Politics to a large extent

28.04.13

Letter to the Editor

Politics to a large extent is determining priorities from the most important to less important things, obviously the most important things are dealt with in a timely manner while the lesser important things are dealt with over time.

So it is with this in mind that I question the priorities of the LNP Queensland government in relation to signing up to Prime Minister Gillard’s education reforms that will benefit all Queensland students in both public and private educational systems. The feeble excuses given so far by the Minister of Education in Queensland do not make sense to the average parent of school children who are looking for the very best education their child can receive.

This once in a lifetime opportunity to have all Australian school children educated to a higher level is far too important to be playing politics with. Mr Newman likes to see himself as the Vladimir Putin of Australian politics, the tough guy, and the bloke who will oppose the Labor Prime Minister. Sadly in this case all he is doing is holding Queensland children to ransom to try to win a political point, which in my humble opinion is absolutely ridiculous.

The LNP NSW government has already seen the light and has prioritized NSW children’s education by signing up to the Gillard – Gonski reforms. It seems that Queensland may return to the Joh era when we were the laughing stock of Australia if this chance to educate our school children to a higher level is missed by Premier Newman and his government. Their priority seems to be to spend millions of dollars on a new parliamentary building and a propaganda newsletter, this is unacceptable to parents who want the best possible education for their children, c’mon Premier, get your priorities straight.

Regards,

Shaun Newman

13 Laura Court

Deeragun, Townsville

North Queensland, 4818

Ph: 0747516184

Email – sne35565@westnet.com.au

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Economics is said

25.04.13

Letter to the Editor

Economics is said to be an uncertain science, however many of the basic principles are clear enough for the average Joe to understand. "Stress for casual workers" (TB 22.04.13) gives us the story concerning job insecurity for an increasing number of Australian workers who are being casualised.

Surely, this practice of casualising the workforce is frowned upon by decent employers who are concerned with the strength of their country and themselves. Rogue employers who operate this way not only deliver insecurity for the employee, but they limit the employee’s ability to purchase a home. This in turn leads to higher unemployment in the building industry, which leads to lower economic growth nationwide.

If anyone doubts this, look at the Newman LNP Government in Queensland which put 14,000 public service jobs to the sword. This has had the multiplier effect of leaving Queensland with the highest unemployment figures on mainland Australia.

The practice of Newmanomics in Queensland does not recognise the reality that when people lose their jobs they no longer buy the newspaper on the way to work, nor do they pull in for a coffee heart-starter at a café or buy their lunch.

This affects trade with small businesses such as the newsagent, the café and the snack bar/food takeaway and causing small businesses to do it tougher or even fold. This causes more unemployment and so the downward spiral continues.

Why can’t they see it? Is it purely a case of ideology over commonsense, with commonsense finishing last?

Regards,

Shaun Newman

13 Laura Court

Deeragun, Townsville

North Queensland, 4818

Ph: 0747516184

Email – sne35565

Whilst I understand

21.04.13

Letter to the Editor

Whilst I understand that my child’s education is the most important part of her life, I also understand that those of us on low incomes with children will suffer if the public were to elect Tony Abbott as Prime Minister in September, not only because the LNP won’t be offering any extra education funding, should they sneak into government, but, should they win they will also abolish the children’s school payments that help low income families to send their children to school.

I am also very angry with Campbell Newman’s plan not to accept the federal funding that is currently on offer, as this funding would make the world of difference to my child’s education. We are comparing the difference between the $800 million the State government is budgeting for education up to what is required which is $1.3 Billion, which in fact means that the Newman government is being asked to spend an extra $500 million to properly educate Queensland children and receive and extra $3.8 Billion in Gillard federal funding. It should be a no-brainer. Australian children’s educational standards are falling, due to the lack of funds, and this needs to be corrected, now.

I don’t want the second class education being offered by Campbell Newman for my child, and I would be very surprised if any parents in Queensland would be happy with the lower standards presented by the State government.

This reform from Prime Minister Gillard is a once in a lifetime opportunity which must be grasped for the sake not only of our children’s future, but ultimately the future of the Australian economy as we come into direct competition with the might of Asia in the coming century.

