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Post by pim on May 3, 2021 23:51:38 GMT 10
Gotta love the video ...
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Post by ponto on May 4, 2021 6:46:02 GMT 10
A good news story Pim, especially if one lives near the Hwy....last year the government was bagging shit out EV and asleep at the wheel with innovation left to private enterprise....conservatives are just dumb brainless dinosaurs hoping for a future coal renascence ... Swap and go: electric trucks to run between Sydney and Brisbane using exchangeable batteriesBatteries can be swapped in three minutes, removing the need for trucks to plug in and chargeCharge-and-change stations for heavy vehicles using the Janus Electric battery will be placed to coincide with mandatory driver fatigue breaks along the Pacific Highway. Photograph: Alamy An Australian company is planning to trial electric trucks with swappable batteries allowing almost non-stop travel for heavy vehicles between Sydney and Brisbane. Developed by Janus Electric, the batteries can be swapped in three minutes, removing the need for trucks to plug in and charge for up to 12 hours. The batteries will reportedly average between 400-600km a charge, with drivers only needing to stop at placed charge-and-change stations along the initial Brisbane-Sydney trial route. The stations will be located strategically, to coincide with mandatory driver fatigue breaks, including at Hemmant in Brisbane, Taree and Coffs Harbour on the Pacific Highway, and Prestons in Sydney. Lex Forsyth, Janus Electric’s general manager, explained that the process wasn’t as complicated as it sounded. “What we’ve been able to do is create a standard battery form factor that can fit in 90% of trucks. You can liken the model to a swap-and-go gas bottle. You don’t care what gas bottle you get, as long as you get your 9kg of gas. That’s how we’ve designed the system.” “By doing the conversion on existing trucks, and it’s not as difficult as everyone thinks because everything is manufactured to a standard. So there’s commonality between the trucks.” “It’s remarkably simple, but it’s about being able to bring all the best technology in the one place.” Forsyth said Janus Electric had worked on developing a quick and simple process for the swapping of batteries. “The truck drives into a change and charge station, there’s batteries already on the rack, where they’re sitting charged or being charged, and our software system is behind that, ensuring there are always batteries there to exchange.” Forsyth says each conversion would cost approximately $85,000 a vehicle, but fleet operators would receive their old diesel engine in return, which he said could fetch up to $15-25,000 on the used market. Although the 600KWh batteries would cost about $110,000, the company would instead rent them to truck operators for $110 for one-time use, or $140 for 24 hours. He thought users could break even after just a year, when factoring in savings on maintenance and the sale of the engine. Typically, conversions take around a week, and will be carried out on trucks that are already due for an engine rebuild, which often comes around every five years. “It’s usually the diesel engine that’s worn out, not the rest of the truck,” he said, “so, instead of spending money on the rebuild, they can convert their trucks.” Forsyth thinks the switch to interchangeable batteries could have a monumental impact on the industry, starting with alleviating the dependence on oil prices. “We can actually start giving the industry a fixed energy cost. There’s no exposure to the oil market. Most businesses have a fuel surcharge they pass on to customers, but we can fix our cost in for fleet operators.” He also said maintenance costs, one of the largest expenses for fleet operators, would also be reduced by the introduction of exchangeable batteries. “Typically a prime mover will cost you between 7.5-8 cents/km, an older one you’re looking in excess of 14 cents/km in maintenance. But we’d bring it down to 3 cents/km.” Forsyth stressed how much the change would also benefit drivers, with the engines running much quieter than traditional diesel engines. Lex Forsyth from Janus Electric with his swappable battery designed for heavy vehicles. ‘It’s just a quieter, more efficient truck to drive’: Lex Forsyth from Janus