“Scientifically Indefensible”: how a $13 billion political fix is killing the Murray Darling Basin
The federal government continues to squander $13 billion of taxpayers’ money in an unlawful mess that was supposed to fix this country’s greatest environmental catastrophe – the destruction of the Murray Darling Basin. It is a tale of political interference, scientific censorship and deception, pressure from lobbyists and bureaucratic cowardice. Richard Beasley SC reports.
New Nationals candidate rejects dirty tricks, Nats junk fake websites, yet John Barilaro defiant
Following Michael West Media’s report on domain squatting by the NSW Nationals in the lead-up to the Upper Hunter by-election, the Nationals candidate has directed the party to relinquish the domains, in apparent defiance of Nationals’ leader John Barilaro. Callum Foote reports.
Two Faced Facebook: how the digital giant lets Exxon, US companies, talk out both sides of their mouths
Australia’s premier tax cheat Exxon is one of a number of companies in the US using conflicting Facebook ads to target both liberals and conservatives, writes Jeremy B Merrill. The left wing sees narratives extolling Exxon tackling climate change while right wing Facebook users see ads asking for support to stop regulation.
Domain Squatters: Nationals play dirty website tactics to defeat foes in NSW by-election
The Nationals are counterfeiting the online identities of their political foes in a critical by-election in NSW by registering other peoples’ domain names, once again employing “bad faith” tactics that a regulator criticised them for using in 2019. Callum Foote reports.
State Capture: Nationals’ corporate funders revealed, tobacco giant Phillip Morris a party member
An investigation shows close links between the tobacco industry and the National Party as former deputy PM John Anderson plots his political comeback. In this final of our State Capture series on corporate members of political parties, Stephanie Tran reports on the company in which Anderson is a shareholder and its links to Phillip Morris.
Media concentration by Murdoch, Nine and Stokes, and ABC cuts, a danger to democracy – report
The heavy concentration of media ownership in Australia corrodes democracy. The antidote is a thriving public broadcaster, but by 2023, Coalition cuts to the ABC will add up to $1 billion. Elizabeth Minter reports.
Crooked Consulting: EY and Deloitte spruik climate on one hand, the explosion in new coal projects on the other
Australia is ramping up a slew of new coal projects just as global demand for coal is in retreat. It’s justified by dodgy “independent expert” reports from the likes of Big Four firms Deloitte and EY. Luke Stacey and Michael West report on the flawed economics of overpaid government consultants which justifies the rush to produce new coal despite a coal market in decline.
Crocodile tears no mask for Coalition’s economic war on women
Well may Scott Morrison tear up as he relates how his daughters, wife and widowed mother drive his every decision. The facts are that every move of the Coalition government ensures women are poorer, more insecure at work and more vulnerable to violence on the job. The Industrial Relations bill pushed through last week is a final nail in the coffin for women. Alison Pennington reports.
JobSlayer: gas giants grab $300m subsidy then axe 3000 workers
The Government touts gas as a key plank of JobMaker, its Covid-19 recession recovery plan. To help “support jobs” the government has given the gas industry $300 million of taxpayers’ money in subsidies. In return, the industry has cut about 3000 workers, more than 10% of it workforce, in a boom production year.
“Scientifically Indefensible”: how a $13 billion political fix is killing the Murray Darling Basin
The federal government continues to squander $13 billion of taxpayers’ money in an unlawful mess that was supposed to fix this country’s greatest environmental catastrophe – the destruction of the Murray Darling Basin. It is a tale of political interference, scientific censorship and deception, pressure from lobbyists and bureaucratic cowardice. Richard Beasley SC reports.
Featured Stories
New Nationals candidate rejects dirty tricks, Nats junk fake websites, yet John Barilaro defiant
Following Michael West Media’s report on domain squatting by the NSW Nationals in the lead-up to the Upper Hunter by-election, the Nationals candidate has directed the party to relinquish the domains, in apparent defiance of Nationals’ leader John Barilaro. Callum Foote reports.
Two Faced Facebook: how the digital giant lets Exxon, US companies, talk out both sides of their mouths
Australia’s premier tax cheat Exxon is one of a number of companies in the US using conflicting Facebook ads to target both liberals and conservatives, writes Jeremy B Merrill. The left wing sees narratives extolling Exxon tackling climate change while right wing Facebook users see ads asking for support to stop regulation.
