What a timely article.I have a grandson with acquired brain injury due to a recurring brain tumour.For 6 and a half years my daughter has asked for help from the govt.Eventually she located a respite centre that would take him and sent the bills to the minister.After nearly a year the government came to the party and paid the bills.Now because of the violence factor she has had to give custody of him to the state.Because the only criteria to do so is neglect or abuse,the welfare are trying to brand her a bad parent.She has found a sympathetic solicitor who is going to fight her cause for her.If the govt had helped when she first started requesting same,it may not have gotten to this stage.Drug addicts,criminals,alcoholics and many more are helped by the powers that be but genuine cases are relegated to the dust heap and conveniently forgotten.Now the govt want to put the lad in a facility that has no medical supervision and his life depends
on a cocktail of drugs.Amazing how a 12 year old girl can be given $4,ooo to have a baby and hard working lower income families get no support.

not amazing at all, haygirl. why should it be otherwise?

oz is basically a sheep staion. the politician-graziers try to keep the flock productive, but individual sheep aren't worth much effort.

ozzies kid themselves about their status, many are so profoundly ignorant of political reality that 'sheep' is too kind.

if the 'history' that oz provided you in school described the conditions of the british people under the medieval kings, you should have some insight into why things are similar today: then and now, the lower classes had no power. having no power, they had no money.

the political party is united in it's basic goals and methods, whatever the factions may say in jockeying for ascendancy. there will be no real change till ozzies make themselves into citizens. i see no sign of this happening.

Unconscionable and at Odds. Banking and Trade Cartels need scrupulous scrutiny. UNCALCULATED DEBT is a NATIONAL HEALTH ISSUE.

As is the activites of administrive departments where the liberty of those employed is protected by their having unfair resource advantage(s).

"POLITICS AS USUAL" has become the "GAME WE PLAY", regardless of the COST(s).

UNDER THIS ECONOMY IS A SOCIETY becoming increasingly BURDENED by UNCONSCIONABLE forms of "fix-it" practice's, villifications and unscrupulous misconduct.

This is being further promoted as formal language, bully-cultures and a re-productive streamlining of REDTAPE.

Neglected HUMAN CAPACITY debunks our sovereigns strength and efficacy: Australian's don't want handouts. They want to solve problems, at community levels, but do not have the right INFRASTRUCTURE to COPE.

Exchange through reciprocal interchange is labor set at an actual value where the currencies ought to be fair through the exchange. STRIP THE INFLATED EXPLIOTATIONS!

Tap out Risk Transferences - work to balance the unconscionable profiting over risk in economic's.

Through Sustainable Community Development, Sharing Service Provisions, be it through transport and communications or through Administrive Service Reforms has to be Nationally Addressed.

It is TIME to get Real about Sustainable Economic Development in Australia.

It is TIME WE DO for ourselves what we "evangelize" onto the Developing ECONOMIES.

See my 2005 United Nations Message to Sevice Providers.

http://esaconf.un.org/WB/default.asp?action=9&boardid=39&read=2427&fid=424

The point is we have the knowledge, the right policies - but need the administitrive reciprocal action within the SERVICING SECTORS.

This is COSTING THE MILLIONS and causing SOCIAL BURN_OUT. (Crime - Mental Health - HOUSE HOLD DISTURBANCE + DEBT)

IT is SHRINKING COMMUNITY!

Look at the meaning of SEOUL. At the idea of " Reinventing Government
Towards Participatory and Transparent Governance".

http://64.233.167.104/search?q=cache:KFJSS0vcSSsJ:unpan1.un.org/intradoc/groups/public/documents/UN/UNPAN020949.pdf%2BUN%2BSeoul%2BDeclaration&hl=en&ct=clnk&cd=1&ie=UTF-8

Analysis of Best practices in government means implementing the policy, regardless of the inconvenient demands for it's truth.

Innovations - Governance and public administration issues and challenges, in keeping up with the New Inventory in governance and Public Administration.

We make mockery of our own citizenship as we place the BURDEN of BLAME, and fail to re-dress a DISABLING mentality, creating distractive adversities rather than a focus of NATION BUILDING.

http://www.miacat.com
.

A Canadian economist said something like this....

The poor complain; they always do.
And that's not idle chatter.
Our system brings rewards to all;
At least to those who matter !

It's Work Choice's birthday soon, isn't it ?
Filip

I agree absolutely with the concern of the authors.

But they are, putting it not so politely, "peeing into the wind" - though that is probably a male only kind of metaphor.

I am trying to think through this kind of socio-political issue, and I have been for 50 years, and still things remain pretty much the same.

Between the lines I think the authors are appealing to a moral sense, to charity, to a sense of fairness. I accept their appeal, but it doesn't seem to work all that well.

What we need is a careful analysis of how our self interest will be served if we reduce poverty and disadvantage. I think an appeal to self interest will be more effective than an appeal to fairness.

How will the majority benefit if poverty is reduced and the disadvantaged are provided with better opportunities? That is where the votes are.

not amazing at all, haygirl. why should it be otherwise?
Yeah, Demos. I've been raving on & on about useless bureaucrats & how they stuff up society. We must find a solution to this problem & find it fast ! Whenever a government changes the bureaucrats don't change with it & so the crap continues & decent folk suffer. We can't rely on the law, we've seen plenty of evidence there. I have written to the Law Reform Commission & the reply was that anything they look at has to come from the Governor general's office first. It only takes three people to present a petition to the Governor General which then HAS to be presented to paliament. Would you believe that it's impossible to get three people with enough conviction to have the nerve to sign their name to a partition. It's pathetic ! Yes the average citizen is a sheep & turns into a sheepish coward when it comes to do something for the betterment of society.