Saturday, June 21, 2014

Here A Budget, There A Budget

Hello France, United Arab Emirates, Saudi Arabia, and Denmark and welcome to the blog...apologies for no post yesterday, couldn't get an Interweb connection last evening...(do you think it was anything to do with the heavy rain?-Ed)...shouldn't, but it certainly does appear that windy and/or wet conditions are enough to compromise the link...must admit that after a long day I didn't try as hard as I have on other occasions, eg, trying every 5 minutes for 1/2 hr until it eventually happens...

Language Warning: I had some great news yesterday re my sore knee in so much as it's absolutely rooted, bone on bone, thoroughly f***ed...and excuse my venom but I am absolutely rabid because I've been trying for years to get something done about it...so I'd just like to thank the rankly incompetent hack here in Mt Gambier whom I first went to about my knee years ago...took a year to get an initial appointment, then several years for that person to get me an MRI appointment in Adelaide that wasn't even a scan, it was an appointment about getting a scan...

(Sorry? so you'd been to an alleged surgeon here, had x-rays, etc, but you still had to travel 450kms to Adelaide to have an appointment about going back a few weeks later for an actual scan?-Ed)...yep...(and that took years for effectively nil or even a negative outcome?-Ed)...yep, and that was 18 months ago...but I'll cover it in another post soon because gross incompetence and well-voiced denigration aside, it's just another case of a South East patient giving up on even trying to access treatment...anyhoos, it's that time of year again for our local politicians to have a go at redefining the realities of the Fiscal Universe...(the FU?-Ed)...indeed, the FU...moving on...

(Whoa, whoa, whoa, hang on a sec, not so fast...I get the "gross incompetence" bit, that's fairly obvious, but what's the "well-voiced denigration" thingy?-Ed)...apparently not everyone in Mt Gambier hates me because I have been reliably and independently advised that said rank hack has been observed mouthing-off about me at volume at public functions, etc...I predict this matter will be resolved via the appropriate processes, so I'd suggest Mouthy Rank Hack get thee to a lawyer because I've had a bloody gutful...  

(Oo oo, that's what I meant to tell you, lawyer Bill Degaris has apparently started his own blog-Ed)...what, the Bill DeGaris whom has featured so frequently in this here blog? our Billy-boy who keeps pulling down posts and threatening to sue me for defamation, but is only confirming to all and sundry that what is posted is true?...(yep, that be he-Ed)...really, I'll have to pop by his blog and ask what he thinks would be an appropriate sanction for a corrupt lawyer whom betrays their clients to help cover-up paedophilia...(thought you might so I've got the address, www.sabushlawyer.blogspot.com.au...sweet baby cheeses, they'll let anyone on that bloody blogspot website-Ed)...indeed...

I'll maybe do 2 posts today, starting with this left over stuff from yesterday...in the interests of transparency I'll open with an unambiguous disclosure of my rank cynicism re any politician sprouting Budget figures and forecasts, particularly given what I know of the functionings of Mt Gambier City Council and the Labor state government and how they so readily misrepresent those realities...I'm not the only one saying that Labor has promised a surplus over and over again whilst simultaneously ruling out privatisation, only to fail miserably on both counts... 

Grant District Council has raised rates quite considerably, but I'd be far more likely to believe and accept that than the simply unbelievable crap spewing out of Mt Gambier City Council about how great their Financial Management is and how they are headed toward an 'Operational Surplus'...(bollocks...last year their gross mismanagement caught up with them and they just doubled there own borrowing capacity-Ed)...well exactly...but we digress...again...

I completely reject the crassly deceitful state Labor Party propaganda that they've done anything to 'protect' South Australians from the Federal Budget, which appears to be their entire strategy for the future, blame the shreckin' Federal Budget...(we already have the second highest electricity prices on the planet, thanks largely to the Labor obsession with Wind Turbines and milking the associated massive taxpayer funded subsidies and astronomical retail prices-Ed)...indeed...

And add to that the highest Business Taxes of any state, the second most expensive water, and the most outrageously extortionist fines for minor traffic expenses...(at least twice, up to 4 times as much as other states-Ed)...indeed...and a health system that's being dismantled to finance the Privatisation of Health via the new Royal Adelaide Hospital...(where work has stopped again after yet another crane accident-Ed)...and that's only going to get worse with Labor stating that they're not going to proceed with $234m of major hospital renovations/re-builds across Adelaide...

