The SPEAKER ( Ms Anna Burke ) took the chair at 9:00 made an acknowledgement of country and read prayers.
That this bill be now read a second time.
That this bill be now read a second time.
In light of the importance of robust and accountable democratic processes in the ACT—characterised by high standards of parliamentary debate, a legislative program covering a range of complex issues, and an active Assembly Committee process—and the significant under-representation of the citizens of the ACT, there is an overwhelming case for increasing the size of the Assembly.
That this bill be now read a second time.
That this bill be now read a second time.
That this bill be now read a second time.
Never on this side of the world was there a New Year’s Day with such high expectations.
That this bill be now read a third time.
That this bill be now read a second time.
That this bill be now read a second time.
That this bill be now read a second time.
That this bill be now read a second time.
That the House take note of the report.
That the order of the day be referred to the Federation Chamber for debate.
That this bill be now read a third time.
I have said no to uranium mining at Koongarra, because I believe that the land and my cultural beliefs are more important than mining and money. Money comes and goes, but the land is always here. It always stays if we look after it and it will look after us.
The Koongarra area is surrounded by the Kakadu National Park and was excluded from the boundaries of the Kakadu National Park when it was proclaimed in 1979. This exclusion was made to accommodate the prospect of future mining activity. Since that time, a number of parties have pursued the development of mining at Koongarra but no mining tenements have been granted.
The Australian government committed at the 2010 federal election to protect Koongarra as part of Kakadu in line with the express views of the traditional owner. The Completion of Kakadu National Park (Koongarra Project Area Repeal) Bill 2013 is part of a process which will see Koongarra incorporated into Kakadu National Park.
That this bill be now read a third time.
I have 3 children (4 yrs, 2 yrs & 9 months), two with Special Needs. My daughter has an extremely rare chromosome condition known as 6p Deletion. There are only 30 documented people worldwide and because it is so rare, it is not recognised by the Government and we have to pay for her therapy, Doctors and specialists.
My eldest son has Autism and whilst he has the Helping Children with Autism Funding, there are three panel providers in Cairns and so we still are forced to pay for therapy ourselves.
The NDIS means that the financial strain will be lifted on our family and—more importantly—that my children can receive the health care and support they need, and to lead a happy quality life—just like their non-affected peers.
I was diagnosed with MS in 1989 and the complaint is advancing slowly all the time. I seek to continue to make a difference in my community in spite of, or perhaps because of that.
My involvement with the Lions Club at Trinity Beach, the Cairns Choral Society, the Centenary Lakes church as well as the Trinity Beach Lions and MS (TBLAMS) Support Group all mean I am a valuable member of this community.
It would be great if this could continue for many years to come. I am concerned that my condition will deteriorate so I am unable to make the valued contributions I have been able to make so far.
I need the NDIS to provide the assurance that the support I need will be available when I need it most. Please make this something other than a political football … my hope is that there can be a bi-partisan approach to getting this done and NOW!!
We are fortunate in that he was covered by insurance. This has enabled us to look after him in his own home. Many others are in similar circumstances but can't afford to care for their loved ones due to financial pressures and lack of resources. The NDIS can do this for them.
I have worked with many people with disabilities and their families. Every one of them, as individuals and as family units, would have benefited from improved access to therapy, equipment, appropriate housing and carer support. Their participation in the community, at school and in the workplace could always have been better facilitated. The NDIS is necessary to begin dealing with the compromised and inequitable provision of services that currently exists.
I see so many people receive different levels of support depending on how and where their disability was acquired. We need to provide people with disability and their families and carers with regular care, support and the equipment they need.
The hardest part of my job is dealing with the system. The kids are an absolute pleasure to work with but it's sad to see how many kids go without and don't get the funding they deserve. Why should disabled people be disadvantaged? Please support this cause.
The current disability support system is underfunded, unfair, fragmented, and inefficient. It gives people with a disability little choice, no certainty of access to appropriate supports and little scope to participate in the community.
