November 2016 – Gordon Gregory's blog

Dreams of home: Beardy Street, Armidale

What is it that makes some experiences or imaginings the stuff of one’s dreams, while so much else – of greater importance, of longer duration – seems unknown to one’s sub-conscious?

Whatever it is certainly characterised the weatherboard cottage at 307 Beardy Street in Armidale and our time in it.

307 Beardy Street - only 50 per cent of the pencil pines I planted at the front survived — 307 Beardy Street – only 50 per cent of the pencil pines I planted at the front seem to have survived

It was our family home for twelve years during which the family grew, was formed.

307 Beardy Street is on the corner with Ohio Street and across the road from The Armidale Playhouse, decked out for a long time in a colour crudely likened to something sometimes found in the nappies at our place.

We left there in the middle of 1985 and for years afterwards that house featured regularly and prominently in most of the dreams that I recalled. I also used to show off by leaping from the tops of buildings and swooping elegantly and safely across the top of the town’s main streets. I haven’t been back, on the ground or in the air, for a long time now.

Twelve of our first fourteen years in Australia were spent there. All four of our children were born in Armidale, with Alpha spending her brief (and mostly restful) confinements in the birthing motel units at the hospital just two blocks away.

The house dated back, I believe, to the 1880s or 1890s, at which time it stood on its own, surrounded by small paddocks. It is a weatherboard construction with bullnose verandahs on all four sides and a steep tin roof. It was of a standard layout, with the front door at the centre of the side facing Beardy Street, and with two rooms left and right off the central passageway. The room to the left at the back had been extended by a incorporating part of the veranda as a kitchen. Three little wooden steps led down from this enlarged space to the laundry and bathroom, with the toilet built into the back verandah. The walls of the room down the steps at the back were made of flattened out four-gallon fuel drums.

The first room on the right from the front door became the bedroom for the growing number of children, with half of the space divided vertically by a large platform on which there were two bunk beds. This made good use of the 11 or 12 foot ceilings in the house, made of pressed tin. A vertical ladder provided the kids with upwards access to their ‘bedroom’ and a fireman’s pole with a rapid way down.

Being at the western end of Beardy Street, our home was within easy walking distance of the shops, and part way between ‘down town’ (‘CBD’ doesn’t quite do it) and the University of New England campus. We were nicely embedded in the town’s social, musical and sporting scenes and I have always thought that if we had been there for another couple of years it would have been our home for life. The town was small enough to be a small town – but large enough in population and cultural aspirations to host ABC concerts.

I was back there for the inter-State veterans cricket competition just a few years ago and was surprised to see what twenty years and a sort of gentrification had done to the pubs and clubs. Dingy but functional drinking spots had morphed into glass-and-piped-music entities with restaurants on the side.

So why did that home on Beardy Street subsequently feature so strongly and so long in my dream? They were certainly happy days, with minimal family and professional responsibilities compared with later years. The first panic attack was yet to occur. Professional responsibilities seemed other people’s rather than partly my own.

Perhaps it’s significant that I used to dream of re-owning the place, escaping from the public gaze and responsibility of work in Canberra, enjoying sun through glass on winter mornings, pottering in the vegetable garden. This all sounds like ‘going back’, or opting out.

At some point towards the end of our time in Armidale our suspicions about the potential use of the space above the pressed tin ceilings and beneath the sharply-rising tin roof were confirmed. Standing with the torch in the roof cavity revealed the extraordinary volume up there. The thought of dormer windows and extra rooms gave us great excitement. Kerry Hawkins produced plans for the major refurbishment and Reg White accepted the preliminary commission to do the build.

Then I got a dream job in Canberra.

I found images of some of Armidale’s (better) Federation houses at https://federation-house.wikispaces.com/Armidale+Federation+Heritage

Structural change in the economy: a real life and political issue

Much of my working life has been spent on matters relating to structural change in the economy. It sounds pretty dry but in fact it’s full of human interest and also important. And it is a topic of great current importance to Australia.

My first job was on the Farm Amalgamation Research Project in England. (One had to speak very clearly when using the acronym.) It was a research study on the dynamics of the way in which farms were being amalgamated and what it meant for agricultural production.

In 1971 I joined a similar study at the University of New England, focused on the impact of the dramatic fall in the price of wool on land ownership and productivity in some of the woolgrowing regions in New South Wales and Western Australia. Were woolgrowers postponing productive expenditures, such as superphosphate or flock management, or were they able to tighten their belts sufficiently by reducing personal household or family expenditures? (You can guess the answer.)

abandoned-farm-house

And was it neighbours, corporate interests or new entrants to agriculture who were buying up woolgrowing country?

These are the sorts of human decisions that drive change in one of the leading elements of agriculture’s structure: the number of farms.
Some of their results are well-known. In 1981 there were about 263,00 farmers in Australia. In 2011 there were 157,000 – a reduction of 40 per cent. The number has been falling for many decades as small farmers find it hard to make a living and sell up to larger operators, and as some family farmers don’t have a successor.

The numbers do not fall evenly through time. Events like major droughts have a major impact. For example, there was a decline of 15 per cent in just 12 months during the 2002-03 drought. And by 2011 there were 19,700 fewer farmers in Australia than there had been in 2006, a fall of 11 per cent in five years.

