I just got back from a talk that I did for the Queanbeyan Evening View Club. Mum has been a member for a long time and I tend to do a talk there every once and a while on my last posting. This was the first opportunity that I had to talk about my last posting to PNG from November 2006 until February 2007. it was just ment to be a informal slide night where I get to talk about being chased down the road by people with machetes 
. I will have to admit that I was surprised that the audience of suburban middle-aged women where really switched on about the topic of International Development. The basic idea is that International Development is all about the fight against poverty.
The fight against poverty may appear daunting but the efforts arising from the Millennium Declaration in 2000 shows what can be done when the world works together to solve a global challenge. The Declaration gave rise to the establishment of eight Millennium Development Goals targeting key indicators of development, including extreme poverty and hunger, education, gender equality, child mortality, and disease control.
Progress against these goals has been encouraging but more needs to be done if we are not to fall short of achieving the Goals by 2015. The Australian Government has committed to spending 0.7 percent of Gross National Income on overseas development assistance (ODA), yet did not set a timeline for when this level of spending would be reached. Our level of ODA as a proportion of Gross National Income is currently 0.3 percent.
The Australian Government’s in-principle commitment to increasing aid expenditure to 0.7 percent of Gross National Income extends all the way back to a 1975 United Nations General Assembly resolution but was more recently affirmed at the 2002 International Conference on Financing for Development in Monterrey, Mexico.
Australia has not yet set a timeline for the achievement of that spending level, unlike five countries that have already met that level and 16 that have committed to reach it by 2015. Australia’s ODA as a proportion of Gross National Income is currently 0.3 percent, significantly below even the OECD average of 0.46 percent.
This stands in stark contrast to the generosity of Australians, who are the second most generous amongst the 22 OECD countries when it comes to private giving. This corresponds with growth in the number of people who approve of official development assistance and who feel that Australia should spend more on aid.
Focus development resources intensively on high-priority nations, with the intent of achieving a more rapid and sustained improvement in economic and social conditions for example work towards an increase in basic health & education and the availability of micro-credit. We should support further cancellation of developing country debt. As well as work for the resumption of multi-lateral talks aimed at the further reduction of trade barriers.
olie, October 17th 2009 |
Tags: Aid
Posted in Opinion
<!– /* Style Definitions */ p.MsoNormal, li.MsoNormal, div.MsoNormal {mso-style-parent:”"; margin:0in; margin-bottom:.0001pt; mso-pagination:widow-orphan; font-size:12.0pt; font-family:”Times New Roman”; mso-fareast-font-family:”Times New Roman”;} @page Section1 {size:8.5in 11.0in; margin:1.0in 1.25in 1.0in 1.25in; mso-header-margin:.5in; mso-footer-margin:.5in; mso-paper-source:0;} div.Section1 {page:Section1;} –> Unless one has actually run for office and failed, it is all but impossible to grasp the full effect of that loss. There is just not a lot of Norv left in the tube. it still sh#ts me to think that Val Came with in 200 odd votes of a seat.
I never really contemplated how it would feel to lose an election after pouring your heart into the effort, just to come up short(twice), you can feel a great deal of pride even in defeat. But it does leave its long black shadow on your hopes for a better society.
Its a stacked pseudo-two party system, but yet I cant bring my self to join either side. So it’s a two-party elected dictatorship the National-Liberal Coalition on one site and the Labor-Green coalition on the other.
The two-party system seems inefficient. Nothing gets done. Also, it seems illogical to be completely conservative or completely liberal just because you consider yourself one or the other. Most people are liberal on some issues, and conservative on others. if we just a a few more parties in the Parliment, ones that cod moderate the polarization. More would get done and people would be less inclined to be “loyalists” to their party on every single issue.
We may see an evolution of the process that leads to a third party again that seriously contends on national level, but you can’t force this sort of sea-change in an existing environment.
Unless one has actually run for office and failed, it is all but impossible to grasp the full effect of that loss. There is just not a lot of Norv left in the tube. it still sh#ts me to think that Val Came with in 200 odd votes of a seat.