Regards,

Shaun Newman

13 Laura Court

Deeragun, Townsville

North Queensland, 4818

Ph: 0747516184

Email – sne35565@westnet.com.au

In the United States of America

21.04.13

Letter to the Editor

In the United States of America they have an expression Question: How do you tell if a politician is lying Answer: Their lips are moving. We in Australia of course have our own version of the answer to this expression , instead of their lips moving we say when they say “um” followed by “arh” and sometimes, “look, look” and occasionally “um, it’s a work in progress.”

Regards,

Shaun Newman

13 Laura Court

Deeragun, Townsville

North Queensland, 4818

Ph: 0747516184

Email – sne35565@westnet.com.au

Oservers of Australian politics

21.04.13

Letter to the Editor

Observers of Australian politics need to recall 1972, to recall a more uneven contest for the Prime Ministers ship of this nation. At that time we had a weak Prime Minister devoid of policies who faced a confident Opposition Leader who had done the home work through his time in Opposition and was choc-a-block with new and exciting progressive policies, such as Medibank, which later became Medicare that we have retained to this day.

Fast forward to 2013 and we have a newly confident Prime Minister full of progressive policies such as lifting the standards of all Australian children’s education re the Gonski reforms, such as the National Disability Insurance Scheme to care for the disabled who were either born that way or became so via the workplace, this is the community taking responsibility for all its citizens, exciting progressive policy for Australia’s long term future. As the States are reducing services under LNP governments the federal ALP government is taking up the slack to try to protect ordinary people’s services such as health.

Challenging this Prime Minister would surely be the poorest Opposition Leader since the LNP Prime Minister of 1972 Bill McMahon. The current LNP leader Tony Abbott has trouble stringing five words together coherently, lacks policy except for the newly released ‘slow broadband’ policy which has been an abject failure and a revised WorkChoices policy that we know will be revived in name only. This man’s answer to policy questions is either “no” or a deferral, it’s a work in progress, goodness me, he has had 6 years, what is the problem? His front bench is stacked with relics from the past, hardly a think-tank for the future, Bronwyn Bishop, Kevin Andrews and Philip Ruddock the father of the house; this could be part of the problem.

I sense a new mood overtaking the Australian community as the Opposition Leader comes under closer scrutiny and Australian’s are not impressed with what they see. Prime Minister Gillard should be confident, she is delivering strong and structured government at a time that is a real turning point in so many ways for our nation; we need to continue with Prime Minister Gillard’s strong leadership on the economy, the environment, education and so much more. It is not time to change horses in mid-stream, let’s wait till we get to the other side of the river and see what her policies deliver, because there are no policies on the LNP side of politics for the foreseeable future. We can only judge the LNP by what they do in State governments, in Queensland we are into our second year of LNP government, so far we have suffered an increase in the cost of living due to their poor policy decisions and currently have the highest unemployment of any mainland State, not a recipe for progress or prosperity is it?

Regards,

Shaun Newman

13 Laura Court

Deeragun, Townsville

North Queensland, 4818

Ph: 0747516184

Email – sne35565@westnet.com.au

Words don’t fail me

16.04.13

Letter to the Editor

Words don’t fail me, but the words I would use to describe Premier Newman and his LNP government would not be printed, my reaction to the State government spending extra money on beefing up security for the Gold Coast Commonwealth Games at the cost of every school student in Queensland. Why is it that there is a pot of money to fund the Commonwealth Games in 2018, yet when it comes to the children of this great state, sorry, we’re broke, and can’t afford to spend the money in order to attract $3.8 Billion of extra funding from the federal government to educate to a higher standard, every school child in Queensland.

Our children’s education is far more important than a few second rate gold medals, yet you have no hesitation in spending for extra security at the games, clearly no amount of security is enough, the fanatics will find a way in. Not good enough Premier, in fact nowhere near good enough, you and your party should be ashamed of yourselves. Shame Newman, shame!

Regards,

Shaun Newman

13 Laura Court

Deeragun, Townsville

North Queensland, 4818

Ph: 0747516184

Email – sne35565@westnet.com.au

How can the LNP

16.04.13

Letter to the Editor

How can the LNP Queensland government claim to be governing in the best interests of all Queenslanders, claim to be broke, yet host the next Commonwealth Games at the Gold Coast while simultaneously knocking back $3.8 Billion in extra funding for all Queensland school children?

