Taxi Price War !

When we ride in a taxi we are accustomed to seeing and hearing the meter ticking away and calculating the cost of the journey by both the distance travelled and the time factor if traffic causes delays.  We pay the cost of the trip irrespective of whether the hirer is a single passenger or a group of several people. That number depends on the quantity of seat belts the taxi can legally accommodate.

When Uber burst onto the taxi scene by incorporating drivers of private vehicles in its taxi fleet it caused massive disruptions to the conventional taxi industry.  The government regulates the number of taxis on the road by limiting the taxi plates issued  and consequently they are of high value.  Since Uber, plate value has dropped sharply.

Now Uber is introducing a new pricing method that seems certain to further disrupt hires between Uber and the conventional taxi companies.  Uber will give passengers a fixed price quote for each journey at the time of hire.  This will be calculated on the known length of the journey according to road maps, expected time it will take given known traffic conditions and by taking in the reported experience of other Uber fleet drivers reporting the traffic situation.

Uber drivers gain their livelihood by way of a share of the fare charged and if traffic disruptions cause a major delay under this arrangement they become the loser.  A traffic snarl can see the journey time double and that is reflected in the fare in a conventional taxi.  A Uber driver is expected to deliver his passenger to his or her destination for a fare that it entirely controlled by the Uber company.

Many Uber drivers report they make little profit and their take home pay is below the minimum wage.  They see a further danger to their earnings in a new scheme Uber is about to introduce.  Called UberPOOL  it seeks to attract fares by offering shared rides for passengers who are generally heading in the same direction.

How that works is not abundantly clear, but the general idea seems to be to lower the journey cost by each passenger enjoying a discount rate.  Uber drivers are suspicious that combined with this quote price for each journey the end result may be a further drop in their take home pay.

Many people are astonished that Uber has been legally able to disrupt what was a tightly controlled taxi industry.  The government had cab numbers in its hand by the issue of taxi plates and each vehicle needed to be sign written and outfitted according to strict regulations. Drivers needed to wear a uniform and undergo a probity check.

Uber managed to snare a share of the taxi business on a world wide basis. Moves to close it down by regulations failed and it is a company providing hire services in most world cities.  Whether its drivers are " employees " or " contractors "  remains unclear and ultimately governments may decide the taxi issue by regulation.   That is a power that market newcomers challenge - at their peril !

The Search for Life !

Just after the end of the second world war we began seeing strange objects in the sky that we could not identify. That was the " UFO " phenomenon and many people believed the arrival of a space ship from another planet would visit Earth.  The thought of an extraterrestial arriving amongst us terrified the churches and they quickly adjusted their dogma to have that fit within their teaching of the creation of life.

We have visited the Moon and within the lifetime of many we will probably set foot on Mars which we regard as a " dead " planet.  Now it has been revealed that there is a massive lake of salty water under its surface.  It is quite possible that this will contain basic living creatures such as we have discovered deep in the oceans of Earth.

The plan is to create a permanent base station on the moon from which a Mars probe will launch with the intent of eventually setting up a colony on that planet.  It will probably be a long time before we can realistically reach that lake about 1.5 kilometres underground to determine if life exists there.  If such life is found, it will probably be bacteria that has been feeding on a stew of toxic chemicals issuing from that planets magma core, scaldingly hot and under immense pressure from above.

Such a discovery will be no longer earth shattering.  It will simply power newspaper headlines for a few days and generate scientific conjecture.  The world population has been conditioned to expect such a discovery and they will take it in their stride.

The one thing that will not change if such a discovery is made is the worlds religions. Many of the wars and much of the friction between peoples over the centuries has religion at its core. The human psyche has one common objective - and that is an after life.  The various religions simply offer their solution of how that objective can be obtained.   In many ways it resembles a giant Ponzi scheme.  Do what the church tells you - and after you die that reward will be yours.

Every one of those many religions has suffered schism - and the resulting sub-orders have divided into sects.  It seems that humankind has an inbuilt urge to find something to worship, just as those hunter gatherers chose to worship the signs of power they could observe, thunder and lightning, the moon and the sun.

Common sense and the reality of scientific discovery should have coalesced into a simple singular world religion by now but exactly the opposite has occurred.  Religion seems ever divisive, because religion delivers both power and money to those who serve as its commanders.

We are building the expertise to colonise deep space from our home planet and we have yet to learn to live in peace within ourselves. No doubt if we discover living organisms elsewhere we will send missionaries to convert them to our religions - at the point of a sword.

Once the discovery of life on Mars would have been mind blowing.  Today it will compete with the stock exchange quotes for world attention !

To Catch a Thief !

The news that the man many thought should have been our next Police Commissioner is to conduct an enquiry into the New South Wales state planning system will be greeted as good news.  Nick Kaldos has been handed a broad brief by Planning Minister Anthony Roberts and this is the outcome of many scandals that have rocked the community.

Nick Kaldos has an impeccable resume.. He was a deputy police commissioner until jockeying within for the top job resulted in the entire upper command being overlooked.  He left the police and served  as the Director of Internal Oversight at the United Nations Relief and Works Agency in the Middle East. He will now enquire whether interstate or overseas integrity systems have a role to play if they are incorporated in state planning.

This will be an opportunity to finally break the nexus between the people who serve on councils and make the decisions, and the developers who are also seated at that table and push their own interests. One policy - championed by Mr Roberts - seeks to strip councils of the ability to decide on development applications.  That function has been vested in mandatory local planning panels which enforce whatever planning controls are in place in that council area.

Councillors sometimes vote to approve developments that go against their own planning laws.  Issues such as building heights and floor plan changes can deliver incredible profits to developers and instances have been uncovered where multiple planning decisions not only lack merit but constitute open graft.

Nick Kaldos' appointment is the latest in a number of anti corruption measures adopted by the state government. There is the expectation that he will do his job swiftly because he is due to report back by this November, and then his recommendations will need to be actively proclaimed as law by the state parliament.

The fact that Mr Kaldos is such a respected figure will make it hard for the politicians to ignore or water down the anti graft solutions he proposes.  Our parliamentarians have also had a swipe of the corruption tar brush and one was recently forced to resign when he was caught seeking a commission for his part in aiding a development deal.  We have a state election early next year and both sides of parliament will be keen to present themselves as squeaky clean.

Councils playing ducks and drakes with the planning laws have been a constant irritant for many years.  The outcome has been buyer dissatisfaction with the outcome in instances where the purchase has been " off the plan ".  Often the finished apartment has little resonance with the image promoted when the building was in the planning stage and may even have view in the opposite direction, be placed on a lower or higher floor and have a totally different layout.

Housing is now the biggest economic decision most people will make in their lifetime.  It is said that it takes a cop to catch a thief - and Nick Kaldos was a very impressive cop during his time with the NSW police.   The shonky people manipulating planning in this state have every reason to be very nervous !

Untying the Knot !

In 1975 - much to the dismay of many of the churches - Australia introduced the " Family Court " and gave it the power to grant " no fault " divorces.  The previous law demanded that a guilty party be identified and suitably punished in the distribution of assets.  That was an era of private investigators peering through bedroom windows and trying to establish evidence of adultery to present in court.

The wisdom of that approach to dissolving marriages that are not working is not shared with the rest of the world and the British Supreme court has just handed down a verdict that condemns a sixty-eight year old woman to remain shackled to a man she detests because English law still demands that the divorce applicant provide evidence of unreasonable behaviour, adultery or desertion - or imposes a five year period of separation.

Her eighty year old partner opposed the divorce and the matter found its way to the Supreme court which ruled that it lacked the power to grant a divorce on the claim that the husband was moody, argumentative and disparaging.   The court claimed that it was not its place to do more than interpret the law and the litigant would need to wait until 2020 when that five year separation will come into effect.

In times gone by Canon law was really a form of bondage.  In many parts of the world the laws of the churches were the laws of the state and that marriage bond was for life.   What was a further obstacle to a happy union was the customs that prevailed.  An unmarried couple required a chaperone to be present at all times at the start of the twentieth century.  Etiquette demanded that they never really got to know each other - until their marriage was sanctified in a church - and then it was too late.

Of course, marriage was simply a way of regulating that human obsession that so confused the churches - the sexual act.   The churches were paranoid that it only occur between married couples and it was deemed a mortal sin in any other circumstances.  The fact that it was also very pleasant did not come into church contention.