Domain Squatters: Nationals play dirty website tactics to defeat foes in NSW by-election
The Nationals are counterfeiting the online identities of their political foes in a critical by-election in NSW by registering other peoples’ domain names, once again employing “bad faith” tactics that a regulator criticised them for using in 2019. Callum Foote reports.
State Capture: Nationals’ corporate funders revealed, tobacco giant Phillip Morris a party member
An investigation shows close links between the tobacco industry and the National Party as former deputy PM John Anderson plots his political comeback. In this final of our State Capture series on corporate members of political parties, Stephanie Tran reports on the company in which Anderson is a shareholder and its links to Phillip Morris.
Media concentration by Murdoch, Nine and Stokes, and ABC cuts, a danger to democracy – report
The heavy concentration of media ownership in Australia corrodes democracy. The antidote is a thriving public broadcaster, but by 2023, Coalition cuts to the ABC will add up to $1 billion. Elizabeth Minter reports.
Media Mourns End Of Prince Philip Stories
<!– by The Shovel –> The world’s media is grieving today, after realising it will have to fill its airtime with something other than inane stories about the life of Prince Philip. “It was a news event cut tragically short,” said Barbara...
Government In Talks With Essendon FC To Learn How To Successfully Rollout Injection Program
<!– by The Shovel –> Health Minister Greg Hunt will meet with members of the Essendon Football Club next week, hoping to gain tips on how to successfully inject a large group of people quickly and effectively. “I think we can learn a lot actually,”...
Morrison Announces Plan C: Australians To Vaccinate Themselves
<!– by The Shovel –> Australians will administer their own COVID-19 vaccinations, as part of a new approach to the government’s rollout, starting today. Announcing the changes, Prime Minister Scott Morrison rejected claims that the new system was an...
Stuff made up by The Shovel
Tax Haven Weather
Pearls & Irritations
Education shouldn’t be about contribution to the economy
The Coalition’s education policy deals only with schools, ignores the critical early years of life and the nature of learning and wrongly asserts a link between student education achievement and...
The role of the ADF and its core business model
The core business of the ADF “will always be the application of lethal violence in the defence of our values, sovereignty and interests”, according to the newly installed Assistant Defence Minister,...
War footing groupthink; subsidies and socialism; glasshouses and stones
Upside down, inside out and black is white. Journalists fall over themselves to paint Scott Morrison as a courageous leader, the Financial Review lauds the “very affordable” housing...
Housing affordability is a problem. Here’s why super-for-housing isn’t a solution
The idea that young Australians should be able to dip into their super to help buy their first home keeps going round and round. The most recent iteration put forward by the Coalition’s Tim Wilson...
Response to Brendan Coates on Retirement Income System
While Brendan Coates makes some valid criticisms of Paul Keating’s recent claims about Australia’s retirement income system, his own claims and assumptions (and those of the Retirement Income...
Courtesy of John Menadue.
Tax Haven Weather
State Capture: Nationals’ corporate funders revealed, tobacco giant Phillip Morris a party member
An investigation shows close links between the tobacco industry and the National Party as former deputy PM John Anderson plots his political comeback. In this final of our State Capture series on corporate members of political parties, Stephanie Tran reports on the company in which Anderson is a shareholder and its links to Phillip Morris.
State of Surveillance: Online Safety Bill captures the bad stuff but Commissioner’s powers too broad
The Online Safety Bill, if passed in its current form, could further undermine political accountability by ensuring footage of police violence or human rights abuses, for example, is taken down. That the government is not listening to concerns about the bill’s wide powers suggests some of the consequences may be intended. Samantha Floreani reports.
Local arts and film jilted in favour of foreign streaming majors Foxtel, Netflix, and Nine’s Stan
Another kick in the guts for the local screen industry as Stan, owned by Nine Entertainment, chaired by Liberal Party stalwart Peter Costello, is exempted from local content rules and foreign streaming giants such as Netflix are structured to skirt them too. As for the Coalition’s supposed rescue package for small players it is simply Kafkaesque and designed to fail. Elizabeth Minter reports.
Revealed: Australia’s Top 40 Tax Dodgers for 2021
Drumroll … trumpets, red carpet: we are rolling out Australia’s Top 40 Tax Dodgers for 2021. Michael West unveils the villains and the heroes of the tax scene, including new gongs this year for Lifetime Achievement Award and UnAustralian of the Year.
