An open thread where, at your weekend leisure, you can discuss anything you like.
63 Responses to “Saturday Salon”
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Kim”
One-hundred-and-oneth Salon ….. somewhere near first place -= perhaps.-
Second?? And I’m lost for words.
Jah Teh
Wot? Not on the Star Wars “A Long Tome Ago …” thread you weren’t.
Everyone:
If you think you’ve seen parking problems, check out what happened in Mumbai - it’s over on the Barista blog
No commentary on WorkDirections? Must be an honest mistake…
Graham Bell,
Your Barista link is an excellent example of the ardours of Technological Reincarnation. For a fusilage without wings, there can be no ascent into Hindu “Heaven”, without first absorbing the lessons of Mumbai “Limbo”. This particular pilgrim took five days.
As air-traffic-controller-in-chief, Shiva will not be trifled with.
Am I the only one who thinks that Matt Price doesn’t contribute anything to journalism?
Ratty tells the truth
http://petermartin.blogspot.com/2007/05/stop-this-multi-million-dollar.html
Enemy Combatant:
Aaah, so that’s why ……
Never had any trouble myself ascending from Mumbai’s old Santa Cruz …. then again, my needs were quite modest. FlightLevel 300 or thereabouts would do just fine, L=O=L
Matt Price ( and Susan Mausfart) don’t contribute much to journalism…but they do contribute to entertainment imho.
Well I’m off to the rugby with my Welsh spouse and daughter. There could be ructions in the togmob house tonight.
This strikes me as a curious story - is this big news in Australia?
http://www.smh.com.au/news/national/rein-defends-life-support/2007/05/26/1179601711711.html
This story has been developing for a few days I think but the relevance of the issue interests me. Does this indicate such practices will be acceptable in future under a Rudd government ?
For thiose using bigpond and are having problems viewing overseas sites like this one, apparently there is a problem with IP routing, especially in the 124.xxx.xxx.xxx range. A soultiuon to this is to disconnect and reconnect your ADSL modem, until you get an IP address that is not in that range.
ivap - I’m sure you’re not the only one; the world is full of stuffed shirts.
Weird scenes in Newstralia.
Yeah, Mr Polluted, this is a real problem that confuses the shit out of me. I’ll explain why I am stonkered further down. The other interesting aspect of this little family problem is that the government has been flogging Kevin with a feather over this. One can see that they could open up a wound but have decided to go soft. Obviously they wouldn’t want to be arguing against WorkMakesYouFree - well, d’oh - and by pursuing Kevin and Therese over this they would be bringing a dirty big spotlight onto the issue, which they themselves would like to go away. So perhaps this is a bit of you wash my bacxk and we’ll wash yours.
And one more thing, attacking Therese could upset businesswomen, and women generally, who apparently vote.
But this little gem appears in the Herald tomorrow:
(My emphasis)
News website yesterday reports that “…Rein personally signed a covering letter for a contract that stripped award conditions for just 45c extra an hour.”
So, this was defended as an “honest mistake”. Then thus here is the explanation of the mistake:
“In a statement, the company pointed the finger at the previous management of Frankston job agency, Your Employment Solutions.
“It said staff had been ‘misclassified’ under former management, and the error was continued when they transferred to common law contracts with WorkDirections.
“However the company continued to defend the 45c wage deal as fair.
“The arrangement offered to transferring employees involved the payment of an aggregated wage rate with an above-award component calculated to fairly compensate employees for their full award entitlements,” the company said.
The point about this is that it was Therese who bloody well signed a letter going to the workers, which in part said: “Our absolute priority is to ensure you feel secure about your future, and you have a full understanding of how the transition affects you…”
Together with the letter came the contract which replaced the employees right to overtime payments, payments for working on a Sunday, holiday pay, and so on. They were asked to sign this contract and in return they would get 45 cents an hour more. That is $3.35 a day extra, and I reckon this would easily breach the no-disadantage test. So this is hardly inheriting it, especially if you put your signature to a letter accompanying the contract!