Electric with his swappable battery designed for heavy vehicles. “The impact on driver fatigue is huge, because we’ve taken the vibrations and the fumes and the noise out of the truck. They become more like cars to drive.” “It’s just a quieter, more efficient truck to drive.” He said he was confident the industry would take up the batteries, saying many were now thinking about their carbon footprint. “Customers are definitely now looking at their carbon footprint, and looking how they can become better corporate citizens.” “The economic numbers make so much sense for a fleet operator to make the change, because our balance of change is the oil prices, and we believe with the push for net zero carbo targets, that we’ll see significant uptake.” Australian Trucking Association (ATA) Transport and Infrastructure adviser Sam Marks said the innovative approach to trucking was welcomed, but needed to be paired with additional work from the government. “The ATA welcomes Australian innovation to advance zero and low emission road transport, such as through the ongoing development of exchangeable batteries. “The application of this technology will depend on the proposed trials, the commercial needs of individual trucking businesses and vehicle manufacturer requirements.” In a statement, the ATA said they believed that access to new truck models, moves to mass production and more cost-competitive models will be imperative to the transition to zero and low emission technologies “This transition needs to include the electric and hydrogen trucks that manufacturers are making available overseas. Governments need to address vehicle design rules, the availability of recharging and refuelling infrastructure, and the need for a temporary purchase incentive to accelerate the introduction of zero and low emission heavy vehicles into the Australian market.” Behyad Jafari, chair of the Electric Vehicle Council, said the trial of the trucks was a reflection of the trucking industry’s desire to find solutions to its carbon footprint. “Certainly in the trucking industry, I see a lot of enthusiasm by logistics operators and their customers, to decarbonise, recognising they do have a role to play in addressing our decarbonisation efforts, and also recognising the benefit of new technologies.” “This is pretty typical of Australian ingenuity in this global transition to electrification, and we see Aussie companies leading the way in innovation and coming up with solutions.” Jafari warned there would be some barriers and obstacles to overcome before the technology is more widely adopted, but that he was hopeful of the results. “We are seeing more entrants in the trucking industry developing and producing more electric trucks, but like with anything else, when new technologies are introduced, there’s a bit of learning involved.” “Those big barriers include what the technology is actually capable of, in addition to the more cultural barriers, that time that needs to be spent by companies to explore and understand the benefits of moving to electric trucks.” One particular challenge that Jafari focused on was the cost, saying it was imperative that the long-term reduction in running costs balance out any upfront expenses. “You’ll usually end up with higher up-front costs and lower operating costs, which means in the long term, it’ll be cheaper to run an electric heavy transport network.” “If their competitors overseas are able to move to electric vehicles and significantly lower their operating costs, and they aren’t able to do so here, that would be a burden on them.” “And of course when you do that, you’re reducing emissions from a very large source of emissions.” Forsyth said the next step was to continue testing the vehicles, and that he hoped to have five vehicles in the pilot program by November. Janus Electric will be taking orders for conversions after the Brisbane Truck Show, where they hope to exhibit the technology. Within five years, they hope to have more than 1,000 trucks in their system.
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Post by ponto on May 8, 2021 15:55:28 GMT 10
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Post by ponto on May 16, 2021 9:24:22 GMT 10
Forget ScoMo from marketing look at Joshie Friedo from sales...with his reassuring calm voice that never gets flustered..a perfect sales manager.
