Spring has sprung

joe6pack Uncategorized

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Warmth may be returning in a big way if these two idiots don’t settle down

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But life goes on

 

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Footy Finals are here. Good luck to all involved. ( Go The Cowboys )

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I can’t wait till this waste of time is over

 

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And Just to remind you all

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According to the big retailers.

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Chin up folks. Things can only get better

1,096 thoughts on “Spring has sprung”

  3. I saw this coming – the facial recognition/handover of photo ID idea was never about ‘keeping Australians safe’. It was always about mass surveillance and control. Labor supports it.

    • I wonder what would be Mr Bernardi’s reaction should everyone on an income from the Commonwealth be required to be submit to the same stringent supervision as those “naughty people” on welfare.
      It might contain some of the rorting by those on government payments at the higher end of the Commonwealth payments scale.

  4. Terrorism suspects will be able to be held for up to a fortnight without charge under an agreement with the states and territories.

    The states and territories agreed to the extra counter-terrorism measures, which also include making drivers licence photos available in real time to help quickly identify terrorism suspects, after meeting with the Prime Minister this morning.

    http://www.abc.net.au/news/2017-10-05/terrorism-suspects-to-be-held-for-up-to-a-fortnight/9018720

    • I think there may be some legal challenges to this plan. Let’s hope so, and hope they succeed.

      Just look at all the premiers falling over themselves in their rush to give Turnbull (and Dutton) what he wants.
      http://www.news.com.au/national/politics/give-gun-smugglers-life-jail-terms-bill-shorten-says-in-the-wake-of-las-vegas-massacre/news-story/acbdab7a741895204762825e7623a877

      I don’t agree with this tripe from Gladys –

      All of us are having to reconsider our civil rights and compromise on those things but I think the vast majority of the public wants us to put security first.”
      “They appreciate that, because of the unusual circumstances and unfortunate circumstances in which we find ourselves, that we have to resort to these laws,” she said

    • Can you imagine the msm if Labor had said no!!!! Any way, with all the data, metadata, cctv etc any privacy we thought we had has long gone.

    • Must admit that when I heard about it this morning, I was very tempted to start looking to what extent Habeas Corpus would be disrupted again. I think it is possibly the last bit of the Magna Carta that still exists in the common law system of the UK and there for Australia?!

      I’m trying to remember who said that something about ‘increasing security will deliver none’ (or words to that effect … I think it was Pres. Eisenhower?)

  10. After Beazley rolled over for Howard re AS,I swore I would never vote for Labor as long as he was leader. Labor rolling over on this surveillance crap has me considering a similar boycott. Grrrrrrrrrrrr.

    • It’s why I vote independent when I can. I disagree with too many Labor policies, especially on asylum seekers and welfare. Too much ‘me too-ism’, too much ‘lockstep with the government’ for my liking.

      Labor will always have my vote in the Senate, but the Reps is a different matter. When you are stuck in National Party heartland you have the luxury of making a protest vote knowing it will not do any damage to Labor’s overall result.

  14. That’s what you get when you cut people’s earnings

    Australian retail trade dropped 0.6% in August, the worst monthly performance in more than four years, raising concerns among retailers as the Christmas period approaches.

    Retail spending growth declined for the second month in a row in August and risks putting a dampener on overall economic growth for the September quarter.

    It included a 1.3% fall in cafe, restaurant and takeaway food spending.

    https://www.theguardian.com/business/2017/oct/05/australias-shocker-retail-spending-figures-raise-christmas-trade-concerns

  15. Push up housing costs push down wages . Quelle surprisement when discretionary spending dies in the arse. Small business will bear the brunt but given how often they lead the charge for cutting wages and conditions my sympathy gland will be merely twitching.

  16. I have to disagree with some comments here.
    Do I support detention centres? NO
    Do I support the “security measures” to be implemented? NO
    However, it’s almost impossible to make changes from opposition especially when almost 100% of the MSM is against you.
    Lets get into govt.
    If ALP makes the same sorts of decisions in govt then let’s criticize.
    For what it’s worth, I help people do their tax returns. Believe me from my experience the govt knows all about us anyway

    • rnm1953

      To say yes sir and wave it through without at least raising the serious issues and dangers involved is inexcusable.

    • When has Labor, after winning government, ever reversed something nasty that they supported in opposition?

    • Rudd ended the ‘Pacific Solution’, something Labor had opposed according to party policy since at least 2002, and did away with Temporary Protection Visas, also following Labor policy. Labor had not voted in favour of those things while in opposition, at least, not after Labor had adopted policies. Then, of course, Gillard and Rudd went back to off-shore detention.

