The latest school tyranny: Obsessive Principal tries to impose his hangups on little kids

Little children do have a faint but distinctive smell. You can smell it if you walk into any primary school. This principal obviously doesn't like it. The school's website makes a point of not giving the Principal's name but the Education Dept. advises that it is Mr Keith Graham. He should get a job where he does not come in contact with those pesky kids. Kids are harassed enough already with "obesity" campaigns etc without adding this latest hatred of normality to their burdens

Children as young as five have been told to wear deodorant to school -- and re-apply once a day. The edict was in Chatswood Hills State School's June 13 newsletter under the title "personal hygiene".

"Please remind your children that, although it is winter. it is still necessary to apply deodorant in the morning and reapply once during the school-day," the newsletter read. "Aerosols are not permitted but rollon brands are encouraged."

The Albert & Logan News spoke to parents, who found the request "odd" and 'weird", while Queensland University of Technology child psychology lecturer Dr Marilyn Campbell said it was "laughable". Dr Campbell, a teacher for 20 years, was shocked. "I haven't heard of such rubbish in my life," she said. "You have to be joking, asking them to reapply during the day. "I don't need to do that and I doubt children would."

Dr Campbell said she had concerns about anxieties such a request could bring. "Will this lead to pretend shaving for the boys, or make-up for the girls?" she said. "I don't think it is right; totally unnecessary. "It's making (pupils) super clean, restricting them from their normal experience."

An Education Queensland spokeswoman said in a statement that the health and wellbeing of staff and students at all Queensland state schools was the department's priority at all times. "Students wearing deodorant is a parental decision and Education Queensland has no policy enforcing its use," she said. "Schools may become involved if there is an issue related to student hygiene or if the issue is impacting on students' social and emotional development, but this is done at a local level, as the need arises." She said schools may also offer reminders to deal with the issue "holistically and sensitively", so individuals were not singled out.

What did Chatswood Hills State School parents think of the statement requesting them to make sure their children wore deodorant? The Albert & Logan News asked 20 parents if they were "comfortable" or "uncomfortable" with the edict. Fourteen said they were uncomfortable, while six said they were comfortable. Only a few of the parents polled were willing to comment publicly. Mother Ali Richards said she agreed with the advice in the newsletter, but thought the school could have worded it better. "It makes it sound like every kid is smelly -- it is generalising every kid," Ms Richards said. "It is up to the parents to teach kids that stuff, not the school." She said she would not instruct her child to reapply during the day, leaving the decision up to the child.

Parent Mitko Kostovski said he thought the school's request was a "bit weird" "If they (children) do wear it, they won't reapply -- they are too busy playing," Mr Kostovski said. One mother, Jaimie Byrne, said she supported the idea and had no problems with the Chatswood Hills school's request. "It is a good thing I think," Ms Byrne said. "I think it could help the kids to stop some getting bullied if they do have body odour." Ms Byrne said her child, who was in Year 5, was given a hygiene talk, which she understood was more for the comfort of the class.

The article above by DANIEL TANG appeared in the "Albert & Logan News" of Friday, June 27, 2008






Amazing: Global warming questioned on popular TV show

Channel 9s "Sunday" show. Video links at the source given below

The theory of anthropogenic, or man-made, global warming has become an unchallengeable fact, a piece of black letter law almost unique in the world of science.

Proponents of the theory say the time for scientific debate is over. It would irresponsible to fund any further research into counter views on the relationship between elevated levels of carbon dioxide and a rise in temperatures since the mid-1970s.

It's regarded as career suicide for scientists to advocate any counter view of the causes of global warming, let alone deny the orthodox consensus view as adopted by the United Nations' Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change.

However, there is a school of thought that our knowledge of climate systems is as yet insufficient to be so conclusive on the causes of global warming.

Today Sunday examines the political consensus building that has portrayed global warming as the most urgent crisis humankind has ever faced.

Skeptics point to the gaps in the knowledge base and the flaws in the measurement of vital climate and weather data upon which the consensus is based.

Social researchers also highlight the dangers of conducting science as a form of religion, divided into believers and deniers.

They warn that as governments prepare to make expensive policy decisions, such as carbon emissions trading schemes, this consensus may not reflect the best science.

