Like all Australians I hate to see any animal suffer a frightening and horribly long death.
The cattle producers of Northern Australia are probably even more horrified at this totally unnecessary cruelty - having bred and produced such beautiful animals for export.
The cattle are in excellent condition when they arrive at the yards for shipment; are transported in purpose-built ships and arrive in peak condition - often putting on weight during the journey.
We are therefore doing everything correctly.
Some Indonesians clearly are not.
And to be brutally honest (as much as I like Indonesians) Indonesians (and Asians in general) do not have anywhere near the same concerns for animals that Australians have. Animal cruelty is all too common in Indonesia, and in many parts of Asia.
So what are the solutions?
Stop live exports - and rob decent cattle producers and Australia of an export income? Not very fair! Of course the cattle producers have already stopped shipment after seeing what happens to their beautifully produced animals - but in the long term?
Personally, given the amount of money paid to the Meat and Livestock Corporation by the producers to try and educate the Indonesians about basic killing techniques, I think those responsible for not knowing about these disgusting practices should be sacked immediately, and serious hard-working people who know Indonesia and know cattle - be employed in their place.
Of course, having spent a lot of time in Indonesia, I fully realise that whatever we do there will always be some sad and horrible deaths for some of our beautiful cattle. This is simply because once they arrive, they are often on-sold to people in small villages who are pretty much unconcerned about animal cruelty. This is the reality of a third world country.
I want live cattle exports to continue. But I also want better monitoring of Indonesian slaughtering practices.
But of course at the end of the day - The Indonesians do own the cattle once they arrive.
The only other solution, other than more effective monitoring would be to have Indonesian -staffed abbatoirs (with lower wages, and wages based on productivity) in Darwin and Wyndham - but with our strict killing protocols in place. Still Halal, but in a decent humane way.
Obviously the Unions would disagree.But everyone knows that it was because of union greed that Live Cattle Exports became such a huge business. Remember Mudginberri?
Tuesday, May 31, 2011
Sunday, May 22, 2011
Less Government EQUALS Higher Prosperity
Ted Dunstan (NT News 19th May, 2011) correctly points out that small business in the NT and indeed right across Australia is hurting. Ted then goes on to tell us that in his opinion the NT and Federal Labor governments have done nothing for small business in their recent budgets.
I do not know what Ted would suggest they could have done, but clearly spending and borrowing more and more money, as both governments have done, is having a detrimental, not a positive effect on the small businesses of our nation.
Most thinking Australians would agree that Australia’s best years were during the period 1996 – 2007.
In those years the Howard/Costello government managed to pay back $96 Billion of Labor debt and at the same time provide significant tax cuts to all Australians in most of the eleven years of that government.
This tells me that smaller, low-taxing, low-regulating, well-managed government is the only way to achieve greater prosperity for the entire community and therefore small business as well.
The Big-Spending, Big-Government approach of the disastrous Rudd-Gillard Labor government and here in the NT the similarly wasteful regime of the Martin-Henderson Labor government only ever achieves tears and economic ruination in the long run.
Government should be lean and mean and hardly ever seen.
I do not know what Ted would suggest they could have done, but clearly spending and borrowing more and more money, as both governments have done, is having a detrimental, not a positive effect on the small businesses of our nation.
Most thinking Australians would agree that Australia’s best years were during the period 1996 – 2007.
In those years the Howard/Costello government managed to pay back $96 Billion of Labor debt and at the same time provide significant tax cuts to all Australians in most of the eleven years of that government.
This tells me that smaller, low-taxing, low-regulating, well-managed government is the only way to achieve greater prosperity for the entire community and therefore small business as well.
The Big-Spending, Big-Government approach of the disastrous Rudd-Gillard Labor government and here in the NT the similarly wasteful regime of the Martin-Henderson Labor government only ever achieves tears and economic ruination in the long run.
Government should be lean and mean and hardly ever seen.
Sunday, May 1, 2011
Marine Supply Base? Another union rort?
Dear Editor,
In principle I support the concept of establishment of an area at East Arm as a Marine Supply Base – to service the Territory’s growing oil and gas industry. It seems like a reasonable idea.
However one wonders what criteria the Henderson Labor Government will use when assessing
the three consortiums tendering to establish and operate the Marine Supply Base?
Could it be Henderson and his union mates will insist that this Marine Supply Base must be owned and operated by a company that has provided an undertaking to employ only union labour?
If this is to be yet another union rort there should be no taxpayer’s funds ($5 million in this years budget) going towards the project whatsoever.
A better, far more transparent way to help with the establishment of a Marine Supply Base would be for the government to call worldwide tenders from companies interested in purchasing parcels of land at East Arm on which to establish and operate a Marine Supply Base. Covenants would obviously apply, but even if a number of companies ended up operating Marine Supply Bases at East Arm, surely that would be better than one heavily unionized “government-selected” operator?
