Leftist leader defies unions

LABOR leader Kevin Rudd has further distanced his party from its union base with an industrial relations policy that restricts the right to strike and limits unfair dismissal protection. On the day that ACTU secretary Greg Combet admitted he was considering standing as a federal Labor candidate, Mr Rudd outlined Labor's new direction in a major speech to the National Press Club. Chief among the changes, a Labor government for the first time will require secret ballots before strike action, and will outlaw strike pay.

Unfair dismissal protection will be restored for some but not all of the 3.5 million workers who lost their coverage under the Howard Government's Work Choices laws. Australian Workplace Agreements (AWAs) will still be scrapped but Mr Rudd ruled out a return to state-based industrial relations regimes, saying he would create a uniform, national IR system for the private sector. "Industrial disputes are serious. They hurt workers, they hurt businesses, they can hurt families and communities, and they certainly hurt the economy," Mr Rudd said. "There can be no going back to the industrial culture of an earlier age."

Under the new policy, bosses with fewer than 15 staff will still be able to sack employees for any reason if they have worked for the company for less than a year. For businesses employing more than 15 people, staff will only be able to claim unfair dismissal if they have worked there for six months or more. Under current Work Choices laws, businesses with less than 100 workers can sack them at any time.

Unions say they want more details before they commit to supporting the changes, while the New South Wales Government has already said it won't hand over its industrial relations regime to the commonwealth. Workplace Relations Minister Joe Hockey said the changes would be a dagger to the heart of business......

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Tasmanian hospital worker protests over appalling care

And the only response is buck-passing

A WORKER at the coalface of the Royal Hobart Hospital has slammed conditions in Tasmania's biggest Emergency Department. Noreen Le Mottee has broken ranks to write to RHH chief Craig White, emergency boss Dr Tony Lawler, Premier Paul Lennon and political leaders about bed closures.

As a triage clerk, she works on the front line dealing with patients and distressed families. "It is disheartening to arrive at work night after night only to find the waiting room full of sick and understandably irate patients who have been waiting up to eight hours to be seen by a doctor," she wrote. "Too often these are category 3 (urgent) patients who should be seen within 30 minutes according to the national standard."

Health Minister Lara Giddings said emergency pressures had got worse and blamed Federal Government under-funding. Mrs Le Mottee's March 27 letter has been released by the State Liberals, who said they asked for a response before going public. Her concerns included:

"As I write there are 10 patients awaiting beds, the request for one submitted 10 hours ago. "My own and other staff's frustration and embarrassment ... is nothing compared to the pain and anguish suffered by the patients. "With no ED cubicles ... no option but for patients to remain on their ambulance trolleys. "Patients are waiting because the department becomes bed-blocked when other patients cannot be sent to a ward. "I feel extremely angry knowing that Ward 1BN, some 30 beds, has been closed since before Christmas ... it must be addressed urgently before the situation worsens with the onset of winter."

Mrs Le Mottee said yesterday she would not speak further and that her letter "said it all". Category 3 includes severe illness, people with head injuries but conscious, major bleeding from cuts, major fractures, persistent vomiting or dehydration.

Liberal health spokesman Brett Whiteley said Mrs Le Mottee had still not heard from anyone apart from the Liberals. Ms Giddings said the Howard Government's neglect meant Tasmanians were finding it harder to get health care and the results were showing up in all public hospitals. Australian Nursing Federation secretary Neroli Ellis said there were 34 beds closed.

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The latest excuse for not building dams

This is a pathetic bit of propaganda below. The extra cost and use of resources involved in supplying tank water to every household would be HUGE. And don't Greenies claim we are using too many resources already? Every tank has an associated electric pump to make the water accessible so imagine the extra electicity usage of a million such pumps being turned off and on all the time!

PEOPLE living in Sydney and Brisbane get the best value from their water tanks, a report has found, with the rainfall patterns of those cities favouring individual household collection. But the initial cost of buying a tank remains high, the report's survey of 20 tank suppliers found, with a two-kilolitre tank costing an average of $2788 and a 20-kilolitre tank costing $4909.

The report, by the National Water Commission, said water collected in tanks was more expensive than that provided by utilities but it was becoming more cost-effective. On top of the initial price, people had to budget for repairs and cleaning.

The report found that tanks helped households lower their water bills and there were a number of potential benefits that could not be priced. These included "mitigating the effects of water restrictions on [owners'] lifestyle, amenity and property values; improving the taste of water in areas of poor water quality; and a sense of community mindedness". About 17 per cent of households have rainwater tanks, with many state governments offering rebates and requiring their inclusion in new developments.