The Usual Suspects: oil and gas majors star in Australian tax heist
Angus Taylor’s rescue package for the oil industry is a testament to governments getting gamed by large corporations. The latest Tax Office transparency data shows oil and gas juggernauts are Australia’s biggest tax cheats, again, yet now they are crying for public subsidies – and getting them – to prop up their oil refineries. Michael West reports on the good and the bad in multinational tax dodging land.
Confession time for Lendlease as Tax Office bears down on humungous tax rort
Nine Entertainment chief Hugh Marks dumped for having sex, Christine Holgate chopped at Australia Post over $20,000 in bonuses. Meanwhile, the top brass at Lendlease, having presided over a $500 million tax scam, nonchalantly say they are “continuing to engage with the ATO and await the finalisation of its draft determination”. Michael West reports.
Domain Squatters: Nationals play dirty website tactics to defeat foes in NSW by-election
The Nationals are counterfeiting the online identities of their political foes in a critical by-election in NSW by registering other peoples’ domain names, once again employing “bad faith” tactics that a regulator criticised them for using in 2019. Callum Foote reports.
End neo-liberal experiment: gutting of bureaucracy led to vaccine and aged care failures
The vaccine rollout debacle is further evidence that the federal Department of Health should not be in charge of reforming the aged care sector, as recommended by one of the Aged Care Royal Commissioners. And when will governments of all political persuasions finally wake up to the failed economic model that is neoliberalism? Dr Sarah Russell and Elizabeth Minter report.
Public Jabs: multiple doses of lies, spin and obfuscation in Covid vaccine roll-out
Scott Morrison and the Coalition keep changing their story on why the Covid vaccine rollout is a debacle. Are they betting the public will be unable to keep up with the rewriting of history? Elizabeth Minter reports on the Government’s world-leading program of false premises.
Logging Eden: NSW south coast forestry dominated by potentially illegal wood-chipping
During 2020, 96% of trees felled in the NSW region of Eden were turned into woodchips, with 1.5% for firewood. Elizabeth Minter and Harriet Swift report on the potentially illegal activity and the huge amount of taxpayers’ money being handed out to the timber industry.
Pressure builds on Woodside to shed its climate stance; expect AGM fireworks
Climate groups have repeatedly criticised Woodside over its climate denial over many years. Under heavy pressure from shareholders, will the company finally shed its laggard ways at its AGM on Thursday, asks Elizabeth Minter.
Shell predicts free gas forever from Gorgon and Prelude LNG projects
Shell's accountants predict the Dutch giant will never pay Australia for gas extracted at the Gorgon and Prelude LNG projects that it can sell for up to about $4 billion a year. Peter Milne from independent energy and climate news site Boiling Cold has the story....
JobMaker scheme fails youth as super accounts drained and JobKeeper bypassed gig economy
The Coalition government’s signature employment policy for young people JobMaker has created just 609 jobs. And thanks to the flawed design of JobKeeper, which shut out many young people from key financial support, superannuation accounts were emptied, for which the young will pay a heavy price down the track. Kathryn Daley, Belinda Johnson and Patrick O’Keefe report.
Psst, about that lazy $178 billion the banks have parked at the Reserve Bank …
The banks have $178 billion sitting on deposit with the Reserve Bank, earning zero interest. It was $155 billion a month ago. This is newly created money. In crude terms, the RBA is “printing” money hand over fist, but why are the banks not lending it? Why is there no nation-building infrastructure program like the US? Michael West investigates.
Group of Eight universities concede to ASIO, restrict vital research engagement with China
China is provoking every country in its region. But that is no reason to cut off all contact, including scientific engagement, particularly if we want to avoid war, writes Brian Toohey.
State Capture: Nationals’ corporate funders revealed, tobacco giant Phillip Morris a party member
An investigation shows close links between the tobacco industry and the National Party as former deputy PM John Anderson plots his political comeback. In this final of our State Capture series on corporate members of political parties, Stephanie Tran reports on the company in which Anderson is a shareholder and its links to Phillip Morris.
State of Surveillance: Online Safety Bill captures the bad stuff but Commissioner’s powers too broad
The Online Safety Bill, if passed in its current form, could further undermine political accountability by ensuring footage of police violence or human rights abuses, for example, is taken down. That the government is not listening to concerns about the bill’s wide powers suggests some of the consequences may be intended. Samantha Floreani reports.
