Thank Kevin's Angels for the bonus

Despite the rational argument that the money would have been better spent on more housing, DH is deeply grateful for the $1400 that her daughter received as a Disability Pensioner.

 

It means that the two of us can afford to have a holiday for the first time in years. We plan to hire a car, and head down to the South Coast.

 

Can't wait to do our patriotic duty to bail out the nation's tourism industry!  So before we tootle off,

 

 

We wish you all a d&m 2009, dear readers!  

 

 

PS. Can't resist one final carp, before we hit the road.

Unfortunately, with the cost of car hire, petrol, and accommodation, their won't be enough left over to indulge any secret inclination DH's daughter may have for booze or gambling, so Tony Abbott should not worry too much. Do he and his cronies have any idea how people actually live??

 

 

 

Erratum: Councillor not Mayor

Due to a lapse in concentration DH mistakenly described a councillor allegedly stacking a public housing tenants association as a Mayor. Apologies for misleading impressions.

Rudd Bonus reignites Class Struggle: Grumpy Old Policy Wonks vs Grinning Housos Clutching New Plasma TVs

Yes! DH has one at last, thanks to the Rudd bonus. Actually, she bought it out of her tax refund earlier this year. But only because she was worried she might not get another job by Christmas. So she figured if the worst happened, the bonus would still allow her to participate in the Nation's most sacred religious rite, the annual re-enactment of the "Resurrection of the Retailers".

(For more innocent days, refer to Quick, hide the plasma TV! Vinnies pays a visit).

All this is by way of thumbing her nose at the Scrooges who begrudge the masses their little bit of Xmas Cheer. It makes you long for the good old days of feudalism really, doesn't it? Back in ye Goode Olde Dark Ages, you only had to vouchsafe your liege 10% of your turnip harvest as rent, you hardly worked except at sowing and reaping time, and at the end of the year, you got invited to the manor to be treated to the latest in communications technology (OK, so it was wandering minstrels wassailing on the back of a tumbril.)

Now we're hearing from the fiscally-responsible classes, if they can tear themselves away from Grumpy Old Policy Wonks on the super dooper widescreens that they've had since they first hit the market, now we're hearing that housos shouldn't have got their $1000 quid, because they'll only spend it on Asian Electronics Multinationals. That's if they're the politically correct left wing middle-classes. Otherwise, they reckon we're all gonna spend it on booze and gambling. Talk about projection at its most obvious! Not screen projection, dummkopfs! Psychological projection, as in Jung and Freud, as in projecting your own secret desires, onto the Other, who can then be disposed of without too much grief.

NO! That bonus should have been spent on worthier recipients! It shoudda been spent on foreign-owned management consultancies like Price Waterhouse, to generate highly responsible feasibility studies, evaluations, reports, assessments, strategic plans, and generally hide the paper trail of blame, should things go pear-shaped.

And another thing, (not to carp on and on about it), but how many times must DH remind you all, (Wake up and smell the bad breath. Something rotten in the state of Howard's Australia) that the budget surplus was extracted from our teeth in the first place.

The ABC's News, in one of its most shameful episodes, trumpeted Tony Abbott's "concern" that beneficiaries would spend it all on booze and gambling. DH was not aware that people with disabilities and pensioners were such a rambustious bunch! Somebody should tweak Abbott's nose for him, and send him into orbit.

Alas, they're all wrong. That 1000 quid is more likely to go on new dentures.

Councillor stacking tenants action group?

[Apologies. DH accidentally wrote "Mayor", when she meant only "Councillor".]

DH hears that a prominent Westie Labor councillor has managed to fill up a local public housing tenants action group with his adoring proteges, and taken over the executive, while the people who reckon they actually did the work have given up in disgust. Reportedly, neither their auspicing agency, not DoH are interested. How did Councillor X do it, and whyever? Based on Anthrop 101, DH can only guess that Arab politics runs on a patronage system, stoked by handing out favours to the faithful and loyal, as opposed to an elected meritocracy. Not that an elected meritocracy inevitably delivers merit that often either, but at least there is something inherently more progressive in the idea than voting for the most powerful sheik in the area. If you believe in progress, that is. And if you don't believe in divine intervention, you gotta believe in progress after all.

2008 | The Housing Year that was | For policy wonks and acronym aficionados

[And if you're not into policy, bureaucratese, and acronyms, go straight to 2008 The Housing Year that was Down Among the Housos. This excursion into tedium is just to disprove those who claim DH is "all sparkling wit and style, and no substance"].

2008 was the year the new Labor Government began to fulfil its election promise to redress the Howard Liberal government’s shameful neglect of housing over its 11 years in office. Howard and Co left housing to “Market Forces”. We all know about that now, don’t we? During its tenure, the Liberals ripped $3 billion out of social housing and transferred it, via the Commonwealth Rental Assistance Scheme, to the pockets of private landlords. Despite fundamental agreement between a raft of government, industry, and NGO housing experts at the 2008 National Housing Conference that negative gearing is the greatest cause of housing inequity, no government has so far been game to touch the national sacred cowshed.

Federal

Tanya Plibersek, universally admired for her commitment to social justice, compassion, intelligence and seeming tireless energy, appointed minister for the new portfolio of Housing.

Oct 14 The federal government announced an increase in First Home Owner Grants to $14,000 for established dwellings and $21,000 for newly-built dwellings

Nov 24 The National Rental Affordability Scheme Act 2008 (NRAS) pass. This scheme aims to increase the supply of affordable rental dwellings by up to 50,000 by 2012. Under the Scheme successful applicants will be eligible to receive a National Rental Incentive for each approved dwelling, on the condition that they are rented to eligible low and moderate income households at 20 per cent below market rates. Second round applications close 27 March 2009

Nov 29 The National Affordable Housing Agreement, (NAHA) replaces the former Commonwealth State Housing Agreement. The Council of Australian Governments (COAG), aka the States, agreed to the … er.. $10 billion agreement, which means they will get $800 million over five years to reform and improve responses to homelessness $1.94 billion over 10 years ($834.6 million over five years) to improve the quality of Indigenous housing and tackle overcrowding in remote communities; and $400 million over two years for social housing as a down payment on longer term reforms.

Dec 21 PM Kevin Rudd and Housing Minister Tanya Plibersek release the White Paper on Homelessness. The government will spend $6.1 billion over 5 years with the aim of halving homelessness (current 105,000 people sleeping out on any given night) by 2020. Amazingly, the NGO's appear to love it.

NSW
Lots happening in Housing NSW, which is bristling with new policies and strategies. Following on from 3 rightwing Housing Ministers whose main public pronouncements took the form of tenant bashing, we now have in David Borger, a Minister who actually has an interest in housing, urban design and renewal. Perhaps we can start taking our BMW's out of our closets..

