Small cuts are still cuts Tony Abbott

Before reading any further, watch the video (27 sec) above. 

It was the night before the 2013 Federal Election and Tony Abbott, on TV, confidently outlined areas of Government that would not receive cuts under his first term of Government.

Though today it has been announced that another $50 million may be cut from the ABC and SBS, after the budget already slashed funding to the public broadcasters by $43.5 million. At the time when this was announced, some commentators were relieved to find that sum smaller than what was originally expected (despite the coalitions promises leading into the election). Yet it seems the fallout from the 2014 Budget is continuing, with the ABC and SBS taking another hit. 

Regardless of your opinion on the ABC and SBS, there is something inherently wrong when a leader of a party so clearly articulates a policy position, and less than 12 months later has to do a major backflip. Defence and the School Chaplaincy Program were not budget promises, though they got boosts in funding! Neither does it make economic sense. The ABC and SBS are two of the most efficient broadcasters (that's comparing all broadcasters, public and private) in terms of quality output per dollar input. So making them jump through more hoops is unlikely to make significant savings, which would be needed in a "budget crisis". 

This round of cuts though has been defended as cutting 'back end' operations. That's a lovely vague title that doesn't appear attached to any form of employment! It also ignores the reality that the majority of work in TV is 'back end' work; legal teams, writing teams, consumes, catering, set production etc. Take away some of those roles, and it affects programming quality. The ABC was scrutinised for its handling of the students protesting on QandA, but security guards and risk management planning also fits into the 'back end' category of work as well. 

The more and more this government releases details about its budget, the bigger hole it seems to dig itself into. It set the bar for accountability and honesty when coming into the election. Though it's about time they listen to what they said themselves, and follow the values that they were voted in for! 

              

Roads that lead nowhere

A new registration system can fix congestion problems
 Source: Flickr

I seriously do not understand the fetishism the Federal Government has with insisting that outdated road policies are the way of the future. For a PM that wants to call himself the "infrastructure Prime Minister", ignoring a Productivity Commission report that highly recommends a change to the road registration system and a call for governments to stop implementing expensive, "popular" and "sexy" projects, and instead focus on ones that are more worth while, you'd think he should listen!

But it's a great big new tax! 

The very phrasing that Tony Abbott gave (as reported by the ABC AM program), is that

"Tolls are a fact of life. We pay for road tolls, we pay for roads through our taxes, we pay for roads through our registration and we pay for our vehicles, so there's already a significant form of user-charging. This new form of user-charging, I suspect, is unlikely to ever be adopted by any government."

But changing the road registration scheme where users pay per km they drive, rather than a flat registration fee, is more equitable and reflective of a user-pays-toll-system. Someone who drives 100km a day will pay substantially more than someone who drives only 50km a week. It effectively becomes a user pays subsidised system; everyone pays taxes to have roads available, and those who use roads more pay more in tax (though their vehicle registration fee) for that service.

Who would it affect? 

It seriously is baffling to see why there is no public interest in this type of system. The only increased cost that would occur would be to those to travel a lot via road (such as affluent people) and transport businesses (taxis, trucks etc). Yet these are the groups that need the greatest incentive to change their transport behaviour. It is trucks and city commuters that clog up arterial roads during peak hour times. If they were charged more based on their driving habits, it would change some drivers behaviour, creating more space on the roads. And this would all magically be done without having to create new roads!

Saving money on future infrastructure costs, creating a more equitable user based system and encouraging more efficient transport usage.... yep, no government would ever want to adopt that.


Sources: 
Making road users pay could clear infrastructure gridlock - The Conversation
Tony Abbott rejects pay-per-kilometre plan in Productivity Commission report aimed at drivers - ABC AM radio program

Bugger off Bolt

Source: Flickr

Opinion articles of seething rage don't often attract my attention. It's interesting to read scathingly wicked prose written behind the protection of a keyboard, but it does not often change my mind about anything. So I hope to do something different here and provide a little more detail, even though the essence of it is Andrew Bolt, bugger off you attention loving, small minded git! 

