Month: October 2003

At first the barracuda were at the top of the food chain. They were pointing into the current waiting for some small fish to get swept passed into their jaws.

I was under them trying to get a backlit photo.

Then came the danger time. The barracuda – about a thousand of them – started to form a protective circle. They were no longer at to the top of the food chain. There were sharks below.

The barracuda form a circle so that together they get a 360-degree view. If two thousand fish-eye lenses are watching for a shark to attack, the whole group gets the advantage of an earlier warning.

They were so elegant. They were mesmerising.

Again came the danger time. This time for me. No; not the shark. Sharks are too smart to attack two metres of bubble-blowing creature. That presents unknown danger to them. (If only they knew how vulnerable we divers really are!)

No; the danger was being so preoccupied in this deep-blue display of nature that the current might take me either away or down or that I might be concentrating so much on taking pictures that I would forget to check my depth gauge and spend too long, too deep for safety, or worse rise too quickly allowing dangerous nitrogen to bubble in the blood. It is like bubbles in a softdrink bottle forming when the lid is taken off releasing the pressure. Little bubbles can stop blood flowing to precious parts of the lungs, brain and joints and can cause tiny blood vessels to burst.
Continue reading “2003_10_october_png travel”

Only two tax cuts count – a cut in the top marginal rate or a cut indexed against average weekly earnings.

All other tax “cuts” are temporary respites until inflation and increases in average weekly earnings restore the Government’s grab. They are lollipop tax cuts – colourful and sweet-tasting at first, but quickly eroded to nothing.

The talk this week – after the announcement of a bigger surplus than expected — was for a tax cut for only some of those on the top marginal rate. There was no mention in a permanent cut in the top marginal rate itself. The spending side is also interesting, but more of that anon.

When the Howard Government came to office the top marginal rate cut in at about 1.5 per cent of average weekly earnings now it cuts in at 1.3 per cent. So Prime Minister Howard is talking about moving the threshold at which it cuts in from $62,000 to $75,000.

Lollipop cuts. If average weekly earnings rise by 5 per cent a year, it will take just four years for its effect to be gone. If they rise by 4 per cent it will take just five years.

But politicians like to hand out lollipops. Only Paul Keating a Treasurer had the ticker to cut the top marginal rate – from 66 per cent to 48.5 per cent. It is one of the reasons that Australia is doing well economically.
Continue reading “2003_10_october_forum for saty tax”

So the Constitution is broke and it needs fixing. Prime Minister John Howard has changed his tune since the republic referendum in 1999. The difference is about prime ministerial power.

In 1999, the republic proposal would have taken away the Prime Minister’s unfettered power to appoint the Governor-General – so let’s leave the unbroken Constitution alone, Howard argued.

In 2003, though, he now argues that the Constitution is broken because it gives too much power to the Senate – so let’s fix the broken Constitution so the Prime Minister can more easily get his way and get his laws through the Parliament.

That said, Howard has a point about the Senate. His Government has been elected and twice re-elected yet it cannot get through what it sees as important legislation. The system could be improved.

The constitutional provisions on the Senate were not well thought-out at the time of the 1890s constitutional conventions. The Senate was created as a sop to the smaller colonies to get them to join the federation. There are several major flaws with the constitutional provisions on Senate – senators’ terms, the nexus and the Senate’s power to block money bills.
Continue reading “2003_10_october_forum for saturday senate”

For how long will doctors get away with it?

This week they have continued to behave like a trade union for more pay and relief from laws they do not like, and more reports of poor practice have emerged.

In short, medical practitioners are like the practitioners of any other profession, trade or occupation. They want to earn a good living. They have their fair share of incompetents. They try their best to give the public a good service. Their profession contains similar portions of the venal, idealistic, selfless, greedy, brilliant, idiotic, caring and cold as other occupations.

Yet, they are consistently rated by the public in opinion polls at the top.

At the bottom are used car salespeople, real estate agents, and journalists.

The most recent Morgan Gallup poll on occupations shows the three professions most often mentioned by Australians as having high or very high standards of ethics and honesty were nursing (90 per cent, unchanged topping the poll for the eighth consecutive year). Pharmacists (89 per cent, up 6 per cent) and medical doctors (80 per cent, up 5 per cent) retained second and third place.
Continue reading “2003_10_october_forum for saturday doctors”

British sociologist Alan Buckingham is in Australia at the behest of the Centre of Independent Studies arguing against speed cameras.

He says that road accidents have not fallen since they were introduced in Britain or Australia and that safety is best promoted by people driving to the conditions. Slow people obeying the limit might actually cause accidents, he argues. He says that the “revenue-raising” of pinging a lot of otherwise law-abiding people for going a bit over the limit alienates them. It would be better to concentrate of technology of car and road safety, he says.

Some of this is half true.

Some of it is inspired by political ideology. Speed cameras are an affront to rugged individualists who do not like state interference and state revenue-raising. Small wonder the Centre for Independent Studies gave an early media crack at the story to talkshow host Alan Jones – that hitherto great campaigner for mandatory sentencing, unless, of course, the offence is speeding.

The road toll has been fairly static in the past few years, even climbing slightly. The dramatic cuts were made from the early 1970s to the early 1990s. The toll in Australia fell from around 3000 to around 1800, despite high population, more cars and more kilometres travelled. The end of the dramatic falls in the toll has been coincidental with speed cameras. But it is a logical fallacy to argue that because sometime comes after something else that there is a causal (SUBS: CAUSAL, not CASUAL) link.
Continue reading “2003_10_october_forum for saturday criminal law”

A little over 30 years ago, regular land auctions were held at the Albert Hall. Canberra was expanding rapidly beyond Woden and into Weston Creek – into suburbs like Duffy and Holder.

Blocks of land, one by one, were knocked down to couples who had typically been transferred from other cities to work in the Public Service.

The land was cheap and the rules were simple. There was to be no land speculation and the suburbs and communities were to be built quickly. The land was sold as 99-year leases with two critical covenants. You must start building within six months and you must finish building and occupy within 12 months. Delays had to be justified. But there were not many.

The suburbs of Duffy and Holder were built, and built quickly.

Exactly nine months ago today 491 houses were destroyed in the January 18 bushfires.

Those who had been burnt out displayed a gritty determination to rebuild. Two-thirds were determined to rebuild. Of the rest, most were undecided or inclined to stay. Few were determined to sell up.

Nine months later the story has changed. Only a half are determined to rebuild. More of the undecideds have decided to go.

The rebuilding has been tardy – dogged by planning bureaucracy, insurance hassles, under insurance and the indecision that inevitably comes after a disaster.
Continue reading “2003_10_october_bushfire stats forum”