That so much of the standing and sessional orders be suspended as would prevent the Federation Chamber hours of meeting for this sitting being extended until approximately 1.45 p.m. and from 3.30 p.m. to 8 p.m. or the adjournment of the House, whichever is the earlier.
On a July day in 2010 my boy Luca, aged 4, who had no other health issues, was diagnosed with Duchenne Muscular Dystrophy—a destructive muscle disease that is progressive and fatal.
Our path in life as a carefree (in the scheme of things now) family changed forever. That same day I decided we would do anything and everything to fight for my son's life.
In my travels, I have found parents, family members and friends around the world that have the same feelings. We all think about action, intent, passion and fighting for a chance. Of which our son was not born with.
Here in Australia this land of hope—a young man's country—the NDIS will give our son a fighting chance to a life. These boys can aspire to become high achievers and [my boy] can die a young MAN and not a forgotten disabled wasting away boy. The NDIS would be a collaborative effort for all disabled people who need a decent life, love and happiness to the end.
Caring for a Duchenner brings the following elements of care into play. Physical, emotional, behavioural, cognitive and educational issues are all part and parcel.
Let the NDIS program serve as a catalyst that helped transform the landscape for disabled people in Australia. We are not seeking exceptional funding; we seek equity for all disabled people and their families. With all states and territories sailing in the same direction we can make a CHANGE!
Thank you, LEVI DE BILDE
"I care for my son in the same way as any father would care for his son," Burns said.
And don’t make the mistake of calling Mac "wheelchair-bound". That would really raise the hackles.
"It’s like saying someone who uses a car to get back and forth from work is 'car bound'," Burns said.
"A wheelchair is a piece of equipment that people use to access their life.
"To describe someone as ‘wheelchair-bound’ is seeing them as nothing more than this piece of equipment."
… … …
"I found disabled people were either seen as heroes or tragedies," Burns said.
"I think people-first language is important. There are people who have disabilities, rather than being just disabled people.
"We should see them as people first rather than as disabled first. Disability is something that people have, it's not what they are."
Many parents of disabled children, carers and disabled people themselves complain that under the current arrangements they must take whatever care is offered.
"The present system is very inequitable.
"It's who screams the loudest that gets things."
The NDIS will not be the be all and end all for every person with a disability. If this parliament comes to a point where it raises the hopes of everybody across this nation who has a disability, woe betide the Prime Minister who has to implement the NDIS, with all the complications before us in our approach to putting this legislation in place and fulfilling its aims.
… every day we hear in the main chamber … and in the other place, cries of 'Where are your costings?'
Of course the costings have been done.
What no-one knows, including us, is how any of these things can be funded.
Revenue from the MRRT does go to investment in infrastructure projects like the Gateway project in Western Australia... If we don't have the revenue from the tax then we can't make the investments.
In Australia, most indicators available for this meeting suggest that growth was close to trend … led by very large increases in capital spending in the resources sector …
We had reservations about embarking on something so complex but Wayne's view was that without it, his credentials as a reforming treasurer would be shot to pieces.
That the House take note of the documents:
Fair Work Australia—General Manager’s reports
Enterprise agreement-making in Australia under the Fair Work Act 2009 (Cth) for 2009-12.
Extent to which individual flexibility arrangements are agreed to and the content of those arrangements for 2009-12.
Operation of the first three years of the Fair Work Act 2009 (Cth) unfair dismissal system, December 2012.
Operation of the provisions of the National Employment Standards relating to requests for flexible working arrangements and extensions of unpaid parental leave for 2009-12.