Regards,

Shaun Newman

13 Laura Court

Deeragun, Townsville

North Queensland, 4818

Ph: 0747516184

Email – sne35565@westnet.com.au

The Newman LNP government

16.04.13

Letter to the Editor

The Newman LNP government’s Achilles heel is about to be displayed as the government tries unsuccessfully to bully the Queensland Police Union into accepting a lousy 2.2% pay raise for their Enterprise Bargaining Agreement. To add insult to injury the government is also trying to lower shift penalties for the police service.

The government will quickly discover that they are not dealing with a weak union, the QPU has fought and won many battles in the past and I predict they will win this one also. With QPU President Ian Leavers is a solid advocate for his members, when push comes to shove the QPU leads the way for most other unions in Queensland.

When the LNP promised to remove Labor’ s arbitrary 2.5% wage rise cap many police officers would have mistakenly read that to mean that the LNP would offer more than the cap, as it turns out the meanness and trickiness of the LNP has come to the fore. QPU Assistant General Secretary Denis Sycz has quite rightly pulled the government on with his statement “ If the Premier and Minister (Jack Dempsey) think they can distance themselves from this, they’re sadly mistaken.”

Good work Mr Newman and your LNP, now into your second, and second last year in office, you have managed to upset everyone, including our police service.

Regards,

Shaun Newman

13 Laura Court

Deeragun, Townsville

North Queensland, 4818

Ph: 0747516184

Email – sne35565@westnet.com.au

I beeg to differ

15.04.13

Letter to the Editor

I beg to differ with the Townsville Bulletin – Editorial ‘Education plans make little sense’. The so called “cuts” are really only slowdowns in payments to Australian universities, today they receive $13 Billion, in 2016 with this plan, they will receive $16 Billion, so in essence it amounts to a slowdown in the rate of funding increase, but then, only for two years. The plan as I understand it (and I admit I could be wrong) is that universities would tighten their collective belts for two years to enable all Australian children to receive a world class prep/primary and secondary education, as per the Gonski report.

The offer being made to the States is a two for one dollar contribution from the federal government to make this happen for all Australian school children, regardless of which system the parent chooses for their child. Personally, I believe that this issue should transcend politics; however the State governments of Queensland and Western Australia seem dead against the concept of all children receiving the world class education?

I note Premier Newman continuing to cite the ,we’re broke claim, any credibility for this claim was lost with the announcement that Queensland – Gold Coast would in fact host the next Commonwealth Games. So in summary, some of our State government/s are placing their ideology above the best interests of the Australian nation, it may not be treason but it at the very least is treachery aimed at those of us who are financially unable, or morally unwilling to sign up to the conservative ideology, preferring education to be universal.

Regards,

Shaun Newman

13 Laura Court

Deeragun, Townsville

North Queensland, 4818

Ph: 0747516184

Email – sne35565@westnet.com.au

I along with the vast majority

14.04.13

Letter to the Editor

I, along with the vast majority of my fellow Australians tend to support plans that contain practicality, step by step easily understood common sense, with initiative, discretion and judgment. We Aussies like to see natural progression in plans and/or policies from our political masters, plans that just make sense.

With this in mind one can only wonder what the Coalition wants to achieve with its latest release of Broadband policy. To continue using fibre optic cable to the node (the junction box under our footpaths) in order to introduce 21st century technology in the carriage of high speed broadband internet, as the NBN Co is currently doing, then having proposed that measure they then hark back to 20th century technology and propose using the old copper cable to run from the node to our home connection, thus in practical terms negating or putting the brakes on the speeds you have just enabled via the fibre optic cable? The LNP policy asks us to accept a slower speed by four times as well, LNP 25mpbs compared to Labor’s 100mpbs, yes $10 Billion may be saved, however this is $10Billion in the context of a multi-trillion economy that is Australia.

It is no wonder that the LNP Coalition have released so few policies, I understand that they have had only a relatively short period in Opposition, however surely they have had enough time to design a reasonable policy position on most areas of interest to ordinary Aussies. If we were to institute the LNP policy on broadband we would be a laughing stock, I can but wonder what the LNP proposal to a high speed train network covering the east coast of Australia would look like.

Regards,

Shaun Newman

13 Laura Court

Deeragun, Townsville

North Queensland, 4818

Ph: 0747516184

Email – sne35565@westnet.com.au