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Post by pim on May 22, 2021 8:48:49 GMT 10
Scott Morrison is pulling a Jedi mind trick, rebadging disasters into triumphs – and getting away with itKatharine Murphy Sat 22 May 2021 www.theguardian.com/australia-news/2021/may/22/scott-morrison-is-pulling-a-jedi-mind-trick-rebadging-disasters-into-triumphs-and-getting-away-with-itThe prime minister has presided over sure-fire botches in Covid times, but has constantly rebranded his failures while sending the public the billAll smirk and mirrorsMy Insiders colleague Niki Savva is a droll woman. She noted in her column this week that our prime minister possesses many talents. Sewing. Hammering. Squinting at things in test tubes. Flipping a breezy thumbs up in the cockpit of a plane. Anyone who watches the television news regularly will have glimpsed these gifts. I’d add another to the list. Morrison can spin straw into gold. What I mean by this is our prime minister possesses some sweet rebranding skills. Various disasters are rebadged as triumphs. Morrison pulls this Jedi mind trick reasonably often, and it’s hard to know what is more irritating: the unapologetic prime ministerial chutzpah, or the fact he gets away with it far more often than he should. Let’s illustrate with a couple of examples. They are trying to fix it, but let’s be honest, thus far, the government has made a hash of its most important job this year: the Covid-19 vaccination rollout. Some of the botch-up was bad luck, but a lot of it was bad judgments. The government was sluggish chasing supply at the start, and then politics rather than efficiency determined the rollout strategy. Because of the bungles, Australia is pulling up the drawbridge when we should be on a path to opening up. To mask the government’s errors, Morrison has read the zeitgeist and switched roles. Only a few months ago, he was the opening up evangelist. Now, the same prime minister who lectured the premiers about lockdowns being no substitute for a public health strategy has morphed into Mr Lockdown. Morrison can flip, the opposite can also be true, because he knows hard borders work in the current political climate. The political potency of fortress Australia, to some extent, shields the government from a penetrating critique of what has led us to this point. While the politics feel manageable for the government, policy failure has real world consequences. Because we can exist comfortably in our Covid-safe bubble, many Australians apparently feel little pressure to get vaccinated, which pushes back the border reopening. Bizarrely, the health minister, Greg Hunt, this week appeared to reinforce hesitancy that has built up in the community about the risks of rare and severe clotting associated with the AstraZeneca jab by noting “there will be enough mRNA vaccines for every Australian” by the end of the year. Presumably this was just a ham-fisted attempt to be all things to all people – but really, who would know? So rather than being pinged, or subjected to much sustained discomfort, Morrison sets his jaw, and sails on relentlessly. Right at the moment, he’s fully intent on piloting past the increasing vexation of premiers who feel they’ve saved Canberra from itself since the pandemic began, past the increasing frustrations of businesses that don’t have a sustainable business model until the border reopens, past universities staggering because of the prolonged absence of foreign students, and past any irritating questions from journalists. Pesky questions can be safely ignored given the vituperative clamour of national affairs muffles any discordant sound. Morrison presents right now as a prime minister sailing into the sunshine of the permanent campaign where the incumbents write the rules – which is his sweet spot. He has an extraordinary fluidity that enables his constant, no-regrets repositioning (which is generally considered the hardest trick to master in politics). But Morrison’s fluidity flows from the fixed point of his professional identity, which is political operative first, second and third. Pump out the budget. How will any unfunded spending be paid for? Wrong question – even though that’s the central question the Coalition has been skewering its opponents with for decades. Zip up to Gladstone. Down to Bass. Sewing. Hammering. Squinting at things in test tubes. Giving a breezy thumbs up in the cockpit of a plane. Morrison is the self-styled star of the faux campaign that will rumble on until the precise moment he is confident he’s got the viable path to victory, and then we’ll be thrust