CAN DO Campbell Newman is the not-corrupt premier of QLD and
Dental plan...
the leader of the not-corrupt LNP party. He led the LNP to a record victory of 78 seats (of a total of 89) in QLD parliament giving him a total majority. For those of you good at maths you’ll see that’s almost a complete obliteration of all opposition.Let’s have a look at some of what Campbell Newman has implemented:
- Cancelling BreastScreen (Mobile breast cancer screening)
- Hiring something like 1100 new police
- Promising to cut 20,000 public sector jobs to help balance the budget.
- Called Queensland the "Spain of Australia" and got in trouble for it
- Won't give more money to National Disability Insurance Scheme (stuff even his Federal counterparts wouldn’t dare oppose)
- Got rid of civil unions in Queensland
- Got rid of that Fair Work Queensland something or other
- Scrapped the Premier's Literary award to save money.
- AND then gave an almost equivalent amount to the producers of Big Brother.
- Had a sudden, mysterious revelation upon becoming elected that the state's budget was far, far worse than he had claimed beforehand.
- Convieniently ignored the spate of natural disasters in recent years and their impact on the state's economy.
- Building a multi hundred million dollar redevelopment of the parlimentary CBD and new office building for himself. Tossing money at his mates in the process.
- Hired Peter Costello on the taxpayer dollar to assess the state's finances. Unsurprisingly recieved very doom and gloom report back to use as justification.
- ♙ut 2000 jobs in Transport and Main Roads.
- Publicly claimed Queenslanderswere thankful for the job cuts.
- Told fired workers they should apply for jobs in the police force.
- Axed Office of Climate Change, offered 70 odd workers including Anna Bligh's husband who he had promised not to fire out of spite and then gave them a $6500 redundancy package so he could claim he wasn't firing them.
- Appointed Fiona Simpson to speaker, where she has enacted a series of draconian crackdowns on the rights of the public and the media to observe and be present at parliament.
Jazz hands
who then went on to:
- Banned media from parliament because they had the audacity to report on people protesting
- Rumoured to be re-implementing Joh era secret dossier's on known dissidents.
- Axed the states only (and excellent) community support organisation for LGBT Queenslanders based on lies and demonstrably false justifications. It is widely known that QAHC considering outspoken support and campaigns for equal rights to be a part of its job was a major factor in the decision.
- Planning to make it a criminal act punishable with jail time for same sex couples to be involved in surrogacy.
- Cut state funding to the Solar Dawn project.
- Cut public Q & A sessions from community cabinet meetings.
- Ignored a UNESCO report regarding developments and increased shipping threatening the great barrier reef.
- Denies climate change.
Uhhhhh rights? What?
- Cut family planning/women's health funding.
- Closing down CITEC, which delivers centralised IT services to departments and agencies (including payroll systems that actually work, which appear to be anathema to the Qld Govt).
- Is spending 1.2 billion on a new centralised 'Tower of Power' / 'Beacon of Beaurocracy' to provide centralised access to government services, complete with secret tunnel to allow politicians to avoid mingling with everyday traffic.
- Cut funding to aboriginal health groups.
- Literally kicked the opposition out of their offices in the Parliament and made them all move down the street.
- Charging the Media ($33,000) for the privilege of being in the Parliament building.
- Proposing to relax gun Control laws
- Smashing up the QLD tent embassy
- Cut $10 rebate for pensioners to get their lawn mowed
- Cuts funding to a Child Protection project that went on to win an award
- Moves the labour day public holiday to the end of the year. Labour day is celibrated world wide inthe early part of the year. Consoidates his views on employees.
- Abolished funding to the Tenancy Advice and Advocacy Service. The funding was provided from the interest on tenant's own bonds that are held in trust by the RTA.
- Ignored UNESCO warning about developing ports on the Great Barrier Reef
*Wants to open up conservation areas to logging and grazing (Thanks Hobo Erotica)
*Cutting funding for a school band competition (How petty - "Sorry musicaly kiddies, Greyhounds are more important!") (Thanks Hobo Erotica) - Sacking 14000 public service workers to help fund a $57000 wage rise for MPs while his office think 'politicians are worth what they get paid every day of the week' while blocking a 2.2% payrise for public servants. They later backed out of the opportunity for Newman to have the same salary as Barack Obama ($400k)
- Removed Labor's cap on political donations
- Drafting legislation which includes 12 months behind bars or a $12,000 fine for parents who allow their children to hold uncontrollable parties.
