Mr Moore, I'm having great difficulty understanding your post, so I have referred back to your original speech. I have some questions. You say police security is supplemented by substantial private protective services and some gaols are also privately run.
Ok, say we save costs by privatizing these services further, and hire out our State Run Service to more countries, such as the Solomon Islands, now doing, and East Timor, most likely the way the drift is heading.

State Schools, our Teacher Unions & P. & C's have pointed out in the past, are being less & less financed by our State & Federal Governments, and told to look after their selves, and finance maintainers etc. from locally raised funds. Which is difficult enough at the best of times, but in our area, the mining boom is in full swing, and on the books of statitians we are a wealthy district. Little do you realize that our shire only 'houses the workers,' they do not permanently live here, just work, and send their moneys home to their families. The mothers who remain in Cities, have the opportunity to have a job, send the younger ones to government funded nurseries, and the older children to your much loved private schools.

I have only scratched the surface of your well intended private plans for Queensland, others may continue this debate, hopefully bringing some realism to your pipe dreams. How long have you lived in Queensland?

The GST bonanza is never over. Australian economics has included two CPI rises per year.

Along with the individual state CPI increase, the product increases in cost and so does the GST collected.

This is why the government is never too quick to inquire about the price increases nor the effect of privatisation and their drives for profits and how this effects on Australian communities.

It just would not be in the best interests of the taxation departments coffers nor the work environments they like to indulge themselves.

John Howard has been in power too long.

He is short sighted and only does what he feels is in the interest of easy-street Government. Governance of the people for the people was never meant to be easy as Malcolm Fraser pointed out. The notion that Howard can tip this on its head at the expense of the Australian public by courting ill considered private government Partnerships under the guise of PPPs (Public private partnerships) is a sad end to a fine political career.

IMO Howard's refusal to back down to public opinion on the Snowy sale will be his end. Australians KNOW from the Cross City Funnel disaster and Sydney Airport skulduggery just how unrealistic private enterprise can be when dealing with the public through infrastructure that has monoply characteristics. If there is only ONE Snowy scheme, one source of water for NSW and Victoria then that is a monopoly. Privatisation will thus be a disaster because there is in effect no healthy competition. Despite ill concieved government assurances to the contrary, the public will be ripped off by private ownership of the Snowy. There are many ways to thwart weak government regulations and turn the Snowy into Kafkaesque cash cow. This in concert with grain species ownership laws will convert Aussie farmers and citizens into serfs and peasants. I simply do not believe the Australian psyche will allow this to occur.

Politicians must realise they have an onerous job and that the public will not accept shoddy decisions, abrogation of responsibilities and senile behaviour no matter how erudite the speeches they are wrapped in.

Sooooo.....

Even in Queensland the hyenas prowl just beyond the margins of the campfire. And our Victorian cancer turns out to be malignant.

I wonder if I will live to see the day when the PPP will be redefined as the relationship between the ordinary person and his/her government.

What an arrow to the heart! We won't remove the poison tip with the aid of anaesthetic, and the operation will endanger the patient. Some of us will have to stand and be counted. Count me as one.

Global economics is looking shonkier with every passing day. The US dollar, once underpinned by cheap abundant oil, requires ever larger infusions of military force to maintain it's value. Global capital must cast around for other essentials to meter and control. Water is high on the agenda, as is hydroelectricity. Health services.... mate, that goes without saying.

Vampires are alive and well... they live amongst us and "work" hard at justifying their existence.

As an amazing coincidence, my post on the Snowy sale has been answered by John Howard and presented in the Saturday Herald.
http://www.smh.com.au/news/national/snowy-sale-bid-to-block-foreign-ownership/2006/05/26/1148524888421.html

It seems Mr Howard will now consider the riders on the sale that I alluded to. It also seems that IEMMA is now in the drivers seat for the sale, so Howard says he can't be blamed anymore. BUT Howard insists the sale WILL go ahead.
That friends is a Clayton's driver's seat Howad is in there. From where I sit Howard is trying to have it bothways and accordingly he's been exposed as a senile twit. Howard is no longer King John. He now is the senile King Lear who is too tired to govern precious assets and so bequeaths them to the Gonneril and Reagan of Private Enterprise.

