The best you can say for this is, it’s not technically bribery: “Australia’s corporate and consumer watchdogs are allowing commissioners and staff to accept gifts and hospitality from the industries they regulate but refuse to publicly disclose the largesse or potential conflicts of interest.”
23 January 2019
A new year, a new project
I can never decide whether I like New Years’ resolutions, but I always end up making them because, I suppose, you certainly won’t reach goals you don’t bother to make.
This year, I have taken up the general resolution of being more productive in various aspects of my life — and this site is part of that project. There is a risk that I am just going to fritter away time on it here instead of on The Bird Site, but hopefully others will find it useful. Time will tell.
The Banner Bright is a weblog about politics and social issues, with a focus on the need to build a more equal, democratic society. The site’s title comes from the great socialist anthem, The Red Flag, with its themes of solidarity, cosmopolitanism, and perseverance:
It well recalls the triumphs past,
It gives the hope of peace at last;
the Banner Bright the symbol plain,
Of human right and human gain.Then raise the scarlet standard high,
Beneath its shade we’ll live and die;
Though cowards flinch and traitors sneer,
We’ll keep the red flag flying here.
The basic principles motivating The Banner Bright are these:
- Parliamentary democracy is important, but its role is to implement the will of the people, and that must be determined and expressed by the community on an ongoing basis, not just occasionally at the ballot box.
- True democracy is about the equitable distribution of power, which requires disparity of wealth or social status to be minimised. Class, race, gender, sexuality, disability, and other factors should not hamper full participation in society.
- While our political and economic world is built around owners and workers, labour unions are the most important institution for building real democracy — join yours and support others!
- The transformation of society can not be achieved by adopting a doctrinaire or sectarian stance. Real change comes from the work of many different people organising in many different ways, and pursuing a range of goals that are broadly consistent with a better future.
The goal of this website is to share and discuss news and ideas that advance these ideas.
I’m wary of making a firm commitment without knowing what the work year has in store for me, but I am aiming to share maybe one or two brief links each day, with an occasional longer post.
The Golden Years of Blogging are now a distant memory, so it is unrealistic to expect that people still have a list of bookmarks they click on to check for updates — but there are other ways to keep track of sites you like.
If you are interested, you can subscribe to The Banner Bright via Twitter or RSS for instant notifications — or if you prefer, you can subscribe by email to get a weekly digest newsletter on Wednesday afternoons.
Let’s go!
Is Labor toughening its stance against “jobs for the boys”? Asked the Gaetjens controversy, Chris Bowen said this: “I don’t think it’s good practice for an incoming government to remove the treasury secretary if that treasury secretary has been a normal, non-partisan appointment. I don’t regard this as a normal, non-partisan appointment…” Earlier this week, when a Liberal Senator quit half-way through his term (so his replacement won’t need to face voters) and was appointed Consul-General within an hour, a Labor spokesman said: “We’re not guaranteeing any of these. We will be assessing appointments on their merits.” They will be kept busy assessing a rash of partisan appointments the Liberals have recently made.
22 January 2019
Hospitality business Merivale, which runs 70 venues across Sydney, has been forced to terminate its “zombie” WorkChoices-era EBA because it undercuts the award. Over three-quarters of the company’s staff are casuals who have been stiffed on evening, weekend, and overtime rates; some have been paid 22% below the award. Unfortunately, the company is being given until March to meet the award minimums, because the ten years since WorkChoices was scrapped has apparently not been long enough. There is a lesson here for Labor, whose Fair Work Act allowed this to occur: any grandfathering of immoral laws must be for a limited transition period only.
The Andrews Labor government scrapped performance bonuses for senior executives after revelations that — just like in the private sector — they were not linked to any meaningful measure of performance. Over at public service news site The Mandarin, the decision prompted bigger questions about “the moral justification” of executives being “bribed to fulfil their duties satisfactorily”: “If a company’s performance is above average and justifies payment of a bonus, should not every employee receive a proportionate share?” Indeed.
21 January 2019
Yesterday, The Age reported on an innocent Aboriginal teenager who was arrested and thrown into a fence. The victim was charged with assaulting police, until a court forced them to reveal notes admitting they thought he was the wrong guy, and “did not see it necessary in any way to use force.” Today, this: another cop “caught on CCTV repeatedly slapping a drunk disability pensioner before hurling him to the ground and knocking him out, leaving the man with ongoing injuries.” The sergeant was convicted of assault, but after a paid suspension — a bonus holiday — he returned to work. The Police Accountability Project is demanding an independent body to handle complaints against police.
19 January 2019
Progressive think tank Per Capita has analysed the composition of the Australian Parliament to ask how diverse it is. It repudiates the Liberal complaint that Labor MPs come from union backgrounds: “The proportion of MPs with union backgrounds has risen to 15% of Parliament in 2018, which squares neatly with the 16% of Australian workers who are union members.” The real problems are gate-keeping by the political machines (40% of MPs were political staffers) and the lack of women (67% men) and non-white MPs (87% Anglo).
John Quiggin imagines a socialist utopia in 2050 Australia: “Ali’s partner, Sam, was one of the exceptions, finding school a bore and not having the aptitude for a skilled trade training. Instead of free education, Sam received a grant of $100,000 at age 20, to be used in starting up a small business, in Sam’s case, a coffee shop. (A society without coffee shops would be a pretty poor excuse for utopia.)”
Victoria’s biggest wind farm, with about 200 turbines, has been approved by the State Government. It is, of course, facing a NIMBY challenge, but most residents of nearby Rokewood support it. One explained, “Scientists are warning people that the first impacts of severe climate change will be felt by agriculture. We want a future for our grandkids, and I don’t think coal or fossil fuels is going to give us that future.”
Legal expert Cristy Clark explains dead fish in the Murray Darling: “The commodification of water has always been designed to enable the (economically) ‘deserving’ to accumulate water rights at the expense of everyone else — including the environment. And now we humans of late capitalism are reaping what our political masters have sown: a world without water.”