- Yet sponsoring $5000 to fund a pop-up picnic, often held in prestigious parts of the city without authorisation
- Cutting 30 staff at Brisbane's only free sexual health clinic, despite having one of the highest rates of chlamydia in Australia and a doubling of HIV diagnoses in 10 years
- Cutting 430 IT jobs and won't guarantee the jobs will stay onshore
- Increasing free range egg densities from 1500 birds per hectare to 10000 per hectare (a 667% increase)
- Says Canberra is stalling Qld economy, despite waning investment in mining and a noticeably higher unemployment rate compared to the national average
- Completely outsourcing the management of Australia's largest publicly owned teaching hospital to a commercial operator
- Allowing oil and gas development in Queensland's Lake Eyre Basin
- Protecting his mates from claims of nepotism by hiding documents related to their employment
- Introducing new laws that can imprison someone for up to 25yrs for supply a 16yr old with marijuana and up to 7yrs for graffiti vandalism
- Closing the only mental health unit that houses teenagers with severe mental disorders
- The G20 Safety and Security Bill, now before State Parliament, would allow police to search people on the spot, arrest and detain anyone deemed a threat without giving them bail for at least the week of the summit while publicly broadcasting the names and photos of people listed "prohibited" from the city
- 'Naming and shaming' repeat offenders as young as 10
- Selling the Clem 7 tunnel for 618m. It cost $3 billion to build
- Abolishing Skills Queensland, set up to address the state's skills and workforce priorities
- Introducing tough anti-bikie laws including: No gym facilities or TV access in jail, a bikie-only prison and only one hour of contact time per week
- Queensland widens bikie law assault with plans for jobs bans
- Attorney-General Jarrod Blejie has given himself a special ministerial decree so that he can overrule Supreme Court judges and prevent the very worst criminal offenders from being released from jail
- Tony Abbott and Campbell Newman reduce environmental checks, unwinding thirty years’ worth of protection for Queensland’s nationally significant environmental icons
- Considering a plan to force jailed members of gangs to wear fluoro pink prison uniforms
- Changing the staffing allocation formula, has resulted in fewer teachers for the same amount of students this year, leading to an increase in classes over the target size
- Police who disagree with the crackdown on bikie gangs have been told to reconsider their future with the service
- The Queensland Police union is pushing for powerful Remington R4 carbine .223 guns with scopes, shotguns and personal body armour tailored to individual officers in the fight against bikies
- Queensland Health is preparing to put thousands of senior medical officers onto contracts, sparking fears doctors will have no protection against pressures to work while fatigued
- 30 positions were quietly abolished in the Environment department, including 2 koala specialists
- Newman declaring that people who do not support his government's laws giving politicians power to overrule the courts in some cases, are "apologists for sex offenders and pedophiles"
- Newman creates bikie refugees as they head as far away as Perth to escape the crackdown on criminal motorcycle gangs
- A legal expert has described Premier Campbell Newman's recent swipe at Queensland's judicial system as "unprecedented" and "reprehensible" - includes long list of QLD anti-bikie laws
- A typographical error in Queensland's new anti-bikie laws means gang members who commit grievous bodily harm will spend only one year in jail as opposed to a one year minimum
- Convicted criminals living within restricted zones for next year's G20 Summit in Brisbane could get a short holiday at taxpayers' expense
- Campbell Newman refuses to back down in an escalating row with the state's judiciary
- For a few days in November next year, it will be illegal for people to carry certain household objects such as eggs and glass jars in central Brisbane or Cairns - unless they have a "lawful excuse" (e.g. a person who purchases a longbow from a sports store in a security area and then carries the longbow in a case to the person's vehicle to take it home)
- Newman says gang-related crime in the state is a bigger problem than corruption issues that sparked the Fitzgerald Inquiry in the late 1980s
- If bikies meet in groups of three or more interstate all police need to do is get some recording of it, such as from a security camera at an airport, restaurant or service station, and if the bikies return to Queensland, they can be arrested and face up to three years in jail. Police also raided the Vietnam and Veterans Motorcycle Club (VVMC) at its clubhouse, which includes men mostly in their 60s and 70s who fought in Vietnam and ex-servicemen who hold an Active Service Medal. In a statement Queensland Police said the raid was "part of a strategy to develop a rapport with legitimate members of the motorcycle riding community in the interest of effective policing".
- Queensland police want to take guns home to protect families amid bikie fears, while considering a policy allowing district duty officers to carry high-powered semi-automatic Remington R4 carbine .223 rifles in their vehicles
- Chief Magistrate issues an edict that could see alleged outlaw bikies kept behind bars for up to a week before they can even apply for bail
- The Chief Magistrate also issued an edict that will effectively ensure he makes all the decisions in cases of disputed bail for accused bikies, stripping this abiliy from Queensland's 88 magistrates
- Victoria launches their own specialist federal anti-gang squad aimed at the growing bikie menace
- Dredging for the development of deep water port facilities would be prohibited outside of five established ports for the next 10 years, although UNESCO is worried about the current dredging proposals within those five areas
- The Attorney-General rejects claims youth boot camp plans axes - A program at Kuranda near Cairns in far north Queensland was suspended in April after the first two participants ran away and robbed a neighbour
- Considering a move for Independent Public School principals the power to boost school chaplaincy hours at the expense of literacy and numeracy programs, or other staff including guidance counsellors and psychologists.
- Attorney-General Jarrod Bleijie decides Office of the Director of Public Prosecutions takes over contested bikie bail applications
- Queensland police officers allowed to ditch name badges ahead of G20 summit
- MULTI-national mining companies will be offered discount royalty rates for being the first to open up for business in Queensland's Galilee Basin.
- Mr Newman said he had no regrets his government’s new anti-association laws were used to arrest three alleged criminal motorcycle gang members while they drank at the Palazzo Versace bar on the Gold Coast.
- Police and Community Safety Minister Jack Dempsey on the Police Powers and Responsibilities and Other Legislation Amendment Bill, currently before State Parliament, which proposes jail terms and fines of more than $12,000 for the organisers of events that are deemed to be out-of-control: "The majority of people who do the right thing have nothing to fear,"
- Three bikies waiting to testify in a trial in a Maroochydore Magistrates Court were ordered by a police sergeant to disperse from the area or face possible jail due to the new anti-association laws.
- Making moves to protect police officers from being sued
- Sacking the cross-party Parlimentary CMC committee to protect the (LNP appointed) CMC boss who is accused of corruption and impartiality after writing an editorial supporting the new anti-association laws, which it was later revealed was written after meeting with Newmans top media advisor.
- The number one parliament across five countries for over-representation (share of seats relative to share of votes)
- Australian Federal Police have been providing funds for studies to test Queensland's sewage for illicit drugs
- The Queensland government is under pressure to ignore expert advice and retain laws requiring cyclists to wear helmets.
- A YOUNG soldier has told of being strip-searched by police in front of his home as the Queensland Government's tough anti-bikie laws continue to take a toll on recreational riders.
- States should stop 'bleating' about Gonski, says Qld Education Minister John-Paul Langbroek
- Despite Parliament enacting controversial new laws giving Queensland Attorney-General Jarrod Bleijie power to override court rulings and keep Fardon and other sex offenders in jail, Bleijie has withdrawn an application to keep convicted sex offender Robert John Fardon in prison.
- Retired Brigadier Bill Mellor, under whom Mr Newman served when he was in the army, is overseeing the State Government's bikie war strategy
- A Rebels motorcycle club member set to be charged under Queensland's hardline anti-bikie laws says the Newman Government has made it illegal to have a beer with your family.