Source. Andrew Bolt comments here




CLIMATE POLICY SPLITS FEDERAL GOVERNMENT

PRESSURE over a new greenhouse gas regime and the looming Garnaut report on emissions trading is fuelling the deepest cabinet divisions over policy and politics since the election of the Rudd Government. Concerns are being aired about the possibility of the Government missing its starting deadline of 2010 for the emissions trading scheme and political backlash over rising costs and compensation for people and businesses affected by the scheme.

As part of the cabinet discussions, consideration is being given to subjecting Australia's entire food production industry - including cattle, sheep, pig and grain growing - to the fulleffects of the new carbon pricing system.

Cabinet and its climate change subcommittee have been sitting every day this week, sometimes almost to midnight, to decide how greenhouse gas producers, including the petrol and agriculture sectors, should be hit with a new carbon price. The cabinet has also been concerned with whether the extremely complex legislation to start an emissions trading scheme can be introduced, as promised in the election, from the middle of 2010.

And as US audiences at the annual Australian American Leadership Dialogue in Washington were told that the Rudd Government could become a "oncer" because of the impact of an emissions trading scheme, cabinet is becoming more pre-occupied with the political backlash over climate change measures. The Australian reported yesterday that union leader Paul Howes and former NSW Labor premier Bob Carr told the Washington meeting that Australia should consider nuclear energy as an option to cut greenhouse gases in 10 to 20 years' time.

Cabinet met again yesterday - after several meetings since last week - to discuss the ETS. Cabinet discussed whether price relief for petrol should be provided through an excise cut and when to include agriculture in the greenhouse gas reduction system. Under an ETS, industries that cannot meet greenhouse gas reduction targets will be forced to buy carbon permits, with the costs likely to be passed on to customers in the form of higher bills for services such as petrol and electricity. For every industry that is made exempt - or is given free carbon credits to continue polluting - the burden for cutting emissions is likely tofall more heavily on other industries.

Parliament has been divided this week over whether petrol should be included in an ETS, with Labor and Coalition accusing each other of internal confusion over the issue.

Kevin Rudd, Wayne Swan and Climate Change Minister Penny Wong have this week reiterated the Government's determination to set up the ETS in 2010 - before the next election. But as complexities of technical measurement - such as livestock emissions - and the political ramifications for industry exemptions and compensation for consumers grow, there is concern the deadline may not be achievable. Yesterday, the Prime Minister was personally confronted on talkback radio with demands to explain the ETS and to take action on petrol prices.

The Opposition continued to concentrate on the impact on petrol prices of an ETS, which will set a price for carbon that will push up costs for energy-intensive industries, such as coal-fired electricity generation and aluminium, and transport if petrol is included.

Mr Rudd, the Treasurer and Senator Wong all refused yesterday to give any detail on the design of the ETS and all distanced themselves from the greenhouse gas emissions report the Government has commissioned from Ross Garnaut, which will be released next Friday. Senior government ministers fear the Garnaut report will adopt far more extreme proposals on cutting greenhouse gas emissions than the Government intends to publish in its own interim "green" paper in three weeks' time, inflaming public concern about threats to jobs and higher costs.

On petrol prices, Mr Rudd told the radio station 3AW that "if you act on climate change and you act on the price of carbon through an emissions-trading scheme, it does effect the price of energy and the price of oil". "The key question is, on the way through, how do you best support and compensate working families, working Australians, pensioners, carers, to deal with any price adjustment," the Prime Minister said. He said petrol costs were being considered, but would not say how relief would be delivered to motorists.

Senator Wong said the ETS would be introduced in 2010 because it was an election commitment. But it would not be introduced "regardless of cost". Part of the Government's task was to convince people that higher prices caused by the introduction of a carbon price would mean lower costs in the long term. "Taking early and responsible action will be more cost effective in the long run for Australia," she said. The minister said Professor Garnaut was "an important contributor to government thinking" and "an esteemed economist with a strong history of reform" but he was independent. "Just as he's independent so too the Government has to make its decisions," she said. "This is hard economic reform."