into the real one, ears pinned back in the slipstream. The operating tempo will pick up, but also deaden as the campaigns assail disengaged voters with slogans tested for salience, and negative advertising. Weaponised fake news will roll through Facebook. I hope this doesn’t sound cynical, because I’m not even close to cynical, and even if I was, cynicism is no use to anyone. My purpose here is diagnostic. I’m charting the topography of Morrison’s politics, and trying to position a prime ministerial oeuvre in the strange, slippery, age of bombardment and bewilderment we all inhabit. My purpose here is light, not heat. We need to grasp that our prime minister governs by constant calculations and recalibration, which is certainly an art, and fascinating in its way. But it can make a person – well, this one, anyway – crave substance with a gnawing hunger. A political world that’s heavy on stagecraft and light on substance delivers us now to the Hunter Valley, and a power plant no one with expertise asked for. After dropping hints for many months, Morrison and the energy minister, Angus Taylor, confirmed this week (conveniently in time for a state byelection in the Hunter) that a gas peaking plant will be built at Kurri Kurri. Please understand the following. Some of the government’s most senior energy policy advisers privately characterise this project as absolutely “bonkers”. But the government has zipped bonkers into an “aren’t we marvellous” onesie, hoping you won’t notice. This week, Morrison and Taylor told us the planned gas peaker (which will actually run on diesel initially if you check the fine print) will deliver cheaper and more reliable power. But it is hard to work out how, given the people who run Australia’s energy market say gas is likely to be more expensive than other options, like batteries, pumped hydro and demand management. Let’s puncture the routine obfuscation with some plain words explaining why this is happening. Australia’s energy market is in the middle of an inexorable transition. The Coalition federally has done everything in its power to suppress this transition, telling voters for more than a decade that things can remain as they were. This has never been true, and we’ve reached the point now where the fiction isn’t holding. Things are moving so rapidly that the coal generators that have propped up the system for decades could leave Australia’s energy market significantly earlier than anticipated. If these anchor fossil fuel assets stagger out the door in chaotic fashion because they’ve been priced out of the market by cheaper, low emissions alternatives, the lights could go off. Voters might even blame the agents of chaos: the Coalition. So what the government is purchasing with Kurri Kurri isn’t cheaper reliable power. It is gold-plated insurance at your expense: a brand new, taxpayer-funded power plant that might never operate, or operate only very intermittently to firm renewables. Again, let’s be clear about culpability. When it repealed the carbon price, the Coalition removed the policy mechanism that would have driven this market transition in orderly fashion, and replaced it with an impenetrable, arbitrary, Soviet-style, picking winners and propping up fossil fuels program. When it did that, it transferred the cost of the transition from the polluters, to taxpayers. The botch-up is now so epic it is possible that we might need some expensive, more polluting, back-up dispatchability to stabilise the grid over the next few years while various technologies mature. Those are actually the facts, but you might struggle to locate them in all the moustache twirling, as various pundits in Canberra pontificate about how the Coalition lobbing this gas plant is actually super clever, because it delivers an atomic wedgie to Labor. I mean seriously. On this match report crap goes. Unfortunately, this isn’t sport, and it’s past time to be crystal clear about the consequences of all the various shenanigans. Here are the consequences. The joke is on you, good voters of Australia. When your government buggers it up, it sends you the bill.
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Post by pim on Jun 4, 2021 17:11:05 GMT 10
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Post by caskur on Jun 4, 2021 20:40:47 GMT 10
35% OF Australians shouldn't have pissed their money up against the wall. No sympathy whatsoever. It isn't as if you don't get any warning you'll TURN 65 one day.
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Post by ponto on Jun 5, 2021 5:23:19 GMT 10
I am all blank on that one...