- Increasing the value of notes that can be fed into poker machines in the state from $20 to $100
- A man who filmed three Queensland Police officers attacking a man outside a gay nightclub in Brisbane has said that he plans to leave the state amid a highly publicised law and order drive by the Newman government. He later destroyed the footage, despite police making a public appeal for it.
- Juvenile crime rises by 21.6% after cutting a juvenile offenders program. More than 1500 juveniles went through the program during the last six months of 2012, with offenders and their families meeting with victims and a police officer, it had a satisfaction rate of 99 per cent. The Government responds by introducing legislation which "includes naming and shaming repeat offenders, making juvenile criminal histories available to adult courts and creating a new offence for breaching bail"
- A study found 34.8 per cent of state education staff believed their workplace was functioning less efficiently as a result of changes in the previous 12 months. The results were even worse for the Department of Transport and Main Roads (52.9 per cent), Department of Community Safety (52.7 per cent), police (40.9 per cent), along with the state health department (49 per cent) and numerous hospital health services. Four out of 10 surveyed education staff said they were “burned out” from their jobs.
- Taxpayers have footed the bill for almost $40,000 worth of security upgrades at Premier Campbell Newman's family home in the wake of the state government's crackdown on criminal motorcycle gangs, including upgrades to security screens, CCTV, external lighting, alarms, locksmith work and intercoms.
- The Health Minister said health union bosses must explain to their members why they should continue to use Membership fees to either bankroll or give support in kind to the Labor Party
- Police Commissioner Ian Stewart has vowed to cut crime by 10 per cent as the service rolls out scorecards for cops across the state. The average number of traffic fines, RBTs, street checks and calls for service per officer will all the assessed on the scorecards along with budgets and overtime.
- The Queensland Council for Civil Liberties (QCCL) says police will be pressured into breaking the law to keep their figures up on scorecards. A representative from the QCCL says it is a return to the so-called "kill sheet" quotas of the 1970s and 80s.
- Campbell Newman declares Queensland tattoo artists and parlours will require a licence to operate, with applicants being screened by Queensland Police Service to ensure that they have no links to motorcycle gangs
- FIVE alleged bikies from Victoria will spend at least six weeks behind bars after being arrested for breaking anti-bikie laws in Queensland. Police allege that the men walked down the street together and met at a hotel bar during their stay on the Gold Coast.
- A man was placed in solitary confinement in a Brisbane jail after allegedly delivering a pizza to his boss and his brother-in-law at a country pub. Unable to explain the intricacies of Queensland's new anti-bikie laws to their two young children, his wife told them their father missed Christmas because he "was solving a mystery with Scooby Doo".
- Incoming human rights commissioner, Tim Wilson, has called for Queensland's anti-bikie legislation to be repealed, arguing “Bikies have just as much right to freely associate as other Australians”.
- Qld Police Service accused of double standard over officer suspension as the report provided next to no information while a person arrested earlier had their details released to the media even before their first court appearance
- Anyone who has declared their membership to a proscribed club, through words or action, sought to have been a member, or attended one or more meetings or gatherings of people who are members or associates is in danger of losing their electrical licence or not having it renewed: “So we have electricians with no criminal record having their honest livelihoods taken off them."
- The president of Queensland Police Union, is calling for the Queensland Police Service to be renamed the Queensland Police Force, the better to represent its role in fighting serious organised crime.
- Queensland's police commissioner has apologised to law-abiding motorcyclists after one rider said he'd been pulled over 21 times since the bikie crackdown began: He said there was an up side to the video (posted below): that it showed police carrying out a respectful and professional intercept
- Newman says he doesn't like his own government's tough anti-bikie laws: But he says they're necessary for now and must, by law, be reviewed within three years of their introduction.
- Campbell Newman has renewed his government's promise to review its contentious anti-association gang laws in 2016, a condition which was written into the act in October 2013
- Newman has called on federal health authorities to investigate the possible trial of medicinal cannabis.
- Attorney-General Jarrod Bleijie has been accused of "pure hypocrisy" in his defence of VLAD laws on a speech the then opposition justice spokesman gave to Parliament in 2009 in which he spoke critically of the Bligh Government's proposed Criminal Organisation Bill.
- On a former Federal Liberal MP who used his taxpayer-funded budget to employ his wife who was never seen in the office: "I've always had a standard in my team that it's not at all preferable to employ family members" "I'm not saying it's never happened in my Government, there've been some instances, but our standard is one where we don't encourage it." "The Labor Party, by the way, do it all the time."
- Queenslanders may never know why 26 bikie gangs have been declared criminal organisations. Attorney-General Jarrod Bleijie says police evidence and detailed criminal histories are behind his declarations. The University of Sydney's Dr Greg Martin says the laws override the court process and the fundamental concept of a fair trial has been stripped away.
- The Queensland Government has abandoned plans for a High Court appeal to keep serial sex offenders like Robert John Fardon behind bars. Fardon was freed from jail last month and moved into a residential facility at Wacol in south-west Brisbane when Attorney-General Jarrod Bleijie lost a second appeal against his release. The Court of Appeal also ruled new laws giving the Government the power to keep some sex offenders behind bars were invalid.
- Queensland Police have confirmed they are investigating a complaint that a serving officer has been posting racist comments on Facebook.
- Five men who were granted bail for meeting at a local pub included a pizza parlour owner, his employee, a renderer, a truck driver and an IT student - all had been linked in some way to the Rebels before they allegedly broke anti-association laws by meeting at the Yandina Pub over several hours on November 1.
- Campbell prefers to target alcohol-fuelled violence through tougher penalties and more police rather than cutting drinking hours: "Higher taxes on alcohol and curtailing drinking hours punish the many (partygoers) for the sins of a few, He describes the measures as authoritarian
- The Maritime Union of Australia and a group aligning itself with the Electrical Trades Union have given $5000 and $10,000 to the United Motorcycle Council's fighting fund. Newman responds: 'I think many hard working union members would be unhappy about their money being used to bankroll criminals'
- Planning to implement a proof of identity requirement for voting, opponents say it will result in those already marginalised sectors of the community, such as the homeless, those who speak English as a second language and Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islanders being denied their democratic right to vote. Director of advocacy and research at the Victoria-based Human Rights Law Centre: “Homeless people for example have difficulty obtaining ID, there is evidence that Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoples have difficulty obtaining birth certificates and Medicare cards, there are a whole range of reasons why people may not have identification." Voter ID laws are commonplace in the United States where they are justified as a necessary way to combat voter fraud despite there being little evidence that fraud is a significant issue.