There seems little doubt that the development of the contraceptive " pill " changed everything.  That trip down the aisle is fast becoming a rare curiosity, the day of the chaperone is long over and most couples cohabitate in sin with several partners before they make a final choice.  In fact sex is now an unspoken normality in what could be termed " casual " relationships.

It seems inevitable that this Supreme court ruling will bring pressure for a law change in Britain. Statistics reveal that about 110,000 couples there divorce each year and there seems a doubt that the 375,000 Islamic couples in that country meet the full extent of the British marriage laws.  It is suggested that to be fully valid they would need to also have a civil marriage.

It seems that fusty old laws in the birthplace of civil law lag behind the modern interpretations of the more enlightened world.  No doubt the churches will fight tooth and nail to retain their last toe hold of moral control.

Whose Flag ?

There is no doubt that the flags of Australia and New Zealand confuse the people of the rest of the world. They can easily be mistaken for one another and now there is a suggestion by the acting New Zealand prime minister that Australia stole the design from New Zealand and Australia should change its flag.

Winston Peters has an irascible sense of humour and that is probably said in jest.  As recently as 2016 our Kiwi neighbours held a referendum to choose a new flag and the existing design won hands down.  Some elements in both countries are keen for a flag change but now it seems to be a dead issue.

Examining the facts tells a different story to Mr Peters claim.  The Australian flag design won a national competition in 1901 and was proudly flown in September of that year during the first flag day.  It underwent minor changes during the following decades.  However, it was not officially designated as our national flag until 1954.  New Zealand technically adopted its flag in 1902.

We often hear claims in both Australia and New Zealand that our fighting forces commemorate battles won or lost under their national flag and that is not strictly true.  The flag actually used was usually the Union Jack simply because neither of our flags were well known in other parts of the world and the Union Jack was the insignia of the British Empire.

In fact, Australia and New Zealand nearly became the one country at the time of Federation. We are probably closer in temperament, humour and living standards than any other tribal people on this Earth.  People move between the two countries with little hindrance - and apart from a few vowels -our language is identical.

A lot of Kiwi's move to Australia and do not apply for Australian citizenship, and there is an exchange of Australians retiring to New Zealand.  Recently there has been friction because Australia has started returning Kiwi's with criminal convictions as deportees, often without bothering to bring them to trial  That puts stress on the notion that the two nationalities are interchangeable.

It seems inevitable that differences between the two countries will widen.  At the end of the second world war Australia opened its doors to the dispossessed of war weary Europe.  New Zealand restricted immigration to citizens of the British Isles.  When Australia abolished the White Australia policy we accepted immigrants from Asia and Australia is now a much more cosmopolitan identity.

We live in a much more dangerous world and our sea of tranquillity in the south Pacific is under threat.  The importance of Europe is fading and Asia is fast becoming the fulcrum of the world.  The fact that our flags are so similar simply reinforces the relationship between the two countries and their isolation from the cockpit that has delivered so many wars.   That is something to be nurtured - and expanded.

Trapped !

The fact that the fire fighting foam known as  PFAS was once thought to be harmless has left many families scattered across Australia in financial limbo.  When the news that poly-fluroroalkyl contaminated ground water and had the potential to cause serious injury hit newspaper headlines  the value of their properties plummeted.

The damage has now widened.  The banks are refusing loans in entire postcodes because of this perceived risk and properties affected are virtually unsaleable.  But the lenders insist that owners continue to pay mortgages owing on what are now worthless properties and in many cases valuers and other trades refuse to enter the property because of the risk.

One of the problems is that we have no idea how wide this risk is spread.  The news broke when PFAS contamination was noticed on land surrounding the RAAF base at Williamstown near Newcastle. PFAS is the prime means of fighting fires based on fuels like petrol or kerosene and it is liberally used on all military installations.  Added to these are the civilian airports in all parts of the country.

It is still being used because there is no comparable alternative in snuffing out a dangerous oil fire and PFAS is present in many household fire extinguishers.  It is commonly used by both city and country fire brigades when they encounter car fires and the runoff is flushed down the drain network. It is quite possible that this contamination may be found in city properties far removed from any airport.

These property owners are innocent victims.  Their properties are devalued because of no action on their part and they are looking for compensation.  The only people with the deep pockets to pick up the tab are the Federal and state governments, and they are hesitant to commit until the extent of the risk is known.

This could easily devolve into what is known as a " lawyers picnic ".  The litigation possibilities seem endless.  The obvious bunny in the gun sights is the manufacturer of PFAS.  When this chemical was developed it was said to be " safe to use " and it was claimed that it was " biodegradeable ".  The problem is that these chemical companies are based in other countries and suing for damages would need to be made in courts subject to the laws of foreign countries.

Pinning the blame on the actual user is far easier.  All military installations and most airports are Federal government agencies and PFAS runoff can be sourced accordingly.  That opens the question of whether such properties can be decontaminated - or whether they need to be acquired and left vacant.  The vexing question is how wide is this problem and what sort of compensation bill are we looking at ?

The one thing that is certain is that property owners affected face endless delay.  The legal aspects will be deeply probed and the science people will seek possible answers, and all that will take time. Interestingly, this PFAS problem affects all the worlds countries because PFAS is used internationally.   Once compensation starts to flow on the international scene that will be a good guide to what will happen here.

Sexual Consent Law Change !

The professional body representing the states 2,400 barristers wants the law changed so that a person who has an unreasonable but honest belief in consent is not guilty of a crime.  In the eyes of many people, that is simply a " Get out of jail free "  excuse for rape.

Under New South Wales law, if a person has " no reasonable grounds " for believing there is consent they are deemed to have knowledge of lack of consent. - a key element of the offence of sexual assault.

What stirred controversy over the consent law was a lurid prosecution that concerned an 18 year girl who visited a night club and was offered a tour of the building by the son of the owner.  Sex was suggested and she told the son she was a virgin, but somehow they engaged in anal sex with her on her hands and knees in an alley behind the club.  The girl protested that she did not give consent.

A trial was aborted, another found a guilty verdict and the son spent time in prison, lodged an appeal and a new trial set him free.  It was painfully obvious that this issue of consent needed work to set a clear set of rules to guide the machinery of law.

Jurors in New South Wales are already directed that consent involves " a conscious and voluntary agreement " which can be given verbally or expressed by actions .   That can be interpreted in many ways and depends entirely on the outlook of the juror.

Both Victoria and Tasmania have changed their consent laws so that consent is absent if they do not " say or do anything that communicates " consent.  That comes perilously close to requiring a written or verbal agreement between two people before sex becomes lawful.

Sex is usually a very private function between two people and it is not normally performed before an audience.  Usually consent is therefore reduced to a " He said.  She said " argument which relies entirely on their memories of the event.

If a woman takes off her clothes and climbs naked into bed with a partner a reasonable person would assume that sex would be the outcome, but to deliver certainty it would be wise if some sort verbal agreement was undertaken.  Many would disagree on the grounds that sex is an act of passion and it would be debased if it required some sort of formal declaration to satisfy the requirements of the law.

The requirements of the law become questionable when we consider the millions of sexual couplings that take place in Australia every night of the year - and the few that end up in a courtroom somewhere having this consent issue decided.

The only way out of that quagmire is to decide individual cases on their merit.  Clearly, both the partners must be in agreement for sex to be legal and if that is missing there is always recourse to the law through the courts.

Luna Park - In Eclipse !

The long term future of Luna Park is in doubt.  This iconic fun park opened in 1935 on the harbour foreshore at north Sydney and provided rides that drew vast crowds of both locals and visitors to the city.  Noise was not an issue at that time because few people lived in the surrounding area.

When the harbour bridge opened in 1932 Sydney's north shore gained new appeal and over the following decades harbour views have deeply influenced the price of housing.  In particular, apartment living has seen high rise crowd all vantage points and Luna Park is now overlooked by a new and vibrant north Sydney.  The residents are quick to protest noise issues whenever Luna Park plans to introduce new rides.

This form of entertainment lives or dies on being relevant.  The public expect new thrills and to meet that challenge Luna Park wants to install a new feature which will be called the " Flying Carousel ". The Land and Environment court has just ruled that this must follow the development application process every time Luna Park  moves or replaces a ride.   That will open proceedings to objections from neighbours concerned about the noise aspect.

Luna Park is spending twenty million dollars upgrading its attractions and it presently draws crowds of over a million each year.  If new rides are refused during this application process the amusement park may become unprofitable and be forced to close.  This opens an argument that is very relevant to many existing forms of business in this city.