Housing NSW is looking at a raft of you-beaut strategies around things like Common Access (so applicants don't have to traipse around telling their story to a multitude of agencies), a Disability Action Plan, new hi tech service delivery options, improving Aboriginal Service Delivery, a strategy for supporting young people in public housing. The only question is, how long will it all take???

Apr 15 The Housing Amendment (Tenant Fraud) bill passed, making Housing NSW the only government agency in Australia with criminal prosecution powers.

Sep 8 David Borger, former Mayor of Parramatta, replaces Matt Brown as Housing Minister

Sep 10 Ex- Housing Minister Matt Brown resigns in disgrace after only 3 days in his job as Police Minister

Nov 11 The NSW Mini Budget cuts $80 million from Department of Housing over 4 years, which is to be achieved by “improved operational efficiency”. The government chooses to focus on retaining its AAA rating, and breaks its promise on ongoing contributions to Housing NSW working capital requirements. The NSW Council of Social Security NCOSS response to the Mini Budget says:

The Treasurer in introducing the Mini Budget called it “tough, decisive and
detailed”. He did not call it fair. … there is nothing in the Mini Budget
for low income and disadvantaged households.

Dec 4 the NSW Legislative Council Standing Committee on Social issues announced an inquiry into homelessness and low-cost rental accommodation.

Dec 5 Housing NSW Annual Report released

Dec 11 Housing NSW releases its new strategy on Environmental Sustainability

2008 | The Housing Year that was | Down Among the Housos

It's the same the 'ole world over,
It's the poor wot get the blame
It's the rich wot get the bail-outs...
Ain't it all a bleedin' shame

"Reshaping Public Housing" has started to bite, particularly in the area of ...

Mental health

As public housing becomes increasingly limited to "those most in need" DH has noticed increasing anxiety among tenants about threatening behaviour from people with behavioural and delusional disorders. This perception is borne out by the 2007-8 Central Sydney North Regional Tenant Resource Service Report which states that for the second year in a row, concerns about mental health/ anti-social behaviour/ rebuilding community cohesion have edged out the perennial tenant favourite gripe, Maintenance, inadequacy of. When you consider that tenants all over are reporting that all but emergency maintenance has been on hold for at least 18 months, while we await the new you beaut Planned Maintenance regime (see below), you can surmise how worried tenants must be.

One of the pillars of "Reshaping" was meant to be the "Accord", a formal agreement between various agencies to support tenants with high support needs to maintain their tenancies. Three years later, there have only been a number of pilot projects, and they are still "under evaluation".

Waiting for Maintenance

Housing NSW's maintenance costs are about $1 million dollars a day, based on the previous year's maintenance bill of the order of $350 million. HNSW is attempting to make long term savings by introducing a new regime of planned maintenance. The idea is that contractors armed with Blackberries descend on all of us, survey what needs fixing, beam it all up to a central database, and then it all gets done in one broad swathe. We await the next exciting episode.

Meanwhile, a typical case study...

18 months ago, a tenant reports a cracked and jammed window that won't open. HNSW response: Nail the window down until approval is given for replacement. Many calls later, approval given. Approval now had for months, but nothing done. Now approval reneged, while awaiting the New Maintenance Sweep.

Tenant Fraud ruckus

Under that fine upstanding young minister, Matt Brown, Housing NSW became the first non-police department in Australia to give itself powers of criminal prosecution over tenants who falsely reported their earnings. The amendment to the Housing act that did this was rushed through parliament, before people like Clover Moore and Sylvia Hale had a chance to gather their wits. The Minister guesstimated that the savings would be about $50 million. Tenants were encouraged to dob in their neighbours, which would seem to militate against the millions spent by Housing NSW on Community development and building strong cohesive communities. There were about 4400 reports of which about 1/4 were self-reports according to "Your Home". Does this mean that 3/4 were reports by neighbours? It will be interesting to see the actual savings compared to the cost of eternal vigilance

The Lowdown on TP

Tenant Participation

Housing NSW is working on a new framework to consolidate the patchwork of existing organisations and confused definitions of what TP is all about. The first stage of this process has seen new rules for the ongoing funding of Regional Tenants Resource Services and Public Tenant Councils. HNSW has appointed a new body, the Statewide Social Housing Tenants Advisory Committee (SHTAC), to replace a previous PH Customer Council whose size and general level of internal conflict was considered to be unworkable. While a consultative committee such as the SHTAC has a useful role to play as a channel of communication between tenants and the department, tenant activists are rightly worried at any prospect that it will replace a robust system of tenant representation. In the meantime, HNSW needs to release more information about the actual achievements of this body. Further consultations between HNSW and tenants and other stakeholders are planned for early next year as further elements of the new TP structures are rolled out.

While consultative committees have their place, HNSW should look at schemes introduced by "New" Labor in Britain in which tenants are increasingly members of the boards of management of their estates. An article by Tony Gilmour, a Sydney Uni researcher published in the latest Shelter NSW newsletter, stated that in Manchester, for example, tenants hold fully 1/3 of the directorships of organisations managing over 75,000 units of housing stock.

And in 2009, UK Tenants are looking forward to the formation of the National Tenants Voice, an independent non-profit tenant lobbying group to help shape government policy, with funding of $5 million annually.

What a great idea, but are NSW tenants up to it?

It depends on which should rightly come first, the chicken or the egg:

It depends on whether you believe:

• that if you give tenants a meaningful role that really leads to change, they'll rise to the occasion, or
• that you can't trust tenants to manage themselves until they get their collective act together, until the old warhorses stop sniping at each other, until there is a sizable number of tenants whose horizons extend beyond their own dripping taps, until tenants finally realise that there is no point expecting "the Department" to be its own opposition, and take steps to set up their own tenants union, which probably means until gen-x, y, and z pull their fingers out, come up with some new ideas and dispatch the old guard

Dear Helmsperson eagerly awaits the dictatorship of the tenantariat, and may it come speedily in her lifetime. Amen.

A few articles in the pipeline to complete the 2008 Desperate Houso Omnibus, due to be released before Christmas.

• The Lowdown on TP
  The state of tenant participation in public housing

• Belated welcome to the New Minister
  As Housing Ministers whizz by, DH thought she'd wait a bit before
  expending energy on David Borger, in case he moves on
  
• The Housing Year


• A handy timeline of the big events of '08
  Stung by critiques that she is all style and no substance, DH will be filling you in with all the big events federally and in NSW


• Down among the Housos
  While the policy boffins and acronym afficionados have been busy little beavers, what's actually changed for housos?
  

Vale "D'oH", or, bring back "the Department"

DH cannot stay silent any longer in the face of increasing outrage at being robbed of her prey.

She will never forgive the Department of Housing for rebadging itself as Housing NSW.

It almost smacks of misleading advertising. Housing NSW is a government department, but the slick new corporate"branding" obscures this fundamental reality.

For a start, a huge slice of the population is barely coping with the fact that the Housing Commission was renamed the NSW Dept of Housing way back in 1986. (Isn't Wikipedia wonderful!).