We all know what happened to King Lear. Let's hope it happens to Howard before the Snowy sale can get up. There will be many more Howard's in our future History but there will only ever be ONE SNOWY Mountains Hydro Scheme.

It has been suggested that the "Futures Fund" that Peter Costello spoke of, will receive the profits from the sale of Australian Assets.

Telstra profits from the sale will go into this "Futures Fund" and will actually be filling the black hole of the Governments Superannuation Scheme.

In arrears is a figure put forward of 90 million dollar black hole which even leaves a deficit of 60 million.

Legislation was passed that politicians now only receive 9% as the rest of the nation.

The exposure and judgement of the lucrative payments taken from the taxpayers, suggested that politicians were receiving were unjustified amount.

But the changes to legislation did not effect those politicians already in government. And unfortunately we like to keep them in double the amount of their shelf lives.

As our politicians retire in their droves there will be a need for a source to draw from.

Is this "Future Fund" really about ensuring our politicians superannuation payouts?

Taking Government Private Partnerships (GPPs) to their optimal limit.

First privatise the Armed Forces. Indonesia, Pakistan, China or Halliburton would all put up fine bids I imagine. Anyway, Governments have no business running armies these days. They are best run by the private sector which is experienced in these matters and has the wherewithall to pay for expensive equipment and recruitment programs.
We can then abolish the Federal Government at a huge cost savings to the country. The Federal Government will have no value since it has sold all it's real assets (Ie OUR assets) and of course no power as it has no armed forces.That means we can streamline the Budget by eliminating Canberra and Federal bureaucracy.

Next, because state governments are so inefficient we can put out tenders for sale of them as well. This adds the missing piece of Howards faulty GPP policy. - competition. The Company owned states will be in competition with each other and that is a healthy thing for a privatised country.
However here's the tricky bit. We will require company elections every four years and if the state Companies are not worthy or not competeing effectively with the other states we the public can tender out for new companies to run our states.

That leaves local governments. Because private enterprise is so efficient we will no longer need local government. Every aspect of our lives from transport to policing to hospitals will be more competitive, more efficient and HOPEFULLY cheaper for we the consumers.

Now that leaves one last problem. What if the massive development ensuing from free market competition pushes our drought status over the tipping point and there is no longer enough food to eat or water to drink?

But that's no problem at all ... there's always Soylent GREEN.

(PSST - soylent GREEN is people!)

To be continued in 24Hr

It is clear from economic growth theory and extensive empirical evidence that policies which embrace openness, competition, change and innovation will promote growth. Policies which have the effect of restricting or slowing change by protecting or favouring particular industries or firms are likely over time to slow growth to the disadvantage of the community.

The Beattie government favours a change-denying, vested-interest approach. It does not acknowledge that investment and growth is driven by the private sector, and sees the community’s increasing embrace of private schooling and medical care as a threat rather than as clear evidence of people’s preferences and as an opportunity.

The scope for improvement is indicated by the fact that labour productivity in Queensland is only about two-thirds of US levels, as well as being much lower than in other states. Queensland can clearly do better with more growth-supportive policies, including a less negative attitude towards the wealth-creating private sector.

This includes dropping the discredited “picking winners” approach, under which bureaucrats with no relevant experience believe that they can identify commercially viable opportunities to which commercial businesses and investors are blind. It also means dropping the emphasis on “big projects”, such as the failed magnesium smelter, which tend to do more for foreign investors and equipment suppliers than they do for Queensland.

Disclosure – the poster contributed to Des Moore’s paper on the role of government in Queensland.

PS - Soylent Green - nice little sci-fi story - silly film.

professor expresses concern over IR laws
Professor Ron McCallum, dean of the Sydney University Law School, says he is deeply concerned over the new industrial conditions introduced as a result of the Federal Government’s WorkChoices legislation.

