A sad statement?  What are you on AFL?

So your saying media outlets should give Labor a free run?

They're reporting the facts.  The Orgill report contained good/bad information about the BER program AFL, money was wasted, the program was mismanaged and taxpayers were not given value for money - simple as that.

You govern, you have to expect scrutiny.....
whether its from the ABC, SBS or The Australian.

We live in a democracy.

so 99% of the projects were fine - seems that hitting a 1% problem rate on a program of this size, rolled out as quickly as it was is pretty bloody good

Rubbish 99%.

What nonsense.

READ THE REPORT.  ffs

Fair dinkum AP, just a shame about some of the content.

AFL.  Tell me WTF does John Howards book have to do with the Building the Education Revolution.

READ THE REPORT FOR YOURSELF!  Fair dinkum.

http://www.bertaskforce.gov.au/

AFL and wombleoz figure....

Why read the report when I can just copy and paste BULLsh1t straight out of Google...............

I think its also reasonable to question Mr Orgills generous words for the government prior to his involvement in this taskforce.

His not exactly a man of objectivity.

It's like if during the Howard Government, Howard recruited Andrew Bolt to examine potential wastage and mismanagement of a massive billion-dollar program.

I mean....
ffs

I can see from your comments and wombleoz two cents worth (which is basically praise for the farcical percentages and stats you post) - that you both have not read the report itself and basically mouth word for word the nonsense that dribbles from various Labor MP's.

Really credible guys.

I was using the figures posted by AFL

* The review team closely examined 57 projects, nearly all of which were drawn from “the most egregious complaints received by the Taskforce or were selected from our reading of media reports”. Seventeen of those 57 projects were found to fail the value-for-money criteria established by the review team.
    * Extrapolating that 17/57 figure across all complaints (even though the selected projects were “the most egregious”) suggests the rate of valid complaints about value for money is 0.9% of all projects.
    * The review has lowered its estimate of how much more the NSW government paid in order to deliver its projects quickly, from 5-6% to “at the bottom of that range, around 5 per cent”.

And Jez, Jez Jez Jez - how many times have you had a go at us for "playing the man not the ball"

I think its also reasonable to question Mr Orgills generous words for the government prior to his involvement in this taskforce.

His not exactly a man of objectivity.

It's like if during the Howard Government, Howard recruited Andrew Bolt to examine potential wastage and mismanagement of a massive billion-dollar program.

I mean....
ffsLaugh


Practice what you preach perhaps???

Tony Abbott launches political attack over Christmas Island boat tragedy

From: AAP

THE Christmas Island boat disaster may have been avoided with tougher asylum-seeker policy, Tony Abbott declared this morning, sharply raising the political stakes in the tragedy.  And he has formally declined Coalition involvement in Julia Gillard's proposed new bipartisan committee.

The Opposition leader said this morning that as long as people-smuggling existed, the risk of disaster remained.

"What happened at Christmas Island last week was just a terrible, terrible tragedy," Mr Abbott told reporters in Sydney.

"It is important that we put policies in place as quickly as humanly possible that do offer the prospect of stopping the boats."

Mr Abbott said previous Coalition policy had worked in the past and he did not believe a new bipartisan committee proposed by the government was needed.

"I don't think we need any new processes and that's why today I've written to the Prime Minister, politely declining her suggestion of the establishment of a new committee," he said.

The Coalition's policy on asylum-seekers includes the introduction of temporary protection visas, offshore processing including opening the Nauru detention centre and turning boats around when it is safe to do so.

Mr Abbott said previous Coalition policy had resulted in fewer boats coming to Australia.

"There is far less capacity for tragedy if there are far fewer boats and far fewer people coming here."

Immigration Minister Chris Bowen said Mr Abbott had missed a good offer by rejecting the committee.

“It's a matter for Mr Abbott as to how he chooses to get his briefings,” Mr Bowen told reporters in Sydney.

“It was a good offer made in good faith, some people may be surprised that he has rejected that offer but it is entirely a matter for him and I'm not critical of him for it.”

s Gillard this week promised to establish a bipartisan "working group" comprising the government, the opposition, the Greens and a member of the independents to share information.