This structural change in agriculture has some serious implications for the economic base of country towns; for the industry’s productivity and income; and for environmental sustainability.

Agriculture has been changing shape but is still a productive industry contributing substantially to the nation’s wellbeing.

hazelwood-power-station

A number of other industries have also experienced big structural changes, including meat processing, timber milling, textiles clothing and footwear, and motor vehicle manufacturing. Many towns in Australia that used to have abattoirs, timber mills or textile manufacturing businesses – and in which these were major employers – have had to adjust and find new industries or lose population.

The economist’s (rather dismal) prescription in these circumstances has usually been along the following lines.

Identify and scrutinise sectors experiencing rapid structural change, in terms of their ability to compete with global suppliers and so to be economically sustainable without government support in the longer term.
Remind everyone that Australia’s is a trade-exposed nation, whatever it produces, and that the free market is our economic friend.

Identify populations (groups in the workforce) and regions (particular towns, for example) that are bearing ‘an undue proportion’ of the costs of such structural change, and/or situations in which the speed of change is ‘unreasonable’. Judgements are involved!

Make a balanced decision about whether compensation should be paid in some form or other to those populations and/or regions in order to ease but not prevent the transition.

If it is decided that there should be ‘intervention in the free market’ that is driving structural change, propose the best sort of compensation, which might be income support (to industries or workers), retraining, relocation assistance or special safety net provisions, and how (and for how long) such compensation should be managed.

This has been the normal prescription for many decades now.
But is there a different medicine, a better approach?

Nick Xenophon may well be among those who thinks there is.
[ – to be continued – ]

Pounds, shillings and common sense

coins

Parri has asked me to explain pounds, shillings and pence. It’s a pleasure to do so.

It’s very straightforward. Let me explain from the bottom up, in ascending order of munificence.

There are two farthings in a hayp-nie and (obviously) two haypnies in a penny. The penny is a large, confident coin, much in circulation, so tends to feature prominently in conversation, as in “A penny for your thoughts”, “In for a penny, in for a pound”, “When the penny drops”, and “Turning up (frequently and at inappropriate moments) like a bad penny”.

Mind you, the haypnie can justifiably claim to be important in reminding us of how some of the world became pink for a while on the school atlas through the travails of England’s sailing vessels, which were rarely “spoiled for the want of a haypnie’s worth of tar”. (I am inclined to believe that the reference to tar in a ship’s caulking pre-dated the tar hollered for in ‘Click go the shears’, in which the focus on ‘ship’ is replaced by ‘sheep’.)

The configuration of the penny-farthing bicycle becomes visibly clear once there is familiarity with those two staples of the currency.

Together, farthings, haypnies and pennies are ‘coppers’ – not to be confused with Dixon of Dock Green (Jack Warner) who is also.

There is no two-penny piece, except when coined in language, as in “I couldn’t give you tuppence for your old watchchain, old iron, old iron” (Lonnie Donegan).

Three pennies are of course thruppence, represented by the thruppeny bit. Just why the thruppeny bit has so different a shape and hue I don’t know. It’s almost as if it’s an interloper from across the seas, its twelve sides and strange colour promising the mystery and curiosity of far-off realms and climes.

There was also a silver thruppenny bit, scarce in my time – an anachronism with the very special added attraction of being seen only on one’s spoon amidst a piece of mum’s Christmas pud. But as the youngest of four boys, and as Parri will understand, I rarely got one – – (!!).

Two thruppeny bits make a tanner (6d) and two tanners a bob (1/-). With a tanner, a boy is rich, with his expectations in the sweet shop probably affected more by physical than financial limitations: perhaps his inability to see over the sweet shop counter.

As a cub scout I participated in ‘Bob a Job Week’ although, living on a farm, there were precious few doors to knock on so that the jobs done were probably remunerated at one shilling each by my mother – jobs which, in all probability, I ought to have been doing anyway if any sort of a son.

A two shilling piece (“two bob”) promises thrilling possibilities for a young boy – and is something of which one might boast to one’s peers. Great aunts might refer to it as a ‘florin’ but I would rather have been dead than to have used such an out-dated term.

Naturally there are twenty shillings in a quid – but never “twenty bob”. Ten bob is denominated in the first bank note of which I was aware. If you have ten bob it could be as a single orangey-brown note, ten separate shilling pieces, five two-shilling coins, or (most gratifying of all!) as four half crowns – or, less symmetrically, a combination of all of these.

You will now see that half-a-crown (the indefinite article is permissible with the singular only – “two half-crowns” not “two half-a-crowns”) is “two and six” (2/6) but never “two and sixpence”.

That’s odd because two shillings and four pence (“2/4”) is never spoken as “two and four”. I suppose that’s because two and six is denominated in a single coin, whereas two and anything else is not.

The half-crow is a coin of such heft and majesty that it requires a paragraph all its own. A boy could not pocket one without being impressed by its considerably greater thickness and weight than its cousin two bob piece – even though its value in the bank is only one-fifth greater. A half-crown is a saving or investing matter, quite over the top in the sweet shop! Together with its weight, something about its markings connotes grandness and seriousness.

