Managing director of Ebono Institute and major sponsor of The Generator, Geoff Ebbs, is running against Kevin Rudd in the seat of Griffith at the next Federal election. By the expression on their faces in this candid shot it looks like a pretty dull campaign. Read on
Welcome to Week 16 of this massive infrastructure project on your doorstep.
Firstly, thanks for your amazing patience in helping us deliver these works which will help make sure we can cope with future needs in your area.
This week’s works will see us continue to build the new sewer maintenance holes inside the two shafts (see second and third photo) which will soon be filled in completely and the area reinstated so traffic flow can return to normal on Hockings Street. We will also continue the slow drill through heavy rock from the shaft in front of 26 and 30 Mollison Street towards the pit in front of Monty’s Spare Parts.
What we need you to know is that we are expecting to start digging the next big shaft (similar to the one at the front of 26 and 30 Mollison Street) in the road and footpath area in front of The Markets Shopping Centre on Monday, 21 July 2014.
While these works will not block any access to the shopping centre, the bus stop will need to be moved about 20 metres towards Montague Road on the same side as its current location. The new location will be where the bus is in the first attached photo. Brisbane City Council will arrange appropriate on site notices to advise of the new bus stop location.
A typical shaft being installed by Urban Utilities
We will be delivering the attached letter to all residents and businesses in our works area later this week. It would be great if you could please pass this email on to anyone you believe may need to know this information.
Shortly, the Project Team is also planning to start work on underground drilling from the shaft in front of 26 and 30 Mollison Street towards the yet-to-be built shaft in front of the shopping complex.
Please feel free to let us know by commenting on this story, if you have any queries and we will do our very best to assist you.
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Your marketing plan is also a crucial part of helping you to attract funds.
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Set yourself a reminder to review your business plan regularly.
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Today’s announcement by the Federal Minister for Justice, Michael Keenan, that all new psychoactive substances (NPS) will be prohibited from import unless importers can prove they have a legitimate use, will see the creation of hundreds of mobile drug labs and secret production houses start up around the country.
Sex Party President and Eros CEO, Fiona Patten, said the Minister’s media release was very thin on detail. “Will the bans be based on pharmacological mimicry (like Qld and SA) or on psychoactivity (like NSW)? If based on ‘mimicry’, then will they only apply to LSD, MDMA and cannabis as suggested in the new laws (ie sertonergics and cannabinomimetics) or also to other drugs like GHB, amphetamine etc (ie GABAergics, adrenergics, etc)?
She said that the new laws would radically change the supply chain for NPS in Australia. “Bans on imports do nothing to address the desire and the market for drugs at home” she said. “If they can no longer be bought in from overseas, there are plenty of chemistry graduates who have the know-how to produce these new synthetic psychoactive substances within Australia. The federal government may have just inadvertently opened the door to a massive new drug problem”.
Ms Patten said that regulation would be far more effective in controlling NPS and cited the release of new statistics by the New Zealand Star Trust group last week that showed that during 2013, while it was legal to sell approximately 30 NPS in that country, illicit drug offences declined by 22.7%. Paul Glue, head of psychological medicine at Dunedin School of Medicine (NZ) said that “Since the Bill was enacted, we have seen fewer hospital admissions and emergency presentations associated with the use of synthetics”.
During 2013 there were no recorded deaths from NPS in NZ at the same time as 3,764 people died from tobacco use. The New Zealand government collected $42 million in taxes from the sale of regulated NPS and 3.5 million packets were sold. There were 12 positive media stories and 2,843 negative ones on the topic during 2013.
Ms Patten said the proposed regulatory regime invested unworkable powers with the ACBPS to determine if a substance had a ‘legitimate use’ and that it was unfair to allow the agency that seized the NPS in the first place to then consider whether or not that decision had been correct. “Many common herbs like Damiana have a psychoactive effect”, she said. “Will they be banned? And what is a ‘legitimate use’ anyway? Is the importation of a weak NPS as a healthier substitute for tobacco or alcohol, a ‘legitimate use’?
Ms Patten said Australia was about to break into the scenarios and storylines of the highest rated TV show of all time – Breaking Bad. On one level the TV show was a ‘morality play’ about a high school chemistry teacher, Walter White, who is diagnosed with inoperable lung cancer. He turns to a life of crime producing methamphetamine from a mobile laboratory in the form of a caravan, in order to ensure his family is looked after when he is gone. On another level, the program offers policy makers a compelling and fascinating account of how the prohibition of the new illicit drugs makes organized crime rich and casts misery on average families. Ms Patten strongly advised policy makers to watch the first series before escalating any prohibition on illicit drugs.
She said the negative impacts and dangers of NPS had been overstated in the Government’s Regulatory Impact Statement with little or no evidence produced. There had been little research done on the actual health impact of NPS. On this note she said she was concerned that the Alcohol and Drug sector had not been consulted and possibly were not aware of the RIS.
