Cando - Australia's Voice's Posts

Industry super funds are the new rivers of gold for the union bosses. The question must be why won’t the government insist they be properly run. If they go bust it will be the workers w ho will lose. Julia Gillard and Bill Shorten won't lose a cent. And this is a Labor government. Employers will soon be paying 12% of wages by way of superannuation. By 2025, industry funds are expected to control assets of $1.5 trillion. Despite a massive fall in membership there are now twice as many union bosses as in 1975. The ratio of bosses to members is five times that of Britain’s. They are very well rewarded, these bosses. And not just in their wages. They can look forward to being life-time beneficiaries of that well known rort, “jobs for the boys”. You name it, jobs on government boards, jobs on commissions, seats in parliament, with of course, generous taxpayer funded superannuation - their political friends, the party machines and the factions will ensure these generous benefits will be accessible. In

On his first programme since the introduction of the contentious carbon-dioxide tax, Alan Jones speaks with Professor David Flint about CANdo's proposal to ensure that our politicians remain our servants and not our masters.

Stopping the boats is not a pipedream, as too many in the commentariat claim. And far too much is made of the constraints imposed by the Refugee Convention. It is for us, the nation state, to interpret this and not interested lobbies. Not only should John Howard’s Pacific solution be restored, but asylum should only be considered for those coming direct from a place of alleged persecution. Further, those coming without papers from Indonesia or any other safe third country should be presumed to be acting in bad faith, and refused further consideration. In summary the government must stop outsourcing this part of the refugee programme to criminal people smugglers. If a government can’t govern, its leader should hand in her commission. The palliative of substantially increasing the refugee programme would be a serious mistake if this were to be as mismanaged as it has been in the last few years. It is essential that those chosen be likely to be contributors to Australia. There are, for example,

Why doesn't the federal government just do its job? Why doesn’t it just concentrate on its core functions? Defence for example. The government is now spending proportionately less on defence than in the Thirties. It's even put off replacing the hopeless Collins class submarines that another Labor government foisted on us . This is the government that turned $70 billion in the bank into something approaching $200 billion in debt. They’ve s even raised their ‘credit card’ limit to 300 billion. This government is always working out new ways to waste money. Particularly in areas which have nothing to do with the federal government. They’ve just announced a $25 million deal with a number of sporting associations. This is against binge drinking. It's to promote safe alcohol consumption to adults, alcohol-free sporting environments for minors and to reduce alcohol promotion in their codes. The bigger sports - Australian rules and rugby league -are not part of the deal. Of course the other sports hav

It is extraordinary that the Gillard government - which finds it difficult to handle its core functions - should engage in something which has nothing to do with them. Worse, experts say is a potentially dangerous social engineering project. This is not about adults. It’s about little children. Three year olds – yes 27, 000 three year olds - are to be screened. They’re to be for early signs of mental illness. The misnamed ''Healthy Kids Check'' programme seeks out children who show troubling behaviour. This apparently relies on such things as sleeping with the light on, having temper tantrums or extreme shyness as signs of possible psychological problems. The program is expected to identify more than 27,000 children. But some mental health experts fear children may be misdiagnosed or given psychiatric drugs unnecessarily. Dr Alan Frances, a professor from the prestigious psychiatric and behavioural science department at America’s Duke University says accurately predicting mental illness in thre

“Jet setting bureaucrats have been slammed by Tim Andrews of the Australian Taxpayers' Alliance for raking up millions of kilometres in luxury air travel. While Aussie families are struggling, bureaucrats are living the high life and travelling to exotic destinations while we foot the bill," he said adding that it was "an utter disgrace.” Officials from the Department of Climate Change and Energy Efficiency spent $3.274 million last year , travelling the world to speak about the perils of a warming planet, he told Barclay Crawford of The Sunday Telegraph (17/6). Their carbon emissions were equivalent to those from the electricity needed to power 113 homes for a year. Their staff took in some of the world's premier holiday destinations, including Cancun in Mexico, the Maldives, Vanuatu, Miami and Grenada and Guyana in the Caribbean as well as the usual destinations - London, Barcelona, Los Angeles, Paris, Hong Kong and Tokyo. More than 42 flights cost more than $10,000, -$10,000. One flight from

Wasn't it enough to reduce funding to the Armed Forces so that we are virtually defenceless? The government seems now determined to undermine morale in the defence forces. We had the case last year when SAS men were subject to an outrageous prosecution for doing no more than their duty in Afghanistan. Now there's talk of a Royal commission into past abuse in the Armed Forces. So every day the media will be filled with detailed allegations before these are tested properly in a court of law. We just learned that a firm of lawyers has produced a report for the government which says there are allegations of sexual and other abuse in the defence forces going back many years. Unsurprisingly, they say that compensation should be paid. The lawyers had no power to compel witnesses neither to appear before them nor to produce documents. The allegations made have not been tested in court where the accused would have the important and crucial right of cross-examination. There was no jury to decide whether the c