A half-crown is seen now and then even by young boys. But never a crown. Never. Unless in a display cabinet in some museum after it has probably been ‘undenominated’ by the making of a hole in it and its presentation to an admiral of the fleet or a civil engineer of the Victorian period.

I have mentioned the 10 bob note – the most junior in the panoply of bank notes. Next in seniority is the pound note, followed (as a young boy I am led to understand – but not to palpably know) by £5 and £10 notes and then by who knows what possibilities above and beyond to dream about.

A pound is a quid – twenty shillings. But much of the serious masculine bidding and trading is done in guineas – including at the Fordgate clearance sale where the tyres on dysfunctional farm machinery were “on their own worth a guinea”. A guinea is 21 shillings (“21/-“) or one pound one shilling – and something one can speak of but not actually hold. There is no guinea coin or note of which a small boy in the 50s is aware.

The following glossary might help:

Denomination in farthings Shop assistant Schoolboy
farthing 1 “farthing – ma’am” farthing

haypenny 2 “haypenny – ma’am” haypnie

penny/pence (1d) 4 “penny/pence – ma’am” penny/pence

thruppence (3d) 12 ” thruppence – ma’am” thruppence

sixpence (6d) 24 “sixpence ma’am” a tanner

one shilling (1/-) 48 “one shilling” a bob (pl. ‘bob’)

two shillings (2/-) 96 ” a florin, Madam” two bob

two shillings
and sixpence or
half a crown (2/6) 120 “two and six, Madam” half a crown

ten shilling note
(no coin) 480 “ten shillings, Madam” ten bob

one pound note (£1) 960 “one pound, Madam” a quid

one guinea 1008 “a guinea, Sir” [bemused silence]

All clear, Paz? boy-puzzled-expression-31013

PS: I left the UK with the tanner in 1971. The bob remained, re-christened 5p.

Parliamentarians and the plebiscite

joshuareynoldsparty

In Marriage equality and greyhounds (10 August) I explain why, in my view, there need not be a plebiscite on marriage equality. And in the piece entitled Of mandates and furphies (12 July) I try to explain my irritation at the way our Parliamentary leaders talk about their “mandate” as if those who voted for them explicitly agree with every element of the package their Party took to the election.

My view is that, having won an election, the victor only has one mandate and that is to form government. It still needs to explain, justify and promote specific proposals for change to everyone, rather than taking those things as read and taking the people for granted.

If there is a plebiscite, it is to be hoped – most earnestly – that the process in which we engage is characterised by respect, generosity of spirit and good will, so that Australia’s social cohesion is further enhanced.

One of the issues that will arise is how individual Members and Senators should act once the people of their electorates and State/Territory have had their say. Should they be bound by the majority view of their electorate, in the case of members of the House of Representatives, or by the majority view of their jurisdiction in the case of Senators? Should they be bound by the majority national view? Or should they only be bound by their own individual opinion even if it is contrary to that of the majority of their electors?

Those parliamentarians who choose the last of these three courses might be thought of as using ‘the Bristol defence’, created by Edmund Burke (1729-1797), the man who brought us the T-shirt we have all seen on the streets:

“The only thing necessary for the triumph of evil is for good men to do nothing.”

This and several other of the recorded quotations from the speeches and writings of Edmund Burke (1729-1797) are so familiar as to seem more like aphorisms than quotations from actual statements made by a real person. Added together, they read today like a Manual for Effective Advocacy on Good Causes.

Nobody made a greater mistake than he who did nothing because he could do only a little.

Those who don’t know history are destined to repeat it.

When bad men combine, the good must associate; else they will fall one by one, an unpitied sacrifice in a contemptible struggle.

Our patience will achieve more than our force.

We must all obey the great law of change. It is the most powerful law of nature.

The arrogance of age must submit to be taught by youth.

Frugality is founded on the principal that all riches have limits.

It is not what a lawyer tells me I may do; but what humanity, reason, and justice tell me I ought to do.

There is but one law for all, namely that law which governs all law, the law of our Creator, the law of humanity, justice, equity – the law of nature and of nations.

It is interesting to speculate about how a man capable of such generous and humane statements would view the issues involved in the debate about marriage equality. I would like to think that he would be driven to support marriage equality by one of the three reasons normally given to explain his scepticism about democracy. This can be seen in the context of another of his quotable quotes:

In a democracy, the majority of the citizens is capable of exercising the most cruel oppressions upon the minority.

Specifically he feared that democracy would create a tyranny over unpopular minorities, who would therefore need the protection of the upper classes. It might be said that this has been the position faced by those with a personal stake in seeking marriage equality in Australia.

For the sake of completeness, let us record the other two reasons behind Burke’s lack of trust in democracy. The first was his belief that good government requires a degree of intelligence and breadth of knowledge of the sort that occurred rarely among the common people. (Our current-day leaders frequently remind us about how smart we are as the mugs who elect them.) The second was his fear that “the passions of the common people could be aroused by demagogues, leading to the potential loss of cherished traditions and established religion, and to violence and the confiscation of property”.

It is not surprising that after more than two centuries these reservations seem very dated. However it is worth reminding ourselves that Edmund Burke had a clear understanding of what, these days, would be called the national interest and in this regard was well ahead of his time

Because of its relevance, let’s consider more of the Bristol story and, to enjoy the beauty of the language, let much of it be done in Edmund Burke’s original words.

