I have checked the list of the unprofitable child care centres. Some are sited on expensive real estate - they probably have high demand for their places and others are sited adjacent to another 6 child care centres. It would be sad to see the child care centres closed because they are sited on expensive real estate when there is demand for their services.

It would be exciting to see the existing child care centres run as cooperatives but the article notes that there is a leadership vacuum, the workers aren't unionised, community groups are dormant and governments are leery of putting 30,000 additional workers on the government payroll.

With the looming economic downturn many grandmothers are looking at their reduced pensions, looking at their houses and calculating how much they can earn caring for children in their own homes and deciding whether they work through the local council or work by word of mouth.

Seeing that Treasuries State and Federal, along with economists - have failed in terms of the economic theories they have treated us all to over the last thirty odd years; and also in light of the reconsideration of government issued bonds and control of the finance secotr by some more re-regulation etc that is currently going on leads me to ask:
Why not government ownership of ABC Learnign Centres?

And further to that: why not also a reversal of the utilitarian 'right' and left wing/secualr alliance by givernment giving true equity to mothers who wish to choose to stay at home to rear young children as well as provide for Aussie Mums and Dads to have even more children?
The DLP have policies and are running on the Federal Senate ballot paper at the next Federal election.
Please consider.

Webby, what the hell do you want more children for. The country is overpopulated now, we are running out of sustainable resources, particularly water. Get a brain.

David

"what the hell do you want more children for"
I assume that is a question and not a feigned sense of indignation?
Why to sustain our population of course; other wise we will have to continue bringing in people from overseas.

" The country is overpopulated now, we are running out of sustainable resources, particularly water. Get a brain."

We are under-populated if you put aside the glazed over look of Tim Flannery and others who appeared overnight who get trumped up awards for alleged contributions to science.Our water and natural gas are plentiful and just need harnessing and long term infrastructure; decentralisation is the way.
All our national policies need to be done over the LONG-term, like our sycophantic love of all things Chinese and culturally Kevin 07.

Next question Webby - why do we need to sustain our population? Why not let it gracefully decline, as it would do without government intervention, and there would be less stress on our water, our resources would last longer or could be shared more widely with other countries and we could lead the world in demonstrating that an economy can survive without the lazy capitalist demand for ever more people to create ever more demand for ever more crud using ever more resources.

Another question Webby - when would you consider Australia, or the world, 'full' from a population point of view? Do you think it is, say, half full now? Because if we are about half full now, then in fifty years time we will be absolutely full, and in another fifty years there will be twice as many people as we can provide for - except by then the planet will be so degraded and befouled that wars will be fought over scarce resources like water and billions will die in misery and hunger. Call me quirky, but I wouldn't wish that on my worst enemy when a bit of restraint, foresight and forward planning could prevent it.

Posted by VK3AUU, and Posted by Candide,

I hope you two don't have kids, or don't intend to have kids, because if you answer yes to either then you are just Hypocrites!

Candide.

"You asked when I would think the world would be full ....."

We all remember the 60's and seventies when we were told that the worlds population would have hit 20 Billion by now but in fact is only at about 6 Billion. (The state of Texas alone could support that population) so I suppose we have a long way to go befpre we would worry in this country.

Webby your right some decent planning on infrastructure and dencentralisation could she this country easily fit another cool 50 or so million.

One only has to remember the recent rains in Noth Queensland on the Burdekin where they were losing a sydney harbour full of water a day.
Imagine if we only had politicians with a bit of foresight.

Perhaps the DLP just might be the answer Webby

Zig

Rehctub - why hypocrites? Did I say we should stop reproducing entirely and wipe out the human race? If you bothered to read what I wrote, I remarked that without government intervention the Australian population would be in natural decline. Nothing about preventing people from having children if they wished, just that the government should not intervene to prevent the decline.

Zig - I was around in the 60s and I'd like to know where you got that 20 billion figure from, as I never heard it - any references? And if you like to think that everything will be hunky-dory with billions more people squabbling over fresh water and juggling between using crops for food or fuel, and whether remaining wildernesses are best used as carbon sinks or chewed up to produce more crops, who am I to forcibly pull your head out the sand? I would prefer future generations to have a better existence, that's all. I would also like all people in developing countries to be better off and better educated - and guess what would happen then? Yup, their birthrate would fall.

Australia is under-utilised. Heavy concentrations in only a few cities and major towns. Water is plentiful alwasy. Problem with shortage of water is man-made indecision from govts of all persuasions; also the evil phenomenon of the 'Greens' who over the apst thirty years have 'encouraged' the major parties for preference deals in reurn for no more dams etc stupidity/lunacy.

Don't complain about problems that are not inevitable. Chuck out Bob Brown and his buddies. And major parties ought to start acting responsibly for the majority who seek decentralisation and services and viable lifestyles and livelihoods in rural Australia not just the cities.
And forget the brainwashing and blind faith in ideological programming from the ABC- the false religion of secularists.

Webby you must live in Brisbane. If you bothered to travel west into the Murray Darling Basin where 42% of our food is grown you would see a parched river system, which this year has allocated security irrigators 4% of their allocation. Rice and wheat farmers have no water allocation this year but will still pay $36,000 for their water licenses. Melbourne plans to extract drinking water from this stressed catchment. In Melbourne itself lawns are brown and dry because they can't be watered and old shade trees are dying as their root systems have been dry for about 5 years now. From where I sit in south eastern Australia I can see Australia importing basic foods to supplement our domestic production. A check of the supermarket shelves will show that food processors import a surprising amount of food so we may not be self sufficient in food now.

We don't need to populate or perish, if we counted the number of people who were unemployed properly we would find that there were enough people in Australia to do the skilled work, care for the aged as well as care, educate and train the young. If farm workers were paid cash then people would harvest the crop - they might be unemployed and topping up their Newstart Allowance, they might be moonlighting pensioners or backpackers but the current system severely punishes pensioners and unemployed for topping up their meagre incomes.

Billie;

Yeah but the bradfield scheme would fix that. Just using the current rivers system. Bring it down from the Fitzroy and the Johnson and fix the problem for good.

The last quote a couple of years back was only 6 Billion and would have a return on investment in 1 year. Its about time some of the major parties really got serious about drought proofing Western Qld and Western NSW. The answer as been there for years and was the second choice to the snowy river scheme.

Its even been modified to add another river flow in northern Nsw.
Lets get on with it. If as you say there is a food shortage then lets cash in on it.

Hi Billie
I'm a Sydneysider. Always have been.
Think I always will be.
Too many nice pasta and Italian cafes, especially at Leichhardt for me to ever leave; except for holidays with la familia.