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Post by pim on Jun 11, 2021 14:34:19 GMT 10
‘How To Look Busy While Doing Absolutely Fuck All’, By Scott Morrisonwww.theshovel.com.au/2021/06/11/how-to-look-busy-by-scott-morrison/One of the things I’ve learned since being in the top job is that Aussies love a do-er. Someone who rolls their sleeves up, gets their hands dirty and chips in to get the job done. Sounds like a lot of hard work if you ask me. Much better to just give the impression you’re working and get paid half a mil a year to do sweet FA. Here are a few tips I asked my secretary to type up. Go overboard on photo oppsNothing says ‘busy’ like a professionally-styled photograph of a 55 year-old man doing barre at a meat processing plant. If you think you’ve done too many cheesy photo shoots of yourself playing rugby on an 8-metre earth mover or hammering a nail into a F-15 fighter jet, then you haven’t done nearly enough. Aim for at least five a day – if you miss a day people will start to question why you haven’t built a quarantine facility even though you’ve had 16 months. Put on a hard hatThere isn’t a single situation that can’t be made to look like you’re a dedicated, untiring workhorse with a florescent yellow hard hat. Signing a document you haven’t read? Put on a hard hat. Heading off on holidays again? Hard hat. Denying you knew anything about a rape that took place 50 metres from your office. Definitely hard hat. Make an announcementOne of the things I’ve realised over the years is that people are always asking you to DO things. Like putting out the bins or having a climate policy. But a little trick I learnt early on is that if you just say you’ll do it, people will usually take you at your word. They’ll often even print a glowing front-page feature piece about it. It means you never actually have to do anything about climate change. And Jen will put out the bins. Re-announce a previous announcementEvery couple of months or so it’s worth rolling out an old announcement and making it sound like it’s something entirely new. This is especially effective if it involves spending money on some sort of program. I’ve promised $50 billion to the arts sector since I’ve been PM, simply by repeatedly re-announcing a $2,500 funding scheme from 2017. Do you want me to put the bins out Jen? Blame the statesIf people question why you haven’t done anything about a certain issue, even though you’ve had over a year to plan for it, be sure to label it an issue for the states. This works even if the issue is stipulated in the nation’s constitution as being a Federal responsibility. Set up an enquiryEnquiries give the impression of vigorous activity, when in fact it’s just some overpaid ex Liberal Party member printing out a templated findings report before heading off to the Tattersalls Club for a cigar. Make sure your enquiry lasts for as long as possible – enough time for everyone to forget what the enquiry was about in the first place so they can instead concentrate on the new photo you’ve released of you sewing together strawberries on the back of an army tanker.
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Post by pim on Jul 2, 2021 12:42:43 GMT 10
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Post by matte on Jul 2, 2021 13:00:25 GMT 10
Pim and Ponto will have to eat humble pie after today's press briefing by the Prime Minister.
We have a very clear plan forward, a plan towards normality. It is still the Liberal states carrying the burden though. For example, it will be New South Wales still doing the bulk of hotel quarantine. It'll be South Australia that will conduct the trial of a 7 day, at home, quarantine period for fully vaccinated return Australians.
The Labor states will simply sit back and watch.
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Post by pim on Jul 2, 2021 16:54:19 GMT 10
You call that “leadership”? It’s still the states doing the heavy lifting and Mr Smirk and Mirrors fronting up to give it the full Scotty from Marketing treatment. Notice that he can’t even say “announcement”? He calls them “announceables”. The record shows that Scotty from Marketing is big on the “announceables” and then disappears when it comes to the follow through
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Post by matte on Jul 2, 2021 22:31:59 GMT 10
Catherine McGregor says that this may be the beginning of the end for the Morrison government.
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Post by pim on Jul 3, 2021 14:43:23 GMT 10