What is it with these people? How does this square with the Light on the Hill? Is this fair dinkum beahviour for the wife of a future Labor prime minister who is getting a dream ride into office on the back of our disgust with the Tories’ mean and tricky handling of industrial relations? More importantly, does the notion, the concept, the idea, of the LABOR Party mean ANYthing?
Please, someone explain this to me, as my brain hurts.
PS At least Jeanette in ordering 40 grand’s worth of chairs didn’t disadvantage any workers. Quite ther opposite, really. I think I’m getting a touch of the Hitchens…
Ken,
If that’s what the Herald (are we talking SMH or Hun here) is running tomorrow, it’s basically a recycling of everything that News has already published.
How come Rein is getting away with it? How come it isn’t damaging Rudd?
Answer: They did something novel in Australian politics - they came clean. They haven’t tried to pretend that it didn’t happen, haven’t blamed the 58 staff members involved for accepting the contracts, or not raising the problem sooner and so on and so forth.
Alternatively, people really are so sick of Howard, Costello and the rest of them that they’re not bothered by it.
And when it comes to the light on the hill, let’s not forget that Bob Hawke found you could see it much better from the balcony of Bond’y penthouse
“I think therefore I am”, I write therefore I’m here! That’s all. See ya’s next week, until then stay left, there’s danger in being right, it leads to arrogance! Belief being the greatest danger in this world.
Leaving aside the issue of Rein’s involvement in a new workplace agreement, I think it is disappointing that the Rudd’s feel compelled to sell the Australian arm of the business. Surely they could have insulated her from any controversial bizz in the manner of a blind trust, a delegated authority or whatever. It’s a sad indictment of our political scene that a spouse can’t do their own thing. I mean Tony Blair didn’t order Cherie not to do any legal briefs while he was minding the westminster store.
GummoTrotsky:
Rudd is a politician; a component in Australia’ peculiar Two-Parties-One-Faction political system - it’s what we have come to expect of such people.
Far, far more important are Jackie Kelly’s stated reasons for not standing again for parliament. The deep hidden tectonic plates are shifting again …. so hang on.
Gummo Bronstein,
All right, Teh Rupertian has run it. You could hardly expect it not to. The main point is that it is true. News hasn’t put any particularly nasty spin on it. Yet.
The main reason why this is not - at this point - damaging Rudd is because the Tories are not going to exploit it to the hilt. They want Rudd in on the caper. He’s much less likely to use this whole issue (a very damaging issue which is hurting Howard & Co) if he owns part of it.
They have come clean because it was the only thing they could do. Not to come clean could have been fatal. It would have been the aggro handshake outside the studio times 10.
You are absolutely right in that people really are sick of Howard, Costello and the rest of them, and that the punters aren’t listening to the same old shit. But let’s face it, the reason why we desperately want a change of government is because the current one is, inter alia, is hellbent on rolling back workers’ hard won conditions and pay in the interests of corporations so the latter can make even more profit and reward its management with obscene amounts of money.
Most people are unhappy because they see the gravy train pulling into the station but they can’t get on - while carpetbaggers and and entreprenooers are making fistfuls of dollars, ordinary PAYE folk are going backwards.
Getting back to Therese. Even without this little revelation, how tenable would it have been for a wife of a prime minister to be running and profiting from a company that provides employees on contract to the federal government?
Ken,
Most of my glimpses into life in Newstralia come from the News bloggers and the News items they link too, such as this one at the Daily Terror. So they come with a lot of spin.
And that’s the problem with the reports from Newstralia - they’re always spun with emotive language. If the reporters and subbies just contented themselves with the facts occasionally, and trusted us readers to draw our own conclusions, they might actually score one or two percentage points for the government.
Now I need to go and have a long think about the significance of all this.
When I first learned that Therese Rein had made a motza out of the old CES privatisation, alarm bells rang. The Job Network provider set-up can be a [government] licence to print money but the outcomes for clients are much less obvious. “Placement” can mean lots of things but the wellbeing of those “placed” isn’t generally a prime consideration. “Training schemes” are also widely variable in quality. Often they’re “going through the motions” activities where skill acquisition is far less important than filing the funding claims generated by through-put.
