Crispin Hull

And what if the Pope dies?

This was the comment at editorial news conference on Monday evening. It was one of those damnable which test “”news judgment”. There were two Page One leads: Cathy Freeman was bound to do something later in the evening, win or lose. It had all the elements: “”Our Cathy” carrying on her shoulders the aspirations of her people; her individual dream come true; or brave Cathy graciously accepts silver etc etc. It was bound to be “”a good story”. It had all the critical elements: human drama, national political significance, huge public interest on both a sensational and serious level.

It did not warrant the absurd comparison that one newspaper made. Running 400 metres, even if you beat the best runners in the world, is not an achievement that can be compared with unifying and expanding Russia, introducing European culture to a largely backward horde, ensuring Russian women got access to education, expanding hospitals and schools etc, etc. Nonetheless, the headline read “”Catherine the Great”.

Nevertheless, it was bound to be the main story of the day from the time SOCOG put out the timetable.
Continue reading “2000_09_september_addendum cathy and pope”

New York’s mayor, Rudy Giuliani, is not permitted to stand for a third term. So at the upcoming election the field is wide open. Despite many commentators in New York saying it is a dull election, there is active interest in the city. The newspapers, the air waves and the chatter in taxi cabs make constant references to it. For the people of New York it is an important election. Among the issues are whether an incoming mayor can maintain the law-and-order success of Giuliani without causing what are seen as major breaches of civil liberties.

New Yorkers are interested. They were also interested in the contest at the federal level, both in Hillary Clinton’s pursuit of a Senate seat and the major White House contest.

Similarly, there was an election last year in the City of London. Londoners were intensely interested, first as to whether Jeffrey Archer would be the Conservative candidate and secondly as to whether the endorsed Labour candidate would defeat the previous Labour head of local government, Red Ken Livingston. It was an exciting tussle. The issues included references to Livingston’s previous attempt to ban harmless children’s books because they were homophobic and his campaign to make London’s transport more accessible and affordable at the cost of high-income-earning Londoners.

Both in New York and in London one could easily bemoan the low quality of candidates and the triviality of a few of the issues. One cannot get much lower than Jeffrey Archer, for example. Nonetheless the people of the those cities engaged themselves in the matters at hand. The matters were discussed at a dinner parties, in hair-dresser shops, in taxis and in workplaces.
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This week Chief Minister Kate Carnell can take a bow. The grass passed the test. The Bruce Stadium was booked out. And yesterday the impartial umpire, the Australian Bureau of Statistics brought down its National Accounts. They showed that the ACT is doing better economically than any other state or territory.

The ACT economy has grown 11.8 per cent over the past year. Next were Victoria and NSW on 5.7 per cent. The ABS has warned there might be some aberrations for accrual accounting. Nonetheless, it shows the underlying reality that the ACT is doing well economically.

The figures also reveal that private-sector investment growth of 29 per cent in the year to June 2000.

Moreover, no longer is it the case of the figure coming off a low base after the horrors of Keating-Howard Canberra-bashing.

The figures are instructive in the face of the Melbourne demonstations against the so-called inequality generated by globalisation and privatisation. With the private sector taking a greater proportion of economic activity, there is no evidence of greater inequality or a band of rich living off a pool of unemployed. To the contrary, the ACT has decreasing unemployment. It is now at 4.6 per cent – the lowest in the land.
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Federal Court judge Justice Maurice O’Loughlin said it – as it were – in black and white.

Yesterday’s decision in the Federal Court was not a resolution of the question of the stolen generations. Nor was it a resolution of the question of whether there should be a national apology to those of the stolen generations.

It never could be. Courts are not capable of doing that. All they can do is decide cases brought before them and rule in favour or one part or the other.

The Federal Court, of its nature, was not capable of doing what many had hoped: to spell out why their should be an apology.

Justice O’Loughlin accepted that the two members of the stolen generations Lorna Cubillo, 62, and Peter Gunner, 53, were taken from their mothers in the 1950s and that Ms Cubillo had been viciously assaulted by a missionary while in a white institution.

The question for the judge was whether this removal could lead to a successful claim of damages by these two (and only these two) members of the stolen generation. Was the removal a breach of the law at the time; was it false imprisonment; was the Commonwealth, as administrator of the Northern Territory at the time, liable to pay damages?
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Get a pin an put it in the centre of a map of Papua New Guinea. There you will find Tari, population 900.

Wantok. Payback.

, with an airstrip that can take a

For Americans, Papua New Guinea is an exotic, exciting and culturally rich place.

“”Try telling that to Australians,” says Bob Bates, ex-patriate Australian owner of Ambua Lodge in the PNG Highlands.

For Australians, the place is a violent, Third World hell-hole.

The typical response I got when telling of a pending PNG trip was, “”I wouldn’t go there.”

Americans are in blissful ignorance. Virtually no news from PNG goes to America, so their image of the place is straight out of National Geographic. Australians, being closer and more involved, get a steady news diet of violence, coup attempts, political instability, corruption and environmental rape. Stories include the recent daring raid on Port Moresby’s main bank by five or six armed men in a hijacked helicopter which resulted in most of the raiders being shot dead by police.

As a result of the poor press, few Australians go to PNG as tourists. Bates gets more people from Finland staying at his lodge than Australians.

On this occasion, the truth does not lie somewhere in the middle. It lies at both ends. PNG is a violent place laced with corruption. It is also an exotic, culturally diverse and idyllic place where people go out of their way to help.
Continue reading “2000_08_augustl_png highlands travel”

Fact file

Qantas flies from Sydney into Port Moresby most days and Air Niugini flies from Cairns into Port Moresby several times a week. Air Niugini flies to Tari five times a week.

Ambua Lodge has western-style facilities but done sympathetically with local material. Each room is a separate hut with thatched roof and bamboo-mat walls with 180-degree windows overlooking the valley, each with en-suite bathroom. A large main dining lounge room is done a similar way. It has a unique orchid collection and organises rainforest and village cultural tours. More information: www.pngtours.com/lodge1.html

ends

20a…. Two young men who have grown their hair for more than a year to make a traditional Huli wig with their teacher, left, who is wearing a wig decorated with feathers from the bird of paradise and the cassowary.
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My GP makes splendid use of computers. He keys in information during consultation. If he issues a prescription, or referral to imaging, pathology or other specialist it prints from his computer. Given the chronically appalling nature of the average GP’s handwriting, I have greater confidence that the pharmacist will not misread quantities or drugs from the printed script than a handwritten one. Given he backs-up daily, I am also more confident he will be able to recall pertinent parts of medical history more easily than shuffling through paper and he certainly can retrieve my file instantaneously on the screen in front of him if I phone him whereas a GP dependant on a paper file has to wait for someone to retrieve it.

But this is only part of the story. It should go further, but does not. There is an enormous lost opportunity here. The information is held in my GP’s hard drive and goes no further.

Many doctors would think this is a good thing. Some argue that the doctor and not the patient owns the information. Most doctors argue that patient-doctor confidentiality is essential to good medicine, and no information should leave the surgery without the consent of the patient. True, up to a point, but there is another way of looking at it.
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