It means that journos now have to clutter their prose with "... Housing NSW (HNSW), formerly known as the NSW Department of Housing ...".

For housos, muttering about "the Department" somehow loses its satisfying Kafkaesque edge. Although the shiny corporate moniker "Housing NSW" could possibly qualify as Orwellian Newspeak.

And for satirists "D'oH" was a gift whose passing is deeply mourned.

Henceforth, DH is putting her foot down. She will not let go of her prey that easily! She shall continue to refer to the "entity formerly known as the Department" as "the Department".

Hi y'all, Tempe Arizona folks!

Just out of curiosity, what brings all you folks from Tempe Arizona to DH's domain? I know times are tough in the US, but if you are hoping to apply for asylum in Australia, I'm afraid we can't find it in our hearts to offer refugees any social security whatsoever. 

 

So sorry you defaulted on your sub-prime mortgage, but it's no use looking for cheap housing here. We're full up.  The waiting list for public housing here in NSW is currently about 40,000 souls, having mysteriously declined from 70,000 last year. Since there was no new housing built over the past year 30,000 have simply vanished. Draw your own conclusions, but personally, DH wouldn't risk it. The Department of Housing is being very cagey about offering any plausible explanation, leaving us to the conclusion that alien body-snatchers have somehow got hold of the Department of Housing's waitlists.  It's a worry.

 

When Barry met Nathan at the Sackville

[Belated entry from an old journalism assignment. There's a nice observation about Rees which DH hopes is worth saving for posterity. ]

"Where else but in Australia", I overheard someone above the din in Balmain's Sackville Pub, "could you get your political leaders turning up to face the rabble without anyone bothering about security?". Had to agree, it's pretty cool that here in Oz, our pollies are this accessible. So there we were in hecklers' paradise as the new Premier of NSW, Nathan Rees, went head to head with the Leader of the Opposition, Barry O'Farrell. And where else but in Oz would the moderator feel sufficiently laid back to refer to the august Leader of the Opposition as "Fatty O'Barrell"? The Coen Brothers couldn't have done better. All that was lacking was some tub-thumping from the Soggy Bottom Boys, Arbib, Bitar, Costa and Iemma, but they'd either been run out of town or kicked upstairs.

This is going to be short on content because you know you could fill in the details in your sleep, so why should I bore you? Be assured that Rees and O'Farrell traded all the requisite economic rhubarb: responsible economic management, accountability, the possession of sound policy in contrast to the other side's lack thereof, and they even shook hands on political donations.

Young Labor and Young Liberals were out in force. The former keeping up a steady catcall: "Where's yer plan, Barry? Show us yer plan! ". A bit dispiriting for those of us in Ageing Labor. Where did we go wrong??? How come our kids are dreaming of Master Planning rather than Barricade Manning (and Womanning of crse). How quickly are the lessons of history forgotten!Why, it seems these young people have never even heard a Socialist 5-year plan joke! See one below: If you believe in Planning... Reassuringly, the Young Libs were still true to tradition, hooting and hollering at nothing in particular, and clueless as ever.

The "Friends of Callan Park" contingent turned up as usual and were promptly ruled out of order by the moderator, Louise Milligan, but not before Rees promised there'd be no selloff of Callan Park to commercial interests. This couldn't have been a huge impost as the Callan Park act precludes it, and Sydney University, who look set to take over, is not a commercial interest.
But what was interesting was trying to divine Nathan Rees' character. Now that we're beyond ideology, character's got to mean a lot. You want someone batting for you who's intelligent, tough, flexible, responsive, can roll with the punches, reliable, up with the detail, and a sense of humor is essential. The times need gravitas: this is no time for clowns or comedians, but the glimmer of dry humor has to be there, proof of quick thinking and guarantee against megalomania. I know we're supposed to be cynical, but I thought Rees fit the bill.

There was one moment that stood out from the predictable argy-bargy. Barry O'Farrell, carried away by the bonhomie of the evening, suggested why not have a series of half-a-dozen of these town-hallers across the state in the lead up to the next election. Instinctively I felt that this is not something Rees would want in a pink fit. But how was he gonna get out of it? I held my breath. How would I have got out of it? Me, a people pleaser, I would have caved, wouldn't want to be seen as lacking in bonhomie. Then I would have gone home and kicked myself and got my staffers to dream up excuses later. But Rees' response was, I thought, forthright and strong, and drew a line in the sand: "No thanks. Barry can run his campaign his way, I'll run mine my way".
Good one!

And another plus for Rees to which one cannot be entirely insensible: he looks like a footballer and has a literature degree: Yess! A sensitive Alpha male at last! What more could a woman (in her capacity as voter of course) want?

But the shock ending was a sign of the times, another sign that the old Balmain was gone. O'Farrell won on the vote. Maybe not on the numbers, but certainly on the volume. The Young Libs are scenting victory and baying loudly for it, while Labor's barrackers lack all conviction.

Maybe the vision of the Glorious Master Planned Dawn just doesn't quite galvanise the masses.

If you believe in Planning...

[For those who put their faith in Master Plans and Strategic Plans as the solution to all our ills ... Take a lesson from history...]

Setting: A factory meeting in the former Union of Soviet Socialist Republics

A lecturer from the district Party committee is telling the workers about their bright future in the USSR.

"See, comrades, after this five-year plan is completed, every family will have a separate apartment. After the next five-year plan is completed, every worker will have a car! And after one more five-year plan is completed, every family will own an airplane!"

From the audience, somebody asks, "What the hell one may need an airplane for?"

"Don't you see comrades? Let's say, there are shortages in potatoes supplies in your city. No problem! You take your own plane, fly to Moscow and buy potatoes!"

Festive Season Wishes

If all our Christmases, Chanukkahs, and Eid Ul Adhas could come at once...

Let's someone pack off all the fundamentalists: Moslem, Christian and Jewish, (and throw in the wearers of silly hats, ~ high correlation with the former), to the Sinai desert, but not before they are stripped of anything invented since the age of miracles. Let them fight it out, and let God pick His favourites by depositing His Manna where He sees fit. We'll go back after 40 years and see who's left standing.

Meanwhile, the rest of us will have got on with it. Ordinary Moslems, Christians, and Jews can get on with good works fortified by whatever fuzzy logic works for them, while we atheists combat our weltschmerz (pain at the pointless suffering of a limited existence) with renewed dedication to social justice. *

And we will be free to start on the Marxists and the Free Marketeers, we'll send them off equipped with nothing but pure theory and the collected works of Milton Friedman, and let the dialectic sort 'em out. And that'll be the end of the creme de la patriarchy and all their benighted handmaidens. And think of all the housing that would be freed up, though we'll have to get rid of all those heavy imitation walnut bookcases housing the holy books.

* No DH would never be so unPC as to forget all the non-Jerusalem based creeds. Just so long as they keep their heads down.

Housing CSO's going cheap...

