Tippy Toeing Into The Minefield !

There is a huge disparity in what happens in the aftermath of life when it concerns those killed in war and their civilian counterparts.  In most western cities there are burial grounds that have long ago reached capacity and fallen into neglect.  That situation is causing thought of limited tenure so that constant reburial can renew cemeteries and make them capable of serving their communities.

War cemeteries are very different.  The graves of Australians killed in France during the first world war are meticulously honoured in well preserved graveyards that even today are constantly visited by people from overseas seeking the final resting place of their forebears.

The Australian War Graves Commission is similarly active in preserving and maintaining war graves from the second world war.  The American dead from that war who were killed in the Pacific theatre are buried in Hawaii and the rolling hills seem to go on forever.  The effort to maintain that massive cemetery is constant and the cost is rarely  questioned. The lives of young men who died defending their country deserve recognition in perpetuity.

It is often said that politicians find their remarks coming back to haunt them, and American president Donald Trump is accused of a slur on the American war dead when a weather event stopped his helicopter journey to a war grave several years ago.  It is alleged Trump said " Why do I need to visit a war grave ?  ".  "  The people buried there are losers - and suckers " !

Trump is just weeks away from an election which will decide if he serves another four years in the white house.   That remark will probably lose him the election, coming as it does after he disparaged a US Senator who survived torture during the Vietnam war when his aircraft was shot down and he served time in the notorious " Hanoi Hilton. "   Trump had little time for those captured by the enemy.

Considering that it is seventy-five years since the end of the second world war Trump probably feels the ranks of survivors is thin and his remark will not draw attention., but in todays conflicts both genders serve in the armed forces and today many still put their lives on the line at the behest of their country.

As a boy, Trump was partly educated in a military school but did not go on to serve in a military unit.  It is rare for anyone to serve the post of American president without the tenure of time in the armed services.  The fact that Trump is also ignoring the " Black lives matter " issue of police shooting unarmed black men in the streets while taking a " law and order " stance is distancing his presidency from a major section of the population.

Trump is suggesting that if he does not win it will be because the election had been rigged.  That includes the suggestion he might not recognise the result.  That is a very dangerous gamble  that might easily misfire.  His rallies have been low on support numbers and if the media are convinced he will lose, a surprise win might not be recognised by his opponent.

The way this election is shaping up, the final outcome may be decided by a vote in the American High Court  !

A Costly Mistake !

 Recently, an Australian woman returning from overseas received an unpleasant surprise when she passed through customs in Western Australia.  The elegant handbag she was carrying was challenged by an inspector on the grounds that it was made of alligator skin and that is an illegal import under the legislation to control Wild Fauna and Flora under CITIES legislation.  As a consequence, the bag was seized.

The woman bought the bag at a fashionable boutique in Paris and it seems that it carried the required  CITIES export permit that allowed it to pass outward through French customs, but the owner had not cleared it for import to Australia by seeking a CITIES import permit for this country.  Such a permit can be claimed after landing in Australia but this carries a $70 processing fee.

That alligator skin bag was valued by customs at $26,000 but apparently the owner was unaware of the protocol to clear it through customs and neglected to pay that seventy dollar fee - and the bag was subsequently destroyed.

It is unfortunate that high fashion in both America and Europe often features the skin of animals under threat of extinction because of the high value their skin brings in the world of fashion.  There is a ongoing battle between rangers tasked with protecting endangered species and the marauding gangs that draw their profits from supplying the fashion trade.

Australian travellers would be wise to know and understand exactly what is allowed - and what is not  allowed - to travel through customs here unchallenged.  Not all countries are signatories to CITIEs legislation and the goods on sale in shops offer no guarantee that they will pass through customs unchallenged. 

The hiatus on overseas travel caused by the coronavirus may have stopped a number of infectious agricultural diseases gaining a foothold in Australia.  The growing tendency to holiday off the beaten  track was taking Australians into close proximity to farming markets and those returning with uncleaned shoes risked bringing unwelcome contamination back with them.   We were being vigilant to contain a pig disease that has spread widely across Asia and has in many cases has resulted in almost complete herd reduction.

