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AFL
01 Feb 13 09:44
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Date Joined: 21 Jul 08
| Topic/replies: 5,732 | Blogger: AFL's blog
IMO.........Laugh
Pause Switch to Standard View Abbott should be sacked......
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Report AFL November 21, 2013 4:33 AM GMT
"Those who are historically responsible for polluting our atmosphere have a clear obligation to be part of the solution."

So rather than putting their money into the Denial Industry from their 1/2 Trillion Dollar reserves.......just like the Tobaccoo Companies did......and Hardie's also  with their poisonous Asbestos that killed and still kills many thousands of people......

Why not accept the overwhelming evidence of the SCIENCE and the harm their products are to society both now and in the future and....

Be part of the solution rather than continue to deny and FUND TIN POT Denialist Campaigns?
Report secong coming. November 21, 2013 6:07 AM GMT
as usual Afl refuse to answer my question CrazyCrazyCrazyCrazy
at least every now and then womble will have a go

anyways
the science is not settled , its just a scare campaign to put all denialists into shame
please find a body that it NOT government funded with credible results.........good luck there lol
the planet is not warming any more than normal ups and downs ....maybe they had a carbon tax throughout the ice age huh?

if in fact these industries do contribute to climate change , how will putting a price on it (pass onto consumer) change the output?
if Oz manufacturing ceases (due to increased price of doing business) in certain areas and production goes down (reduced emissions), don't you think that the product still makes its way here from another country - there negating any such savings?
no way in the world will third world countries give a flying fook about carbon emissions they just want to turnover and over and over more and more products @ $0.50 labour cost per hour


see how you go with the NON GOVERMENT paid global warming bodies? ooohhhh hang on its not global warming any more (err because there aint none!) it's climate change , yeah you know the stuff that's never ever going to go away even with a tax lololol
Report THERE....IS....NO....SPOOOOON November 21, 2013 8:50 AM GMT
Wonder if the indos would have more luck stopping the boats if we strapped random percentages of their foreign aid to the bottom of them predeparture?
Report THERE....IS....NO....SPOOOOON November 21, 2013 8:53 AM GMT
Apparently they're highly offended

Should send military chiropractic teams over there as a gesture

They've gotta have sore necks from laughing so hard at us Crazy
Report spyvspy27 November 21, 2013 8:58 AM GMT
THERE....IS....NO....SPOOOOON • November 21, 2013 8:50 AM GMT
Wonder if the indos would have more luck stopping the boats if we strapped random percentages of their foreign aid to the bottom of them predeparture?

Good point, haven't heard anywhere that they told us to stick our aid up our clacker
Report Thebas November 21, 2013 9:05 AM GMT
Laugh

indignation takes many forms ... but refusing money is rarely one of them Wink
Report spyvspy27 November 21, 2013 9:14 AM GMT
Spot on
Report AFL November 21, 2013 10:15 AM GMT
The opening post on this thread still rings true.......




Tony Abbott’s  judgement…….


How will he act as our spokesperson on the world stage?........

How does he react to events in the general discourse of day to day life?

Does he have the gravitas and the demeanor of a States-person? Cry

Does he have the diplomatic skills of a Prime Minister?  Cry

Has there ever been an event that he has commented on that he hasn't tried to score a political point.

Can he ever apologise for something he said or did ......without giving a qualified response and a dig at his detractors?

……………………………………………………………………………………………………………


“This is one boat that did get stopped”
He makes sick jokes at the expense of the Men, Women, and children who drowned in the Costa-Concordia disaster in order to try and score a political point.

‘’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’

Laurie Oakes…….

He did not apologise for making light of the shipwreck tragedy, conceding only that it was "probably something that should not have been the subject of light-hearted banter".

"probably".

And he added that "banter is banter" and critics should "appreciate just the way talk radio operates. “

The bloke just doesn't get it.

‘’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’’

So he gives a conditional apology and then has the nerve to castigate anyone who is critical of him because THEY do not understand how talk radio works.

In reality it was a non apology and a one finger salute.

THIS IS OUR ALTERNATIVE PRIME MINISTER.

His sick joke was broadcast around the world,  in dismay at  how a tragic disaster  could bring out the worst in  people who put politics above anything else.

This is what the world knows about our alternative Prime Minister……..Tony Abbott.

…………………………………………………………………………………………………………

He humiliates Bernie Bamtam.... he man who was stricken with cancer from asbestos all because he went to work, and was in a fight against a big business.

Whilst using intimidating body language he accuses him of having ulterior motives for his stand against asbestos………
He tries to intimidate those who oppose him

………………………………………………………………………………………………………..

TONY ABBOTT ……..Alternative Prime Minister of Australia.

After the death of  Margaret Whitlam……

''There was a lot wrong with the Whitlam government but nevertheless, it was a very significant episode in our history and Margaret Whitlam was a very significant element in the political success of Gough Whitlam,'' Mr Abbott said.

Several letters to Fairfax newspapers accused Mr Abbott of inappropriately scoring a political point, of being vindictive, and an affront to basic decency.

Linking her passing with the sins of the Whitlam government to try and score a political point appears  to have struck an extremely wrong note.

…………………………………………………………………………………

Tony Abbott , alternative Prime Minister.
Report spyvspy27 November 21, 2013 10:19 AM GMT
Haver never seen the term "educated dill" fit anyone as well as it does him
Report Kye November 21, 2013 10:40 AM GMT
Keep crying. He is doing a fantastic job & will be doing it for nearly another 3 years. HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH...
Report spyvspy27 November 21, 2013 10:44 AM GMT
Both parties are as bad as each other in my unbiased opinion, unlike your obvious biased opinion. Your last word sounds like it was said by a real galah LaughLaugh
Report spyvspy27 November 21, 2013 10:44 AM GMT
Or goose
Report AFL November 24, 2013 9:40 AM GMT
Fall Of The Whirling Dervish
November 19, 2013

bushfirebill   
http://pbxmastragicsdotcom

Three months is all it took.

Three months and the mistaken belief that a series of snarky heckling points in QT, borne of hubris and post-election triumphalism, would be seen merely as “robust Australian politics” by the Indonesians.

When I think of the column-miles of bullshit written about how Abbott was a natural at diplomacy (much better than the professionals), had “repaired” the relationship in one afternoon meeting with SBY and had come back to Australia with a Foreign Affairs miracle under his arm… and then contrast all that with where we are today… it really does make you want to sob with frustration.

Alexander Downer saw yesterday’s developments for what they were – a looming disaster, if not an actual one – but he, too, put in his two bob’s worth a few weeks ago on The Drum, by subscribing to the Rad Hadley/2GB view of relations between the two countries: “Indonesian boats, flying Indonesian flags, from Indonesian ports… &etc”, in all its tiresome glory.

Australian exceptionalism (summarised as “Let the Dagoes look after the Dagoes”), combined with schoolyard slagging in Parliament and the media, plus empty hubris have all combined to render the hard work of previous governments with Indonesia almost completely moot.

Abbott wanted the top job, and by God he has got it. Yet, he has trouble lifting himself above slogans and mantras of the previous three years in Opposition.

Abbott Hatesman Statesman

He is immature, dopey and is competing WAY above his class. The Whirling Dervish approach is utterly inappropriate to the gentler arts of Foreign Affairs.

The world of the Daily Telegraph – with its fawning coverage of everything he does from playing “firey” and “lifesaver” – and The Australian – with it’s man-love of “Spartacus” Abbott, must look so inadequate now.

Murdoch sold Abbott on the idea that, in exchange for as yet undisclosed favours (but we can guess), he would cover for him, prop him up, inflate his standing in strategic sections of the Australian community and generally give him a free pass into the highest office in the land.

In Abbott’s Bloke World, a hearty, pumping handshake and some hail-fellow-well-met macho talk is enough to get you by with fellow firies and lifesavers, but not – unfortunately – with Indonesian Presidents.

A little bit of flunkied argey bargey in the local media keeps the home fires burning as we tell the Indonesians what they are to do to make OUR lives easier. The connection can always be denied, or explained away, or not even addressed, can’t it?

No it can’t.

While Abbott and his gang of wreckers may be able to get away with crass denials, cheap stunts and sloganeering here, where the measure of a man is more physical, the Indonesians have a different view of things.

They know the media is speaking for Tony Abbott when they see “This will all blow over” stories, or when they hear some over-coiffed nobody hack from nowhere dismiss Indonesian feelings as “posturing” or “chest thumping”.

The Australian media, too used to depicting everything in terms of “winners”and “losers” has declared Tony Abbott to be the “winner” over SBY, much to the Indonesian President’s displeasure (for Christ’s sake, SBY is even tweeting now). He knows they speak for Abbott.

Abbott can deny this connection all he likes, but what matters is not Rupert Murdoch’s opinion, or the the way the front bar at the Rooty Hill RSL sees it, or whether the tradies think he’s a good bloke.

What matters is how Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono sees Tony Abbott. It is SBY’s opinion only that carries real weight in this matter.

And his opinion of Tony Abbott – braggart, triumphalist, double-talker, buffoon from the boxing ring, bully and bullshit artist – is pretty low at the moment.

The more Abbott and his pals couch the relationship with Indonesia as the Indonesians’ problem as much (or even more) than ours, the more they slag them off, the more they patronize them as if they were school children or petulant teenagers, the more the Indonesians will turn the thumbscrews and make life a lot harder for Australia in the region.

Speaking of the region, the laughter you here from over the horizon is not just the Indonesians chortling. It’s also the Malaysians, the Japanese, the Russians and just about everyone else Abbott managed to lie to, keep waiting, fawn over, or outright insult as he cut a diplomatic swathe of destruction over the first few weeks of his tenure in office (not that you’d have known it from media reports of his magnificent passage… they wrote it up as almost “Peace In Our Time”).

And the amazing thing about it is that he doesn’t seem to have a clue why they’re so angry, and doesn’t seem to have the slightest idea of how he’s going to get himself out of the mess he’s created for himself, except to keep on slugging.

It’s pretty clear by now that Peta Credlin, in telling Abbott to keep his mouth shut, was spot on the money.

The only problem is that she wasn’t allowed into the various meetings he had with Asian and Pacific heads of state where, it appears, he has managed to set relations with most of them back 10 years in the space of a single week.

And who has he got to help him?

Scott Morrison and Julie Bishop… step forward please.

Jesus wept.

.................................................................



Never a truer article written.

But wait  there's more......



.................................................................

bushfirebill   
November 22, 2013

http://pbxmastragicsdotcom

............................................

Mark Kenny:

    That an Abbott insider is being so blatantly offensive to the Indonesian leadership while Abbott himself is going out of his way to remain respectful and salve an inflamed situation is big news in Indonesia.

    Read more: http://www.smh.com.au/federal-politics/political-opinion/mark-textors-succum...
............................................


Kenny’s concern seems to be more that he’s upset Tony Abbott may be embarrassed, than that Textor’s comments really are pretty tame compared to some of the rubbish being put out on Abbott-friendly outlets like the Daily Telegraph and 2GB.

The real problem for Abbott is that four years (one under Rudd, and three under Gillard) of muck-raking, whingeing, slander, libel, insinuation, sexism, and outright hatred from his media pals has gotten them used to the idea that they are bullet proof. Abbott’s winning government only reinforced that and gave their loony tactics a kind of bizarro legitimacy.

I have always entertained the hope (guilty hope, that is) that the Frankenstein’s monster created by Murdoch and the Liberal Party would come back to bite them on the nuts.

We’re starting to see that play out.

SBY rightly sees Abbott’s media toadies as speaking on his behalf, to his core domestic audience. All these sycophants know is slagging-off whomever criticises Abbott. SBY has done it, so he deserves to be slagged-off. That’s the logic.

2GB runs continuous talk-back hate sessions on the subject. Abbott himself tries it on… “Everybody does it, Leigh!”, and points out it was done under Labor (while declining to answer any questions about whether Howard, and indeed himself, did it too).

The Daily Telegraph posts shock/horror headlines. The Australian – in between soporific contributions from St. Paul Kelly, patron saint of insomniacs – mutters about Indonesia beefing up their own spy agencies, and hints darkly that – despite explicit assurances that they will not make a political issue of this – the Labor Party is termiting efforts to fix the problem.

Alexander Downer (and like-minded Lib ex-politicians) wave the issue away as “Chest-thumping.” These are all standard Liberal Party PR tactics: designed to minimize the problem, project it onto the victim, and then blame Labor for everything anyway.

The only problem is that SBY is upset, and he can’t be waved away so easily. He doesn’t read the Daily Telegraph, except perhaps to reinforce his impression that Abbott is a glad-handing buffoon who speaks out of both corners of his mouth… or worse, gets others to do the slagging-off on his behalf.

So SBY’s demands become simple: a full, public explanation is required, and (very possibly by now) a full public apology would be nice too, or else all bets are off, including Indonesian co-operation on his signature policy of “Stop The Boats”. SBY can turn off the tap with a twitch of his little finger, and he seems in a mood to do it.

Abbott fell into the trap of believing his own publicity, written by the hacks and urgers around him. Kenny, Sheridan, Kelly, Downer… all of them and more… told us how brilliant Abbott had been in defusing… beef exports!

No mention was made, naturally, of the disgraceful things either he or his attack dog Morrison had said about Indonesia (and our other Asian “friends”) during heated debates in parliament, except perhaps a few insincere words on the subject of “robust Australian politics”, parenthesised by that braying laugh of Abbott’s which he uses when he’s lying.

Torture, corruption, baksheesh, lack of resolve: all of these were attributed to our neighbours to the north. Tony Abbott was going to get on a jet plane and go up there and tell them what they were to do to assuage Australian outrage. If they didn’t like it… tough. We’d go it alone.

That idea lasted about five minutes after the election was declared. This about face was explained away as “clever politics”… clever in that Abbott had fooled the Western Sydney Bogans into thinking he’d confront Indonesia toe-to-toe and give them what-for. As always with Abbott, switch inevitably followed bait.

Suddenly it was Smarmy Tony who, with a few well-chosen, oleaginous words (obviously phoney, but good enough to fool the darkies in Jakarta, who like that kind of obsequiousness) would snatch Peace In Our Time from the fire of international friction.

This agenda was all Abbott’s. It was Abbott who had said he wanted to pay more attention to Jakarta than to Geneva (Geneva being chosen simply because it alliterates well with “Jakarta”, and not for its current importance in geopolitical relations). It was Abbott who insisted on an immediate meeting with SBY, megaphoned for a couple of years beforehand. It was Abbott who was going to employ some shuttle diplomacy and right all the wrongs of the past.

We were given the impression that SBY had no choice in the matter, or even its timing. The Whirling Dervish was coming and Bambang had better drop everything to accommodate him.

This may well have been the start of the Indonesian President’s distaste for Abbott’s two-faced style. If you’re the President of a nation of over 200 million people, you don’t like being told some tinpot, newly-elected raver who’s made a hero of himself by riding bikes, fighting fires and chanting three-word slogans has decided your agenda for you (and has even pencilled the entry into your appointments diary)… especially when said raver has slagged you off in the past for running a corrupt nation, and has made a big thing of saying he couldn’t care less what you think. He won an election, or something, and it seems his mandate extends to the Presidential Palace in Jakarta.

You can almost hear Bambang thinking: “Well.. we’ll see about that.”

It only got worse after that. Bouyed by man-love from the likes of Sheridan and the rest of the Murdoch gang, and egged on by the braying of the shock-jocks and their demented callers, Abbott hamfistedly went to Jakarta and managed to insult just about everybody.

First the hail-fellow-well-met bloke stuff was all wrong. The handshakes (two handed, to emphasize Abbott’s “sincerity”) were too aggressive, too hearty, as if Abbott was trying to put something over SBY. The swagger was outright embarrassing. Indonesians are much less demonstrative than that. The further up the Asian hierarchy, the softer the handshake. Bone crushers indulge themselves at their own risk.

But as long as the media back home, full of sycophants and lurk merchants writing Abbott up as a diplomatic savant, looking to shore up the Rooty Hill vote, egged him on, Abbott continued his blundering his way through several meetings with Asian leaders, calling them all “Australia’s best friend” (convincing none, I suspect, we’ve all met a buffoon at a party who tells you he’s in love with you only). Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono must have been bemused.

Abbott’s basic mistake was to believe that what played well in the Daily Telegraph and 2GB, so used to fooling the punters with Abbott hero worship, played well in Jakarta.

And then, out of the blue (because failure was never considered as an option), came the Phone Tapping Crisis.