A few years ago an acquaintance told me he had put solar panels on his houses and how profitable it was. I said you realise that pensioners are paying for this in their increased electricity bills. He said he knew that but when the government made the offer he realised that there would be a lot of money in it. If the government was silly enough to do this he was going to take it. And that is the problem when politicians get a bright idea. In broad terms electricity bills are likely to rise by about 20% over the next year. About 10% relates to the carbon dioxide tax which the Gillard government introduced in breach of a clear and specific election promise by Prime Minister Gillard and Treasure Wayne Swan that they would not. This is on top of the increases over the last few years. In NSW prices increased by 70% over the past 6 years.- The remainder of the 20% increase after the new CO2 tax relates to another politicians’ folly. This is the RET, that is renewable energy targets. Labour and the coa

Has the federal government gone stark raving mad? They have already put the live cattle export on its knees. They completely ignored departmental advice. Foreign Minister Kevin Rudd didn't bother to go to Jakarta. Prime Minister Julia Gillard didn't bother to pick up the telephone to speak to the Indonesian president. But within a few days of the Four Corners program showing terrible cruelty in one particular abattoir, they panicked. MinisterJoe Ludwig suspended the trade for six months. Six months. And including exporters with access to good abattoirs in Indonesia. And now the Indonesians have decided, understandably, that we are not a reliable partner. So they are looking to other sources and they significantly reduced the number of cattle that can be imported. Thousands of jobs are at risk, businesses and property made worthless, and the taxpayers will have to pay the massive damages which the cattle producers are obviously entitled to under any system of decent justice. If that wasn’t enough

The Syrian situation is worsening. Over 40,000 have fled, around 20,000 have been killed. This includes 500 children. 600 people died under torture. There is only one answer - the overthrow of the evil regime of the dictator, President Bashar al-Aassad. He inherited this from his father - who was even worse than he is. The Western powers, exhausted from their interventions in Afghanistan, Iraq and Libya, are little inclined to send forces in. The Arab league does nothing. Israel is understandably wary – she quite legitimately fears that the Baathist regime could be replaced by something worse. The UN Security Council is completely impotent. Russia and China have made it clear they will veto any sanctions against the regime. And Australia? There's not much a middle power can do. This is especially so given that the government has completely run down our defence forces. But the government is doing something. They're pursuing their useless exercise in international vanity. They trying

Australia's live export industry and the many businesses dependent on it are still suffering from the severe blow inflicted on them by the Gillard government in June 2011. Some fear it may yet prove fatal. A year ago the ABC’s Four Corners screened a story showing appalling cruelty to a small number of Australian cattle sent to Indonesian abattoirs. The Gillard government took just six days to respond with a six months total ban on the live export trade with Indonesia. The minister did not go to Indonesia. Nor did Foreign Minister Kevin Rudd. Prime Minister Gillard did not even pick up the phone to speak to President Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono . The government ignored advice from the department not to do this. They warned that farmers would be overstocked and would have inadequate feed. Animals could starve and the industry damaged. Acting against this advice the Minister, Joe Ludwig, clearly panicked. This has been ruinous for the industry. The Indonesian government has clearly h

We have long been saying that any asylum seeker coming from a safe third country – Indonesia Malaysia – without a passport should be assumed to be acting in bad faith. They should not be allowed to seek asylum here. It's good to see the coalition has adopted our proposal. In the meantime Australians are outraged by the case of Capt Emad. The ABC’s Four Corners had tracked him down. A people smuggler, he entered Australia as an asylum seeker. The Gillard government process found him to be a refugee. He and members of his family were given government housing. Some were on welfare. As soon as the program aired, he fled the country. And the police let him go. They said they'd been watching him but didn't have admissible evidence. Australians are concerned about the timidity of our police. Just recall the Australia Day riot. Instead of warning and if necessary then arresting the rioters, they engaged in the farce of carrying the Prime Minister out bodily to escape a few demonstrators. An

Our government has been surreptitiously bringing in foreign soldiers sailors and airmen. And they're giving them bonuses. Up to $200,000. Meanwhile single Australian soldiers are to lose being reunited with their families at Christmas. A once a year reunion. And unlike government ministers and top bureaucrats, they had to fly economy class. This is a government which has left the country next to defenceless. As a proportion of the Gross National product, we're back to spending about the same as we were in the 1930s. Before the disastrous Collins class submarines are replaced there's going to be another enquiry. This has the advantage of taking any replacement out of the budget for this year. You get it- a saving. And where are the new fighters for the RAAF and the modern artillery for the Army? In the meantime military prosecutions are still centralised Canberra. They are in the hands of a person who has never been under fire. This led to the appalling prosecution of our SAS soldiers who

This is a massive government scam. It involves governments effectively stealing your property by making it useless and uninhabitable. At least some of it is part of the scheme to enrich trade union superannuation funds. It all relies on the questionable theory that man is the principal cause of global warming. Or as they now say climate change. This scam involves putting wind farms across the country They’re planning 10,000 of these monstrosities. The Australian’s environment editor Graham Lloyd has written of the tremendous damage being caused by a wind farm to one small community. (“Where eagles dare not fly” The Weekend Australian 21 April 2012) This is Waterloo, north of Adelaide. He interviewed a number of victims whose lives had been ruined by the vast, swooshing wind towers looking over their homes. The people of found sleep almost impossible; they couldn't concentrate; they had night sweats, headaches, palpitations, heart trouble. Their chickens were laying eggs without yolks; th