The flow of travellers through airports has long been the high risk factor for the introduction here of both plants and animals that may threaten our national diversity.  We are in the habit of returning with souvenirs of our trip abroad and if these take the form of seeds of any form of living matter it can set in motion change that can be catastrophic to the economy.  The customs regimen we have in place is designed top stop that happening.

The wise would be well advised to know the rules - and avoid incidents like that twenty six thousand dollar handbag being destroyed in a furnace because a seventy dollar fee went unpaid.

Keeping The Shops Open !

 That dreaded word " Recession " now applies to Australia and we are already encountering empty shops in our shopping centres. One in every three Australians rents the place they call home and presently they are protected from eviction if the lockdown is causing a rent shortfall.   That same protection applies to business rents, but the legislation will shortly expire.

Whether this recession deepens until it becomes a " Depression " will largely depend on the owners of business premises facing reality and lowering rents in accordance with the circumstances.  When the economy was robust, rents for shopping space was governed by demand and this delivered a bonanza for shopping space owners.  A surprising number of families earned their living from a range of small businesses tucked away on the fringe of shopping centres and scattered across the suburbs.

Many of these were only marginally profitable and their staffing was composed of casuals instead of permanent employees.  This was the start of the " gig " economy where many casuals had more than one job in which they provided service when needed as a " contractor ".  This led to the fiction that such people were " self employed ".

When we encountered a mini recession in 2008 many owners of business property were more inclined to shutter a shop than trim the rent to suit the circumstances.  This lockdown has depleted the savings of many families and when the recovery starts many will be more concerned with restoring their savings than following the previous lifestyle.  Life will be tough in the business world for the foreseeable future.

The length of this recession will depend primarily on the owners of business premises being realistic.  The business community simply can not support the rents that were charged in the boom years and for many small businesses this is fast becoming the " survival period ".  There is no doubt that the sight of empty shops in a shopping centre encourages shoppers to shut their wallets and reduce their spending habits.

Unfortunately, many owners of business premises locked their superannuation away in rental property in the expectation that rent would deliver their support income.  Just as the people who look to term deposit money held in banks are experiencing  income loss due to the lowering of interest rates, property owners need to be realistic.  The worst outcome is a closed shop and a complete cessation of the rental return.

Perhaps the biggest recovery danger will come from business premises rented out by large corporations who fear shareholders abandoning them if their dividends falter.  Decisions made in the dizzy heights of the boardroom often do not travel well when they are applied to the reality world where profit or loss depends on keeping the doors open.  The owner with a small property portfolio is much more likely to ne realistic when it comes to rents.

The incentive to be a business owner rarely wavers in the minds of many people, and the range of ways in which people earn their living is expansive.  It seems evident that many of the business chains that had premises in numerous shopping centres will not survive this downturn.  Recessions seem to be cyclical in the western world and it is a fact of life that those businesses which survive such downturns usually expand vigorously when the good times return.

If commonsense comes to the fore we will survive this recession !

The " Gang " Murder Scene !

 The " gang murder " business is alive and well in Sydney, but a trial presently in progress shows how the risk factor has increased in this electronic age.  The Supreme Court is hearing the prosecution of Fredon Laith Botrus who is accused of stabbing to death Alfredo Isho as  he sat in a barbers chair getting a haircut.

The evidence of how this murder proceeded sounded like the script for a movie.   In his opening address the prosecutor revealed that on the morning of the murder Mr Botrus received a text message on his phone that simply stated in Arabic, followed by an emoji of a man getting a haircut. " Yo brother. There's a dog at the hairdresser ".

Later, CCTV footage shows Mr Botrus leave the home he shares with his parents and siblings on a mini motorbike and heads towards that barber shop. He is wearing black pants, a blue hooded jumper and is wearing a face mask, and he was wearing an  O'Neal brand motorcycle helmet.  At 12.31 he entered through the rear door of the barber shop and demanded a haircut.

The barber told him to come by the front door, and moments later he again entered by the back door and stabbed Mr Isho near his right collar bone as he sat beneath a protective cape in the barber chair. He had been carrying a knife concealed in his sleeve and immediately after the stabbing he left the barber shop and fled on the mini bike.

It seems Mr Isho was unaware that he had been stabbed.  He walked outside the hairdresser's shop and made a phone call, but the wound had punctured a lung and severed an artery and he soon collapsed.  He died the next day in Liverpool hospital.

