I just can’t sit through a whole hour of this biased drivel anymore.
With three panel members nodding away in agreement with each other and with Barrie, what is the point?
And their technical knowledge of policy details and the processes of government is just abysmal.
Take Karen ‘golly gosh’ from the SBS. She really had no idea about the issues surrounding the super-trawler decision and seemed to think that the fact that the fishing quota had not been fully utilised confirmed the government’s decision.
And what’s a bit of sovereign risk, anyway, according to George. If we had a bit more sovereign risk, the dollar could be lower because foreigners would love us less and we would all be better off. Honestly!!!!!!!!!!
Barrie of course served up the ‘just tell me what you want to tell me’ questions to our Tanya. Cuts? No, according to our Health Minister (say no more), just savings.
I really want someone to tell me what the 10,000 public servants in the Commonwealth Department of Health actually do. No fat? Come off it, Minister. It is all fat and Barrie should be asking the hard questions. After all, the Commonwealth Department of Health does not actually provide any health services.
Talking about cuts (note to Coalition – slash the ABC allocation) – Insiders is an obvious candidate. And another obvious candidate – Q&A which has just become a left-wing faux comedy masquerading as a program about serious policy questions.
Agree Judith, on all counts. Insiders has never been the same since Bolt left.
Sleetmute
16 Sep 12 at 10:09 am
It’s pathetic.
Econocrat
16 Sep 12 at 10:09 am
Thank you Judith. I totally agree with you. I am angry that our taxes pay for this purile crap called Insiders and every other news and political coverage that our A(LP)BC serve up.
Enough!
Steve
16 Sep 12 at 10:10 am
No. Note to Coalition – there are NO justifications for State owned media in a free and democratic society. Sell the ABC and SBS.
Cut the debt and save $1.5b+ per year.
And that will be an actual savings, not a a Labor ‘savings’.
johno
16 Sep 12 at 10:11 am
Right now I’m “nodding away in agreement” with you, Judith…
ar
16 Sep 12 at 10:14 am
I really think that the best thing is to make the ABC irrelevant. We kept switching on hoping for some semblance of balance only to be disappointed Sunday after Sunday. We have even stopped watching the ABC news. I honestly think that the “average” Aussie has no idea of the seriousness of our situation- militarily, economically and civically. I think this is due to what I see as the active censorship of specific issues by the ABC now in open collusion with non-conservative ideologies.
elizabeth
16 Sep 12 at 10:19 am
I used to work for the Commonwealth Department of Health. The Division I was in looked after public health issues. The flu pandemic; disease intelligence; emerging diseases; chemical safety; imports of controlled substances; border control in relation to disease; health issues in the Torres Strait border with PNG; disaster preparedness; that kind of thing.
Julian O'Dea
16 Sep 12 at 10:26 am
I stopped watching the ABC a couple of years ago – if it went I wouldn’t even miss it
I remember Klaus asking what the public servants working in the Dept of Climate Change actually do … got me beat
val majkus
16 Sep 12 at 10:30 am
Surprise a public servant in his office cubicle after 30 June and odds on he’ll be working on his tax return.
Sack every 3rd one for a start, especially from the pretend crisis generator Departments.
Alfonso
16 Sep 12 at 10:37 am
Julian, so that is maybe 30 people and how much of all that is duplicated in Defence, Customs and Quarantine?
FM
16 Sep 12 at 10:39 am
FM, more than 30. More like 300. Defence and other departments would bring their own relevant expertise to some of it. The Division I was in also runs the national emergency room for things like pandemic flu, the Bali bombing and bushfire medical response co-ordination. Some of my colleagues volunteered their time during the swine flu epidemic, although we were an area doing regulatory toxicology on agricultural chemicals (dioxin issues and that kind of thing.)
I cannot comment on the rest of the department.
Alfonso, I never saw that in 30 years in the Australian Public Service.
Julian O'Dea
16 Sep 12 at 11:02 am
Your not wrong Narelle.