I never really contemplated how it would feel to lose an election after pouring your heart into the effort, just to come up short(twice), you can feel a great deal of pride even in defeat. But it does leave its long black shadow on your hopes for a better society.
Its a stacked pseudo-two party system, but yet I cant bring my self to join either side. So it’s a two-party elected dictatorship the National-Liberal Coalition on one site and the Labor-Green coalition on the other.
The two-party system seems inefficient. Nothing gets done. Also, it seems illogical to be completely conservative or completely liberal just because you consider yourself one or the other. Most people are liberal on some issues, and conservative on others. if we just a a few more parties in the Parliment, ones that cod moderate the polarization. More would get done and people would be less inclined to be “loyalists” to their party on every single issue.
We may see an evolution of the process that leads to a third party again that seriously contends on national level, but you can’t force this sort of sea-change in an existing environment.
olie, February 11th 2009 |
Posted in Opinion
Unfortunately the account given on Stateline by one mother of her daughter’s experience in the system is not a one-off. She was just the one who went public—and good on her. Anyone with friends in that unit know how the system treats people—and that the fault does not lie with the nursing staff, who are doing the best they can with the facilities and resources they have. The ACT has the highest rate of long-term mental health and behavioural conditions (13.8% of the population in 2004–05) in the country. This is clearly an area that we need to do more in
Fortunately mental illness no longer carries the stigma that it did even a decade ago, but it is still difficult for people with an illness. The first episode can bring feelings of deep shame that do not accompany an episode of the flu or cancer, making it socially isolating and deeply traumatic for people who are unwell and their friends and family alike. Unfortunately the ACT mental health system does not seem to have caught up with the wider community.
Families have difficulty getting appropriate diagnosis and treatment for their children, being told that the behaviour is just characteristic of ‘a difficult child’ or ‘typical for a teenager’. The focus needs to be on early detection and intervention, community care and appropriate and caring acute care where this is necessary, and on the family and supporting family as the primary caring unit
The government, for example, has been promising an acute care psychiatric facility for children for more than four years, but has not yet delivered. The high dependency unit (once known as the locked ward) is as dangerous as it has ever been. Our first step will be to look at all the multi-million dollar promises for infrastructure and facilities, and sit down with patients, their families and nursing staff and, if necessary, redesign the proposed facilities to create something that will work.
olie, October 6th 2008 |
Tags: Mental Health
Posted in Opinion
Well I have just read the Canberra Times polling article. The outcomes are not as good as I had hoped at 1% I am a statistical anomaly so my sister tells me. However they are no where near as gloomy as the Canberra Times predicts. There are two fundamentals that the Canberra Times and most political commentators ignore this is mainly due to them only caring about “picking a winner” and also through ignorance.
Months ago the “new” parties would not have rated at all and now they do. Also months ago most voters would have only indicated support for Labor, Liberal or Greens. The growth of support for the “others” will continue, as we get closer to polling day and voters (particularly the undecided) make more informed decisions. So the more unknown you are, the more likelihood of improvement, the only way I can go is up. 
From the article there is somewhere between a 9% and 25% undecided response and the article says that these voters have been allocated to parties “according to which party the respondent would prefer formed government”, which again inflates the Labor, Liberal and Green support. The undecided vote in pre-election polls predominantly goes to the smaller parties on polling day.
The Greens do seem to be doing remarkably well. And good on them! A third party is better that the two majors. Of course the greens have their faults which I won’t discuss in this post. However we will have to wait and see if the support for the Greens is real or not. If it is, then the Community Alliance will struggle, but it is likely that much of the Greens support at this stage is a protest vote, it means not Labor and not Liberal as the Greens are the next best recognized party.