Luna Park existed in its present form before those residents chose to live adjacent to an amusement park - and the noise was an issue they accepted when they made that decision.  It seems grossly unfair to now cite noise as a reason to refuse normal ride upgrades which may drive a city asset to oblivion.

Luna Park has trimmed its operating hours and closes earlier to accommodate these noise issues and perhaps the ball in now back in the court of those neighbouring residents.   Double glazing their windows and installing insulation would go a long way to achieve the quietness they crave and the fact that Luna Park existed was a condition that affected the price of their unit when they made their buying decision.

This is a growing phenomenon in all parts of the city.  Because an industry is dirty or noisy or employs too many people who need to park their cars we are seeing surrounding residents demanding that the company close and move elsewhere.  In many cases, the price of surrounding land was artificially lowered to compensate for the presence of such an unappealing industry.

To add insult to injury, if Luna Park did close those same residents would demand a say in what use if  the site found a new owner.  There would be pressure for it to remain open space parkland and resistance to more high rise - which would block their harbour views.

Luna Park is an icon this city needs.  The sound of people enjoying themselves should not be a reasonable ground for refusal !

Bicycle Safety !

We have just had a law change in New South Wales which raises the age limit at which kids can ride their bicycles on the footpath.   The old law required them to ride on the road and share it with cars when they turned twelve years old.  This upgrade raises that to sixteen

Strangely, New South Wales and Victoria are the only states which impose an age limit on cycling on footpaths.  It is perfectly legal in the rest of Australia at any age and there are few instances where that seems to have been a problem.

Here in Sydney we have spent a lot of money creating shared cycling and walking paths in an effort to promote the use of bicycles as a replacement for polluting cars.  It intensely annoys motorists to have slow pushbikes weaving along in city traffic when there is a perfectly good but unused such track running parallel with the road.   There is no law in place to force bike riders to use that facility.

The only place bikes are banned seems to be in road tunnels.  These usually have a speed limit higher than can be achieved on a bike and that represents an obvious danger.  Highways with a speed limit of 110 kph have a narrow bike lane less than a metre from the traffic flow and often that surface is littered with roadside debris.  Legally, a child of any age can ride in that facility.

The expectation of many parents is that their children can ride safely to school and return home by the same method - and that can not be achieved if they have to share the road with the normal traffic flow.  Children usually become conversant with the traffic rules when they begin to learn to drive a car.  The very fact that they are children is the usual reason they are unreliable decision makers until they reach maturity.

The obvious danger of children riding bikes on shared footpaths is when that bike is ridden furiously at high speed, and that is something kids of all ages sometimes do.  Collision with the aged and infirm can cause serious injury and the fact that bikes are silent increases this danger.  Perhaps a requirement that all bikes ridden on footpaths have a " flapper "  activated by contact with the wheel spokes to make a noise would be a welcome improvement.

It seems to be a fact of life that the police ignore cyclists - with the exception of booking those not wearing a safety helmet.  In the past riders over twelve and many adults rode on footpaths without hindrance and little is likely to change.  The vast majority ride at a safe speed and with a little common sense danger can be avoided.   The old and infirm would be wise to avoid those time periods before and after school when bike traffic on footpaths would be heavy.

Parents should be urged to instill in children  the basic courtesy of slowing to accommodate pedestrian traffic and riding in a sensible manner, and a law change to require shared bike paths to be used where they are provided would be welcome.

Bike riding children have never been known to take much notice of the law and little is likely to change.

A Beach " Overload " !

Bondi makes the claim that it is the most famous beach in Australia.  That is disputed by Manly and beaches in other states but there is no doubt that this nine hundred metre stretch of sand in the heart of Sydney is a " must see " for many tourists.

It made world headlines back in the day when the " bikini " became the rage of swimsuit fashion and only Bondi had a notorious beach inspector with a tape measure in his hand.  He decreed that there must be four inches of fabric covering the thighs of sunbakers on his beach and he checked all and any potential offenders.   Those that failed the test were ordered off the beach.

Now Bondi is heading for another clash with the council debating the need to separate swimmers and surfers for safety reasons.  Depending on the wind and weather, the northern part of Bondi beach   usually is more sheltered and with smaller waves.  The best surfing waves are to be found at the southern end.

The council is thinking of either forcing all board riders out of that northern section or barring boards with a fin from surfing anywhere but that southern part of the beach, and that has surfers making noisy protests.  At present the entire beach is a mix of swimmers and board riders and collisions are inevitable.  The Lifesavers are continually treating casualties.

One of the areas of contention is the type of surf boards in use.  Kids and beginners usually start with " soft " surfboards that lack a fin and they are unlikely to cause harm to others.  It seems likely that the proposed ordinance will lump all surfboards into that southern section of the beach and that has the potential to be a very dangerous mix.  Most serious surfers are tethered to their board by a leg rope and that and a fin can do damage to swimmers.   There is no proposal to ban swimmers from the southern end of the beach, hence the perceived danger.

If this ban goes ahead it will create an overload of surfers waiting for a wave at the southern end of the beach and that will test the surf culture that prevails. Not everybody can surf the same wave and at present those surfers are distributed along the entire beach and this delivers a degree of harmony. Mixing old hands and raw beginners will inevitably bring misunderstandings as the courtesy of precedence is learned.

There is no doubt that a mix of swimmers and riders of boards with a fin are a dangerous mix.  If finned boards are relegated to the southern end of the beach  that raises the density question of how many board riders should be allowed at Bondi at any one time and that varies according to the surf conditions.

It may be necessary to put that decision in the hands of the Lifesavers and for a coloured cap to be issued to indicate those permitted to surf.  When a surfer leaves the surf, that cap is returned to the lifesavers and issued to the next on the waiting list.  It seems that this question is now raising the issue of just how many people can the waves of Bondi accommodate at any one time.

Withdrawal from the Grid !

A new electricity plan being trialled at Kurnell must be sending shivers down the spine of the investors who have risked their money as shareholders in the New South Wales electricity grid. Electricity is an essential and the ever rising charge to consumers promises good dividends provided the majority of homes draw power through the metered system.

Natural Solar is a company building a cluster of twelve three and four bedroom homes at Kurnell which will have solar on their roofs and batteries to store the excess solar power generated during the day.  The unusual factor is that these batteries are inter-linked with the aim that nobody draws power from the grid and the cluster is self serving in its electricity needs

The thinking is that in such a cluster there will be a mix of how much each home uses and those linked batteries will even things out.  This constitutes a vast difference between individual homes with both solar and a battery.   That battery must be much larger to accommodate unexpected high demand while linked batteries even out the flow.

This plan involves a safety factor where a link to the grid exists so electricity will still flow if solar fails because of some weather phenomenon.  It would be reasonable to expect that the charge would be above the normal level in such circumstances.

The more the price charged for electricity from the grid increases the more interested consumers become in the solar/battery mix that grants them independence.  There is a very good chance that this idea will spread to existing clusters of homes.  It would be fairly simple for adjoining homes to create a similar plan and enjoy freedom from electricity bills.

If that happens, there will certainly be winners - but with equal certainty there will be losers, and they will be the people who do not enter into pooled solar/battery schemes.   The cost of electricity is not entirely governed by how it is generated.  One of the biggest costs is the poles and wires that take it to every street in every suburb of the city.  If even a small percentage of homes drops off the grid, the supply costs have to be met by those remaining on the grid.

The danger facing the grid is the ever lower cost of roof solar and the steadily increasing efficiency of large battery storage systems.  The existing input from roof solar feeding back into the grid is starting to create an over supply problem in the heat of the day and the generating industry would be wise to consider battery storage to balance the economics of the night load.

The one thing the electricity industry can not do is to put off decisions and keep hiking the price of power.  It is fast becoming evident that this solar/battery combination is now an economic reality and once a change away from the grid becomes a practical decision for households it will be unstoppable.
It has the power to destroy the economics of the grid !

An " Empty " Land !

A famous British film actor here on a location shoot was once asked by the media for his impression of Australia.  Used to working in both Europe and America his comment summed up the peril we have faced since the first fleet arrived.  He said " Its just so empty " !

We are about to see the Australian population topping the twenty-five million mark and by world standards that is a very small national population number.  Americans now have three hundred and twenty-five million people living in a land area similar to Australia and that constitutes many big cities and an amazing number of small towns spread across the entire continent.

