Blatant attempt by Federal cops to evade their duties in union corruption matter

On Monday 4 August 2014 I made this report to the Commissioner of the Australian Federal Police.

The key points were:

*    The AFP enforces the Statutory Declarations Act 1958

*    On 24 March 2014 Mr Wayne Forno swore an apparently false Statutory Declaration, stating the TWU NSW Branch had 43,835 members - by his admission he knew at the time it had 17,300.

This morning I received this letter from Superintendent Mark McIntyre of the AFP Crime Operations department.



The Fair Work Commission has no enforcement role in relation to policing the Statutory Declarations Act 1958 - it also has no role in policing murder, rape or armed robbery.   Police prosecute a range of Australians every day - normally without regard to the status their job might confer on them.   That is the duty of police.   Their role is to detect offences and bring offenders before the courts. 

Joel Silver makes some very good points in this paper submitted to the Royal Commission into Union Corruption and Governance, summed up in this quote:

"While there is some merit in their separate registration and regulation, there is nothing so unique or complicated about trade unions as to justify investigations into them being handled by a specialist agency, let alone to the exclusion of ordinary law enforcement. Agencies including the Australian Federal Police and
Australian Crime Commission have experience in such investigations (of which the General Manager Fair Work Australia was shown to be lacking), and whose impartiality is not as easily called into question. Such agencies should have responsibility for all and
any future investigations"

I note that the Fair Work Commission's GM Bernadette O'Neill is yet to report any inquiry or investigation into this matter.

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Energy company starts fracking in NSW -- to Greenie protests

The NSW government approved controversial coal seam gas exploration at Gloucester before receiving proof that chemicals involved were safe for human health, throwing into doubt claims it is clamping down on the contentious industry.

It comes as protests at the site became heated this week, including allegations that a protester tried to hold the head of a security guard under water during a scuffle. Protesters described the claim as "exaggerated".

Police charged two protesters on Monday after they allegedly accessed the AGL site illegally. About 20 protesters reportedly blockaded the entrance to the site on Tuesday, but were kept out by a large police and private security guard presence.

AGL's Waukivory pilot project, south of Gloucester, has emerged as the latest front in community opposition to coal seam gas, following fierce protests around Narrabri and Lismore.

Fairfax Media has learned that the NSW Office of Coal Seam Gas signed off on the latest stage of the project before receiving lab test results confirming the chemicals to be used were safe to human health and the environment.

The AGL pilot involves the controversial process of hydraulic fracturing or "fracking", which forces gas to the surface by pumping water, sand and chemicals underground.

There are fears it can cause gas leaks, damage aquifers and pollute water with toxic chemicals.

Companies must demonstrate that all fracking additives comply with Australian drinking water guidelines, by having them tested by a certified laboratory.

The NSW government approved AGL's fracking work on August 6, despite officials not receiving the test results until more than two months later, on October 23.

A spokesman for Resources Minister Anthony Roberts said AGL was required to identify the chemicals to be used prior to approval being granted, but did not have to run tests on the chemicals before that date. The company was "compliant with its obligations", he said.

Greens MP Jeremy Buckingham said allowing AGL to start fracking before its chemicals were scientifically deemed compliant "defies common sense" and was at odds with community expectations.

AGL says the pilot will test the amount of gas produced from wells and provide data about the area's geology and groundwater. 

A company spokeswoman said test results were supplied to authorities before fracking occurred and AGL had complied with government policy.  She said the results confirmed no banned substances were detected in its hydraulic fracturing fluids.

AGL reportedly required police escorts to move fracking equipment onto the site last week.

The spokeswoman said based on information from its private security team on Monday, "protesters were aggressive" and threw punches at guards who were attempting to prevent protesters from accessing the site.

"In one incident a security guard fell into the river and a protester allegedly tried to hold his head under water. A third security guard suffered a cut to his arm," she said.

A spokesman for Mr Roberts said the minister met with concerned community members from Gloucester last week and authorities would "make regular inspections of the [AGL] fracking sites to ensure compliance".

The department "has and will continue to ensure a detailed level of transparency" around coal seam gas applications, he said.

In a report into the industry released last month, NSW Chief Scientist Mary O'Kane said the government should "establish a world-class regime" for coal seam gas extraction and ensure good communication about the industry's activities.

Laws should be supported by a transparent and effective compliance and reporting regime, she said.

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Criticism of Aborigines to be banned?

And what will count as "discrimination"?

A BIPARTISAN joint parliamentary committee believes the constitution could be changed to explicitly prohibit racial discrimination against indigenous Australians.

THE government is committed to a referendum to recognise indigenous Australians, however when it will be and what it will look like is uncertain.

The committee on constitutional recognition for aboriginal and Torres strait islanders, chaired by indigenous MP Ken Wyatt, has released three options to include indigenous people in the legal document.

Two include the prohibition of racial discrimination - a recommendation of the government's expert panel in 2012.

It's something opposition leader Bill Shorten also wants, however Prime Minister Tony Abbott has indicated he's not keen for discrimination to be included in the debate.

Both options change the constitution to state: "The parliament shall, subject to this constitution, have the power to make laws for peace, order or good government of the Commonwealth with respect to Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islanders".

