It is over five years since I wrote a post on this blog about the many promises that have been made over the years to build a rail link from Brisbane to Redcliffe. In the five years since, plans to build to build the railway have been put on and then off the table once again. Redcliffe has also ceased to be a separate city, being forcibly amalgamated with ...
In the last couple of months I have spent a lot of time around the West End area in Brisbane as it is one of the places I am doing some work at the moment. This morning I discovered that a few spaces in West End and the nearby South Bank region will be among many areas in Brisbane taking part in PARK(ing) Day, which occurs tomorrow, Sept ...
I had a momentary flashback as I went down to my local shops to get the papers this morning. There on the footpath were people with some election campaigning posters, including a Liberal Party one with the word HOWARD across the top in big letters. After spending all of last year hanging out for the federal election to be done with, the sight caused an instinctive churning of ...
There’s a rally and walk for sustainable transport happening in Brisbane city tomorrow (Saturday) from 11am. It’s another effort to try to draw attention to the bizarre cognitive dissonance that characterises the transport policies of the Brisbane City Council. There is a continued determination to spend hundreds of millions on tunnels and bridges to expand car usage, sitting blithely alongside statements and programs purportedly aimed at ...
It is human nature to overlook or excuse one’s own hypocrisy by saying (or thinking) that other people are worse. This isn’t really good enough though, particularly if you are going to try to convince other people that they need to change the way they act. It is much easier to accept the things that we want to believe are true, while ignoring those facts that are inconvenient. This ...
The Brisbane City Council made one of those strange decisions today where a majority of people supported something which I can only assume they know is a seriously bad idea. The Council’s Civic Cabinet, which has a Labor majority, agreed today to support the Liberal Lord Mayor’s plan to build the Hale Street Bridge, which will increase the total number of cars on the road and funnel a whole ...
An issue which has not got very much attention so far has been the planned changes to fuel tax. It is a complicated area, but it has significant ramifications for biodiesel, renewable fuels and oil recycling. The Senate Committee examining the legislation is tabling its report today. I understand it will recommend some changes, although how far they will go I am not sure. (UPDATE: Report can be ...
I thought the evidence was pretty obvious by now that spending massive amounts of money on freeways, tunnels and extra road space inevitably just leads to more people using cars, with a corresponding increase in pollution levels and a return to the traffic congestion levels that were used to justify the major roadworks in the first place. Despite this, the Brisbane City Council, with a Liberal Lord Mayor, enthusiastically ...
Brisbane airport has been planning to build a new parallel runway for some time, and today’s Courier-Mail has a range of stories on the possible impacts. There’s four separate stories on the Courier-Mail website (here, here, here, and here, (plus the cartoon). They are also attempting to make more use of the online format, providing an “in depth multi-media report” on the issue, with video interviews and graphics. ...
Despite the disruption of losing Senators and staff (and the Government winning control of the Senate), I have still had to keep busy with local and national issues. In some ways I have to keep busier than ever if I want to (a) cover the same number of issues with fewer Senators, (b) balance out the likely loss of some of the forums that previously existed in the ...
The last week in the Senate once again had a much higher number of Bills dealt with than usual – 19 in total in the 4 sitting days. None of these were very controversial, apart from the law to abolish ATSIC. As usual, details can be found on my main website. I left Canberra on the Friday morning, with the Senate not sitting again until the Budget appears ...
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Every Monday morning during my radio show on community radio 4ZzZ FM, I chat with Peter Black, a constitutional lawyer, follower of social and political issues and obsessive user of social media. I don’t normally put links to those chats on this blog, but given that our talk this morning was all about the federal election, I thought it was worth putting a link to it on this occasion. You can have a listen to it by clicking on this link.
(0)Given I am now running as a Greens candidate, I suppose it is no surprise that I am indicating my agreement with a comment that Bob Brown made today. But I would also say that it isn’t any secret that I haven’t agreed with every public comment that Bob has made, and I would agree with the following comment about the schoolyard level nonsense regarding another possible leaders debate even if it had been made by Steve Fielding:
“What we’re seeing now between the two leaders is an absolute farce and people everywhere are rolling their eyes at Tony Abbott and Julia Gillard not having the maturity to get together to agree to the series of debates which would have enlightened the electorate,“It is a joke and a sad reflection on the optic and image driven nature of political media coverage in Australia. A couple of weeks ago, there was a three way debate at the National Press Club on important ICT issues such as internet filtering, broadband and wider communications policy. More... (6)
A couple of years ago I wrote a blog post about mountaintop mining in the USA. All mining has some impact, but the sheer destructiveness of this type of mining is astonishing – and that’s before you take into account the greenhouse impact of the coal. This article in the New York Times details the potential impact of a similar project in West Virginia. The significance of this proposal is that there is the possibility it may be stopped, or seriously curtailed, by the Obama administration, which would be a signal of a positive shift on this issue.
(2)Following are links to a couple of recent radio interviews I’ve done, plus an online one
More... (1)As I noted in my previous post, this week’s Newspoll saw the Greens register 16% support – the highest that party has ever achieved, comparable to the Democrats best Newspoll result of 17% back in 1990. History suggests it is unlikely that this peak will be maintained right through to election day (or even the next Newspoll) but it is part of a continuing trend of solid Greens results. I’ve written a piece expanding on this, and how the party might approach the challenges ahead, at The Drum/Unleashed on the ABC’s site – which you can read by clicking on this link.
(0)Contention over Queensland’s Wild Rivers legislation has been bubbling along for quite a while now. Unfortunately, as with many issues which become polarised, each “side” is focused on defending their position, which has meant that some important underlying issues are not getting the attention they deserve. I’ve just had a piece on this topic published at The Drum on the ABC’s website. It’s fairly long, so they published it in two parts – the first part is at this link and the second part is at this one. I should emphasise that the article reflects my personal views, and is not a formal view of the Greens, nor of ANTaR Queensland, who I am also involved with.
(18)Hip hop fans in Brisbane might be interested in tuning in to my radio show on 4ZZZ FM this Monday morning around 7:30am. I’ll be talking with the Gold Coast based duo Choose Mics, who are launching their debut full length album Beggars Can’t Be Choosers at the Step Inn in the Valley this coming Friday night as part of what will be a big night for fans of hip-hop/rap/urban sounds, with Brisbane’s The Optimen also launching their second album “The Out of Money Experience” as part of the same event. Even though there is a steady stream of musical offerings in Brisbane, a double album launch of this magnitude doesn’t come along every day of the week, so I’ll dedicate a half hour or so to exploring not just the words and sounds of Choose Mics, but getting a broader overview from them of the hip hop related scenes locally and nationally.
More... (2)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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