In principle I support the concept of establishment of an area at East Arm as a Marine Supply Base – to service the Territory’s growing oil and gas industry. It seems like a reasonable idea.
However one wonders what criteria the Henderson Labor Government will use when assessing
the three consortiums tendering to establish and operate the Marine Supply Base?
Could it be Henderson and his union mates will insist that this Marine Supply Base must be owned and operated by a company that has provided an undertaking to employ only union labour?
If this is to be yet another union rort there should be no taxpayer’s funds ($5 million in this years budget) going towards the project whatsoever.
A better, far more transparent way to help with the establishment of a Marine Supply Base would be for the government to call worldwide tenders from companies interested in purchasing parcels of land at East Arm on which to establish and operate a Marine Supply Base. Covenants would obviously apply, but even if a number of companies ended up operating Marine Supply Bases at East Arm, surely that would be better than one heavily unionized “government-selected” operator?
Wednesday, February 9, 2011
Penni is missing something and so am I
Dear Editor,
It is not surprising that well respected and successful businesswoman Penni Tastula is wondering whether she is “missing something” about the proposal by the Henderson Labor Government to introduce a Container-Deposit-Scheme here in the NT.
Well I am also confused and like Penni, also “missing something” when it comes to the need for such a scheme.
Recycling, if that is what the aim of the legislation is; is already happening in most NT towns. Two bins are provided – one for rubbish, the other for recyclables. The bins are picked up at set intervals by efficient contractors, and the cost is included in everyone’s rates. What is better than that?
Why then the need to introduce a Container-Deposit-Scheme? A scheme that will impose an additional cost burden on Territorians and force them to drive across town (surely increasing those emissions we hear so much about) with bags full of cans and bottles. Of course, that is assuming they choose to recover their deposit.
Why? What additional benefits will this proposed scheme provide? I suggest none. Actually, it is extremely likely this scheme will be a retrograde move.
But let’s look at the main “litterers”…..:
Will the people who litter most in the NT; those who can be found at various places in most Territory towns lying around with bottles, cans, wine casks, soiled clothing, used nappies and a whole lot more, suddenly make their way to the local recycling depot to return their packaging and receive their deposit back? We all know the answer to that.
Forget this latest crazy scheme Paul Henderson. It is unwarranted and total madness! And you probably know it!
Yours truly,
Dave Wane
9th February, 2011
Saturday, February 5, 2011
More Federal Funds??
Dear Editor,
So the writer of the NT News Editorial of 31st January, 2011 seriously believes that more “Federal Funds” is the answer …….. In the writer’s own words: to “solve the Territory’s terrible social problems”.
Is the person who wrote this Editorial for real?
The Northern Territory now has more expenditure on bureaucracy (17,000+ on the taxpayer-funded payroll and growing) than probably any similar size jurisdiction in the Western World!
And to make matters worse, Clare Martin and Paul Henderson have added at least 5,000 extra taxpayer-funded employees since Labor was elected in 2001 – at an ANNUAL cost to the NT budget of around HALF A BILLION DOLLARS!
Even if extra Federal Funds could somehow “solve” the problems that are described in the Editorial (which of course I very much doubt), could it be that the lions share of the NT Government’s funds are gobbled up by their massively overstaffed, poorly managed, wasteful and scandalously inefficient bureaucracy – leaving only a pittance for expenditure at the “coal-face” where it is claimed to be needed?
In Health, Education, Police, in fact everywhere within the NT Government, it seems that the first priority of available funds is to hire more and more unnecessary staff, accommodate them in bigger and more salubrious surroundings, and pay them salaries way over what they would ever hope to receive in the REAL world - in the market-place!
And finally: the suggestion that this incompetent debt-ridden Martin-Henderson Labor government should ask the also incompetent “Drunken-Sailors” from the now deeply (and unnecessarily) in debt, Rudd-Gillard Federal Labor government for more funds has to be the biggest joke of all!
Yours truly,
Dave Wane
Friday, February 4, 2011
Unnecessary Container Deposit Scheme.
Dear Editor,
Independent Member for Nelson, Gerry Wood claims that Kate Carnell and the Australian Food and Grocery Council, are orchestrating some kind of con to mislead Territorians about the Government’s Cash for Containers scheme.
However, as an independent observer, I believe it is Gerry Wood and the NT Government that are either willingly, or through total head-in-the-sand ignorance doing the “conning”, and therefore misleading Territorians on this totally unnecessary scheme.
Firstly, all NT local governments (councils) already have an effective rubbish collection and recycling regime in place. All NT councils have two wheelie bins – one for waste, and the other for recyclables. I understand this works very well here in the NT – apparently about the best in Australia. So why the need to put deposits on every container sold in the NT?
Secondly, can Wood or Henderson actually dispute the figures provided by the Australian Food and Grocery Council? The examples of additional costs provided by the Australian Food and Grocery Council seem to me, in view of the massive additional expenditure required to collect, store and transport all these containers, to be, if anything, on the conservative side. Currently the majority of all recyclables are efficiently and cost-effectively, collected by the various council waste contractors from households, and similarly by waste contractors from commercial premises.