Abbott – personally, and through his shills and hangers-on – blamed everyone for his misfortune: Labor, Bambang himself, Fairfax and The Guardian, Snowden and even Kevin Rudd. This ploy usually works well domestically, the Whirling Dervish takes no prisoners, but was like water off a duck’s back to the only person whose opinion mattered: SBY.

Through this week Abbott’s utterings have gone from alibi (“It was Kevin Rudd, Leigh!”), denial (“The relationship is good, and getting better”), regret at Bambang’s embarrassment (!), tortuously read-out diplo-speak (tortuously, to emphasize that he didn’t really mean a word of it, as if he was reading a bad script), eagerness to engage (“I’ll respond quickly and respectfully”) to today’s no show. He’s probably thinking, “But I told him I was his friend!” right now.

It seems pretty clear that the Indonesian government has offered Abbott a way out that he can’t refuse, but desperately wants to, to save face. They want his balls on the table, and it’s no-one’s fault but his.

Abbott has to admit publicly that the last couple of months have been a sham of his own (and his lurk merchants’) making, that SBY is not to be toyed with, that his own agenda is not necessarily Jakarta’s, that respect is not so easily earned, that blokey bonhommie is not SBY’s style, and that the entire relationship needs to be reset and then proceeded with on the basis of reality, not cheap media spin.

It’s going to be hard for him, perhaps impossible, but right now, as he throws options around the crisis table in his Canberra bunker, he’s going to have to ignore Peta Credlin’s small time media management tactics (the front bar at the Rooty Hill RSL may be on-side, but that won’t help Abbott anymore).

He’ll need to eschew the dismissiveness of those Liberal ex-big shots (ESPECIALLY Alexander Downer, whose last dealings with Indonesia were when he was pushing lame-duck President Habibie around over East Timor). He’s going to have to shut off 2GB, perhaps even tell Hadley and the rest to shut up, please. He’s going to have to sacrifice Textor as a small offering.

And only then can he get down to the task at hand.

Abbott’s core problem has always been that he did not take Indonesia and its President seriously. They were bit-players in his braggart’s game, props in his political theatre.

His standard practice has been to say and do whatever it takes to get him to the next stage, and then to oil up and grovel in apology, or to get others to do it for him. He is famous for saying, “It’s Better to seek forgiveness than seek permission.”

But the Indonesians are clearly immune to his charms. They are trying to run an almost unrunnable country and don’t need Abbott kibbitzing on the side, telling them how to run it.

The Whirling Dervish is about to find that against a talented and skilled opponent, boxing scientifically, staying cool and keeping his distance, his tactics of bluff, braggadocio and bullshit cut no ice.

Abbott has met his match and he would do well to realize this, pronto.
Report AFL August 18, 2014 2:28 AM BST
We can now add "The whole of Scotland" to the list of countries this "Idiot in charge" has offended.


Yes And No Campaigners Rubbish Abbott's Wee Poke At 'Enemies Of Scottish Freedom'
By Chris Graham
newmatildadotcom 18 08 2014

Tony Abbott's assault on the 'enemies of freedom' - aka the Scottish Government and half of the population of Scotland - has blown up in his face. Quelle surprise. Chris Graham reports.

Both sides in the Scottish Yes/No referendum for independence from Great Britain have taken aim at Australian Prime Minister Tony Abbott, albeit one a little more gently than the other.

Yesterday, The Times reported an interview with Tony Abbott in which he described people who support the secession of Scotland from the United Kingdom as the ‘enemies of freedom and justice’.

That happens to be include the Scottish Government, which is leading the charge for secession, plus around half the Scottish population, based on the latest polls.

On September 18 – a year to the day since Abbott was elected to government in Australia – the Scots will again go to the vote to decide whether or not to go solo from the United Kingdom.

The Yes side was outraged by Abbott’s comments, who they described as “famously gaffe prone”. The most prominent government minister leading the Yes campaign, Alex Salmond, Scotland’s First Minister, lead the assault on Abbott overnight.

"Mr Abbott's comments are hypocritical because independence does not seem to have done Australia any harm,” Salmond told BBC.

"They are foolish, actually, because of the way he said it. To say the people of Scotland who supported independence weren't friends of freedom or justice, I mean, the independence process is about freedom and justice."

Mr Salmond told the BBC that Abbott was "notoriously gaffe-prone" and he had "put his foot right in it" with his comments.

"If it does anything it will persuade people to vote Yes because the natural reaction to this sort of nonsense is 'Who is Mr Abbott to lecture Scots on freedom and justice?'"

And that’s a theory that seems to have been shared by the ‘No campaigners’ who wasted no time in distancing themselves from the Australian Prime Minister, mindful that Abbott singing the praises of the Empire might harden Scottish attitudes against London.

“Well, Australians are famously direct,” Jim Murphy, an MP from the Better Together Campaign told the BBC, apparently trying to “play down” the remarks.

“They say what they mean and they mean what they say – it’s a different political culture.”

Which is true of Australian politics to some degree, but famously not true of Abbott.

On the broader politics front, Mark Latham probably did mean what he said when he called the Liberals a ‘conga line of suck holes’.

But Tony Abbott probably didn’t mean what he said when he referred to the ‘suppository of all knowledge’; to having never met with George Pell when he had; to telling Kerry O’Brien that people shouldn’t believe what he says; to referring to the ‘housewives of Australia while they’re doing the ironing’; and to calling Canada ‘Canadia’.

For his part, Abbott this afternoon had decided to finally shut his mouth. Cornered by the press in the Blue Mountains for the final leg of his Pollie Pedal charity ride, Abbott was asked to expand on his Scottish ‘enemies of freedom’ comments.

Abbott simply smiled at the media, and walked off… in a purple riding jersey, perhaps for the first time, meaning what he said.


..................................................................


Ohh there he goes again....He got a question that wasn't from sycophantic shock jock  and he can't handle it with a 3 word slogan

..so off he walks....


Someone please call an election
Report AFL August 18, 2014 6:57 AM BST
Poor SC's angry I brought this thread back up. Laugh

He knows he backed a dud PM and a DUD party.

They better get rid of him quick..........i reckon Labor are guaranteed 1 term... next election as it stands now

At this rate if they let him go the full term it will be 2 terms MIN Labor.

NOT EVEN MURDOCH WILL BE ABLE TO SAVE THEM

Laugh
Report AFL August 18, 2014 7:02 AM BST
SC doesn't want to post on this thread

As it keeps Abbott (His Hero)  at the top of the page LaughLaugh
Report VeryLTU August 19, 2014 11:30 AM BST
I loved abbott's analysis of the current ASADA investigation into Essendon FC. He was reported as saying this in todays Harold. He does have some intelligence after all Wink It seems as though tony knows/has been told the real story behind this trumped up investigation. It can only be hoped the story is revealed one day....... in a courtroom. ONe brave , proud, un bribable Essendon champion stands up where everyone else sits down imo.

Tony Abbott reported in todays harold.

"But far from being the blackest day for Australian Sport, it was a black day for the Labor Party". Realising it was in "all sorts of trouble", the government had chosen to tarnish the reputations of Australia's sporting elite and use the Australian Crime Commission to do it for a short term political distraction. It was a really silly, squalid, sordid thing for them to do... it's absolutely pathetic. Eighteen months later, a lot of decent people were still struggling to restore their reputations.

Go for them Hirdy, take it allllll the way back and make the scumbags PAY for their defamatory actions.
Report secong coming. August 19, 2014 10:12 PM BST
i am happy with my decision to be rid of the Labor disgrace that spanned 6 years of waste......very happy with TA as well

the Betfair market does not agree with you believing Labor will get 1 term .........1.67 coalition 2.34 labor.....surely you will empty your account out here?? lol

dream on LaughLaughLaughLaugh
Report wombleoz August 19, 2014 11:11 PM BST
Say it ain't so Very - a Bombers fan??? ShockedShockedShocked

It will indeed be a fascinating day when then truth comes out - if we do end up with 50 odd players banned for taking PEDs i'd argue that's a pretty black day for Aussie sport

Come on Secong, the government is in chaos, their budget is screwed they've broken almost every "promise" they've made - Abbott will be lucky to make it to the next election
Report AFL August 19, 2014 11:30 PM BST
Partly edited from....

http://blogs.crikey.com.au/northern/2013/09/13/cheap-at-twice-the-price-the-prime-minister-and-big-pharma/
Report secong coming. August 19, 2014 11:39 PM BST
lol womble why is the market the way it is then , 2 term tony nailed on


yawn yawn AFL do some research on Gillard in the 90's .......of course you wont...lefties are immune from any wrong doing CrazyCrazyCrazyCrazyCrazyCrazyCrazyCrazyCrazyCrazyCrazyCrazyCrazy
Report AFL August 19, 2014 11:43 PM BST
Do you reckon Abbott's got hold of some free product?

That could explain it. Laugh
Report secong coming. August 19, 2014 11:48 PM BST
explain what?
Report VeryLTU August 20, 2014 2:24 AM BST
if asada proves essendon's "dirty" 34 took ped's ........ then we might as well ban woolworths and coles from selling multi vitamins and protein shakes from the "health and well being" shelves ....... because, so far, the only concrete evidence against them is that they've been taking the same chemicals you can get with ur paywave card at woollies.
Where are these drug dealers that were operating out of efc ??? who were they ??? Which bikie club was supplying efc with ped's ??? Exactly which organised crime group was connected with efc ??? What....... u tell me a friend of a friend of a friend of someone that plays for essendon was once convicted for selling an ecstacy tab !!!! Well, fk me, lets start a riot.
Report bigted. August 20, 2014 2:18 PM BST
whose the libturd ringin up getting posts deleted Confused cant handle the truth..fking pathetic..

just like ..

Matias Conman being handed the poison chalice of selling the budget..good luck arnie Excited
Report Village Kid August 20, 2014 2:53 PM BST
NBN was scheduled to be rolled out in my street last month......obviously never happened
now stuck with adsl that can drop out over 20 times a day, usually just before a race or worse still when betting inplay
when the local kids gets home from school dies in the arse like clockwork
have to pay at least $250 a year for two back ups.......internet speed in this country is a laughing stock
Report wombleoz August 20, 2014 11:43 PM BST
they are a disgrace VK

false fav Secong, not much interest in the market yet

Charter is the link Very, importing stuff from China for Dank - will be interesting to see what the Cronulla players do, i hope they take the offer
Report VeryLTU August 21, 2014 1:21 AM BST
yes, and my GUESS is that those substances that he got from china and thailand..... were ultra cheap amino's and legal volume batched peptides which were used as part of a scheme to rip off EFC monetary wise. Robinson and Dank were shown the door at EFC very quickly after Rboinson presented EFC with an invoice for supplements that the Footy Manager realised was a load of carp !! Around 60 grand from memory. It's my GUESS that Dank knows exactly what the players got and it was not anything expensive and/or under phase trial but something he thought he could get away with on selling for windfall profit. This is why he knows that evidence can never be produced to find him guilty of administering banned substances and hence his attitude towards ASADA. Just my theory .... it's the profit motive 99 times out of a hundred behind this sort of criminal behaviour.
Report VeryLTU August 21, 2014 1:32 AM BST
couldn't agree more VK, school holidays and approx. 4 O'clock in the afternoon are an expensive nightmare in st. albans. NO ONE does any training or has a kick in the park or a hit in the nets or gets a few bombs in at the local pool after school anymore.
Report AFL August 21, 2014 2:40 AM BST
Team Australia: Patriotism, religion and idiots

Duade Borg
independentaustraliadotnet
21 08 2014


Tony Abbott's appeal for immigrants to join 'Team Australia' is simply a crude dog-whistle attack against another religion, writes Duade Borg.

RECENTLY, THE FEDERAL GOVERNMENT has been attempting to draw attention away from their shambles of a first year in office by putting security on the national agenda.

The politics of fear is a tried and true success story for the politically and socially stagnant. Any time the progressive side of politics is having a good run, you can be assured the stagnants will jump at every spook.

I’ll borrow an idea from the great George Carlin.

When you consider just how stupid the average person is, and then realise that half of everybody are even more stupid, it’s not difficult to see why conspiracy theories and fear of the unknown are such vote bringers. Stupid people are easily alarmed and there’s a lot of them.

This is the essence of Prime Minister Tony Abbott’s "Team Australia" comments. It's simple political symbolism designed to invoke a sense of patriotism.

Patriotism is great for making idiots unquestionably follow the will of the government; you’ll find some of the most interesting and wondrous tales of patriotism in Nazi literature and Axis history in World War II. Powerful stuff indeed.

Many of Abbott’s comments and undertones are fuelling the Team Australia bus down the express route through Muslim territory into Bigotry City. Lord Mayor Andrew Bolt – the name synonymous with racism – has been extremely vocal on this issue as one would expect, having written many rants on the local Sorbent in Melbourne.

Let’s not mince words. Team Australia (and pretty much everything Abbott and Bolt ever do) is about perpetuating Christianity (and Judaism) at the expense of Islam.

Now myself, I’m an atheist. A militant anti-theist, no less.

The best part about being an atheist is that you get such strong emotional responses to the absurdity of all religions.

For example, a Christian would find certain parts of Judaism and Islam completely off limits for ridicule, as all three religions are just different versions of the same untruth. However, when you regard them all with the same disdain and consider all their followers equally as schizophrenic and deluded, the blinders are lifted and the only thing left to see is the harm created and perpetuated by them.

So let’s start talking about these 'good Christians'.

The sheer ludicrousness of the Tony Abbott business advisor Maurice Newman’s recent comments about climate change science being a new form of 'religion' could only come from the demented, unhinged mind of a religious lunatic.

Science is the application of logic and reason where religion is the suspension of it. Science is observation and experimental reproduction where religion is a disregard of your own observations.

Such brazen contempt for the scientific method could only occur in a country such as Australia, where the Government consists purely of far-right stagnants.

Prime Minister Tony Abbott’s maiden speech to Parliament in 1994 began with a reference to the first Christian service in Australia.

He stated in his speech that

    “... loss of faith is a social problem extending far beyond politics and far beyond Australia.”

He went on to claim that

    “God and the ghosts of great men give [him] strength."

Treasurer Joe Hockey gave a speech in 2009 to the Sydney Institute titled 'In Defence of God', where he attempted to defer the blame for the influence religion has on people to do terrible things. He has repeatedly cited his Catholic faith as his reason for opposing socially progressive policies such as gay marriage.

Scott Morrison, the Minister for Immigration and Border Protection (note: only a stagnant government, with a constituency of mostly deluded idiots, could possibly elevate border protection to the highest level on the national agenda in a country surrounded by oceans) spoke very highly of himself and his Christian values in his maiden speech in 2008:

    From my faith I derive the values of loving-kindness, justice and righteousness, to act with compassion and kindness, acknowledging our common humanity and to consider the welfare of others; to fight for a fair go for everyone to fulfil their human potential and to remove whatever unjust obstacles stand in their way, including diminishing their personal responsibility for their own wellbeing; and to do what is right, to respect the rule of law, the sanctity of human life and the moral integrity of marriage and the family. We must recognise an unchanging and absolute standard of what is good and what is evil.

    Desmond Tutu put it this way:

    ‘... we expect Christians ... to be those who stand up for the truth, to stand up for justice, to stand on the side of the poor and the hungry, the homeless and the naked, and when that happens, then Christians will be trustworthy believable witnesses.’

Three obviously deeply religious men, they are probably so deluded that they don’t even realise their idol/prophet is likely to have had the same coloured skin as those children and families they have condemned in squalid detention centres for simply seeking a life away from the harm causes by religious groups at war.

All claim to follow the teachings of a profoundly progressive, left-wing, prophet and yet none of them act in such a way. Cases in point being Abbott’s vandalism of our environment, Hockey’s vandalism of our social fabric and Morrison’s vandalism of our morality.

The dangers of religious delusions are real — regardless of the religion that the person prescribes to. For such a prescription to occur, there must first be a suspension of logic and reason. If an adult claimed to hear voices, have visions, or speak to a sky fairy without attributing them to “god”, they would be promptly medicated or institutionalised for being a schizophrenic menace to society. Curiously, though, this is not the case with religion.

Stagnants love the word “terrorism” because of the connotations. It’s another great way to invoke fear and compliance.

But have you ever seen or heard the term used by a stagnant to describe a massacre committed by a white man?

Take this article from Andrew Bolt a few years ago as an example. No less than three times are acts committed by Muslims referred to as terrorism, yet not once does Bolt refer to the 2011 Norwegian shooting massacre by a white, right-wing extremist as a terrorist act.