In 1774, Edmund Burke was elected the Member of Parliament for Bristol, at the time England’s second city – a seat for which there was a real electoral contest.

In May 1778, his constituents – citizens of a great trading city – urged Burke to oppose free trade with Ireland. He resisted, saying:

“If, from this conduct, I shall forfeit their suffrages at an ensuing election, it will stand on record an example to future representatives of the Commons of England, that one man at least had dared to resist the desires of his constituents when his judgment assured him they were wrong”.

This shouldn’t have come as a surprise to the Electors of Bristol. Burke’s thoughts on the matter had been spelled out in his speech to them on 3 November 1774, just after they had elected him!

“Certainly, Gentlemen, it ought to be the happiness and glory of a representative to live in the strictest union, the closest correspondence, and the most unreserved communication with his constituents. Their wishes ought to have great weight with him; their opinions high respect; their business unremitted attention. It is his duty to sacrifice his repose, his pleasure, his satisfactions, to theirs, – and above all, ever, and in all cases, to prefer their interest to his own.

But his unbiased opinion, his mature judgement, his enlightened conscience, he ought not to sacrifice to you, to any man, or to any set of men living. These he does not derive from your pleasure, – no, nor from the law and the Constitution. They are a trust from Providence, for the abuse of which he is deeply answerable. Your representative owes you, not his industry only, but his judgment; and he betrays instead of serving you if he sacrifices it to your opinion.”

“Parliament is not a congress of ambassadors from different and hostile interests; which interests each must maintain, as an agent and advocate, against other agents and advocates; but parliament is a deliberative assembly of one nation, with one interest, that of the whole; where, not local purposes, not local prejudices ought to guide, but the general good, resulting from the general reason of the whole. You choose a member indeed; but when you have chosen him, he is not a member of Bristol, but he is a member of parliament.”

His support for this and other causes that were not popular with the gentlemen of Bristol led to Burke losing his seat in 1780. For the rest of his parliamentary career he represented Malton, a pocket borough under the patronage of the Marquess of Rockingham, leader of the Whig faction.

Current Australian parliamentarians wishing to adopt ‘the Bristol position’ should consider what has changed since 1778 in the relationship between parliamentarians and the people.

And they might also want to consider just one more of the T-shirts designed by Edmund Burke:

“Nothing turns out to be so oppressive as feeble government.”

On holiday with Anne Cahill-Lambert and (photogenic) Rod

This piece is several things.

It’s a big ‘thankyou’ to Anne Cahill Lambert for sharing her holiday snaps and thoughts with those of us who have chosen to follow her on Facebook.

It is a case study in the conversion of a Luddite to an understanding and appreciation of what Facebook is and does.

And it is a demonstration of the joy and potential of vicarious pleasure.

Being informed about the holiday that Anne and Rod have enjoyed over the past 60 days has connected and touched me many times and at a number of levels. It is clear that there are degrees of vicarious pleasure – hot, warm, cool – determined by the extent to which the active person’s observation of a particular place or event reflects or matches the experience of the other – the passive person experiencing things through another.

So, for instance, I gained some limited (or neutral) vicarious pleasure from the pictures and descriptions of my daughter’s trip to Machu Picchu. But having never been there myself, my enjoyment of what I saw through her eyes was limited – more cerebral than emotional.

Anne and Rod, on the other hand, have been to and reported on places with which I have a strong connection. Some of what they have observed and said has reminded me of things that were once dear to me and that had to be left behind as a part of becoming Australian: historic streetscapes, stone walls, green fields and castles.

When Anne was CEO of the Women’s and Children’s Hospitals Association, we shared a tenancy in a building owned by what was then the Australian Hospitals Association. Times were tough: Anne had one half of the broom cupboard, I had the other. It was a close relationship. We were both herding cats, had similar political approaches and fed off each other’s strengths and weaknesses.

Anne then contracted ‘an incurable lung disease’ – which of course she eventually beat, after a huge amount of effort, energy and determination. Her strength of purpose was always an inspiration, whether in her personal travails, as an advocate for oxygen and organ donation, or as a gun for hire on health consumer issues. On winter weekends I sometimes call in on them for a beer after my hockey at Lyneham.

We are close.

Anne just had time before she and Rod left for their holiday to impart the best bits of Retirement 101 in which she lectures, gratis, to anyone who will listen. I have tried to put her lessons into action.

Between 28 June and 24 August Anne posted to Facebook about their holiday 55 times. These posts included 473 photos, 82 of which (17.3 per cent) feature Rod. Only 6 of the 473 (1.3 per cent) include Anne herself. That’s a poor example of the gender agenda.

The earliest highlights include a photo of what Anne describes as “high tech border protection” near Helsinki: a naive and forlorn looking sign standing on a grassy rise with an arrow pointing to ‘Passport control’.
On 4 July there was a photo of both Rod and Anne, with Big Ben in the background, in which Anne is wearing a Gift of Life hat. (She never lets a chance go by!)

Another memorable shot has Mahatma Gandhi watching – with strong approval, surely – a small demonstration close to the Houses of Parliament.

Anne succeeds in embedding her record of where she and Rod are at a particular moment into notable events elsewhere, as with the picture (from a TV) of Andy Murray in the fifth set against Tsonga, “while Wales is playing Portugal in the European cup”.

