ICAC? (formerly Lipson Estate - Gillman)

[pushbutton]

9/11

alert alert alert

Looks like I was correct in moving this thread to the pub.

A gentle reminder to people not to visit such depths as tarring a whole population with the same brush and such wild generalisations.

Not sure what that means as I was most definitely not making generalisations or tarring a whole population with the same brush, so I'm genuinely confused about that!

I agree though that this is now totally off topic. If anyone wants to discuss 9/11 maybe start a new thread on that topic and I'd be happy to contribute. Otherwise, I would suggest doing your own research, and using critical evaluation to determine what you think is most likely.

[Will]

9/11

alert alert alert

Looks like I was correct in moving this thread to the pub.

A gentle reminder to people not to visit such depths as tarring a whole population with the same brush and such wild generalisations.

I know I'll sound like Andrew Bolt, but we shouldn't dissuade discussion of certain topics because of a perceived notion that talking about them is "racist".

[pushbutton]

I agree with Will, but at the same time I was not saying anything that I thought anyone might find racist, so I apologise if it appeared that way to anyone.

[monotonehell]

9/11

alert alert alert

Looks like I was correct in moving this thread to the pub.

A gentle reminder to people not to visit such depths as tarring a whole population with the same brush and such wild generalisations.

I know I'll sound like Andrew Bolt, but we shouldn't dissuade discussion of certain topics because of a perceived notion that talking about them is "racist".

I wasn't dissuading discussion. I was reminding people that not all terrorists are Muslim and not all Muslims are terrorists. That kind of thing. Usually this topic gets derailed by someone carelessly doing this.

[pushbutton]

I wasn't dissuading discussion. I was reminding people that not all terrorists are Muslim and not all Muslims are terrorists. That kind of thing. Usually this topic gets derailed by someone carelessly doing this.

I think I see the point you were making now. Of course I agree not all terrorists are muslim and not all muslims are terrorists. Anyway, this is nothing to do with Lipson Estate so I'll leave it there unless anyone wants to start a seperate thread.

[stumpjumper]

Ahem, gentlemen. Back to the Gillman land.

It looks as though Mr Weatherill is clearing the room of anyone who can credibly deny the Weatherill version of events around the Gillman land deal.

Fred Hansen, CEO of RenewalSA, has been sacked by Weatherill and will return to the US. My advice is that our feeble ICAC has no ability to require Mr Hansen back or to compel him to testify.

Raymond J Spencer, the head of SA's Economic Development Board, has also had his appointment terminated by Weatherill. Spencer was pivotal in setting up the deal, exploiting Weatherill's discomfort at losing 6000 Holden jobs by tempting him into the Adelaide Capital Partners' Gillman deal with a claimed 6000 jobs resulting.

Soon the only principals of the deal available will be Stephen Gerlach, Weatherill and Koutsantonis, who are all singing sweetly from the same hymn book.

As to the 6000 jobs, remember Treasurer Foley's claim for Newport Quays? 2000 jobs for the ten years construction then 200 permanent jobs thereafter. Lol. Why does anyone believe these shysters? The government should stick to roads, schools and hospitals, and leave development to those who know what they're doing. If they did, the public would be a lot better for it.

[stumpjumper]

It looks though the Gillman issue is going to be explored in full. The Libs are gathering ammunition to support the push by former valuer-general John Darley for proper disclosure of what looks like a deal done hurriedly as a political fix but which when the dust settled created a monopoly in the formerly competitive waste disposal industry, and on terms incredibly favourable to the monopolists - terms unavailable to several other declared potential buyers who were not approached for competitive offers.

This deal needs to be brought before even our weak-kneed ICAC ASAP.

Considering the press coverage this issue is starting to generate, and the public interest to be served by looking closely at this deal, it might be wise to move the topic back into the metropolitan development forum.

Rau's ridiculous claim in the Australian today (p 18) that the hyper-secretive SA ICAC was better than the TV reality show' that is the NSW ICAC, Rau says, 'where nobody gets prosecuted' could not be farther from the truth.

What a joke, Mr Rau. The NSW ICAC has In fact got plenty of convictions and numerous heads have rolled as we all know from media reports.

It is Rau's dishwater-weak SA imitation ICAC which has failed to date to lay a glove on a single crook, much less get any actual convictions. Rau's ICAC is a waste of time. It has very limited coercive powers, and can basically be lied to or ignored without much penalty. It's a pity we can't refer our government crooks to the NSW ICAC, where at least we might see some action.