In a classic act of Bolt obfuscation, he attempts to make the left-wing look bad because someone pointed out that the shooter was a Christian. Obviously, Bolt’s sensibilities are threatened by white Christian massacres.

It’s always amusing to watch someone with such a weak ideological foundation sit in their glass house throwing pebbles.

Highlighting the hypocrisy of Bolt’s “journalism” serves little purpose. His readership and viewership are idiots but at least he brings them together where we can keep an eye on them, as you would any group of people who lacked full development.

What brings Bolt, Abbott, Hockey and Morrison together is not religious extremism, or Islam, or even Team Australia, it is simply that it is not the right sort of religious extremism: the Christian sort — the one that brought us the Spanish Inquisition and the Crusades.

Idiots.

You can follow Duade Borg on Twitter @diabzAU.
Report VeryLTU August 21, 2014 7:50 AM BST
luvin it afl.... especially amusing was the reference to Bolt and the local Sorbent in Melbourne. So ironic to get a laugh out of Bolt, considering the self imposed ban on even reading his headlines was due to keeping my temper in check LaughLaugh ... and this ban was imposed after reading only 3 articles Laugh
Report AFL August 21, 2014 8:12 AM BST
Yes...Murdoch Ban in my house-hold as well. Great to see they are losing money hand over fist.

Including the least trusted and most disgusting newspaper in the country Daily Telegraph and the UN-Australian

hasn't turned a profit in donkeys years. Laugh
Report bigted. August 21, 2014 1:54 PM BST
cleanaway has one incident and 2400 trucks off the road. Catholic Church hundreds of incidents and no safety check.
Who is protecting these ****s Confused any pollies ever given testimony Confused

Boy oh boy,wowee,what a world we live in..
Report secong coming. August 21, 2014 11:00 PM BST
should we be running a BILL SHORTEN should be sacked thread now? Surprised
Report PittsburghPhil August 21, 2014 11:20 PM BST
Go for your life.

It might last a week and and maybe a dozen replies.
Report wombleoz August 21, 2014 11:38 PM BST
we'll know soon enough re all the drug stuff Very

Murdoch losing millions with his Australian papers, no surprise

good luck with that Secong

What odds Abbott sends troops overseas to try and save his job???
Report VeryLTU August 22, 2014 2:30 AM BST
i bloddy well hope so, i'm getting sick of defending my footy club to collingwood supporters looking for something, anything, to throw at essendon supporters Crazy btw: any news will jsut add to stuff that the afl and asada already know........ blood samples from essendon players were sent to laboratories in germany (unannounced to efc) way back in 2012, by the afl and during essendons supplements program, and ... which banned peptides that were specifically test requested were found ?????

NONE,ZIP,NADA,ZILCH............... SFA.
Report AFL September 4, 2014 10:30 AM BST
The strange and suspicious case of Tony Abbott's citizenship......
Ross Jones
04 09 2014

Why is the PM's chief of staff so desperate to prevent proof emerging about whether Tony Abbott is eligible to sit in Parliament? Sydney bureau chief Ross Jones reports.

You don’t want to be blocked by Mal Brough — look what happened to Peter Slipper.

It happened to Tony Magrathea when he posted a message to Brough telling him there was a serious cloud hanging over the legitimacy of his leader, Anthony John Abbott, to hold the highest public office in the land.

Magrathea is a Sunshine Coast-based blogger who doesn’t normally get involved in the political arena. He refers to himself as ‘The Ideas Man’ and his blog normally covers technology issues. He is not a lefty.

Born in England, Magrathea is about the same age as Abbott and, like Abbott, came to Australia as a £10 pom. Abbott arrived in 1960 aged three.

Before the last election, Abbott made a few comments that piqued Magrathea’s interest in Abbott’s progression from England to Australia, then back to England to Oxford, then back to Australia and a life in politics.

Magrathea noticed an odd thing: Abbott had been apparently granted Australian citizenship back in 1981 — as he was entitled to do, because while his father was British and he was born in London, his mother was Australian. This apparent change in status meant Abbott was now a dual British/Australian citizen.

1981 was the year Abbott ‘matriculated’ to Oxford, but he did so as a British citizen.

After Oxford, he returned to Australia and entered a seminary. The priesthood didn’t stick and, after managing a cement plant, and then some stints as a journalist, monarchist and apparatchik, he entered Parliament in 1994.

Section 44 of the Australian Constitution is clear when it says:

    Dual nationality is considered an acknowledgement of allegiance and entitled to the privileges of citizenship of a foreign power disqualifies people from standing for parliament.

This is a provision strictly applied. In 1996, Jackie Kelly was forced to face a by-election after being found to have been elected holding both Australian and New Zealand citizenship. Employment Minister Senator Eric Abetz appears to have been elected to the Senate holding dual German and Australian citizenship before finally renouncing his citizenship after a High Court action has been commenced against him.

So Magrathea, in an idle moment, had a look around for the date Abbott renounced his British citizenship — but there was no apparent record.

He first turned to the National Archives of Australia who keep citizenship applications for everyone who applies to be an Australian citizen. These documents should record if Abbott had renounced his British citizenship at that time.

These are generally public documents available to all. However, in Abbott's case, the NAA decided to make the application file a secret document in February 2014.

Coming up blank there, he turned his attentions to the UK Border Office, part of the Home Office, which has a form called

    ‘Declaration of Renunciation of British Citizenship, British Overseas Citizenship, British Overseas Territories, British National (Overseas) Or British Subject Status’.

This declaration is otherwise known as Form RN and around 5,000 are completed each year.

In early May, Magrathea sent an FOI to the Home Office asking for Abbott’s RN.

They say they are still looking.

So, Magrathea put in an FOI to the Department of Prime Minister and Cabinet. Having half a brain, Magrathea waited until Abbott ‒ and, more importantly, his chief of staff Peta Credlin ‒ were in Washington in June.

Things, according to Magrathea, were going well and he’d made contact with a Department staffer who was willing to help in his quest. Apparently, on the day the public servant was to formally respond to Magrathea with the results of his search, Credlin came home and went straight to the office. She immediately kyboshed the request and told Magrathea,

Magrathea posted a note to his Federal MP Mal Brough’s Facebook page, pointing out that any doubt over the Prime Minister’s legal right to hold office should be settled before the upcoming G20 Summit.

Brough blocked him.

He posted the same thing to the Attorney-General Senator George Brandis. Nothing.

He posted to Opposition Leader Bill Shorten. No reply.

He wrote to the Federal Police regarding a possible crime against the Commonwealth. Nil. He wrote to the Queensland Governor General. Nada.

On 1 August, Magrathea’s email account was hacked and all his emails were deleted. What started as an innocent enquiry has begun to morph into something quite serious — and perhaps sinister. Certainly suspicious.

Abbott can clear the whole thing up in the blink of an eye, of course — just show us the RN and it will all be over.

But he and his camp followers don’t seem to want to do that — or allow others to release this information. We can only wonder why.

If the British Home Office come back to Magrathea and say they are unable to find the RN, things may move up a notch.

Find out more about this issue on Tony Magrathea’s blog tonymagrathea.blog.com.

Creative Commons Licence
This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivs 3.0 Australia License
Report AFL September 4, 2014 10:31 AM BST
from independentaustraliadotnet
Report secong coming. September 4, 2014 9:59 PM BST
and then some stints as a journalist, monarchist and apparatchik...........lost all credibility right there...why do you post this sh!t


then
Abbott can clear the whole thing up in the blink of an eye, of course — just show us the RN and it will all be over.

just like Buzz could do.... like swearing on the Bible to say he landed on the moon huh?

and Barack was never born in the USA

the list goes on and on AFL.....they has nothing to prove

I can prove Abbott owns your head space though WinkWinkWinkWink
Report AFL September 4, 2014 10:40 PM BST
sallymcmanusdotnet

TRACKING ABBOTT’S WRECKAGE

Tony Abbott has been in power since 7 September 2013. From that moment, he and his government have broken promises and hurt Australians. This post will be regularly updated to keep track of the Abbott Government’s broken promises and everything his Government does to hurt Australians. Each separate item will have a link to a source. Broken promises appear in bold and in a separate list at the end.

THE LIST

281. Delays superannuation increases for seven years costing workers thousands of dollars in retirement savings – 2 September 2014

280. Kills the Low Income Super Contribution payment and the Superannuation Guarantee which aimed to boost the retirement savings of 3.6 million workers who earn $37,000 per year or less – 2 September 2014

279. Repeals the mining tax on the profits of big coal and iron ore companies – 2 September 2014

278. Bans secular workers from the school chaplaincy program – 27 August 2014

277. Refuses temporary visitors visas for Sri Lankan trade unionists to attend a union conference in Australia because they “do not have enough personal wealth” – 25 August 2014

276. Unemployment hits highest level in 12 years – 7 August 2014

275. Breaks an election promise to amend the race hate laws - 6 August 2014

274. Directs all government departments to disclose every contact with every union for any reason over the last decade to the Royal Commission - 28 July 2014

273. Allows the suspension of payments to parents whose children do not attend school in the Northern Territory – 19 July 2014

272. Axes the carbon tax with no viable policy to address climate change or Australia’s emission targets - 17 July, 2014

271. Risks up to $1 billion in revenue through job cuts at the ATO - July 15, 2014

270. Cuts all funding to Vibe Australia, the Indigenous organisation responsible for creating and producing the Deadly Awards, Deadly Vibe and InVibe magazines, Deadly Sounds radio, Move It Mob Style TV and deadlyvibe.com.au -  July 14, 2014

269. Detains 153 asylum seekers at sea on board a customs ship for a month, despite questions about the legality of this action - July 12, 2014

268. Offends China and many Australians by praising the “skill and honour” of Japanese soliders who killed 22 000 Australians and hundreds of thousands of Chinese during World War II - 9 July 2014

267. Hands over 41 Sri Lankan asylum seekers to the custody of Sri Lankan authorities after screening them at sea and transferring them while still on the water - 07 July, 2014

266. Creates a strategic communications branch employing 37 people  and costing $4.7 million each year, to oversee communications in the department of Prime Minister and Cabinet despite saying at the 2013 launch of the Liberal Party’s book on ALP waste, that they would spend less on spin than the previous government  - July 05, 2014

265. Describes Australia as ‘unsettled’ before the British arrived, during an address to the Australia-Melbourne Institute Conference - 04 July, 2014

264. Grants the Immigration Minister power over the granting of permanent residence allowing him to personally decide the conditions of the test and his decisions will not be subject to appeal  - 03 July, 2014

263. Breaks a promise not to grant permanent permanent residency to people arriving by boat  by granting a visa to a least one refugee - 03 July, 2014

262. Prohibits Community Legal Centres from using Government funding to advocate for policy or law reform - 02 July, 2014

261. Appoints a former Liberal MP and a conservative columnist and vocal opponent of the ABC to the ABC and SBS appointments panel - 02 July, 2014

260. Strikes out protections for consumers of financial advice before the report into the Commonwealth Bank of Australia financial planning scandal is tabled, which recommends a Royal Commission into the bank to investigate allegations of fraud, forgery and a management cover-up - 01 July, 2014

259. Refuses to confirm the existence of two boatloads of refugees reported to be currently on board customs vessels. The Government previously denied the vessels were in trouble and refuses to comment on whether the refugees will be landing in Australia - 30 June, 2014

258. Revokes the residential determination of two asylum seekers from Vietnam currently in high school in Adelaide and removes them to a detention centre, resulting in up to 7 other children, also in school, running away for fear of the same fate - 28 June, 2014

257. Cuts Dementia and Severe Behaviours Supplement, a payment to those who provide care for people with severe behavioural  and psychological symptoms of dementia - 26 June, 2014

256.  Breaks promise that no public servants will be forced into redundancy as it is revealed that staff in Treasury in Finance will be made involuntarily redundant  – 24 June, 2014

255. Seeks to reintroduce Temporary Protection Visas after the High Court strikes down the Government’s attempt to limit the number of permanent visas available each year  - 22 June 2014.

254. Refuses to halt return of refugees to war-torn Iraq - 18 June, 2014

253. Abandons the long-held, bipartisan position of referring to Palestinian land captured in 1967 as occupied - 06 June, 2014

252. Abolishes the Corporations and Markets Advisory Committee, which has, for 25 years,  investigated gaps in Australia’s corporate and financial markets law  and recommended ways to close them - 05 June, 2014

251. Excludes Australian shipyards from a major new contract, sending jobs offshore and threatening the industry in Australia - 05 June, 2014

250. Cuts funding to the peak refugee organisation the Refugee Council of Australia - 30 May 2014

249. Takes money from the Royal Commission into Institutional Responses to Child Sexual Abuse and gives it to the Royal Commission into the Home Insulation Scheme - 28 May 2014

248. Breaks promise that no public servants will be forced into redundancy after revelations that public servants in the Department of Industry have been made involuntarily redundant – 19 May 2014

247. Scraps the National Water Commission – 13 May, 2014

246. Abolishes funding for Building Australia’s Future Workforce — Connection Interviews and Job Seeker Workshops and the Experience+ Career Advice initiative - 13 May, 2014

245. Abolishes the Get Reading Programme - 13 May, 2014

244. Scraps the annual subsidy to local ethanol producers – 13 May 2014

243. Slashes the Biodiversity Fund – 13 May, 2014

242. Cuts the Education Department’s Online Diagnostic Tools Programme – 13 May, 2014

241. Abolishes the Australian Organ and Tissue Donation and Transplantation Authority which was established to encourage organ donation – 13 May, 2014

240.  Introduces annual reviews for veterans receiving military compensation payments due to illness or injury – 13 May, 2014

239. Terminates the Office of Water Science research programme – 13 May, 2014

238. Abolishes the Commonwealth Human Rights Education Grant - 13 May 2014

237. Abolishes funding to the Exotic Disease Preparedness Programme - 13 May 2014

236. Slashes funding from the Indigenous Health Budget - 13 May 2014

235. Cuts funding for Indigenous language support - 13 May 2014

234. Cuts funding to the Torres Strait Regional Authority - 13 May 2014

233. Abolishes the Congress of Australia’s First Peoples, the only elected representative body for Indigenous Australians - 13 May 2014

232. Breaks election promise and slashes funding to Landcare - 13 May 2014

231. Abolishes the National Rental Affordability Scheme - 13 May 2014

230. Cuts funding from the corporate regulator ASIC which oversees the financial sector - 13 May 2014

229. Axes the first home buyers savings scheme - 13 May 2014

228. Reduces funding to the Tertiary Education Quality and Standards Agency - 13 May 2014

227. Abolishes the Improving Educational Outcomes Programme - 13 May 2014

226. Cuts funding to the Child Care Early Learning Projects and the Professional Support Program which assist childcare workers gain skills - 13 May 2014

225. Reduces funding to the Australian Institute for Teaching and School Leadership - 13 May 2014

224. Cut the Research Training Scheme, with tertiary education providers to introduce student contributions for higher degrees - 13 May 2014

223. Ends the development of the Australian Baccalaureate - 13 May 2014

222. Cuts higher education reward funding - 13 May 2014

221. Cuts the Australian National University’s HC Coombs Policy Forum - 13 May 2014

220. Cuts Australian Research Council funding - 13 May 2014

219. Abolishes tax break for mature age workers and replaces it with a payment for employing people over 50 who have been on Newstart or the DSP for more than 6 months - 13 May 2014

218. Cuts an incentive program for graduates to take up work in regional locations of need - 13 May 2014

217. Axes the National Partnership Agreement on Certain Concessions for Pensioners and Seniors Card Holders which supports state and territory concessions for senior citizens including energy rebates. - 13 May 2014

216. Kills off four grant programmes including the the Australian Community Food Safety Campaign and Outreach Support Services for Criminalised Women - 13 May 2014

215. Cuts $2.3 million in contribution to the World Health Organisation - 13 May 2014

214. Abolishes the Australian Interactive Games Fund which helped support local video game developers - 13 May 2014

213. Breaks a promise not to cuts funding to health by dramatically cutting hospital funding - 13 May 2014

212. Cuts $240 million over four years to community programs that support poor, sick or disadvantaged people - 13 May 2014

211. Cuts $25million over 4 years or a quarter of the funding to Community Legal Centres who provide legal support to the poor and disadvantaged - 13 May 2014

210. Cuts the Women in Leadership program - 13 May 2014

209. Breaks a promise to have one million more solar roofs across Australia and at least 25 solar towns - 13 May 2014

208. Breaks a promise to spend $2.55 billion Emissions Reduction Fund by committing less than half this amount in the budget - 13 May 2014