Manchester’s architecture surprises her, including the impressive facades of Carlton House and the Corn Exchange, and the walkways between the Town Hall and council offices which, to me, look a little like the Bridge of Sighs! “It’s breathtaking looking at buildings that were built hundreds of years before my own city”.

From Manchester, where Alpha worked in a music specialist school just a block from the Cathedral, they go to Edinburgh, where Anne takes stunning shots of and from the castle. Some connections: brother Peter went to university in Edinburgh; Pella and I went to The Fringe Festival; Jonathan and Katrina now live there; Parri passes through with tour groups.

The photographic record Anne takes on board the Royal Yacht Britannia is impressive, with its gorgeous sitting room. From there they went to Greyfriars Bobby at 34 Candlemaker Row, for Rod to continue “eating pies around the UK”.

In York they come across Dame Judi Dench walk. Yes: she was born near York.

Moving south they visit Bob at the Wold Gliding Club, who winters at Benalla. Anne sums up the complexities of the enclosure movement and hundreds of years of the English countryside: “I love the use of hedges to divide paddocks”.

On 16 July: “When you think an old building can’t be any better or worse than you’ve seen elsewhere, then visit Cambridge.” Connection: The uni graduations they interrupted there were only a few days later than the ones in which Scott took part. While in Cambridge Anne and Rod busy themselves “looking for Inspector Morse, DS Lewis and avoiding murder”.

Next evening they saw the Corrs in London at Kew Gardens in London. Tad and I saw the Corrs at the National Folk Festival years ago when they were just starting out.

One of the strongest coincidences is the fact that, in Paris, Anne and Rod came across Le Jardin du Luxembourg (23 July). Our family have stayed several times in a cousin’s unit just across the Boulevard Saint-Michele from the gardens. We all have fond memories of Le Jardin.

The last stage of the Tour de France hit the Champs-Elysées on Sunday 24 July. Were Anne and Rod secretly watching before they set off for Spain?

Rod features heavily in the reports and pictures from San Sebastián between 26 July and 8 August. He represents Australia in the world unicycling championships, and proves to be the 19th fastest (50+ male) in the 800 metres, with a time of 3 minutes 31.9 seconds. He also competes in the hockey and, in the wet, in the 10 km race. Number 301, Rod Lambert “comes home with a wet sail, shirt and shorts”, notes his doting supporter. Connection: Pella spent time in San Sebastián last year.

Then – what a day! – the two of them celebrate their 29th wedding anniversary, still in San Sebastian. There’s a lovely selfie of Anne and Rod – with red wine.

En route back to England Anne is reminded of some of the world’s current realities. “We saw the refugee camp in Calais. Overwhelmingly sad.”
From London they fly to Dublin. More green fields and hedges welcome them. In a pub in Kinsale they catch an ad hoc performance of The Band Played Waltzing Matilda, just a few days after the Pacific Boy Choir show the piece off as their Australian speciality when they perform it during their visit to Canberra.

Back in England, near Windsor on 22 August, we see (at last) a nice portrait of Anne and Rod together. They pass through scenic Bourton-on-the-Water on the way to Cardiff, resist feeding the feckin’ ducks, as requested, and in Cardiff they see the Welsh National Assembly.

bourton-bakery

Soon they will be back in their refurbished, well-appointed pied–à–terre in Canberra. Anne will want to worry about the Hawks’ form. But we all know that hers will be immaculate. Thank you so much Anne!

For good rural health we need good rural jobs

This piece was written by gg and published by Croakey during Anti-Poverty Week 2016. It was edited for Croakey by Marie McInerney. Thanks to Marie and Melissa Sweet for the work they do on Croakey and for permission to publish the piece in www.aggravations.org

abstract-sketch-of-craftsman-working-with-a-pick-vector-illustration_zjkwgmdu_m

For people living in rural and remote areas to have a real chance of equal health and equivalent access to health services, more focus is needed from the Federal Government on the urgent need for economic change in those areas.

People in rural communities want to see explicit and meaningful recognition in government programs of their own characteristics and challenges. There are positive signs, including the new Building Better Regions Fund.

The income challenge to good health

Some of the social determinants of health are stronger or better in country areas than in Australia’s capital cities. These include the greater connectedness of people with each other, resulting in a valuable sense of community. There is also easier access to the natural world, a disposition to be independent – and less time spent in traffic jams.

Unfortunately, however, most of the weightier social determinants of wellbeing are tilted against people in rural and remote areas. Most importantly, these include years of completed education[1] and access to work and income.

In 2010-11, wage and salary earners outside Australia’s capital cities earned only 85 per cent of the amount their capital city counterparts earned. The percentage of employed people earning $15,600 or less was 15 per cent higher outside capital cities, while the percentage of employed people earning $78,000 or more was 26 per cent lower.

In 2011-12 the median gross household income in the cities across Australia was 1.37 times higher than for the ‘balance of state’. People in rural and remote areas also experience higher rates of unemployment
These significant income challenges have been exacerbated as the nation’s mining sector has moved from a growth-and-capital-development to a production-only phase. The slowdown in employment opportunities in that sector has naturally been felt most strongly in rural and remote regions.