The report was critical of water utilities' assessments of water tanks, saying they had not presented them "in such a positive light, concluding that tanks are generally less cost-efficient and energy-efficient than many other water supply solutions". The report was also critical of government advertising campaigns. It said they needed to be "more transparent in evaluating the cost-effectiveness of their own programs to encourage rainwater tanks, and more up-front with taxpayers and consumers about the costs and benefits of the subsidies provided".

Sydney and Brisbane consistently recorded the highest amounts of water captured and used, compared with Adelaide, Melbourne and Perth. The report said tanks in the two cities compared favourably with dams because many households were closer to the coast where rainfall was more frequent. This had resulted in a "green drought", where dam levels continued to drop despite reasonable rain along the coast. The report suggested people should consider the type of rainfall in their area before installing a tank. Timing of rainfall was more important than quantity.

The report, by Marsden Jacob Associates, found the average five-kilolitre tank should provide 71 kilolitres of water during an average year. Roof size was an important factor in rain capture. A separate report by the same consultants found that if rainwater tanks were installed in 5 per cent of households a year the need for a desalination plant in Sydney could be delayed until 2026. That report, commissioned by environment groups, found installing water tanks in 5 per cent of homes in Sydney, Melbourne and south-east Queensland would provide as much additional water as planned desalination plants in Sydney and on the Gold Coast and the first stage of the Traveston Dam on the Mary River.

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ECONOMY COMES FIRST: AUSTRALIA REJECTS CARBON EMISSIONS TARGETS

Australian Prime Minister John Howard on Friday reiterated his opposition to targets for cutting the greenhouse gas emissions that cause global warming. Speaking to reporters after meeting with state government leaders in Canberra, Howard said he had rejected a call to set a target of reducing Australia's emissions by 60 per cent. "We were unwilling, for reasons I have stated publicly, to commit to a particular target because of the possible consequences of that on the economy," the prime minister said.

The Howard government has come under pressure to join every other developed country other than the United States and sign the Kyoto Protocol on curbing climate change. Howard maintains that joining any international scheme to abate climate change would disproportionately affect Australia because it's the world's biggest coal exporter and relies on coal for over 80 per cent of electricity generation.

He rejects Kyoto because it doesn't include China, India and other developing countries in the first-round effort to cut greenhouse gas emissions. Howard said he would fund a Climate Change Adaptation Centre in Canberra to help prepare the country for warmer weather, less rainfall and rising sea levels.

FULL STORY here




Killers lurk in spa bath

THERE could be a killer lurking in your spa, and the best way of slaying it and its lethal compadres is simple, effective and very cheap. It's elbow grease.

This week Queensland Health sent out a notification that two visitors to a Gold Coast resort had been diagnosed with legionnaires disease - which they had contracted after using the resort's spa bath.

It makes sense that the warm, moist environment inside the filters and pipes of spa baths and pools would make the perfect place for bugs such as legionnaires pneumophilia to set up home and procreate. Australian Medical Association Queensland infectious diseases expert Michael Whitby said the legionella bug was readily found throughout the world, from Antarctica to jet engine oil, but it was most commonly found in water. He said the major outbreaks in Australia, which include a scare at the Yamanto police station in Ipswich in 2005, had been associated with the cooling towers of large buildings that had not been properly maintained. "They have a lot of metal fragments that help legionella to grow, and for legionella to get into your lungs it has to be in very small particle size so you have to actually spray them out of the airconditioning system to breathe them in," Dr Whitby said.

It's this spray, created when water is expelled at high pressure, that can make spas a risk. Queensland Health senior director of population health Linda Selvey said the mist provided a perfect avenue for bugs to make their way into lungs. "The big issue with spas is that the water is warmer so it provides a nice environment for bugs to live in," Dr Selvey said. "Secondly, because you're forcing air through the pipes at reasonably high pressures to get bubbles, you get a mist of water above the spa pool and you actually acquire legionella infection by breathing in the bugs."

Dr Selvey said the best way to prevent infection was to empty spa pools once a month and manually clean the filters and pipes. "With spa pool maintenance it's very important to empty the pool and pull out the filters and with a bit of elbow grease scrub them clean," she said. "And the emptying and cleaning of filters needs to be done once a month."

There are several types of legionella, but the two that occur most commonly here are pneumophilia and longbeachae. Pneumophilia is the type associated with spas and cooling towers, as it produces pneumonia-like symptoms such as a high temperature, coughing and shortness of breath. Longbeachae is found in soil and is the reason behind many potting mixes carrying safety warnings. Both are potential killers.

This year there have been 12 cases of legionnaires disease in Queensland. Legionella is a relatively modern bug, identified in the late 1970s after several delegates from an American Legion conference in Boston fell ill and died shortly after the meeting. While a good scrub is the best way of keeping pipes and filters clean, washing spas out with degreasing solutions is also important to control buildups of body fats, soap residue, oils and scum

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