The time factor following this stabbing is illustrative.  The stabbing occurred just after 12.31 and at 12.42 Mr Botrus was home in his garage, disassembling the motorbike. He used pedal fans to cool the hot engine and shortly after two men arrived in a white Holden to take away both the murder weapon and distinctive parts of the motorcycle.

Later that afternoon Mr Botrus was stopped when in a car driven by his father and his phone was seized.  Police also obtained that blue hooded jumper and blood on it matched that of Mr Isho.  Mr Botrus has pleaded  not guilty.

It has become fairly obvious that gang murders are now part of the crime scene.   War between bikie gangs is now carried out openly on the streets and even the lesser gangs combine victim intelligence with a coordinated scenario of support to hide evidence and avoid guilt, but the ever widening of electronic componentry is giving the police an edge.

The use of firearms increases annually and this is where the public are most at risk.  Such killings often involve an ambush and a spray of bullets can involve innocent people.  In this case the weapon used was a knife, but it is a sobering thought that the need to have a regular haircut can involve the unwary in a murder scene in this age of drugs and the gangs that profit from drug activities !

Opportunuity " Knocks " !

It would be hard to think of Sydney without that iconic opera house dominating the ferry terminal at Circular Quay, but originally the land beneath it was a parking lot for the city's original tram fleet. When the decision was made to build an opera house the design was thrown open to world minds - and what we got is a building that gains immediate recognition across the entire world.

Sydney is Australia's best known city and world audiences remember our harbour bridge, the Opera House - and the new year fireworks celebrations.  Now we are about to spend  three hundred million dollars on an upgrade of the ferry terminal and it looks like the design will be restricted to the ideas of government architects working under the instructions of our politicians.

That is something that should be open to world competition.  We are lucky to have one of the world's most magnificent harbours and that ferry terminal at Circular Quay is the focal point of vast crowds travelling to and from work on harbour ferries.  There is no doubt that ferry travel is more romantic than being crammed in trains or buses over inland routes.

Those ferry wharves have been unchanged for a long period of time, and they are looking very dowdy. Many people think the city centre was diminished when the Cahill Expressway was imposed across the building overlooking the harbour.  This upgrade of the ferry terminal presents an ideal opportunity for this major feature of the city to undergo a complete change.  It should be an opportunity for the world's best minds to think freely and work outside the proverbial " nine dots "  !

The problem with restricting change to government architects is that commercial interests come to the fore.  Powerful people seek to resist change in case it affects their property ownership and we are unlikely to get the best result unless all such restrictions are set aside.  This is an opportunity to present Sydney as a world  city - and Circular Quay as a new " wonder of the world ".

One of the problems of the proposed development is that already many possible innovations are being ruled out.  No permanent living accommodation will be permitted in the new design and yet such a decision should be made after the winning design is selected rather than imposing limitations before the opportunities offering are fully explored.

Perhaps the main reason this development is not being thrown open to world minds is fear of the cost of what might emerge.  The plan for the Opera House was so outstanding that it just had to be built, and yet the final cost was unknown.  Creating a building different from anything that had previously been even thought of created immense challenges.  The builders were pushed to the limit, and the outcome was something that astonished the world.

A similar opportunity exists with this Circular Quay redevelopment.  It is an opportunity to " think big " and open the project to a world audience.  But it seems there is a tendency to " think small " and avoid the risk factor.  It is about time the same thinking that created the Opera House was allowed to prevail !

The " Sexual " Revolution !

 The sexual harassment scandal within AMP has seen the share price drop to an abysmal low and a  flurry of highly paid executives offer their resignation.  Amazingly, a leading London barrister with " QC " after his name was engaged to determine the extent of what is regarded as a " social offence " and the woman who received this unwelcome attention has also left the firm.

This simply illustrates the hazard attractive women face in the workplace. When  a man is the gatekeeper for advancement up the corporate ladder and a fatter pay packet, demand for sex is all too often the price women have to pay and that exists in all levels within most company structures.  New employees often get a  subtle warning to " watch out " because the boss has a roving eye.