Last week there were reports of one employer using the legislation to remove its workers' rights to penalty payments, bonuses and public holidays in return for a pay increase of just two cents an hour.

Professor McCallum says more like that is around the corner, and he is worried too about the way in which WorkChoices has been introduced.

The Commonwealth Government has purported to grab control of industrial relations from the states using the power to make rules governing corporations given to it in the Australian constitution.

Professor McCallum has told Sunday Profile's Julia Baird there is something wrong about using a power over corporations in order to control the working conditions of human beings.

"I think it’s the most significant case on federal-state powers since the High Court disallowed the nationalisation of the banks in the Chifley government in 1949," he said.

continued.........
"The High Court and the Privy [Council] said the federal government didn’t have power to nationalise the banks, it’s of that level, because if the Federal Government wins in this case then it seems to me they can establish a whole lot of other laws governing all the things that corporations do and corporations do most of the things that happen in private sector economy."

Professor McCallum says if corporations law is used to settle and prevent labour disputes, then labour laws become a subset of corporations law, thereby making workers a commodity.

"I have put this view up by using examples which may seem frivolous but it’s to make a serious point," he said.

"Supposing we had a power in the constitution called the women’s power and it allowed parliament to make laws about women. Could we use that power to make laws allowing women and men to marry each other and divorce each other and the answer is, yes. But wouldn’t we say that these laws are a bit lopsided and that we gentlemen are but mere appendages? The point I’m trying to make is that if you put labour law as an appendage to corporations law, it’s corporation law that always wins."

Professor McCallum says he has worked all his life around the world and in Australia to find balance between the rights of employers to run businesses and the rights and obligations of employees, and has found the laws are unbalanced.

"I find it unjust for example that if the majority of workers at an enterprise want to be dealt with collectively, they can’t insist upon that right," he said.

"I find it unjust that if your employer which is incorporated and has a hundred or less people and you are terminated because arbitrary capricious or unfair behaviour, you have no remedy other than the common law.

"I live and breathe these laws. I have friends and acquaintances and family working, I’m a worker myself and it’s only really through our passion and commitment that we can really get things done."

God i hate Des Moore.

More on Government-Private Dictatorships (GPDs) and the doomed Snowy sale.

On a serious note, may I remind people that the ASIC/ASX which is now charged with ensuring fairplay from the new Snowy Hydro owners is a lame duck. It has presided over an explosion of westpoint style con-schemes and rip-offs across Australia in the last 15 years that has touched the lives of just about every Australian. In fact beacause such schemes stimulate spending (by the con artists) they are good for the economy. Thus it is not beyond possibility that the ASXs motives for going soft on corporate criminals is politically motivated and may not be incompetence.

There is no doubt in my mind that whoever buys the Snowy will be allowed to do whatever they please whenever they please and foreign ownwership regulations will be quickly overwhwelmed. If Howard was serious about foreign ownership caps he would have installed them from the get-go. He didn't. Adding them upon public pressuring like a senile King Lear is extraordinarily effete. There are ways to avoid foreign ownership rules by using shelf company structures. As for price gouging, Sydney Airports Corporation (SAC) airport prices and invents new ones, then justifies them by saying the changes reflect equivalent prices at other global airport facilities. Of course they don't tell you that they own or have substantial interest in the other airports. The eventual Snowy owners, like SAC, will have ample scope to play that same game, finagle humungous price hikes and present the usual to hide the pure greed involved. They will probably end up smuggling drugs through the Snowy as well?

John Howard and HIS Federal government will just stand by saying, "we can't do anything except buy them out and that's too expensive an option. We will have to raise your taxes to buy them out"

Well Mr Howard, why don't WE privatise your job as well since: "We too do believe that the private sector is better at running private businesses like FEDERAL GOVERNMENT than the government'' .

Facts for NSW Labor and its puppet leader to consider while they build Government-Private Dictatorship infrastructure for BIGGER Sydney populations at the expense of existing citizens and at the expense of the rest of this great State of NSW.