New South Wales is the most populous state but should we drive from Sydney to Adelaide by the most direct route across inland Australia we would have to contend with an unbroken vista of grazing land with few signs of habitation.  The population of Australia hugs the coastline and inland towns are tiny in comparison with our five major cities.

There was a time at the end of the second world war when the " Populate or Perish " mantra saw us open our doors to mainly European migration.  We are determined to maintain an " orderly " arrival process despite huge numbers languishing in squalid refugee camps in neighbouring countries just waiting for the people smugglers to resume their lucrative trade across the seas.

We should be mindful of the world population numbers.  They have risen to about seven billion and there is the expectation that it will top ten billion by the middle of this century.  Already the twin incentives of both war and famine are sending refugees on an unstoppable search for a better life. We have experienced boat people arriving on our shores unasked and many are still detained in detention centres with little prospect of being granted citizenship.

If we maintain an Australia with a small population living mainly in big cities it is inevitable that we will face a future where our borders can not be defended short of sinking incoming boats at sea and going to war with the incoming hordes.  We are fast becoming the last great empty land - in a very overcrowded world.

From a point of view of defense we probably need a population of about a hundred million  people, and that would deliver change much faster than we have previously experienced.  It takes several generations for newcomers to fully integrate but the American experience shows that is the outcome from the era when the United States absorbed the unwanted of the world.

If we expect our alliance with others countries to protect us when world populations are on the move we will be disappointed.  Australia would become the pressure point which relieves their own borders from inward pressure. We can not expect to be immune from the pressure for living space when the search for food has people streaming across borders.

Increasing our migrant intake will certainly change Australia, but if we do it under our own control we can maintain a degree of management.  The alternative is to do nothing and some time in the immediate future world events will determine the future of the Australian continent by unstoppable force.

It doesn't take the mind of Nostradamus to predict what happens in a future overcrowded world.

Presidential Jeopardy !

Donald Trump has been a controversial figure in his business dealings and even on election day he was widely thought to be the loser in the presidential election race.  The fact that he won shocked the world and ever since he has been the most controversial president ever to hold office in America.

He is now in Presidential jeopardy.  A lot of his citizens think he committed treason when he  absolved Russian president Putin from blame for the fake news stories run on Facebook to influence voters choice to him and against Hillary Clinton.  He then dismissed the investigation by his own security people - and by special investigator Robert Mueller - as a " witch hunt " which he proposed to ignore.

It is becoming quite clear that this investigation is revealing the compelling truth that government operatives within Russia were responsible for damaging stories appearing on Facebook that turned voters from Clinton to Trump.  Whether he won office fairly is now in doubt and the people go to the polls in November for the mid term elections.  It is quite possible that the political balance in both the house and the Senate could change if the voters have a different opinion on their president's performance in office.

Trump has another two years before he must again face the voters for a second term.   The big question is what damage he could do to America's security in that time.  The power to wage war rests in the hands of the president but equally the safety of the country from attack also rests in his hands.  We live in a dangerous world and Trump's insistence that he can win a trade war is sharply disagreed by most economists.  If the world engages in a tariffs race we could end up with a repeat of the great depression of the 1930's.

Trump won office because his promise to " Make America Great Again "  appealed  to those who had lost their jobs to globalization and to the middle class who had seen no wage increases for years. He appeared " different " from the usual presidential aspirants and his break with formality in running his office has held their support.  At the same time, it has appalled  an equally big section of the community who see Trump as a maniac retreating from NATO leadership and puttying the American military at serious risk.

America has two great political parties in the Republicans and the Democrats but in the past both managed to achieve enough cross aisle accommodation to deliver workable government. That partisanship reached breaking point under Obama when the Republicans refused to appoint a nominee to fill a vacancy on the American High court.  Now Trump has a similar task and many fear the tone of the court may swing into a more conservative direction.

Several American presidents  have fallen victim to an assassins bullet and once again the person holding this high office is stirring conflicting passions.  The gun in private hands is more common in America than any other part of the world.  The job of protecting the president falls on the secret service.  The controversy about this president makes that task critical  !

A Sad Story !

A prison is not supposed to be a happy place, but there is the expectation that inmates will serve their sentence and be released back into the community alive.   When a prisoner dies in the hands of correctional staff the inquest will delve deeply into how that death occurred.  Just such as inquest is revealing how a prisoner with psychotic tendencies was handled when staff needed to move him - against his will - to a cell where installed video cameras could monitor his health.

That man was a twenty-six year old Aboriginal who was housed in the prison hospital at Sydney's Long Bay prison on December 29, 2015.   He was serving a six and a half year sentence for robbery in company with wounding, aggravated sexual intercourse and assault occasioning actual bodily harm.   He suffered from Diabetes and was on anti psychotic medicine and was uncooperative with staff.

The prison authorities decided that the move was necessary and a team of six officers from the immediate action team rushed into cell Cell 71 just after 2-42 pm.   They pinned the prisoner down on his bed and later - on the floor and he was heard to complain that " he could not breathe ".  He was carried down the corridor and placed in Cell 77, which had video surveillance.

This move was recorded on a hand held video camera and audio captured repeated complaint that " he could not breathe " and one of the guards remarked " if you can talk, you can breathe ".  Moments later he was unresponsive.

An emergency physician expert was highly critical of the CPR given before paramedics arrived at the prison and in particular Justice Health staff failed to provide consistent cardiac massage and ventilation.  As a result, efforts to revive the prisoner were " effectively without value :" and  " incompatible with survival ".

The inquest heard that the an autopsy report listed the prisoner's death as " unascertained "  and later Corrective Services made a number of changes to inform staff about the risk of positional asphyxia when restraining inmates.

Like so many inquests into " death in custody " this one is unlikely to deliver a clear finding.  It seems that the prisoner suffered cardiac arrest as a result of being restrained in the prone position by the IAT members.  By their very nature, prisons are places where uncooperative people are housed and force is often required to achieve compliance with the rules that apply.

This death might have been prevented had CPR been given more affectively but that would be impossible to determine without doubt.   The officers were simply performing their duties and that had an unfortunate outcome.  The relatives of the deceased are unlikely to be satisfied with such a finding.

Fortunately, the vast majority of people sentenced to prison serve their sentences without incident and return to society unscathed.  We can only hope that every inquest into a prison death results in rule changes that improve the chances of prison survival.  Realists will accept that they can never be completely eliminated.

A Lower Voting Age !

Older Australians may remember when the " age of maturity " was set at twenty-one.  For most young people, that was the legal age that allowed them free entry into pubs and the right to consume alcohol but it also was the age that they emerged from the strict control of their parents.  Both genders required parental permission to marry before that age.

All that changed in 1974 and that was primarily because of the Vietnam war.  Australia had conscription and at age eighteen all young medically fit men were required to be entered in a lottery in which a portion were required to undertake military service.   It seemed incongruous that an eighteen year old should be compulsorily required to wear a uniform, be handed a gun and sent to fight a foreign war, and yet not be entitled to drink alcohol, marry or have a vote on the legislation that required him to undertake that duty.


The law was changed and the age of maturity was lowered to eighteen., and along with access to alcohol that change included the requirement that eighteen year olds would be legally required to cast a vote in all Federal, state and council elections.  Eighteen became the age when young people could legally sign off on all manner of legal documents and become fully liable for the obligations such contracts empowered.

Constitutional law experts are now arguing that the voting age should be lowered to sixteen.  It is not suggested that all sixteen year old citizens should automatically get the vote, but that should be granted on a voluntary basis for those who choose to apply.  Proponents of change argue that people under eighteen can leave school, get a job, pay taxes, become a parent and join the Australian defence forces, but are denied a say in the laws they are required to obey.

Such a law change could have unexpected consequences.  If a person is granted the vote at age sixteen, they would automatically have the right to be elected to parliament at that age.  Would a sixteen year old seated in the lower house or as a Senator in the Senate have the maturity to decide the legislation that is decided in those chambers ?

Some would argue that those younger than eighteen have scant knowledge of the parliamentary process, but that also applies to many older folk that the law requires to cast a vote on election days.  The vote is a constitutional mandate rather than a test of intelligence. That vote is still required of those who lack the ability to sign their own name and sign documents by simply " making their mark "

This is a matter that all the political parties will approach with caution.  There is already a lobby agitating for the compulsory vote to be to be made optional, as is the custom in most of the rest of the world.  Unfortunately, in some elections the decisive vote comes from such a small voting base that the outcome can not be considered the true intention of the electorate. This Australian vote is intended to ensure that the nation gets the government they deserve by making electing it to office compulsory.