207. Orders the spending of $11.7 million to plan the privatisation of: Defence Housing Australia, the Royal Australian Mint and the registry function of the Australian Securities and Investments Commission - 13 May 2014

206. Announces 3000 job loses at the Australian Tax Office - 13 May 2014

205. Freezes the Family Tax Benefit A at a set income level regardless of the number of children - 13 May 2014

204. Cuts the Family Tax Benefit B end-of-year supplement by 15% - 13 May 2014

203. Reduces funding for the Australian Nuclear Science and Technology Organisation - 13 May 2014

202. Reduces funding to the Australian Institute for Marine Science - 13 May 2014

201. Scraps a range of grant programs aimed at funding innovation and start-up businesses, including: Australian Industry Participation; Commercialisation Australia; Enterprise Solutions; Innovation Investment Fund; Industry Innovation Councils; Enterprise Connect; Industry Innovation Precincts; and Textile, Clothing and Footwear Small Business and Building Innovative Capability - 13 May 2014

200. Rips a further $111.4 million over four years out of the operating budget of the CSIRO - 13 May 2014

199. Ceases funding for National ICT Australia, which is a research centre for communications and information technology - 13 May 2014

198. Abolishes Medicare locals - 13 May 2014

197. Reduces payments to people under 35 with a disability who cannot find employment if they could work more than eight hours a week - 13 May 2014

196. Mandates religious education in schools by taking away the option for school to opt for a secular social worker instead - 13 May 2014

195. Abolishes the ABC’s disability communities website Ramp Up - 13 May 2014

194. Abolishes the Disability Discrimination Commissioner - 13 May 2014

193. Abolishes the Better Schools Centre for Quality Teaching and Learning - 13 May 2014

192. Dismantles the Australian Institute of Health and Welfare and will establish a health productivity and performance commission - 13 May 2014

191. Abolishes the Seniors Supplement - 13 May 2014

190. Axes the tax break for people with dependent spouses - 13 May 2014

189. Axes the Diagnostic Imaging Quality Programme - 13 May 2014

188. Ceases the Dental Flexible Grants Program - 13 May 2014

187. Axes the Charles Sturt University’s dental and oral health clinics - 13 May 2014

186. Axes funding for the nursing and allied health scholarships in Tasmania - 13 May 2014

185. Defers 13 Partners in Recovery programs which help people with severe and persistent mental illness and complex support needs - 13 May 2014

184. Cuts funding to the National Anti-Tobacco Campaign - 13 May 2014

183. Cuts Australia’s Animal Welfare Strategy - 13 May 2014

182. Abolishes Health Workforce Australia and cuts the expansion of the Clinical Training Funding Program - 13 May 2014

181. Axes the National Partnership Agreement on Preventive Health - 13 May 2014

180. Defers the National Partnership Agreement for adult public dental services until July 2015 - 13 May 2014

179. Reduces the Medicare benefit for optometry services and allows optometrists to charge more - 13 May 2014

178. Abolishes the GP Education and Training Limited and ceasing the Pre-vocational GP Placements Scheme - 13 May 2014

177. Axes industry and community clean energy programs include the Low Emissions Technology Demonstration Fund, the National Low Emission Coal Initiative, Energy Efficiency Programmes, the National Solar Schools Plan, Energy Efficiency Information Grants and Low Carbon Communities - 13 May 2014

176. Scraps The Australian Renewable Energy Agency (ARENA) which was set up to support new and emerging renewable technologies and in doing so breaks an election promise - 13 May 2014

175. Scraps the Housing Help for Seniors scheme which provided assistance to older Australians - 13 May 2014

174. Pulls $2.5 billion from aged care, including $1.7 billion from home based support such as Meals on Wheels - 13 May 2014

173. Cuts the benefit for unemployed people under 25 by moving them onto the Youth Allowance - 13 May 2014

172. Kills off the Gonski school funding vision by cutting future funding by $30 billion - 13 May 2014

171. Reduces Medicare and Pharmaceutical Benefits Scheme safety nets - 13 May 2014

170. Breaks a promise to make no cuts to health with a $368 million cut from preventative health measures - 13 May 2014

169. Cuts the Family Tax Benefit A end-of-year supplement by 17% - 13 May 2014

168. Increases the fuel excise twice a year by indexing it to CPI - 13 May 2014

167. Forces students to repay their debt earlier by lowering the wage they need to earn before payments kick in - 13 May 2014

166. Increases debt for students by increasing the interest on their fees - 13 May 2014

165. Makes it harder for retirees to access the Commonwealth Seniors Health Card - 13 May 2014

164. Guts the Australia Council and Screen Australia by cutting $87 million for the Arts - 13 May 2014

163. Forces people under 30 to work for the dole if they want to receive any financial support after a waiting period of six months with no financial support - 13 May 2014

162. Imposes a six month wait for people under 30s to receive unemployment benefits - 13 May 2014

161. Cuts the Family Tax Benefit Part B - 13 May 2014

160. Cuts the old age pension by indexing it to CPI instead of wages - 13 May 2014

159. Increases the pension age to 70 from 2035 - 13 May 2014

158. Imposes a $5 increase on the cost of all medicines available under the Pharmaceutical Benefits Scheme (80c for concession card holders) - 13 May 2014

157. Cuts the ‘Tools for the Trade’ program which helped apprentices buy their tools, and replacing it with a loan scheme apprentices will have to repay - 13 May 2014

156. Caps the amount of money workers can recoup in entitlements if their employer becomes insolvent or bankrupt to 16 weeks - 13 May 2014

155. Breaks a promise to only cut the foreign aid budget by $4.5 billion and cuts it by $7.9 billion instead - 13 May 2014

154. Axes funding to the Australian Youth Affairs Coalition, the national peak body for young people- 13 May 2014

153. Slashes Disability Support Pensions by indexing to inflation - 13 May 2014

152. Abolishes the highly successful Youth Connections program that supports young people who have not completed, or are at risk of not completing Year 12 or equivalent qualifications also costing hundreds of community sector jobs - 13 May 2014

151. Breaks a promise of “no new taxes” by introducing a fuel levy - 13 May 2014

150. Announces the sacking of 16,500 public sector workers as whole Departments are abolished despite promising only 12,000 job losses - 13 May 2014

149. Cuts $500 million from indigenous programs over five years - 13 May 2014

148. Breaks a promise of “no new taxes” by introducing a deficit tax rise of two percentage points for people earning more than $180,000 a year - 13 May 2014

147. Scrapping a net $1.2 billion in tuition subsidies for universities - 13 May 2014

146. Scraps the Australia Network, Australia’s international television service broadcast across our region that provides news and current affairs from an Australian perspective - 13 May 2014

145. Breaks promise of “no cuts to the ABC or SBS” by cutting $43.5 million from the ABC and SBS - 13 May 2014

144. Undermines Medicare by imposing a $7 fee increase for GP visits - 13 May 2014

143. Tears up Federal Government’s agreement with states and territories to help fund increasing health costs - 13 May 2014

142. Scraps caps on university fees, meaning universities will be able to charge whatever they like for degrees - 13 May 2014

141. Abolishes the COAG Reform Council — which provides information to Governments so they can track the performance of their programs - 13 May 2014

140. Sacks the National People with Disability and Carers Council — which pushed for and then helped build the NDIS - 13 May 2014

139. Releases the Commission of Audit report which recommends savage budget cuts that would negatively affect every Australian - 1 May 2014

138. Breaks a promise to introduce the paid parental leave scheme he took to the election - 30 April 2014

137. Spends $12.4 billion on new fighter jets whilst claiming a budget “emergency” and preparing to make big cuts to health and welfare - 23 April 2014

136. Abolishes the research and development tax incentives board – 11 April 2014

135. Begins dismantling GP Super clinics - 8 April 2014

134. Cuts 480 jobs from the Environment Department who are responsible for protecting places such as Kakadu, Antarctica and the Great Barrier Reef - 7 April 2014

133. Forbids public servants from making political comments online, even anonymously, and instructs them to report on colleagues who do - 6 April 2014

132. Establishes a secret, publicly funded “hit squad” to target political opponents led by the man who provided a “chaff bag” for Alan Jones to auction at a Young Liberal fundraiser - 1 April 2014

131. Imposes fees and charges on people who become bankrupt – 1 April 2014

130. Axes free legal assistance for asylum seekers - 31 March 2014

129. Defunds Ethical Clothing Australia that worked with industry to protect outworkers in the textile and clothing industry from exploitation and abandons the Governments ethical procurement guidelines - 30 March 2014

128. Opposes a UN resolution to conduct war crimes inquiry in Sri Lanka - 28 March 2014

127. Closes all Medicare offices on Saturdays - 26 March 2014

126. Brings back the awards of knights and dames which were abolished in 1986 - 25 March 2014

125. Cuts 400 jobs from the industry department - 25 March 2014

124. Ensures a human rights enquiry into the Manus Island detention centre is shut down and human rights lawyers are denied access to the centre - 23 March 2014

123. Abolishes one third of the jobs in Treasury costing approximately 300 jobs - 21 March 2014

122. Cuts welfare payments to orphans of soldiers - 16 March 2014

121. Moves to deny funding to artists or events that refuse corporate sponsorship for ethical reasons - 15 March 2014

120. Cuts hundreds of jobs at the CSIRO - 14 March 2014

119. Reopens 457 visa loophole to allow employers to hire an unlimited number of workers without scrutiny - 12 March 2014

118. Overturns a ban on cattle grazing in the Victorian Alpine National Park - 6 March 2014

117. Frustrated and defeated an attempt at the UN to highlight the humanitarian consequences of nuclear war - 5 March 2014

116. Axes funding earmarked to save the Sumatran rhinoceros from extinction - 28 February 2014

115. Introduces legislation to allow people aged between 17-24 years old to work for half the minimum wage and be exempted from all other work rights including health and safety laws and protections should they be injured at work – 26 February 2014

114. Axes funding to Aboriginal Early Childhood Support and Learning Incorporated, the only Indigenous peak body advising on early childhood issues for Indigenous people in NSW - 25 February, 2014

113. Misleads the Australian public about what occurred on Manus Island when asylum seekers were attacked killing one person and injuring seventy-seven. Once the information was known to be untrue, waited five days to correct the record - 25 February 2014

112. Contravenes 113 years of established practice by moving to release the previous Government’s confidential cabinet papers to the Royal Commission into the Pink Batts scheme - 22 February 2014

111. Scraps food grants program for small farmers - 21 February 2014

110. Pressured SPC Ardmona to cut the pay and conditions for workers in return for Government money - 20 February 2014

109. Blames carbon pricing for the close of Alcoa smelters and rolling mills and the loss of nearly 1000 jobs, despite the fact the company states it had no bearing on their decision - 19 February 2014

108. Breaches the privacy and puts in danger around 10, 000 asylum seekers and their families by releasing their personal details on the Department of Immigration website - 19 February 2014

107. Fails to ensure the safety of asylum seekers in our care on Manus Island who were subjected to a vicious attack, which left one person dead and seventy-seven seriously injured – 18 February 2014

106. Reverses the previous government’s decision to care for refugee children who are without an adult family member (ie unaccompanied minors) in the community and sends them to detention centres in Nauru – 17 February 2014

105. Removes poverty reduction from the goals of the foreign affairs budget –February 17, 2014

104. Appoints a climate change sceptic to head a review of our renewable energy target – 17 February 2014

103. Pays hundreds of indigenous workers in his Department up to $19 000 less than non-indigenous workers doing the same job and cuts the budget for the representative body the National Congress of Australia’s First Peoples causing two-thirds of the staff to lose their jobs – 15 February 2014

102. Breaks a promise to provide fibre-to-the-premises for all Tasmanians for the National Broadband Network – 13 February 2014

101. Unemployment rate jumps to highest in more than 10 years - 13 February 2014

100. Lies to the Australian public about the reasons Toyota gave for their decision to close in order to blame the workers and their union - 12 February 2014

99. Takes down a website providing information to the Australian public on the ingredients and nutritional content of foods. It is later revealed that the person in the Minister’s office who gave this directive is married to a lobbyist from the junk food industry and was still a share holder in their lobbying company - 11 February 2014

98. Destroys the Australian car manufacturing industry by refusing to provide any industry assistance leading to the decision of Toyota to shut costing up to 30 000 jobs – 10 February 2014

97. Launches a Royal Commission into unions – 10 February 2014

96. Attempts to reintroduce temporary visas for asylum seekers found to be fleeing persecution preventing them ever settling in Australia and retrospectively applies them to 20 000 people. This is stopped in the Senate twice by the ALP and The Greens - 7 February 2014

95. Supports a reduction of penalty rates and other Award minimums in a submission to the Fair Work Commission’s review of all Awards - 4 February 2014

94. Lies to the Australian public about the wages and working conditions of factory workers at SPC Ardmona in Shepparton and uses this incorrect information to blame them for their job insecurity - 4 February 2014

93. Launches an “efficiency study” into ABC and the SBS - 30 January 2014

92. Cuts the wages of Australian troops deployed overseas by almost $20 000 per solider - 29 January 2014

91. Intervenes on the side of Toyota to support cutting Australian workers wages and conditions - 28 January 2014

90. Privatises the 104 year old Australian Valuation Office costing nearly 200 jobs – 24 January 2014

89. Seeks to wind back the World Heritage listing of Tasmania’s forests – 23 January 2014

88. Withdraws funding for an early intervention program to help vulnerable young people – 22 January 2014

87. Exempts Western Australia from national environment laws to facilitate shark culling - 21 January 2014

86. Defunds all international environmental programs, the International Labour Organisation and cuts funding to a range of international aid programs run by NGOs such as Save the Children, Oxfam, CARE Australia and Caritas – 18 January 2014

85. Violates Indonesia’s territorial sovereignty while turning back asylum seeker boats – 17 January 2014

84. Politicises the national school curriculum by appointing a former Liberal staffer and a Coalition supporter, both critics of the current curriculum to conduct a review - 10 January 2014.

83. Directs that people already found to be refugees who arrived by boat be given the lowest priority for family reunion - 8 January 2014

82. Fails to contradict or take any action against a member of his government, Senator Cory Bernardi, who makes divisive statements about: abortion, “non-traditional” families and their children, same sex couples, couples who use IVF and calls for parts of WorkChoices to be reintroduced - 6 January 2014

81. Scraps funding from the Jewish Holocaust Centre –January 3, 2014

80. Devastates Australia’s contribution to overseas aid by cutting $4.5 billion from the budget, causing vital programs supporting those in extreme poverty in our region to collapse - 1 January 2014

79. Drastically reduces tax breaks for small business and fails to publicise it - 1 January 2014

78. Appoints Tim Wilson, a Liberal Party member and Policy Director of a right-wing think tank to the position of Commissioner at the Human Rights Commission even though this think tank argued for the Commission to be abolished – 23 December 2013

77. Approves private health fund premium increases of an average 6.2% a year – 23 December 2013

76. Breaks his promise to provide the promised customs vessel to monitor whaling operations in the Southern Ocean – 23 December 2013

75. Requests the delisting of World Heritage status for Tasmanian forests – 21 December 2013

74. Cuts funding to the Energy Efficiency Opportunities Programme which makes it mandatory for large energy using businesses to improve their efficiency –17 December, 2013

73. Breaks a promise to make no cuts to health by cutting $150 million from hospital and health services - 17 December 2013.

