Climate change and politics

An open letter to Senator Fielding, the man who supports climate sceptics and willingly gives them an open platform, from Will Steffan, the leading ANU climate scientist and one of the Australian delegates at the Copenhagen talks.

Well worth reading for both tone and information.

http://www.crikey.com.au/wp-content/uploads/2009/08/ltr-senator-fielding-22-july-09.pdf

Midwifes and Medicare

There was an interesting question posed on Q and A last night about midwives... apparently Nicola Roxon (the Australian Minister for Health and Aging) is suggesting that midwives who go about their midwif-ly duties in a hospital setting should be able to access the same sort of insurance and benefits to which doctors and nurses are currently entitled. This would not, however, extend to home births with no medical supervision.

Some women are visably distraught and upset about this - for some reason that I can't quite understand they seem to believe that their ability to choose how they have their baby is being taken away from them. I can appreciate that, if that was the case, it would cause distress to anyone facing such a big moment... but the arguement to me seems absolute rubbish. The choice is still open, and as with any choice there are consequences to take into account. These might be financial, health related or social but to expect that the repercussions of your choices should be equal is just ridiculous.

Personally I think the opportunity to choose a midwife rather than a doctor is a huge step forward. While I can appreciate the appeal of a world where giving birth at home and giving birth in a hospital carried the same amount of risk and was therefore a choice on preference rather than medical or financial reasons, that is a little unrealistic and places a huge burden on the rest of society to cater to the whims and fancies of every single individual. Of course, having never been pregnant or given birth, nor being a medical professional I have zero experience in professing my opinion... but I would like to think that one day it is a choice I would have to make and that I wouldn't expect the entire community to shoulder the risk and consequences of my own personal preferences. Just saying.

What would you do?

Latest email translated into normal speak:

We want you to ask people whether they would like to come to this event, but we aren't going to tell you what the event is for, what it's about or whether it's actually going to happen or not. And we need your list of invites before you go home.

Breaking up is hard to do

The powers that be declared 'let there be two seperate divisions' and it was so, but there was much wailing and knashing of teeth.

Those who had not been consulted asked 'Why Me?' but were told to leave and cross the mighty Lake at the middle of the Kingdom, to set up store in a new place.
Those who were in power but fighting on foreign land came back and were newly crowned a Knight of the Kingdom but was unaware that they had been ostracized and their people were fractitious and unhappy.
The Head of all Divison ran from those who who had been marked and cast to the other side, abdicating responsibility to their sucessor and setting up her own people in their rightful places by her side.

And there was much confusion as to who was responsible for ordering the stationary, or coordinating information and delegating tasks.

Highlights from Hansard (or 'why am I earning less than these people')

Senator ABETZ—I do not need to know the matters, but do you take it upon yourself to proactively encourage the minister and the government to consider certain matters, or do you
see your role as just responding to requests from the minister?

Senator Carr—Proactively.

Senator ABETZ—I know the previous chief scientist saw that as part of his role. As I understand it, the position is as an independent Chief Scientist. Is that right?

Prof. Sackett—That is absolutely correct.

Senator ABETZ—That is why I think it was not helpful for the minister to intervene in trying to answer for you and I would like to hear from the independent Chief Scientist.

Senator Carr—You are an absolute prat.

Prof. Sackett—I am pleased to answer the question.

Senator ABETZ—Chair, if you want standards in this committee then the minister has to abide by them.

CHAIR—I do not know whether that it is unparliamentary as such.

Senator Carr—You are getting on your high horse. You asked the question whether the Chief Scientist acts proactively and I can assure the committee that she does. She has a standing invitation, which she exercises, to actually contact me and other ministers, which she does regularly.

Senator ABETZ—The independent Chief Scientist should be given the courtesy of being able to answer for herself without a bully boy minister trying to intervene.

CHAIR—Senator Abetz!

Senator ABETZ—Chair, if you allow that sort of description of me then you have got to allow it back the other way. I should withdraw that comment about the minister, and I do, and I would invite the minister to do the same.

*And so it continues. Boring I know. I had to read this stuff for two hours today so though I would spread the pain. I had flashbacks to 'teaching' in London with me being the CHAIR (although those kids probably wouldn't have used the word 'proactively')
** Or the word prat. I can think of a few others they probably would have substituted....

Budget freedom, sweet freedom

Working in a proper public service job has given a whole new tinge to the Federal Budget announcement. In fact, it's almost exciting... almost. (I'm still a little bitter about the fact I and my sister both miss out on the $900 'thanks-for-being-Australian' bonus because we didn't pay tax in 2008.)

I noticed that science has done ok out of the whole thing, which is nice - and as long as I don't work to hard and earn too much money, my situation won't get any worse. But I think my favorite bit of budget-reporting so far has been a word-image of the Treasurer's speech - especially when you compare it with last year's speech. There are some obvious differences.