Crispin Hull

The committee said it heard of numerous instances that question the success of the self-regulation by the information and communications industries, including breaches in the privacy, display of undesirable images, broadcasting of undesirable content and news broadcasts that are influenced by commercial arrangements.

Improvements could be made to self-regulation, including: better and more proactive enforcement of the self-regulatory codes of practice; an increased awareness of and ability to complain about breaches of codes of practice by the information and communications industries; increased guidance on the self-regulatory codes of practice that protect an individual’s right to privacy.

The committee recommends the establishment of an independent statutory body, the Media Complaints Commission (MCC), which will be a one-stop-shop for all complaints and will assist to enforce standards established by self-regulation.
Continue reading “2000_04_april_media summary”

A recent business survey in New Zealand has revealed that 80 per cent of businesses want to share a common currency with Australia. The business people see obvious advantages. With so much trade with Australia, they do much of their export business in Australian dollars. The Australian dollar is a much traded currency. Indeed, the volume of trade in the Australian dollar is far greater than the size the Australian economy would otherwise warrant. As a major world currency, New Zealand business would trade with third countries in the Australian dollar. How much more convenient it would be to have the same currency.

Since the early 1970s the Closer Economic Relationship pact between the two countries has resulted in a common market with no customs duties and very few restrictions on the movement of people. There is quarantine, but it is not as strict as between Australia and other countries. There are limits on claims by nationals of one country on the social security system of the other, but, once again, each country’s nationals get more favourable treatment in the other country than nationals of other countries.

New Zealand also joins most of the ministerial councils held among federal and state ministers. We have mutual recognition not only between the Australian states but also between the states and New Zealand on food and a range of other matters. Minsters are working towards more uniformity in things like commercial and corporate law.
Continue reading “2000_04_april_leader30apr nz dollar”

Prime Minister John Howard may have read too much into the indefinite postponement of the visit to Australia by Indonesian President Abdurrahman Wahid. Mr Howard said that after Australia’s intervention in East Timor Australia’s relations with Indonesia could never be the same. Well, that much is obvious. But Indonesia’s relations with other countries is changing, too. That is because Indonesia itself has changed politically in a major way. Indonesia now has an elected President. The army still has significant influence and the institutions that enable the rule of law have not fully developed, but Indonesia is now a democratic country. It would be a mistake to regard Indonesia as monolithic. It may well be that some people in the Indonesia Government and the Army carry a resentment against Australia for its role in East Timor, but Mr Wahid himself has shown no sign of that. Indeed, all his statements point to wanting good relations with both Australia and Timor. That was made clear yesterday when Mr Wahid said he would like a three-way meeting with Mr Howard and Timorese lead Xanana Gusmao in Australia or Indonesia soon.

That makes the earlier postponement very puzzling. Was it an over-reaction to the very minor spying scandal involving a junior officer in the Australian peace-keeping force in East Timor. Then there were the unsubstantiated allegations by Indonesian officials of Australian spy aircraft flying over Indonesia. These events run contrary to recent events indicating an improvement in Australian-Indonesian relations. Indonesia has made extra effort to rein in militia in West Timorese refugee camps, even if it is not enough to allow all refugees to feel free enough from intimidation to return home to the east if they wish. More importantly, we are seeing a change in Indonesia’s approach to illegal immigrants on their way to Australia. Instead of turning a blind eye, Indonesian authorities have arrested illegals before they could set sail.
Continue reading “2000_04_april_leader29apr indon relations”

The Australian Competition and Consumer Commission has struck a welcome blow against Telstra using its ownership of the telephone network in an anti-competitive way to the detriment of consumers. At the same time it has illustrated that the method of the partial privatising Telstra was misconceived and would have been done in a different way.

Telstra had proposed to charge the other carriers that use its network 2.3 cents per minute for 1999-00 and 2.0 cents per minute for 2000-01. The ACCC has slashed that to 1.8 cents per minute for 1999-00 and 1.5 cents for 2000-01. It is a significant which will result in long-distance prices falling by up to five per cent and saving the average consumer $25 a year, according to the ACCC’s chair, Professor Allan Fels. Telstra charges other carriers wholesale prices to use its network. These carriers, such as Optus and AAPT, then use this as a base to charge their retail prices to customers.

