It’s Time The Territories Got State Rights – An Issue For The Gay And Lesbian Community?
The Rudd government is set to follow – again - in the footsteps of John Howard’s ultra conservative government. Rudd and his administration are considering, we are told, overturning the recent legalization in the ACT of same gender marriages and rights.
The moral zealots are working overtime in Canberra pushing to see the gay and lesbian same sex union laws buried yet again.
This couldn’t happen if the ACT had the same standing as the Australian States – the responsibility and right to make binding laws on behalf of its citizens. The ACT and the Northern Territory risk a Federal veto on any legislation a majority of parliamentarians may pass. It’s way past time the territories were given the same constitutional standing State governments – and voters – expect and enjoy.
This disparity between territories and states means those living in the ACT and NT do not participate in or receive the same democratic freedoms the rest of Australia takes for granted. This must change. It will take a referendum to do it too. Surely this is a referendum that would command a majority of votes in a majority of states, one Australia would pass. The people in the territories are Australians too, after all.
Gay And Lesbian Rights
Naturally it follows, once the territories are given the same respect – and recognition and autonomy – as the states, we will see laws such as for gay and lesbian marriages in the ACT proclaimed, out of the hands of the moralising minority that somehow manage to populate the federal parliament.
We’d see it taken out of the hands of the conservative crusaders who claim to be christians (none of this newfangled compassion nonsense) shuffling around the corridors of parliament pushing one eyed, “our size fits all”, depraved, dishonest and dissolute doctrines.
I suggest to the gay and lesbian rights movement that to achieve their goals, autonomy for the territories would be the vehicle they need to accelerate their freedoms. This is common ground for their community and the heterosexual majority
This is a broader set of rights. At the end of the day, we all win.
Scott Kane
Dont take my word for it: Climate Change Debated in Higgins, Collyer led.
Last week the Familes against Climate Change hosted The “Climate Change Candidate Debates” for the Higgins by-election candidates, a highlight of recent elections. Unsurprisingly, Liberal Party candidate Kelly O’Dwyer was a no-show, despite repeated offers to set a date that suited her.
Rather than give a blow by blow account of the evening, read this by Paul Kavanagh, lifted directly from The Tally Room, an authoritative high-level psephology site:
“Extraordinary scene at the Climate Change candidates forum in Glen Iris last night (Nov 18).
The Sex Party’s Fiona Patten continued to impress, acknowledging her limitations of policy details.
Thanks Paul!
And the Monash Journal agreed:
Heat on candidates to tackle some big issues
A review of the evening by the Higgins local press can be read here:
“David Collyer is currently contesting the Higgins by election for the Australian Democrats against Clive Hamilton for The Greens and Kelly O’Dwyer for the Liberal Party,”
ETS Lynchin? Better Ask Minchin!
The temperature is rising across Australia this week.
The barometer and the thermometer are peaking out to red. The forecast – FAIL.
Suburban Melbourne faces the first SEVERE fire weather warning on Thursday under the new system. We follow the Weather Bureau’s predictions with our hearts in our mouths.
From Canberra, the news is even more serious.
EPIC FAIL!
- The Australian Greens are campaigning on Climate Change in the Higgins by-election while steadfastly refusing to negotiate with the Federal government in or out of the Senate chamber.
Five (5) Australian Greens Senators in the Senate. Five!
Negotiation? Discussion? Nil, Nix, Nada, Zero, Zilch.
What a waste of activist energy and tax payers money The Greens experiment is proving to be!
EPIC FAIL!
- The federal Labor government knows if they don’t get the Liberal/National Coalition on side their ETS bill will earn a “Catastrophic” forecast too. The ETS faces the same future as PM Rudd’s Grocery Watch scheme. Will we once again have politicians hiding behind “core” and “non core” election promises – as famously coined by John Howard? “Not happy Jan!”
EPIC FAIL!
- The Liberal/National Coalition, currently undergoing the worst ignominy a conservative political party can endure – opposition – are lurking in dark party corners with razor sharp knives for the ritual Seppuku of their leader Malcolm Turnbull.
EPIC FAIL!
- The Coalition opposition are flipping and flopping with contradictory statements of victory in respect of negotiating amendments to the ETS while simultaneously trying to torpedo it.
Liberal Senator Bill Heffernan has reportedly said:
He’s kidding right? Has Heffernan a future career as a stand up comic at the Melbourne Comedy Festival? He must, because on the same day Senator Nick Minchin states:
A “whole range of other coalition amendments”? Reads like “Our way or the highway” to me. This is not a process of negotiation – it is politcal castration being performed by an absurd and out-to-lunch far left (The Australian Greens) and a medley of Climate Change deniers within the Liberal/National Coalition.
EPIC FAIL!
- The Labor government’s Senator Wong meanwhile takes the fine art of saying nothing while implying new heights, when asked if the Federal government would be “willing to dump other sectors from the ETS to appease the coalition.”
Is that a yes, a maybe or are you just being contrite Senator?
EPIC FAIL!
And it’s not even Summer yet.