Again, I ask: why are Henderson and Wood advocating such unnecessary nonsense when it will achieve nothing other than push up prices? I know it was originally Wood’s idea as part of his backing of Henderson’s minority government. But Henderson has now (at least publicly) embraced it with gusto.
Does Henderson’s serial interventionism in so many aspects of our lives (and Martin’s before him) ever achieve anything of value for normal everyday Territorians? Certainly Not, in my view! These leaders (Henderson and Martin) seem to be under the complete influence of their army of advisors, most of whom would be unlikely to make it in the real world. Are these faceless, highly paid and unelected men and women (mostly from failed southern states) the kind of people we want running our once fiercely independent and free-thinking Territory?
Yours truly,
Dave Wane
Independent Member for Nelson, Gerry Wood claims that Kate Carnell and the Australian Food and Grocery Council, are orchestrating some kind of con to mislead Territorians about the Government’s Cash for Containers scheme.
However, as an independent observer, I believe it is Gerry Wood and the NT Government that are either willingly, or through total head-in-the-sand ignorance doing the “conning”, and therefore misleading Territorians on this totally unnecessary scheme.
Firstly, all NT local governments (councils) already have an effective rubbish collection and recycling regime in place. All NT councils have two wheelie bins – one for waste, and the other for recyclables. I understand this works very well here in the NT – apparently about the best in Australia. So why the need to put deposits on every container sold in the NT?
Secondly, can Wood or Henderson actually dispute the figures provided by the Australian Food and Grocery Council? The examples of additional costs provided by the Australian Food and Grocery Council seem to me, in view of the massive additional expenditure required to collect, store and transport all these containers, to be, if anything, on the conservative side. Currently the majority of all recyclables are efficiently and cost-effectively, collected by the various council waste contractors from households, and similarly by waste contractors from commercial premises.
Again, I ask: why are Henderson and Wood advocating such unnecessary nonsense when it will achieve nothing other than push up prices? I know it was originally Wood’s idea as part of his backing of Henderson’s minority government. But Henderson has now (at least publicly) embraced it with gusto.
Does Henderson’s serial interventionism in so many aspects of our lives (and Martin’s before him) ever achieve anything of value for normal everyday Territorians? Certainly Not, in my view! These leaders (Henderson and Martin) seem to be under the complete influence of their army of advisors, most of whom would be unlikely to make it in the real world. Are these faceless, highly paid and unelected men and women (mostly from failed southern states) the kind of people we want running our once fiercely independent and free-thinking Territory?
Yours truly,
Dave Wane
Monday, December 27, 2010
The effects of Big Bloated Government on labour supply in the NT.
Dear Editor,
In Darwin and throughout the territory we are again hearing of Employers who are unable to find workers for their businesses.
The Martin-Henderson government has of course already increased public sector employment by well over 5,000 since coming to power -and continues with this scandalously expensive practice by providing even more costly and mostly unnecessary “jobs”, almost on a weekly basis.
Could it be that the reason there are so few people available for real jobs out in the marketplace is a direct result of this government’s corruption of the Labour Market through excessive hiring of thousands of public servants?
Put simply: the “supply” of labour in the NT is limited, but the unnecessary and mostly artificial “labour demand” created by this government has used up so much of the “labour supply”.
Sadly, as a result of this, many young people now actively seek a safe, secure “claytons” job in the government with wages and conditions that are unaffordable in the real world - in the marketplace, leaving real employers without workers.
And of course all this was totally unnecessary, as there was never any justification whatsoever to increase the size of the already bloated NT public service of the Burke Government by 5,000.
Big Government causes Big Problems. The lack of workers available for real work in the NT is of course only one problem caused by the Big Bloated Henderson Government. There are plenty more.
In Darwin and throughout the territory we are again hearing of Employers who are unable to find workers for their businesses.
The Martin-Henderson government has of course already increased public sector employment by well over 5,000 since coming to power -and continues with this scandalously expensive practice by providing even more costly and mostly unnecessary “jobs”, almost on a weekly basis.
Could it be that the reason there are so few people available for real jobs out in the marketplace is a direct result of this government’s corruption of the Labour Market through excessive hiring of thousands of public servants?
Put simply: the “supply” of labour in the NT is limited, but the unnecessary and mostly artificial “labour demand” created by this government has used up so much of the “labour supply”.
Sadly, as a result of this, many young people now actively seek a safe, secure “claytons” job in the government with wages and conditions that are unaffordable in the real world - in the marketplace, leaving real employers without workers.
And of course all this was totally unnecessary, as there was never any justification whatsoever to increase the size of the already bloated NT public service of the Burke Government by 5,000.
Big Government causes Big Problems. The lack of workers available for real work in the NT is of course only one problem caused by the Big Bloated Henderson Government. There are plenty more.
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