Although on a positive note, the new show on one of the commercial channels (Gina’s) talking about remote & regional issues whilst not brilliant is at least entertaining. Seeing the Nats & the head of the Farmer’s federation gang up on Tony Burke was quite good.
Dianne
16 Sep 12 at 11:05 am
And George Imamegagenius was simultaneously starkly ignorant whilst condescending to assert his opinion as if they were irrefutable truth.
It’s a shame that Australia is cursed with ignorant pollies who don’t understand our constitutional federation and division of powers.
It’s a good job Imamegagenius is around most Sunday mornings and wiv Tingles Cantankerous Ramsey twice a quarter on Lateline to put ‘em straight.
Thank you….ooh thank you George, our hero and champion of da common man.
JamesK
16 Sep 12 at 11:22 am
Insiders is unwatchable. Ol’ Leatherface is that far past his use-by date it’s not funny, it’s like when the ALP wheel the Silver Bodgie out for a ra-ra session to stave of the doom.
Of more concern is the bias shown by AM, PM and Lateline. ALPBC group think – apparent to former Chairmen but not the current Managing Director, is trashing what little remains of the ABC’s legacy for credible news and current affairs.
H B Bear
16 Sep 12 at 11:43 am
Insiders has jumped the shark. Morally, it jumped the shark when they got rid of Glen Milne. But ignoring that and looking at it purely as analysis and entertainment, it’s deteriorated over the past year or so. I had it on while I did housework.
They spent a lot of time discussing The Punch (TM). Considering their studious avoidance of the AWU scandal until it was unavoidable (namely, until Gillard herself spoke about it thus giving them permission to do so too), it was quite cheeky of them to sit there and repeatedly draw equivalences to the AWU scandal. They laughed at Sheridan’s radio interview on the topic. And Cassidy gave Plibersek a free kick to discuss The Punch and explain why the AWU scandal is completely different because it’s exactly the same. Cassidy softballed these and other questions to her.
Now as for sovereign risk. The panel scoffed at criticisms of ‘sovereign risk’ But they showed they don’t actually understand what it is. It’s not enough to say ‘foreigners can take their money elsewhere’, because the point is that foreigners invested money in good faith and then the goalposts were moved by the government. That is sovereign risk. It’s moving the goalposts when people have already sunk their money into the investment.
dd
16 Sep 12 at 11:53 am
In other words, writing lots of reports. I’m sure they all looked nice and glossy, had pretty pictures, and were read by nobody.
You just made the case for shutting down this hive of useless activity better than anyone else here.
dd
16 Sep 12 at 11:57 am
dd
No, they managed the preparation for and response to the swine flu pandemic, for example.
It is a public health function.
Julian O'Dea
16 Sep 12 at 12:04 pm
It is a sham.
For all the talk today about “The Punch” not once did they actually pose the question or ask each other – do you think it is true?
Because Marr had wrote it was proof enough apparently.
So now we have the absurd spectate of four people agreeing with each other that Abbott had not answered something correctly without the first principle inquiry being made to ascertain if the thing to be answered was truthful.
First time I have watched in a month. Can’t see the point in watching anymore to be honest.
Mark
16 Sep 12 at 12:29 pm
Julian, the things you list are all done by other agencies (“imports of controlled substances?” come on, who are you kidding). In the case of flu pandemic, that could easily be done with coordination between state bodies. Coordinated response is possible without a Federal agency, you know. Anyway I’d rather see that done by a specialist organisation, modelled on America’s CDC (Center for Disease Control), rather than through a generic health department.
dd
16 Sep 12 at 12:30 pm
No Julian – that is a Civil Defence function.
Actually do we have a Civil Defence Department?
I mean greater than some poor bastard Lieutenant in Russel St who shuffles bits of paper when he’d rather be out bush, learning how to do his job?
Bob Sewell
16 Sep 12 at 12:38 pm
dd, the functions I listed are operational as well as policy activities. The controlled substances are narcotics and the like. The Health Department provides expert advice to Customs, I understand. The chemical regulation areas set safe levels of chemical residues in food and provide OH&S advice for farmworkers using agricultural chemicals, as well as for safe use of pesticides in the home.