Look what the NSW govt hopes to buy for $22 an hour! Could explain the mystery of why all the beaut things dreamed up in HousingNSW head office seem to die a horrible death by the time they make it to the local offices.

DH's offspring, who has learning difficulties, just got her first job which requires a bit of cleaning and helping out in after-school care. And she gets $20 and hour!

But HNSW iss offreing $22 an hour for which they want social work experience, managing a caseload of often very troubled people....

$22 an hour equates to about $40,000 a year. That's if you never have a sick day or a holiday, and work through all the public holidays as well of course.

$22 for being strong-minded. Hmm... what does this mean? Probably a code word for working in a system in which, thanks to Labor's* big idea, "Reshaping Public Housing", the majority of people who get public housing will have a drug problem or a mental illness... So perhaps

Strong-minded = un-trained, de facto mental health worker

Still desperate for a job, no matter what the pay? You'll find this one registered with Quay Employment.

Dept of Housing - Client Services Officer - Inner West

Our client requires a strong minded and experienced customer service representatives preferably with a background in social work or community care to assist with managing a portfolio of clients. Your role will be to manage your portfolio of clients while under the guide and with support from your team leader to ensure you provide high level customer service while juggling a large workload of differing priorities.

Located close to Busses. Paying $22 P/H your duties will include but won't be limited to:

· Managing a portfolio of clients and looking after their special needs
· Counter customer service
· Client visits
· General Administration

Must have:

· Previous experience in a customer service background
· Social Work or Case Work desirable
· Excellent open and friendly communication skills both verbal and written
· Proven conflict resolution skills
· Ability to understand and interpret policy
· A current driver's license a must
· Ability to work well under pressure as well as in a team environment
· Understanding of confidentiality and a strong work ethic

*Not sure whose big idea it was, but it happened under Joe Tripodi's watch, and his protege, Kristina Keneally's hubby had a lot to do with it,

All we are saying, is give Rees a chance

Whatever happened to the gentle journo's agreement that some topics should be off-limit in the public interest?

For cryin out loud, capitalism is melting down, the barbarians are at the gate, (and in a worrying develpment, it's "their" barbarians, not "our" barbarians), and nobody knows how many of us will be jobless, if not homeless, by the end of the financial year, assuming there'll even be a financial year once the dollar sinks below the event horizon. NSW's coffers are bare-ish, our infrastructure is crumbling, and to top it all off, the Emirates own the Melbourne Cup, nobody told DH, and now they're hoofing it off all the way back to Bahrain or wherever with DH's 5 bucks on that nogood Irish, Michael O'Reilly,

And with all this calamity going on, what tack is the State's maybe most influential journo, the political editor of the SMH taking? Check out Andrew Clennell's hatchet job in Saturday's SMH, and decide whether he's got any other mission than to undermine the Premier, rub his nose in his inexperience, and score as many cheap points as he can. Doesn't the Political Editor of the SMH have anything better to do than ask 3 times about love and traffic?

When you open the spillgates and deluge the Premier of NSW in a flashflood of drivel, it's not just the Premier who drowns, the whole State drowns with him.

Should a government fall because a politician has a temper, and grabs someone's leg in the heat of the moment? Is that all? Are staffers made of glass? Maybe they should teach the delicate young plants in staffer school that politics is a high-conflict zone, not a personal growth sharing circle. Stewart should rise and fall on his record, nothing else. If there's a stench around him, show us where its coming from, don't just wave the the nearest red herring under our noses.

And who cares if Rees made a throwaway comment that didn't quite come off? Only this morning that dullest and most affectless of journalistic heavies, Laurie Oakes, was on Radio National breakfast lamenting that politicians nowadays never say anything risky or colourful. How can they if they are put through the grinder for every misstep?

Since when is inexperience a crime? The young feller stepped up to the plate. He's obviously got brains, he's doing his best to save the situation. Maybe our commentators should give him some credit for having the guts and give him a chance.

Mystery deepens as 30,000 NSW renters simply vanish!

Shock figures released at yesterday's Housing Budget Estimates committee meeting reveal that 30,000 people have vanished from NSW Public Housing waiting lists in the space of 1 year!

But only about 110 new dwellings have been built.

So where did they all go?

Did they manage to find suitable accommodation in the midst of this nation's greatest housing crisis, when the eligibility limit for public housing hovers near the poverty line?

Did 30,000 BMW owners fess up during the Tenant Fraud Amnesty and voluntarily make way for those "more in need"?

Did those waiting more than 10 years give up out of sheer frustration?

Snatched wholesale by aliens?

Responding to a question from Greens Senator Sylvia Hale about whether the numbers had declined due to frustration at the long wait, or due to tightening of eligibility requirements, new Housing Minister David Borger replied that the decline was thanks to regular surveys to determine ongoing eligibility and better matching of applicants to criteria (which are tighter). In addition, Mr Borger stated that "a number" of products like Rentstart, others products unspecified, allowed renters to make choices in relation to private housing. Umm, Rentstart applies to people with savings of less than $1000 dollars, pays 75 percent of bond, then you're on your own in Sydney's ferocious rental market, and if you're not mentally ill, disabled or aged, but merely on a low income, you haven't got a snowflakes of getting public housing in less than 8 years. In short, we're talking about closer applicant matching to the complete non-availability of housing to anyone on a low income who can still crawl.

What it's all about is that 40,000 sounds a lot better than an embarassing 70,000, and a positively excruciating 100,000 the year before. It reduces the pressure on governments to cough up a greater share of the national cake to help struggling renters.

But before you get up in arms about Housing NSW, who struggle gamely with inadequate funding, blame the Howard government. No wonder there's no new housing. They robbed Public Housing of $3 billion worth of funding over their miserable tenure. And alas, $3 billion these days wouldn't buy you a magnum of bubbly at a Bank Holiday picnic...

Quibble, quibble, foil and squabble...

Quibble, quibble, foil and squabble...
O'er entrails of sub-prime bubble


Here's some choice hocus-pocus from our economic wizard, Malcolm Turnbull and his Sorcerer's Apprentice, Julie Bishop, spotted at dead o' night on Lateline. They'll do anything to foil Labor initiatives

TONY JONES: Earlier today Mr Malcolm Turnbull told a radio interviewer, "We would no doubt have designed it differently", meaning the package. What would you have done differently

JULIE BISHOP: Well, that's why Malcolm said we wouldn't quibble about it. There is no point now saying had we been in government...


TONY JONES: You are quibbling about it. That's the point.


JULIE BISHOP: No, Tony.


TONY JONES: By saying we would've done it differently you're quibbling about it. What would you have done differently?


JULIE BISHOP: Tony, isn't it reasonable for the Opposition to ask what the assumptions underlying the Government's judgment...


TONY JONES: That's not my question. You've made that point, with respect. Mr Turnbull says you would've done it differently, so what would you have done differently?