In a speech to the Minerals Council Prime Minister Julia Gillard has told the miners something they already know – they don't own the minerals. On the "Governments only sell you the right to mine the resource.” "A resource we hold in trust for a sovereign people.” "They own it and they deserve their share.” The Prime Minister has muddied the facts. This is to justify Canberra's outrageous move into yet another area reserved to the states for their income. The federal government already takes 80% of the all taxes. Canberra doles out money to the states so that it can control precisely what they do. This is not how the Federation was supposed to work. It’s the result of years of the federal government moving into areas of state taxation. It is to allow Canberra to control matters and do things which are completely beyond their understanding. The Prime Minister says “we” hold the minerals in trust for sovereign people. Who is “we”? Obviously she means her government.

About 22,000 unmarried soldiers will lose their annual flight home due to Gillard government Budget cuts. This is while healthy young men of military age claiming to be Afghans - usually without the passports they used to fly into Indonesia - are welcomed to Australia often to be flown around the country and housed in accommodation not available to many Australians. This is while ministers fly luxury class around the country and the world staying in the best hotels. The annual flight home has been in place for decades and allows singles based in places far from home, such as Darwin or Townsville, to be with their family at Christmas. Even flights for married troops posted away from their families are also under review. "The world's changed since that was introduced. You get cheaper airfares, communications are different, the town is not so isolated anymore," Defence Chief General Hurley told the Herald Sun’s Ian McPhedran ( 25/5). "Do we really need to subsidise 30 or 40-year-olds for a t

She is now the largest shareholder in Fairfax. But for some reason Gina Rinehart is being denied the two seats on the board to which she is clearly entitled As if it were an amoeba, the board is duplicating itself. Appointing grey directors who have no experience in running newspapers and who are certainly not entrepreneurs. For years people have been telling me how they have stopped buying The Sydney Morning Herald or The Age. What turns them off is the obvious left-wing bias the newspapers display This stands out especially in the selection of letters to the editor. In the editorial pages - and only there - these once proud journals of record were in past times the voice of what Menzies called the forgotten people. Too often today they mix news and comment into a boring and predictable left wing cocktail. (Not that there aren’t some very fine journalists still there) The present leadership of Fairfax has resulted in the loss of 60% of share value. The circulations of all the mastheads fallen

The Daily Telegraph reports that the Gillard government has quietly enlisted, at Australian taxpayers expense, a $5500-a-day international public relations and crisis management firm to help ease backlash expected when the carbon tax comes into effect in July. http://www.dailytelegraph.com.au/news/we-pay-for-spin-to-sell-us-a-tax/story-e6freuy9-1226367791201 This follows the controversial $36million Carbon Tax advertising campaign, which has been labelled “dishonest” for its focus on how much Australians will pocket, and without actually referring to increased costs-of-living under the contentious Carbon Tax. It’s ridiculous that Australians are not only being forced to fork out for a Carbon Tax, which will have next to no effect on global emissions, but must also pay a flash PR firm to tell them about it. A friend recently showed me a letter from the Hon. Jenny Macklin, Minister for Families – full of spin – informing them about the wonderful increase in assistance they are to receive. The posit

The first duty of a government is to defend the nation. Not only has the Gillard government lost control of our borders - unless of course this is a deliberate boats for votes policy. It is, as the Australian Strategic and Defence Studies Centre Director Hugh White says, in the process of downgrading Australia from being a middle power to a small power with all the loss of influence that entails. Worse, is not admitting to the Australian people how it is betraying those who defended and built this country. Because the government carelessly wasted the vast assets left to it by the Howard government, and is now bound to borrow enormous sums overseas, it has taken the axe to the defence budget. Hugh White sees no evidence that the Gillard government has a defence strategy at all or even realises the damage it is doing. This is made worse by the ideological obsessions and political deals of this government. Just as the previous Labor governments gave us the virtually useless and massively expensive Collin

There is an agenda by left wing European parties to use the Muslim vote to gain and to keep power. A pattern is emerging of encouraging Muslim immigration. In France and Spain, socialist parties have even proposed allowing Muslim residents to vote even when they are not citizens. In Australia until now we’ve assumed the Gillard and Rudd government were just hopelessly incompetent when they lost control of our borders. For all we know, there could well be a deliberate “boats for votes” agenda here in Australia. For the first – but certainly not the last time – Muslims have decided who should govern in a European country. A poll taken for the Paris newspaper Le Figaro reveals 93% of Muslims voted for socialist François Hollande. This means that about 1.7 million Muslims voted for Hollande. He defeated President Nicolas Sarkozy only 1.1 million votes. No wonder Muslims voted for Hollande. He promised to allow Muslim residents to vote even if they were not citizens. He also promised an