Hello Austria, Canada, France, and again to Turkey, where apparently there are a handful of people following this blog...whilst my blog's 'Statistics' page can be a bit rollercoasty, it shows a trend across the last weeks and months of regular views from Turkey, merhaba and salam...(do you say both?-Ed)...not sure sorry, Interwebbed it, but 'merhaba' is hello, so merhaba...(apols for no post yesterday but no Interweb connection last night, again, please ignore any 'yesterday' references and/or take them back a further day)...
Carbon Aussie, Carbon, Carbon: come on Aussie come on...so says the famous jingle from the 1970s or early 80s...(was it for World Series Cricket?-Ed)...might have been...but I of course refer to the Carbon Tax Repeal Bill that yesterday in Federal Parliament stalled and failed with barely a whimper, let alone a bang...(it was more cough, fart, and expire-Ed)...indeed...the Palmer United Party back-flipped amid claims they were deceived by the Liberals, but shreck only knows because Clive (Palmer) changes his story from one interview to the next...(if he stays long enough-Ed)...quite.
The only quotable 'fact' is that the CTRB has failed to fly twice now, so that's a second Double Dissolution trigger for another Federal 'Full Senate' election, but Foreign Minister Julie Bishop isn't counting her chickens just yet...(is that another trigger/'pullet' joke-Ed)...no......yes...it's a very hard debate to follow but there are some fairly conservative commentators who support 'a Carbon Tax' whilst others continue to cry foul and feathers fly in Federal parliament...
Congratulations Mr President: as Mr Joko 'Jokowi' Widodo appears to have won the Indonesian Presidential Election...one of the largest democracies on the planet with a huge Muslim populace...(is Indonesia the world's largest Muslim Democracy?-Ed)...think so, Interweb it baby...can't say how happy I am to see a relative Political Hippy run the show to our North, rather than a soldier, because it's a country with an army, not an army functioning as a country...(fair enough-Ed)...but I digress...
Two Mental Health Nurses have resigned to go interstate, leaving more gaping holes in Health Provision in the South East...and the ABC interview with a spokesperson from the Mental Illness Fellowship SA was another absolute doozy, with the interviewee, basically unchallenged, furiously papering over the massive crevasses the Labor government has gouged through Mental Health and Drug/Alcohol services...excuse me, but one Fly-in/Fly-out Psychiatrist available only 13 days a month is not anything to be celebrated, how dare you...brief, flippant referral to 'it would be nice to have 2 Psychs here because 1 couldn't cope' are not appropriate given that we should have 5-6 for the populace.
This follows on from local Drug/Alcohol Service Providers directing people who need help/treatment to go interstate because services are so bit-piece and reactionary in Mt Gambier, as reported on WIN TV News...the whole thing is a bloody shambles, and however you 'justify' this disgraceful state of affairs, it is the direct responsibility of the state Labor government...whether you believe that this is part of the campaign to dismantle the SE Social structure to make us vulnerable to takeover by Wind Turbines and Fracking and 'Foreign Investment', or simply a reality of the gross nepotism and corruption in South Australia, and/or Fiscal Incompetence, or a combination...whatevs, it's happening.
The South Australian Labor government has no plan for the South East outside of how we can best serve them personally, maintain their electoral popularity, and in that broader sense how we can serve Adelaide.
ABC Forestry Interview: yesterday I posted re the ABC interview on Wednesday 9th July, as available on the ABC South East SA Interweb site under Morning Show, Reloads, and I was up to the bit where Forestry Minister Leon Bignell was asked about 141 Plantations, the new 'owners' of the South East Forestry Estate, who don't even have an office in South Australia, let alone Mt Gambier, about them felling huge numbers of trees...(that are trucked to Portland and then shipped to China-)...indeed...and the issues of Fire Prevention/Protection being provided by 141P.
Just now on ABC Radio News (0630hrs), a report about this Fire Protection issue and a meeting (yesterday?) between Leon and Forestry SA and the Country Fire Service (and other Emergency services?), and a bit from CFS leader John Probis stating that this was an opportunity to express their concerns about Fire Protection, Prevention, the role of Contractors, but that there were no definitive answers from Minister Leon...Mr Probis 'hopes' there'll be further discussion on this issue and others re the changing Forestry Industry...
(So the official bodies, FSA and the CFS, have had a meeting with the Forestry Minister, Neon Leon, specifically to discuss the Fire Prevention issues, and they've come away from that with no answers, no plan, not nuthin' but hope that there may be another meeting...half way through the 5 year FSA management deal with 141 Plantations and there is no Fire Protection Plan-Ed)...I guess Labor figure that 141P are felling trees so fast that by 2017 there'll be nothing left standing to burn!
(Now 12th July) and yesterday there was an interview with Transport Minister Stephen Mullighan and alleged Independent Geoff Brock, from Mr Brock's seat of Frome...just another motor-mouthed cavalcade of empty rheotric from Geoff Brock, and Mr Mullighan stated that Labor's ridiculous integrated Transport And Land Use Plan 'sets out transport plans for the future' (paraphrase)...(no it doesn't, it repeatedly says 'write to us and tell us what you think should happen, and there is virtually no 'Plan' what-so-ever for the South East, eg, absolutely nothing about Rail-Ed)...well quite...
Yesterday's The Border Watch has Forestry and Tourism Minister Mr Bignell on the front page, sitting on a bike, grinning away, up at the Blue Lake Tours/Café thingy, and some bollocks about the Tour Down Under bike race coming to Mt Gambier in 2017...and not a word of a lie, but when I raised the Fire Protection interview stuff with someone yesterday, there was an animated discussion between several people (a walking group? coffee club thingy? whatevs) who were apparently at the BL Café thingy when Leon breezed by...(and apparently he did exactly that-Ed)...
Indeed, our illustrious Tourism Minister went to the Blue Lake Tours/Café thingy, had his photo quickly taken, and then literally jogged back to his car and left...he didn't do the famous Aquifer Tour of the most identifiable Tourism icon in South Australia, or go into the Café thingy and spend ten bucks ($10) on touristy trinkets or a cuppa and some bikkies (biscuits), or even talk to the proprietors, not even to say hello, he had his little photo op and then left...(sorry? the Tourism Minister is in the South East for 3 days or more, and that's the closest he gets to engaging with the no.1 Tourist attraction in the Region...absolutely pathetic-Ed)...
I approached the proprietors Trish and Gary Turner and they confirmed that indeed Minister Bignell had arrived, 'selfied', and then did literally jog back to his car without even speaking to them...they politely declined to offer an official comment for this here blog, but were happy to be quoted as being "very disappointed" with this latest in an apparently long line of Tourism Minister snubs...as I understand it Jane Lomax Smith was the last Tourism Minister to actually go/talk to the Aquifer Tours thingy operators...
(Why do you keep saying 'thingy'?-Ed)...because it looks like a small modern European-style Bus Terminal with a very small cafe attached, it just doesn't look like a major Tourism business...it looks like you go in, buy your ticket for the bus, grab a takeaway coffee, and that's it...it doesn't even have a view of the Blue Lake, it faces the street...but I digress again...Minister Bignell has recently excused the repeated absence of Mt Gambier/the South East from official SA Tourism stuff, stating that it's up to the Advertising agencies, not him, to make decisions about what does and what doesn't feature...ridiculous...
Gunna' stop here due to another 2 post day today, sorry, and more Forestry crap,
Tomorrow: Um, Yeah, The Forestry Stuff...Actually This Arvo
Probably...I am Nick Fletcher and this is my blog...cheers and laters...
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