Exclusive: Morrison ignored chief health officers’ adviceRick Morton July 3 - 9 2021 www.thesaturdaypaper.com.au/news/politics/2021/07/03/exclusive-morrison-ignored-chief-health-officers-advice/162523440011987On Monday, chief health officers urged Scott Morrison to drop the AstraZeneca vaccine entirely. Instead, he broadened its usage.Not so Smirk and Mirrors nowIn Monday’s tense national cabinet meeting, held as nearly half the country went into lockdown due to the spread of the Delta strain of Covid-19, the country’s chief health officers urged Scott Morrison to dump its commitment to AstraZeneca. The Saturday Paper has spoken to several people with direct knowledge of how the emergency meeting late on Monday unfolded. There was a sense of panic and frustration from the prime minister, who also grilled the Australian Health Protection Principal Committee (AHPPC), the advisory body for chief health and medical officers, about making vaccines mandatory for aged-care workers. “They wanted AstraZeneca abandoned,” one source says, “but Morrison wouldn’t do it.” Instead, the meeting heard that a national no-fault indemnity scheme was now ready to be deployed. It would cover GPs who administered the AZ vaccine, which has been linked to rare blood clots, to people in age groups for which it was not recommended. The drug is approved for use in Australia by the Therapeutic Goods Administration, but its guidelines for delivery have been written and rewritten by the Australian Technical Advisory Group on Immunisation (ATAGI), which is co-chaired by two eminent professors, Allen Cheng and Chris Blyth. At the time of the national cabinet meeting, ATAGI’s advice was clear: the AZ vaccine could be used in adults aged under 60 where Pfizer was not available and “the benefits are likely to outweigh the risks for that individual and the person has made an informed decision based on an understanding of the risks and benefits”. Now, with a Commonwealth indemnity scheme in place – which Health Minister Greg Hunt says covers both the GP and the patient in the event of serious complications or death – the federal government had a solution for an emerging problem. Entire batches of the AZ vaccine are due to expire within weeks and months. “They were worried about the optics of doctors having to throw out lots of AZ stock the feds had bought,” one source tells The Saturday Paper. “But at the meeting [of national cabinet] there was no discussion about encouraging people to go out and get the shot.” This version has been corroborated by other sources at the briefing. By his own admission, Morrison used the meeting to badger the AHPPC and get agreement for mandatory vaccinations of aged-care workers despite failing to deliver the program as agreed. “When it comes to the issues of mandatory vaccines, this is not something that any government should do lightly,” Morrison said during a combative press conference on Monday evening, following national cabinet. “And, as a result, you know, we have been considering this matter for some time now, based on the best possible medical advice. And it was only at this point this evening, after some determined questioning of the AHPPC by the national cabinet, and myself in particular, that we have arrived at the position tonight that supports that decision.” Even so, the requirement is for aged-care workers to have a mandatory first dose by September, some five months after the federal government pledged to have completed the rollout of phase 1a. What state premiers were not expecting at that press conference was an explicit push from the prime minister for young people to get AZ. “But the advice does not preclude persons under 60 from getting the AstraZeneca vaccine,” Morrison said. “And so if you wish to get the AstraZeneca vaccine, then we would encourage you to go and have that discussion with your GP.” The remaining members of national cabinet saw this as an ambush and, rightly or wrongly, it triggered a near complete collapse in the nation’s strained political response to Covid-19. The consequences will likely be serious. Less than three weeks ago it was entirely conceivable the nation could – and probably would – slip back in the grips of Covid-19. But it was still difficult to imagine. The first hint something had gone wrong in New South Wales was an inconclusive Covid-19 saliva test taken by a 60-year-old limousine driver on Tuesday, June 15. That afternoon, the “not negative” result sparked the interest of the state’s contact tracers, who spoke with the man at length, late into the evening, to piece together his movements. Already, authorities had a problem. The driver worked transporting overseas flight crews, both commercial and freight, and was required to take daily saliva tests as part of the state’s control procedures. None before June 15 had registered any anomaly. By the Wednesday, a second more reliable test confirmed the driver was positive for the SARS-CoV-2 infection. Later that day, his wife became the second case in what would become known as the Bondi cluster. Within days, the Sydney outbreak would seed itself in Western Australia and then Victoria, while a separate, unrelated series of quarantine leaks in Queensland – first with a goldminer and then an unvaccinated casual receptionist outside a Covid-19 ward in Brisbane – cascaded into the Northern Territory before being carried into South Australia via another miner. As June came to a