BF2S Forums Australian politics thread.

American politics would be of no interest to anyone if they didn't keep starting wars.

I can usually find many more entertaining things tbh

-Whiteroom- wrote:

Jaekus wrote:

I can usually find many more entertaining things tbh

eleven bravo wrote:

-Whiteroom- wrote:

Jaekus wrote:

I can usually find many more entertaining things tbh

Bitch bitch bitch bitch bitch. Can mining interests please just shut the fuck up? Even if just for a week.

- Clive Palmer bitches about unfair treatment from FFA and withdraws his team from A League to start his own. Presumably with Blackjack and hookers.

- Clive Palmer bitches endlessly about unfair taxes for the mining industry and the carbon/mining taxes. Revealed not to be paying taxes anyway. Dickhole.

- Nathan Tinkler equally bitchy with FFA withdraws his team from the A League. Ty notices that neither of their teams made the play-offs.

- Whole mining industry moaning about unfair treatment. BHP Billiton closes small coal producer in Central Qld to show just how much it is hurting, (it should be noted that the Norwich Park mine is being closed because of the effects of flooding and a workers strike, not anything the Government is doing.) Meanwhile the mining industry continues to enjoy some of the most liberal regulations and lowest tax rates in the developed world.

They're digging up Australia and rolling around in money - but they can't reach a fair bargaining agreement with their own workers, they can't contribute more to the towns they end up destroying, they can't work to mitigate the effects of the two-speed economy and skills shortage they created, they can't put Clive Palmer into a Hessian sack and weigh it down with rocks, they can't deal with the same flooding that every other industry has had to cope with, they can't invest and adapt to absorb the costs of things like the carbon tax, (which is the bloody point of the thing.)

Gillard should tell them to shut the fuck up. Of course she won't given her rise to power was paved by the Labor Party's concern with how Kev was ticking off the mining industry. And that the fact that her Government is impotent. Mining really has Australia by the balls.

Labor can't do much when it has to compromise with the independents.

Ty wrote:

Bitch bitch bitch bitch bitch. Can mining interests please just shut the fuck up? Even if just for a week.

- Clive Palmer bitches about unfair treatment from FFA and withdraws his team from A League to start his own. Presumably with Blackjack and hookers.

- Clive Palmer bitches endlessly about unfair taxes for the mining industry and the carbon/mining taxes. Revealed not to be paying taxes anyway. Dickhole.

- Nathan Tinkler equally bitchy with FFA withdraws his team from the A League. Ty notices that neither of their teams made the play-offs.

- Whole mining industry moaning about unfair treatment. BHP Billiton closes small coal producer in Central Qld to show just how much it is hurting, (it should be noted that the Norwich Park mine is being closed because of the effects of flooding and a workers strike, not anything the Government is doing.) Meanwhile the mining industry continues to enjoy some of the most liberal regulations and lowest tax rates in the developed world.

They're digging up Australia and rolling around in money - but they can't reach a fair bargaining agreement with their own workers, they can't contribute more to the towns they end up destroying, they can't work to mitigate the effects of the two-speed economy and skills shortage they created, they can't put Clive Palmer into a Hessian sack and weigh it down with rocks, they can't deal with the same flooding that every other industry has had to cope with, they can't invest and adapt to absorb the costs of things like the carbon tax, (which is the bloody point of the thing.)

Gillard should tell them to shut the fuck up. Of course she won't given her rise to power was paved by the Labor Party's concern with how Kev was ticking off the mining industry. And that the fact that her Government is impotent. Mining really has Australia by the balls.

Mining companies truly are fucking Australia, short term and long term.

Interested in this Sydney Morning Herald article about Australian jobs being moved to New Zealand - seemingly countering the Brain Drain fears over everyone in NZ leaving for greener pastures in across the Tasman.