Scott Kane
Warning Graphic Images. Australian Liberal Party’s Nuclear Agenda; dirty politics = radioactive environment
The CPRS legislation is before the Senate and the Liberal/National coalition, with the predictability of a summer bushfire, have heaved out their old files supporting nuclear power.
They are in a bind, with 10 coalition MPs steadfastly and publicly opposed to the carbon pollution reduction scheme. So Deputy Opposition Leader Julie Bishop has dusted off the nuclear power issue and brought it forward with the justification that “19 of the G20 countries already relied on nuclear power…”
One can only assume that if 19 of the G20 countries announced they were going to jump off a cliff into the ocean tomorrow Julia Bishop would don a new bikini (no pun intended) and join in.
We’ve got big problems with carbon based power. The science condemning it is beyond question and the need to act is urgent.
But nuclear?
Consider the images above. These are “survivors” of Chernobyl. These are people. The only difference between them and us is we wear hats with corks to keep away the flies, play cricket and Australian Rules or Rugby and prefer beer to vodka.
I could write paragraphs about the half life of various nuclear isotopes. The centuries upon centuries it takes for them to be rendered inert. But why? The images of the “survivors” of Chernobyl speak louder than words…
Warning Graphic Images Click to Zoom In.
Scott Kane
Media Release – Exempt Left-Handed From Climate Change
Today’s announcement by Climate Change minister Penny Wong excluding the agricultural sector from the costs of the Carbon Pollution Reduction Scheme under proposed new compromise legislation is ridiculous and mistaken, say the Australian Democrats, and opens the door wider to further lobbying and rent-seeking by major polluters.
“If minister Wong is willing to destroy the effectiveness and universal consequence of the CPRS with this attempt to buy the support of the conservatives, I would advocate also exempting left-handed people,” the Australian Democrats candidate for the Higgins by-election David Collyer said. “After all, they only produce one twentieth of our pollution, are very nice people and are equally deserving of assistance.
“This proposal is no sillier that minister Wong’s nonsense.
Recent scientific studies suggest farm animals, notably ruminants, are major contributors to climate change through the emission of methane, a potent greenhouse gas with significantly larger impacts than carbon dioxide.
“These studies need to be repeated, refined and enlarged, but without an environmental ‘all clear’, exempting agriculture from the CPRS is a grave error and probably irreversible.
“Many members of the Liberal/National Coalition are Climate Change skeptics, who do not believe in anthropogenic climate change and are unmoved by the now-extensive scientific literature.
“Minister Wong is desperately trying to placate the implacable. The Opposition are laughing behind their hands at her weakness and impotence.
“Australia’s farmers are now well into their second decade of drought. They know change is needed. And while shifting adjustment costs to others is an old political game, accurately targeting the source of emissions for actions to change behavior is in the interest of all.
Exempting any polluter – let alone an entire sector – means the cost of adjustment must fall more heavily on the rest. The Garnaut Report gave this matter great emphasis and sternly warned against permitting ‘business as usual’ anywhere.
“If minister Wong is so willing to riddle this crucial legislation with exemptions and concessions, then by her measure the left-handed are entitled to a free ride too,” Collyer concluded.
Media contact – David Collyer 0413 248 193
“David Collyer is currently contesting the Higgins by election for the Australian Democrats against Clive Hamilton for The Greens and Kelly O’Dwyer for the Liberal Party,”
Childhood Obesity Condemns Young Australians to a Short, Sick Life. Eat, Drink, Consume, for Soon You Die.
22 million children world-wide are obese.
In the US 16% are overweight. 28% of Uk children are too. In Australia, 1 in four are obese.
Meanwhile, 230,000 students and 46% of NSW secondary schools have gone with a computer tutoring package sponsored by McDonald’s, putting fast food advertising in front of students in their homes and classrooms.
This, while the Australian Society for the Study of Obesity (ASSO) paints a miserable picture of the future for obese children: asthma, high blood pressure, high cholesterol and orthopaedic problems.
It only gets worse with age. Obese adults can look forward to diabetes, cardiovascular diseases, gallbladder disease, ovarian, breast, prostate and renal cancers, not to mention the psychosocial disorders.
Analysis by Tim Gill from the NSW Centre for Public Health Nutrition at the University of Sydney show that in Australia, roughly half of 16- to 18-year-old boys consume nearly a litre of soft drink a day.
Not surprising, since the Australian Schools Canteen Association is contracted to the Coca Cola company- a company that has been known to spend up to $180m on its television advertising.
Compare that to the funding Nicola Roxon recently earmarked for the new National Preventative Health Strategy. The $17.6m funding allocated by the Federal Government is a drop in the ocean compared to the advertising spend.
Yet we see no leadership from our government on the issue of childhood obesity. They should be responding to research like Gill’s and making companies accountable. They should be spreading information on what 1000mls of Coca Cola per day does to the a young person.
They should be investing more time, money and effort in combating an epidemic which will otherwise consign the next generation of Australians to lives of ill-health, sickness and disease.
They certainly should be curtailing the ability of companies like McDonalds to reach into the homes and bedrooms of school children.
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Darren Churchill ACT- MEDIA RELEASE: Monday, 19 July 2010: Labor/Greens preference deal shows the bias
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