- Campbell Newman wants to protect young Queenslanders's right to “sow their wild oats”. Mr Newman said he didn't believe earlier closing times for clubs and pubs was a “magic bullet solution” and those advocating it should think back to the “6 o'clock swill”.
- Minor parties have warned Queensland voters are in danger of having their representative choices limited to the two major parties if controversial electoral reforms proposed by the government are passed, including donation caps for parties and individual candidates will be abolished and the donation declaration threshold will be lifted to $12,400. In addition parties would need to win at least 10 per cent of the vote to receive public funding.
- A library assistant has become the first woman charged under Queensland's anti-bikie laws
- The State Government, meanwhile, says it makes no apology for looking to appoint public relations consultants to promote its controversial laws. The cost of the campaign has not been finalised, but it has been reported that it could cost around $500,000.
- More than 500 Queensland doctors have voted to reject individual work contracts proposed by the State Government. The Australian Salaried Medical Officers Federation, which represents more than 3,000 Queensland specialists, says the Government has downgraded conditions and other protections from the workplace agreements.
- Axing a free booster program for expectant parents, then two weeks later a 6 week old baby died from whooping cough, a vaccine-preventable disease. He was too young to be vaccinated and his parents had not received pertussis booster shots.
- The board of the agency charged with protecting the Great Barrier Reef has failed to adopt its own experts' recommendation that it ban port developments which threaten the reef. Former Townsville mayor Tony Mooney earns $250,000 a year working for a coal company, and Queensland's top public servant Jon Grayson owns a one-sixth shareholding in a company called Gasfields Water and Waste Services. Both men helped set the Great Barrier Reef Marine Park Authority's position on ports at a number of board meetings.
- Gold Coast pubs, clubs and bars are refusing to admit patrons with visible tattoos in the wake of the State Government's war on bikies. While many venues have had "no tattoo policies in place for years, revellers say operators have only started enforcing the rule in the past few months.
- Attorney-General Jarrod Bleijie said he expected the focus of his anti-crime laws to "ease off" on checking the credentials of ordinary people who happen to ride big motorbikes and shift more to gathering intelligence information about "bad criminals" and criminal organisations
- A north Queensland fisherman says the decision to dump dredge spoil from the Abbot Point coal terminal in the Great Barrier Marine Park will seriously damage the local fishing industry: "Once it's in the ocean, there's no controlling it,"
- Student groups around south-east Queensland have raised concerns about recent State Government changes to student concessions on public transport. Students who are enrolled in a course with less than 12 contact hours are not eligible for the new Tertiary Transport Concession Card (TTCC), even if their workload is classified as full-time by their educational institution.
- Having a inquiry into sexually explicit outdoor advertising and recommending that ads featuring adult themes be reviewed by the Advertising Standards Bureau automatically, all outdoor ads to carry information of how people can lodge a complaint and a review board to assess complaints and refer any breaches of a code of ethics to the Attorney General in Queensland, who can decide on any fines to apply. Inquiry document
- Campbell Newman sullies the entire profession of solicitors by suggesting bikie lawyers are hired guns who belong to a ``criminal gang machine and hits back at comments made by corruption buster Tony Fitzgerald describing him as describing them as "political vigilantes fantasising about Dirty Harry" A Gold Coast law firm is threatening to sue Queensland Premier Campbell Newman and the state's attorney-general for suggesting they are part of the "criminal gang machine" for defending bikies.
- Queensland's jails have reached capacity, with the number of prisoners exceeding the number of built beds, putting staff safety at risk. The Opposition Leader says it is a result of Government cuts to programs that replaced jail time
- The low-emission, gas-fired Swanbank E power station west of Brisbane will close for three years because it has become more lucrative to sell the gas than to burn it and sell electricity. The station’s owner, state government-owned Stanwell Power Corporation, will instead re-start the coal-fired Tarong power station to meet electricity demands.
- The latest financial returns, published by the Australian Electoral Commission, showed the Queensland LNP received just under $17 million in 2012/13. The biggest single donations came from now-former member and billionaire Clive Palmer ($43,300), Gold Coast window and door company Jeld-Wen Australia ($100,000), the Manildra Group ($49,500) and Beach Energy ($55,000).
- Stephen Keim, a prominent Brisbane barrister, spoke about the human rights implications of the anti-bikie legislation at a legal conference on the Gold Coast today: "I think it will generate long-term problems for our community and I think that the public are already coming to realise aspects of this,"
- In 2013, 43 sharks, were caught in shark nets off the Sunshine Coast, 30 were over two metres and considered dangerous to humans. Only four of the 43 sharks caught were released alive. The net also trapped a small number of dolphins, turtles and whales, and a dugong. No whales died, but three dolphins, one turtle and the dugong did.
- Prison authorities refuse to release images of the cells being used to hold bikies in solitary confinement, citing “safety and security considerations”. According to those statements, prisoners are forbidden from wearing underpants and, in the bikies-only facility at Woodford prison, are clothed in pink uniforms. They are held in lockdown for 23 hours each day in cells “the size of a large dining table”, with only a mattress and a toilet.
- Attorney-General Jarrod Bleijie introduced new laws which mean unions will have to give at least 24 hours’ notice before entering a workplace on suspicion of a breach of the Work Health and Safety Act. The laws also remove the right for union safety officials to direct workers to cease unsafe work. If unions ignore the changes they face fines of up to $22,000.