The ACCC ruled that Telstra’s wholesale price was too high because it should have charged at cost level only and not put any margin on. That reasoning is stands up. The only possible way that effective competition in the telephone market can be sustained is to have the retail service deliverers operating from a level base. If Telstra were to charge its competitors a profit premium on their wholesale rates for access to the network, it would have an unfair advantage, because presumably Telstra itself would be getting access to the network for base cost.
Continue reading “2000_04_april_leader28apr telstra”

The 28 deaths and perhaps 300 injuries in the Easter disaster in Australia did not get the attention they deserve. If the disaster had been a ferry sinking on Sydney harbour, a cyclone, the collapse of a football stadium, an adventure trip gone wrong, a landslide taking out a mountain lodge or some other single event, the nation would have stopped in its tracks. There would have been memorial services, dramatic television pictures, inquiries and much commentary. As it was, the 28 people died in the disaster that is Australia’s road toll.

Police point the finger at speed, alcohol and fatigue. They frequently target speed and alcohol with blitzes. At holiday periods, Governments impose double demerit points. Still the people die. True, road deaths have fallen from two decades ago, both in relation to the number of cars on the road and kilometres travelled, but more impressively in absolute numbers. In the past two decades the trend has been for fewer people to die despite more cars and people on the road. But in the past couple of years the toll that trend has ceased. The toll was an horrific 3321 in 1981. With some blips it fell steadily to 1768 in 1997. The trend now is for it to be stuck around this level.

A fair amount of research is needed for precise conclusions, but it is fairly apparent that seat belts, random breath testing, radar and speed cameras have contributed a lot, so have improved roads and better cars. But can we now conclude that these factors have run their course in reducing the toll, though they are still necessary to keep it at its present level.
Continue reading “2000_04_april_leader27apr road toll”

A peaceful handover of six-year-old Elian Gonzalez to his Cuban father was an unlikely prospect. Elian had been with his relatives in Miami since his mother drowned while they were fleeing Cuba for the US five months ago. Elian’s father, Juan Miguel Gonzalez, who was separated from Elian’s mother, had stayed in Cuba. He is loyal to the Castro regime. Elian became a pawn in a political war between Mr Gonzalez and Cuban exiles in the US, including many relatives of Elian on his mother’s side. Mr Gonzalez came to the US to pick up his son, but the maternal relatives had virtually kept Elian boy kidnapped. In any event Elian was under virtual siege by the media. Large television trucks and batteries for photographers surrounded the house where he was staying and followed him wherever he went.

Ultimately, the US Government had little choice but to use force to uphold the rule of law. That is the final element in the rule of law: the parties do not abide by the result the Government uses whatever force necessary to achieve the result. Hence last week’s armed police invasion of the relatives’ house to take the boy into custody so he could be returned to his father. Blame for any trauma suffered by the boy must lie with the relatives who have behaved with recalcitrance and near hysteria since Elian arrived in the US. The relatives have behaved with near religious zeal in saying that Elian should remain in the free US rather than go back to communist Cuba. In taking that line they have ignored the much more important consideration that a child should be with parents, or parent if only one is alive, wherever possible. There has been nothing to suggest that Mr Gonzalez is other than a loving capable father. That his politics are pro-Castro is irrelevant when considering his fitness as a father.
Continue reading “2000_04_april_leader26apr elian”

Suggestions that Anzac Day should become Australia’s national day are completely ill-founded. There may well be objections to January 26 being the national day, with the solution being another day. But Anzac Day is not that day. The national day is one of broader perspective and would need to celebrate things – like achievements in the arts and sciences — that would be irrelevant to the things marked on Anzac Day. If Anzac Day were to become the national day either the Anzac element would be diminished or elements of the celebration of national achievement would go unmarked. The Anzac element of honouring the service and sacrifice of the armed services in war and more recently in peace-keeping operations, which also have their dangers, must be marked on its own day and not become part of a national day. Conversely, a national day would celebrate in a wider context than what is encapsulated in the Anzac spirit.

The idea was put this year by the Anglican Bishop of Canberra and Goulburn, George Browning. It has been put by others in the past. Bishop Browning went further. He called for a memorial place on Anzac Parade to recognise the pain and suffering of indigenous people and said, “”Perhaps the biggest challenge facing Anzac Day was for it to truly embrace the spirit of reconciliation with Australia’s indigenous people.”
Continue reading “2000_04_april_leader25apr anzac”

There are now 1,860,520 people in jail in the land of free, the United States. This figure was revealed by the US Justice Department. It means that the US has more people in jail than any country on earth. It has more people in jail than China, yet China has more than four times the population of the US. China has about 1.2 million people in jail. It has more people in jail than Russia which has about a million people in jail. The US has more people in jail per head of population than any country on earth. It has five per cent of population and 20 per cent of the prison population.

Bear in mind that Russia is the child of the Soviet Union, the place US President Ronald Regan called the evil empire. Bear in mind that the US periodically attempts to get China condemned in the United Nations for breaches of human rights.