The comment in the Canberra Times article about a coalition government is just uninformed crap! It just goes to show how little most of these ‘commentators’ know about the possibilities of our ACT Electoral System. The fantastic system here in the ACT allows the Assembly Members to choose a government without a coalition so why would Labor or Liberal make a non-party Member a Minister? And why would any party tie themselves into a non-flexible arrangement of having to support another party as government? Majority government whether as a coalition or not has the failings that are making Labor unpopular right now. I would be quite concerned about a Greens coalition government.
olie, October 4th 2008 |
Tags: Politics
Posted in Opinion
With the current financial crisis, Labor and Liberal have shown that they are completely unable to adapt to changing circumstances as they continue to make multi-million dollar promises of how they will spend taxpayers money. Although we are fairly well protected in Australia, there could well be impacts for the ACT’s budget. At the very least, we are entitled to know from the major parties how they intend to manage the uncertainty, and what promises they will break first. I advocate strongly for responsible financial management: putting the essentials first. I really do believe there should be some risk analysis to indicate the possible impact of a global financial crisis on the ACT’s economic and financial sustainability. It’s time for both Labor and Liberal to take a step back from their historical tendencies towards a frivolous wasting of ACT taxpayers money, The Liberals managed to overspend millions on a stadium, with painted green grass, and a now- defunct car race. And their management of public housing in the late 1990s is almost certainly at least partly responsible for the housing crisis. Labor’s record is no more impressive, with Rhodium, Firelink, bushfire appeals and busways, issues around land supply and planning, the data centre debacle, and the efforts to maintain the secrecy around school closures as notches on its own belt of mismanagement. The election spending spree is now at more than $800 million. While some promises are undoubtedly more deserving than others, now is a time in which we should be doing a very careful evaluation of exactly what should be spent as financial uncertainty looms. Money wasted in one area leads to a government crying that it is too poor to spend money on people’s needs. The Community Alliance has formed to represent people, not an ideology, and we will do our best to make sure their voices are heard in a new Assembly.
olie, October 1st 2008 |
Tags: Governance
Posted in Opinion
Why has it taken so long for ACT Labor to get the business case for a light rail system in Canberra together when submissions for the infrastructure Australia money were asked for at the beginning of the year? I think that a light rail system could be great for Canberra, as part of an integrated public transport solution. I’ve looked very carefully at the viability of a light rail system for Canberra. That said, our current transport arrangements, with minimal bus services and car-centred planning has got to change in a fundamental way if Canberra is to remain a great place to live. Integrating a system that is based around people’s actual movements, which also has the flexibility to adapt to changes in those movements, is just so important. We have the ability to do it right if we take the political compromises out of the equation and focus on a good outcome. Good public transport can really add to peoples quality of life, but bad public transport is a misery for users. We just can’t figure out why it has taken so long for this to get support from either of the two major parties. In 2001 the Stanhope Labor government said that they would do a business case. Seven years later, the contract to prepare a business case for light rail was awarded to Price Waterhouse Coopers. Canberrans are absolutely entitled to demand that our public transport systems are done on time and done right the first time (unlike the GDE project) and in a way that will enhance the quality of life for everyone who lives here. Of course, if the Community Alliance is part of a future ACT government then we will make sure that any new system is exactly what Canberra needs, by combining the best of expert advice with community consultation. We also think that any new projects for Canberra should consider using Australian solutions. Foreign is not better, as anyone who has ridden on the appalling new European-built C and D class trams in Melbourne will attest.
olie, September 30th 2008 |
Tags: Transport
Posted in Opinion
Just how much truth is the public entitled to know? Precious little, if the major parties are to be believed. The extravagant election promises made by ACT Labor and the Canberra Liberals, totalling $880 million so far according to Thursday’s issue of The Canberra Times, are extremely deceptive. What Liberal and Labor don’t tell you is that the calculations of how much money will be spent are based on a 5 or 6 year time frame. This makes them seem more impressive. This ‘Lib-Lab numbers game’ is essentially meaningless. It is a game in which promises to spend potential future revenue, and data about numbers of doctors, police or school class sizes are tossed around like confetti for the amusement of out-of-touch politicians. The relentless announcements of dollar amounts in funding and other statistics completely fail to address how the two major parties intend to deliver actual outcomes. Will they spend the allocated amount, even if the outcomes have been delivered with a smaller sum? Or, more likely, will they continue to spend on a process or policy which doesn’t work, just so they can say they kept their election promise? Of course, most likely of all is a simple broken promise. I belive that that it is party attitudes, decision-making processes, integrity and accountability that count for most with the ACT community. The Alliance will work with government and the community to develop long-term budgeting strategies that reflect community priorities and provide for recurrent funding of essential services like education, health, infrastructure, and the environment. Because The Alliance has such close ties to the Canberra Community, we have a policy focus that is grounded in practical, outcome based solutions. It is often the communities themselves that can tell government how best to help. This bottom-up approach is highly targeted and will deliver excellent value for ACT taxpayers. When will Liberal and Labor get it? It’s not about the dollars and statistics. Its about outcomes.