      I was thinking of something Howard did with the PBS while he was in government. I can’t remember all the details, something about increasing prices or making pensioners pay more. Labor supported that. I remember Jennie Macklin saying people had voted for the Howard government so they must want Howard’s policies, but Labor would reverse the change when they got back into government. They never did.

  21. The new database scares me. Animal welfare and environmental activists are already referred to as Eco-Terrorists. Would Animals Australia have their people stopped from boarding a plane to Indonesia or ME to get inside footage on conditions in overseas abattoirs? A nudge nudge wink wink from Indonesia and certain people do not manage to get on their plane in an Australian airport?

    Or am I just tin foil hatting?

    • You are right to fear. any power given will always ,always be at some point abused.

    • You are not tin foil hatting. There are members of this government – George Christensen, for example – who refer to environmentalists as ‘terrorists’.

  22. No photo id? Tough!

    Airline passengers could soon be forced to produce photo identification before boarding domestic flights in Australia, bringing security standards in line with those at international terminals.

    The Australian Federal Police (AFP) and aviation security experts have long argued that identity checks are needed to prevent criminals and fugitives boarding flights under false names.

    There have also been calls for liquid restrictions and full body scans.

    http://www.abc.net.au/news/2017-10-05/government-moves-to-boost-airport-security-with-photo-id/9020504

  23. Children as young as 10 could be held by police for 14 days without charge under a new national detention law applying to terrorism suspects, the justice minister has confirmed.

    Michael Keenan told the ABC it was “deeply regrettable” that children could be held under the new counter-terrorism regime, approved by federal and state governments at a special Council of Australian Governments meeting in Canberra on Thursday.

    But he said Isis specialised in the radicalisation and recruitment of children.

    Keenan confirmed the new regime would apply to children “as young as 10”, but he said minors would be subject to “an enormous level of safeguards”.

    https://www.theguardian.com/australia-news/2017/oct/05/ten-year-olds-held-without-charge-new-terrorism-laws

  24. Bananaby would make a motza

    Malcolm Turnbull has resumed pressure on the New South Wales premier to approve the controversial Narrabri gas project, declaring the Santos development would lower domestic gas prices.

    https://www.theguardian.com/australia-news/2017/oct/05/malcolm-turnbull-renews-pressure-on-nsw-premier-to-approve-narrabri-gas-project

    Ahead of Thursday’s Coag meeting, the Victorian premier, Daniel Andrews, told Sky News there was “no shortage of supply”, as Victoria produced enough gas to supply 7.2m households and only used about 3.6m households’ worth.

    “The real issue here is not supply, it’s where the gas is being sent,” he said.

    “Some of us, the prime minister, for instance, and others, can’t seem to recognise the centre of debate is that Australian gas should be for Australian households and Australian businesses.”

  25. We have enough cheap, easy-to-extract gas to last 100 years. There’s just one problem.
    Australia has plenty of cheap gas. The problem is private companies are selling it all overseas, writes principal adviser at the Australia Institute Mark Ogge.

    View at Medium.com

  29. On Wednesday Malcolm said, “Everything we do, every day, is to make Australians safe”. Well, he’s not doing much of a job in the field of domestic violence.

  33. Peter Martin on the retail slump.

    A ‘shocker’ for retail spending as consumers shut wallets
    http://www.smh.com.au/business/the-economy/a-shocker-for-retail-spending-as-consumers-shut-wallets-20171005-gyuwb3.html

    You don’t have to be a genius to work out what is happening. You cut wages and penalty rates and workers have to find ways to manage on less. It’s no coincidence that things have really gone bad for retailers since penalty rate cuts were introduced on 1 July.

  34. Apparently, scaring people is not the answer – to this particular problem

    The Turnbull government is again resisting calls to ban the importation of flammable cladding, saying scaring people “is not the answer”.

    Building ministers will consider a ban on Friday on the importation of combustible aluminium composite panels of the type that were implicated in the rapid spread of London’s Grenfell Tower fire in June, which killed at least 80 people.