close, four state and territory capitals were plunged into lockdown. Townsville, Magnetic Island and Palm Island in Queensland, and Alice Springs and its remote satellite communities in central Australia, were also sealed tight. Contact tracing works like a high-stakes puzzle, with shifting, context-specific pieces. Following the identification of the airport limousine driver and his wife as positive cases, NSW Health teams worked with the couple to figure out where they had been in public, how long they had stayed and the kinds of surfaces they may have touched. It quickly became clear, based on analysis of the virus strain, that the 60-year-old driver was infectious in the community for as many as five days before he came on their radar. The NSW chief health officer, Dr Kerry Chant, revealed the virus was the highly infectious Delta variant, near perfectly matched to one circulating in the United States. This was the clue that the man had almost certainly picked up the pathogen from flight crew. It also presented contact tracers with a greater challenge: this strain moves fast, with less effort than the first iteration of Covid-19. Multiple visits to a Vaucluse eatery across five days from June 11, saw Belle Cafe registered as a test and isolate site. A member of the driver’s household also attended an afternoon screening of Hitman’s Wife’s Bodyguard at Bondi Junction’s Event Cinemas on Sunday, June 13. Health officials declared the entire window between 1pm and 4pm at the cinema complex as concerning, but especially for anyone who had been to the 1.45pm screening of the action flick. By June 17, 700 people had been instructed to get tested and isolate. Cases began to flourish in Sydney’s eastern suburbs and then across the city. A Perth physiotherapist who visited Lyfe Cafe in Bondi returned home to Western Australia, taking the virus with her. Exposure sites blossomed across Sydney: west of Penrith, in the far north-west at Rouse Hill, past Camden in the far south-west of the city, and everywhere in between. For five days in a row, the state recorded two new locally acquired cases during each 24-hour period. By June 22, the government had announced five cases in a single day. This figure doubled to 10 the following day. Then, on Wednesday, June 23, authorities discovered a birthday party held in West Hoxton had become a super-spreading event. At the time, eight people tested positive and NSW Health contact tracers believed there were 30 attendees. These figures would shift over time and late this week authorities confirmed 27 people had caught the virus at the party, infecting another 12 people who were not at the party. The only people who did not contract the virus at the gathering were fully vaccinated and one who was partially vaccinated. “Since the pandemic has started this is perhaps the scariest period that NSW is going through,” Premier Gladys Berejiklian said on Thursday, June 24, as the West Hoxton event filtered into the news. “It is a very contagious variant but at the same time we are at this stage comfortable that the settings that are in place are the appropriate settings, but that is so long as everybody does the right thing. Please be extra cautious.” While these transmissions had the focus of the nation, a healthy mineworker from Bendigo flew to Brisbane on June 17 and was required to quarantine in the Novotel Brisbane Airport hotel before catching a charter flight to the Newmont Corporation goldmine in the Northern Territory’s Tanami Desert. This was a crucial error. The man was placed in a hotel room between two high-risk travellers and appears to have contracted the virus there before boarding the flight to the NT. His infection, however, was not caught until Saturday, June 26. NT Chief Minister Michael Gunner announced a 48-hour lockdown across the Top End the next day, and this was extended during the week. More than 900 miners, including those who had already left the mine for their homes in Darwin, Brisbane, Perth and Adelaide, were put into isolation. On Wednesday, June 30, South Australian authorities announced five new cases of Covid-19 linked to the family of one of these miners. This man had flown back to Adelaide via Alice Springs, which also placed that regional centre into a lockdown. The middle of the week just gone also marked the moment an uneasy co-operation between governments of all levels exploded in a messy, very public way. Queensland’s chief health officer, Dr Jeannette Young, launched an extraordinary intervention regarding the AZ vaccine – triggered by Scott Morrison’s unexpected announcement. “No, I am sorry if I hadn’t made that clear. I do not want under 40s to get AstraZeneca because they are at increased risk of getting the rare – it is rare – they are at increased risk of getting that rare clotting syndrome,” she said during a press conference on Wednesday. “We’ve seen up to 49 deaths in the UK from that syndrome. I don’t want an 18-year-old in Queensland dying from a clotting