Not all Job Network providers are shonky and I’m not suggesting that Therese Rein’s companies are offenders in this respect, but she is operating in a government contract-funded corporate culture that trades heavily in the human stress zone between Centrelink payment reliance and denial of benefits and I think it’s an uncomfortable place for a potential Labor PM’s spouse to be.
I don’t think the issue is about Therese Rein’s right to run a business as Kevin Rudd’s wife - of course she has that right. For mine, it’s much more about the issues relating to the nature of the business that she has been running.
“I don’t think the issue is about Therese Rein’s right to run a business as Kevin Rudd’s wife - of course she has that right. For mine, it’s much more about the issues relating to the nature of the business that she has been running.”
Nicely put Geoff Honnor.
Job Networks, their government contracts and performance need the proper scrutiny that only an open minded, independent opposition can bring. We are looking at individuals becoming extremely wealthy and certain church organisations building up even larger empires, off the backs of those unable to gain fair employment, as things are now.
Not sure how Labor can get in there with the big hoover, that this area so obviously needs, when their leader has indirectly benefited , so much, from it’s present trickle up arrangements.
As an ex-CES person, I’m fully with Geoff and Joe2 on this matter. It is practically a licence to print money the way it was set up, modified only when the Kemp vision became clearly unworkable.
Even then Abbott probably saved the thing from collapsing - but the price as Joe2 said was increasing the empires of church and community organisations and a distinctly compromised interdependence between community groups and government. I don’t know if a new government will be brave enough to untangle it and replace it with … what?
I doubt if the Swiftboaters will keep pushing this one for various reasons mentioned. One interesting point is that Work Directions apparently has done well out of placing seriously disadvantaged jobseekers. In my regional knowledge (Western Vic) those on the Job Network gravy train have generally shunned this segment in favour of the easier and more frequent rewards from placements of more job-ready people.
Geoff, Its about the hypocrisy of Kevin Rudd, his wife and the left-leaning commentators on LP who slam the WorkChoices legislation repeatedly but turn a blind eye when the wife of the opposition leader uses the same legislation for her material gain.
It is total and inexcusable hypocrisy.
Well Harry, to get technical - she didnt use Workchoices at all.The employees were on Common law individual contracts, not AWAs.
In some ways, thats worse - as its illegal to cut below award conditions under common law arrangements.
Thats its perfectly legal under the AWA statutory contracts is the problem with the legislation.
I agree it wasnt a good look. Hopefully this will shift ALP tactics away from naming ans shaming (not that its been as big a feature as Howard and Paul Kelly makes out) to making the argument that the only parties to be blamed are the government. These businesses are acting lawafully - the prblem is the law.
As for Paul Kelly’s absurb and tendentious piffle this morning about “a feint whiff of class war” - well, f*ck me - what is Workchoices but a full frontal pong of class war?
Harry, I doubt that the hypocrisy of Larvatus Prodeo bloggers and commenters is a big issue with either the electorate or the Newstralian muckrakers.
As for me - well, I’m withholding my opinion on Rein as a Job Network operator until everybody shuts the hell up and stops yelling at me trying to tell me what I’m supposed to think. I suspect that a lot of others are responding to the reportage from Newstralia the same way.
“As for Paul Kelly’s absurb and tendentious piffle this morning about “a feint whiff of class warâ€? - well, f*ck me - what is Workchoices but a full frontal pong of class war ”
I don’t spend much time reading News corporation’s journalists various musings but the absence of a raving , extreme to the point of absurdity style of attack on the Rudd Family had me wondering what elements was I missing with this situation? So if WorkChoices is a full frontal attack on the working classes why is the Leader of the Opposition’s wife putting money in her pocket from it? This ability to differentiate so finely between the interests of any one individual may be a fine testimony to the maturity of the electorate but it would also seem to be a fertile place to dirty for mud.Mud to attack the poll frontrunner , the face of the new way to govern Australia .
Gummo’s useful observation -
“And when it comes to the light on the hill, let’s not forget that Bob Hawke found you could see it much better from the balcony of Bond’y penthouse ”
I find this more reassuring- say one thing , do another , keep the NSW Labor Right on side and eventually what manner of things might get up?Are we going to see the rehabilitation of Richo?