Local arts and film jilted in favour of foreign streaming majors Foxtel, Netflix, and Nine’s Stan
Another kick in the guts for the local screen industry as Stan, owned by Nine Entertainment, chaired by Liberal Party stalwart Peter Costello, is exempted from local content rules and foreign streaming giants such as Netflix are structured to skirt them too. As for the Coalition’s supposed rescue package for small players it is simply Kafkaesque and designed to fail. Elizabeth Minter reports.
Revealed: Australia’s Top 40 Tax Dodgers for 2021
Drumroll … trumpets, red carpet: we are rolling out Australia’s Top 40 Tax Dodgers for 2021. Michael West unveils the villains and the heroes of the tax scene, including new gongs this year for Lifetime Achievement Award and UnAustralian of the Year.
The Usual Suspects: oil and gas majors star in Australian tax heist
Angus Taylor’s rescue package for the oil industry is a testament to governments getting gamed by large corporations. The latest Tax Office transparency data shows oil and gas juggernauts are Australia’s biggest tax cheats, again, yet now they are crying for public subsidies – and getting them – to prop up their oil refineries. Michael West reports on the good and the bad in multinational tax dodging land.
Confession time for Lendlease as Tax Office bears down on humungous tax rort
Nine Entertainment chief Hugh Marks dumped for having sex, Christine Holgate chopped at Australia Post over $20,000 in bonuses. Meanwhile, the top brass at Lendlease, having presided over a $500 million tax scam, nonchalantly say they are “continuing to engage with the ATO and await the finalisation of its draft determination”. Michael West reports.
Domain Squatters: Nationals play dirty website tactics to defeat foes in NSW by-election
The Nationals are counterfeiting the online identities of their political foes in a critical by-election in NSW by registering other peoples’ domain names, once again employing “bad faith” tactics that a regulator criticised them for using in 2019. Callum Foote reports.
End neo-liberal experiment: gutting of bureaucracy led to vaccine and aged care failures
The vaccine rollout debacle is further evidence that the federal Department of Health should not be in charge of reforming the aged care sector, as recommended by one of the Aged Care Royal Commissioners. And when will governments of all political persuasions finally wake up to the failed economic model that is neoliberalism? Dr Sarah Russell and Elizabeth Minter report.
Public Jabs: multiple doses of lies, spin and obfuscation in Covid vaccine roll-out
Scott Morrison and the Coalition keep changing their story on why the Covid vaccine rollout is a debacle. Are they betting the public will be unable to keep up with the rewriting of history? Elizabeth Minter reports on the Government’s world-leading program of false premises.
Logging Eden: NSW south coast forestry dominated by potentially illegal wood-chipping
During 2020, 96% of trees felled in the NSW region of Eden were turned into woodchips, with 1.5% for firewood. Elizabeth Minter and Harriet Swift report on the potentially illegal activity and the huge amount of taxpayers’ money being handed out to the timber industry.
Pressure builds on Woodside to shed its climate stance; expect AGM fireworks
Climate groups have repeatedly criticised Woodside over its climate denial over many years. Under heavy pressure from shareholders, will the company finally shed its laggard ways at its AGM on Thursday, asks Elizabeth Minter.
Shell predicts free gas forever from Gorgon and Prelude LNG projects
Shell's accountants predict the Dutch giant will never pay Australia for gas extracted at the Gorgon and Prelude LNG projects that it can sell for up to about $4 billion a year. Peter Milne from independent energy and climate news site Boiling Cold has the story....
JobMaker scheme fails youth as super accounts drained and JobKeeper bypassed gig economy
The Coalition government’s signature employment policy for young people JobMaker has created just 609 jobs. And thanks to the flawed design of JobKeeper, which shut out many young people from key financial support, superannuation accounts were emptied, for which the young will pay a heavy price down the track. Kathryn Daley, Belinda Johnson and Patrick O’Keefe report.
Psst, about that lazy $178 billion the banks have parked at the Reserve Bank …
The banks have $178 billion sitting on deposit with the Reserve Bank, earning zero interest. It was $155 billion a month ago. This is newly created money. In crude terms, the RBA is “printing” money hand over fist, but why are the banks not lending it? Why is there no nation-building infrastructure program like the US? Michael West investigates.
Group of Eight universities concede to ASIO, restrict vital research engagement with China
China is provoking every country in its region. But that is no reason to cut off all contact, including scientific engagement, particularly if we want to avoid war, writes Brian Toohey.
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