“The size of the market for synthetic cannabinoid-type products alone is estimated at more than $600 million in Australia”, she said. “If other NPS and individual purchases made via the internet are included, then that figure could be as much as a billion dollars. Considering the size of the market for these products it must be assumed that the vast majority of consumers do not suffer any significant negative health effects.”
Ms Patten said that the solution to the emergence of the New Psychoactive Substances was to legalise an old one – cannabis.
One day before the senate sits to vote on key budget measures proposed by the Liberal National Abbott government, thousands of Australians all over the country, protested to bust the budget.
In Brisbane, over a thousand men, women and children took to the streets yelling chants such as “ Stop Corporates getting fatter, workers rights matter,” and “ Stealing from the sick and poor, send this budget out the door”.
Treasurer Joe Hockey’s budget has slashed funding for public hospitals, resources for Aboriginal services, public funding for universities, payments for unemployed people under the age of 30 for six months in year, and ‘re-assessment’ of eligibility for people on disability pension.
Representing the aboriginal community, Sam Watson, an aboriginal elder addressed the masses by commencing his speech with a moment of silence, recognizing the elders of the land and the cause for action.
“Abbot and Hockey have stolen money from our resources and we’re going to fight back for it,” Mr. Watson said.
According to recent polls more than 65% of the population are against the budget and are hoping for the senate to block decisive sections of the budget and to target the deeply unpopular and unfair elements in the budget. This will force the Tony Abbot government to either agree to the amendments or witness the defeat of the entire budget with the consequential shut down of much of the government.
Peter Simpson, the Queensland branch secretary for Electrical Trades Union, assured the people about the role of the trade unions in the community and reassured the people that they were fighting for the rights of the common man.
“If anyone thought this wasn’t a class struggle, you’re kidding yourself ,” Mr Simpson said.
“Class warfare begins with a fight against Abbot’s budget attacks and should move on to demand free public healthcare, increase in funding for public hospitals, abolition of anti-strike laws, removal of tertiary education tuition fees and increase in low rent public housing,” he said.
“ I grew up in a society where the strong and powerful, looked after the weak and needy.
“ If this budget passes through, it is the end of our culture.
“Start getting involved in these fights so we can beat Abbot and his cronies.”
In the university sector, the biggest reform is the deregulation of university fees, which will allow universities to determine the cost of a degree.
According to the architect of HECS loan system, Bruce Chapman, this could result in the cost of a degree tripling, leaving students with debts of more than $120,000. Thus, for many, this debt will become a form of financial servitude.
Duncan Hart, representing the National Union of Students, illuminated the mass with the knowledge that this plan was a massive Americanization of the education system.
“The Abbot government has thrown away $24 Billion on fighter jets and say that they can’t afford education. This is despicable because these hypocrites got their education for free and their children and getting it for free, but they want us to pay and fall into debt,” Mr Hart said.
“We ordinary people need to get out there and make Abbot sweat,” he said.
Treasurer Joe Hockey’s budget, will also be cutting funds for public hospitals and this will make people pay a $7 fee per person for each doctor’s visit.
According to the Queensland nurses union, Australians will end up with a more expensive American style system of privatized health care, where if you don’t have the money, you don’t get the care.
Dr Brian Senewiratne, a consultant physician, conveyed that the introduction of co-payments will harm those who require care the most – the elderly, the poor and those with chronic diseases.
“ I was going through the budget last night and for the first time in 40 years as an Australian, I felt ashamed. I love Australia, I love Australians, Australians are clever and one of the nicest people in the world but I can’t understand why 21 million people can’t select 100 people with brains to represent them in the parliament,” Dr Senewiratne said.
“ Consider the situation of a poor mother with 4 children. If one child catches pneumonia and then unfortunately the rest of them contracts it from that one, which is inevitable. She has to pay, $7 per child and what if she doesn’t have that money? What if, the situation becomes more serious and they send her to Princess Alexandria Hospital where each bed costs $700 per day?,” he added.
“ What happens to the $7 she has to pay? $5 is taken by Abbot.”
Adrian Skerritt, from the Cloudland Collective encouraged the people to pressurize the government by claiming that such rallies have demonstrated that the budget is a horrible lie and he estimated that if an election was held next week, the polls demonstrate that Tony Abbot and his government would be history.
“ If the rich don’t like a law, they buy an outcome to suit their selfish interests,” Mr. Skerritt claimed.
“I worry that change in the government will not be enough. Unless we do something about a more profound change, nothing will progress. The task is to organize a society that does not have this shocking levels of inequality,” he said.
Economist Prof. Richard Holden argues that Australia does not have a debt crisis. The Commonwealth net debt is about 11% of the GDP, the third lowest in OECD (Organization for Economic Co-operation and Development) where the average is 50%, and low by historical standards.
Jason, a trainer, believes that the whole debt crisis is an elaborate illusion to mislead the people, and that the LNP is seeking to change the balance in favor of capital investment at the expense of public health, education and the standard of living of working people and their families.