72. Scraps the Home Energy Saver Scheme which helps struggling low income households cut their electricity bills - 17 December 2013

71. Defunds the Public Interest Advocacy Centre whose objectives are to work for a fair, just and democratic society by taking up legal cases public interest issues - 17 December 2013

70. Defunds the Environmental Defenders Office which is a network of community legal centres providing free advice on environmental law - 17 December 2013

69. Axes funding for animal welfare - 17 December 2013

68. Breaks his election promise of no cuts to education by cutting funding for trade training centres in schools - 17 December 2013

67. Abolishes the AusAID graduate program costing 38 jobs - 17 December 2013

66. Cuts Indigenous legal services by $13.4 million. This includes $3.5 million from front line domestic violence support services, defunding the National legal service and abolishing all policy and law reform positions across the country - 17 December 2013

65. Abolishes the position of co-ordinator-general for remote indigenous services - 17 December 2013

64. Breaks his promise to unequivocally support the NDIS by changing the name of NDIS “launch sites” to “trial sites” and flags cuts to funding – 17 December 2013

63. Abolishes the National Office for Live Music along with the live music ambassadors - 17 December 2013

62. Cuts $2.5 million from community radio – 17 December 2013

61. Weakens the ministerial code of conduct to let ministers keep shares in companies - 16 December 2013

60. Disbands the independent Immigration Health Advisory Group for asylum seekers – 16 December 2013

59. Dumps the National Occupational Licensing Scheme which was designed to increase productivity by making it easier for skilled workers to work interstate - 14 December 2013

58. Axes $4.5 million from charities and community groups for the Building Multicultural Communities Program – 13 December 2013

57. Starts dismantling Australia’s world leading marine protection system - 13 December 2013

56. Scraps the COAG Standing Council on Environment and Water – 13 December 2013

55. Breaks his NBN election promise of giving all Australians access to 25 megabits per second download speeds by 2016 – 12 December 2013

54. Overturns the “critically endangered” listing of the Murray Darling Basin - 11 December 2013

53. Dares Holden to leave Australia. Holden responds by announcing its closure which costs Australians tens of thousands of jobs – 11 December 2013

52. Approves Clive Palmer’s mega coal mine in the Galilee Basin which opponents say will severely damage Great Barrier Reef - 11 December 2013

51. Demands that the few childcare workers who got pay rises “hand them back” – 10 December 2013

50. Approves the largest coal port in the world in the Great Barrier Reef World Heritage Area – 10 December 2013

49. Removes the community’s right to challenge decisions where the government has ignored expert advice on threatened species impacts – 9 December 2013

48. Downgrades national environment laws by giving approval powers to state premiers – 9 December 2013

47. Undermines Australia’s democracy by signing a free trade agreement with South Korea allowing corporations to sue the Australian Government – 6 December 2013

46. Damages our diplomatic relationship with our nearest neighbour East Timor – 5 December 2013

45. Repeals the pokie reform legislation which was designed to combat problem gambling – 4 December 2013

44. Suspends the Wage Connect program, despite it being proven to deliver good outcomes for unemployed people – 3 December 2013

43. Axes funding to the Alcohol and Other Drugs Council of Australia, forcing the 46 year old organisation to close. It is later revealed that a staffer in the Assistant Health Minister’s office had links to the Alcohol Industry - 27 November 2013

42. Breaks his promise to support Gonski and back flips three times – 25 November 2013

41. Shifts Australia’s position at the UN on Israeli settlements - 25 November 2013

40. Damages our diplomatic relationship with the Indonesian Government by refusing to apologise for tapping the phones of their President, his wife and senior Government officials – 23 November 2013

39. Converts crucial Start-Up Scholarships into loans, increasing the debt of 80,000 higher education students by $1.2 billion – 21 November 2013

38. Gifts two navy patrol boats to the Sri Lankan government to stop asylum seekers fleeing the Sri Lankan government - 17 November 2013

37. Introduces a Bill to impose on workers who are elected onto unpaid union committees huge financial penalties and jail terms for breeches of new compliance obligations – 14 November 2013

36. Condones torture by foreign governments by saying “sometimes in difficult circumstances, difficult things happen” – 14 November 2013

35. Hides information from the Parliament and the people about the government’s treatment of asylum seekers – 13 November 2013

34. Abandons Australia’s emission reduction targets - 12 November, 2013

33. Separates a refugee mother from her newborn baby – 10 November 2013

32. Cuts 600 jobs at the CSIRO - 8 November 2013

31. Abolishes Insurance Reform Advisory Group which provided a forum for industry and consumer bodies to discuss insurance industry reform - 8 November 2013

30. Abolishes the Maritime Workforce Development Forum which was an industry body working to build a sustainable skills base for the maritime industry - 8 November 2013

29. Abolishes the High Speed Rail Advisory Group whose job it was to advise Governments on the next steps on implementing high speed rail for eastern Australia - 8 November 2013

28. Abolishes the Advisory Panel on the Marketing in Australia of Infant Formula which for 21 years ensured companies comply with agreements on the advertising of infant formula - 8 November 2013

27. Abolishes the Antarctic Animal Ethics Committee who ensured research on animals in the Antarctic complies with Australian standards - 8 November 2013

26. Abolished the National Steering Committee on Corporate Wrongdoing that for 21 years worked to make sure the law was effectively enforced on corporate criminals - 8 November 2013

25. Abolishes the National Inter-country Adoption Advisory Council which provided expert advice on overseas adoption - 8 November 2013

24. Abolishes International Legal Services Advisory Council which was responsible for working to improve the international performance of Australia’s legal services - 8 November 2013

23. Abolishes the Commonwealth Firearms Advisory Council a group of experts in gun crime and firearms which was set up after the Port Arthur massacre - 8 November 2013

22. Abolishes Australian Animals Welfare Advisory Committee a diverse group of experts advising the Agriculture Minister on animal welfare issues - 8 November 2013

21. Abolishes the National Housing Supply Council which provided data and expert advice on housing demand, supply and affordability - 8 November 2013

20. Abolishes the Advisory Panel on Positive Ageing, established to help address the challenges the country faces as the number of older Australians grows – 8 November 2013

19. Refuses to offer support to manufacturing in Tasmania, despite requests and warnings. Caterpillar announces the move of 200 jobs from Burnie to Thailand, costing around 1000 local jobs - 5 November 2013

18. Provides $2.2 million legal aid for farmers and miners to fight native title claims - 1 November 2013

17. Abolishes the 40 year old AusAID costing hundreds of jobs - 1 November 2013

16. Launches a successful High Court challenge which strikes down the ACT Marriage Equality laws invalidating the marriages of many people and ensuring discrimination against same-sex couples continues – 23 October 2013

15. Denies there is a link between climate change and more severe bush fires and accuses a senior UN official was “talking through their hat” – 23 October 2013

14. Appoints the head of the Business Council of Australia to a “Commission of Audit” to recommend cuts to public spending – 22 October 2013

13. Cuts compensation to the victims of bushfires - 21 October 2013

12. Instructs public servants and detention centre staff to call asylum seekers “illegals” - 20 October 2013

11. Appoints Howard era Australian Building & Construction Commission (ABCC) Director to help reinstate the ABCC with all its previous oppressive powers over construction workers – 17 October 2013

10. Axes the Major Cities Unit a Government agency with 10 staff which provided expert advice on urban issues in our 18 biggest cities - 24 September 2013

9. Breaks his promise to “stop the boats” – 23 September 2013

8. Scraps the Social Inclusion Board, which had been established to guide policy on the reduction of poverty in Australia - 19 September 2013

7. Abolishes the Climate Commission – 19 September 2013

6. Appoints himself Minister for Women – 16 September 2013

5. Appoints only one woman into his cabinet and blames the women for his decision, saying he appoints “on merit”– 16 September 2013

4. Abolishes key ministerial positions of climate change and science – 16 September 2013

3. Breaks his promise to spend his first week with an Aboriginal community -14 September 2012

2. Takes away pay rises for childcare workers – 13 September 2013

1. Takes away pay rises from aged care workers – 13 September 2013



The Broken Promise Count



1. Does not spend his first week as Prime Minister with an Aboriginal community – 14 September 2013. This promise was made in front of indigenous elders and participants at the Garma Festival on 10 August 2013, this is a live recording.

2. Fails to “stop the boats” – 23 September 2013. This promise was repeated so many times I can’t count. Here’s Abbott’s 2013 campaign launch speech.

3. Breaks his promise to support Gonski - 25 November 2013 and 13 May 2014. Fails to commit to future funding or to require States to match the Commonwealth funding commitment. See paragraph two from Christopher Pyne on 29 August 2013

4. Breaks its NBN election promise of giving all Australians access to 25 megabits per second download speeds by 2016 – 12 December 2013 This was the Coalition’s policy they took to the election first announced 9 April 2013.

5. Breaks his election promise of no cuts to education by cutting funding for trade training centres in schools on 17 December 2013. He made this promise at the National Press Club on 2 September 2013 and in writing on 5 September 2013 as part of their policy commitments.

6. Breaks a promise to make no cuts to health. He made this promise at the National Press Club on 2 September 2013 and in writing on 5 September 2013 as part of their policy commitments. This promise was first broken on 27 November 2013 when they cut funding to the Alcohol and Other Drugs Council

7. Breaks a promise to make no cuts to health on 17 December 2013 when they cut $150 million from hospitals and health services.

8. Fails to provide the promised customs vessel to monitor whaling operations in the Southern Ocean – 23 December 2013 Promise made by Greg Hunt - 9 April 2013

9. Breaks a promise to provide fibre-to-the-premises for all Tasmanians for the National Broadband Network. This promise was confirmed my Malcolm Turnbull on 17 August 2013 and confirmed as broken by the NBN Co executive chairman Ziggy Switkowski on 13 February 2014.

10. Breaks a promise to introduce the paid parental leave scheme he took to the election on 30 April 2014 by reducing the promised benefit for those earning above $100 000.

11. Breaks promise of “no cuts to the ABC or SBS” by cutting $43.5 million from the ABC and SBS.

12. Breaks a promise of “no new taxes” by introducing a deficit tax rise of two percentage points for people earning more than $180,000 a year.

13. Announced to sacking of 16,500 public sector workers as whole Departments are abolished despite promising only 12,000 job losses and through natural attrition.

14. Breaks a promise of “no new taxes” by introducing a fuel levy.

15. Reduction in foreign aid budget of $7.9 billion over five years despite promise to not exceed $4.5 billion and cut via indexation.

16. Increases the pension age to 70 from 2035 after promising no changes to pensions

17. Cuts to old age pension by indexing to CPI, while it was promised there would be no changes.

18. Scraps The Australian Renewable Energy Agency (ARENA) which was set up to support new and emerging renewable technologies and in doing so breaks an election promise.

19. Tears up Federal Government’s agreement with states and territories to help fund increasing health costs despite promise of no cuts to health.

20.  Breaks a promise to make no cuts to health with a $368 million cut from preventative health measures.

21. Reduces the Medicare benefit for optometry services and allows optometrists to charge more, despite promise to not cut health budget.

22.  Axes the Charles Sturt University’s dental and oral health clinics, despite promise to not cut health budget.

23. Abolishes Medicare locals, despite promise to not cut health budget.

24. Breaks a promise to spend $2.55 billion Emissions Reduction Fund by committing less than half this amount in the budget.

25. Breaks a promise to have one million more solar roofs across Australia and at least 25 solar towns.

26. Breaks a promise not to cuts funding to health by dramatically cutting hospital funding.

27. Breaks election promise and slashes funding to Landcare

28. Breaks promise that no public servants will be forced into redundancy after revelations that two public servants in the Department of Industry have been made involuntarily redundant since September.

29. Breaks promise that no public servants will be forced into redundancy as it is revealed that at least 30 staff in Treasury will be made involuntarily redundant.

30. Breaks a promise not to grant permanent permanent residency to people arriving by boat by granting a visa to a least one refugee

31. Breaks a promise to amend the race hate laws

32. Breaks a promise to “make no unexpected detrimental changes to superannuation” by killing the Low Income Super Contribution, the Superannuation Guarantee and delaying superannuation increases for seven years.

..........................................................................................
Report AFL September 4, 2014 11:03 PM BST
Some key-words that help define Abbott and his illegitimate government.....

Vindictive Delays  Kills  Repeals  Bans   Refuses   Breaks  Risks  Cuts   Detains  Offends   Axes

Prohibits  Revokes  Abandons   Abolishes   Excludes  Slashes  Terminates  Reduces  Ends  Freezes  Rips 

                                      Ceases  Reduces

Dismantles   Defers  Undermines  Sacks  Forbids   Imposes   Defunds   Misleads   Contravenes  Breaches

Reverses  Removes   Destroys   Privatises  Violates  Politicises  Devastates   Hides



and the biggest one of all......

                                    LIES LIES LIES.



The infrastructure PM.what a sad joke.....what have they built?????

apart from a lifetimes worth of resentment.

Operation KICK HIM OUT.
Report secong coming. September 4, 2014 11:42 PM BST
illegitimate government.....
???????????????????

but the majority voted them in....Stupid
Report secong coming. September 4, 2014 11:43 PM BST
oh yeah Sally Mcloonyleftunionistmanus will always write up in favour of the cause CrazyCrazyCrazyCrazy
Report AFL September 4, 2014 11:47 PM BST
The latest count is he/they have broken 32 DIRECT PRE ELECTION PROMISES

That means by any standard they were elected on a platform built on lies.

This makes them an illegitimate Gov't.
Report secong coming. September 5, 2014 12:42 AM BST
THERE WILL BE NO CARBON TAX UNDER ANY (REPEAT FOR THE HARD OF HEARING AND POOR SIGHT....ANY) GOVERNMENT I LEAD...
The biggest porky of ALL time.....your criteria rendered her govt illegitimate
Report AFL September 5, 2014 2:58 AM BST
Abbott and his 32 lies far outweigh Gillards NON - LIE

32 times worse than Gillard even if you count her non lie as a lie.


Grin

Abbott is he really an Australin..... or does he hold dual citizenship .....or is he still just a Pom?

That would make him doubly.......illegitimate Laugh
Report AFL September 5, 2014 3:04 AM BST
Wouldn't it be sickening but hilarious....to find out that he has been a Pom all this time

The first real illegitimate PM

After he spent 3 years telling Gillard she was illegitimate to have it revealed that he was the illegitimate

one...... and for it to come back on him and get hit by the KARMA BUS.


LaughLaughLaugh
Report secong coming. September 5, 2014 11:18 PM BST
ANOTHER NON LIE? CrazyCrazyCrazyCrazyCrazyCrazy

this one from the biggest spender in oz history (and we are all paying for it now)WAYNE SWAN

"Well certainly what we rejected is this hysterical allegation that somehow we are moving towards a carbon tax from the Liberals in their advertising. We certainly reject that.”
Meet the Press, 15 August 2010.
Report AFL September 6, 2014 12:39 AM BST
Climate Change is crap

Who said that?

There will be no changes to pensions.

Who said that before the last election?
Report AFL September 6, 2014 1:52 AM BST
The biggest lie is Abbott telling the world he believes in Climate Change

When everything he has done is the exact opposite of someone that believes in Climate Change

How gutless and deceitful is that?..He hasn't got the guts to go to the Australian people and be honest

about his real beliefs in this matter but prefers to lie to get into power and then becomes a enviornmental

vandal of the highest order with his attack on Science and his dismantling of any programme that has a green

tinge.

That is the biggest lie by a Prime Minister in our history. But you won't find a critical member of

the MSMthat has the guts to pull him up on his lies...because they gave him a free pass into Gov't without

any scrutiny and now sit back as if it has been a shock that he/they have been such an abomimation as a

gov't.
Report AFL September 10, 2014 8:37 AM BST
Time for Abbott to stop fudging on the citizenship issue

Ingrid Matthews 10 September 2014
independentaustraliadotnet

The fudging, blocking and delaying from both conservative governments, in Australia and Britain, suggest the date when Tony Abbott renounced his British citizenship will be politically harmful to the Prime Minister. Law lecturer, Ingrid Matthews, looks at the facts.

IN THE U.S., being born in that country is a constitutional requirement for standing for the Presidency. Anyone born outside the U.S. is not eligible to stand. There was once some talk of changing this so that Arnold Schwarzenegger aka the former governator of California, would become eligible to run for president. A sex scandal broke, he disappeared from public life, and so did the debate.

This is a constitutional matter. A legal fact. The political and cultural requirements are numerous and complex. For instance, there is no requirement in the constitution that a presidential candidate also be a Christian. But the current political reality is that candidates are compelled to state their adherence to the Christian religion and end their speeches with ‘God Bless America’. This is so despite the fact that the framers of the American Constitution were determined secularists. Freedom of religion and freedom from religion is the secular liberal tradition. The private letters of U.S. Constitution framer Thomas Jefferson clearly show his secular outlook and contain the phrase ‘separation of church and state’ to explain the First Amendment, which opens with this line:

    ‘Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof’

Atheists are usually required to demonstrate our knowledge of your religion in order to refute it. In this tradition, Jefferson supported his argument by quoting the gospel of Mark (12:17):

    ‘Then Jesus said to them, "Give back to Caesar what is Caesar's and to God what is God's." And they were amazed at him.’

Because Barak Hussein Obama is a black Democrat with a funny sounding Muslim-ish name, a group of right wing conspiracists made up a story: that Obama was not born in the U.S.

This is simply a lie. It gained traction in all the usual ways: via the lie-spreading machine that is Fox ‘news’, funded by millionaire Donald Trump, who donates generously to the Republican Party and increases his already obscene wealth under the demonstrably terrible ‘economic policy’ measures favoured by the extreme right wing.

