Bill Shorten, when interviewed during a former forum for Perth Businessman today, suggested that he wants to find a place for Julie Bishop, John Howard and other politicians who have now retired from the political life. He believes they are person super make a strong and valued contribution to the continuation and the betterment of Australia.

Me Shorten will I believe become our prime minister on May 18. If he carries through on this suggestion then he will in my opinion be a wise prime minister.

This is the situation that could well be applied to retired persons on many organisational fronts. On retirement, those with experience are generally tossed aside and no regard is paid to what they might offer by way of advice or suggestion.

This leads to people starting all over in many organisations. The desire to “go with the loan“ and from the fair point of litres “finding my own way“ means that far too many key institutions are stuck on Genesis 1:1. They are always “in the beginning”. Meaningful evolution and sound progress are are best, proceeding at snail’s pace.

Discounting and discarding what has gone before in terms of acquired organisational knowledge is not wise. It leads to organisations going around and around and around in circles

GREEN ANTS – WHEREFORE ARE YOU?

There used to be green ants aplenty in the NT. They were everywhere. They had nests in vines and trees and proliferated the Northern Suburbs of Darwin. They could bite and it never paid to disturb their nests in any wanton manner. However, they were the best of agents when it came to fertilising flowers. I relied on them to look after flowers which preceded passion fruits and various tropical plants in our yard.

Then they disappeared. That disappearance happened suddenly about ten years ago. They are no more around our suburbs. Where have they gone? I have asked an no-one knows.

What I DO know is that green ants have become a delicacy. They are central to an indigenous industry that has them appearing in gin, cheese, a variety of spreads and other delicacies. A television program showed collection of green ants as being all about knocking their nesting colonies from trees, bagging and taking them away for processing.

This begs the question. Are green ants on the wild being replaced or are their numbers being decimated? Given the fact that they are being reduced in number to feed an ever voracious niche market in food and drink preparation, it is not too premature to ask whether this species will become extinct in the Northern Territory.

CAPITAL WORKS COSTS TO GOVERNMENT

Can someone please help me understand what has been an ongoing and quite everlasting conundrum to my thinking. There are a couple of components to my query.

1. Why are capital works programs for the construction of school become almost exponentially inflated in cost terms. Only 10 – 15 years ago, a new school could be supplied and fitted out for no more than $10 – $ 12 million. Now, a few short years later, that cost has doubled and then some. Construction costs for government funded projects like schools have increased exponentially

Why? Do unreasonable profit margins play a part in this cost escalation?

2. Why in a capital works context are there seemingly two sets of quotes, one for government and another for private supply?

A number of years ago, a quote for a school building was accepted by government for $250,000. At the same time at the same school the school council sought a quote for a support services building. That was supplied by a different firm for a building that was of approximately the same dimension as the building quoted to government.

That quote was for $75,000.

When I queried the difference with a senior government minister, I was told that in effect, “that’s just the way it is”.

Why? Can this change?re

I firmly believe that a sense of hopelessness about the future is contributing to the shroud of gloom settling on and in the minds of far too many young people. Suicide can be a way of escaping the bleakness of a confronting outlook about what lies ahead.

So often the future looks to be kaleidoscopic at best and maybe a black hole at the worst end of depressed moods. Hope about a better are more decent way forward is a prospect that seems to dangle from a very thin thread.

The way in which young people view the world is hardly helped by the depth of confusion into which it is being thrust by politicans and many organisational gurus whose concern is with ‘here and now’ short term policies.

Another issue for me, is the influence of social media on the thinking, actions and reactions of young people. Without doubt, a great deal of the social media essence plays on the minds of young people. This ranges from cruel comments and character stripping levied by callous comment, to the macabre influence of the far too many hideous online games. Games that devalue life and highlight in the taking of lives of the characters in the game. The crossover that can occur from imagination to reality is not hard to envisage.

What price the future?

HORRIFIC AGED CARE STORIES

THE Royal Commission into Aged Care will confirm that cares for the aged in homes is in a dreadful place in Australia. My feeling is that having aged care connected with the private sector listed on the stock exchange, immediately fills me with suspicion. If the motive is profit and shareholder benefit, then what price the care!

I understand that some patients take a lot of management, especially those whose dementia and deterioration manifests itself in aggressive and abusive behaviour toward staff. But the care overall for everyone has to rise above the levels it seems to have reached.

It seems that those in care homes need the support of family members visiting every day to look after the needs of the elderly. That is not going to happen without family support and patients will be left in useless limbo and static, motionless existence for hour upon hour each day. To aid this passivity by medicating patients is also an alarming thought, if the aim is to induce a zombie like state.

The though of going into aged care fills me with absolute dread. Euthanasia if and when that time comes is a far better option.

There is a spate of property damage being livid against industrial, commercial, retail and businesses in the NT like never before.

This invasion extends to the home front of people’s domiciles and vehicles.

Often (and with perceived justification) magistrates are canned for judicial leniency when dealing with young criminals – many of them recidivist.

Punishments for juveniles and young people in terms of crime against property and people is more than the magistrates issue.

Magistrates, along with the Northern Territory government and the community as a whole has been hogtied by the royal commission into juvenile detention. The commission gave a carte blanc open ticket to offenders because punishments were going to be so minimal.