The government recognises the urgent need to diversify Australia’s economy through the development and growth of newer industries. Much of the focus has been on the loss of manufacturing jobs, the majority of which are in the capital cities and major regional centres. This is perhaps the reason why there seems to have been little focus on the urgency of the need for economic change in rural and remote areas.

This situation will have to change if people in rural and remote areas are to have a real chance of equal health and equivalent access to health services as those in the cities.

A good sign

The Governor General’s speech, given to the opening session of each new Parliament, is supposed to set the agenda for the duly elected government. It is a statement of intentions, formulated by the new administration and delivered by the Queen’s representative.

For people concerned with the wellbeing of Australia’s rural, regional and remote people, it was encouraging to hear Sir Peter Cosgrove include the following in his formal speech:

Regional communities

Cities are crucial, but there are almost eight million Australians living in rural, regional and remote communities. Our regional communities generate 67 per cent of Australia’s export earnings and have untapped growth potential.

My government will tap into that potential with the $200 million Regional Jobs and Investment Package.

The package will support regional communities to invest in and diversify their economies, create new business and innovation opportunities, and help boost jobs in regional areas.

The new Building Better Regions Fund will also provide continued support to regional projects.

The Prime Minister’s emphasis

The Prime Minister has made it clear that an important part of his government’s agenda is to diversify the economy, including through the development and expansion of industries not tied to the export of mineral resources. In working on this agenda the Prime Minister is aided by Assistant Minister for Cities and Digital Transformation Angus Taylor – ironically the member for Parkes, consisting of large parts of southern inland New South Wales – and Minister for Urban Infrastructure Paul Fletcher, the Member for Bradfield, an electorate of just 101 square kilometres.

In a major speech in April the Prime Minister said that “smart cities” would be the engine room of innovation and growth in Australia’s new economy. The aim is to provide jobs closer to people’s homes, more affordable housing, better transport connections and healthy environments.

Regional cities are included in the rhetoric relating to ‘Smart cities’ and Townsville is to be the first to be recognised in a ‘City Deal’ under the Smart Cities Plan. But Townsville has a population of 180,000 and the majority of Australia’s rural, regional and remote people live in places far smaller.

The Government also promotes cities as ‘living laboratories’ for its National Innovation and Science Agenda, including the work of the Digital Transformation Office.

Hopefully the Prime Minister will not forget that the need for economic diversification is arguably stronger in rural than city areas. It is after all in those areas that the bulk of mining and minerals activity occurs.

This underlines the critical role to be played by Senator Fiona Nash in her capacity as Minister for Local Government and Territories, Regional Communications and Regional Development. She will be expected to demonstrate that the Turnbull Government does have a specific agenda of support for rural and remote industries and their people.

The Regional Jobs and Building Better Regions approaches

In this endeavour Senator Nash has two programs from which the agenda can be launched. Both were mentioned in the Governor General’s speech.

The nine regions eligible for the Regional Jobs and Investment Package are all non-metropolitan and have been selected because they have been affected by the slowdown in mining, falling commodity prices and changes to the manufacturing sector – but also have potential for growth.

This emphasis is good. But of course there is just $20-30 million for each of the nine selected regions, to be spent on business innovation grants, local infrastructure projects, and skills and training programs.

The Government’s plans for the Building Better Regions Fund (BBRF) also provide an encouraging signal.

The BBRF is to replace the National Stronger Regions Fund (NSRF). Successful applications to the third and final round of the NSRF have recently been announced, and from the list it is clear that NSRF was primarily for non-metro activity. Only about 15 per cent of the $126 million allocated in that round went to metropolitan areas, including grants to Hurstville and St George in Sydney, Wollongong, South Perth and the Blue Mountains.

But the fact that metropolitan proposals will not be eligible for support under BBRF suggests that the special circumstances and needs of rural and remote areas will be recognised by the Government.

The BBRF will focus exclusively on areas outside the major capital cities. The majority of its funds will still be focused on infrastructure, but there will also be a community investment stream. This will provide an opportunity for small community groups and volunteer organisations to access funding where they can’t contribute matching money themselves. This community stream will help build local leadership and community projects which have previously been ineligible.

Project proposals will compete against other projects of similar size: small projects against small projects, medium against medium, and major infrastructure projects against major infrastructure projects.

These are positive signs. To become meaningful there must be no reduction in the funds available to BBRF relative to the National Stronger Regions Fund it will replace. About $630 million was available through three rounds of the NSRF. And the people of rural areas will be looking for examples of such positive discrimination in other policy areas. They crave some explicit and meaningful recognition of the particular characteristics and relative challenges facing rural people in the communities in which they are fortunate enough to live.

Anti-Poverty Week, 16-22 October

There is another opportunity for all of us to focus on the rural aspects of deprivation in Anti-Poverty Week. It’s a special Week in which all Australians are encouraged to organise or take part in an activity aiming to highlight or overcome issues of poverty and hardship here in Australia or overseas.

It was established in Australia as an expansion of the UN’s annual International Anti-Poverty Day on October 17.

The Principal National Sponsors of Anti-Poverty Week for 2016 are the Brotherhood of St Laurence, the Australian Red Cross, the St Vincent DePaul Society and the University of New South Wales. Much of the Week’s momentum comes from Julian Disney and Jill Lang, Founder and National Coordinator respectively of Anti-Poverty Week.