- The government’s proposed changes to the Electoral Act 1992 cover a lot of ground. Among the changes the LNP is proposing is a removal of caps on donations and expenditure, increasing the donation disclosure amount from $5000 for parties and $2000 for candidates to $12,400, and upping the threshold from 4 per cent to 10 per cent of the vote before political parties received public funding. That last amendment would mean the Greens, which at the last election polled at just under 8 per cent and minor parties, which given Queensland’s unicameral parliamentary system have struggled to win long-term representation, would also struggle to access public funds.
- Leonie Murray of Sunshine Powder Coating which has employed Eric Fehlhaber for the past 10 years said he was a model employee, husband and father whose alleged bikie associations were not the sum total of who he was. She said he was the company's only boilermaker and the only one with a licence to drive its delivery truck. His arrest had created major problems for the small business. Ms Murray said the company was now scrambling to make deliveries
- The Queensland government is trying to win public support for its controversial anti-bikies legislation by using it to target pedophiles, a civil libertarian says.
- Liberal National Party members in Queensland have urged the federal government to investigate how a temporary ban on live cattle exports has affected drought stricken farmers.
- Treasurer Tim Nicholls warns state coffers will run dry in three years without asset sales
- The Newman government is facing a revolt within its own ranks, with a senior MP threatening to resign over the escalating dispute with the state’s doctors.
- Energy Minister Mark McArdle today announced an end to the mandated 8-cent solar feed-in tariff by government-owned electricity companies Energex and Ergon, leaving nearly 50,000 QLD households using solar energy to negotiate directly with the retailers over a price for the energy they produce.
- Letter from Attorney-General Jarrod Bleijie highlighting that a person charged under the VLAD laws have "the opportunity to provide that the organisation to which they are connected to is not an organisation that engages in criminal activity" (guilty until proven innocent)
- When the Queensland LNP went to the 2012 election, it claimed it would protect Cape York. Yet the State Government is now proposing to prioritise development over biodiversity values in most of Cape York and enabling a paper-thin, discretionary level of protection for key iconic areas.
- Elective surgery in Queensland's public hospitals could cease by July if the state government fails to give more ground to senior doctors in its long-running dispute over individual contracts. The threat from the Australian Salaried Medical Officers Federation (ASMOF) comes as Queensland Premier Campbell Newman says doctors who resign en masse can be easily replaced.
- Queensland Premier Campbell Newman is being urged to sideline his health minister as doctors at public hospitals threaten to resign en masse over individual contracts.
- Two breast cancer surgeons working for Queensland Health have quit, blaming the proposed Newman Government contracts as “the final straw’’. The surgeons have quit the Royal Brisbane and Women’s Hospital during the contracts dispute, saying the threat of hospital managers controlling their rosters, and the impact on their families, had been a precipitating factor.
- The government will have the power to appoint the Crime and Corruption Commission chair, CEO and commissioners without bipartisan support under its planned reforms. Attorney-General Jarrod Bleijie introduced the changes to parliament on Wednesday, giving the parliamentary review committee six weeks to complete its report on the bill.
- Treasurer Tim Nicholls said it may take a combination of privatisation, raising taxes and cutting services to restore the state's debt to a manageable level: "It may involve a combination of all of those three, but let's have a discussion with Queenslanders first and see what they would like to see happen."
- Queensland's former Solicitor-General Walter Sofronoff has called for the Attorney-General Jarrod Bleijie to resign after the Attorney-General publicly revealed details of a conversation between himself and Court of Appeal president Margaret McMurdo. Mr Bleijie said "everyone will move on" and he would not resign over the affair.
- The Australian Medical Association says the Queensland premier has inflamed an industrial dispute by threatening to hire doctors from interstate and overseas. Newman: “If people do choose to resign, we will have in place arrangements to replace those people and if we have to replace people from interstate or overseas ... we shall do that,” “Do not doubt the Government’s resolve. Do not doubt that we will see this thing through,”
- The doctors themselves have taken to the streets on letterboxing campaigns. This link includes a letter from a senior doctor at the Prince Charles Hospital. Pastebin archived link
- The Queensland Government remains prepared to employ doctors from interstate and replace any medicos who quit over new contracts. Keep Our Doctors spokesman says the state government's contracts are so bad that employment warnings have been issued interstate and overseas warning doctors to avoid working to Queensland: "There are going to be very few, if any, top doctors willing to come and work under these conditions."
- Rebuttals to the Director-Generals comments to the Senior Medical Officers
- Attorney-General, Jarrod Bleijie, introduced the Crime and Misconduct and Other Legislation Amendment Bill 2014 to Parliament, which includes the renaming of the head of the Crime and Misconduct Commission from 'chairperson' to 'chairman'
- Newman announced a new plan to tackle “alcohol-related violence”. The plan, if implemented, will set up 15 trial “safe night precincts” across Queensland, with rest and recovery services and “sober safe centres” where police can detain people they judge to be too intoxicated, charging a $200 fine for the first offence. Late trading clubs will also be required to introduce ID scanners linked to a state-wide database to track people banned from clubs in other cities.
- Outgoing solicitor-general Walter Sofronoff has slammed Queensland Attorney-General Jarrod Bleijie, saying he cannot be trusted and the public should be alarmed by his behaviour. Campbell Newman said he fully supported Attorney-General Jarrod Bleijie after his latest spat with the Queensland judiciary. Mr Bleijie has come under fire after accusing Court of Appeal president Justice Margaret McMurdo of nepotism.
- Two interstate lawyers have weighed and measured Jarrod Bleijie's law reforms in historical context: “to illustrate that together they constitute a great leap backward that unravels centuries of gradual reform calculated to improve the state of human rights in criminal justice”.
- Queensland judges may blacklist Attorney-General Jarrod Bleijie for leaking details of a private discussion with Court of Appeal president Justice Margaret McMurdo.
- Premier Campbell Newman, his ministers and opponents have been awarded pay rises backdating to July 2013. Newman’s wage will jump 21.8 per cent, from $311,635 to $379,562, almost $70,000 more
- The Australian Medical Association fears the Queensland government's unprecedented attempt to stop unions from providing advice to members and its introduction of individual contracts for public hospital doctors could embolden other states to follow its example. Unions say they will not be silenced or intimidated by the Queensland Government's attempt to take them to court over doctors' contracts.