The emergency response room is activated in cases where more than one state is involved in a disaster. For example, after the Bali bombing or in the case of the bushfires. Liaison with other Federal Government departments, such as Attorney-General’s and Defence may be required.
Julian O'Dea
16 Sep 12 at 12:42 pm
What is a civil defence function, Bob?
Julian O'Dea
16 Sep 12 at 12:43 pm
In fairness to Julian, at least Julian’s here defending the Department. the questions we’re asking and issues we’re raising should be put to the minister, and give her the chance to answer them just as Julian is valiantly attempting to do. Is the Commonwealth department a useless bureaucratic monstrosity? It doesn’t actually deliver any frontline services, so there is a question mark about what it brings to the table, other than more centralisation and regulation.
Unfortunately, Cassidy didn’t choose to ask her about any of this. It’s his interview and he can run it how he likes, but the result is that if Plibersek had a devastating comeback on such criticisms, she never got a chance to make it. If she has killer arguments in defense of the department, we never got to hear it.
dd
16 Sep 12 at 12:49 pm
Actually julian and dd the legislated responsibility and abilities to do what Julian lists rests with the states the Feds play a support role at best. My experience is with bushfire and horse flu the states MOUs for mutal support are what makes it work not the Feds who play a very limited role in those processes.
Bronson
16 Sep 12 at 12:50 pm
It depends what you mean by frontline services. The health standards I mentioned are applied throughout Australia and affect residue levels in the food supply and are intended to protect the health of agricultural workers throughout the country.
Co-ordination is also a legitimate function, both among the States and the Commonwealth and within the Commonwealth bureaucracy. Many functions require input from several agencies. The Bali bombing presumably required input from A/Gs, Defence, Health and so on. When I worked in the Australian Fisheries Service, and foreign fishing vessels were detected in our Australian Fishing Zone, there had to be coordination with Customs, the Navy and, for example, the NT fisheries service.
Border issues are obviously best handled on a national basis. Services may be delivered at the state level, but coordination is necessary in such cases. This applies to human quarantine as well as animal and plant quarantine.
Julian O'Dea
16 Sep 12 at 1:04 pm
Julian, as you have first hand experience of the operation of the department, I’ll accept what you say that some useful things are done there, but I’m very skeptical that the Commonwealth department of health is necessary at all. but let’s let it go for now.
The point is that there’s a serious question about the rise of massive commonwealth bureaucracies, and Federal takeover of state roles, that doesn’t get asked enough.
dd
16 Sep 12 at 1:05 pm
Julian, was that a serious question?
Bob Sewell
16 Sep 12 at 1:08 pm
One valuable function Insiders does serve is to directly expose the partisan positions held by so many “journalists” that filter what is reported to us as news and current affairs. Anyone who has seen Fran Kelly, Laura Tingle, David Marr, Malcolm Farr and others spouting on with Ol’ Leatherface has only themselves to blame for regarding any of their “reporting” as credible.
George Megalogenis seemed to treat today’s episode as an audition for the Greek treasurer’s position, “They are lining up to give us [Australia] money”. Mistaking the billions of hot money parked on 10am call because our interest rate is not zero per cent and Australia is not yet insolvent, with 30 and 40 year mining projects that are being pulled as fast as they appear for approval.
H B Bear
16 Sep 12 at 1:17 pm
dd, I have no problem with queries about Government functions. Obviously it has been a live issue during my time in the Australian Public Service, which ended this year after nearly thirty years – which is one reason why I now have time to chat at places like this.
The debate over the proper function of government has had a lot of effect on the activities of the public service. Many functions were privatised, and questions were continually asked about whether our functions were appropriate. For example, there was an economic argument put for why the Commonwealth should involve itself in the management of fisheries outside state limits (in the Australian Fishing Zone). This was based on a market failure, both as to misallocation of resources in a common property situation, and also a “tragedy of the commons” which tended to result in fishing out of common fish stocks.