That:
(1) Mr K. J. Thomson be discharged from the Standing Committee on Appropriations and Administration and that, in his place, Ms Saffin be appointed a member of the committee;
(2) Mr K. J. Thomson be discharged from the Standing Committee on Climate Change, Environment and the Arts and that, in his place, Mr Cheeseman be appointed a member of the committee;
(3) Mrs D'Ath be discharged from the Standing Committee on Education and Employment and that, in her place, Mr Perrett be appointed a member of the committee;
(4) Mr Neumann be discharged from the Joint Select Committee on Gambling Reform and that, in his place, Mr McClelland be appointed a member of the committee; and
(5) Ms Parke be discharged from the Parliamentary Joint Committee on Human Rights and that, in her place, Mr Zappia be appointed a member of the committee.
The adverse impact to the government's management of the mining tax on investment in Australia.
In Australia, most indicators available for this meeting suggest that growth was close to trend in 2012, led by very large increases in capital spending in the resources sector …
… the royalties entities pay on iron ore and coal are to be credited against the MRRT liability of a project—
It provides a way to meet the needs of the States and Territories and captures more of the profits at the peak of the resources cycle, in a way royalties alone cannot, for the benefit of all Australians.
Equally, the MRRT should not be used as a mechanism to enable States and Territories to increase inefficient royalties on MRRT taxable commodities—
Accordingly, the PTG also recommends the [Commonwealth], State and Territory Governments put in place arrangements to ensure that State and Territory Governments do not have an incentive to increase royalties on coal and iron ore. This would limit their negative impacts, while allowing the [Commonwealth’s] taxation regime to maximise the return to the community during the highpoint of the resources cycle, so achieving the balanced outcome described above.
It's a major problem when a big company from a trading partner as important as South Korea chooses not to compete for business in Australia on the basis of 'sovereign risk'—a term indicating a serious lack of confidence in our policy settings.
Not only was it the right amount; it was extraordinarily well structured, with careful attention to what would stimulate the economy in the shorter run, the medium term and the long term.
When I look around the world it was, I think, probably the best-designed stimulus program in the world and you should be happy that in fact it worked in exactly the way it was designed to work.
The finite supply of non-renewable resources allows their owners to earn above-normal profits (economic rents) from exploitation. Rents exist where the proceeds from the sale of resources exceed the cost of exploration and extraction.
In most other sectors of the economy, the existence of economic rents would attract new firms … However, economic rents can persist in the resource sector because of the finite supply of non-renewable resources.
… professional support, advice and facilities to each House of the Parliament, to parliamentary committees and to Senators and Members of the House of Representatives …
… independently of the Executive Government of the Commonwealth.
That this bill be now read a third time.
Dumping is said to occur when an overseas supplier exports a good to Australia at a price below its ‘normal value’ in the supplier’s home market. If dumping causes, or threatens to cause, material injury to local producers of like goods, then remedial action—mainly the imposition of special customs duties—can be taken against the imported goods concerned.
Similarly, countervailing duties can be imposed on imports which benefit from certain subsidies from an overseas government and which cause or threaten injury to a local industry producing like goods.
The plant at Bremer is world class. It has got the latest technology, it has got a highly skilled workforce and can compete with the best plants in the world. What it can't compete against is products in countries where they are subsidised by governments and where they manipulate their currency. We've been campaigning strenuously for three years for major reform in the anti-dumping regime in Australia that would allow a company such as Capral to put either new cases in or revised cases in that would improve the remedies available to us.
Moving responsibility for anti-dumping decisions from Customs to another department is just bureaucratic reshuffling and will take away the responsibility for making decisions from the staff who actually monitor what is being imported into Australia.
It shall be unlawful for any person engaged in commerce, in the course of such commerce … to sell, or contract to sell, goods in any part of the United States at prices lower than those exacted by said person elsewhere in the United States for the purpose of destroying competition, or eliminating a competitor.