It certainly sounds reasonable than if a person younger than eighteen is sufficiently interested to go to the trouble to apply to be registered on the voting roll that should be a valid reason for that request to be granted.  Simply  lowering the voting age could bring a backlash that extends the work of the Electoral Commission in following up on voters who failed to record a vote on voting day.

The Need for Communication !

It is a long time since Australia faced the threat of invasion.  The last time was in 1942 when Japan entered the second world war with a sneak attack on the American Pacific fleet at Pearl Harbour and its military might conquered British, French and Dutch Pacific colonies and invaded our nearest neighbour, New Guinea.

At that wars end we were in the nuclear age and that delivered a mixed blessing.  The great powers have kept their finger off the Atomic button because a nuclear war would deliver Armageddon.  Wars are now proxy affairs, but a new way of war has evolved and to that we are very vulnerable.

The age of the computer brought with it the age of automation. A single computer could do the work of hundreds of clerks.  Over decades it has infiltrated every aspect of production and service across all industrial segments.  There is hardly a factory producing consumer goods that does not rely on a computer somewhere in the production process and this is particularly relevant in the electric power industry, banking and finance sector, transport and communications. A computer glitch can bring all of these to a grinding halt.

Unfortunately, skilled hackers can penetrate even the most secure system and the way is open for countries to bring an enemies economy to a standstill by industrial sabotage.  The blame can be sheeted home to terrorists hiding on their soil and they can claim innocence.  The damage done could be catastrophic with massive power blackouts, communications cut and banks and supermarkets forced to close.  Petrol supples would grind to a halt and public transport would cease without electric power.

Australia is now putting in place measures to reduce this risk.  Critical infrastructure protection will require the operators of electricity generation, petrol storage and delivery, ports, railway systems and the banking industry to supply detailed information on who owns, has access and controls the infrastructure and its systems.  Ministerial intervention powers will apply and the government will be looking at the source of supply for components which may be subject to interference by an outside body.

One of the problems of such an attack would be the communications blackout. The failure of the electricity supply would automatically close down radio and television transmissions and knock out both the landline and mobile phone networks.  The government would lose the ability to speak to the nation and  direct effort where it was needed.

We have in place a communications format which reaches into every far corner of this country.  It is ABC radio and the government would do well to see that every ABC transmitter has backup generator power and a secure form of relaying messages from a central point.  The public should be warned that in the event of a national emergency they should turn to the ABC for information and advice.

Without electricity, mobile phone will soon lose power and can not be recharged, but there is another massive battery source of reception available - and that is the motor vehicle.  Very few Australian families lack a car and every modern car has a radio.   The car battery will be long lasting to power that communication source and in an emergency situation the family car would be the unfailing contact between the government and the people.

That should become an integral part of this safety programme.

Recalibrating University Degrees.

A university degree is fast becoming an expensive trap for many young people.  The problem is the matter learned is more applicable to the workplace needs of Australia fifty years ago than it fits in to the world of today. That now applies to a smaller number of professions and in the wider workforce that degree no longer guarantees both a job and an above average income.

The problem is that the market place has changed - and the university thinking hasn't.  It is still geared to a four year grind with a degree at the outcome.  In that four years so many industries have so progressed that what has been learned is now out of date.  This learning process is fast becoming a learning evolution that progresses over a lifetime.

Fortunately, university thinking is changing.  The need for relevance has senior university people considering " bite size " degrees with the option of students returning to university on a regular basis to expand their knowledge in tune with what is happening in the market place.

One of the outcomes that need to be addressed is cost.   The present system is delivering degrees with the student saddled with a bill that can run to a hundred thousand dollars, to be repaid when his or her earnings reach an agreed level.  We are seeing an appalling " drop out " epidemic which at some universities can reach very near fifty-percent of those sitting some courses.   That bill still applies and we are seeing an ever increasing number of Australians with no degree - and no job.

University study needs to be within the financial grasp of the masses and that probably means  a wider number of online students in relation to those earning their degree in the " hallowed halls ".  In fact, the future probably involves a mix of online learning and practical sessions where a physical presentation aids understanding.  Demonstration can be a big part of this learning mix.

This change of direction will deeply affect the outlook of the universities.  The intent will be to equip students with sufficient knowledge to make them both interesting and rewarding to employ by prospective industry employers and to progressively increase that knowledge by returning to university to study the latest industry progression as it is happening.  University tutors and lecturers will need to be keeping abreast of this progress as it happens.

In particular, universities will need to keep abreast of where job opportunities are heading. In the world of computer engineering for a long time the progress was in chip technology where fitting ever smaller function ability was the aim.  Today there is a shortage of coders who bring advancing systems into use by making algorithms function to produce output.  That would be an area of learning that would produce job outcomes.

Fortunately, the universities are not resisting change.  Relevance is a modern world is ever changing and the problems of both cost and outcome need to be addressed.  The university of the future will most likely combine the needs of both students and industry.

Resistance to " Change " !

A meeting held by angry residents protesting about a proposed " development " in their suburb is now a common sight in Sydney.  The push is underway to fit the inevitable expansion of over a million more residents into this city and the people already here are resistant to change.

The suburbs feeling the most pressure are those served by both our expanded road system and rail improvements.  It has been made clear that these transport hubs will have to expand living density because the city can not ever expand outwards.   The most economical option is to adopt the " vertical village " culture and expand the numbers on each hectare of land with high rise towers.

The latest suburb to experience what they see as a threat to their way of living are the residents of Lindfield on the north shore.  The local ordinance at present limits developments to a maximum height of eight stories, but an existing 1.3 hectare parking lot in the middle of the suburb has excited developers who envisage the creation of a " town hub " which would contain supermarkets, eateries, shops, open spaces and even a town library.

The sticking point is the prospect of that height limit being raised - and the new height proposal is for seventeen stories.  Lindfield residents are trying to gain the support of nearby suburbs Gordon, Turramurra and St Ives because they will eventually have similar problems

.   It is evident that the leafy north shore has service facilities such as water, power and sewers already in place to facilitate a greater service load and the economics of upward expansion are compelling.

A seventeen story building is not a " skyscraper ".  In todays world it is a modest structure compared to what is being built in world capitals and it makes sense to concentrate our population where transport access can serve their needs.  That old concept of each family living in a free standing home on a quarter acre block of land has become a very expensive option which is ever shrinking within the inner city.

The fight to stop change is really a NINBY reaction.  Most reasonable people accept that living ratios have to become more condensed, just so long as that happens somewhere else and doesn't change the culture of where they live. The pressure becomes intense on local councillors to resist change and that issue usually becomes political.

Inevitably, councils will lose the option of applying floor ratios and height restrictions within their municipalities.  That would seem the only way that living densities can be geared to the provision of transport routes on a city wide basis.  Whether the battle in Lindfield is won or lost, eventually change will overcome those areas where logic dictates  that increased living densities are essential.

Tax Mutiny !

On July first the ten percent Goods and Services tax became payable on online sales of all items of any value and not just on purchases that had a value in excess of a thousand dollars.  Our bricks and mortar shops have long complained that freedom from the GST has seriously disadvantaged them by giving online traders a significant price advantage.

The two big American online trading houses - Amazon and eBay - have reluctantly applied the tax but the situation is unclear with many of the smaller traders dealing on the Australian market. In most cases their literature mentions the tax but the price of the goods remains unchanged, leaving the tax status in doubt.  There is no mechanism in our tax system to allow the customer receiving the goods to independently pay the Goods and Services tax.

It seems that the Australian tax office now has the task of implementing a means of gathering those GST payments from the plethora of individual companies trading to Australian customers.  That will not be a problem with the bigger outfits like Marks and Spencer and ASOS because they can be hit with a seventy-five percent legal penalty for not applying the GST, but that would not be a practical approach to the sole traders who are tiny and control a big slice of the online trade.

It is estimated that applying the GST to all online trades would gather at least $500 million a year to the tax office.  The problem is that putting together a tax net to catch goods coming into the country with the GST unpaid could easily exceed that sum and would be a bureaucratic nightmare.

One of the attractions of online shopping is the ease of doing business.   You select the goods and pay for them with a credit card, and they are delivered to your door by either the post office or a specialist home delivery firm.  All such deliveries pass through our customs barrier where they may be checked to ensure they do not contain narcotics.