Nevertheless, I remember having my doubts about the good sense of our being involved, given the problems that our involvement created, not the least of which was the risk of bureaucratic corruption (one of my colleagues went to jail).
There is a good debate to be held about these issues. All I am trying to do is correct some of the less nuanced perceptions of what public servants actually do.
On the supertrawler, I have not been involved in fisheries management for many years, but the whole thing smells like political interference in the normal business of the Australian Fisheries Management Authority. This is the kind of thing that drives public servants nuts, and is an example of the perfidy of politicians not public servants.
Certain MPs seem surprised that professional fishing involves the killing of fish.
Julian O'Dea
16 Sep 12 at 1:19 pm
ABC Radio also slso should be subjected to critical scrutiy. Most of Radio National’s programs – including its currrent affairs programs – have become narrow, superficial, fatuous and vacuous. For example,the replay of today’s RN’s Background Briefing, about drones and privacy, running on its news and current affairs station as I type. A huge beat up. Should have been left to the local newspaper where it belongs …
Warwick
16 Sep 12 at 1:19 pm
Julian had me at this:
How do you show hysterical laughter punctuated by moments of uncontrolled rage on a blog?
cohenite
16 Sep 12 at 1:22 pm
LOL
Is there a member for Pinkenba?
.
16 Sep 12 at 1:23 pm
Yes, Bob. I shall take a guess and assume you are saying that some public health issues are civil defence problems. OK. I can think of two ways you can handle that. Set up a Civil Defence department to manage civil disasters (an epidemic, terrorist attacks, toxins in the food supply, whatever) with various kinds of expertise in-house. Or you can have input from various specialist departments. Either way, an incident like the Bali bombing is going to involve many types of expertise. You can have it in-house, as I said, or seconded, or you can get it from specialist departments, such as Defence, A/Gs, Health and so on.
Julian O'Dea
16 Sep 12 at 1:29 pm
No need for that, cohenite, Julian’s a good guy.
dd
16 Sep 12 at 1:30 pm
cohenite, delighted to have brightened your Sunday. I was thinking of controls on diseases like swine flu and the risk of introduced pests. Perhaps you were thinking of people smuggling? As I said earlier, public servants are not responsible for the folly of their political masters.
Julian O'Dea
16 Sep 12 at 1:32 pm
Struth, it even sounds exactly like an otherwise unemployable useless public servant’s résumé.
I don’t see anything helpful such as collecting the garbage or fixing road damage – oh wait, that’s all been outsourced to contractors with the capability.
As for the co-ordination and liaison nonsense – the States have ministers and ministerial staff with that responsibility. Their public servants conference at resorts in the tropics throughout winter, discussing co-ordination and liaison.
The States have departments which do pretty well all those things mentioned, and mobile phones with each other’s phone numbers saved ‘n all. They probably all know how to email stuff as well.
Education, Health, Enviiimunt, approving coal mines and fishing trawlers is merely federal fiefdoms shoving their way in to expand the kingdoms of the permanent heads, so they can boast in their résumés about their vital co-ordination skills. It helps when it comes time to justify their guaranteed performance bonuses too.
Mick Gold Coast QLD
16 Sep 12 at 1:35 pm
Mick, ministerial advisers don’t do those things. Their role is mostly political.
I mentioned operational functions as well as coordination functions. If people want government, these are both required. People want good public health standards, consideration of the environment, and so on. In many cases, it makes sense to have these functions done federally, rather than reproduced in each state. In some cases, for example mangagement of the Australian Fishing Zone, border control, international liaison, the Commonwealth Government is legally required to be involved.
Some of this is due to our federal system. There may be some duplication of functions, but I would say there is less than there once was. To some extent, the issue is politicians being jealous of their powers on behalf of their states or the Commonwealth.
Julian O'Dea
16 Sep 12 at 1:46 pm
… which in no way obviates the need for “hysterical laughter punctuated by moments of uncontrolled rage on a blog” at the hopelessly naive assertion that “Border issues are obviously best handled on a national basis.”
