the ALP controlled states which spin the green rhetoric but do little on the ground.
The spotlight is flickering on the Bracks Government in Victoria. It is crunch time. It is faced with a decision to keep the Hazelwood brown-cioal power station (Australia's dirtiest power station) operating until 2031.It is also decidng whether to underwrite cheap coal-fired power for a $1 billion-plus expansion of Alcoa's Portland aluminium smelter.
The Brack's Government has called for deep cuts to Greenhouse emissions, supports state-based emissions trading and voluntary sustainability, is implementing greenhouse abatement measures, and says that it is committed to increasing renewable energy targets.
Like NSW and SA there has been little action on the ground.
Crunch time.
Posted by Gary Sauer-Thompson at 04:20 PM | Comments (2) | TrackBack
May 08, 2005
Federal budget tensions
If the week before a federal budget is a strange one--a mixture of political restlessness, bureaucratic lockdown and keen business anticipation---this time around it is overlaid by a big shift in the policy and political landscape.
The work of the Howard Government in the next term is reforming both the welfare-to-work system and the nation's industrial relations framework; putting Telstra up for sale; deregulating the media; maanaging a slowing economy; and resolving the rapid development of Liberal Party leadership tensions into a brawl.
Will it be Costello's last budget? Aah the hares are up and running. Who will deliver the 2006 Budget? Nelson? Abbott? Downer? Now that gets people thinking.
The first step in the new reform agenda is the Costello Budget, due to be handed down next Tuesday. Judging from from the leaks, it is structured around reforms to welfare-to work system. The media leaks indicate that it is not going to be a big bold reform, due to the protracted Cabinet battles on the issue. So is ithe budget the first instalment on the well thought-through fourth term agenda that can be delivered with a Senate majority? Or is it another sign of policy drift?
The media leaks also indicate that despite the promised "sandwich and milkshake" style tax cuts to soak up the big surplus, all is not going well on the welfare-to work policy. There appears to be too much severe stick and not enough sweet carrot.
Too much stick means instruments to move people off pensions (tougher criteria for pensions, less genereous indexaton of pensions, greater penalties for long term unemployed who break the rules).The ideology to stop the men with "bad backs" abusing the welfare system. The central thrust is to contain the cost of pensions by cracking down on the long-term unemployed, who are simply seen as shirkers.
Not enough carrot means investment to ensure increased workforce participation through vocational training, wage subsidies, child care for sole parents looking for part-time work,better tapering of nenefits as income increases, extra support for pensioners facing cuts and incentives to business to hire people with disabilities or mental health problems. If the stick is about punishing the unemployed, then the carrot is about helping the long-term unemployed overcome the substantial barriers they face in getting a job. That will cost a lot of money.
I'm only guessing what the protracted conflict within the Government over the welfare-to-work reform has been about. I am presuming that the hardline Kevin Andrews, the Minister for Employment and Workplace Relations, has adopted a tough stick (punishment) approach based on presuming that 25% long-term dole recipents are not making a serious effort to get off welfare; one that enphasizes the outsourcing of welfare to the Job network agencies.
I am presuming that Howard and Costello want a greater emphasis on the carrot.
Posted by Gary Sauer-Thompson at 11:59 AM | Comments (0) | TrackBack
May 07, 2005
going going....
Elections have a way of sealing political futures.
Things are moving fast. Michael Howard has gone. His resignation speech. The Conservatives have some problems to overcome before they can return to power, as they have not done the hard work to develop a policy agenda that would appeal to the middle ground. Theirs was a politics based on dirty hospitals, filthy criminals and smelly immigrants and gypsies.
And Tony Blair? He has credibility problems and is next for the chop:
It will be bye bye Tony Blair in a year or so. He is damaged goods, as he was too content to remain George Bush's lapdog, use dodgy intelligence to make the case for war and continue to spin on Iraq for too long. Gordon Brown, the current Chancellor, will replace him, as a result of a pact made during the election campaign. Will Brown be the Tailgate Charlie of an exhausted Labour government?
The Liberal Democrats made some gains against Labour. So Charles Kennedy is safe, as by shifting to the left on the war and Blair's market-orientated reforms of higher education, he obtained more seats and ballots than four years ago, But the Lib Dems much heralded "decapitation strategy" against senior Tories fizzed. Does that mean they will have to move back to the centre with the Conservatives?
Posted by Gary Sauer-Thompson at 08:06 PM | Comments (0) | TrackBack
May 06, 2005
only a god can save us now
Nice. The can do Carr Labor Government in the state of NSW reckons that it has all the hot issues nicely under control, except for water.