- Public sector technology workers are becoming an endangered species in Queensland with the latest figures suggesting their numbers fell 24 per cent in the past 18 months. Their ranks will be further reduced when the government offloads its commercial technology services bureau CITEC, slated for sale by August 2015. The agency employs about 400 staff and is the government’s primary ICT service provider. ITnews article: More than 1300 ICT jobs have been cut from the Queensland public service in the 15 months between September 2012 and the end of December 2013.
- A Queensland lawyer who represents outlaw motorcycle gang members is seeking more than $1 million in damages from the state's Premier and Attorney-General in a defamation suit over claims that bikie lawyers were part of a "criminal gang machine" and would do anything to defend their clients.
- Newman has become the latest political figure to be embroiled in an inquiry into the Obeid-linked Australian Water Holdings (AWH). The Independent Commission Against Corruption (ICAC) has heard a $5,000 donation was demanded as the price of a meeting with Mr Newman when he was Brisbane's lord mayor in 2007.
- The Newman Government seeks feedback from Queenslanders using the Strong Choices for Queensland questionnaire
- Queensland MP David Gibson has stepped down as chairman of Parliament's Select Ethics Committee after it was revealed he was charged with theft in 1999. Court documents showed Mr Gibson was charged with four counts of theft while serving in the Army. He was accused of creating false invoices worth about $7,000.
- Queensland Attorney-General Jarrod Bleijie says an inquiry into February's Redcliffe by-election, north of Brisbane, has recommended changes to practices at polling booths during elections: "(Such as) limiting the numbers of scrutineers, authorising electoral staff to give lawful directions to people, restricting the display of certain political statements, and of course introducing involuntary codes for people participating in the electoral process."
- Environment Minister Andrew Powell wants Australians to boycott Ben and Jerry's ice cream for supporting WWF's “propaganda” save the Reef campaign, saying it has damaged the reputation of the Reef and jeopardised jobs and tourism dollars. SBS Opinion article The LNP then referred the ice cream comapny to the consumer watchdog
- Attorney-General Jarrod Bleijie wants to overturn the 800-year-old double jeopardy law which he says is a roadblock to justice, making it totally retrospective: ‘‘This is about re-balancing the scales of justice and putting victims first,’
- The 52-bed "bikie-only" prison at Woodford, north of Brisbane, is virtually empty with just one "bikie" prisoner, while the Maryborough jail remains over capacity.
- The Queensland Resources Council releases a series of TV commercials on the Great Barrier Reef
- James Mackay is the head of corporate affairs for QCoal, a mining company which is at the centre of an environmental dispute. He also happens to have been in charge of developing policy on the environment for Queensland's ruling Liberal National Party (LNP) since 2012.
- Federal MP Clive Palmer has served defamation papers on Queensland's Premier, Campbell Newman, over claims Mr Palmer had tried to "buy" the State Government. He said Mr Newman falsely accused him of trying to "buy" the LNP State Government and implied he had offered incentives to Northern Territory MPs to join the PUP.
- The Queensland government has signed off on what could be the biggest coal mine in Australia and one of the largest in the world. The proposed $16.5 billion Indian-owned Adani Carmichael coal mine project in the Galilee Basin has been approved by the state's coordinator-general
- An independent inquiry into a major dredging project in the Great Barrier Reef World Heritage Area finds environmental conditions on a central Queensland port expansion were too vague to be enforced.
- Queensland Deputy Premier Jeff Seeney uses parliamentary privilege to call Clive Palmer a "crook".
- The mining group New Hope seeking to expand its coal mine at Acland, west of Toowoomba, taking the operation's output from 4.8 million tonnes to 7.5 million tonnes per year, donated $700,000 to LNP, federal Liberal Party
- The Queensland Government last week approved Indian company Adani's plan for a giant mine in the Galilee Basin west of Rockhampton. In giving it the go-ahead with conditions, the State Government sided with Adani against the Independent Expert Scientific Committee (IESC) on coal seam gas and large coal mining developments, set up in 2012 to advise state and federal governments. The IESC said not enough was known about how the coal seams connect to the Great Artesian Basin, or the likely effects of mining.
- Queensland Premier Campbell Newman says federal MP Clive Palmer should withdraw his defamation action to spare taxpayers from paying the legal bills.
- Premier Campbell Newman sacks Chris Davis as assistant health minister. Dr Davis was on borrowed time after siding with doctors in their pay dispute with the government: “I realised there’s always a fine line in politics between speaking out for one’s electorate and the notion of Cabinet solidarity so the decision’s been made.” Dr Davis is a former Australian Medical Association state president and first-term MP for Stafford.
- The majority of political donations in Queensland are set to go unreported under new laws. The declaration threshold will rise from $1000 to $12,400, to align with the federal government. In the last six months of 2012, only 15 of the 352 donations to the LNP were over $12,400, and only six of the 161 donations to Labor were more than that amount.
- Former Queensland assistant health minister Dr Chris Davis says that he had raised concerns with the Premier about looming changes to political donation laws, which is partly why he was sacked. A spokesman for the Premier says Dr Davis never raised any concerns about electoral donation laws with either himself or the Attorney-General, and any claim that he did is completely wrong.
- A top Queensland corruption fighter says changes to Queensland's Crime and Misconduct Commission (CMC) are designed to spare the Newman Government political embarrassment: "It's quite obviously not intended to encourage corruption, but it's equally clearly intended not to impede the Government in its many activities, including its fund-raising activities,"
- The Queensland Parliament has rejected legislation that would have compelled people to remove burkas and face veils for identity checks. Attorney-General Jarrod Bleijie said the legislation was unnecessary: "This Government believes in a multicultural Queensland,"
- The Pirate Party sends an open letter to Newman regarding the Queensland State Government’s consideration of banning canvassing at polling booths during elections.
- Queensland's major gas export projects to further expand may have been derailed by the latest mega deal for Russia to sell gas to China, the largest market in Asia.
