I rarely pay much attention to most of what is said and done in the House of Representatives, but like many I have been following their debates on the RU486 issue. The Second Reading of the legislation has just passed by 95 votes to 50, which is quite a sizeable margin. There will be some support for the amendments moved by Bowman MP, Andrew Laming, and ...
Since the Senate’s decisive vote to pass the RU486 Bill last Thursday, I’ve had a few people ask me in a hopeful tone whether this means we can see more cooperation across parties and a chance for a bit more democracy to grow through the cracks in the concrete cloak of control the Prime Minister has put over parliamentary politics. My short answer is (a) the Bill still has ...
After the 2nd Reading of the Bill passed by 45 votes to 26, there were 2 sets of amendments put in the Committee stage of the debate - 1 on behalf of Senators Barnett & Humphries, (lost 28 votes to 44) and the other on behalf of Senators Colbeck & Scullion (lost 33 votes to 41). The concluding 3rd Reading vote was called at 4.45pm. The result was announced ...
UPDATE #4: The Second Reading of the Bill occurred just before 1pm. There were 46 votes in favour and 25 votes against, with 5 Senators not present. There are two different sets of amendments which will be voted on around 4.15, and the final Third Reading vote at 4.45. I believe some of those who voted for the 2nd Reading will not vote for the 3rd ...
Although there are other Bills being debated in the Senate this week – most notably amendments to the Defence Act to extend the power of the Government to call out our military within Australia in the event of an emergency - the main political and legislative focus is the debate on the drug widely known as RU486.
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This line from David Marr is one of the best descriptions I’ve ever read of the farcical sound and fury which is Question Time in the House of Representatives:
It’s a bit like an RSPCA pound: never free of the spectre of being put down, the dogs bark and howl to attract attention.(0)
For those interested in basic facts about temperature trends in Australia and globally over recent decades, there is a great post over at Lavartus Prodeo by Brian Banisch, who has been following the data and the various scientific reports on this issue for a long time. Very much worth having a read of for those who are just wanting some facts.
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Many not for profit and charity groups have got a lot smarter over the years in tapping into some of the large amounts of money that get spent over Christmas. Christmas catalogues full of gifts for good cause groups have become widespread. In recent times, that has extended to bypassing a present all together, and giving someone a donation which actually goes direct to the good cause. This form of fundraising is now also tapping into social media, so much so that even my humble blog gets occasional requests to promote a cause from people who specifically target the avenues of social media to widen their reach. Here’s one example I recently received on behalf of World Vision.
More... (4)I’ve posted a piece over at The Stump about the links between global hunger and climate change, and the unfortunate parallels between the less than successful climate change summit in Copenhagen and an even more dismal outcome at the recent Hunger Summit in Rome, which received far less attention.
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Following are links to some items I’ve had published on other sites
More... (0)Disclaimer: The inclusion of a blog or website in this list should not be taken as an endorsement of its contents by me.
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