I wish to call on the Federal Government to :
" FREEZE / SUSPEND all FOREIGN AID IMMEDIATELY "
as this national disaster will cost us dearly for a long time to come ! We were ahead of the world during the GFC (global financial crisis), but this unexpected disaster is a wake~up~call to all POLITICIANS to concentrate on the job~at~hand ....................is there anywhere we the TAXPAYERS and RATEPAYERS can unite to put this demand to the government !? Help in this regard is much appreciated !
mail to : brisbaneseaside(at)gmail.com

Hey, that's a great idea, lukkihans.

>>I wish to call on the Federal Government to : " FREEZE / SUSPEND all FOREIGN AID IMMEDIATELY "<<

You could let these folks go hang, for a start.

http://www.google.com/hostednews/afp/article/ALeqM5gZA3ZefompYO2LY8TvwvNQnMwpKA

And these.

http://www.reliefweb.int/rw/rwb.nsf/db900SID/LSGZ-89GD7W?OpenDocument

You'd be of the view that they probably deserved it, anyway, right?

I hope you have a wonderful, safe and carefree life, lukkihans, you sound such a lovely, warm and caring person.

This is such an important article, once again those who are doing it tough are sidelined by the drama of the cities.

I don't know how that can be changed, but I hope somebody who does know reads your piece.

There are trucks packing goods interstate bound for Toowoomba, Gympie and other country towns tonight Peter. Telethons and donations within interstate cities are commencing in the morning.

As occurred immediately after the Victorian bushfires, interstate truck drivers are sacrificing their livelihoods to deliver goods from our major cities and country towns interstate.

It is being co-ordinated this evening and tomorrow.

My heart and prayers along with many interstate Aussies has been with all of the people in and around Toowoomba, Gympie, Grantham and all townspeople who urgently require foodstuffs and basic necessities in worse situations.

Quite a few government and aid workers will be undoubtedly reading your plea and act upon your request immediately.

Individual businesses interstate have kicked off with co-ordinating road deliveries at the same time as requesting donations and funds now that one or two highways have just been cleared by the wonderful Ses, Police and townspeople working on the the Bruce Highway and other roads/highways.

There is a long-standing and absurd expectation that people who live in the country are tough. We seem to expect that they can do without, that they can just deal when their property is damaged. The reality is that a house is a house whether it is in the city or in the country. It houses families, memories, the possessions that often represent years of savings and, ultimately, it houses entire lives. A flooded house is a flooded house whether it is in the city of the country.

While produce departments and, at times, dairy departments have been bare here in North Queensland since the start of the year, at least we have food to eat and water to drink. We have electricity, phone coverage, homes to go to and fuel to put in our cars. What's more, we have a port and a RAAF base to accommodate the deliveries that couldn't come by truck. Brisbane has these things, too, though some residents may be in no position to take advantage of them for some time. What we need to learn is that this country (or at least this state) does ride on the backs of the truckies but, sometimes, the truckies just can't make it. I am not an engineer, nor am I a politician, but one thing we can see is that our current level of infrastructure is not adequate. We can't simply rebuild - we need to improve. Julia Gillard indicated that she shared this view, though how much - and when - this comes through remains to be seen.

Perhaps they are tougher in the country, but they're certainly not superhuman.

..in worse situations compared to city folk with closer cities and suburbs towards the Gold Coast.

Perhaps some of us interstate could also contact our Local Member sending them your OLO article urgently Peter [I will do this now] and follow up with a phone call early in the morning.

Hello Lukkimans and welcome to OLO.

Don’t worry about our old resident rogue Pericles.

As one who has strongly espoused a big increase in our international aid effort, to at least the UN-recommended level of 0.7% of our GDP annually, I agree with you that in times of domestic turmoil, our aid expenditure should be wound right back and the money should be redirected to where it is desperately needed in this country.

Not a freeze on foreign aid, but certainly a big diversion of that expenditure.

Your request has urgently been sent to a couple of the PM's parliamentary staffers Peter.

FWIW, Vexnews on Twitter tweeted a link to this article, under its own title, around four hours ago. See: http://twitter.com/vexnews/status/25447125902954496

I don't know what sort of readership Vexnews really has, but its Twitter profile lists 7920 followers.

Ah phoowey……..lukkihans.

Sheesh that is piss poor when I can't even get the name right!

Rrrghh! ):>(

----

<< … once again those who are doing it tough are sidelined by the drama of the cities. >>

I don’t think that is a fair comment Briar, not in this situation. What is happening in Brisbane / Ipswich / Toowoomba / Lockyer Valley is every bit as bad as all the other Queensland flood-hit towns and regions put together, in terms of the number of people affected. And it is the primary current issue, so of course it is getting the most attention.

briar rose, "This is such an important article, once again those who are doing it tough are sidelined by the drama of the cities."

There was no evidence of that. Police numbers for example have been applied strategically to areas of greatest need at the time.

I don't mind politicians getting attention and lobbying for their constituencies, but let there be no shadow of a doubt that the Queensland State government, government agencies and emergency personnel have done a simply superb job and severe challenges are yet to be faced.

Without doubt, Anna Bligh's performance (and I have been one of her critics in the past) has been magnificent and she is being lauded by both sides of politics for it.

It is to the credit of the major political parties in Queensland that they immediately united as one in this for unprecedented co-operation. The smooth, robust management of the response to this dreadful calamity will be used as a case study world-wide and rightly so because as I said earlier it has been and continues to be utterly fantastic. As well as being a very effective and efficient response in the face of terrible catastrophe, the emergency management has been able to respond to continually changing circumstances where nature continually delivered challenges with only the rarest and small breaks of luck for the rescuers.

It has been and is, a very, very long and hard grind and everyone has been stretched to their limits. For the rescuers and managers, they have gone beyond what can be expected of normal people.

Now there could be a cyclone.

80 people dead in the Brazil floods. No hint of that in the Australian media but sport was the first non-flood related news item.

"No hint of that in the Australian media". Strange - I saw it on the news, and long before the sport came on. Obviously, it hasn't been given as much airtime as the SEQ floods - possibly because it is a much more common occurrence (the favelas around Rio are frequently subject to disaster), possibly because it has no immediate impact on the bulk of the Australian population. That said, several days of rolling coverage, showing the same footage over and over, has been a terrible waste of our TV resources. It wasn't particularly helpful to the people in flood-affected areas, either: because it was national coverage, it was too vague to be of value.

Again, FWIW to those who are interested, this article has been the top article on the 'today's most popular' display on the main page all morning.

See: http://twitpic.com/3prytn

It would be interesting to know what proportion of views of the article are being made via the Vexnews Twittered link, if that is possible to determine.

As far as the media is concerned is the only flood happened in Brisbane.
At least that is all we in vic are told about.
I don't know how big a bill the federal govt; would put into this. If this is going to happen more frequently, the money would be better off going into more sustainable projects.