And the entire State Budget strategy is trying to sling it all at the feet of Federal Liberal Budget cuts of (I think) $650m approx...which allegedly justifies an increase to the Emergency Services Levy of $150, more cuts to health including shelving those hospital upgrades, and instead creating the Health Capital Investment Fund or some such shizzle...and selling the Motor Accident Commission... 

Selling the MAC forces motorists to shop for separate Third Party Insurance...this relates to the recent changes about suing a tree for jumping in front of your kangaroo...(sorry what?-Ed)...I mean hitting a tree because you swerved to miss a kangaroo so therefore there's no-one to sue, that was the recent change trumpeted by Tom Koutsontonis, but it is being criticised as merely a streamlining of the MAC processes, thus making it more attractive to potential private owners...and of course Labor pockets the $500m+ MAC fund amassed over decades...and that's our money, not Labor's...same as the SEFE...

No Segue At All: but I'm deeply concerned that at City Council's meeting Tuesday 17th May 2014 that Acting Mayor Penny Richardson was talking about Christchurch I think it was, in Aotearoa (New Zealand) and how they've consolidated their sporting facilities to minimise duplication and greatly reduce maintenance costs, etc...Ms Richardson made the observation that Mt Gambier could do this and have a dedicated sports precinct (paraphrase)...

Two things: 1) Mt Gambier already has a sports precinct, it's called Olympic Park, and there was an International Tennis tournament played there, as recently as 2012, but Council failed to maintain the courts and lost it to Pt Pirie I think...and it will never be coming back...(yeah, that's right...Mayor Steve Perryman was in the media dismissing it as no biggie because it 'didn't generate much revenue' for Mt Gambier...irresponsible, unbelievable, untenable-Ed)...global advertising that you simply couldn't buy and the Mayor just waves it away, couldn't care less...just another case of City Council ignoring what doesn't interest/benefit/profit it's constituent members...

And 2) Council have time and again failed to invest in the Aquatic Centre which would/should already be the centrepiece of that Sporting Precinct...(and there's already the expansive Blue Lake Sports Pk thingy-Ed)...exactly...what concerned me most was use of the word 'consolidating' because 3) I believe that this is the thin edge of the 'Sell The Rail Lands Wedge', namely that Council can sell some assets to pay for other works...I've covered this in previous posts...(but you digress-Ed)...sorry, yes...

Laugh I Nearly: fell off my shreckin' chair because Adelaide's precious One-Day cricket match has suddenly been moved to Sydney...ahahahahahahahahahahahaaaaaa...not that I'm a bitter and vindictive person or anything...no, wait, yes I am ahahahahahahaaaaa...aaaahh...just hilarious...congrats on your new toilet shaped stadium that you payed for by selling the South East Forestry Estate, a state owned profit making enterprise that used to fund approx $60m in government wages and Forestry Fire Protection, etc, all of which was jobs for South Australians, and yet still produced a net yearly profit of $40m for state coffers...

Never forget, that of the $670m that Labor did get for the Forestry Sale...(itself less than 2/3 the market value of the SEFE-Ed)...nearly $90m of that went on a massive bribe to the South Australian Cricket Assoc to pay off SACA's debt and get them to agree to the 're-development'...(and $40m for that footbridge-Ed)...indeed...and Geoff Brock has allegedly got a whole $30m for all of Regional SA...woohoo...and I note there's about $1.6m for the SE Drainage System which I absolutely guarantee will be for that new, massive drain to get the desperately needed fresh water for the Coorong at the cost of the SE wetlands, aquifers, food chains, etc...

Absolutely typical that there's no money apparent for the basic maintenance of SE Drainage Infrastructure, namely the $80m-$100m to replace decaying and often undersized bridges, several major drain renovations, ongoing maintenance, etc, but there is funding for another drain so that Labor can point at it for the delectation of Adelaide's Inner-Suburban Greenies (and again, yes, I used to be one), so that Labor can point and say, 'oo look what we're doing for the iconic Coorong and therefore the SE Environment, hooray for us'...pricks...

And the reality for the people who live in the SE is that we're getting wall-to-wall Fracking and pillar-to-post Wind Turbines and (I predict) a new levy to cover the most basic Drainage renovation works...(that new drain wouldn't be draining land belonging to Tom Brinkworth would it?-Ed)...don't know, but it wouldn't surprise me...but it's absolutely about grandstanding for AISGs like me used to be...

Gonna' finish here and post some shizzle 'ron...

Tomorrow: More Budget Smuggling And Associated Shizzle

Maybe later today, probably tomorrow...whatevs...did I mention my knee hurts?...

I am Nick Fletcher and this is my blog...cheers and laters...

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