That seems to deliver the logical control point to ensure that the GST has been paid.  Firms that have a tax arrangement in place with Australia and charge the GST and remit that tax to the Australian tax office should be permitted to affix a clearance stamp to their goods which allows deliveries unhindered passaged to the end customer.

Goods that lacked that clearance stamp would need the value stamped on the package - and the GST would need to be paid before delivery.  Either the customer would need to collect it - and pay the tax - at the post office, or this would become a task of the delivery firm.  Obviously, that would attract a handling fee in addition to the GST to be paid.

The onus is then placed on the firm offering the goods to ensure that the tax has been paid to allow fast delivery directly to the end customer.  Goods that have not been tax cleared suffer a delivery delay and the tax collected before proceeding, and probably an extra handling charge for that service - and that is a very good reason for the supplier to arrange compliance if they hope to remain in business.

What we are seeing at present is a tax mutiny by small traders.  They feel remote from the Australian tax office and many will simply ignore that tax.  Stopping delivery at the customs barrier is the obvious answer.

This " Brexit " Mess !

The fact that the senior minister tasked with heading the withdrawal of the United Kingdom from the European Union  has walked away from that task must send urgent warning signals that a harmonious breach next year is now unlikely.  The parliament is split along similar lines to the referendum that narrowly opted for Britain to take an independent course away from the " closer union " movement that was embracing the continent.

The only two options seems to be a split between a " soft " or a " hard " exit.  It seems prime minister Therese May has reconciled her parliamentary colleagues into accepting a soft stance, but that would not be acceptable to the other members of the British public because it would still leave Britain accepting free movement within the union and subservience to the European court of justice.

The impetus for that referendum was a movement to shield Britain from the influx of people from Europe choosing to live in their country and to make British law paramount and not subjected to the laws of those other countries in the EU.   That referendum was more a wish to return to the golden age when Britain had an empire than a practical decision on the world that exists today.

The reality is that the world has split into trading blocks and Britain is locked in the European sphere. That was the original idea of creating a " common market " without barriers to trade imposed by tariffs and the restrictions of custom inspections at national borders.  The long term aim is Europe without passports or any form of travel restriction.  Common laws that apply in all countries and those nation states becoming the United States of Europe.

One of the problems is that the British people have never thought of themselves as " European ".  Their country was unique in heading a massive empire and maintaining the worlds biggest navy and that conferred independent status.  It helped that during that period of empire Britain was never defeated in a war and suffered occupation by a victorious enemy.  By drawing help from its dominions it emerged as the victor from wars and for a long time literally " ruled the world ".

That era is long past and again world leadership is in crux. Britain remains one of the five nations with nuclear weapons and a permanent seat on the security council of the United Nations, but it is no longer the dominant world power. Its withdrawal from the European Union will certainly come at a cost in terms of trade and the important dominance in financial markets.  It is wishful thinking that all the benefits of membership will remain after withdrawal in 2019.

Britain is at a crossroads and only now can the cost of withdrawal from the EU be fully estimated. The government will shortly need to put its proposal to a vote by the other EU members and that will be crucial to the standard of living that will be the eventual outcome.  It would be fair to send the people to the polls for an affirmation that this is what they are accepting in confirming the vote from that earlier referendum.

This EU withdrawal decision will deliver the standard of living that will affect every man, woman and child living in the United Kingdom.  It is a human trait that people often change their mind when circumstances alter, and the end result was not known when that earlier referendum was held.  Putting it to a new vote would seem a merciful act of sanity !

Facebook Peril !

The age of the computer is said to be the " communication age " and the public certainly embraced public information channels like Facebook and Twitter.  Some reveal embarrassing details of their personal lives and it is not uncommon for insults to be exchanged.  So far that seems to be mostly legally unchallenged in " free speech "  Australia.

What you post on Facebook appears to a world audience and some people are finding that it comes back to haunt them when they holiday overseas.  Not all countries are as tolerant as Australia and comments that are acceptable in this country can get you a prison sentence elsewhere.

Just that happened to a woman from Lebanon who was holidaying in Egypt.  Apparently she was harassed by two men in a Cairo street in an upmarket neighbourhood and suffered ill treatment by a taxi driver.  That caused her to let loose a diatribe in which she called Egyptian president Abdul -Fattah El-Sissi unjust and Egypt a " son of a bitch country ".

Those remarks on Facebook brought arrest and she found herself charged with having  " deliberately broadcast false rumours which aim to undermine society and attack religion. "   The judge handed her an eleven year prison sentence, reduced to eight years the next day on appeal.   Egypt is one of many countries that take any form of criticism seriously and have draconian laws in place.  In Thailand the king is revered and even criticising his dog can bring a prison sentence.

Travellers returning from an overseas holiday and reporting their experiences on Facebook need to use caution.  What they say is on the public record, and if they return to that country years later it may bring retribution.

There is not a lot that Australian consular services can do to help if you get into trouble overseas. Local law must run its course and in some cases the tourist may have unwittingly intruded into a political issue or comments may be misconstrued as support for a local insurgency.  We would be wise to steer well clear of religious issues when we travel abroad.

That woman in Egypt facers an uncertain future.  Tourism has lagged because of unrest following revolution in that country and the Egyptian government may commute her sentence to avoid bad publicity, but she may have to serve her time in an Egyptian prison if they choose not to intervene.  A lot would depend on how strong her home country's trade relations influence the Egyptian authorities.

We would be wise to remember that we are guests in someone elses country when we travel overseas - and act accordingly.  Reporting what we see as truthful comment can easily earn us a savage prison sentence from which there is little chance of relief.

A Human Tragedy !

The shocking news that a father methodically planned the execution of his two teenage children has reignited the gun debate.  The fact that he carried out the killing with two legally owned hand guns will throw attention on the licensing process that allowed this to happen.  Unfortunately, it seems that this father was both a cunning and vengeful man and he took the best part of a year to bring his plan to fruition.  The motive seems to be a custody battle.

Love and hate are separated by a thin line in the human psyche.  When attachments sour the dividing of assets causes friction and children of that relationship are often central to claims of dispossession.  In this instance, the family sought to keep their home address from their estranged father and they lived with an element of fear.  This is a situation all too common in our society.

The outcome of this murder will be a tightening of the law on hand gun licensing.  That will be welcome but if it prevents law abiding people having access to shooting clubs it will not stop future murders of this kind.  The underworld is rife with smuggled hand guns and anyone with money will always be able to access such a firearm, and those who experience difficulty will simply use a different type of weapon.

The creation of the family court was supposed to bring in " no fault " divorce and remove the friction of ending relationships.  The aim of the court was a fair division of assets and to safeguard the best interests of any children of that union.  Unfortunately, that depended on the people involved being sane and fair minded.  Many are far from rational and in some mindsets a spouse if regarded as " property " with a consequent lack of freewill.  If the matrimonial breach lacks the agreement of the other party stalking and violence are common.

We have AVO's to separate the combatants, and they are rarely worth the paper they are written on. A big part of the work inflicted on police revolves around domestic disputes and the courts can deliver incarceration for persistent offenders, but fortunately murder is an uncommon extremity.  No doubt the coroner's enquiry will uncover aspects of these child murders where this outcome should have been apparent to trained eyes but it is also evident that the perpetrator was a respected executive  and the family kept to themselves.  Too often tragedy is hidden away well out of sight and only becomes public when it bursts onto media headlines.

A thoughtful re-examination of gun licensing laws would be welcome, but help in settling dangerous situations would be more practical.  Where a vengeful person is deemed a continuing danger the removal of those in danger to another state and with a new identity would be a necessity.  It would take the coordination of government agencies to make that happen.

Harsher gun laws would be a knee jerk reaction. It would be unlikely to prevent this type of crime.

Understanding Opression Tendencies !

Nearly half a century ago a psychology experiment at Stanford University in California  revealed the dark side of the human psyche.  It has long held a leading place in trying to understand why healthy, normal, rational people can turn into monsters when power is delivered into their hands.

A professor of psychology persuaded twenty-four of his students to undertake an experiment during the holidays for which they would be paid.   They were randomly separated into two groups, one of which would play the role of prisoners while the other would be guards.   A mock prison was constructed in the basement of the Stanford psychology department.

The experiment was timed for a period of two weeks but was cut short just six days later.  The professor was horrified to discover signs of mental breakdown from stress in some of those acting as prisoners and it quickly became evident that some of the guards were showing a tendency to sadism. This play acting has long been described as the most notorious experiment in the field of human psychology.