JULIE BISHOP: I understand Malcolm was saying had we been in Government we may well have done things differently, we may well have looked at a different composition, we might have looked the tax cuts, we might have reconsidered the first home owners matter. We might have got information as to whether or not this would be an inflationary package and if you calibrate it had another way. But what we're say something we would like to know the basis upon which the Government made this judgment, that $10.4 billion should be expended this way with these component parts.

The Chutzpah of Malcolm Turnbull

To those of you who lack a rich Yiddish vocabulary, the classic definition of Chutzpah is that quality enshrined in a man who, having killed his mother and father, throws himself on the mercy of the court because he is an orphan.

We might say that Malcolm, having killed off the evil gnome, John Howard, (may his name be blotted out!), figuratively speaking, by to all intents and purposes blotting his vote-losing name out, now wishes to appeal to us on the basis of big daddy's budget surplus alone.

Mr Turnbull never tires of claiming the moral high ground for this surplus, which he claims was accumulated by "sound economic management".

Sound economic management, our ragged ars*s!

Just ask any of the toothless wretches living around DH's estate.

The budget surplus, Malcolm, was extracted from our teeth!

And then there was the $3 billion cut from public housing.

Then there were the cuts to disability services, and the disability organisations that advocated for them,

What a master of the excision of memory.

Come back, Elites, all is forgiven!

DH of course has always been a member of the elite.

The elites as we know can be recognised by 3 things:

• a love of lattes
• a pied-a-terre in the Inner West
• some rudimentary level of higher education

And DH qualifies on all counts

Some people might say: But how can DH be one of the elite? She:

• does not own a major share in the means of production
• can't afford dental care, holidays, new clothes, or even a friand to go with her latte
• doesn't jet around the world, own a yacht, or get invited to weekends away on the Packer's estates

Nah, doesn't matter. According to experts on elitism, Miranda Devine, Gerald Henderson, Michael Duffy, and all those other champions of the "real people", that doesn't count. The real give-away is having a social conscience and a few brain folicules to rub together.

Well, we elites have been generous and patient. We have let bona-fide battlers, like George W Bush and John Howard have a turn in the play pen. We're even giving Malcolm Turnbull, that child of hard times, a bit of a go.

But with Western Civilisation about to go down the gurgler thanks to the free rein given to President Bozo the Clown, it's time we elites clamped down.


The final straw was watching Michael Duffy's pin-up girl, Sarah Palin, humiliating herself in an interview with Katie Couric.

Noblesse oblige, surely, dictates that we put these dummies out of their misery.

Has the world gone completely mad? What have we come to when a politician's greatest claim to office is her own stupidity and wilful ignorance?

More of a worry is that no matter how low these characters nosedive, there are still huge numbers of people who will vote for them!

Couldn't we send anyone who is now, or has ever been, a registered Republican or a member of a Pentacostalist church, to Guantanamo for some re-education in the "American Way"?

"Free Market Experiment We Had to Have" tanks

YIPPEE!

The Free Market Experiment We Had to Have has tanked!

Socialists are back in business! (Just don't breathe the S-word out loud)

Didn't we tell them so!

So let's get back to bashing the rich which is right and proper.

Yeah! How cool would it be to sink the confederacy of dunce presidents, carpetbaggers, robber barons, corporate criminals, greedy Pig bankers, hucksters, subprime pyramid salesmen, craven politicians, spin merchants, welfare bashers, and all the dumb schmucks who've been duped by them, the pentacostalist nincompoops, the Joe Sixpacks - the ignoramuses who feel entitled to comment on things they're too lazy to educate themselves about.

Bit of a worry though that this bunch of dolts and crooks could be the concrete shoes that drag the rest of us down the gurgler...

Unfortunately DH doesn't understand high finance well enough to know whether sinking the banks will sink the rest of us. It's tempting to want to gloat, but history does teach us that when things tank, it's the poor that bear the brunt.

Bail out People, Sink the Banks

Bail out Main Street not Wall Street

In the US, they're calling for:

• Putting real regulations back on runaway financial corporations, and taking an ownership stake in exchange for any taxpayer support
• Providing mortgage relief so ordinary Americans stop losing their homes
• Putting millions to work by investing in new green jobs and infrastructure
• Investing in a health care plan to cover everyone

It all seems pretty relevant to Australia. Just add " invest in affordable housing" to that list.

How to fix the Wall Street mess

Can't go past this item by Michael Moore! Here's an excerpt:

The richest 400 Americans -- that's right, just four hundred people -- own MORE than the bottom 150 million Americans combined. 400 rich Americans have got more stashed away than half the entire country! Their combined net worth is $1.6 trillion.

During the eight years of the Bush Administration, their wealth has increased by nearly $700 billion -- the same amount that they are now demanding we give to them for the "bailout." Why don't they just spend the money they made under Bush to bail themselves out? They'd still have nearly a trillion dollars left over to spread amongst themselves!

Of course, they are not going to do that -- at least not voluntarily. George W. Bush was handed a $127 billion surplus when Bill Clinton left office. Because that money was OUR money and not his, he did what the rich prefer to do -- spend it and never look back. Now we have a $9.5 trillion debt. Why on earth would we even think of giving these robber barons any more of our money?
I would like to propose my own bailout plan. My suggestion are predicated on the singular and simple belief that the rich must pull themselves up by their own platinum bootstraps.

Sorry, fellows, but you drilled it into our heads one too many times:

There... is... no... free... lunch.

And thank you for encouraging us to hate people on welfare!

So, there will be no handouts from us to you. (more...)

Beam us up, Scotty!

Guess what Scott Morrison, the new Turnball appointee to the shadow housing ministry reckons is the solution to the nation's housing crisis?

(Admittedly he is new to the Housing portfolio, so it's only fair to allow him a certain amount of bluster room while he comes up to speed.)

He told assembled affordable housing lobbyists at Wednesday's National Affordable Housing Advocacy day that the main way to solve the nation's housing problems was... wait for it...

"Strong economic management"

Well if that's the case, Scotty, how come after 12 years of Liberal rule we're in the fine mess we're in?

Aren't you the party that claims the high ground on economic management?

Lemme guess, blame state governments and local councils and taxes?

The member for Cook, out around Botany Bay, didn't disappoint.

Ho hum... pass the buck round one more time ...

Mr Morrison seemed like a likeable, intelligent sort of feller. So what's he doing in the Liberal party? When addressing the lobbyists, Mr Morrison took care to pay his respects to the dedication of public sector workers when it came to housing the poor and clothing the naked and all that. But when he listed the organisations he respected, they were all faith-based.

A quick check of the Scott Morrison website shows why. He's one of those prosperous young things who workships at the Shirelive Church. In short another upwardly mobile Hillsong pentacostalist taking over the Liberal Party.

Mind you, DH doesn't mind the faithful as much as she did in her youth. You might as well believe in something other than Malthus and Darwin. Anything to keep us cheerful as we contemplate how we consumed ourselves into oblivion. Since the US meltdown, the only place the underclasses are ever likely to get a decent home is in heaven.