Back to the future anyone ?
Well if it’s raving, extreme absurd attacks on Rudd you’re looking for, Bolt’s blog and the comments on his posts are the place to find ‘em.
H,
Perhaps you are revealing your own standards and expectations, formed long ago, but you are actually implying that hypocrisy is okay for the Coalition, that is to say, there are always excuses for their hypocrisy, but not for Labor because we, you inclded, expect a higher standard from them. And I agree with that.
In the end I guess we have to support Labor Lite, regardless, because as Hilaire Belloc once said:
If Harry does a search of the archives here, I think he’ll find a lot of criticism of both the Job Network and also Labor’s great moving right show under Rudd.
Rein, an extremely successful businesswoman, sacrifices her career so her husband can obtain political power. And the Fairfax press has the nerve to call her a role model…
Good grief.
BBB
In the rush to find a way to condemn Rudd and his wife over this thing, a couple to things are worth remembering:
1. The contracts under which these people were underpaid were signed before Ms Reins company actually bought the organisation in question,
2. The error was found as a result of an investigation launched shortly after the purchase,
3. The employees have already been repaid the money they were owed, and the company is still trying to track down 8 who have since left, and
4. The underpayment was illegal under the common law contract system, but perfectly legal under “Workchoices” (which one would you rather have in your workplace?).
Its a complete non-story really, but in a politically charged atmosphere, that means nothing. Did anybody else notice that this story seemed to be getting most of its steam from the ABC, especially Virginia Trioli? I dont think I imagined that.
Does anybody know where it came from in the first place?
But Pre dawn Leftist re your first point , from Ken Scott above -
“But this little gem appears in the Herald tomorrow:
The Office of Workplace Services is investigating the case of 58 staff at Victoria-based Your Employment Solutions (YES) who were moved to common law contracts AFTER the company was bought last year by Ms Rein’s firm, WorkDirections Australia.
(My emphasis)
News website yesterday reports that “…Rein personally signed a covering letter for a contract that stripped award conditions for just 45c extra an hour.�
So, this was defended as an “honest mistake�. Then thus here is the explanation of the mistake:
“In a statement, the company pointed the finger at the previous management of Frankston job agency, Your Employment Solutions.
“It said staff had been ‘misclassified’ under former management, and the error was continued when they transferred to common law contracts with WorkDirections.
“However the company continued to defend the 45c wage deal as fair. “”
So in the all too typical way of these problems the facts are clouded out and responsibility for decisions is not easily tracked.
Skies, the lack of a full attack on Rein is no doubt because the coalition are hoping it will make the ALP go a bit easier on their Achilles heel of Serfchoices.
Even though its not strictly related to the legislation in question, it will certainly seem like it is in the public arena.
Again, double edged for the coalition - how much do they play yet another example of how crap employees can be treated?
It was supposed to be the big rabbit for the Liberals to get traction against Rudd and hold him over a barrel until election day but the sale has turned it into another coalition misfire and that has been the story of the coalitions mud throwing tactics all year. Piers was almost wetting himself with excitement over the issue on Insiders this morning.
I’m sure that with the coalition continuing with the same tactics the polls and bookies will react to the same results we have had from past mud slinging exercises this year.
Lefty E - I don’t doubt your ideas are right on this but the spinners for the Libs must be beside themselves trying to work out how to exploit this situation.
After Gummo’s suggestion I read some News Corp blogs - a strange experience in itself but the tone there is very aggressive towards what could be construed as a double standard being exercise by the commercial interests of the Rudds.
Piers Akerman has apparently uncovered more evil goings on with the german branch of the company and it’s role in obtaining working visas for skilled workers. “Taking jobs from aussies ” is the cry but again this could all prove to be beyond the ability of the journalists involved to get to the facts in the case.
“Labor’s great moving right show under Rudd”. Yes ,if it keeps on going then we can all look forward to enthusiastically discussing and workshopping which group of elite managers/pollies will best control their marketing plan so as to spread a sense of well-being to our oneness as a society. Division will be so passe.