The thesis that power results in oppression has often been cited to explain why relations between guards and prisoners in the worlds jail systems often leads to riots and breakouts.  It has been used to explain the extraordinary conduct of American service personnel who were tasked to interrogate detainees in Abu Ghraib prison in Iraq.   Simply putting on a uniform delivers power and with it the opportunity to oppress.

Now the findings of that Stanford experiment have been challenged by another psychology professor at the university of Queensland.  There was an assumption that it showed willingness to oppress others simply by putting on a prison guards uniform. New evidence showed that some guards actually resisted these goals and were cajoled by the experimenters into enacting them.   The outcome suggests that individuals would be heavily influenced by the group attitude that was prevailing at the time they commenced their duties.

It could also explain why decent, ordinary soldiers rostered for duty in concentration camps during the second world war succumbed to the absolute inhumanity ordered by their superiors.  This form of collective brutality manifests itself across a broad range of power spectrums.   It could explain why some police forces are out of control in their policing methods, and it certainly sheds a light on why many prisons are at the point of mutiny.

In the Stanford experiment, the briefing to the " guards " was enlightening.  They were told " You can create in the prisoners feelings of boredom, a sense of fear to some degree.  You can create a notion of arbitrariness that their life is totally controlled by us, by the system - and they have no privacy   They have no freedom of action, they can do nothing and say nothing that we don't permit.  You are going to take away their individuality in various ways.  In general, what all this leads to is a sense of powerlessness . "

Perhaps that past failed experiment needs a re-evaluation.  Wherever power is placed in human hands the strength of the most powerful personalities manifests itself.   It seems obvious that when the commanding authority fails to carefully select the core group which will dominate the actions of others this sort of problem will inevitably occur.

What that Stanford project made clear is that result is not inevitable.

A " Privacy " Issue !

Have you ever wondered if your family history may have included a convict transported to Australia when the First Fleet arrived ?    That used to be a matter of shame to be scrupulously avoided but in todays more open world many people are curios about their ancestry and the tools are available to make detailed searches.

It can be exciting to find a convict lurking in the distant past and many organizations can help with that search.  They need to known details of your parents and grandparents on both sides of the family and they usually also ask for a DNA sample.  That can be as simple as spitting into a specimen jar.

In the last few decades DNA research has increased in great leaps and bounds.  Every few months it makes unprecedented progress.   We are fast reaching the stage when the presence of a suspect at a crime scene can be detected without finding an actual fingerprint.  The air we breathe can transfer our DNA to where it can be recognised by the ever improving detection apparatus.

This march of progress is being headed by law enforcement.  DNA analysis is a vital tool of police forensics and many a case has been solved by extracting DNA from a discarded cigarette butt or from a drink can.  Law enforcement is using ever widening methods of accessing the gene pool to narrow the search for offenders and this is fast becoming a privacy issue.

That raises the issue of DNA samples we have willingly provided to medical organizations and to the various researchers who track our ancestry records.  The DNA search engines are fast reaching the stage where the DNA of a suspect can be cross matched to that of a member of his or her family - if the DNA of another family member is on record somewhere.

That is a chilling thought. Many a very respectable family has a " black sheep " that rarely gets a mention in polite conversation.   They dread the day a conviction may lead to lurid newspaper or other media stories which highlights their association.  The police use of DNA technology is ever widening and the use of the genetic database is sought by Interpol.  It is now quite possible to link a criminal operating abroad with the data from a family living in another country.

This increasing research may soon make it possible for a criminal to be positively identified simply by cross matching his or her DNA to other family members.  As the need for DNA samples widens for medical reasons and for ancestry research the DNA pool records widen exponentially.  We may have supplied a sample without our knowledge.

We may have passed the point of no return.  If even a distant member of our family is on DNA record that may be sufficient to start the researchers looking in our direction.  It is impossible to determine just what heights DNA analysis may reach in the years ahead.  Our identity may be instantly available from a common data base by mid century.

Seal of the Confessional !

For the first time a priest of the Roman Catholic Church has been convicted of the crime of  failing to report child sex allegations learned from a fellow priest making his confession as required of those following the Catholic creed.   The law of New South Wales comes into conflict with what the Catholic church claims is the seal of the confessional.

In the Newcastle local court, Magistrate Robert Stone found Adelaide Archbishop Philip Wilson guilty of concealing a child sex crime and sentenced him to twelve months prison.  Wilson has signalled that he will appeal this verdict and he has declined to  resign from the priesthood, nor has the Roman Catholic church asked for his resignation.

In the eyes of the law, Archbishop Wilson is now a convicted criminal.  It seems impossible that the Pope can simply ignore that situation and allow him to remain as Archbishop of Adelaide. That would be seen by many as sheer Catholic arrogance.   The church has an appalling record of priests defiling children and covering that crime by simply moving the offender to a different parish.

The crux of this matter is the convention held by the Catholic church that confession to a priest is where the priest is standing in as an intermediary for God and it is God who forgives the confessed sin.  Over centuries, the church has clamed to be above the law of the land in which it serves and we now have a legal ruling that this interpretation is not valid in New South Wales.

A new convention is in place.  Any priest who fails to report knowledge of child sex abuse puts himself at risk - of conviction and prison.  It seems that this reporting requirement applies exclusively to child sex crimes. and leaves the matter of murders unresolved.  That probably awaits a decision to be made in another court at another time, but this child sex verdict overturns the professed seal of the confessional.

A vexing decision for any priest and an agonising situation for Rome.  If Rome orders priests to maintain silence it comes into conflict with civil authority and condemns priests to martyrdom. Perhaps the answer to this problem is already apparent in the rules that apply when any form of civil crime is being investigated.

A suspect is made aware of his or her rights - and obligations.  That legal precursor is necessary before that person is interviewed and it would seem prudent for priests to make it clear that should a child crime be confessed to him during that persons confession he is obliged by law - and will obey that law - by discharging that obligation to the authorities.

By making that standard clear before confession the onus is clearly back in the hands of the perpetrator.  The priest is obeying the obligations of the land in which he resides and the person making confession is aware of what limits apply.

Archbishop Wilson is sixty-seven years old.  He certainly has the legal right to appeal and follow the course of the law and he has stated that should the appeal fail he will resign.  Obviously, the church would be wise to accept that resignation if it happens and a rational warning of the limits that apply in confessions should resolve this confrontation between church and state.

The Credit Card Trap !

According to the Australian Securities and Investment Commission ( ASIC ) a vast number of people should not have a credit card because they do not have the ability to safely manage their money.  A major credit review has delivered the sad news that over two million Australians - and that is 18.5% of the population - is stuck in a fifty billion dollar debt cycle.

This ASIC review is disheartening.  It disclosed the problematic litany of credit card holders who are in arrears on their repayments and who never manage to pay off their outstanding debt.  This is debt they would never have accrued if they had needed to put cash on the counter to obtain the goods and that magic credit card is regarded as a " money tree ".    We all wish we had one of those growing in our garden.

In all started in 1974 when the Australian banks launched Bankcard.  Before that the more wealthy had access to store credit cards, but " ordinary " people obtained major items by the use of hire purchase agreements, or the " never never " as it was known.  Bankcards arrived through the mail and Australians discovered the joy and ease of the " buy now - pay later " society.  Bankcard was only acceptable within Australia and it was eventually replaced with credit cards applicable internationally.

A credit card account is an expensive way to borrow money.  The interest rate is usually above twenty-percent and in the quest for volume some cards are offering to transport unpaid balances into new accounts with an interest free period of years to apply.  If that balance is unpaid after that interest free period, draconian interest levels come into force.

ASIC  is clamping down and will force credit lenders to reform their acceptance of new clients.  The will need to assess their customers ability to repay when setting credit limits and apply new guidelines to determine that the card holder is able to repay credit card debt within a reasonable period.   One of the known money traps is people holding several credit cards and trying to balance repayments on overall unsustainable debt.

This concentration on ability to pay will put existing customers under pressure.  Many will find their credit limit reduced and eventually those who handle credit responsibly may find interest rates lowered as unrecoverable debt write-offs are reduced.   The majority of people who handle credit responsibly are paying for credit insolvency.

It is simply a fact of life that not all people are emotionally able to manage their money and putting a credit card in their hands leads to disaster.  It is up to the issuer to determine that risk and set both acceptance and limits accordingly.

A New " Ageing Disease " !