As it is, the Labor Party will soon have most of the potential hostile witnesses in the Gillman land scam safely overseas or otherwise paid off or fixed up so that the Foley/Rann legacy of crooked government against the public interest can continue under the new self-seeking, criminally inclined ALP leadership of SA.

[monotonehell]

The Federal Police need a national ICAC branch which covers all states, territories and Federal politicians. So sick of the rot. It's nation wide and across all parties.

[pushbutton]

The Federal Police need a national ICAC branch which covers all states, territories and Federal politicians. So sick of the rot. It's nation wide and across all parties.

That's what happens when you only have elections every few years, and there's only really two parties which have any real potential to form government.

It's not what I call democracy, and we are certainly capable of doing much better. With the technology we have these days there's no reason why we couldn't completely reinvent democracy for the 21st century.

1. Abolish state and local governments. Have just one government for Australia, but still have MPs based in each local area to give representation on local issues. The massive amount of money saved by eliminating duplication of services would enable both taxes and debts to be slashed!

2.Give everyone the right to vote on EVERY government decision (securely online) and if you don't exercise your right on a given issue, your local MP votes for you.

3. No fixed term in government. All MPs / senators remain in power only so long as they have the support of the majority of voters. (That plan needs a lot of fleshing out I know, but it could be done in such a way that it would work).

4. Breaking a promise made publicly to voters would result in automatic, immediate, and permanent expulsion from politics. No second chances!

5. No more lifelong benefits to politicians. Once they leave their job they can look for another, or if they have reached retirement age they can live off their pension / super / savings like the rest of us.

6. Get governments out of things that really don't need to concern them. Focus only on providing essential services in the interests of voters. And provide those services, rather than force us all to pay more by privatising them!

7. Slash wastage of money on unnecessary foreign aid, welfare, and all the many other things they throw our money away on.

[monotonehell]

Pushy, the last thing we want is for the great unwashed to vote on everything. In general people don't know what they need. Most people don't care enough to understand things. Most people who think they understand things, do not. Most people can't think past their self interest, or outside their own experience. Most people are easily lead by the media on hot button non-issues. Further; "the majority rules" is not a just system of government. that's how we end up with theocracies or worse.

In short, total democracy doesn't work because at population levels above the small village, people are not engaged enough in the decisions that need to be made.

Better to have an open and transparent government, stocked with representatives who understand the importance of evidenced based decision making, who can think and plan beyond the election cycle, who understand more than some narrow ideology or mindset, who understand that money is not the only way to measure things, and who aren't just in it to feather their own nest.

Politicians should be pragmatic, thinking, rational, big picture people who have empathy.

Politics has become moribund in this (and other) country(ies). It has been captured by self interest groups and lobbyists. It is spinning in ever decreasing circles, forgetting what it is that it's supposed to be doing. It is not serving our collective futures.

[pushbutton]

Pushy, the last thing we want is for the great unwashed to vote on everything. In general people don't know what they need. Most people don't care enough to understand things. Most people who think they understand things, do not. Most people can't think past their self interest, or outside their own experience. Most people are easily lead by the media on hot button non-issues. Further; "the majority rules" is not a just system of government. that's how we end up with theocracies or worse.

In short, total democracy doesn't work because at population levels above the small village, people are not engaged enough in the decisions that need to be made.

Better to have an open and transparent government, stocked with representatives who understand the importance of evidenced based decision making, who can think and plan beyond the election cycle, who understand more than some narrow ideology or mindset, who understand that money is not the only way to measure things, and who aren't just in it to feather their own nest.

Politicians should be pragmatic, thinking, rational, big picture people who have empathy.

Politics has become moribund in this (and other) country(ies). It has been captured by self interest groups and lobbyists. It is spinning in ever decreasing circles, forgetting what it is that it's supposed to be doing. It is not serving our collective futures.

Good points. I agree on some points and half agree on others. I think we both agree though that a lot could be done to improve on the version of democracy we have at the moment! Well, in theory at least. Trouble is it would take nothing short of a massive public uprising to achieve much, and as you say people just don't care enough to do much. Very sad state of affairs.

[Aidan]

The Federal Police need a national ICAC branch which covers all states, territories and Federal politicians. So sick of the rot. It's nation wide and across all parties.