“My message to the people is to take a good, hard look at yourself. The Howard government put a lot of people in debt, so now people have mortgages to pay. Families require a two income family structure to survive. I know that most people don’t want to risk their job by joining a fight against the government, but if this keeps going on, they’re going to lose their jobs anyway.
“In a two income family, if one loses their job, they’re going to suffer. They’re going start losing their houses, they’re going start finding it harder to get jobs and it’s going to affect their kids education. So people need to examine their situation, they need to stop being selfish and self- centered and look at the big picture instead of branding protesters as troublemakers or hippies,” he concluded.
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This links to Asher Wolf’s story breaking Steve Kilburn’s story
Papua New Guinea residents have told guards at Manus Island they will kill every last refugee that their government tries to settle in the country.
Steve Kilburn told a packed Kurilpa Hall today that he had every reason to believe they would carry out the threat. “This was just after I saw the police and army line up pointing guns at each other metres outside the detention centre.” Kilburn had called the police after interrupting an attempted rape by an Army officer.
“This solution cannot work, is not designed to work and the only logical explanation for it is that we are just trying to break the spirit of these people,” he told the packed meeting organised by the Refugee Action Collective.
Kilburn nursed forty wounded inmates lying on bloody mattresses for two days, with only Panadol to relieve the pain of broken limbs, ribs and in one case a completely smashed eye socket. His stories were corroborated by speakers from Amnesty International as well as guards who wished to remain anonymous because they want to return to work and one ex-guard who broke his silence for the first time at Kurilpa Hall.
Prisoners are kept without shade in tropical sunshine and refused hats. They queue for hours in the hots sun for meals because the inadequate kitchen facilities run out of food part way through meals. Guards offered to build shade structures out of spare materials already on site but were disallowed. When Amnesty visited the shade structures were erected, only to be removed after the Amnesty visit.
Shoes provided by humanitarian aid groups in Australia to protect inmates feet against the harsh rocks and jagged coral that makes up the floor of the compound sit under lock and key in a container next to the compound. Shoes are offered as rewards to prisoners who comply with the guards.
Prisoners in ‘naughty corner’ do not have toilets. They shit in a hole in the ground and the stench makes the guards physically ill when they walk past. Prisoners are allowed 4 minutes of shower a day in one or two sessions. They have to shower facing a guard who times them to ensure they do not use more than their share of water. Water is one of the resources that causes bitter resentment with the local people. The mountains of rubbish and the drain on medical resources are others.
Every speaker described the unholy heat and the overcrowding with people sleeping centimetres apart and one narrow walkway through 160 beds crowded into a space designed as living quarters for twenty people.
Because of the highly insanitary conditions all inmates and guards are “fogged” sprayed with a chemical to reduce infections and infestations. One 72 year old asthmatic, collapsed every day during the fogging. Guards offered to walk him out of the compound during the fogging, but were refused. He now huddles in a shelter with a wet towel over his head and hopes not to die. Every day.
Mr Kilburn believes that most Australians simply do not believe how bad things are. “They turn a blind eye because they think these people have come here illegally and deserve to be discouraged. They do not believe that our government could be doing things this bad. We are deliberately torturing these people.”
A number of asylum speakers spoke about their experience in refugee camps and detention centres across the world. “These detention camps are the worst ever. They are worse than the prisons I fled in my home country,” one speaker said.
Mr Kilburn believes that the government feels that the program is a success. They are prepared to sacrifice these humans as a deterrent to other refugees. He believes the deliberate cruelty is specifically designed to make refugees give up and return home even if they face certain death.
Other speakers supported this, quoting people saying they would rather die at home with family than in a prison camp between the tropical sun and jagged coral gravel.
Mr Kilburn spent three days trying to get a Syrian man to eat bread because he had stopped eating after finally giving up his attempts to seek asylum in Australia only to be told that he could not go home either because the Australian government could not guarantee his safety.
He feels that he is a failure because he dragged his family from their homeland in the hope of a better life only to see them trapped in this tropical hell from which they are told every day there is no escape.
All the speakers talked of the threats they face by speaking out. They are in breach of confidentiality agreements so broad and so draconian they cannot even mention that they are under a confidentiality agreement. They know they will never work in the security industry again or work for a government agency. They are told they will be refused loans or credit and so may never buy a house or a new car. These are serious threats in Australia.
Steve Kilburn told a shocked audience that he has had to decide that nothing the Australian government can do to him is worse than it is doing to the asylum seekers.
“They can come and get me”, he said, “because when they do, I will have my day in court and I will subpoena everyone who has ever worked for these agencies in my defence and the whole story will come out into the harsh light of day. They do not want that.”
While most people attending the meeting were already opposed to offshore processing the overwhelming majority are shocked at the atrocities being carried out on the orders of our elected government. The overwhelming mood of the meeting was that we must collectively get out there and talk to people who are opposed to cruelty but might have supported offshore processing because of fear of refugees.
Understanding and truthful information are the best tools to overcome fear.
Information is available from the following sources