The primary nemesis of the aged care industry is fall prevention.  Otherwise healthy people who have a fall often break bones and the older we get the slower the healing process.  Many elderly citizens suffer from osteoporosis in which the bones lack calcium and become brittle.  A fall can have a serious effect on that persons confidence and ability to maintain an active life in a care facility.

Now we are becoming aware of a new disease which is being termed sarcopenia, coined from the Greek words for " flesh " and " loss ".  It was discovered by American scientist Irwin Rosenberg in the 1980's but has not yet been recognised on the formal list of diseases known as the International Statistical Classification of Diseases and Related Health Problems.  It is expected to achieve listing about this time next year.

As a consequence, it is not a subject taught in Australian medical schools and consequently it is fairly unknown by most general practitioners and specialists, and yet some researchers believe that it may be as common as osteoporosis is in the aged community.  Perhaps as prevalent as appearing in forty percent of those aged over sixty-five.

Sarcopenia is defined as the loss of muscle mass and strength. Those suffering from it frequently walk slowly and are prone to falls.  When they attempt to arise from a chair they have a tendency to fall backwards if the seating is too low and these limitations tend to lose them confidence.  One of the known characteristics is an inability to climb or descend stairs.

There are treatments believed to be affective in both preventing and reversing  sarcopenia.  These include resistance exercise, vitamin D supplicant and increased protein in the diet.  Many aged care centres have a daily programme of exercises to prevent muscle loss but these are voluntary and many people opt out.  It is a constant battle to encourage activities which prevent age deterioration, and at the same time deliver the freedom of choice which is so important in age care.

We have an ageing population and this is a growth industry predicted to become huge in the latter half of this twenty first century. Falls that result in broken bones are often the issue that sees patient needs change from a place in an active aged care facility, to a bed in a nursing home.  If we can prevent the onset of sarcopenia it can have a dramatic effect on health care costs and deliver a better and freer style of living to many in active aged care.

It is important that Sarcopenia be added to that important list of aged ailments and treated alongside osteoporosis as these appear to be relatively tandem diseases. A relatively small change in lifestyle is capable of delivering a huge improvement in life quality for the aged !

Medical Competition !

The Royal Australian College of General Practitioners has issued a warning against the " health checks " being offered by several chains of competing chemists.   The Pharmaceutical industry is conducting various " walk in " consultations at which the state of the patients heart, cholesterol level, weight and susceptibility to stroke are measured and this either involves a small charge or the check is chargeable to Medicare.

The RACGP is adamant that healthcare needs revolve around a GP  understanding these health needs and monitoring them over time. Doctors are generally very protective of their role in the health system and many see this service as active competition.  It raises the question of whether the chemists are offering checks to provide a genuine consultative service, or hoping to sell goods to those enticed into the shop.

Back in the 1980's a medical group setup what seemed to many to be a very innovative approach to medical health. Patients passed through the hands of what seemed to be like an assembly line of medical people.  It was all done in a single session in the one location and the results were mailed to the patients nominated General Practitioner.  The aim was a pro-active medical check across the entire body, including sight and all the various pathology tests that disclose underlying health problems.

This was sharply criticised by many doctors as conducting unnecessary tests and imposing a cost on the health system.  It was initially very popular but interest waned and it eventually shut its doors.  The serviced offered in chemist shops seems to be a new approach to draw medical dangers to the attention of those people who are not regularly attended by a medical professional.

In the distant past it was common for GP's to setup in sole practice, have a restricted number of patients and make house calls. Today they are more likely to group together in a clinic for economic reasons.  These clinics are more prevalent in affluent areas and it is becoming hard to access a GP in many low income and country areas.

There is every reason that the work of GP's and chemists should be complimentary. A vast number of people rarely consult a doctor but regularly visit a chemist.  This presents an opportunity to determine underlying ailments from the relief sought. Chemists enjoy wide public trust and they are in an ideal position to steer patients to seek treatment from a GP.  What seems to be in contention here is whether the chemist industry is seeking to intercede in the treatment process !

Where " POT " Is Legal !

California would certainly have been the place to be for recreational pot smokers when July 1 rolled in. New laws came into effect on that day and a law upgrade ended a six month moratorium of legal marijuana being replaced by a stricter quality regimen that required the product to be free of pesticides and microbiological contamination, packed in child proof packaging and tested for potency.

For days, the marijuana industry has been heavily discounting old stock at reduced prices to stay within the law.  It will be interesting to see how much trickled over the border into surrounding states where pot is still illegal and possession can result in a prison term.  Legality has certainly put the street pushers in California out of business.

The interesting question concerns how taxation will affect marihuana distribution.  The tax rate is forty percent on some products and legitimate vendors fear this may send customers back to the unlicensed dispensaries which number about 1300 in Los Angeles alone.  Just because the product is now legal it will not avoid the criminal fraternity who do their trade as a tax dodge.

What is even more interesting is the silence from Washington.  The biggest and most populace state in the United States has legalised marijuana - and the sky has not fallen !   In fact several smaller states have also taken the plunge, and to the north Canada has also granted the right to its people to smoke a joint for similar satisfaction gained from cigarettes and drinking alcohol.

It all seems to hark back to that old puritanical notion that any sort of pleasure - is a sin.  Probably the reason some of the churches had such a hard time dealing with the sex question.  People were supposed to be working hard and praising God.  Having fun in any form was definitely not on that agenda.

A long time ago the world hippie movement had discovered marijuana when addiction to heroin began to become a problem.  Marijuana got swept up in a drug panic and over decades the drug scene has advanced to various forms of narcotics with Cocaine and Oxy-Codeine heading the death toll.  It is claimed that marijuana is merely playing an introductory role in leading users to hard drugs.

In much of the world the majority of police anti drug activity is directed at the marijuana trade. At the same time, those caught with small quantities for personal use are usually released with a caution. The politicians thinking of legalising marijuana are terrified of being accused of being " soft on drugs " and avoid any involvement with a sensible solution.

Sadly, any hope of marijuana being legalized in Australia and providing a welcome tax dividend to the treasury seems unlikely in the near future !

Faulty Consumer Protection Law.

A case recently resolved between a major whitegoods and electronics manufacturer and the Australian Competition and Consumer Commission ( ACCC ) has delivered alarming news to those trying to get faulty goods refunded, repaired or replaced under warranty.

It seems that manufacturers are not obliged to make the terms that apply under warranties known to their customers.  At law, the onus is on the customer knowing his or her rights and it is not misleading for the goods manufacturer to withhold that information.

The law in Australia entitles the purchaser of faulty goods to three options.  Having them " repaired, replaced or refunded " with that choice the prerogative of the customer.  The law is also clear where that choicer should be exercised, and it is at the point of sale.  Many items carry information that faulty goods must be returned to the manufacturer - at the buyers expense.  Such goods might be sold on the international market and that advice does apply where no consumer protection laws are in place, but sales in Australia are governed by our consumer protection laws.

Most goods carry a twelve month warranty and most people think their protection ends when that period expires, but that is not so.  The ACCC will consider the reasonable working life of the item concerned and should it fail an unreasonably short time into that period the consumer is still entitled to exercise those " three R's " !

The ACCC reviewed claims for high priced television.  It is common for sales outlets to claim the item is out of warranty and offer a discount on a replacement, or offer repairs at a discounted price. Should a manufacturer refuse a consumers rightful claim that constitutes an offence that can carry a fine of $ 1.1 million for each contravention.

It is abundantly clear that there is a vast difference between low and high priced goods.  Returning a faulty toaster to the point of sale is usually resolved amicably, but a high value item often encounters resistance and a consumer who is not aware of the law is at a disadvantage.  Often they accept a solution that costs them money when legally resolution should have been without that cost.

Consumer protection advocates have long been campaigning to have a listing of consumer rights summarised in the way of a public notice to be displayed at all points of sale.  This would require validation by an act of parliament, and so far this has not happened.

Perhaps the biggest item to be resolved under consumer protection laws is the automobile.  A new car is probably the most expensive purchase the average person makes in a lifetime after buying a home and yet it is less protected than a toaster or a jug.   It can spend endless time in the repair shop and  we have long awaited " lemon "  laws to mandate refund or replacement after a given repair period.

The politicians were reluctant to pass such a law when we had a local car manufacturing industry, but we are now customers to the world car industry and consumer protection should be paramount.  In the interim, the public are advised to make sure they know their rights when it comes to negotiating faulty goods.