Saturday 2nd August 1997
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It was therefore somewhat ironic that Justice William Deane (now Governor-General), who has said that the dispossession of the Aborigines (land) was the darker aspect of Australian history that has given us a legacy of unutterable shame, which had to be addressed at law, said yesterday in Canberra, "We Australians are truly one people, one nation..." what hypocrisy!
Sir Roderick Carnegie, the former chief executive of CRA, said yesterday that the major Australian parties should set out to "crush Pauline Hanson".
"It would be a tragedy for the future of Australians if we permit into our political process for more than a one-term wonder a party committed to hostility to our Asian neighbours," Carnegie told The Weekend Australian newspaper.
Former Liberal Party federal director Andrew Robb mooted a preference swap in Ipswich with the Labor Party to ensure that Ms Hanson was defeated, but said that no deal, as yet, had been struck.
The obvious political leaning of the Ipswich City Council who banned Pauline Hanson's One Nation Party from using the city's venues, became apparent yesterday when it was revealed that during the last few months the Humanities Building (at the centre of the dispute) has been booked not once, not twice but nine times by a group known as the Socialist Equity Party. Cr Paul Tully had previously claimed that the building's charter states that it is for the use of "community based bodies" only.
One Nation has cancelled two bookings with the council following the ruling.
A letter in today's Queensland Times mirrors the feelings of many Ipswich ratepayers. The letter by Peter Le Messurier of Leichhardt reads,
"The Ipswich City Council's decision to ban One Nation meetings on council property will not be ratified until Wednesday, August 6th. By preventing the meeting from taking place at the Humanities Building, the Ipswich City Council have breached Local Government by-laws, therefore the council is guilty of committing an illegal act, I call upon the resignation of councillors."
Fat chance though - the councillors first move when they were voted in March 1995 was to give themselves a very substantial pay rise. Noses are so deep in the trough that it will take more than this to get them out.
Tully is a wonderful spokesperson for One Nation, by his sometimes strange and extreme publicity seeking actions. Who can ever forget the time that he accused Hanson of using her electoral fax to cancel her health license for her fish and chip shop after it was sold.
Here is an extract from that report, "On top of this, the question must be asked how Ald. Tully has been allowed to remove from Council chambers what is essentially a private document between myself and one of council's departments?".
Some sitting councillor's in Ipswich have shown in the past that they have absolutely no hesitation of breaching good commercial practice by publicly releasing private and confidential commercial documents for personal or political gain making it a very hard and disturbing decision to consider doing business with them in the first place.
Yesterday we rose the issue of the little Aboriginal girl Melita who was taken away from her white foster parents because of the "stolen generation" report.
Aboriginal relatives of Melita have now vowed to go to the Family Court to have the decision by the Family Services Department overturned after they made the following revelation. Ms Patricia Creek an Aboriginal resident of Coen, who cares for Melita's elder brothers (Jimmy and Harold) originally had custody of Melita when their mother died in a car accident in November 1995 losing custody of Melita just eight weeks later. Melita was suffering from foetal alcohol syndrome at the time she was taken away from Ms Creek and - according to her white foster mother, Mrs MacDonald, had other problems.
"When she came to us she had salmonella, she had thrush, a bowel infection and a kidney infection", Mrs MacDonald said.
"She was also completely red raw from her stomach, round through her loins and up her back, from just not having nappies changed."
An Aboriginal elder at Coen, Banjo Kepple claims, "That little girl was always sick (while being cared for by Ms Creek), she was always filthy. But Patricia was drinking a lot and neglecting her. She doesn't deserve to have her back. The MacDonald's were wonderful to Melita. They brought her back to good health."
Melita has now been returned to Ms Creek.
One can only wonder at how many "little Melita's" made up the so-called "stolen generation".
A study by the New South Wales University's National Drug and Alcohol Centre has claimed that heroin deaths have risen by 800% in the last 16 years. The number of deaths from overdose rising from 70 in 1979 to 550 in 1995 or a rise over the period from 10.7 deaths per million Australians to 67. The cost in heroin sales is now estimated to be Au$1.7 billion per annum, with the drug lords now controlling a major industry.
In Melbourne a hit of heroin is so freely available that it can be bought for the cost of a packet of cigarettes.
What the report fails to recognise is that 96% of heroin found in Australia stems from the Asian golden triangle according to a National Crime Authority report. Interesting, also that Cabramatta is recognised as the drug capital of Australia - and the city is dominated by Asians and their triad gangs.
Pauline Hanson jump station.
Six years after 'the recession we had to have' according to Paul Keating, 20% of Australians now receive just Au$117 per week - which is less than 4% of the total income (down from 5% of income), while the top 20% jumped from 46.2% to 48.3% of total income received by Australians.
Have a great day.
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