Everyone from the small p prime minister down to the minister, rear vice admiral thingy, senior officers and hopeless public servants in the Russell Offices directing the welcome to country fleet takes their pay under false pretences on this one.
Mick Gold Coast QLD
16 Sep 12 at 1:47 pm
Mick, I think you are referring to boatpeople issues. I was not, as I explained above.
Julian O'Dea
16 Sep 12 at 1:59 pm
Julian, with my comment at 10:39, I wasn’t trying to convey the number of people I thought were actually doing the job, but rather the number of people I thought should be doing it – if they should be doing it at all. As I intimated, there’s a lot of duplication at play here and not just at the Federal level. To use one of your examples, State health departments like Queensland should be drawing up contingency plans for the health problems of the Torres Strait islands (spillover effects from PNG). They will be the ones dealing with it in their hospitals. They probably already have different plans.
My background is in Defence and I would guess that there are actually less than 30 people actively engaged in full-time contingency planning for more likely contingencies. Somehow we get by.
FM
16 Sep 12 at 2:01 pm
Julian I’m sure you believe you’ve striven manfully in the Federal public service but “People want good public health standards, consideration of the environment” is delusional. They had hitherto been handled – over-handled – by the States, until the Federal government butted in.
For example, in 1973 Tom Uren launched into urban development stuff for no reason other than politics – shelling out loot to his favourite marginal electorates under the RED scheme and such. His office used, literally, a white board to map it out dollar by electorate. It had nothing at all to do with “People want … consideration of the environment”.
The same thing happened in about 1990 when the Federal government climbed into the mineral resources approval process, which was being perfectly well managed under new, restrictive legislation enacted in most States.
That arrived just as we gained heavily conditional approval in NSW (State and Local) to expand our evil oil owned open cut coal mine. The Feds decided suddenly to stall the process while they got used to their training wheels imposing an unnecessary third level approval, and our investment funds were pulled instantly by our US head office and sent to other more certain investments in Malaysia, RSA and South America.
Mick Gold Coast QLD
16 Sep 12 at 2:03 pm
Mick, I don’t defend every case of federal government involvement, especially Whitlamite overreach.
I think we need to look at these issues on a case-by-case basis.
FM, the swine flu issue is interesting. After that risk subsided, and no more pandemics were in the offing, there was a downsizing of the preparedness function and a lot of staff were shed.
Julian O'Dea
16 Sep 12 at 2:14 pm
Julian, welcome to The Cat. You’ll soon learn that around here your average public servant is imagined to be a nineteenth century scheming Protocols type of Joo, with octopus tentacles and a glass brimming with the blood of a freshly squeezed Christian virgin.
Abu Chowdah
16 Sep 12 at 2:41 pm
Here’s what they do:
I haven’t looked into the staff allocation, but remember health includes aged care, which is no doubt pretty big.
SteveC
16 Sep 12 at 2:44 pm
Putting a box named “aged care” on an organisational chart doesn’t make it so. The Commonwealth does not run, manage, or oversee aged care facilities.
dd
16 Sep 12 at 2:53 pm
As all subsidised aged care facilities are fedrally funded i find it hard to believe the acceditation process is not also a commonwealth job. Any time I want to enquire about my mothers Aged Care facility I call the commonwealth department of health.
SteveC
16 Sep 12 at 2:56 pm
Don’t mention the 1000 public servants in the Dept. of Defence they are cutting because our budget has been reduced to pre WWII levels.
Matt
16 Sep 12 at 2:57 pm
And the Aged Care act is a commonwealth act, so i think you will find that aged care is on the whole a commonwealth responsibility
SteveC
16 Sep 12 at 2:59 pm
I stand corrected.
dd
16 Sep 12 at 3:00 pm
Abu Chowdah
I understand. I am a bit unusual because my politics tend to align with this blog, despite my having been a “fat cat” here in Canberra.
I have commented in the past at this place. But I do a lot of commenting on American Manosphere blogs, under a penname. I grew tired of talking to Americans, so I thought I would spend some time here.
Most of my friends and family think I am impossibly rightwing.