That's what happens when you only have elections every few years, and there's only really two parties which have any real potential to form government.

It's not what I call democracy, and we are certainly capable of doing much better. With the technology we have these days there's no reason why we couldn't completely reinvent democracy for the 21st century.

1. Abolish state and local governments. Have just one government for Australia, but still have MPs based in each local area to give representation on local issues. The massive amount of money saved by eliminating duplication of services would enable both taxes and debts to be slashed!

Even with good local representation, do you really think the Federal government has would be better at providing local services?

2.Give everyone the right to vote on EVERY government decision (securely online) and if you don't exercise your right on a given issue, your local MP votes for you.

That would only work well if the public ere well informed. But even then there are problems, as there are some things the public must be kept from knowing for security reasons.

3. No fixed term in government. All MPs / senators remain in power only so long as they have the support of the majority of voters. (That plan needs a lot of fleshing out I know, but it could be done in such a way that it would work).

I don't see how!

4. Breaking a promise made publicly to voters would result in automatic, immediate, and permanent expulsion from politics. No second chances!

Who decides what constitutes a broken promise? When? And what should they do if they discover a promise was made on the basis of incorrect information?

5. No more lifelong benefits to politicians. Once they leave their job they can look for another, or if they have reached retirement age they can live off their pension / super / savings like the rest of us.

I can't argue with that!

6. Get governments out of things that really don't need to concern them. Focus only on providing essential services in the interests of voters. And provide those services, rather than force us all to pay more by privatising them!

What services do you regard as essential? Which services do you regard as non essential? Why?

7. Slash wastage of money on unnecessary foreign aid, welfare, and all the many other things they throw our money away on.

How much of our foreign aid is necessary?
Please read this and answer that question again.

[stumpjumper]

Meanwhile the Gillman saga rolls on.

Parliament resumes this week and the Libs are apparently gearing up to give Labor a hard time not only about the deal itself but about the frantic sackings and relocations of personnel that has gone on in relation to the decision under ministerial direction of the RenewalSA board to accept the Adelaide Capital Partners offer for the land, and the subsequent immediate resignation of five of the board members, followed by the immediate gagging of those board members by the government.

The word is that despite the cash and constructivbge loss to the people of SA, and hte creatikon of a monolpoly far into the future for waste disposal, the government line will be:

"This deal is such a fantastic result for the people of SA that we were justified in bending a few boring old conventions to facilitate the deal."

and

"This deal will make us the envy of the big boys in the Eastern states."

[stumpjumper]

The Federal Police need a national ICAC branch which covers all states, territories and Federal politicians. So sick of the rot. It's nation wide and across all parties.

I agree with you, mono. Many crimes cross jurisdictions; they should be covered by an umbrella ICAC.

But we haven't got one - does that mean that we should tolerate white collar crime until we do have a national ICAC? Of course not. We now have an ICAC - let's beef it up so it isn't a waste of time.

As to the Gillman deal, the longer it has to cement itself the harder it will be to unravel if there is shown to be maladministration. The 'hidden dragon' in the deal is decades of a virtual private monopoly on waste disposal in SA. I suspect that is the real prize in the game. Such a monopoly would not only increase the cost of development in the state, but also the cost of any disposal of waste, including by most metropolitan councils. If those costs rise due to a lack of competition among service providers, the question would be why should metropolitan ratepayers underwrite the fortunes of the Gerlach, McMahon and Brown families into the 21st century?

The state government is here to look after the interests of the electorate, not to facilitate the ripping off of the electorate by made-for-the-purpose private entities with clout at ministerial level.

[monotonehell]

Looks like the Greens are also digging now...

Greens win Riverbank documents under freedom-of-information application

The Ombudsman has ruled the South Australian Government should release documents disclosing the Walker Corporation's development plan for the Torrens Riverbank precinct. Greens leader Mark Parnell applied for documents through Freedom of Information more than a year ago, but commercial confidentiality was cited as the reason for withholding them. He is pleased the documents can now be scrutinised, saying they are in the public interest.

"The Riverbank precinct and the area between the Festival Theatre and Parliament House is one of the most important public spaces in Adelaide and that's why it is important for the public to know exactly what deals have been done between the Government and a private developer to allow that area to be developed," he said.

http://www.abc.net.au/news/2014-05-19/g ... oi/5462216


Since this thread has well and truly left the topic of the original post I've moved it to the Pub and renamed it.