That so much of the standing and sessional orders be suspended as would prevent:
(1) the meeting of the Federation Chamber on Thursday, 14 February 2013, commencing at 9 a.m. and extending until approximately 1.45 p.m.; and
(2) Government business having priority from 9 a.m. until approximately 1.45 p.m
I notice in the past week the prune growers in Australia are facing dwindling markets because of cheaper imports, due to the high Australian dollar and the usual raft of other problems. Then a friend told me growers at Shepparton left either 60 tonnes (or it maybe 600 tonnes, but either way a lot) of apricots to rot because SPC couldn't handle any more for processing. … isn't there some way a Federal Government (of any persuasion) can't simply say no more imports of fresh produce in times like these or at any time for that matter? It is ridiculous that we pay less than half the price of Australian vegetables and fruit for overseas produce like grapefruit, oranges and onions, notably.
Australian mass media is concentrated into the hands of a very small number of proprietors. For example, 11 of the 12 major newspapers in Australia are owned by Rupert Murdoch's News Corporation—
or John Fairfax Holdings. In fact, Murdoch bestrides the Australian media landscape like a colossus—NewsCorp owns 8 of that 12, and also dominate the regional and suburban newspaper publishing industry, as well as owning a major slice of Foxtel.
… the rise of weblogs supplanting the public's attentions to traditional news media, and the slow death of newspapers due to erosion of mindshare by online influences such as news web sites, chat rooms, message boards and online gaming.
There is an element of democratisation and accessibility that did not exist before as the communications revolution has opened up new opportunities for more voices to be heard, the voices of the people. The cost of internet-based and other digital media has become relatively cheap. The speed and reach of communications has opened up new horizons for trade unions, Indigenous peoples, environmentalists, peace and many other activists and groups. It is being used very effectively to not only disseminate information but as an organising and campaigning tool with some great victories.
Independent Australia—through managing editor David Donovan, investigative supersleuth Vince O’Grady and many others—has spent hundreds of hours of investigating and researching the James Ashby/Peter Slipper scandal—a covert political conspiracy by the Coalition to bring down the Parliamentary Speaker, Peter Slipper, and through him the Federal Government of Australia.
So much of what happens here passes people by; sometimes it even annoys them. May this be an occasion when the parliament lifts people's spirits and makes them feel more proud of our country and more conscious of our potential to more often be our best selves.
We need to return to politics as a clash of principles and to get away from the notion that it is a clash only of warring personalities.
If there’s 100 players, entire teams, whatever, found guilty of this latest drugs issue or match fixing, we don’t want them in our game.
I have spent more money than you have made in your lifetime.
Since arriving at the Time Out House I worry less about feeling depressed and anxious and I feel much more confident in myself and my choices. I have recently organised to enrol in a course at TAFE I feel very proud of the efforts I have made and the progress I am making.
The ongoing support from the Time Out program has been a huge part of my recovery at a time in my life when, to be frank, I needed time out and some support and I had no other options.
I don't buy the argument that a slight change to tax is going to discourage people from planning for their retirement.
The DEPUTY SPEAKER ( Mr BC Scott ) took the chair at 9:30.
I am, as you know, hugely unconvinced by the so-called settled science on climate change.
Indeed I guess to be more CO2 emissions from these fires and there will be from coal-fired power stations for decades.
…the rest of the world was not going anywhere near carbon taxes or emission trading schemes and that's why the Coalition is absolutely right to say no to a carbon tax and to say no to an emissions trading scheme.
… meandering back to surplus … would compound the pressures in our economy and push up the cost of living for pensioners and working people.
Without the right uniform, bag or even books, they'll find it hard to fit in and will struggle to keep up.
1. Give nine rules for the use of capital letters.
2. Name the parts of speech and define those that have no modifications.
3. Define verse, stanza and paragraph
4. What are the principal parts of a verb?
… … …
6 What is punctuation? Give rules for principal marks of punctuation.
7 - 10. Write a composition of about 150 words and show therein that you understand the practical use of the rules of grammar.
1. What is meant by the following: Alphabet, phonetic, orthography, etymology, syllabication.
… … …
10. Write 10 words frequently mispronounced and indicate pronunciation by use of diacritical marks and by syllabication.
Sexual health is not just for people who have had sex or have a Sexually Transmissible Infection (STI). It means taking care of your body, your health, and your partner's health and making decisions about having sex. Trying to avoid STIs is part of sexual health.