They then state the government can not discriminate on the basis of race, unless the laws are made for the purpose of overcoming disadvantage.

The committee recommends a third option for constitutional change which gives the government powers to make laws with respect to indigenous Australians.

It wants the repeal of Section 25 which allows states to ban people from voting based on their race and section 51(xxvi) to remove any reference to race.

The referendum should also be held on or shortly after the 2016 election.

Mr Abbott has all but ruled out a referendum before 2017, saying it must be bipartisan to be successful and an election would make that near impossible in 2016.

Mr Wyatt told parliament that national, active leadership must be shown on this issue.  "It's time to take this step further," he said on Monday.

The committee agreed for the most part with the government's expert panel in 2012 - concurring with all but one major recommendation.

The committee doesn't believe indigenous languages need to be included in the constitution as recommended by the expert panel.

It's final report is due in June next year.

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Pickering on Gough

I used to say that I would go to Margie’s funeral to pay my respects but I would go to Gough’s funeral to make sure he was dead. Of course that is quite uncalled for and in extremely bad taste now that he has gone.

But to be honest, he disliked me intensely and I detested him. As the Left today will recall with sombre reverence his many legacies, I will remember him for the irreparable damage he caused this nation, damage that will continue to last generations.

I recall his economic illiteracy, the unwavering belief in himself, his disdain of mere mortals and his self-acclaimed intellectualism, it was painful. Had he been competent in the slightest, it was a pain I could have endured.

Gough, with his corrupt Cabinet, was unable to serve one complete term of Office and what he did serve was utter mayhem.

The Left decry his sacking but Gough, bereft of supply, was quite prepared to go down in flames and take the nation with him.

The ensuing general election was an exercise in what the Australian people really thought of him.

Crean, who printed money like there was no tomorrow. Connor, who tried to borrow even more from a shady loan shark called Khemlani. Cairns, the unabashed communist root rat. Attorney General Murphy, who escaped jail by dying. Grassby the drug lord who dressed with the light off.

Just one example of Gough’s economic empty headedness was his grand idea to provide housing for young Labor voting couples who could not break into the housing market (much like today). He dumped a borrowed $500 million (a lot in those days) into the banking sector at a ridiculously low rate of interest.

Instead of assisting young couples, the banks predictably lent the money to existing home-owners who upgraded to bigger, better homes. Why not? After all they had the security in their current homes the banks wanted. Not one new house was built and the resultant increased demand on existing houses put them even further out of reach of the young couples, who were supposed to vote Labor, but in the end they didn’t.

But Gough’s real crown of thorns was his Schools’ Commission and his fixation with phonetic spelling. The real legacy left by Gough is the kids of today who cannot spell, or construct a sentence.

But never mind, Gillard’s Labor fixed that with a multi-billion Gonski scheme that will do nothing to educate teachers, but will certainly ensure they are paid better.

Kids now lack communication skills, the ability to express themselves, and there is no-one to teach them because the teachers of today were Gough’s pupils of yesterday.

English Expression and Latin are lost subjects, exchanged for ethereal ideological Social Studies’ subjects that extol a global-warming hoax and a One World Government.

Yes, that’s the real legacy of Gough... kids without communication skills who in frustration resort to violence to explain themselves and journalists without the ability to sub-edit their own work.

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The Leftist education "revolution" of the 70s led to a rot in standards

Pickering

Gough gave us universities full of dickheads who can now call themselves doctors and professors. Once upon a time a university education was fought for and deserved. Without excellent marks, a scholarship or doting parents prepared to go without, it was hello workforce.

Now anyone can dodge getting a job, go to uni and the taxpayer will finance you. And we wonder why our education status has slipped well below the international average.

Well Gough certainly achieved his aim because degrees in union thuggery, Marxism, political science, green pursuits, global warming and any other bloody useless subject Left of centre are now held proudly by those who make up the Labor Party... the party of the struggling "working man".

Higher education will never make a person smarter, nor will it increase any person’s IQ. It may make a person more aware of a chosen subject, most of which could be gleaned from the net but the net doesn’t offer fair dinkum doctorates.

Left wing law firms, like Slater & Gordon and Maurice Blackburn, soak up the rubbish with law degrees, like Shorten, Bandt, Roxon and Gillard... all utterly unemployable outside the Labor fraternity and all locked into a Marxist philosophy of new world egalitarianism.

Those who can’t enter the Labor movement return to uni as lecturers to recycle the same garbage that made them unemployable in the first place. And the uni lecturers I know couldn’t teach a bloody fish to swim anyway.

Shorten this morning launched his campaign against Abbott’s university reform policy. A reform that is critical to repairing a broken education regime that Gough started and Gillard perpetuated.

As usual, Labor’s solution to correct its own failures involves dipping into that bottomless piggy bank of the “privileged elite”, ergo those awful employers.

Gonski’s billions won’t mend our illiterate educators any more than the billions thrown at aborigines will mend that disaster.

Higher education should be a reward, a privilege earned from dedicated hard work in secondary school.

As long as taxpayers are forced to finance dickheads through uni we will finish up with Prime Ministers like Julia Gillard and, perish the thought, Bill Shorten.

But you’re entitled to disregard my opinion, I left school at 14 and never returned.

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