(image courtesy homebrewedtheology.com)

The whole shrieking mess can be translated into a simple invalid argument: Obama is black, therefore he is not eligible for the presidency.

The situation in Australia is different. Not for the first time, we have a foreign-born Prime Minister. This is neither a legal nor political problem. The constitution does not even mention the prime minister, let alone direct that the person holding that office be born in Australia.

The Australian constitution does, however, require all elected members of Parliament to only hold Australian citizenship. That is, if you want to take up an elected position in our democracy and become part of the highest governing authority in the country, it is illegal to do so if you also hold allegiance to a foreign power in the form of citizenship of another nation. You must be neither a non-citizen nor a dual citizen. You must be an Australian citizen and an Australian citizen only. This is in section 44, which sets out the conditions and requirements of election to the Commonwealth Parliament.

Section 44 of the Australian Constitution lists the grounds for disqualification on who may become a candidate for election to the Parliament of Australia. It states in particular:

44. Any person who -

(i.)  Is under any acknowledgement of allegiance, obedience, or adherence to a foreign power, or is a subject or a citizen or entitled to the rights or privileges of a subject or citizen of a foreign power: or

(ii.) Is attainted of treason, or has been convicted and is under sentence, or subject to be sentenced, for any offence punishable under the law of the Commonwealth or of a State by imprisonment for one year or longer: or

(iii.) Is an undischarged bankrupt or insolvent: or

(iv.) Holds any office of profit under the Crown, or any pension payable during the pleasure of the Crown out of any of the revenues of the Commonwealth: or

(v.) Has any direct or indirect pecuniary interest in any agreement with the Public Service of the Commonwealth otherwise than as a member and in common with the other members of an incorporated company consisting of more than twenty-five persons:

shall be incapable of being chosen or of sitting as a senator or a member of the House of Representatives.

Here’s the thinking behind the provision on foreign powers. While the states run day-to-day internal matters such as health, education and policing, the Commonwealth must deal with external affairs on behalf of all Australians.

So if a member of the Commonwealth Parliament holds dual citizenship, they immediately risk a conflict of interest where the Australian government is negotiating, or going to war against, a foreign power. This is an unacceptable level of risk, because of national security.

So to stand for public office as a dual citizen is in breach of our founding legal document, the law that authorises all other Australian laws. Again, this is not necessarily a problem.

If the constitutional breach is seen as inadvertent, a mere oversight, we extend the principle of charity. This is the same rule that gives the batsman the benefit of the doubt. People make mistakes all the time. Where there are humans, there is human error. In the first instance, we give them the benefit of the doubt. They said it was an oversight, and it probably was. It’s a small problem with a simple solution.

Renounce the other citizenship, become an Australian-only citizen, if necessary hold a by-election. If you win the by-election after renouncing the non-Australian citizenship – the citizenship of a foreign power – both the legal and political problems are resolved. That’s it.

It is a different case altogether to repeatedly stand for public office not once, but twice, or three or four or five times, while not being eligible to stand under s44 of the Australian Constitution. It is certainly a substantially different matter if the person who did this is the Prime Minister, a person who holds qualification from an elite university, a highly paid member of parliament who knows or ought to know that what they are doing is in breach of the constitution.

Someone in this position is attributed with constructive knowledge, that is, if you say you didn’t know, the law says you ought to have known, in this case on the basis of the responsibilities and remuneration of your office, and the foundational principles of the Westminster system, such as ministerial accountability.

There is no crazy conspiracy ‘birther’ movement in Australia. There is a group of people on social (and now some traditional) media asking whether the Prime Minister has stood for public office while ineligible to stand, and if so, how many times.

Comparisons with the birthers should be dismissed out of hand as weak analogy. That is, there are too few similarities, and those similarities are very broad (both arguments are founded in political oppositionism and use the constitution to make their case). There are too many highly relevant differences, and the differences are very specific.

The birthers simple seek to discredit the president and their opposition is racist as well as political. In Australia, we are asking whether the Prime Ministers tendency to lie goes all the way to his election to public office itself.

The question is easily answered. The Prime Minister’s office tells us he has renounced his British citizenship. It refuses to say when. The fudging and blocking and delaying from both conservative governments, in Australia and Britain, suggest the date will be politically harmful to the Prime Minister.

My guess is that the date he renounced British citizenship is relatively recent, and will show that he wilfully, not inadvertently, stood for public office more than once, while being ineligible to do so.

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Report AFL September 10, 2014 8:44 AM BST
SC  seething.....Laugh
Report AFL September 10, 2014 8:46 AM BST
Is this why Abbott had that un explained trip to England recently?

When there were important meetings with the yanks he missed.Shocked
Report AFL September 12, 2014 9:34 AM BST
Abbott has made Australia less safe — so he’s right to lift the threat level

Bernard Keane | Sep 12, 2014
crikey

Tony Abbott’s announcement that the terrorism threat level has been raised is correct — after all, he has

taken a deliberate decision that will make Australians less safe, and done so for political purposes.

However facile and meaningless Australia’s terror threat level system is, the Prime Minister is correct to

raise the level to high — a move he has announced this afternoon. The increase in the level — based on the

claim that a terrorist attack is “likely”, although there was “no specific intelligence of particular plots” 

— will be accompanied by a “modest information campaign”, the Prime Minister revealed, in an announcement

that presumably entirely by coincidence was simultaneous with another NSW Liberal MP being exposed at the

Independent Commission Against Corruption and Senator Arthur Sinodinos returning to ICAC for more

questioning.


Australians are less safe now than a few weeks ago — and less safe because of decisions taken, primarily for

political ends, by the Abbott government: namely, to intervene in a conflict in Iraq and Syria that has

nothing to do with Australia’s national interest.


We know this will make Australians less safe because our security and intelligence officials told us how the

2003 Iraq war made Western citizens less safe. Australian Federal Police commissioner Mick Keelty said it

at the time and was abused by the Howard government for his trouble. Senior intelligence officials in the

United Kingdom and the United States have confirmed it since: the Iraq War radicalised hundreds of Western

Muslims who saw only unprompted aggression directed toward a Muslim country (the former head of MI5 has

explained this best, for the Chilcot Inquiry in the UK).


Islamist terrorism is portrayed in the media as a force of irrational evil - far more so than white male

terrorists ever are.
But terrorism is a response by extremist individuals to external events, not a

random occurrence of a disturbed or depraved mind. Osama Bin Laden understood this, knowing that if he could

provoke the United States into attacking a Muslim country, it would deliver a generation of angry young men

to his cause.
For Bin Laden, it took the intricately-planned, epic-scale attack of 9/11 to achieve that.

Islamic State militants, however, have achieved it with far less: some slaughters of prisoners and brutal

murders of two Western hostages. As if compelled by an other-worldly force, once again Western countries

are dropping everything to do exactly what Islamic extremists want — intervene in a Muslim country.


In choosing to be part of this process — which includes, along the way, providing arms to a proscribed

terrorist organisation, PKK, which happens to be fighting on “our” side — Tony Abbott has therefore taken a

decision that will demonstrably make Australians less safe. Moreover, he has done so primarily for political

purposes.
Having discovered a competence in international affairs of the kind that eluded Julia Gillard

until much later in her prime ministership, Abbott has been keen to use international affairs as a

distraction from the domestic difficulties that see his government lagging in the polls. He has also, like

John Howard, sought to keep the focus on national security, an area where he knows the Coalition always


leads Labor — indeed, part of the theatrics of raising the threat level are to do just that.

Problematically, however, Abbott isn’t getting the political benefit: the polls so far show his government

continues to struggle and that he isn’t trusted on international affairs. It’s one thing to place the lives

of Australians at risk for political purposes, but it’s even worse to do it so badly you fail to get any

political benefit.



It has been noticeable (and it’s been noticed by Labor) that Abbott is ostentatiously

invoking Labor’s bipartisan support on the terrorism issue and repeatedly insisting that he is not using it

for political purposes — especially that the decision to lift the threat level is one for security officials.




Governments in national security situations can normally rely on the electorate to stand behind them with

little convincing — it’s oppositions that have to be careful not to be perceived as being out of step. [b]But in

this instance, Abbott occasionally looks as though he’s clinging onto Opposition Leader Bill Shorten for

protection against the criticism of politicising terrorism.


The broader point of all this is, well, duh. As Crikey has noted repeatedly, this isn’t about gormless

politicians endlessly repeating the mistakes of their predecessors. They, and security officials, know

perfectly well what perpetuates the War on Terror, which is such a boon for large companies, security

agencies and politicians. That’s why they keep on perpetuating it.

.................................................................................

PURE EVIL Devil
Report secong coming. September 15, 2014 5:08 AM BST
loony
Report secong coming. September 15, 2014 5:08 AM BST
he was never asked the question and you answered it for him- misrepresenting the truth
Report AFL September 15, 2014 5:19 AM BST
Opposition Leader Tony Abbott has been forced to defend his comment that "sometimes **** happens" when discussing the events surrounding the death of a digger in Afghanistan last year.

Lance Corporal Jared MacKinney was shot dead in a battle with Taliban insurgents in August.

Channel Seven has broadcast footage of Mr Abbott in October discussing the incident with US commander James Creighton.

Mr Abbott in Tarin Kowt,is seen saying:"It's pretty obvious that, well, sometimes **** happens,doesn't it?"
Report secong coming. September 15, 2014 5:21 AM BST
but he did not say it in relation to a made up question from YOU regarding the current conflict, did he?
Report AFL September 15, 2014 5:26 AM BST
Nahh   just shows what he really thinks about the deaths of our soldiers .......

Sh it happens.... move along ......  there's an election to win
Report secong coming. September 15, 2014 5:27 AM BST
you are out of line on this one
Report AFL September 15, 2014 5:40 AM BST
No way out of line........

HE SAID IT and you can not put any other interpretation on it.


Just the fact that he mumbled this should have excluded him from the highest office

Had it been a Labor Politician he  would have been hounded from office by the war mongering Murdoch Press.
Report secong coming. September 15, 2014 5:55 AM BST
Sh it happens.... move along ......  there's an election to win


find where he said that???


you ARE out of line by portraying him as saying that when HE DID NOT
Report secong coming. September 15, 2014 6:05 AM BST
and FFS billy bob is still going on about WW2.....bill its ok mate let it go CrazyCrazyCrazy
Report AFL September 15, 2014 6:14 AM BST
Abbott was asked by Riley to put his remark into context....and he couldn't ....

Do you remember the interview???????

Where Abbott stood there like a rabbit in the headlights for 20 seconds

I stand by my interpretation of what he meant.
Report AFL September 15, 2014 6:17 AM BST
And this was after Abbott had more than a couple of hours warning that the interview was going to be about his Sh it Happens comment.
Report secong coming. September 15, 2014 6:40 AM BST
AFL  • September 15, 2014 4:51 AM BST 


HEY TONY ARE WE REALLY GOING TO WAR AGAIN, OUR SONS AND DAUGHTERS COULD BE KILLED?




ABBOTT:        SH IT HAPPENS

-FIND THE REPORTER QUESTION AND TA ANSWER WITH LINK PLEASE











AFL

Report •  Quote  •  Block User  AFL  • September 15, 2014 5:26 AM BST 


Nahh   just shows what he really thinks about the deaths of our soldiers .......

Sh it happens.... move along ......  there's an election to win


-FIND THE REPORTER QUESTION AND TA ANSWER WITH LINK PLEASE?


Difference between your interpretation (TA - who is this AFL? character?) AND AN ACTUAL QUESTION/ANSWER (your words -figment above)

On that I am correct and you ARE NOT , you can't say he answered your questions above with sh it happens because he didn't  - THAT'S A COLD HARD FACT












secong coming.

Report •  Quote  •  Block User  secong coming.  • September 15, 2014 5:27 AM BST 


you are out of line on this one









AFL

Report •  Quote  •  Block User  AFL  • September 15, 2014 5:40 AM BST 


No way out of line........

HE SAID IT and you can not put any other interpretation on it.


Just the fact that he mumbled this should have excluded him from the highest office

Had it been a Labor Politician he  would have been hounded from office by the war mongering Murdoch Press.
Report AFL September 15, 2014 6:56 AM BST
Please go ask Tony Abbott what he meant by SH IT HAPPENS
Report AFL October 14, 2014 8:33 AM BST
What a f k wit we have for a PM. Total embarrasment on the world stage.

Like the local punch drunk pi ss pot trying to big note himself.

What a disgrace he is and this is the best the Liberal Party have ?????

What a  sad joke.
Report Kye October 14, 2014 8:42 AM BST
Yawn

AFL you are really bitter & twisted. Get some help!

Instead of twisting & criticising every comment by our Prime Minister try reviewing you own psychotic ramblings.
Report AFL October 14, 2014 9:10 AM BST
Get stuffed  he's the PM of our country and there has never never been a worse example of one.


He's a fu k wit that should never have been waved through without scrutiny by our pathetic Murdoch scum and

the MSM.
Report bigted. October 14, 2014 9:16 AM BST
abbotts a c0ckhead and all you tories know it..you know your a fkwit when jacqui lambie is calling u immature Laugh
Report AFL October 16, 2014 9:16 AM BST
Ebola  over 4000 dead.... projected over 1 million dead   Abbott and the Liberal Party give a measly stingy 16

million when a single person has donated around 25 million. No boots on the ground.

Selective compassion.

What a disgrace of a Prime Minister and a Gov't.


No votes in heping a bunch of black people in far away land.
Report therhino October 16, 2014 11:10 AM BST
Zuckerberg donated the 25 mil. He can afford more than we can.

The West has given a fk about Africa since I don't know when, both left and right govts. Not sure what you think the other mob would do different.

How much money should be donated and what is an appropriate response?
Report therhino October 16, 2014 11:11 AM BST
*The West hasn't given a fk...
Report bigted. October 16, 2014 11:30 AM BST
he should be sacked for telling more lies than Pinocchio..thats a fact..
the average redneck are believing the spin doctors and warmongers..fking gross mob of ****s

gotta love the Lieberal Party..
Report AFL October 16, 2014 11:41 AM BST
We are far far far richer than Zuckerberg, and have a global duty and ability to pitch in a lot deeper than

one single person.

The AMA is calling for medical teams and equipment and help with co-ordination boots on the ground

DOCTORS NURSES all of which  Labor would have in process by now.
Report bigted. October 16, 2014 11:41 AM BST
Scared

Report AFL October 16, 2014 11:46 AM BST
The biggest and greatest lie ever told in australian political history is Tony Abbott saying he believes in

Climate Change.

When Everything he has done in Gov't has been consistent with a Climate Change DENIER of the

greatest order.

But you wont find a member of the press bail him up on it.
Report bigted. October 16, 2014 1:05 PM BST
LNP ebola statement ...

Hopefully Ebola doesn't make it's way to Iraq. We wouldn't want to have to leave prematurely.
Report secong coming. October 16, 2014 9:37 PM BST
The biggest and greatest lie ever told in australian political history is JULIA GILLARD saying

'THERE WILL BE NO CARBON TAX UNDER ANY GOVERNMENT I LEAD'

the cold hard FACT is we had a CARBON TAX UNDER JULIA GILLARD (in between playing for Footscray but that another lie for another day)- black and white for the dumb f***ers here CrazyCrazyCrazy

we need a one eyed smiley for the brain dead here bigted and afl...the labor party have never ever done a thing wrong on their eyes FFS
Report wombleoz October 16, 2014 11:04 PM BST
is that a bigger lie than saying

there will be no cuts to health or education, no changes to pensions, no cuts to the ABC or SBS

all lies, lies I tell ya
Report wonby10 October 19, 2014 12:03 PM BST
I thought this was a thread about a religious guy in a brown dress.
Report wombleoz October 19, 2014 12:07 PM BST
LaughLaughLaugh
Report AFL October 28, 2014 6:24 AM GMT
The Unanswered Questions In The Hunt For Freya Newman

By Ben Eltham
newmatilda com au

The public handling of a 'private' scholarship is a matter that should motivate those in power to take action. Ben Eltham explains.

It was a scandal in the halls of academe.

In late 2011, Paul Greenfield, the Vice-Chancellor of the University of Queensland, was forced to resign.

The reason? According to the university, there had been “an irregularity in the enrolment process”.

Irregular it certainly was. Despite under-performing on her admissions test, Greenfield’s daughter had been given a “forced offer” to the prestigious School of Medicine at the sandstone university.

As the official report by the Queensland Crime and Misconduct Commission makes plain, Greenfield had pulled strings to get his daughter a place. In the quaint but revealing terminology of university corruption, a “forced offer” occurs when “an offer to a student to enrol in a particular course is made manually into the computer system rather than letting the computer system automatically select the students to receive an offer based on certain conditions such as scores.”