“One interesting point is that Work Directions apparently has done well out of placing seriously disadvantaged jobseekers. In my regional knowledge (Western Vic) those on the Job Network gravy train have generally shunned this segment in favour of the easier and more frequent rewards from placements of more job-ready people” says Don Wigan.
A great point there.
Work Directions Miracles.
How does Mother Therese do it?
And further to that, no prob with a god fearing women making money from government contracts.
Still, what if there is a bit of opinion about, that the Howard governments privatised employment policy stinks?
That it might be appropriate for the opposition , in developing new policy, to redirect a lot more of the funds towards the people that the system was set up to help.
Just askin’?
Don’t worry about the FBS. I saw his greasy features on Insiders (why do I do it to myself?) and he says he has “uncovered” visa rorts… except that he wouldn’t be able to uncover anything except the lid to a saucepan with grub in it that someone else has cooked, so he can stick his fat finger in to taste it.
How would the government exploit this situation? Harry knows.
Harry blogs here at 1.49pm and says “Hypocrisy” and at 6pm it’s on the news: the government’s line is: “Hypocrisy”.
Exactly! Lefty, as you point out, the ALP and others ought to focus on the principles involved (or lack thereof) not those people who are simply making a living (legally).
Politically, however, it is difficult to make the point of principle(s) without using some real life examples of the consequences of those principles.
But they should try.
Maybe, we have just reached the point where Ri¢hie Ri¢h and wife need to come up clean, or move corporate.
No point in waiting, till just before the election and we are disappointed again by another non-starter/rip off.
Isn’t it a little bit strange that ordinary folks are relying again, on people to rule, who do not seem, to have a clue?
From the day Rudd won the Leadership, there have been hints and whispers from the right that the real game of the election will be the attack on the Business dealings of his wife.
The story is over but some like Piers will battle on for a week or two like they did over the Brian Burke fiasco they beat up.
If this government was going to fix workchoices they would have by now and the same goes for fixing the Jobnetwork which has been a dysfunctional beast since the day it was introduced.
Screams of hypocrisy from desperate Howard supporters who cheered themselves hoarse for 11 years are a bit late as the show has moved on.
“If this government was going to fix workchoices they would have by now and the same goes for fixing the…… Jobnetwork which has been a since the day it was introduced.”
Steve you have got it.
Sadly, this “dysfunctional beast” is likely to continue, because labor may well continue this insanity. Because it will possibly hurt those who have done nicely, and destroy established roosts.
Ken Scott
‘How would the government exploit this situation? Harry knows.
Harry blogs here at 1.49pm and says “Hypocrisyâ€? and at 6pm it’s on the news: the government’s line is: “Hypocrisyâ€?.’
I am driving their agenda Ken?
I have to make sure that the surge of power I feel after reading this utter nonsense is not just my consequent need to visit the bathroom.
Spot on, Joe2. Sadly, it seems a bit like education and schools. Even a token effort is going to attract unwelcome partisanship. I’d imagine it’ll quietly be ignored on the Beazley principle of not opening up too many fronts. Let’s hope that if elected they have enough courage to do something about it.
Everyone:
Hate to spoil all the fun ….
…. but it was under the Hawke, Keating and Howard governments that the Commonwealth Employment Service - long-overdue for reform and modernization - morphed into our present gold-plated Employment Prevention Program. It was under the same three prime ministers that Training turned from something that improved productivity, profitability and customer satisfaction into Rort Central [and b.t.w., don’t hold your breath waiting for a Royal Commission into the families of senior bureaucrats and politicians being “trained” under the National Employment & Training Scheme during the Whitlam and Fraser years]
Howard’s lame duck “economic argument” against greenhouse gas reductions (which, incidentally, he’s never outlined for us - merely asserted) has just been shot down.
Its dead, but will probably still flap on in his mind.
http://www.abc.net.au/news/newsitems/200705/s1934458.htm
I agree wpd. My suggestion (and to be honest, they have mainly done this) would be to name and not shame.
ie ‘and here’s yet another business - doing whats now lawful under John Howard’s workchoices.’
The Bugle won’t give up on THerese.
http://www.theaustralian.news.com.au/story/0,20867,21804428-601,00.html
True Frank, but the voters won’t give up on their intolerance of this inept Government either.