In this instance, the woman obviously had talent to the extent that she was included in a work mission abroad and that barrister graded the sexual approaches made in the range from " modest " to " serious ". Questions about the age of her boy friends were certainly intrusive and the offer of the use of her boss's credit card to buy clothing was conducive on her accompanying him to an intimate dinner one evening.

That type of sexual harassment was ignored until the " Me Too " movement brought it to public attention.   In too many companies the overseeing board of directors allow the reigning chief executive unlimited power  which allows this to happen.   In any reasonable structure, both the accountant and the company auditors should query women's clothing on a chief executive credit card, but this is the same person to whom they report.

All too often the board consisted of a " men's club " but pressure has resulted in most boards now containing a mix of men and women.  It seems obvious that chief executives need to be kept on a tighter reign and this scrutiny needs to be reflected in lower management levels.  This AMP debacle shows how swiftly adverse public opinion can harm the value of the company if it goes public.

Unfortunately, there are usually some women willing to trade sex for company advancement and if promotion is not based on merit then company competence suffers.  A company with a high turnover of female staff should be sending ample warnings to its board that all is not well and they need to look closely to determine the cause.  If the cause is a predatory CEO they need to do something about it.

Unfortunately, a CEO who delivers consistent and ongoing profit under his rule usually escapes close scrutiny from the company directors.  In many cases ideocyncracies such as mixing too closely with staff are ignored -  until they become a newspaper headline.

Unfortunately, it is women who dress smartly and have the good fortune to look attractive that usually draw the attention of predatory bosses.   Women who have the misfortune to be considered " plain " rarely encounter this problem, but also are often passed over for advancement despite an excellent work history.

We live in a changing world and more women are gaining entry to the CEO's suite in many aspects of business.  Both sexes can be equally ruthless in the business world and it seems inevitable that we will eventually encounter this same sexual problem with female CEO's.

The " Flying " Car ?

 We already have car speeds legislated to forty kph in school zones and in some area with a high pedestrian and cyclist mix, but there is growing pressure to extend that speed limit to the entire city of Sydney council area.

It is the safety argument behind this sort of thinking.  Statistics prove that a vehicle that hits a pedestrian at 50 kph is highly likely to cause a fatality.  Should that same vehicle be travelling at 40 kph that fatality will most likely be reduced to an " injury ".

Each year the number of cars on our roads increases and we are fast reaching saturation point.  Some overseas cities have used tax measures to keep car numbers down in the inner city and drivers are encouraged to park and use public transport  to reduce traffic density.  Any sort of toll system to reduce car use in the city is being bitterly resisted by motoring groups. It seems that something that only existed in the minds of science fiction writers is about to become a reality.   Prototypes of " flying cars " are already at the testing stage and there is every indication that this type of travel is about to burst onto the transport scene.

This modern concept is based on the " drone ".  The humble drone that we send aloft to take photographs or drop rescue equipment to swimmers caught in beach rips has been enlarged to hold a human with small rotating blades to give " lift " at each of its four corners.  It is quite obvious that this is practical and the idea is drawing interest from both car manufacturers and the giant aviation industry.

At this stage, the models undergoing testing look like something between a helicopter and a light plane, but they lack any sort of " wings " and should the engine fail they would have the gliding capability of a " brick ".  Cost analysis indicates that a basic flying car could be mass produced at about the same selling price of a small car.

The aspect of this type of transport moving about in the air space above our heads is frightening.  Just imagine the congestion if the flying car ever became as numerous as the cars on our roads today, and what rules would apply to keep them apart from one another ?

This could replicate the day early in the twentieth century when the Wright brothers first proved that powered flight was possible.  That ungainly contraption of wood and canvas not only developed into the sleek jet liners of today, but they also became the primary weapon of war.  It is inevitable that this flying car concept will be vigorously  expanded by military planners as a possible battlefield weapon.

One of the lessons of science we have learned is that it is impossible to " uninvent " something that causes problems.   We learned that with the atomic bomb.  The principle of the drone proved practical in some clever minds and is now being tested as personal air transport.  The " drone principle " car is about to become reality and that will probably create many of the very same problems we are encountering with road traffic today.

Just how fast we will be permitted to drive in the inner parts of Sydney may be the least of our future transport problems !