Julian O'Dea
16 Sep 12 at 3:00 pm
We have some Green trolls here who think the Labor Right is right wing while defending illegal immigration and the air tax. The extreme left currently in power imagine that they’re engaged in a permanent revolutionary overturning of the social order. They’re going to get a hell of a shock when they’re tipped out onto the street next year.
Tom
16 Sep 12 at 3:18 pm
Julian. Welcome to the Cat. New views are refreshing.
Keep up the good work in trying to explain what public servants ACTUALLY do. There is a widespread misunderstanding about what public servents actually do. Many people don’t seem to have grasped the basic idea that if governments are to do certain things, then governments will need to employ people to do those things.
The debate needs to move away from beating up on fat cat public servants and towards whether government should be doing certain things like attempting to provide free universal medical care. If we are to have a national Medicare scheme, then we need public servants to run it.
The argument should be on why centrally planned, government run, taxpayer funded health provision will always be inferior to health services provided by the market, rather than about abolishing a Commonwealth Department because it doesn’t run any hospitals and it’s a State resposibility anyway.
johno
16 Sep 12 at 3:31 pm
Parkinson formulated his law after extensive experience in the British Civil Service but it is equally applicable to all government departments
In 1986, Alessandro Natta complained about the swelling bureaucracy in Italy. Mikhail Gorbachev responded that “Parkinson’s Law works everywhere”. (Wiki).
manalive
16 Sep 12 at 4:06 pm
Thanks, johno.
Those are important and interesting issues, which have been discussed a great deal inside as well as outside the public service. I am not an economist, but I worked with many over the years (fisheries economists, industry economists, and so on) and they did discuss these issues. We said “no” to spending money more often than outsiders might have expected.
It always amuses me to watch segments of popular TV programs. One item will be on the need to sack public servants to save taxes; and the next will be on some safety issue, and why doesn’t the government do something?
Julian O'Dea
16 Sep 12 at 4:08 pm
Julian, I worked in the APS for many years. The Cat mostly aligns with my views but I don’t have the same negative opinion of the pubes. Mind you, I didn’t work in any of the retard areas such as environment or aboriginal pork barrelling.
Abu Chowdah
16 Sep 12 at 5:15 pm
Abu Chowdrah
I worked mostly in the agriculture department and Health.
I wasn’t a very fat cat.
Julian O'Dea
16 Sep 12 at 5:59 pm
The ABC works (the way it does) because of its ‘no enemies to the left’ bias. On the other hand, the mainstream right polices ‘enemies-to-the-right’ so effectively, that the boring, degenerate ‘consensus’ ambles on in an insidious downward spiral.
Big Jim
16 Sep 12 at 7:58 pm
Being welcomed by Johno is interesting.
blogstrop
16 Sep 12 at 8:52 pm
Welcome Julian. Good to see a right wing public servant. There’s a big difference between getting rid of government and making it work. There is an obvious discussion that needs to be had about WHAT the role of government is, and I also like getting views from inside that tent that aren’t propogated by leftie trolls.
LordAzrael
16 Sep 12 at 9:08 pm
I was one of the poor uniformed drones required to do their penance in DoD Russell Offices Canberra for a year or so. It was probably the most soul destroying period of my career.
I (gladly) departed with a new found and highly cynical opinion of the upper echelons of Defence, both uniformed and civilian.
Opinion is still the same.
Pedro the Ignorant
16 Sep 12 at 9:52 pm
Que?
There are a couple of Johnos, each with a slightly different spelling. You might have confused me with one of them as I often disagree with their views. Not all Johnos are the same.
Johno
16 Sep 12 at 10:49 pm
Bravo, Judith—100% correct!
truth
17 Sep 12 at 1:01 am
So, really, duplication is created by incoming Ministers. We should do away with the Federal government making any sort of policy decision and restrict it to solely collecting the GST and Defence.
Dan
17 Sep 12 at 6:50 am
The right is becoming an ever-decreasing, insignificant minority in Australia. Insiders’ panel of centrists and slightly left-of-centre panellists is actually pretty representative of the Australian public’s position on political issues these days.