How can Therese Rein be accused on any form of misconduct, if she had placed staff with employers that have provided AWAs, its what every Job Network Provider has done. Is she supposed to refuse to place clients in such jobs, and then breach them for not looking for “suitable” work (from what hear if you are unemployed, you are not allowed to refuse to take a job that offers an AWA). This has to be up their as the most hypocritical page-one stories I can think of, unlike the earlier revelations, its a non-story.
Thanks for that, Frank. Wow! They don’t give up, do they? The assumption seems to be that if the Rudd-Rein motives were all that pure, Workdirections simply would have put a ban on taking vacancies from employers wanting to apply Workchoices.
Agree with steve. Even when they can draw a scratch, they’re not doing the slightest good for the Government’s Workchoices policy.
Today’s Herald Sun Voteline is asking readers: “Should gay pubs be allowed to ban heterosexuals?”
The newspaper reports today that the Victorian Civil and Administrative Tribunal has granted “an exemption to the Equal Opportunity Act” which effectively prohibits entry to “non-homosexuals”.
Concerned about heterosexual patrons entering the pub “in large groups”, VCAT Deputy Cate McKenzie has expressed concern that “This would undermine or destroy the atmosphere which the company wishes to create” because the straight groups may outnumber the gay men, instead creating the atmosphere which results in “sexually based insults and violence towards gay male patrons”.
During the application for the exemption, the intended changes were advertised within The Peel Hotel itself and attracted no public objections, yet now that it’s a public enough issue to even attract the attention of Channel Seven’s Sunrise this morning, it will be interesting to get the public reaction from Herald Sun readers.
One of my concerns reflects a question raised by Sunrise newsreader Natalie Barr, which was along the lines of “how can you tell if someone is heterosexual”?
Another of my concerns is this statement from VCAT’s Cate McKenzie, stating the reason for the Equal Opportunity exemption:
“Sometimes heterosexual groups and lesbian groups insult and deride and are even physically violent towards the gay male patrons.”
Does this mean the lesbian groups will now behave themselves towards these “gay male victims”, now you have the “violent heterosexuals” kept outside the pub?
VCAT’s Cate McKenzie reveals that:
“(This exemption) seeks to give gay men a space in which they may, without inhibition, meet, socialise and express physical attraction in a non-threatening atmosphere.”
What VCAT’s decision does not reveal is that this is ultimately a proprietary space that’s “marketed to gay men”.
So while today’s Herald Sun report reveals that our gay male victims have recently been made to feel like “zoo animals” in a way that devalues and dehumanises them, The Peel Hotel is next month involved in the marketing of an event called “Southern HiBearnation - the largest bear event in the Southern Hemisphere” - an event that turns men into bears “without any violence” from heterosexuals.
As a current student of Public Relations, I find the “rhetoric” that’s been used by The Peel Hotel to be worthy of further public scrutiny, especially given the inclusion of lesbians in identifying the problem and only the exclusion of heterosexuals in identifying a solution.
…From Justin
Bear Cave:
If homosexuals want to claim a pub where they can feel safe and relaxed with each other without being pestered by those who don’t share their lifestyle …. well, good luck to them [but just count me out thanks].
However, when I heard an extended news item on that issue I was disgusted. Every term used to describe the discrimination and injustice against these gays and lesbians could have been equally applied to the majority of Viet-Nam War veterans - yet none of the useless bureaucratic ornaments that pretend to be anti-discrimination bodies has ever lifted a finger. The hypocrisy of it stinks to high heaven.
I don’t begrudge gays and lesbians anything - but it would be a nice change if these bureaucrats earned their keep by being less selective in what discrmination they choose to deal with and waht discrimination they choose to ignore!
Thankyou for that reply Graham.
I am very much focusing on the rhetoric being used - Every term used to describe the discrimination and injustice alleged in the Peel Hotel case.
The comparison with the Viet-Nam War veterans is a fair call and helps me to put some of the Public Relations theory I am learning into context.
…From Justin
An interesting result from yesterday’s media publicity given to the Peel Hotel issue.