Australian Medical Association (AMA) Queensland president Dr Richard Kidd said it was not just the young, single miners spreading diseases.
'We're aware of anecdotal reports concerning pregnant women presenting with STIs, being treated, and getting a STI again before pregnancy concludes,' Dr Kidd said.
'So presumably their partners are infecting them again.'
Dr Kidd said the mix of a large disposable income and boredom meant fly-in, fly-out mine workers were responsible for the increase in cases of STIs in towns—
'Misty' is a FIFO prostitute, one of hundreds to descend on Queensland's roaring mining towns in Surat and Galilee basins in the Maranoa.
She has a lot in common with her clients: she lives on the east coast but she's flexible about where she'll work.
A sex worker can put their mobile phone number in an ad on the internet or in the local paper and they're free to go where the work is.
The only problem is finding a hotel room—
in a town with such a transient population.
Industrial wind is a fraud of enormous consequence whose foundation is based on greed, ignorance, subsidy and entrenched institutional deceit. People who value intellectual honesty should not allow themselves to be quietly fleeced by such industrial treachery or even by their government's callous … indifference.
Wind industry propaganda flatters the gullible, exploits the well-intentioned …
They plunder our environment while enriching foreigners all under the guise of some mythical societal benefit. They take our health, our land, our peace of mind and our taxes.
One trick is all that horse can do.
He's a one trick pony
One trick is all that horse can do
He does one trick only
It's the principal source of his revenue
Undermine their pompous authority, reject their moral standards, make anarchy and disorder your trademarks. Cause as much chaos and disruption as possible but don’t let them take you alive.
Most importantly, I'll ensure the budget is in surplus by 2013.
My commitment to a surplus in 2012-13 was a promise made and it will be honoured
We saved jobs, stayed out of recession and got back to surplus.
The government who robs Peter to pay Paul can always depend on the support of Paul.
You cannot bring about prosperity by discouraging thrift.
You cannot help small men by tearing down big men.
You cannot strengthen the weak by weakening the strong.
You cannot lift the wage-earner by pulling down the wage-payer.
You cannot help the poor man by destroying the rich.
You cannot keep out of trouble by spending more than your income.
You cannot further the brotherhood of man by inciting class hatred.
You cannot establish security on borrowed money.
You cannot build character and courage by taking away men's initiative and independence.
You cannot help men permanently by doing for them what they could and should do for themselves.
The Government put in place a strong framework for introducing digital. Firstly the broadcasters are required under law to provide signal for digital which are equivalent coverage to what they had for analog.
The Government has always supported increased transparency in our tax system and we believe any revenue from the MRRT should be published …
Small business issues do not often come up in terms of issues that are before the Prime Minister or before the cabinet. I guess our focus of resource tends to focus on those issues which are before the Prime Minister or the cabinet.
… inconsistent with years of detailed analysis undertaken by Defence, the JSF Program Office, Lockheed Martin and the eight other partner nations.
… basically flawed through incorrect assumptions and the lack of knowledge of the classified F-35 performance information.
The key difference in Health under this government, compared to its predecessor, is that Health dollars matter …
Health dollars buy operations. They buy beds. They pay staff. They are what enables us to improve the health of Queenslanders. The good management of Health dollars enables improved facilities and services. With good management, we extend our reach into remote area health. It enables better access to advanced medicine. It facilitates research and we reap the benefits.
The Labor government is gone, but the legacy of Labor’s financial mismanagement remains and the burden it imposes gets worse. Why? Because while the LNP strives to fix these serious problems we are sabotaged by a growing problem with Labor financial mismanagement in Canberra.
I request that you apply your attention to this immediate issue as it will place my family, my child and many other critical and needy families and their young people in a very precarious situation.