I'm probably preaching to the choir here but there are a lot of reasons why people don't like Andrew Bolt. Let me just focus on one thing; this article. It has all the hallmarks of a very informative [read: trashy] article from the Herald Sun. A catchy simplistic title that appeals to "us all", pictures of footballers training and a good opinionated dash about Bolt's own family history and innocence. That, and it's riddled with rage inducing crap. Yes. Crap. 

1. The way Bolt clearly misinterprets Goodes' words: (Read Goodes' actual comments here). 

"That process starts with understanding our very dark past, a brutal history of dispossession, theft and slaughter. For that reason, I urge the many fair-minded Australians who seek genuine prosperity and equality for my people to find the courage to open their hearts and their minds and watch Utopia." - Adam Goodes

Nowhere does it say that you should feel shame, guilt and a personal responsibility for what occurred. Understanding is the key word that is employed here. Yet you, Bolt, take it as a personal attack upon yourself to feel guilt and shame. Goodes is appealing to the rectification of a historical event and ongoing inequality. You Bolt, are just trying to deny the existence of the issue.

2. Making the issue about Bolt's own views, and not the issue at hand

 "Adam, my grandparents committed no thefts, rapes or murders." - Andrew Bolt 

Adam Goodes never claimed your grandparents did any of those things. He neither claimed that it was an entirely 'foreign' force that is to blame and that his entire linage is innocent. He states that it is

"Europeans, and the governments that have run our country, have raped, killed and stolen from your people for their own benefit" - Adam Goodes

So why personalise things Bolt? Is it because you want to try and remove yourself from the issue by laying a duty of responsibility upon a few, which you then go on to say were a minority? Then you go ahead and implicitly (and explicitly) defend their actions. Andrew Bolt, you have misconstrued Adam Goodes' writing to make an issue that is just really you voicing your own opinion and trying to pin blame on others. No one is attacking YOU, yet you see it as so. For that I just pity you.

3. Hypocrisy and half told truths. 

"So why didn’t he praise the good as well as acknowledge the bad of our past — a bad that he seems to have grossly exaggerated" - Andrew Bolt

A) Ummmm, Goodes does! Did you even read his article!?
B) The little fact you get from Geoffrey Blainey's positive book about the successful lives of Indigenous Australian's pre European settlement, is GROSSLY EXAGGERATING your case. Not to mention the "per capita" reference.
C) In the same decision where the South Australian Supreme Court found that ruling, they also gave $755 000 compensation to Bruce Trevorrow, a victim of the Stolen Generation, for being forcibly removed from his family. That court decision doesn't prove the Stolen Generation didn't exist. It just cleared one party (the SA government) from orchestrating it.

4. Worst of all, the way Bolt obfuscates the issue to deny the existence of inequality. 

The start of Bolt's article highlights the benefits that Adam Goode's has received, and how positive his life is. This statement is also true

"Life for many Aborigines then was brutishly harsh and often included appalling rates of violence against women, as established by paleopathology expert Stephen Webb from the evidence of fractured skulls" - Andrew Bolt

But police and hospital reports from 2014, not 1700, show that an alarming rate of Indigenous women are subject to violence. Today, there is still massive inequalities in healthcare, education, and employment between Indigenous and non Indigenous Australians. Yet your small minded focus on proving that things have improved from being "brutishly harsh" misses the fact that life for most Indigenous Australians isn't even acceptable by Australian government or international standards.

"Our history is not as simple as Goodes claims. Nor is our guilt" - Andrew Bolt

You have the audacity to say that an issue is complex, though only deal with terrible facts that suit your case, and IGNORE the blaring issue of inequality existing today; a major theme of Goode's piece. 

Andrew Bolt, your weak attempts at looking like a professional journalist and commentator only serve to highlight how narrow minded and convoluted your theory of Australian history is, and your ongoing agenda to ignore the attempts at rectifying Indigenous inequality.