    The ban is one of several measures on the agenda to toughen up building standards in Australia when the state and federal ministers responsible for building meet in Brisbane.
    Australia considers import ban on flammable cladding after Grenfell Tower fire
    Read more

    A Senate inquiry called in September for an urgent ban on the sale, use and import of polyethylene composite panels in Australia, which have a polyethylene core between two sheets of aluminium, as a matter of urgency.

    https://www.theguardian.com/australia-news/2017/oct/06/coalition-resists-calls-to-ban-importation-of-flammable-cladding

  35. Yeah, who cares what Al Gore thinks!

    From time to time the ABC undertakes editorial reviews to see if the news department is meeting editorial standards. A spot audit of the same-sex marriage debate was undertaken on 7 and 8 August, covering more than 60 items on national television and local and national radio. It found that overall there was a “broadly even number of voices both in favour and against the plebiscite”.

    An audit of the ABC’s coverage of former US vice-president Al Gore’s visit to Australia in July turned up a more interesting conclusion. Gore was in the country to promote his new documentary – An Inconvenient Sequel: Truth to Power – and he did eight interviews across all ABC outlets. One question asked by the review was whether eight interviews was unnecessary duplication. The interviews were on 7.30 with Stan Grant; on Hack with Tom Tilley; on Radio National Breakfast with Gregg Borschmann; on Sydney Radio Breakfast with Robbie Buck; on Perth Radio Drive with Belinda Varischetti; on Melbourne Radio Drive with Alicia Loxley; on Brisbane Radio Afternoons with Kelly Higgins-Devine; and on One Plus One with Jane Hutcheon. The review concluded that the ABC should have conducted just two interviews, one radio and one TV – despite the loss of localisation.

    https://www.theguardian.com/media/2017/oct/06/al-gore-embroiled-in-abcs-inconvenient-audit

  36. It’s not that you are getting sicker, folks;it’s that GDP is down. So, we all need to improve domestic production

    Health expenditure exceeded 10% of gross domestic product for the first time in 2015-16, data released on Friday shows.

    The growth in health spending continues to slow, but not to the same extent as GDP growth. Last year, $170.4bn was spent on health, $6bn (3.6%) more in real terms than in 2014–15, the figures from the Australian Institute of Health and Welfare show. It was the fourth consecutive year growth was below the 10-year average of 4.7%.

    A health economist with the Grattan Institute, Dr Stephen Duckett, said the share of the economy represented by health had hit 10.3% largely due to a slowing increase in GDP.

    https://www.theguardian.com/australia-news/2017/oct/06/australias-healthcare-spending-rises-above-10-of-gdp-for-first-time

  37. She is being bullied so she must stand down. Now, there’s logic for you!

    Conservative donors have called for Theresa May to stand down because she is being “bullied” by colleagues including Boris Johnson.

    Following an ill-fated conference speech and rumours of a backbench plot against the prime minister, two wealthy supporters said the party must act quickly and install another leader.

    https://www.theguardian.com/politics/2017/oct/05/conservative-donors-call-for-may-to-stand-down-over-bullying-by-johnson

  38. And that’s not the only part of Australia that is suffering from that sort of contamination, if I remember rightly

    Potentially carcinogenic firefighting chemicals discovered in a Victorian wetland may have been spread across the state because of a commercial fishing practice known as “ranching”.

    The Victorian Environment Protection Authority said testing by the Department of Defence had discovered “elevated” levels of per-and poly-fluoroalkyl substances – commonly knows as PFAS – in animals from the Heart Morass wetlands near Sale in eastern Victoria.

    The wetland is popular with fishers and hunters, and while the EPA said people who had eaten the animals were not “at risk of any adverse health effects”, it warned against eating animals from the area.

    The results of the testing have not been released, but the EPA said elevated PFAS concentrations had been found in fish, eels and ducks.

    https://www.theguardian.com/australia-news/2017/oct/06/toxic-firefighting-chemicals-found-in-animals-from-victorian-wetlands

  39. More concealed weapons are the answer. Who knew!

    The National Rifle Association has broken its silence four days after the deadliest mass shooting in recent US history to call for “additional regulations” on bump-fire stocks, which the Las Vegas shooter used to turn his semi-automatic rifles into rapid-fire weapons.

    But alongside the rare concession, the NRA also suggested it was time for further relaxation of laws permitting Americans to carry concealed firearms.

    “The NRA believes that devices designed to allow semi-automatic rifles to function like fully-automatic rifles should be subject to additional regulations,” Wayne LaPierre and Chris Cox, the group’s two leading figures, said in a joint statement.

    https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2017/oct/05/republicans-guns-bump-stocks-las-vegas-shooting

  40. Cardinal George Pell will face a four-week committal hearing next March as he fights historical sexual offence allegations.

    Australia’s most senior Catholic cleric faced his second hearing at the Melbourne Magistrates’ Court, after charges were laid by Victoria Police detectives in June with offences involving multiple complainants.