Their fingers are crossed because they are waiting for the rains to fall to solve Sydney's growing water shortage. Nothing that a bit of spin won't fix.
Posted by Gary Sauer-Thompson at 01:57 PM | Comments (6) | TrackBack
May 05, 2005
the media: democracy's watchdogs?
In her Deakin lecture Michelle Grattan writes about the relationships between information, government and the media. The issue is an important one as the media is now a part of the entertainment business. And the Murdoch media is increasingly become partisan rags disguised as news sources. These support President Bush no matter what, whilst their media dogs work away at arousing, then moulding, fear, anxiety and hate.
Grattan begins by constructing a powerful image of the Howard Government's media management:
A modern government operates like a powerful hose, designed to get the message out in a forceful, directed and managed way. Leaks are anathema, and the system is strongly reinforced to prevent them, although this never works totally.
Government's try to achieve the 'message-in-a-hose' model as best they can. One way to ensure this spin is to muzzle the bureaucracy. As Grattan points out:
Today's problem is not so much that the bureaucracy has been politicised, though there's that, but that it's had the fear of God put into it. Many professional men and women have been turned into mice, afraid of what should be a useful and non-controversial role in helping inform what the media convey.
And the media? How does it fit into the hose model? Or does it oppose it? Should it become part of the drip feed?
It should be deeply critical according to the watchdog model of the media. Grattan is critical of the media because it has accepted the muzzling of the bureaucracy:
The media must also take some blame for the failure to extract information from the public service. Once, print journalists would be constantly nagged at by head offices for not getting into the bureaucracy enough. Now, this would be seen as more likely to produce "incremental" stories, dismissed as boring and not worth space in tight newspapers.
The inference it that the media have dumped being the watch dogs of democracy. The dumbed-down media is no longer interested in providing information and knowledge for democratic citizens to make their judgements.
If the media management of the hose model is basically anti-democratic, then how can things be changed? Grattan's argument is that the media should recover its watchdog role:
I think the media should be simultaneously more constructive and more critical - and that this is not a contradiction... On the whole, I think we could do with less trashing of politicians. On the other side of the coin, eyes should be sharper and should be more rigorous...Political investigative journalism is not strong. Where, for example, is the expose of the culture of the Immigration Department?
This means that the media becomes more self-critical about its own practices and understandings.
There are gaps in Grattan's lecture. Which media are we talking about in this? Presumably the corporate media. And the mainstream media? Is it just the quality broadsheets given the partisan nature of the Murdoch Press? Does it include the tabloids who do entertainment? Where does the internet figure in this?
Suprisingly, nowhere in the lecture does Grattan link 'the media' to democracy and citizenship. These are notable by their absence. So what are the media watchogs for? Who are they defending with their sharper and more rigorous eye? Are they just watching themselves?
Posted by Gary Sauer-Thompson at 11:29 PM | Comments (0) | TrackBack
May 04, 2005
getting down to the wire
I was in prosperous Melbourne yesterday working through the Productivity Commission's recent work on health. I was unable to access a free internet connection at the airport Hilton business centre when I had a free moment to write a post for public opinion.
That was a big suprise. The Hilton charged a $100 to use broadband for the afternoon. Broadband should be treated just like a telephone line: there all the time as part of hiring a meeting room in the business centre.
When I glanced through the nation's newspapers over breakfast this morning I noticed that most of the political news was about the Costello v Howard leadership tussle in the federal Liberal Party, with Brendan Nelson hovering in the background.
Ho hum. Another indication of the growing instability in Coalition ranks. This is Canberra Press Gallery territory. They love this kind of story. They are going to write their stories though the lens of the leadership tussle now.
There was also some material on the Bracks Government's lets-loosen-the-purse-strings-a little-budget handed down by John Brumby in the media. The neo-liberals in love with fiscal responsibility are muttering that the Brack's Government is still cruising on the Kennett legacy unaware of the need to tighten the budget settings, Tough reforms are needed they add......
I found it more interesting reading about the UK election with the battle for middle-ground voters between New Labour, the Liberal Democrats, as the defections continue to drift to the Liberal Democrats over the angst about the Iraq war. A challenge is being presented by the Liberal Democrats (Conservatives slipping a further two points to 27 with the Lib Dems rising by two points to 23), with Labour faring poorly in the marginals.
Few see the Conservatives as the government in waiting. Few voters give Blair's Labour government much credit for their good deeds in achieving low inflation, low interest rates, low unemployment and rising employment. These signs of economic prosperity and stability indicate that Britain is a generally prosperous nation, confident of its place in the world and tolerably well governed.
