Crispin Hull

Parliament sits next week after the long winter break. Federal MPs have been out of Canberra in their electorates and elsewhere for seven weeks. Talking to the “real” Australia as they like to portray it. Labor MPs will come back to a caucus meeting on Monday and backbenchers are expected to relay to the leadership some of their electors feelings and concerns. It is likely they will portray concerns about the electorate’s dislike of Paul Keating, especially the feeling that he is aloof from the concerns of ordinary Australians. Mr Keating does not have long to correct that; the next election is only six months or so away. Essentially, he has the parliamentary session up to Christmas to turn around the perception that his Government has not delivered on the economic recovery and that he is not alert to the economic concerns of ordinary Australians.

The most recent opinion polls suggest that Labor can by no means be written off. After lagging the coalition for months, Labor has bounced back to level pegging. Mr Keating, too, has bounced back to be level with John Howard as preferred prime minister.
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It is almost ritual for any in-coming government to tussle with the Public Service. The tussle can be over suspicion by the Government about the political sympathies of senior public servants; suspicion about their empire-building and empire-consolidating tendencies; or suspicion over inefficiency.

The ACT Government appears to have no difficulty on the first count. Most senior ACT public servants have worked with governments of both complexions. However, it has a determined view that the ACT Government Service is too large. That view seems to be a combination of two things: that the same job could be done with fewer people or that the ACT simply cannot afford to have a service of the present size so it must be cut and if that means fewer functions, so be it.

Ideally, a government would like to deliver the same functions and services with fewer people, or at worse deliver the same services, even if some are contracted out.
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The idea of having the head of a the ACT police force as a statutory appointment under ACT legislation is merely one of symbolism. At present the nominal head of ACT policing is an officer of the Australian Federal Police appointed by the Commissioner of the AFP who is answerable to the Federal Government. In fact the appointment is made with consultation with the ACT Government. If the office were to become an ACT statutory office it would not be filled without consultation with the Federal Government, so in practice nothing much would change _ both Governments would have an effective veto.

Some see having a separate statutory head of ACT policing as the precursor of a separate police force. The ACT used to have its own police force answerable to a Federal Minister. However, since the creation of a separate Australian Federal Police, the ACT force has been subsumed – to the advantage of the people of the ACT. The AFP provides better career opportunities and the ACT gets the advantage of officers moving between ACT and federal duties. The ACT also gets all the economies of scale associated with a bigger force.
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The ACT Government’s decision to sell Jindalee Nursing Home has to be seen in the framework of the Commonwealth’s increased role in the field. The Commonwealth has increasingly used its control over the purse strings to exercise ever more control over all aspects of health, including nursing homes. At present it grants nursing homes subsidies according to patient numbers. In return it demands certain standards are met. The trouble at the moment is that the ACT Government is not meeting all the standards. It is not very good at running nursing homes _ unlike others in the private sector and in the non-profit (charity) sector. The ACT Government is running Jindalee at a loss after Commonwealth subsidy and is running it sub-standard. It meets medical and nursing standards, but not all the quality of life standards.

It would be better for the patients and for the ACT Budget to get someone who is good at running nursing homes to run Jindalee. The Commonwealth subsidy would continue. Moreover, Commonwealth standards would more likely be enforced unlike now.
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The electorate of Kalgoorlie in Western Australia is one of the largest in the world _ if not the largest. As well as the mining centre of Kalgoorlie it contains huge almost empty areas of desert and salt-lake country that go for kilometre after kilometre. A man could go mad in such country.

The electorate is held for Labor by the outspoken Graeme Campbell. Mr Campbell has made many statements in the past contrary to the prevailing views of the party. He has variously attacked immigration, multi-culturalism, aspects of Aboriginal land rights, the High Court, the move to a republic and proposals for an anti-racial-vilification law. He also offends party orthodoxy in refusing to ask Dorothy Dixers in parliamentary Question Time, preferring to asking testing questions of government ministers.

In short he is a pest to party disciplinarians. But he holds the seat of Kalgoorlie by a reasonably healthy margin. Worse, from the perspective of party disciplinarians, he holds the seat precisely because of his outspoken views, not despite them. His opponents within the party acknowledge that he attracts a red-neck or working-class-Tory vote that would otherwise go to the National Party. It means that to expel him from the party or to give pre-selection to someone else would result in the likely loss of the seat in an election where every Labor seat is likely to be very precious to the party.
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Amid the hype over the battle for the presidency of the Liberal Party in Western Australia, there is cause for concern. The contest has been described as a test for the leadership of the Leader of the Opposition, John Howard. Mr Howard has repeated many times that the organizational wing of the party is not subject to the parliamentary leadership and vice versa. He said before the weekend ballot that he would not back either contestant and he would work with whomever won. That may have been a sensible stand before the vote. It may not be afterwords.

The contest was between former senator Reg Withers and the incumbent Dr David Honey, widely seen as the protege of Senator Noel Crichton-Browne whose forces have attempted (with some success) to install candidates with right-wing views as Liberal candidates in Western Australia.
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The former director of the Australian War Memorial, Brendan Kelson, and the deputy director, Micahel McKernan, have been refused legal aid in their challenge over a report by the Merit Protection Review Agency.

The MPRA did a four-month inquiry at the memorial last year and presented it to Public Service Minister Gary Johns just before Christmas.
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The Federal Government has reversed its decision not to give the former director of the Australian War Memorial, Brendan Kelson, and the deputy director, Michael McKernan, legal aid in their challenge over a report by the Merit Protection Review Agency.

The MPRA did a four-month inquiry at the memorial last year and presented it to Public Service Minister Gary Johns just before Christmas.
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Izzy Asper’s Can West Global Communications appear to have rebutted assertions that they are in breach of Australian Broadcasting regulations after they and the Ten Network won a major legal victory over Charles Curran and his Capital Television Holdings.

Mr Curran failed this week to pursue a case he mounted in the NSW Supreme Court against Mr Asper’s Can West, Ten Network and others and agreed to them pay costs of about $1 million.

Mr Curran had sued asserting the defendants had conspired to deprive him and Capital Television Holdings from buying Northern Rivers Television last year. (Capital Television Holdings has no connection with the Canberra Capital station.)
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The Great Oxymoronic Confluence is more likely to be next year than this year. Several things have caused the postponement _ a skiing holiday and some resulting upper-leg pain, a new job with a later finishing time, the change of date of the oxymoron itself, and more pertinently the regrettably conflicting desires of wanting to be an athlete in the morning and a consumer of fine wine, food and good company in the evening.

What was the name of the dumb philosopher could not understand the distinction between the mind and body? The Great Oxymoronic Confluence is almost inevitable, but not this year.

It will occur when I run the 10 kilometres of The Canberra Times Fun Run in the same number of minutes as my age in years _ 44 by Fun Run day. It is an elegant equation, and I’m sure there is a quick physiology PhD in it for someone.
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