The group would meet before the end of the year and again in the new year if necessary. "This is an unusual step, but one I've determined to undertake because I believe it's important that the comprehensive facts are available to all," Ms Gillard said.

But the proposal immediately drew a frosty response from the Coalition, with Mr Abbott expressing surprise at the news.

The independents also criticised the proposal, with NSW MP Rob Oakeshott describing the idea as "questionable".

Mr Bowen also said today that Mr Abbott's suggestion to re-open the Nauru detention centre was not possible.

“The Liberal Party insists on the line that there is a detention centre ready and waiting in Nauru - there is not,” he said.

“The detention centre in Nauru closed, half of it is a school, other parts of it have been dismantled and moved around the island, some of it is government offices.”

Nationals Senate leader Barnaby Joyce said this morning that Australia's immigration policies should be designed to make people smuggling a “completely unattractive and worthless proposition”.

But he warned politicians against using the Christmas Island tragedy as a springboard for policy discussions and debate.

“(The public) will be very reticent if you try to use that as some sort of moral bulwark or leverage to try and change the policy agenda to an issue about immigration,” Senator Joyce told Sky News.

He admitted Coalition members had been briefed on how to respond publicly to the tragedy but said it wasn't really necessary.

“It's self-evident that if you go and try and pin this one personally to someone in Australia, no matter who that is, inside or outside the political field, then people will call you for it.”

Senator Joyce stressed any decision about turning boats around, a key plank of the Liberal-Nationals' border protection plan, should be made by the Navy, not political figures in Canberra.

I am waiting for the day, and i could be the waiting a long time, for the media to start having a crack at Abbott for treating the population like idiots - "stop the boats" - he thinks, and he is right at the moment, that he just has to say those 3 words and not discuss the issue at all to win votes - it's a disgrace. I think he used his 3 word slogan around 5 times in his press conference today.

Chris Bowen's response was pretty good - now we just need someone to ask Abbott if he'll close down the school and government offices that are running in the detention centre on Nauru???  It's not just sitting there mothballed

Julia tried to play politics by going with the committee - but hey, she's a politician so that's to be expected

It's all good though, Commander Abbott is ready and willing to tell the navy to turn the boats around

IDIOT [smiley:crazy]

Why would they have a crack at him?  Not sure how you find this so funny wombleoz, I really don't.

Stop the boats and dozens of people may not have perished near Christmas Island, wombleoz.  You ever think about that? [>o]

Course not.

I don't know how you can by default support the people smuggling trade and the again, by default encouragement of leaky boats - with REAL people on board - men, women and children - risking there lives.

Wake up and have a closer look at the carnage and the dead.  This is real life, real people and real deaths.  You get it?

I'll tell you what a disgrace is - Gillard, as Prime Minister of this nation, showing not an ounce of leadership, wombleoz. 

Gillard Labor's answer to such a horrific and stark event:  a committee - yet another fkn review.  FFS.

You let this slide as "Julia being a politician" - the self-proclaimed MOVING FORWARD (27 times in a presser) Queen - yet you've got gall to ridicule Tony Abbott for pointing out the obvious.

You stop the boats.
You stop the deaths.

You disagree.  But what are the almighty Gillard Labor-Green Coalition doing?  Oh thats right, having a chinwag about it for the next 12 months - a REVIEW/COMMITTEE - suppose they are hoping that they can cheaply achieve bipartisanship and flog the issue off as a shared responsibility.

Moving on from that.

Whilst you babble on blindly supporting this pathetic excuse for a government - imo this government is in deep trouble and is entering a dangerous phase - leadership whispers are not far away, I'll give her 3 months into the new year before the faceless men re-emerge.

Every time Gillard speaks, whether in parliament or at a presser, she appears shaken, surprised and not at all confident.  This government is slipping away - this country is eager, ready and desperate for LEADERSHIP.

An Abbott Government is around the corner.