It turned out that young Ms Greenfield (we still don’t know her first name) had been given a spot in the highly competitive degree above more than 340 better-qualified students. Indeed, she’d failed one of the three sections of her entrance exam. On the university’s rules, therefore, she was not eligible for a place.

That didn’t stop her father, Paul. Although he was away on holidays, he was, after all, the University’s boss.

Greenfield called the head of the medical school, David Wilkinson. According to Wilkinson, Greenfield asked him bluntly, “Is there any other way we can get her into medicine at UQ?” Feeling under pressure, Wilkinson contacted UQ’s acting Vice-Chancellor, Michael Keniger.

Keniger acted swiftly. “I will arrange for her to be accepted,” Keniger said. The admissions office was phoned. When the office expressed some reservations, Wilkinson phoned Keniger back. They had a short conversation. Wilkinson phoned academic registrar Maureen Bowman, and told her that the request had come straight from the top. The next day, the offer was duly sent out.

It was nine months before the UQ nepotism scandal came to light. Senior staff members, including executive deans, knew about the forced offer. One senior professor even examined the official medical school database, to see whether students had been admitted without the requisite scores. As the CMC report details, there he found “anomalies in the admissions of several students, namely, that they had not achieved the requisite… score.” But he didn’t go public with that information.

The beans were finally spilled in September 2011. In an unrelated probe, Maureen Bowen told a UQ investigative officer about what had happened. The University’s Senate and Chancellor were told. An investigation was launched. Greenfield and Keniger stood aside.

When the news broke, a storm of controversy blew up. Brisbane daily The Courier-Mail ran several articles on the scandal, and the University was forced to update its admissions procedures and internal integrity safeguards.

Greenfield and Keniger never returned to their roles. Their academic management careers were ruined; Greenfield also stepped down from his chairmanship of the board of ANSTO, the federal government’s nuclear science agency. In its official report on the matter, the CMC reserved stinging criticism for UQ for downplaying the seriousness of the affair.

It’s interesting to contrast the UQ admissions scandal to another college scandal involving the daughter of a powerful person: Frances Abbott.

While the cases are not identical, they have much in common. When Tony Abbott was opposition leader, his daughter, Frances Abbott, was offered a lucrative scholarship to a private design college, the Whitehouse Institute of Design.

Ms Abbott was offered a scholarship that wasn’t advertised, wasn’t announced, and for which ordinary students cannot apply.

As a result, she paid just $7,546 for the $68,182 degree. She was later given a job by the Whitehouse Institute, a position that leaked documents showed did not have a formally defined role.

It seems impossible to reconcile the Whitehouse Institute’s claim that the Abbott scholarship was awarded “on merit” with the known facts of the case. The leaked documents obtained by New Matilda reveal that Ms Abbott was offered the “Managng (sic) Director’s Scholarship” at her first and only meeting with the owner of the Institute, Leanne Whitehouse.

To this day, the Whitehouse Institute’s website still says it does not offer scholarships.

Just as in UQ’s case, accepted protocols appear to have been by-passed, and academic governance procedures were substandard.

In fact, in some key aspects, what went on at the Whitehouse Institute was far worse than what went on at UQ.

UQ at least made a public, formal offer of its place in medical school to Ms Greenfield. The University’s governing Senate also acted swiftly to investigate when the scandal came to light. Finally, senior executives resigned when their positions became untenable.

In contrast, at the Whitehouse Institute, the very existence of the scholarship was kept a secret. When it was outed, there was no internal investigation. Nor was there any admission of improper behaviour. The Whitehouse Institute continues to maintain that it has done nothing wrong, and that the daughter of the Prime Minister was offered a scholarship on the basis of academic merit.



In the debate about Freya Newman’s role and actions, it remains astonishing that so little media attention has focused on the actions of the Whitehouse Institute educators on whom she is accused of blowing the whistle.

Private tertiary education in Australia has long taken a back seat to the larger and more established higher education providers in the public sector. But that doesn’t mean that private colleges don’t have a responsibility to the students they educate, nor to the public at large.

The taxpayer is an indispensable subsidiser of private tertiary colleges in this country: without access by students to subsidised federal loans through the FEE-HELP system, many private colleges would fold.

Critically, the state also sanctions and regulates the provision of higher education. You can’t just hang out your shingle in Australia and start offering degrees. Like every other college and university, the Whitehouse Institute falls under the federal tertiary regulator, TEQSA, which has accredited it to issue bachelors and masters degrees.

The law that governs TEQSA accreditation – the Higher Education Standards Framework (Threshold Standards) 2011 – makes for interesting reading in light of the Frances Abbott affair. Section 3.7 of the act mandates that:

    The higher education provider’s corporate governing body protects the academic integrity and quality of the higher education provider’s higher education operations through academic governance arrangements that provide a clear and discernable separation between corporate and academic governance, including a properly constituted academic board and course advisory committees.

It’s certainly open to question whether this section of the act has been complied with in the Frances Abbott affair. At the very least, the governing body has interfered with what would normally be an academic decision.

It appears as though the academic board played no role in the offering of a scholarship to Frances Abbott.

Did Frances Abbott formally apply for this scholarship, in a normal process, via normal procedures? The evidence suggests that she didn’t, and the Whitehouse Institute has not provided any that would shed further light on the scholarship's merit. After all, there was no scholarship advertised, and the Whitehouse Institute website still maintains that “Whitehouse does not currently offer scholarships to gain a place into the Bachelor of Design.”

Nor do the academic governors appear to have played any part in the single interview with Leanne Whitehouse that led to Frances Abbott’s scholarship offer. How much did Whitehouse’s Academic Board have to do with this matter? Did they even know? Is it time for the chair of the Academic Board, Andrew Gonczi, to explain what, if any, role he played?

This background matters when we turn to the role of Freya Newman, the purported whistleblower whose actions led to the public disclosure of Frances Abbott’s subsidised education.

Newman, a court heard last week, found out about the secret scholarship from overhearing a conversation amongst more senior Whitehouse staff. She then used another staff member’s login and password to access the Whitehouse’s student database.

As a result of her reported actions, Freya Newman has suffered significant consequences. The New South Wales Police investigated and then charged her with accessing restricted information on a computer.

According to her lawyer Tony Payne, Newman was motivated “by a sense of injustice”. Newman accessed the database only to verify the scholarship, and did not disclose the details of any other student. She has written a formal apology to Frances Abbott and has expressed remorse for the damage to Abbott’s reputation.

Newman will be sentenced next month. The prosecution is pushing for a criminal conviction to be recorded against the 21-year old.

The most salient question in the Freya Newman affair is why she was ever charged in the first place. While she has admitted her crime, Newman’s actions were manifestly in the public interest.

The public interest in Frances Abbott’s scholarship is two-fold.

In the first instance, the actions of the Whitehouse Institute appear, on its own rules, to be improper. The Whitehouse Institute is a beneficiary of public subsidy through FEE-HELP and is the subject of federal education law. The college’s actions in by-passing its own stated policy on scholarships have never been adequately explained, and its bluff denials of any wrong-doing are not credible.

The broader public interest of the Frances Abbott scholarship goes to lobbying, and the many and varied ways that private interests seek to influence politicians and public officials.

New Matilda has uncovered clear evidence that the Whitehouse Institute pursued Frances Abbott with a scholarship offer. A source inside the Whitehouse Institute told New Matilda that “Leanne got the Chairman of the Board [Les Taylor] to tell [Frances Abbott] she had the offer of a scholarship.”

It is all too clear why a private college would wish to curry favour with the Prime Minister’s daughter.

Australian higher education is currently experiencing the biggest policy shake-up in a generation. The Abbott government’s proposed changes, which break a stated 2013 election promise, will deregulate university fees and open up the higher education system to private providers like the Whitehouse Institute.

Private colleges stand to gain hundreds of millions should Christopher Pyne’s legislative changes to higher education pass the Parliament.


And we have evidence that Frances Abbott was used as a bargaining chip to lobby the Abbott government about higher education policy reform. Tony Abbott has attended two separate functions at the Whitehouse Institute, including the now-notorious December 2013 gala in which college owner Leanne Whitehouse made pointed remarks about the need to reduce TEQSA red-tape. “And yes, I am looking at you, Prime Minister,” sources say Whitehouse said.

The Abbott government slashed funding to TEQSA, the tertiary regulator, in the budget in May.

The comparison with the UQ affair is stark.

There, the person who eventually blew the whistle, academic registrar Maureen Bowen, has not faced official or legal sanction. Nor have either of the two senior academics that accessed university databases to check on Ms Greenfield’s entrance scores. Indeed, no-one involved in the UQ admissions scandal has faced any charge of misconduct at all, either from the university or under Queensland law.

Why did Maureen Bowen, Paul Greenfield and Michael Keniger at the University of Queensland escape without even a university misconduct charge, while Freya Newman was charged with a criminal offence?

The answer is inescapable: Newman is being punished for embarrassing the powerful. As Crikey pointed out in an editorial last week, “in our minds, there is also no doubt that if Frances Abbott were not the Prime Minister’s daughter, Newman would not be in court today, facing jail for her actions.”

Nothing could better highlight the pressing need to protect whistleblowers. If Freya Newman had been working at a public university, she may well have been protected from legal repercussions by whistleblower protection laws. Because she was at a private college, she enjoyed no protection.

Instead, a young woman’s life has been upended, her future prospects seriously harmed, simply because she did the right thing.


Meanwhile, Frances Abbott continues to work for the Whitehouse Institute, and Whitehouse officials who made the decision to give her the scholarship have suffered no repercussions.

To international observers, what’s happened is all too obvious: a whistleblower has been punished, while others have got off scot-free.

The International Business Times ran a story last week that summed it up: “It Doesn’t Pay To Be A Whistleblower In Australia,” ran the headline, “Especially If Subject Of Expose Is PM’s Daughter.”
Report AFL October 29, 2014 8:47 PM GMT
Fantastic to see but what a total embarrasment for a PM to virtually be blown of the stage of the Science Awards by the lack of

applause for this disgrace of a PM and his WAR ON SCIENCE.
Report AFL November 5, 2014 8:07 AM GMT
What an idiot we have for a PM. The most devisive PM in our history.

What sheer born to rule arrogance to demand how you want to be remembered....... after one pathetic year in office..... where the 

budget you excreted on the people would struggle to pass with a mouthfull of laxatives.

I am the infrastructure Prime Minister he demands ha ha what a joke.....I am the Toll ROAD Prime Minister  it should be.

Is that the best thing he reckons he could do for the country is build more toll ways ........what a visionary he isn't.

I hope this mob of poor hating, science hating, bigot loving bas tards let us kick him out.
Report AFL November 12, 2014 1:44 AM GMT
OUR FEARFULL LEADER

How is he viewed around the world?

Away from the Murdoch and MSM Cheer Squad that imposed him on us


The Guardian judged him "politically incorrect to the point of dementia"


According to the New Statesman Abbott represents "politics at it's most crass, exploitative and disturbing."


UK Labour MP Paul Flynn called him a "bigoted airhead"


The LA Times called ITSELF "scandalised" by his prejudices.


The Sydney Morning Herald said Tony Abbott had plumbed "new lows" in Governmant decency.


Le Monde thinks he is "sexist and vulgar."


And for the Huffington Post, he is simply "an idiot."































And Putin just thiks he's gutless.


Laugh
Report AFL November 12, 2014 6:30 AM GMT
Petitioning Tony Abbott



Show the public your British Citizenship renunciation form, proving you were not elected to our Parliament illegally.



                                         Petition by Abbott's Australia


Section 44 of the Australian Constitution forbids anyone holding dual citizenship from being elected to Parliament.  Tony Abbott's refusal (under FOI request) to provide his Form RN renouncing his British citizenship before being elected (26 March 1994), raises serious questions about his legality as a Member of Parliament.  Openness and transparency are vital and we don't need or want, and cannot tolerate an MP (far less a Prime Minister) in breach of the founding laws of our country - the only set of laws of Australia that cannot be changed by the Government of the day. Follow our Facebook page here.

See details of the FOI requests surrounding Abbott's citizenship status here and the 8 Oct 2014 "document cannot be found or does not exist" FOI response from the Dept. Prime Minister and Cabinet here.

Tony Abbott was born in London in 1957 and came to Australia in 1960 as an assisted migrant. He applied for Australian citizenship in 1981, becoming a dual citizen of Australia and Britain.  We all know this country is made up of boat people. Many made lives here with very little but blood sweat and tears. Many had to cop abuse as immigrants or as children of immigrants - Europeans, Asians, Africans and others alike (not to mention our original inhabitants). We are this country, and its spirit. 

In this day and age we should not have to endure such one-eyed mean spirited bigots as Tony Abbott telling the people that he serves, that the doors are now closed unless you jump through his ever burgeoning and more convoluted hoops - whilst the world faces a refugee crisis greater than during any of the great wars -  when he can't even own up to his heritage, now refusing to prove his own legality as a Member of Parliament.  And finally, to put up with his shameless temerity in marginalising and demonising those who have so very little, when we are as a country so very rich...back handing his mates and supporters. As Malcolm Fraser says, Abbott is a "dangerous politician...will do anything to get power...and we have lost our way".  If he has indeed failed to renounce his British citizenship prior to entering Parliament in 1994, his election is illegal and void.  Show us your papers Tony!



To:
Tony Abbott, Member for Warringah
Show the public your British Citizenship renunciation form, proving you were not elected to our Parliament illegally.

Sincerely,


.............................................................................................









After spending 3 years falsely calling the legally elected Gillard Gov't "Illegitiment"

why do you refuse to prove that you have renounced your British Citizenship and are a legitiment Prime Minister of this country?


Why are the Murdoch and MSM who waved you into power strangling this story on your behalf?


Wouldn't it be ironic if it was Abbott who is found to be the "Illegitiment" Prime Minister"



????????????????????


LaughLaughLaugh
Report PittsburghPhil November 13, 2014 1:31 AM GMT
Illegitimate on so many levels.

You've heard of Richard the Lionheart.
You've heard of Alfred the Great
You've heard of Atilla the Hun ... Ivan the Terrible ...

Introducing:

ABBOTT THE ILLEGITIMATE
Report AFL November 13, 2014 10:50 PM GMT
Tony Abbott and the Age of Stupid

Lyn Bender
independentaustraliadotnet
13 11 2014



The death of Gough Whitlam reminds us that the great man was everything our new prime minister is not, writes Lyn Bender.


A GIANT EXITS AND A PYGMY ENTERS. Let the booing go on.

The results are in. Tony Abbott is a colossal non-hero and Gough Whitlam’s evil twin.

He is a master promoter of folly and disaster. Now languishing on the sidelines, as China and the United States do a deal on big emissions cuts, he is left with only his feeble impotent direct action as his climate plan.

Meanwhile, the Russians are ship-fronting Australia as he postures ineffectually on the bridge. Abbott is exposed as the inept captain of a floundering vessel.

Tony Abbott is our modern Les Patterson abroad; he is as excruciating as any Barry Humphries caricature. Abbott is our own you bet, Putin defying shirt fronting, suppository of wisdom. He is very good at being deeply and undisguisedly bad.

He is our salutary lesson; he shows us where we must not go.

Abbott attacks science, supports the rich elites, and increases the hardships of the young, elderly, and the most vulnerable. He is as vividly explicit as the portrait of Dorian Gray in the attic, except his gruesome moral failings are on display for all to see.

In just a little over a year in power, Tony Abbott has

    turned a blind eye to human rights abuses, in Sri Lanka;
    returned refugees to potential danger in defiance of the Refugees Convention;
    repealed the price on carbon, and other effective measures, when other nations like China and the US, are ramping up climate action;
    put in place a worse than useless climate program called ‘Direct Action’, that pays polluters ‒ with taxpayer’s money ‒ to please pollute less, but only if they feel like it;
    doubled the deficit;
    increased Australia’s terror threat, arguably, by hastily ‒ without parliamentary debate ‒ sending Australian forces to another war in the Middle East;
    made cuts to the CSIRO and science funding, including crucial climate science.

All this is terrible for Australians and the planet, but at least it is unequivocal.

Abbott tells us many lies, but it is his superficial selfies that truly demonstrate his narcissism.