Interesting to see the dramatic comeback by Julia Gillard in today’s Newspoll. This is close to my forecast of a couple of weeks ago, although I was one fortnight out in my prediction. Labor will now go from strength to strength and will romp home in the next election.
It will be interesting to see the squirming on this and other far-right blogs. The rage of insignificance!! Ha, Ha.
hammygar
17 Sep 12 at 7:40 am
Hammy, get the kero and light the match. The Liars party will not win the next election. The polls are teasing mentally unstable idiots like you.
JC
17 Sep 12 at 7:47 am
It is interesting to see how the Liars Party supporters enjoy watching a show where the Stenographers guzzle down the government endorsed sewerage.
Now the Ramjan standard exists in Australian journalism, who knows who will it will hurt next!!!
BTW, Micheal Smith has more documents on his page about the fraud that was perpetrated from the SLUSH fund the PM set up and did not tell S&G about in her exit interview.
Token
17 Sep 12 at 8:05 am
Interesting to see what hammy finds “interesting”.
Which itself would say lotsa “interesting’ things about da ham for those who might be interested.
Which unfortunately for da ham is precisely nobody.
JamesK
17 Sep 12 at 8:05 am
But the montages….
Gabs
17 Sep 12 at 9:39 am
“The right is becoming an ever-decreasing, insignificant minority in Australia. Insiders’ panel of centrists and slightly left-of-centre panellists is actually pretty representative of the Australian public’s position on political issues these days.”
Nonsense. Put any simple right-populist notion to the test of public opinion in a secret ballot (ie, controlling for demonising and its concommitant, status-mongering.) Why do you think referenda seldom achieve progressive aims.
Big Jim
17 Sep 12 at 9:58 am
What does the Federal Education Dept do?
HECS is paid to the ATO.
States generally run unis and authorise them to exist.
Seems DEST exists to fill in FEE HELP forms and annoy academics doing research.
.
17 Sep 12 at 3:00 pm
I genuinely would like to meet the Hamster to see firsthand a fruitcake I would not otherwise have the anthropological curiousity to hunt down. Given the gvavatar picture he has chosen, I imagine he is a wheezing degenerate close to death who looks like Harold Steptoe.
Tom
17 Sep 12 at 3:49 pm
Was that a rhetorical question dot?
If not, here you go. Note there is no Dept of Education as such, there is schools within DEEWR and higher education in DIISRTE
http://www.deewr.gov.au/Pages/DepartmentSites.aspx
http://www.deewr.gov.au/highereducation/Pages/Overview.aspx
SteveC
17 Sep 12 at 6:10 pm
Fair enough Julian – the Civil Defence function was the bit I was really concerned about. And to whoever else mentioned it, a subsection dealing with contagious diseases like the CDC is a necessity.
Iran may be waving the big nuclear stick in one hand whilst quietly working on a lethal smallpox in the background.
Bob Sewell
17 Sep 12 at 7:41 pm
Hammy’s avatar is James Scullin, another failed Labor PM.
Scullin has some eerie parallels with a more recent failed Labor PM. Scullin was elected in 1929 and took office two days before the Wall Street crash. He also came to office by vanquishing a PM who lost his seat in an election that was fought over industrial relations.
The Scullin government was a complete rabble which quickly disintegrated. Firstly, a group of Jack Lang supporters left the Party and set up ‘Lang Labor’. Lang’s economic policy make the Greens Party’s polices look reasonable.
This was followed by Joseph Lyons and Jack Fenton leaving, teaming up with the Nationalist opposition to form a new party, the United Australia Party, which trounced Labor in 1931.
Lyons rejected the Keynesian approach to dealing with recessions and stuck with sound policies. This is one of the reasons Australia bounced back from the recession of the 1930s better than countries like the US that went full blown Keynesian.
The lessons of old are easily forgotten. Maybe that is why hammy is a big fan of Scullin.
johno
17 Sep 12 at 8:19 pm