The jobs are manufacturing or low-skilled jobs generally. Call centres, tomato sauce bottling, that sort of thing. Minimum wage. Crap jobs. The reasons are self evident to the unions - and true - lower NZ wages, and lower-value NZ dollar means a significant decrease to a company's cost. It's something the Key Government here seems very proud about which I despise. PM John Key and Deputy PM Bill English argue that it's a good thing that NZ workers are paid shit-all because it lures these companies to New Zealand. True enough I suppose. I don't think it's something to be boasting about though, I personally don't want to live in a country that prides itself on cheap labour because such countries only end up being exploited. Key just wants to reaffirm NZ has a nation of blue-collar under-employed factory workers because that's a demographic that generally votes for his National Party. What a twat.

Meanwhile all the intelligent people are still heading overseas to better themselves. (I still count as intelligent though because I already work for an Australian company. )

Thing is I don't agree with Key's assessment that we need to compete with Australia in how much we pay workers. We could equal it in NZ dollars and still have a dollar-for-dollar advantage. Not that I'm arguing for that but an improvement would be nice.

But even then, (and this is my main point,) Australia has a massive disadvantage compared with NZ in its work force in that they are over-represented by unions. I work in the Australian media and I am constantly amazed by how much sway and influence unions have in politics and in business - and how poorly they represent their own members. Unions choose to strike at the worst possible time for everyone involved so they can maintain their own importance. Look at the recent closure of the Norwich Park mine; flooding, a declining coal market and a union aware of this deciding that it would strike - and over an enterprise agreement, something that they have a role to sort out without impacting negatively on workers. A minute ago I was covering a news story on the SA Ambulance Employees Association threatening strike action over payroll issues! Are strikes the only tool they have at their disposal?

Credit with credit's due, the unions have had a role in ensuring that Australian workers have the pay rates they enjoy but in the current economic situation they are doing far more harm than good. I'd say it is mostly because of the eternal union fear that they are becoming irrelevant. At the moment the best thing they could do is lie low, keep track of things and ensure they are acting the best interests of their members, not their executives.

It's all very well blaming the high Australian dollar and Australia's high health-and-safety standards, (no higher than NZ by the way,) but lets face it; pushing for undeserved and unnecessary pay increases and holidays during times where industries are struggling is not smart. Striking for each and every issue is not smart either - not to mention it also paints Australian workers in a less-than-positive light.

That being said, NZ really needs to pick ups its game - it's getting embarrassing. We've always liked to consider ourselves as Australia's Canada but it seems were becoming more Australia's Mexico. Nice one John Key. You twat.

This rambling made possible by news websites refusing to allow comments on certain news articles.

Most of them, yes, but every time I want to make an incredibly observant, intelligent and articulate comment on a news article I find it's one they have chosen to not be commented on. Obviously my only course of action is to come here and bore you with an overwritten mess instead.

Ty wrote:

The jobs are manufacturing or low-skilled jobs generally. Call centres, tomato sauce bottling, that sort of thing.

Low-level value addition is the bedrock of the economy, shame so few people understand it.

He's a dumbarse.

Sick of Aussie budget talk. I get it, everyone wants a free lunch and to be rewarded for... I dunno, existing I guess, and those that didn't get pandered to are a little sad. World's smallest violin folks, world's smallest violin.

Be interesting to hear Abbott's budget response speech. I hope he has something better than "Hey, you know that proposed 1% business tax cut we fought tooth and nail to end? Yeah, now that you've scrapped that we actually think it was a good thing".

And people are buying this rhetoric. I am constantly amazed at shit's apparent inability to stick to this guy.

Gotta say businesses are not painting themselves in the most sympathetic light. They're no better, they were supporting Abbott's call to scrap the tax cut, now they're saying they can't live without it. I think that realistically Labor realised that nothing they would do would get them to quit suckling on Abbott's teat so they said "fuck 'em" and decided to pander to their own low-and-middle-income-families-crowd-who-might-actually-vote-for-them-but-probably-won't. Fair play really.

That's why the inquiry into the media announced a while back after the News of the World thing was a good idea and why interested parties were campaigning so hard to exclude media ownership from the investigation. Like that wasn't the point. I'm sure Gina Rinehart just wanted to get into newspapers because she thinks it's a growth industry.