- The government has used its huge majority to pass laws that will keep political donations under $12,400 a secret from voters.
- The Newman government has legislated to make voters present identification at polling places. However, evidence reveals that voter ID at the polls is unwarranted and unnecessary. Electors already have their identity witnessed when they enrol.
- Queensland has seen a dramatic spike in HIV notifications, with 93 people diagnosed this year, up 34 per cent on the same period 12 months ago.
- Federal MP Clive Palmer has threatened to reverse any Queensland government asset sales: "If any assets are sold between now and the next election, and we are forming part of the Queensland government, we will immediately resume them without compensation,"
- Treasurer Tim Nicholls announces 'cautious' budget with billions in asset sales
- Queensland government public servants moving into a landmark new office building will be encouraged to buy information and communication technology services from the private sector, despite concerns the industry may not be up to the task.
- Electrical firm PSG axes 600 jobs as firm goes into receivership. The secretary of the Victorian branch of the Electrical Trades Union, Troy Gray, said the cuts were the result of mismanagement on some large projects in Queensland.
- Queensland MP Freya Ostapovitch has claimed abortion increases the risk of breast cancer. A quick Google search brings up many studies which have debunked the claim
- Five mega ports will be allowed along the Queensland coast, mainly in areas near the Great Barrier Reef. Abbot Point, one of the world's biggest coal terminals, has been declared a port development priority area.
- Queensland treasurer Tim Nicholls has described solar panels as the preserve of the "champagne sippers and the latte set" while attacking a solar bonus scheme set up by Queensland Labor. An analysis of solar installations and ATO figures tells us that poorer Queensland suburbs are more likely to have a greater number of solar installations than wealthier suburbs.
- Travelling members of the Newman Government ministry are being funded to eat and drink their way through $167 a day, without a requirement to produce a single receipt.
- Legal figures question the suitability of Tim Carmody as the new Queensland Chief Justice. The decision has been condemned by former corruption inquiry chief, Tony Fitzgerald QC: "it's deeply troubling that the megalomaniacs currently holding power in Queensland are prepared to damage even fundamental institutions like the Supreme Court and cast doubt on fundamental principles like the independence of the judiciary." Days after being appointed chief magistrate in September 2013, Mr Carmody and Mr Bleijie had a private dinner at the upmarket Urbane Restaurant in Brisbane, documents show. Civil libertarians are describing the appointment of Queensland's next chief justice as a throwback to the corrupt era of Sir Joh Bjelke-Petersen. The Australian Bar Association has warned the independence of the judiciary is “under threat” in Queensland and the state's law society has also added its voice to concerns over the Newman government's appointment of Tim Carmody QC as chief justice of the supreme court.
- Nuclear and wind power could be part of Queensland's energy mix within 30 years as the government considers how the state will be powered by 2044.
- Clive Palmer files $1.1 million defamation suit against Queensland Deputy Premier Jeff Seeney
- Karreman Quarries was facing legal action by the Department of Natural Resources and Mines over unlawful extraction of sand and gravel from the Upper Brisbane River when an amendment, slipped unnoticed into a package of reforms to the Water Act, retrospectively legalised its activities, ordered by the Deputy Premier. Queensland Deputy Premier Jeff Seeney has denied giving special treatment to a company that had donated money to the Liberal National Party (LNP).
- A new paper called Mining the Age of Entitlement: State Government Assistance to the Minerals and Fossil Fuel Sector shows that since 2008-09, the Queensland government has provided more than $9.5 billion in direct support to mining and energy companies.
- Newman has said it is time to “get on with the job of getting behind” incoming Chief Justice Tim Carmody, the premier said, with the government looking to move on from the controversy his appointment created.
- Tattoo parlour owners are citing discrimination as their criminal records are put under the spotlight in the Newman Government's next phase of the anti-bikie laws. Queensland tattooists have just one week left to apply for new licences, which will only be granted after strict police checks. They will have their finger and palm prints taken and be forced to reveal details about close associates including staff, business partners and even their landlord.
- The head of one of Queensland's anti-bikie taskforces is warning that criminal motorcycle gangs may be back in business if the state's tough new laws against bikies are overturned.
- Academics, parents and Queensland's peak teaching union have questioned the State Government's plans to reconsidering introducing Teach for Australia (TFA) graduates into schools as it tries to plug the teacher shortage, despite rejecting similar proposals last year. The organisation has come under criticism for placing graduates with less experience rather than those who complete university diplomas and degrees in teaching.
- Former Queensland corruption fighter Tony Fitzgerald has launched another scathing attack against the Newman Government: "Queensland is extremely vulnerable to the misuse and abuse of power"
- A Northern Rivers whale expert has spoken out following claims Queensland's Department of Environment may euthanise whales off the east coast in future due to sickness brought on by food shortages.
- Queensland Deputy Premier Jeff Seeney has moved to update his parliamentary register of interests after the ABC discovered he was listed as a joint owner of a property in Cairns that he had not declared.
- A donor to Queensland's Liberal National Party has escaped possible prosecution for unlawful quarrying after a last-minute, unannounced change to the law by Campbell Newman's government.
- Students in south-east Queensland say they face hefty fines on public transport as they wait for a backlog to clear in applications for new concession cards. State Transport Minister Scott Emerson denied there was a backlog, even though some students claimed they submitted their TTCC applications up to four months ago and had received neither the card nor a reply from TransLink.
- The Queensland premier has rejected Clive Palmer's claim that he is a 'Nazi', but has not signalled whether he will take the matter further.
- Clive Palmer has declared the Palmer United party (PUP) will push ahead with plans to convene a Senate committee inquiry into the actions of the Queensland government, escalating his long-running dispute with the premier, Campbell Newman.
- Australia's peak solar power body fears Queensland's electricity companies are trying to put people off installing new solar systems.
- Newman has hit out at media hypocrisy, saying his government will not stop appealing judiciary decisions it considers "inappropriate" and out of step with community expectations.