olie, September 28th 2008 |
Tags: Politics
Posted in Opinion
Nobody wants to talk about Canberra’s population growth! I have identified time and time again Labor’s one-eyed view of revenue growth, which is completely dependent upon unsustainable population growth in Canberra. This will have the effect of destroying the qualities that Canberrans love about their city. The only winner will be ACT Treasury. We need to take an honest look at what the maximum sustainable population actually is for the ACT. We need to have some long-term thinking, and some creativity about how to maintain or improve the quality of life for current and future ACT residents. Revenue is generated by increased population (quantity), or increased productivity (quality). In a ‘quantity vs quality’ debate, I know which side I want Canberra to be on. I will plan for quality into the future. Quality lifestyle, quality amenities, quality jobs and housing. It’s what our city was founded on, let’s take this idea into the 21st Century and use the best ideas to work out how to make Canberra’s population stable and sustainable. Without the necessary strategic planning, the Molonglo development could become like the worst of the western Sydney developments, with no facilities, no transport and no quality of life for the residents.”
olie, September 20th 2008 |
Tags: Housing, Planning, Population
Posted in Opinion
A payroll tax waiver system for new business is cautiously welcomed, but more must be done to support new business. The Community Alliance believes there is merit in the idea of reducing payroll tax in the first five years as long as it is administered in an open, accountable and equitable manner, and that’s the key issue. If we held balance of power, the Community Alliance would support a selection process of businesses for support that is fair and above board. Having an apolitical panel of accountants selecting businesses on the merits of their proposal is a sound idea. Our concern is that the Chief Minister’s proposal, for Cabinet to make the final decision, exposes the process to potential political abuse and favoritism and must be rejected. I am committed to working cooperatively with community, business and government agencies to create an environment that fosters small business and cuts through some of the red-tape and selective and anti-competitive practices that have increased in recent years. We have always said we will support good policy, and the part of this proposal that helps start-up businesses based on merit, is a good example of the sort of policy we would like to see more of. More broadly we are working progressively to bring affordable cuts in rates, charges and levies for government services and to ensure our tax burden is distributed fairly among ACT residents and businesses.
olie, September 15th 2008 |
Tags: Business, Governance
Posted in Opinion
Government have zero credibility on this issue, but I’m willing to cut them some slack. Instead of meeting with Bureacrats and Businessmen, I’ve got a list of community meetings that I’m personally inviting the Chief Minister and the Planning Minister to attend. There’s plenty of time for them to find room in their diary, as the first meeting is Wednesday next week. This is a lot more notice than the government has been giving the community. I’ll be attending them, and if the ministers would like a lesson in how to listen I’m happy to give it to them, because I’ve had a lot of practice. Give the consultants a holiday, and come and listen to the community. This “Citizen Centred Governance” report is 30 pages of unreadable bureaucratic drivel. Somehow, the Chief Minister has managed to make this issue much more complicated than it really is. It doesn’t take 30 pages to explain how to listen to the community. Canberra is full of intelligent, well educated people who are very good at stating their case. All the chief Minister has to do is turn up, put himself at the front of the room and listen. I’ll even demonstrate to him how it’s done, as I’ve got pretty good at it over the last few months. I’ve listened to all the community members who can’t get their voices heard by the government. One final note: sending ministers to meetings on State of Origin night, like the last Woden Community Council Meeting that the planning minister went to, doesn’t count – there was no-one there to ask questions. Ibelieve that Government Decision making BEGINS with Consultation, and not the other way round. In this government, ministers make bad policy decisions, then ‘sell’ the policy to the shocked community and call it consultation.
olie, August 28th 2008 |
Tags: Governance
Posted in Opinion