It's down to the wire as they say. And in more ways than one.Tony Blair has been obliged to do a deal with Gordon Brown to hand over power during Labour's third term.
Is Blair's time over as the ground shifts beneath his feet? Is he increasingly becoming yesterday's man? Are the hard-faced Tory boys on the move? Will the Conservatives judge that the strategies of Australian campaign director Lynton Crosby---a narrowly focused and negative campaign about immigration and asylum seekers targeted at marginal seats---were wrong?
It was interesting reading about the process of producing The Guardian's election editorial. Most unusual.
Posted by Gary Sauer-Thompson at 01:10 PM | Comments (0) | TrackBack
May 02, 2005
democracy in Iraq
A very interesting post on democracy in Iraq by Faiza of "A family in Baghdad". The post is about her experience at some kind of "democracy in Iraq" conference in Amman that was hosted by some unnamed US organizations. An excerpt.
'On the next morning…the lecture was about democracy and the free economy....The man spoke about the necessity of adopting the Free Economy in Iraq for the coming phase, not giving the unbounded control of the country's wealth to the state, because then it will be rich and strong, and become a dictatorship. He said that oil is a wealth, but would be like a curse on people, if governments took hold of its investment. He said that we are supposed to forget the government in our future life, we shouldn't need it, nor expect it to clean our houses or do our laundry, for we shall be doing this ourselves.'
Then the questions came. A third woman said:
"where would the income of the Iraqis come from, if the wealth was to be in the hands of private companies, and free economy? Aren't we supposed to write a new constitution, containing good laws to protect the people, elect a good government, and divide the wealth justly among citizens?"
When the questions became difficult the organizers said that the discussion time was over. Those in the audience shouted back, in protest.
Faiz says that the woman beside her said:
we want to finish the discussion; we want to understand why would they want the oil for their private companies? Huh… so, they are telling us; from now on, wash your hands, the oil isn't yours, so, manage your affairs without it. How shall we live?
More attempts were made to close down the discussion. Then Faiza stood up, looked at the lecturer, and spoke directly to him:
...it is not correct that the time would be limited for us only to listen, this isn't acceptable. You should listen to us. We listened to you, and know your viewpoint, but you too should listen to us, because we, the Iraqi women, shall go back to Iraq, and not you. We shall build Iraq, not you. The future of Iraq belongs to us, not you … we didn't come here only to listen to you, we came to learn, and debate, but you won't allow us to talk… the rules and laws of the conference should be re-arranged as we want…
More shouting and more attempts to stop the discussion.
Do have a read. It's about the formation of nationalists then their confrontation with the power plays of empire.
Posted by Gary Sauer-Thompson at 03:31 PM | Comments (0) | TrackBack
May 01, 2005
disengaging from Gaza?
Land, territory and borders have always been at the heart of the struggle between Israel and its Arab neighbors.
The issue of settlements within Israel, and in the Occupied Territories, has been at the heart of the political and ideological Zionist movement. A major source of contention now is the extension of this immigration and settlement policy in the post-1967 Occupied Territories, in which Israel aims to colonize the territory through Jewish immigration and Palestinian exodus to such an extent that it can claim the land as its own.
Hence Israel is a state based on colonial settlement, one with a history of 37 years of making an Arab land into a Jewish state by disenfranchising Palestine’s indigenous Arab inhabitants from those areas intended for Jewish statehood. Today it is being said that no Israeli government can, should or needs to remove the major settlement blocs. Today Zionism means expanding the big settlement blocs in the western part of the West Bank. Three decades of Israeli expansion into the West Bank undercuts the viability of a Palestinian state.
Disengagement from the Gaza Strip could mean the transformation of Gaza into a region with no attributes of sovereignty or independence. So far it appears that Israel will maintain full control of airspace, territorial waters, and crossing points of Gaza. In addition, the Gaza Strip will be cut off from the rest of the world and, most devastatingly, from the rest of Palestinian territories in the West Bank and Jerusalem.
Does that mean that the Gaza Strip becomes a cantonized entity? If so, then that would not enable the establishment of a viable, contiguous Palestinian state. Does it not act to prevent the establishment of such a Palestinian state? It suggests that Israel gains control of the West Bank, defers Palestinian statehood for decades and Israel continues to annex territory and to fragment what is left into isolated cantons.
So we would do well to question the Zionist version of history. This presents Jewish history as a narrative of eternal victimization and to define Zionism and Israeli nationalism as the only guarantors of Jewish survival and continuity. A Jewish state in Palestine would insure Jewish security (and normalize Jewish existence) in an eternally hostile gentile world.
Posted by Gary Sauer-Thompson at 01:38 PM | Comments (0) | TrackBack