To get involved in an activity for Anti-Poverty Week in your area, go to http://www.antipovertyweek.org.au/
[1] In 2013 over 75% of children in metropolitan areas completed year 12, compared with just under 70% of children in provincial and remote areas, and only 40% of children in Very remote areas. This and most of the other statistics in this piece are from the NRHA’s wonderful Little Book of Rural Health Numbers.

On electoral ‘mandates’ and furphies

Of mandates and furphies

mandate, noun: 2: the authority to carry out a policy, regarded as given by the electorate to a party or candidate that wins an election.

With the election over, we now move to consideration of the often tetchy issue of who has a mandate to do what, with what and to whom.

The mandate theory of democratic governance has it that a government has both the right and the responsibility to enact the proposals to which it committed in the preceding election campaign. And presumably it’s a winner-takes-all situation in which the margin of an electoral victory has no implication for the mandate supposedly earned.

There are a number of issues with this and a number of ways in which talk of ‘a mandate’ can overreach.

First, it might be interpreted in such a way as to discourage or preclude a new government from changing its mind on something promised during the campaign. The belief that politicians and, in particular, Prime Ministers should never ever change their mind is one of the silliest and most damaging characteristics of government in Australia.

We are familiar with the situation in which, when there is change in the Party occupying the Treasury benches, the new government argues that because it was not in possession of the full details of the financial situation inherited it is unable to meet all the commitments it made. This is an entirely reasonable position to take, with the only possible criticism being that, in the national interest, there ought to be more transparency about the nation’s true financial situation at any given time.

For instance, right here and now, if the Coalition is guided by the apparent widespread opposition to the freezing of Medicare rebates and decides to end the freeze earlier than 1 July 2018, will it be accused of reneging on its mandate? Can it use the mandate argument as a reason for not unfreezing it early?

A reasonable interpretation of the mandate theory is that the Party or Parties that won the election have a general mandate to govern. It is annoying and illogical for a new government to claim a mandate for a swag of specific issues as if, when people cast their vote, they were aware of and supported every single commitment in a particular Party’s platform.

In Government that Party should still engage with the public in explaining and justifying the need for and the fairness of particular new policy proposals, whose existence and details may have remained completely unknown to individuals when they cast their vote.

A third issue relating to a mandate is the relationship between the House of Representatives and the Senate. The Government can claim a mandate on the basis of winning the majority of seats in the Lower House. But the Senate and its individual members can claim a mandate to review – particularly on behalf of the less populous jurisdictions – given the voters’ decision not to give the Government control of the Senate.

This situation is tailor-made for fractiousness and opposition – two features of our system of government we are currently being asked to forego in order to ensure no further deterioration in the nation’s economic future.
And have a care for the position of the Leader of an Opposition after an election. He or she has no mandate from the public but it would be passing strange for someone in their position to provide nothing but support for the Government until the time when the next election is called. The Westminster system relies on there being an Opposition at all times, not just for the duration of an election campaign. Its duty is to provide alternative ways and means of doing government business.

Reference to a global mandate cannot reasonably be used as the rationale for limiting debate and criticism of specific proposals.

Finally, political parties and those who comment on them cannot have it all ways where electoral success or failure is concerned. Either seats are won and lost on the basis of local issues and the qualities of local candidates; or people vote on the basis of the full set of national policies enunciated in a particular Party’s electoral platform; or people are swayed by perceptions of the individuals who lead the major parties.

Of course the reality is that it’s a mix of all three of these things.
rural-polling-place
This mix and the complexity involved in individuals’ voting decisions should be considered by people using ‘the mandate argument’ as justification for particular policy proposals.
gg
12 July 2016

“Look at the tyres!”

Aphorism. Meaning: incredulous assertion that one single part of an entity actually has a value greater than has been ascribed to the whole entity and, therefore, that the person making such a valuation must be kidding.

A household or farm clearing sale is an open invitation for everyone who’s always wondered how their neighbour lived – God Rest Their Soul – to check the reality against their prejudicial thinking on the matter.

Capt Gordon George Gregory’s clearing sale at Fordgate Farm was in 1958. Capt Gregory, his wife Flora and their four children had moved to Fordgate from Little Broughton farm, near the Taunton racecourse, in 1946. Gordon’s sightless brother Richard remained at Broughton and could regularly be seen, without reciprocation, milking his cows. On at least one occasion Uncle Dick was found tending the tiles on top of the cowshed roof, and he was said to plant out potatoes in the field in what, to people with sight, was clearly the middle of the night.

For the Gregory boys, Fordgate was a second home, enjoyed in the periods between their 12-weekly stints at Taunton School. It was the base from which Capt Gregory used to travel to the five racecourses at which the ‘system’ which governed his betting on horses apparently worked best. They were Doncaster, Newbury, Alexandra Palace (‘Ally-Pally’), Kempton Park and Goodwood.

Four of these five are relatively close to each other in the south east of England, and Capt Gregory made use of the Southern railway line, joining at Templecombe, between Sherborne and Wincanton, and on the Exeter to London (Waterloo) line.

He and some of his friends sometimes drove, and David recalls going to Goodwood races in a small Standard belonging to one of his racing friends, “who drove and overtook like a maniac”.