A diminished Gillard caught in a storm of her own making
Paul Sheehan - Sydney Moring Herald December 20, 2010

The most surprising aspect of Julia Gillard's first day of facing parliamentary questioning as the newly elected Prime Minister was her demeanour. Gone was the woman who had made an art of confidence, even mockery, during question time. On this day, September 29, she was pale and nervous. She even said the government's home insulation program ''was beset by problems. It became a mess''.

Australia's first woman Prime Minister was clearly shaken from having just emerged from a terrible election campaign. She had lost the election. More members sat opposite her, and on the crossbenches, than sat with her government. That she was still Prime Minister was due only to a political fluke, a statistical improbability, and the moral gymnastics of two rank opportunists, the independent MPs Robert Oakeshott and Tony Windsor. This pair managed to turn the lowest combined vote in the entire nation for Labor and the Greens into a mandate for a Labor government, propped up by the Greens.

Three months on from her near-death experience, Gillard has still not grown into her new role. Never did this seem more evident than in the aftermath of the tragedy at Christmas Island with asylum seekers dying in the surf. What did she do in this moment of crisis? She called for a committee.

It is impossible to exaggerate the failure of Gillard and her government in their policies towards boat people. She was the principle author of a policy paper, Protecting Australia, Protecting the Australian Way, which became Labor policy. This policy has managed to create the worst of both worlds: cruel yet ineffective. And ludicrously expensive, like almost everything else this government does.

The detention centres are bulging. More are sprouting up. A detention centre has been set up in a Brisbane hotel. Another in Darwin. Another in Melbourne. Another at a remote air force base in Western Australia. Another at a second remote air force base in north Queensland. A defence housing site in the Adelaide Hills has been turned into yet another detention centre, to the consternation of the locals. As for Christmas Island, it became saturated a year ago.

The vast majority of those arriving by boat are being granted residency. The approval rate is roughly twice that of applicants processed by the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR). This is a green light to the people-smuggling trade.

The High Commissioner for Refugees has warned that large numbers claiming asylum status in Australia are not refugees. The government has been slow to handle legitimate refugee claims. It has been slow to handle illegitimate claims. Detention centres have seen riots, demonstrations, hunger strikes, self-harm and suicide by asylum seekers.

The courts are clotted with immigration appeals. The law itself has been rendered uncertain. The refugee intake quota has stayed set at 13,500, which means boat people are significantly displacing those awaiting processing by the UNHCR. This is the ''queue'' that refugee advocates pretend does not exist. It is another green light for people-smuggling.

The government has failed to prosecute those who blew up an asylum boat in 2009, killing five and injuring 40. It capitulated to demands from people with zero leverage during a standoff with Sri Lankans aboard the Oceanic Viking.

Almost 200 boatloads have arrived since Labor came to government. The people-smuggling trade is thriving. The budget for handling the refugee intake has blown out. Expensive charter flights are shuffling asylum seekers around the country. Children have drowned. Families have been separated.

All this manifold policy failure was compounded by Gillard when she came up with the panicky initiative of proposing an offshore refugee processing centre in East Timor. It was a ludicrous idea. East Timor is a failed state. It cannot be relied upon for anything.

During her first question time as an elected prime minister on September 29, Gillard was asked, with no delicacy, about yet another emergency Band-Aid being applied to the asylum seeker backlog:

Warren Entsch (Liberal National Party): ''I refer to the government's claim prior to and during the election that asylum seekers will not be housed at RAAF Base Scherger, nor would an immigration detention centre be built at RAAF Base Scherger. Now that the government has announced that RAAF Base Scherger will be used as a detention centre, how can anybody believe any promise made by this government?''

Gillard: ''I think we should be a little bit clear about the facts. What has been announced by the government is that the base will be used for short-term accommodation, while longer term options are investigated.''

This was misleading. On August 2, three weeks before the federal election, The Cairns Post reported that preparations were under way at the base to install a high-wire fence and outdoor lighting.

The newspaper quoted a government spokesman saying: ''On current plans, asylum seekers will not be housed at RAAF Scherger. Nor will an immigration detention centre be built at RAAF Scherger.''

Within weeks of the election, Scherger had become a detention centre. It now houses 300 male asylum seekers. This is all a Gillard-owned debacle on a scale even greater than her gold-plated Building the Education Revolution.