The commission has been a blight on the Northern Territory. It effectively took away what should be a logical conclusion to the issue because consequences for actions were discounted by the Commission’s recommendations.

Recommendations the Government swore it was put into place.

Crime in Darwin, Palmerston and in fact around the Northern Territory is out of control. It has always been an issue but never more so than now.

It is true to say that crime in the Northern Territory is indeed an epidemic.

Anti-vaxers have been out there preaching their message for a good long time – years in fact. And now we are starting to see the results of their preaching and the extent of their influence. Suddenly we have outbreaks of measles and an urge being placed upon people to attend to vaccinating their children and themselves at all costs. Measles are making their presence felt in some force.

Complacency is a part of the problem, but the influence of the anti vaccination message has also had a negative influence on the way people think and feel. Be it deliberate or by accident, our adherence to vaccination programs has slackened and our children are the sufferers.

I also wonder whether, at some time in the future, as child or children denied vaccination by parents, will turn around and sue those parents for their neglect. Especially if the non-vaccination has wreaked havoc on those children’s lives.

Consider also this juxtaposition. Many parents who are anti -vaxers, have the benefits of immunity because when they were children, THEIR parents saw to it that they were vaccinated.

Doesn’t make a lot of sense, does it!!

ROYAL COMMISSION COSTS ARE HORRENDOUS

Put it down to me being a simple old man doesn’t understand complexity, but I cannot see why Royal commissions cost what they do!

The recent experience in the Northern Territory with the Royal Commission into Juvenile Detention cost north of $70 million. The outcomes from that commission are such that I’m almost inclined to think that with in the few months The report will be forgotten and put away in the filing cabinet along with hundreds of other commission reports from around Australia.

I question the veracity of the need for commissions to happen on a lot of occasions. Now on again, one gets milage out of changes in society but those “successful“ commissions are rare .

And now there is a proposition for a Royal Commission into Disability and the disability industry. That commission is going to cost well over $500 million?!

As an old person, I would suggest that many of the issues that take a commission to look at – with the outcomes often being only a reinstatement of the problem – could be overcome by small groups of people applying commonsense to issues.

Commissions are too often seen as a palliative and conscience soothing sop. The Australian mentality when it comes to commissions is well and truly over the top.

GRAVY TRAIN

The other point that concerns me about Royal commissions and costs is the way they are becoming an absolute gravy train for those connected with their operation.

I am generally excepting public servants from this because their role has them doing commission work as a part and parcel of normal salaried positions. However, many of those public servants pick up big slabs of extra money through overtime requirements.

The amount of money extracted by commissioners and by huge numbers of legal staff by way of recompense and fee costs is mind blowing! Huge costs are added to the budgets of governments because of our preoccupation “by habit” with royal commissions.

It is not going to far to suggest that while on the one hand Royal Commissions feather of the nests of those directly connected with their operation, on the other, they are major contributors to Australia’s debt burden.

BRING EUTHANASIA BACK TO THE NT

The Northern Territory Voluntary Euthanasia Bill of 1997 was one of the most enlightened and visionary pieces of legislation ever passed by our Assembly. It’s overturning in the Federal Parliament by the Kevin Andrews/Tony Bourke bill was both callous and cruelly indifferent. For the federal parliament to pass this bill of recission was a denial of Territory rights.

Over time a significant number of people with terminal illnesses have been robbed of natural justice. Many have been forced to endure untoward suffering in their final weeks and months of life.

Interestingly, Victoria and now New South Wales are moving in the direction of their own state legislation that embraces euthanasia.

It is to be hoped that the David Littlejohn initiative to allow the Territory to re-engage on the issue is successful. Should that be the case, my hope would be that a bill encompassing euthanasia would be re-introduced into the Northern Territory parliament and and passed. That would reinstate an entitlement savagely stripped away by Canberra 21 years ago.

Ia a following post I will share my letter to Kevin Andrews on the subject.

Graeme Sawyer’s column ‘Toad war looms’ (NT Sunday Territorian 17/2/19) should serve as a wake up call to all who are in cabe toad areas. Mr Sawyer warns that cane toads, a scourge for the past 20years, are again on the move and could severely impact upon our lives.

Cane toads were a threatening menace until Frogwatch took a hand in devising control measures. The organisation’s effectiveness at toadbusting, helped with toad control. Sawyer, Frogwatch NT’s Coordinator, was recognised for his concern in 2014, when awarded a Pride of Australia medal for Community Service.

The CLP government’s decision, when in office, to remove funding from Frogwatch was not wise. When funding was discontinued, actioning Minister Bess Price was reported as suggesting that cane toads were no more an affliction than flies.

The loss of CLP government support stretched Frogwatch NT to a point where it’s contribution was placed under threat. Everything Frogwatch does is totally voluntary. It would be in our ecological and community interests for this organisation to be financially supported.

Local government should pick up the baton on this issue. The City of Darwin, Palmerston and Litchfield Councils should allocate an annual amount – my suggestion is $15,000 each a year – to Frogwatch. The NT Government should contribute $50 000 by way of an annual grant. This would restore important funding and encourage continued vigilance, educational programs and research against toads.

Without support, Frogwatch will be limited in what can be done about toad control.

A normal wet season will bring cane toads upon us all with a vengeance. We will quickly realise they cannot be brushed aside like flies.