The Herald Sun’s Voteline asked readers “Should gay bars be allowed to ban heterosexuals?”
From a total of 1617 votes, 57% said “yes” (923 votes) and 43% said “no” (694 votes).
Given such a ratio of 57:43 would appear to be as significant as the similar 60:40 ratio we currently get between Labor and Liberal in the opinion polls, it may seem that there’s a significant majority that approve of the Peel Hotel’s new policy.
However, insights expressed by people such as Graham Bell in this thread and listeners to nighttime talkback radio programs hosted last night by Kym Ferguson (on Regional Radioworks Network) and Bryan Carlton (on Triple M) were still worth taking note of to determine the in-depth, underlying reasons and motivations of the general public regarding this issue.
I get the impression that there’s a bit of a barrier to the general public gaining a full understanding of this issue and the quantitative research conducted by the Herald Sun is not altogether indicative of concerns raised in the qualitative feedback.
I assume this is because most people in the population are not directly affected by the issue anyway. Still, I appreciate the coverage the media gave to this landmark decision.
For those who wish to form a more in-depth, informed opinion on this matter, here’s a list of active resources:
The ABC’s overview coverage:
link
The decision in detail
link
Rodney Croome’s gay advocate position on the issue:
link
Debate at the gay community level:
link
…From Justin
BearCave:
Aren’t Pubs actually Public Houses? Open to one-and-all provided they had money and behaved themselves? Not the same thing as a Club - which one would expect to be exclusive. Could this whole issue been avoided if the establishment was a Club rather than a Pub?
Dolly kow-tows for the Indonesia Lobby and speaks for all Australians who insist upon Trade before Justice.
“Mr Downer says Australians need to be sensitive to Indonesia’s concept of humiliation.”
http://www.abc.net.au/news/newsitems/200705/s1938403.htm
Not that “Australians need to be sensitive to” the genocide of 200,000 East Timoreans, “after all we’ve done for them”, or the murder and official cover-up of the Balibo Five, or simply, any other other little “things that splatter” like that.
Twining’s tea anyone?
Grahem Bell wrote:
“Aren’t Pubs actually Public Houses? Open to one-and-all provided they had money and behaved themselves?”
The Peel has two dance floors in addition to the traditional Pub offer of the bar, lounge area and pool tables.
At the same time, there’s no adjoining TAB agency on the site where you can place a bet on the horses or dogs
There’s also no Chicken Parmigiana or Frog in a Pond jelly on any bistro menu
So I’m not so convinced you can apply a narrow definition of “pub” in determining the validity of VCAT’s decision regarding The Peel.
My major concern is the painting of heterosexual men as groups of bullies, heterosexual women as hens night groupies and lesbians as militant pool players, while also painting gay men as the “victims” of these other groups - groups that “just happen to be” the rest of the human population other than gay men
People are being classed, then generalised, according to who they are rather than the way they as individuals behave. Suddenly, the rest of the human population is regarded as a problem rather than as a challenge.
Given there was already a previous step taken that granted “men-only” status other gay-marketed venues (including a pub) in the same suburban district, I’m questioning how genuine the need really is to grant an even greater exemption from equal opportunity law, which I now understand also excludes lesbians (something I hadn’t initially understood).
It is now appropriate to wait and see just how discreetly these exemptions are implemented.
…From Justin
The Productivity Commission report on Indigenous Disadvantage is here.
Has the Federal government any role in this matter ?
Does the person who was going to be summonsed have a history that might explain what happened ?
The view from here is of a very aggressive ,rather offensive manner being used by the police and courts. The BBC reported that the government hadn’t apologised - but I assumed that this would be a diplomatic affair rather than a state matter. So Iemma’s apology seems weird as well.
http://www.smh.com.au/news/national/iemma-terribly-weak-widow/2007/06/01/1180205492878.html
I hate privilege.
The way the police did this does seem strange and ill advised. Someone I am sure is getting a kicking in the backside over this.
I don’t like what Downer said. But those in power everywhere have weird form of altruistic, self preserving rationalism whereby they pay overdue respect for each other.
Many cultures in south east Asia are far more elitist and class divided than our own. They have much more sense of entitlement than our own mob.