So beam us up, Scotty!

DH goes to Canberra for National Rental Housing Advocacy Day

Happy National Rental Housing Advocacy Day!

DH popped in to Canberra on Wednesday to sort out a few things on your behalf.

She had the best time treading the corridors of power, telling her hard luck story to any Minister who would listen, and looking incredibly important, responsible and resolute in her black trouser suit!

So anyway, let's get down to business...

A Historic Opportunity for Social Housing

Why?

Because the Commonwealth and the States are negotiating a brand new National Affordable Housing Agreement (NAHA) which determines how the Federal Government funds social housing.

But guess what?
The amount of money the Federal government has given the states for housing barely covers their operational costs. There's nothing in it for new construction.

And the bad news is:

• there are nearly 200,000 people on public housing waiting lists.
  And that's only because low income working families don't even bother to apply
  
• there are at least 600,000 families and singles in housing stress (ie more than 30% of their gross income goes on rent)
  
• there are 105,000 people homeless

The supply of public housing has gone down by
30,000
dwellings since 1996

Whose fault is it?

Oddly enough, 1996 is when the Howard Government got in, and proceeded to slash 3.5 BILLION out of the money they gave to the states for public housing

So,

Whadda we want?

• 30,000 additional public and non-profit housing by 2012
  
• $5 billion more than we got out of the last Commonwealth State Housing Agreement
  
• an Affordable Housing Growth Fund because we need new housing.
  About 7.5 billion over the next 4 years should be a start
  
• a separate Operating Subsidy program of $7.5 Billion
  just to keep us standing still in the same spot
  
• a 30% increase in Commonwealth rental assistance.
  This would put an extra $15 per week into the pockets of the poor buggers doing it tough in private rental housing.

When do we want it?

Over the next 4 years

When are we gonna get it?

In our dreams, according to the Leftie turned Hollowperson who DH managed to buttonhole in a corridor...

Malcolm Turnbull, Woolly Waffler

Wake up without a hangover? Miss that swollen-tongued, brain filled with cotton-wool feeling?

DH has just the cure for you.

Check out any recent interview with Poor Malcolm. His monotonous wafflings will soon have you thumping the sides of your head, clawing your earholes with you pinkies, trying to clear the sudden fog in your brains.

Dear Liberal voters, DH knows you feel encouraged by Malcolms apotheosis.

But darlings, it's about more than having a noble profile and a magisterial way of padding out a striped suit. He does look grand, ones grant you. But one does have to be able to speak clearly and explain oneself, one would have thought. Patrician vowels in themselves are not quite sufficient, surely.

Ya shoudda heard him today waffling on the Fran Kelly on the ABC.

With this guy, its one step forward, two steps back. Out pops a word from his mouth, two of them are retracted. Today's classic, a telling exchange on every level was.

Fran Kelly: Who's your favourite footy team?

Malcolm Rex: Er, well, er, I vote for the Roo, er, vote for???, ha-ha-ha, er, I support the the Roosters

He's still got nothing better to do than go on about Kevin Rudd's overseas trip.

Finally challenged by Kelly"

So what would you do if you were the Prime Minister?

Malcolm goes:

Um, err, [thinks quickly: That was a curly one. Um, what would I do??.]
Um, well, I would come back.

[... incomprehensible 2 minute waffle about markets ...]

Of course DH, can be accused of being biased about the liberal party. She is still feeling dirty about things like the way they extracted their budget surplus from the teeth of the lower orders, the children going mad in detention centres, and all the other stuff in the right hand column

Shouldn't Malcolm start by saying sorry?

... To be continued, when DH gets a chance to listen to the podcast. There will be rich pickings.

The Plight of Poor Malcolm

Heart-breaking isn't it?

Malcolm's got it all except underprivilege.

DH sympathises. She doesn't think she could live off more than $273 a week. It might cruel her claims to moral superiority.

Then there's our new Premier Nathan Rees, bignoting himself by claiming to be a garbo. Yeah right, while supporting himself through an arts degree.

Kevin Rudd's doing it tough of course, and who can forget instant Housing expert, Cherie I-grew-up-in-Minto Burton (until the family moved to Drummoyne, they say)

There's self-made landlord, Matt Brown, and who knows, or dare ask, what hardships the likes of Joe Tripodi and
Eddie Obeid have salted away offshore.

Kiama Karma: It's not the undies that undid Matt Brown

Ex-Housing Minister Matt Brown's karma caught up with him yesterday. As Swamiji Semi-Detached Houso teaches us: "He who encourages the riff-raff to dob on their neighbours, shall himself be dobbed in by his parliamentary colleagues. And if he's not careful he may be reincarnated as a lower life-form, such as a real estate agent".

While Housing NSW's compassionate leftist hand invests heavily in community development, ex-Minister Brown's punitive Rightist hand undermined hard-won trust by encouraging public housing tenants to act out their petty resentments against their neighbours. Only recently, Mr Brown proudly trumpeted the number of people who had denounced their fellow housos to the "Housing Police" in the early days of the Tenant Fraud amnesty.

Mind you, there's a lot to be said for casting out from our midst these BMW-driving silvertails with their bizarre fetish for cross-dressing in trackie-daks and slumming it in sleazy low-rent ghettos. They should be corralled in Vaucluse or Pymble where we can keep an eye on them!

But then again, it's not for nothing that the Mighty Bronzed Oz despise dobbers. Nothing undermines our great traditions of social capital accumulation (that's "mateship" to the non-latte-drinkers amongst us) more

It's not the undies that undid him

But it's not the undies that undid Matt Brown in DH's eyes. What a man does to unwind in the privacy of his Ministerial suite on his own self-funded sofa is his own business. If keeping the lid on such antics wasn't the civilised media norm, we'd have heard a lot more, for instance, about how a certain Minister from one of our barbarous neighbouring states earned the moniker of "Swizzlestick". But admittedly, that particular politician is believed to be sufficiently talented to be worth preserving.

No, the true award for tastelessness came with the parading of first Matt Brown's niece and then his hapless child for the media, in the sad belief that this would somehow make things better. With such poor political judgment, it's no wonder that the man left no visible mark on the housing portfolio, other than to parrot his illustrious mentor Joe Tripodi's tenant-bashing catchphrases. And to rush Australia's most discrimatory legislation through Parliament, the extraordinary "Tenant Fraud Amendment 2008" which makes the NSW Department of Housing into the state's, and maybe the nation's, only government department with the powers of criminal prosecution.

With such acumen, the Minister will make a grand real estate agent. While holidaying in Kiama recently, DH thinks she found just the shopfront (left) for a start-up.

0 0 0 0 0

Oh, alright, alright, so DH was given notice by her higher self recently. Well, she can hardly be expected to stay silent in the face of taunts from her fan-base (all 1 of him) that she was going soft on Housing Ministers.

Desperate Houso Evicted!

