Giving away the pokies?
If you take the figures in the Victorian Auditor-General’s report on the auction of pokie licenses as gospel, it’s arguably the most single most financially costly mistake the Bracks-Brumby government made. The report estimates that a fair market value for [...]
Andrew Bolt sued under Victorian Racial and Religious Tolerance Act
Right-wing Herald Sun columnist has been sued under Victoria’s Racial and Religious Tolerance act: HERALD Sun columnist Andrew Bolt is being sued under the Racial Vilification Act by a group of Aborigines led by 73-year-old activist Pat Eatock over two [...]
Quick link: Bowe on what’s happening in the Senate
William Bowe has all the news on the shifting dynamic in the Senate. We know The Greens have won a Senator in each state, bringing them up to 9 Senators when the Senators elected yesterday take their seats on 1 [...]
Senate group preference tickets released by AEC
The AEC has released the Senate group preference tickets online. For those who might not be aware of how this works, if you vote “above the line” (that is, if you put a 1 in one of the parties’ or [...]
The politics of health: COAG and beyond
With the Council of Australian Governments meeting for a second successive day to deliberate on the federal government’s National Health and Hospitals Network plan, the usual suspects are proclaiming that there will be no deal, which will be a disaster [...]
Teach for Queensland
The Queensland government is pondering the introduction of the ‘Teach for Australia‘ model into state schools. The idea, trialled in Victoria and inspired by an American programme, is to fast track graduates with Bachelor’s degrees in any discipline into classrooms [...]
Blame the Minister?
Media reporting suggests that Victorian Public Transport Minister Lynne Kosky’s departure was indeed for “family reasons”. Whatever the details (and they of course aren’t our business), good luck to her and her family as she confronts what sounds like a [...]
Loy Yang Power buys carbon offsets
Here’s an interesting sign of things to come. Loy Yang Power has bought 100 000 Certified Emissions Reductions in a pre-emptive strike on regulation of the electricity market under the CPRS. Two points worth making: this is a drop in [...]
SA to challenge Victoria's water trading rules in High Court
In a move that will undoubtedly go down well with their constituents, the South Australian government is going to sue the “upstream states” in the High Court to force trade in Murray-Darling Basin water to be de-restricted. Mike Rann’s statement [...]
Fire disaster appeal
A number of commenters on a previous post raised the good idea of a dedicated fire disaster donations appeal thread. As I reminded folks on that thread, I posted a link on Tuesday to John Quiggin’s appeal. His thread is [...]
Possum versus Bolt
Possum takes on Andrew Bolt on the topic of his distorted and inflammatory misuse of statistics: Andrew Bolt has been banging on about Africans again- Sudanese and Somalian born Africans in particular and their crime rates compared to the Victorian [...]
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