There was, incidentally, nothing maniacal about Capt Gregory’s wagering. His system has been referred to, and Peter remembers him as a very disciplined gambler: “sometimes he would travel miles to a racecourse but if the ‘runes’ weren’t right he would not have a single bet”.

Getting from Fordgate to Doncaster was quite a different challenge. This was in the period before motorways had been laid across large swathes of the English countryside. One can only imagine the time and energy it would have taken in his friend’s Standard or in his own Wolseley 4/44 (number plate RFC 5) to drive from Fordgate to Doncaster and, given his propensity while hurtling along to inspect the livestock in fields adjacent to the road, the number of near misses there might have been.

His nearest Mrs, Flora, would stay at home with the Aga cooker, in the large rambling house – several of its rooms unused – comfortable in the knowledge that she was in the bosom of the team of farm workers whose loyalty, by birthright, was to the farm and its proprietor.

I loved Fordgate very dearly and determined to buy it once my fortune had been made. (That hasn’t happened, but the fact that an anagram of its letters is one of my computer passwords attests to the importance of its memory! Another ongoing connection for me is the batting practice on the lawn at Fordgate, with Granny bowling to me underarm, the few remaining fruits of which are now ‘enjoyed’ by the Queanbeyan Razorbacks fifth grade team.)

There must have been many days’ preparation for the clearing sale. When it arrived every item which I had ever seen at any spot around the farm, together with many I had never seen at all, was arranged in separate piles in serried ranks like the regular droppings of some gigantic Beast of the Industrial Revolution. Each little pile was accompanied by a stick in the ground with a number which corresponded to the roneo’d listing of the day’s munificence.

The larger items, such as tractors (some of which were capable of independent motion), ploughs, discs and balers were at one end of the roneo’d sequence, with smaller piles of hand tools of known and mysterious function towards the other. I don’t recall if it was so but I imagine pride of place might have been taken by The Potato Harvester, a device of such huge scope and stature that – when laid up for the non-potato harvesting seasons – provided endless metallic channels and cubbyholes for small boys to play in.

Capt Gregory was an inveterate attender of auctions and the clearing sales of other farmers, and hopelessly incapable of keeping his hands in his pocket when in full view of an auctioneer with a difficult job to do. Thus it was that he used to come home with trailerloads of ‘things’ which were unloaded at some vacant and unsuspecting spot around the farm, there to be ignored until it was time for 1958 and the clearing sale.

I have a distinct memory of one such load arriving one day, with expectations on the part of the driver and – who knows? – perhaps on its own account (but not on Flora’s) that it might one day again amount to something of value. At first sight – and even more so at second and third – it appeared to be a load comprised of striplings of semi-rotten softwood mixed randomly and inextricably with wire and chicken netting. It was not, our father assured us, firewood as we suspected, but a useful and commodious chicken house needing only to be reassembled.

Capt Gregory’s four boys all inherited a gene which gave them a predisposition for creating one-liners which captured the essence of memorable family events (such as running out of petrol; having one of the boys fall out of the car on a bend; skiing uncontrollably; and trying to find new homes for piles of immature industrial archaeology) and then quoting it to undeserved gales of laughter by other members of the family as well as by the teller himself.

Anthony (‘Greg’ to everyone in Australia) gave few words to the sale in the detailed description he wrote of his life from birth to 1970, but nevertheless captured its essence and the one-liner that became associated with it:

It was the ex-US army Dodge that had sat in the bottom yard for 10 years, un-driven and unloved, that made the most impact. It must have been towed by a tractor to take its place in the orderly rows of sundries on offer.
“What am I offered?” came the auctioneer’s usual cry.
” Ten pounds'” came a genuine offer.
“Ten pounds!?” replied the auctioneer in disbelief. Then, striking the vehicle close to the ground with his shooting
-stick: “Look at the tyres: they’re worth more than that on their own!!”

Other family sayings of note included “They know me in the office”, (about petrol in the tank) “There’s enough for another twenty miles”, and “That ‘No Entry’ sign doesn’t mean us”. David has a clear memory of arriving at Cardiff Arms Park for a rugby match against England for which Capt Gregory had no tickets. After he went to ‘the office’ he and David found themselves high up at the end of the old stadium with a fantastic view down the pitch – ideal for appreciating Bleddyn Williams’ jink.

In his book Greg records the fact that his best friend Pete Raw was also permitted to be away from school for the clearing sale, which may have been part of his – Pete’s – inspiration to become a successful auctioneer himself.

Dusk fell over Fordgate. Many of the piles were loaded onto trucks and trailers and pondered away to new homes. And the Home Field – every field in this glorious 300 acres of Somerset had its own name – returned to normal duties.

Not sold that day were the bee hives. A bees’ nest in an elm tree just across the drive from the front lawn had been transferred to a hive, with more hives added to the collection when swarms provided the opportunity. It may be that the last vehicle to leave Fordgate Farm was RFC 5 with a trailer in tow containing the bee hives.

Nobody had thought to close the hives overnight, so when it came time to relocate them they were simply covered with hessian bags and loaded onto the trailer. Capt GG Gregory set off up the lane to North Petherton followed by a mass of bees confronted, like him and his family, with the challenge of a new home address.