- Corruption complaints have decreased by almost 70 per cent since the state’s crime and corruption watchdog shifted the threshold for what constitutes major corruption.
- Newman has thrown his support behind setting aside a portion of income tax for the states and territories, arguing that too much federal funding for local services “comes through the Canberra mix master” with strings attached.
- Independent Australia: Stafford by-election shows up Campbell Newman's drunken shambles
- The Strong Choices consultants under Treasurer Mark Gray admitted the decision to embed two Phillips Group consultants within his department to help it better sell its message cost just under $385,000 (without GST) for six months work, during a budget estimates hearing
- Former LNP MP Chris Davis has called for an early state election after a large swing against the Queensland Government in the Stafford by-election.
- Queensland Premier Campbell Newman has apologised to the people of Queensland as he announced a reversal of several controversial policy positions. The Premier said the Crime and Corruption Commission (CCC) chair would again be a bipartisan appointment, estimates would revert to their previous schedule and jailed bikies would no longer be isolated.
- Online bookmaker sportsbet.com.au is reporting that 91% of money placed on Newman retaining his seat at the next State election has gone AGAINST him doing so – the price now $1.30 from $1.38 in 24 hours.
- Queensland Premier Campbell Newman has said he is determined to stand firm in his Brisbane seat of Ashgrove despite his party's massive loss in the neighbouring electorate of Stafford over the weekend with a huge swing of 18.6 per cent against the LNP.
- The Queensland Government could be emboldened to launch a new wave of anti-bikie laws, with internal research suggesting a rise in the number of people supporting additional measures
- The Wilderness Society says the passage of Queensland government legislation to repeal the state’s Wild Rivers Act is a tragedy for some of the last free-flowing rivers on the planet.the Wilderness Society said the repeal would do away with buffer zones created under the act to protect rivers from risky development such as strip mining, intensive agriculture and in-stream dams. It said the laws had been “trashed” to satisfy miners and developers.
- Queensland's unemployment rate continues to rise, reaching its highest level since June 2003. The latest statistics from the Australian Bureau of Statistics showed Queensland's seasonally adjusted rate increased from 6.3 per cent in June to 6.8 per cent in July 2014.
- The official Australian Bureau of Statistics data for July showed year-ending youth unemployment had hit 13.7% in July, up from 11.9% when Campbell Newman was elected.
- [http://reneweconomy.com.au/2014/the-500-a-day-service-charge-designed-to-kill-solar-71705 Queensland businesses are being hit with daily service charges of more than $500 a day on their electricity bills, in a move the solar industry says is designed to kill the roll-out of commercial-scale rooftop solar across the state.
The charges were quietly unveiled by the Queensland Competition Authority and the state government in July.]
- =Labor moved a motion condemning the Abbott Government’s $7 GP Tax and the Newman government refused to support it
- Health minister Lawrence Springborg is urging private patients to stick to private hospitals and steer clear of “the most outstanding hospital of its kind in the country”. Mr Springborg said there was now real evidence the $1.8 billion Gold Coast University Hospital was luring private patients to the public sector and with “significant” budget increases to the health service, there was nothing left to do but to get the message out.
- The member for Gregory and parliamentary chief whip, Vaughan Johnson, has been campaigning for a driving and road rules test for foreigners wanting to drive in Queensland.“I’m not against Asian people, don’t get me wrong – but a lot of those Asian people come from an environment where they have no comprehension of road rules in their own country,” Premier Campbell Newman was forced to publicly slap down his MP, with Mr Johnson later apologising for any offence caused by his “inappropriate’’ comments.
- Labor has indicated it will support a Palmer United Party (PUP) push for a federal Senate inquiry into the Newman Government.
- Alleged rorting and corruption in the Queensland government and the possible nationalisation or taxpayer bailout of struggling companies will be investigated by two extraordinary parliamentary inquiries at the behest of Clive Palmer.
- Australian state Queensland is soliciting investments from Indian corporates for mining uranium and coal to enhance economic ties between the two sides.
- The deputy premier of Queensland, Jeff Seeney, will put a plan to state cabinet that would reverse the decision to dump sediment from the Abbot Point coal port development on the Great Barrier Reef, disposing of it on land instead,
- Federal Senator David Leyonhjelm has lashed out at the Queensland government - labelling Premier Campbell Newman a "control freak" - after the government moved to make e-cigarettes privy to the same regulations as their tobacco counterparts.
- Corruption fighter Tony Fitzgerald believes Queenslanders should shun both major parties until they reform the state’s political system and commit to operating without self-interest.
- Premier Campbell Newman has criticised Queensland parents for not reading to their children: "Only about half the parents are actually doing this 10 minutes a day of reading at the moment,"
- Obtained documents show police intelligence is being kept on protest groups in Queensland.
- Queensland could lease its entire electricity network for up to 99 years to pay down state debt.
- Prime Minister Tony Abbott, former prime minister John Howard and Queensland Premier Campbell Newman are holding a $5,000-a-head dinner to raise cash for the Liberal National Party (LNP) ahead of next year's state election. LNP state director Brad Henderson defended the October 9 event and said the party did not have the financial backing of unions, as Labor did, and instead had to rely on the general community for support. "The event ... complies with all state and federal electoral laws,"
- Former Queensland Government MP Chris Davis has put in a membership application to join the Labor Party, less than 24 hours after resigning from the LNP.
- Supreme Court judges snub public ceremony for Queensland's new Chief Justice Tim Carmody
- Sued Alan Jones for criticising him
- had a man arrested for wearing a tshirt
mmmm oppression
But after all that he’s still:
So really the only group he hasn’t fucked with yet are white heterosexual males (unless they ride bikes, or know someone who rides bikes... or have ever seen a motorbike....)
A poll has indicated that he would lose his seat of Ashgrove if an election was held today (Nov 27 2013 A new opinion poll shows Queensland Premier Campbell Newman would probably lose his Brisbane seat if an election was held this weekend (Feb 16 2014)
Queensland motorbike rider simulator
The Queensland Government have released a working draft of their 30-year vision for Queensland, your feedback is encouraged here
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