Dear Readers,

The time has come when I must evict DH from her tenancy in my teeming, overcrowded brain.

I have tolerated this strident termagant for quite long enough. She has failed to bring in even so much as a googly cent for all the time she has wasted on ranting and trying to be funny. Times are getting tougher and I regret that I am no longer in a position to act the philanthropist or carry on subsidizing my inner "artist".

The fact is that I'm totally demoralised, and drastic action is called for. My market rent has gone up to $440 a week, and what with paying HECS-HELP and SFSS, with the anachronistic Rental Subsidy Eligibility limit threatening to cut out just at the maximum I can hope to earn with my meagre talents as a $35 an hour contractor (no holiday pay, sick pay, or any kind of leave, remember), I'm giving up all hope of self-realisation. Instead, I plan to spend any free time I have trying to nut out a system for winning Lotto at last.

Yes, yes, I know, private renters are doing it tough too. But is it my fault that the Howard Government neglected housing policy for 10 years and landed us all in this fine mess?

Is it my fault that all we've had to stand up for us losers in NSW is the likes of Tripodi, Cherie Burton, and Public Landlord No1, the Overlord of the Underwear, Matt Brown?

Besides, now that we don't have Mr Banality-0f-Evil himself, John Howard, to kick around anymore, the joy has simply gone out of blogging.

...

It all began way back in 2005, with the upbeat entry Unemployed again!

When I first let DH have a free rein here, I was hoping to have a good old vent about how I being pincered in a poverty trap between Centrelink's mean-spirited bunglings and DoH's short-sighted work disincentives. Perhaps I even had some vague ambition that one day "Desperate Houso" might contribute some modest footnote to a future history detailing the death throes of the Welfare State.

Little did I realise that Desperate Houso's diary would one day become a hugely popular website amongst some of the world's most neglected niche populations. I refer, of course, to South American Nazi Sympathisers With Dyslexia, and Florida Retirees with Oral-Hygiene Issues.

Hardly a day goes by that some would-be Nazi with a spelling problem does not lob here to read the groundbreaking expose which proved that Howard's new National Aspirationalism was nothing more than a Nasi Party front. Or have the Brazilians been misleading us all these years into thinking their alphabet contains the letter "Z"?

As for the Florida pensioners, my impassioned outcry, Wake up and smell the bad breath. Something rotten in the state of Howard's Australia which so resoundingly denounced the Howard Government's lowest act, the destruction of free public clinics, has proved an irresistible drawcard. Clearly there are more Yanks out there worrying about their morning breath than they do about their failing sub-prime mortgage sector.

Apart from that the only other conspicuous search term is "That nincompoop, Brendan Nelson". And that's not likely to last much longer.

Not a lot to say after that.

Just itching to ditch a blog that's just not fun anymore...

Google StreetView nabs BMW

Being the public-spirited houso that she is, DH feels she has been seriously letting herself down.

With Housing NSW' Tenant Fraud Hotline in full swing, she has so far failed to dob in so much as one single BMW owner! She knows they're out there in droves, her Housing Ministers have told her so, yet she daily struggles with the guilty knowledge that it is only her lack of vigilance that has prevented the apprehension of these unconscionable barnacles on the public purse.

So when she first heard of Google Streetview yesterday, she realised immediately that she had the perfect tool to do the necessary large scale reconnaisance of the neighbourhood!

While it is true that she has not so far been able to capture any BMW in flagrante in the neighbourhood, DH wasn't born yesterday, you know. Why, there are no lengths to which the sybarites of public housing will not go to conceal the evidence of their opulent lifestyles! So she was a wise-up as soon as she discovered the suspicious object depicted. She anticipates that she will be in a position to make a citizen's arrest just as soon as she has had a chance to nip down the road and peak under the next-door's tarp.

She urges her fellow tenants to follow her example, do the right thing, and keep a close watch on their precincts. It is to be hoped that the Department's Tenant Fraud SWAT team has lost no time in establishing an evaluatory committee to investigate the addition of this invaluable tool to the Departmental Surveillance Armoury.

Note: DH hastens to advise Housing NSW that the late model Hyundai Getz peeking out of her garage belongs to a visiting friend.

Our lives on Kafkalink's lawn

DH has been peremptorily summonsed to an interview with Kafkalink for a "random sample survey" being conducted on her Newstart Allowance.

She will have to rustle up in short order:

• proof of birth
• original documents to the value of 50 points that will help confirm your identity
• proof of Australian residence, if you were born outside Australia (for example, your passport or
• details of any employment undertaken in the last 12 months (for example, payslips)
• all current bank, building society or credit union statements or passbooks
• details of any income you receive from any other sources (for example, real estate, boarders,
• details of any assets with proof of income (if any) you get from these assets
• details of what you have done to find work in the past 4 weeks (if you have a Job Seeker Diary

There is nothing "random" about it. Centrelinks's internal administration is so hopeless that their left hands don't know what their right hands are doing. DH is, as befits her advancing years, on quarterly reporting, rather than fortnightly reporting. So when she reported her last job, a contract for 4 weeks beginning in May, she was told not to worry, just report it on the 1st of July. Idiot she is, she trusted them and didn't insist on a written copy of the determination. Meanwhile, data matching apparently shook her out in the interim, thus it was that the system once again went into fibrillation with all the alarm bells going hysterical

Now you would think that with so many people on quarterly reporting, Kafkalink would have figured out a process for handling intermediate income without dragooning its "customers" through this tiresome process that we have all gone through so many times already.

HCF toothache agony

DH has paid a fortune to HCF over the years for very little benefit.

She is in it basically for 3 reasons

1. Howard's stick - join now or burn in public hospital limboland for every
   


2. Howard's destruction of dental hospitals. She never wanted to be in a position to have to walk around with a big black hole in her smile.
   


3. She is able to bundle her mother, now 80, with herself and child, and so it seemed like a necessary investmant

Currently the rate is about $55 a week. Thank Goodness, none of them have been in hospital. Well her mother has, but she was advised that she would get a better deal in a public ward, so never used it.

Now finally, when DH is getting to the age when her investment in Health Insurance might reasonably be expected to have paid off (God Forbid!), current economic realities are forcing her to lose her grasp on the payments.

She needs to have an infected tooth removed, but she is getting up to nearly $500 in arrears. What to do? Borrow money to catch up with the payments, and hope her job-seeking efforts pay off soon? Drop the insurance and just pay the dentist? How agonising would that be after having sunk so much money into this outfit over the years?

You would think that a wealthy country like Australia, with a fortune coming in in mineral sales, and hardly any population to speak of compared to the rest of the world, could organise to have its population's toothaches cured, without having recourse to visiting Thai Budhhist monks coming here as an act of charity to fix the teeth of the poor, (as reported in the Daily Telegraph. See Wake up and smell the bad breath. Something rotten in the state of Howard's Australia.)

The Chrismas Island Hilton: A Holiday Camp for Housos?