Here is a sample:

    Lifesaving Tony in red speedos — showing us he is physically fit to rule.
    Lycra Tony on his bike —don’t look at my policies, look at my pins!
    G.I. Tony, working out with the troops — but don’t expect good pay and benefits, veterans!
    Fireman Tony, doing his bit to help fight fires — but not to fight climate change and reduce their risk.
    Fighter Pilot Tony in a Striker Jet cockpit — can’t wait to use those on a “humanitarian” bombing mission.
    Coal miner Tony, opening a “good for humanity” coal mine while stifling renewables — no worries, Gina!

When it comes to talk about increased fire prevalence and intensity being induced by climate change, Tony will have none of it.  UN Climate negotiator Christiana Figueres, was ‘talking through her hat’, he declared.

Abbott has almost entirely dismantled or reduced investment confidence in climate change action and renewables. This is a disaster but he has never pretended to care about climate change. His position has wafted from pronouncing it to be ‘crap,’ to a grudging acknowledgement of climate change being ‘real’. But Tony has stuck by his position of supporting fossil fuels, recently declaring that coal is good for humanity.

With Tony Abbott we should no longer be under any illusion. He is in the pocket of his fossil fuel backers and has no interest in the well being of Australians or future generations. In psychiatric terms, his actions would be analysed as psychopathic.

Writes clinical psychologist Lisa Johnson:

    ‘If the Abbott government was an individual, he would be a psychopath.’

In the opinion of this psychologist, if the Abbott government were your boyfriend it would be time to dump him and take out an apprehended violence order.

The Institute of Public Affairs ‒ IPA‒ has even anointed Tony Abbott to be Gough Whitlam’s [evil twin] successor, instructing Tony Abbott to emulate Whitlam’s transformation of Australia; but in the opposite direction. It delineates Whitlam’s ‘most left wing’ reforms in education, health, social justice, welfare, women’s and indigenous rights, proposing that Tony reverse them — and fast. It lists 75 radical ideas to transform Australia — Tony has already embarked upon these.

Bob Ellis writes of Gough’s memorial

    ‘Farewell to a giant’.

But we could add:

    Moral pygmy enters stage right.

Or even:

    As the pygmy arrived, the crowd booed.

Paul Keating has said, Whitlam changed the country’s idea of itself and changed its destiny.

Now Abbott wants to create an Australia with a new mean spirited self-destructive idea of itself and a new and terrible destiny — its own extinction.

His goal is to transform Australia into a country that is mean, inequitable, and an irresponsible global citizen.

None of us can claim that we don’t know. Unlike the German citizens in denial, who were marched past the corpses in the concentration camps by the conquering allies — we know.

Tony Abbott is destroying our children’s inheritance.

David Suzuki regards climate change denial as extremely dangerous. He has accused Abbott of willful blindness and criminal negligence.

Coal is not the future. Coal is not ‘good for humanity’. Coal is not ‘the foundation of prosperity for the foreseeable future’

Abbott is brutally and methodically dismantling much that has made this nation progress towards equity prosperity and fairness.

When he said that he is a PM of no surprises, he was declaring his gotcha moment. He will consistently lie and cheat, whenever it suits him. He will implement the agenda of big coal. He will keep his promises to his backers and friends - including Gina Rinehart and Rupert Murdoch - and the right wing think tank - The Institute of Public Affairs.

That is why Abbott was heartily and deservedly booed at the Gough Whitlam Memorial service. We all know what Tony Abbott is on about, now.

He is no role model for the future. He is no hero. He is part of what has been dubbed ‘The age of stupid’ — the age that jeopardizes its own survival. In this paradoxical way Tony Abbott reminds us to:

Remember Gough. Maintain the protest. Maintain the scorn. Maintain the rage.

Maintain the booing!

You can follow Lyn Bender on Twitter @Lynestel.

Creative Commons Licence
This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivs 3.0 Australia License
Report AFL November 17, 2014 7:55 PM GMT
Our Prime Minister Tony dumb dumb Aboott announces to the world that China will be fully democratic by 2050.


“I have never heard a Chinese leader declare that his country would be fully democratic by 2050,” Abbott said on Monday night. “I have never heard a Chinese leader commit so explicitly to a rule-based international order founded on the principle that we should all treat others as we would be treated ourselves,” he said. “I thank you, Mr President, for this historic, historic statement which I hope will echo right around the world.”


What will echo arouind the world is you are a f wit that is so far out of your depth you are drowning in your own mediocrity.




China’s president mentioned democracy in speech to Australian parliament, but experts suggest Abbott misunderstood

Abbott's response startled China-watchers. “There is nothing new in what the Chinese president has said. What’s important is actually the concept of a ‘modern socialist country’: it’s a country run by one party, the Communist party,” said Jean-Pierre Cabestan, an expert on Chinese politics at Hong Kong Baptist University. “I’m afraid Abbott has been a bit too optimistic … He seemed a bit overwhelmed having so many heavtweights around him."


..................................................................................................................



They should not let this bloke out without a note.



Prime Minister Tony Abbott confuses China with Tasmania as he toasts leader Xi Jinping


It's hard to confuse Tasmania and China, but the prime minister has managed just that — in the presence of the Chinese leader to boot.

Tony Abbott was toasting Xi Jinping at a special dinner at parliament house on Monday when he made the gaffe.

He was summing up the day’s developments after the two nations reached agreement on a free trade deal and a speech by Mr Xi to parliament, when he appeared to confuse the island state with the Asian nation.

“To mark President Xi’s visit, Australia and Tasmania and, and — we’ve said a lot about Tasmania — Australia and China have reached agreements.

“It’s hard to confuse Tasmania and China — but I have,” Mr Abbott said...
Report PittsburghPhil November 18, 2014 7:28 AM GMT
so ... Tasmania is going to be fully democratic by 2050 Excited
Report VeryLTU December 8, 2014 5:52 AM GMT
** .... neither, i'll go for bookies odds Wink
Report AFL December 8, 2014 8:16 AM GMT
LOL VeryWink


Posted by marscolonist at the guardian .......


Australians have to understand that Abbott is an ignorant conservative religious fundamentalist who rejects science and who was indoctrinated in his youth by Bob Santamaria, a clerical fascist who supported Mussolini and who told Abbott that environmentalists were godless communists. On one occasion, Abbott described Santamaria as “the greatest living Australian” and in 2007 he confessed that he had spent his life under Santamaria’s “spell”.

According to Santamaria, the role of young Catholics like Tony Abbott was to devote their lives to the grand battle to save civilization and turn back the cultural tide and that evidently included doing everything that he could to defeat the enemies of religion like the environmental movement.
Following Santamaria's death in 1998 Abbott transferred his dependence for political and religious guidance from Santamaria to Cardinal George Pell, an individual condemned by many experts for his outspoken scientific ignorance. For instance, in 2011 Pell made a written submission to a Senate hearing in which among other false claims he said that carbon dioxide was not driving global warming and that nitrogen is a greenhouse gas, a completely stupid statement. On other occasions Pell has said that concerns about global warming are a form of paganism so given that Abbott relies upon Pell for advice and direction, why should anyone be surprised that he says the same sorts of ridiculous things as Pell?

For Tony Abbott the greatest world leaders of recent times are Ronald Reagan and Margaret Thatcher yet Margaret Thatcher was a trained industrial chemist (i.e. a scientist) with a degree from Oxford University so she understood the warnings about the effects of carbon dioxide emissions on the world's climate and the chemistry of the oceans. As she once said:

"...the danger of global warming is as yet unseen but real enough for us to make changes and sacrifices, so that we do not live at the expense of future generations."

Her political understanding of the issue also led to her call in 1989 at the General Assembly of the United Nations for a global response that would bring about real change:

"It is no good squabbling over who is responsible or who should pay. Whole areas of our planet could be subject to drought and starvation if the pattern of rains and monsoons were to change as a result of the destruction of forests and the accumulation of greenhouse gases. The environmental challenge which confronts the whole world demands an equivalent response from the whole world. Every country will be affected and no one can opt out."

Abbott ignores the truth of Thatcher's statements and 25 years later we have Abbott and his cabal of fools denying the reality of the role of carbon dioxide emissions in global warming, climate change, sea level rise and the acidification of the oceans while doing everything that they can to sabotage measures to reduce emissions. Abbott has a religious conviction that the warnings of the scientists are based on lies and ignorance about god's purpose and that all the evidence is either fabricated by atheists or misinterpreted by people who do not have the blessing of Abbott's god-given understanding.

Is it any wonder that the rest of the Western world thinks that the Australian Prime Minister is completely nuts?
Report AFL February 9, 2015 10:45 AM GMT
The mark of a man

Posted: February 4, 2015

By Adam Gibson

adamfgibson.com

As a young cadet journalist in the late ’80s/early ’90s at News Ltd’s Sydney newspaper HQ, I was assigned to work on the Foreign Desk

at The Australian newspaper. There were a variety of interesting characters on the paper at that time, all sorts of pleasant and

not-so-pleasant eccentrics hanging on from an older era of Australian newspapers. A time when copious amounts of alcohol were

consumed at lunchtime (or any time) at the old Journo’s Club on Chalmers St, when it was commonplace for junior female journalists to

be mildy harassed without compunction at any given opportunity and there was the occasional dust-up in the corridors.

It was a tough, cut and thrust environment, but that said, it was a generally convivial place and there was a sense of being “all in

it together”. Young fresh-faced journos were mates with crusty old crime reporters who had quite literally been there, done that. The

radio room operators monitoring the airwaves for the latest police incidents were chums with the most powerful news editors or

newspaper chiefs of staff. The woman who ran the photo library was just as likely to be your pal as the fellow who ran the canteen

or the sparky who fixed the fuses.

But one particular character has always stuck in my mind. He never said hello to any of the cadets, nor any of the copy people, nor

indeed seemingly anyone from the general news desk. He was a “leader writer”, meaning he was responsible for writing the editorial

and some comment pieces in the paper. He was in sweet with the editor Chris Mitchell and there was no doubt he was best mates with

owner Rupert Murdoch. You just knew that he answered directly to him and few others.



But he didn’t seem to be mates with really anyone else. He seemed a lone wolf who carried himself with a slightly menacing air. He

stomped around the office with a swaggering gait and always had his shirt sleeves rolled up over what at the time to me seemed

Popeye-like forearms. He always looked like he’d just taken his tie off and undone his top button but I never actually saw him wear a

tie. He would sit at the keyboard station next to me (these were massive computer terminals at which journos sat when writing their

stories) and hammer away at the keyboard with a distinctly heavy-handed manner.


The general air about him was “don’t even think about talking to me”. I probably saw him every day for about six months and not once

– not once – did he ever acknowledge my presence or even existence, even if it were just he and I passing in the corridor, no one

else around. That in fact didn’t bother me. I just thought, “what a **** you are mate. What a private school, up ‘imself goose”.

Fair enough, he had no reason to need or want me or any of my peer group in his world. But I

remember at the time thinking that the mark of a person is how they treat people whom they might not have anything to gain from,

people who were juniors or perceived “lessers”. To this day, that man would have absolutely zero knowledge of ever having seen me,

nor probably anyone else in a similar position to me then. I made no impression on his world or memory and that’s just how he clearly

wanted it.

But to this day, I remember the mark of the man from those days. In an unvarnished view, with no sense of hindsight, just a raw

impression of his ungilded character, I knew for certain back then that he was a dickhead, and I have never wavered in such an

opinion. It’s the small things that tell the greater whole about people.


That bloke was Tony Abbott.
Report AFL February 12, 2015 7:36 AM GMT
Justice? Fairness? Who needs them when we've got Abbott and co?

Richard Ackland

theguardian.com

The interweaving of terrorism, national security, and boat people reached fever pitch in a single day of fanciful spruiking from Australia’s politicians

‘Our national impoverishment, at the hands of poor quality leaders, knows no bounds.’ Photogr

Thursday 12 February 2015


Our national impoverishment, at the hands of poor-quality leaders, knows no bounds.

A police media conference and flourishes from politicians accompanied the arrest, charging and court appearances of two men on terrorism-related allegations. On Wednesday Mohammad Kiad and Omar al-Kutobi were formally charged with acts done in preparation for, or planning, terrorist acts.

This offence is to be found in the Commonwealth Criminal Code and applies even if the preparation or planning is not done in relation to a specific terrorism act. The maximum penalty either way is life imprisonment.
Details are scant. The police claim that “a number of items were seized” in raids on premises at Fairfield in Sydney’s west, including a video, a flag, a machete and a hunting knife. The police have not said so publicly, but the Daily Telegraph declares this was a “plot to behead on our streets”.

Never mind the prejudice. Normally once someone has been charged with a criminal offence, publication of overheated and prejudicial comments is off limits. Not so for a poll-starved prime minister who is keen to politicise this branch of the criminal law:

    This was an imminent attack in Australia inspired by the Isil or Da’esh death cult.

Almost hopefully he added: “This is a serious problem and I fear ... it will get worse before it gets better.”

What bits of this turn out to be true or false will ultimately be up to a NSW supreme court jury, not Tony Abbott, the attorney general, the minister for immigration, or any of the other Little Sir Echos.

The prime minister was reprising his performance from the September field army raid by 800 police resulting in the charging of Omarjan Azari. “This is not just suspicion, this is intent,” he announced then.
Why do we bother with a criminal justice system at all when we have a fearless leader handing down off-the-cuff verdicts?

On Thursday, Abbott and George Brandis made a glad-handing visit to AFP headquarters in Canberra where they congratulated commissioner Andrew Colvin for his important work in dealing with this “metastasising threat”.

Abbott then went back into the parliament and selectively quoted parts of what one of the accused allegedly said on the video, about “stabbing the kidneys and striking the necks”. The prime minister added:

    I don’t think it would be possible to witness uglier fanaticism than this - more monstrous fanaticism and extremism than this - and I regret to say it is now present in our country.

The attorney general was also quick out of the blocks to claim the beneficial results of his recent anti-terror laws:

    I was advised this morning by the [AFP] commissioner that it may be the case that the arrests would not have been able to be made under the higher tests under the previous legislation.

This is a reference to the changed arrest threshold that was part of recent amendments.

The new law gives the police power to arrest someone in relation to alleged terrorism offences on the grounds of “reasonable suspicion” rather than “reasonable belief”.

This is another way of Brandis suggesting that without his diluted threshold the accused might still be at large with their flags and knives – an entirely fanciful piece of spruiking.

All the attorney general has done is underscore that the inflammatory remarks from Canberra and in the media are based on even lower grounds of suspicion than might previously have been the case.

Then it was the turn of Peter Dutton, the immigration and border protection minister, to bring his special brand of enlightenment to the front of the stage.
He and the Daily Telegraph (aka the Police Gazette) are in step, both saying that the accused are refugees who arrived by plane. One of the suspects might have entered Australia on forged documents and the other, even worse, “was on the dole”.

Both the Tele and Dutton are saying that the latest “plot to behead” is really Labor’s fault, because boats were pouring in under the previous government and Asio was so snowed under it didn’t have the resources to check people arriving by plane.

Until this very moment, refugees and asylum seekers arriving by plane were perfectly acceptable, while their cousins and aunties arriving by boats were reviled.
All of this fits perfectly with the orchestrated defenestration of professor Gillian Triggs and the Human Rights Commission’s devastating report detailing the inhumane treatment of children held in immigration detention.

According to the prime minister the findings are “blatantly partisan” and the Human Rights Commission should be “ashamed of themselves”. The interweaving of boat people, terrorists and national security has long been a desperate dog whistle. Thursday’s federal question time was a showcase of poor behaviour.

On the basis of minimal information and a tide of leaks from self-interested parties, the process of justice has taken a back seat to fear-mongering and grandstanding politicians.

..................................................................................

What a grub this bloke is. He couldn't wait for justice and the courts to do their job he

needs to grandstand and it appears that he actually hopes there is a terrorist attack so he

can politicize it. Then has the gall to accuse the human rights commission of being political.

In international law there is no Labor or Liberal ......only AUSTRALIA  dik head.
Report AFL February 12, 2015 8:24 AM GMT
Then he accuses Labor of a   “Holocaust” of job losses

......................................................................


Tony, you’re confused. The fact that we have detention camps for innocent people doesn’t mean

jobs experience a holocaust. — derridalittle (@derridalicious) February 12, 2015
Report AFL February 12, 2015 8:27 AM GMT
This is the best the Liberal Party have got for the highest office in the land.

What a disgrace they and him are.
Report bigted. February 12, 2015 8:35 AM GMT
disgusting human being..and the brown nose yes pple behind him..what a ****..but its labor's fault..

http://www.adelaidenow.com.au/news/breaking-news/abbott-goes-too-far-with-holocaust-image/story-fni6ul2m-1227217556839
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