But we must ask why all these people are in jail. In China and places like Saudi Arabia and a dozen or so African countries many people are in jail for political offences – because they voice dissent against the Government. In the US, all the prisoners are common criminals. They have committed crimes against the person or property. They have not caused crimes against the state, as such. Political dissent is tolerated – at least up to a point — in the US. There are no long jail terms for political dissent, though you might spend a weekend in jail if you are caught up in a demonstration against the IMF in Washington.

But is the US so lawless and are the people of the US so under siege by crime that it is necessary to have so many people in jail? Is it purely a matter of dealing with common criminality? Perhaps it is worth looking beyond the offences for which the 1.9 million people have been convicted. The number of people in jail in the US and the length of time they are in there is in fact a direct cause of political policy rather than any sensible need for justice, deterrence or rehabilitation. Looking at typical sentences western democracies for various crimes, the US figures is much higher. The reason is that US politicians allow themselves to the swayed by the irrational calls from their voters for longer sentences. So how can one describe the balance of the sentence served in the US that goes beyond typical sentences in the rest of the world other than as years spent in jail for political reasons.

Moreover, it is the blacks in the US who suffer the heaviest sentences. Noting is stated in the law, but that is how it ends up in practice.

Mandatory sentencing has also swollen US prisons. Many US states have mandatory sentencing laws that make the Northern Territory’s look like a model of liberalism. In California, a minor third offence, can result in 25 years without parole. Moreover, with discretion moved to prosecutors and police, blacks are bearing the burden. The political imperative to impose and not commute death sentences is also a cause of human-rights concern. It is surprising that UN human rights bodies have so little to say about the US and so much to say about Australia. It is surprising that the US criminal justice system is not attacked more in international forums.

A large factor in the high US imprisonment rate is the prohibition policy with respect to drugs. A high proportion of those in jail in the US are their for possession of drugs of for crimes committed in the pursuit of money to obtain drugs. Once again, politics is a major reason for the strict prohibition policy and for the policy that imposes draconian sentences for drug offences. In a sense, the drug prisoners are political prisoners, too, once they have served what would in other western democracies be considered the norm for their offences.

The US constitutional guarantees of civil liberty are fine in theory, but they are not working in practice.

The Federal Government’s call for a one-year moratorium on internet gambling may be well-intentioned, but it is hopelessly impractical. Last week the Government called on the states and territories to agree to the moratorium. However, only NSW agreed fully and Western Australian partially. The other states and territories rejected the call, arguing that it was better to licence and regulate Australian operators than have Australians going to overseas-based websites. The Northern Territory and the ACT already have issued licences and gambling on the internet is running. In the territories probity and liquidity checks have been done on the licence-holders to make sure they are of good character. It means that gamblers who win on these sites can be confident they will get their winnings. They will have a licence registry in Australia and a regulatory body to help enforce winnings and to ensure the sites are run properly and pay the odds they say they are paying. Guarantees like this do not exist with respect to overseas-based sites.

The Federal Government should recognise the reality of the internet. It means people in their homes in Australia can gamble down the phone lines using credit-card facilities at the speed of light as if they were in a casino in Nevada or a Caribbean island. Most Australians would prefer to use an Australian-based site, preferably one that has been licensed. But in the absence of Australian sites, people will use overseas sites. A Federal Government moratorium, therefore, is worse than ineffectual, it is actually harmful because it will drive people to off-shore sites. Australia will lose the income. Australians can get ripped off without recourse.

Continue reading “2000_04_april_leader23apr internet gambling”

Over the past couple of days the indices which describe sharemarket volatility have shot down nearly six per cent and then bounced back a couple of per cent. The six per cent fall is the equivalent of a year’s earnings lost in a day. The bounce back is several months’ earnings gained in a day.

The volatility has not been as sharp as the big falls in the crashes 1987 or 1929. That is largely due to the extra knowledge around now. Further, Australia has the largest proportion of its population as share-owners in the world. Both of these factors have helped stability. When you have a very large number of people with small share-holdings, there is less likelihood of panic. Many of those people take less interest in daily share movements. There is also less at stake for them. So they tend not to trade vigorously. They are happy to leave their shares alone for a sell-off down the track which is related to personal circumstance rather than market circumstance. Moveover, a lot of the wider share-owning public are more interested in dividends than capital appreciation. In this climate, the speculators tended to congregate around the hi-tech stocks and two markets developed – an exceptionally volatile hi-tech market and a stable blue chip market. The hi-tech market took a pounding as the speculative bubble burst and the blue chips remained fairly stable.
Continue reading “2000_04_april_leader19apr shares”