    The exact detail and nature of the charges have not been made public.

    The court heard about 50 witnesses will give evidence at Cardinal Pell’s committal hearing, which will determine whether there is enough evidence to commit him to stand trial.

    Cardinal Pell strenuously denies the allegations.

    http://www.abc.net.au/news/2017-10-06/george-pell-at-court-historical-sexual-offence-allegations/9021596

  45. I keep going on about fracking and CSG in the Pilliga. I’m going to keep doing it, because it’s important.

    Last night, on 7.30 –
    Will the government’s agreement with gas supplier deliver lower gas prices?
    http://www.abc.net.au/7.30/will-the-governments-agreement-with-gas-supplier/9020812

    The NSW government will approve the Santos plan, but not until after two crucial by-elections on 14 October. The National Party is threatened by the Shooters, Fishers and Farmers Party in the seats of Murray and Cootamundra. (There’s a third by-election, in Blacktown, but Labor will win there so no-one wants to talk about it.) It’s not just about gun laws.

    Note the change of name of the Shooters and Fishers to include ‘Farmers’, done last year to reflect rural support for this party. Here’s the party’s policy on farming – strongly against CSG. That will win voters who might not usually support this party.
    http://www.shootersfishersandfarmers.org.au/nsw_primary_industries_and_farming

    Premier Gladys is not going to risk a Nationals loss in either seat by talking about approving gas drilling and fracking in the Pilliga, so she is busy pretending she is never going to do it. Watch for a sudden change in attitude before the end of the year.

  46. Rajoy has played this very badly

    Spain’s constitutional court has moved to stop the Catalan government making a unilateral declaration of independence by suspending the regional parliament session in which the results of Sunday’s referendum were due to be discussed.

    On Thursday, the court upheld a challenge by Catalonia’s Socialist party – which opposes secession from Spain – ruling that allowing the Catalan parliament to meet on Monday and potentially declare independence would violate the rights of the party’s MPs.

    The court warned that any session carried out in defiance of its ban would be “null”, and added that the parliament’s leaders could face criminal action if they ignored the court order.

    Carme Forcadell, president of the Catalan parliament, said Monday’s session had not yet been formally convened, but that the court’s decision to suspend it “harms freedom of expression and the right of initiative of members of this parliament and shows once more how the courts are being used to solve political problems.”

    The Catalan government is understood to be meeting to discuss its response to the latest move by the court. It has previously ignored the constitutional court’s rulings, not least its order to suspend the referendum itself.

    https://www.theguardian.com/world/2017/oct/05/spanish-pm-mariano-rajoy-warns-of-greater-harm-from-catalonia-independence-plans

  47. “Poor Theresa” is right

    European newspapers were brutal on Theresa May’s mishap-strewn Conservative party conference speech, with verdicts ranging from “a fiasco” to “fatal” via an awful lot of “British dreams turning to nightmares”.

    In France, Libération’s London correspondent said the prime minister’s keynote closing address to the conference had “turned to torture” thanks to “a prank by a comedian, a terrible coughing fit and a set that fell apart”.

    It needed to be a success, the paper said, “but it was a catastrophe – a long nightmare worthy of an episode of the famous series The Thick of It … that left Theresa May drained of blood, in pieces, and perhaps on the way out”.

    Le Monde said the prime minister had been left fragile after a conference speech that was supposed to mark her return. “In politics, coughing fits can be fatal,” the paper said. “Those suffered by May … seem a metaphor for her political weakness.” For Le Figaro, “she arrived weak, and finished on her knees, close to tears”.

    Germany’s Bild, in a report headlined “Everything went wrong for Lady Brexit”, said May “seemed unsettled, and radiated anything but security and authority”, while the business paper Handelsblatt went with: “May coughs, the Conservatives suffer.”

    https://www.theguardian.com/politics/2017/oct/05/poor-theresa-may-how-european-newspapers-reacted-pm-speech-conservative-conference

    • I suspect Xenophon knows his citizenship case will see him kicked out of the Senate, so he’s getting out before he’s forced out.

  49. Twitter abuzz with Xenophon’s announcement to quite Senate and stand for SA seat of Hartley in 2018. Suggests concern about High Court S44 rulings.

    I think his peak appeal as an independent voice may now be well past with his surrenders to the Libs so often anyway.

  50. TLBD

    “………saying scaring people “is not the answer”.

    Say the people from the “Keeping Australia Safe” bulldust scare dispensary.

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