Even so, none of this is an excuse for the odious accusations that have been assiduously constructed by refugee advocates that the Gillard government, specifically the navy, was partly culpable for the drowning deaths of 30 asylum seekers at Christmas Island on Wednesday.

The moral chain in this matter is not complex. The people who sold places on the boat, and bought places on the boat, were assiduous in avoiding the process of legal arrival and safe passage. The protection of the state does not extend to illegal entry through ocean storms.

yes as it will be the last full year of mankind......it all ends for us in 2012

Don't know how you figure that wombleoz.  I believe your side is a first term government that lost its majority, bloodied its first term PM and has bungled and busted anything it set itself too!

Tony Abbott is in a strong position.

In fact, the Coalition are in a strong position and 2011 will be a big year of policy redevelopment.  It's an exciting phase for an Opposition, mostly in Australia we see Oppositions using the small-target strategy (Labor and Liberal), I think with this precarious hung parliament the Opposition have a beautiful opportunity presenting itself.

You talk about Wilkie.  Wilkie was incredibly dirty about the Howard years, I'm not going there, but lets be mindful of the history Wilkie has with the Opposition - he was never going to back the Coalition - if the Coalition-Wilkie lies accusation is your trump card wombleoz - your a miserable failure my friend.


I think the nation are trying to comprehend the pathetic response from the Gillard Government after such a human tragedy near Christmas Island.  Of course the bleeding hearts dribble there nonsense - but the fact is, after another boat today.......

Stop the boats.
Stop the deaths.

Call it a slogan.

But thats the only argument YOU, wombleoz and LABOR have.

No ideas, no suggestions, no plan B.

Just critisism of the Opposition for showing some gritty leadership in trying circumstances.

Wake up to yourself pal.

from crikey blogs.

I think jez might be ringing headquarters.

So we have nearly 1700 Australian Asylum Seekers not added to the figures of boat arrivals during the LIBS reign.  That could be more than 50 boats.
The LIBS say that having soft border control and soft treatment of asylum seekers is driving more and more of these people to our shores. These PULL factors out weigh the PUSH factors of Persecution, Famine, Starvation, Floods etc. Including the level of unrest in our region.

The figures don't add up. In effect they are saying that the millions of refugees in the world are motivated by moving to the Countries with soft border controls. When in truth they are forced by the push factors to seek refuge in any country that gives them sanctuary.

Howard shifted the Goal-Posts literally for the Asylum Seekers without their broad knowledge.
They still came in boats to the same destinations some landed but have never counted in the LIB intake because the Goal – Posts were shifted.  The rest sunk or got towed/ turned around.

Here's an idea.

How about THIS CURRENT GOVERNMENT.....

Gillard Labor!

Actually addressing the issue at hand?
Not a fkn REVIEW
Not a fkn COMMITTEE

You two realise that last week dozens of people died?

We need leadership and a appropriate response to this.
Gillard has blood on her hands.  This goverment has failed.

Yet your both waffling and rabbiting and laugh and scoffing like schoolgirls about the technicalities of the early Howard Years.

We need real action.....
Stop the boats. 
Stop the deaths.

It's quite sad that two extreme socialists would, rather than start thinking about a solution, idea or policy for preventing or lessening the chance of tragedy, similar to what we saw near Christmas Island last week. 

Instead we're seeing copy and paste nonsense from CRIKEY about the apparent fudging of figures on asylum seekers from the Howard Years.

Wonder why we haven't heard a Labor MP waffling on about this?

Because its a completely farcical argument to make....
At this time, when the government should be taking ACTION or at least seeming to act on a clear failure of policy.

PS - But I won't have you spreading nonsense about the Howard Government.  The facts remain, that after the strong border policy and stance on asylum seekers from the government, the number of boats dropped.  You can micro-debate a few boats here or there -whether they were in waters or towed away or WHATEVER - but the facts remain, the number of boats dropped.

Under this government, the boats continue, thick and fast.  Even after this tragedy, two more full boatloads of asylum seekers.

Will it take another 30 or more people to die for the government to act?

Shame.  Shame.  Shame.