One of the most depressing things about being caught in a poverty trap is that you never get to have a real holiday, no matter how hard you work.

DH and daughter have not been out of Sydney for more than 3 days at a time in 21 years, except for the few times they wore out their ever-dwindling welcome with their Qld friends*.

So it was with a growing sense of excitement that she read today's news that Christmas Island had been refurbished to Hilton standards

She has always longed for a Pacific Island holiday! Why not send all up in relays, for a well deserved break?

As long as it's not a one way ticket...

The Brits thought of it first in 18th century to deal with their excess populations of ill-housed wretches.

The Krauts refined the concept.

Excuse DH, but being a post-war baby, the idea of "Concentration Camps To Go" in remote locations is a bit of a worry. Course it cd never happen here.

Iemma hires Pope, Randwick Racecourse, to hear Houso Confessions

So now we know why Iemma and da Boys had to hire Randwick Racecourse and bring in the Pope!

It was the only way to fit in the 350,000 housos lining up to confess their sins in this month of the Tenant Fraud Confessional and Amnesty.

For whomsoever amongst us hath not salted away a bit of moonlighting income to pay the electricity bills or fix the kids' teeth, let them cast the first stone.

Housos Against Global Warming

DH calls upon all her fellow housos to give up their wicked fuel guzzling ways and donate their BMWs and Hummers to charity.

It's time to take a principled stand!

The Horror, the Horror: China, Zimbabwe, Iran, Indonesia, Burma

rHow UTTERLY repulsive it was to see China's show relay in Tibet

DH is usually pretty strict about keeping this blog within its parochial parameters

But enough is enough

Then there is Zimbabwe, And the mealy-mouthed African states totally incapable of standing up for justice for their own people.

Then there are the Muslim religious fascists who have declared war on the West,

Now poor Schapelle Corby is rotting away in an Indonesian sh*thole. No doubt she smuggled a bit of dope. But this is no way to treat a human being

Everywhere you look, rotten, corrupt states getting away with it.

And at every turn the Australian left has gone to the dogs and panders to worn out arguments that everything that has gone wrong in these benighted nations is the West's fault.

It's enough to make you sick

Still, it's true that we are oil addicts and are now beginning to pay the price.

Accordingly, DH now calls upon all her fellow housos to give up their BMWs

as a sacrifice to World Peace.

Holiday Choices, Labor's newest Affordable Housing Strategy?

Today's SMH reports:

"Under [Howard's] Work Choices employers and staff could cash out up to two weeks of an employee's annual leave each year. Labor's standard will allow individual industrial awards to include provisions for cashing out annual leave with no ceiling on the amount that may be paid out each year."

This from a Labor Government???

Is this some kind of backdoor "Affordable Housing" strategy, tempting workers to solve a systematic problem with an individual solution?

It is clear where the extra money will go.

Some Holiday Choices! Workers will be forced to make the agonising decision. Shall I sacrifice my rest, my health, my family time to catch up on my mortgage or rent arrears".

This "Sophie's Choice" should never be imposed on the vulnerable members of society.

Only yesterday. DH praised Rudd to the skies. Kevin Rudd, go back out in the cold please.

And only yesterday, under the heading NSW Govt exploits contract workers, DH explained very carefully how workers' entitlements are eroded by contract work, and how contract deals that looked so sweet 10 years ago are now leaving contractors far worse off in every way than permanent employees. All that is left is the illusion of freedom.

A corollary of this principle is that once employees trade their holidays away, they will never get them, let alone their health, back.

In what has been the most Judaeo-Ecumenical week in the history of this diary, DH, a card-carrying atheist yet, has had to remind Kevin Rudd once again to go back to his Bible and "Consider the lilies".

Dear friends, today's lesson calls Father Kevin to "Remember the Sabbath Day and Keep It Holy".

That simple tenet, the fundamental need for time for rest and replenishment, underpins the social justice ethic of Western Civ.

Not a good idea to throw this time-honoured principle to the dogs.

* The pic is a still from Sid Caesar's "Boardroom Lunch", which is not only brilliant slapstick, but in its ending, an education in realpolitik. Guaranteed to make your day

Praise Rudd and give the Della Bosca a rest

DH was a bit hard on Kevin Rudd about the work ethic, but the fact is that she thinks he's terrific.

 

She was fortunate enough to be in the audience at Q&A and was nervous as hell in anticipation of what she was sure would be a debacle.  She has never been one to take pleasure in seeing gladiators being thrown to the lions for the delectation of the mob.

 

But lo and behold, St Kev did battle with the lions and came out covered in honour and glory.

 

He was humorous, he was totally across everything,  he was compassionate, he was intelligent, quick on his feet, altogether bloody fantastic.

 

DH came away feeling that Australia couldn't be in better hands. What more can we ask of just one man?

 

* * * * *

 

Now poor Della Bosca. For heaven's sake, give the man a break. Does it ever occur to the ravening pack that what was at stake may not have been his own personal gain,  but also the stability and continuity of government. By all accounts, Della Bosca is an intelligent and competent minister.

 

How can anyone be expected to take on the vital job of government if they can be torn down for the slightest trivial character flaw?

 

Let s/he who is without blemish cast the first stone.

 

DH, BTW, has been convinced by people more knowledgable than herself, that a selective selloff of power stations is a good idea, what really matters is a strict regulatory regime to protect consumers against market failure. Still what does she know? Her general principles is, fools rush in, when it comes to difficult technological questions, but wise women abstain from taking sides.

 

 

 

 

 

 

NSW Govt exploits contract workers

Continuing DH"s theme that the NSW public service appears to be held together by rubber bands and sticky tape:

 

DH is looking for contract work in the public service and noted a Grade 9/10 role being offered at the rate of $40 per hour.

 

Assuming an average Grade 9/10 salary per annum is $85,000, then to arrive at that figure, you would have to divided by 52 weeks, at 41 hrs per week.

 

HULLO!!!!

 

The whole idea of contract work was that you were supposed to be paid an extra high rate to compensate for the fact that you get

• no holiday pay
• no sick pay
• no training
• no bloody nothing except the hour by hour sweat of your brow.

As an old leftie, she knew the argument against contracting was perfectly clear. It was an appealing bait at first to get people to give up secure  wages and conditions, then once the work force has lost its rights, the contract wage will gradually drop.

 

From the figures above it is clear that this is exactly what has happened.

 

Contractors now earn in real terms no more that abt 75-80% of a permanent wage, if that.

 

Factoring in annual leave and sick leave, compassionate leave etc, and public holidays, that 85,000 shd be divided by 45, minus, lets say $1000 a year in training, works out at about $50 an hour.

 

DH is pretty hopeless about money, so if she has got it all wrong, please email her at desperate.houso@gmail.com

 

Oh and that's where Centrelink's big stick comes in.

 

Woe betide you if you refuse to accept the rip-off.

 

That's the way we are turned into indentured laborers