1. They think we don't know. They think that reducing quality of life for ordinary Sydney siders by stacking us in like sardines-in-a-can AND making us pay for it with $6 fees to cross privatised 'GPD funnel whatevers', will make us BELIEVE it is all for our own good.
They have GOT to be kidding, right? Most of us will be lucky to get $6 per week after new labour laws begin to bite. It's like the water thing: the only reason we a are short of water is because of a Sydney population explosion from excessive G-PD development. NSW Labor wants to fix it by immigrating more foreigners into the city? Come on, we KNOW!

2. The planet's population continues to explode: from 1 billion
in 1820, to 2 billion in 1930, 3 billion in 1960, 4 billion in 1974,
5 billion in 1988, and 6 billion in 2000. For the 21st century,
the continued exponential growth in science and technology
raises both hopes (e.g., advances in medicine) and fears
(e.g., development of subdued, subservient populations by ever more pernicious Government-Private Dictatorships and the inevitable REVOLT that must ensue)

3. Australia is a desert continent without the fresh water and air flows, the two prerequisites for New-York/Tokyo/London style grand populations.
Sydney is not suited to a large metropolis plan. If NSW labour and their developer backers want to indulge in this INSANE MEGALOMANIA then they should look to New Zealand. NZ has the water and air flows to eventually support a population of 60 million people and stack of mindless political MEGALOMANIACS

Is OLO a CROC?

The most significant topic for discussion in Australia today is the sale of the Snowy. The fact that this forum neglects to have a specific discussion on the Snowy sale is highly suspicious and smacks of Federal Government censorship.

It is regrettable that in a world where most public fora allow posters to choose their own topics, this forum is tethered to topics and opinions that kowtow to the worst aspects of global capitalism.

The Snowy sale is WRONG. The westpoint debacle shows that legislation cannot guarantee absence of foreign ownership or fairplay in a timely or effective manner. The Cross City Funnel Tunnel and Macquarie Airports jerk-off show that government private partnerships are nothing more than GPDs (Government Private Dictatorships).

It does not take an Einstein to see where this Snowy sale will lead. Perhaps it will take an Einstein however to realise that it can happen to YOU and that John Howard will care less in a wealthy retirement.

Yes KAEP selling the Snowy IS wrong as is the privatisation of any essential resource or service to the public.

However, beg to differ on your opinion of OLO. Believe it WAS only a matter of time for debate on Snowy. However, the PM has done a backflip on sale - the only decent thing he has done since gun control.
Read it here at

http://www.theage.com.au/news/national/pm-in-snowy-backflip/2006/06/02/1148956512764.html

"Mr Howard earlier said: "The commonwealth has decided to withdraw from the sale of the Snowy Hydro."

"We will no longer have our 13 per cent share on offer," he told reporters.

The federal government initially decided to sell its 13 per cent interest in the Snowy scheme after the NSW and Victorian governments announced they would sell their larger stakes."

Of course the only reason for the PM's rescinding of sale is he realised that the political fall-out on this one would just be too great. Once again the rodent wriggles free.

That's right KAEP, we're so biased that we've allowed numerous posts from you on the subject! The reason that there is nothing on the Snowy sale is that no-one's sent us in any articles. OLO operates like a blog - the comment boxes are reserved for comments on articles/posts.

We may well run an open forum in the future where anyone can start a thread, but my observation of most of that type of forum is that they don't run particularly well. I'm always impressed by the standard of comments on OLO and I suspect that this has something to do with the fact that they relate to an article which by definition will be well-researched, even if a lot of the posters won't agree with the article one way or the other.

Well said Graham. Your modesty is most refreshing. That bugger KAEP is just being a malcontent. Your articles are the bestest bestest in the world.
When u finnaly get a well researched scholarly piece on the Snowy sale KAEP will apolagise profusely to you all at OLO.

Least i hope he will.

The snowy sale was always a mistake just like work choices.
This country is turning bad and Howard voters it's your fault.