Some of the cabinet discussions concerned the issue of which agricultural sectors should be included in the ETS, and whether they should be put into the first or second phase of the new system. Mr Swan refused to talk about details of the cabinet discussions on the ETS, and said there would be a discussion of all issues related to an emissions-trading system. The Treasurer ruled out calls from Mr Howes, the Australian Workers Union national secretary, and Mr Carr to consider nuclear energy. Asked yesterday about the possibility of Labor embracing nuclear power, Mr Swan said: "No, a capital N-O".

Opposition Leader Brendan Nelson said yesterday the Coalition continued to support a 5c cut in petrol excise. The Coalition's environment spokesman Greg Hunt said the Opposition had set out to establish a petrol price policy in relation to an ETS that meant there was "no net rise in new petrol taxes".

Source




"Innovative" ambulance computer system fails yet again

We were orginally told it just needed oiling (or some such)

THE statewide rollout of the Emergency Services computer system has been put on hold after it went offline for a fourth time. Again ambulance and fire officers were forced to write incoming jobs on a whiteboard.

Yesterday morning's crash was the worst to date. All but two ambulance and fire communication centres were left without their computers for more than two hours, from before 3am until after 5am. Three previous system failures were put down to human error and the Department of Emergency Services said "early advice" was that human error was again to blame.

However Emergency Services Minister Neil Roberts said the system's rollout to the remaining Central and South-eastern regions would be "put on hold" pending advice from the system's American supplier, who had been asked to analyse yesterday's outage. "I am advised that triple zero telephone and emergency services radio communications were not affected by this incident. Communication centre staff dispatched ambulance and fire crews using a manual back-up system," Mr Roberts said.

Fire officers have been highly critical of the new system, which they say has only been "half implemented" by the department making it ineffective. "The system is meant to locate the closest vehicle to an incident and dispatch that vehicle. But they're yet to install the automatic vehicle locaters in our trucks so it can do this," an officer said.

He said vehicles from two or three stations away were being sent to jobs instead and even driving past these manned stations on the way. "The most ridiculous example we had was when the computer tried to dispatch a vehicle from Capalaba station to a job on the Sunshine Coast," the officer said.

Fire communications centre staff have also raised concerns about screen freezes in the new system which can take valuable seconds off a job. "You're trying to talk to a coms centre operator and they're like, `Oh, wait a minute, the screen's frozen'. It happens every time," the officer said.

Mr Roberts said the "state of the art" computer-aided dispatch system was in use in communication centres across the world, including Australia and all of New Zealand's emergency services. "DES remains confident that its full implementation will result in improved response to calls for service from the community," he said.

Source





Through other eyes

UNLV basketball player Kendall Wallace is providing occasional postcards from the team's six-game tour of Australia. An installment below. His comment about prices being much higher in Australia than in the USA echoes my own experiences. The official exchange rate for the US and Australian dollar is about 1 to 1 so that is not the problem. Taxes, import duties and labour laws are probably the main problem. And Australia does not have cheap Hispanic labour -- JR

On Thursday, we went to the Sydney Opera House, which may be the most famous structure in the world. There was an architectural contest to see who could come up with the best design. The man who won pushed the limits of architecture. The plan originally was supposed to cost $2 million, but the project ended up costing more than $100 million.

To raise the extra money, the city of Sydney had a lottery, which raised it easily. The tour we took was informative and interesting.

The basketball games finally have started, and, after getting that first game out of the way, our team has beaten a solid team from Illawarra (on Friday), and (Saturday) we beat a professional team from West Sydney called the Razorbacks. They had only one person under 6 feet 5 inches. It was a tough comeback win.

Over the last couple of days, there has not been anything planned for the team, so we have been at some of the cool places around the town.

We found a cool bowling alley and ultra-lounge in a place called Darling Harbour. We went over there for a couple of hours and had some competitive games of bowling, with a whole lot of trash talking.

One thing about being in Australia is that nothing is cheap here, and you will not find a meal under $7. Not even at McDonald's, which seems to be popular here. McDonald's doesn't have a "dollar menu" here. In the U.S., you can get a double cheeseburger for a dollar; in Australia, a double cheeseburger is $3.75. I have tried to save my money, but I've realized that isn't possible here.

Source