illness who, if they got Covid, probably wouldn’t die. Now, wouldn’t it be terrible if our first 18-year-old in Queensland who dies related to this pandemic died because of a vaccine?” Asked if her view was consistent with other state chief health officers, Dr Young said, “Yes.” Using less incendiary language, Premier Berejiklian announced that the NSW government would not be offering the AZ vaccine to anyone under 60, unless it was a second dose for someone who had already had the first. The rationale was clear: mass state vaccination hubs are not a place where people can receive informed medical advice, which is what the official recommendation dictates. “If you’re under 60 and want the AstraZeneca, you should have a conversation with your GP,” Berejiklian said on Wednesday. “And what the NSW government will continue to do is follow the health advice of the federal regulators.” On Thursday morning, Chris Blyth, co-chair of ATAGI, reiterated the body’s advice: Pfizer remains the preferred vaccine for under 60s. When pressed on whether young people should be getting AZ, he said: “There are some pressing situations where that would be warranted, but they are quite small.” The Saturday Paper reported last week that the Commonwealth plans to phase out AstraZeneca entirely by October, three months from now, as new supplies of Moderna reach Australia and Pfizer stock soars. Barring major changes, this will be the last hurrah for the AZ shot developed by Oxford University. For those who have had their first shot of AZ, which provides some Covid-19 protection, the second will be administered after a 12-week gap. By Thursday morning, some 2616 people under the age of 40 had already received their AstraZeneca shot “with informed consent” following Morrison’s Monday evening press conference. One senior source associated with the vaccine rollout told The Saturday Paper Morrison’s bizarre intervention in that press conference was the “wrong process, right outcome”. But the aftermath torpedoed what was left of a fragile coherence on vaccine policy, made all the more troubled by constraints on supply and hesitant older Australians. Once again, the rollout is stricken. An end to the pandemic seems a long way off, pushed further out by a breakdown in politics.
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Post by matte on Jul 3, 2021 23:50:38 GMT 10
"Wrong process, right outcome", that is all we need to know.
I read all of that to reach that very sensible conclusion.
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Post by caskur on Jul 4, 2021 3:10:58 GMT 10
will be New South Wales still doing the bulk of hotel quarantine. Well you fools want to "live with the virus," so suffer in your shorts.
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Post by ponto on Jul 4, 2021 5:51:50 GMT 10
ScoMo didn't follow expert advice when he followed Trump's advice in thinking the virus would fade away to nothing....resulted in 1 in 5 people in then States died from Covid..and still people think Trump is a good bloke....no doubt ScoMo is still a fan.
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Post by caskur on Jul 4, 2021 7:42:31 GMT 10
ScoMo didn't follow expert advice when he followed Trump's advice in thinking the virus would fade away to nothing....resulted in 1 in 5 people in then States died from Covid..and still people think Trump is a good bloke....no doubt ScoMo is still a fan. TRUMP was the President NOT a dictator... States have rights in the USA like we have state rights. They have ZERO control over people in the USA.... period. If a person says, "shove your masks up your ASS," they can say it and not only that, practice it. You're not even in their headspace Ponto. You have no idea about Americans at all.
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Post by pim on Jul 4, 2021 19:39:42 GMT 10
From ‘carpark rorts’ to the vaccine rollout: What Scott Morrison’s latest debacles have in commonThe vaccine rollout debacle and the carpark 'slush funds' are both a product of how the PM views politics, writes Lindy Edwards.Lindy Edwards 4 July 2021 thenewdaily.com.au/news/politics/australian-politics/2021/07/04/carpark-rorts-vaccine-rollout-morrison/amp/Scott Morrison’s two political debacles this past week, the vaccine rollout and the carpark grants program, have more in common than first appears. They are two sides of the same coin that is Morrison’s approach to leadership. Different political leaders have a different views of what political leadership is. Paul Keating used to argue that politics was a battle of ideas. That it was all about ‘the vision thing’. To him political leadership was storytelling, where the goal was to win people over to your view of the world. It is more common for political leaders to be transactional. Leaders like Julia Gillard saw politics as being about the art of compromise. To them it is about bringing together people with conflicting interests and finding an accommodation that enables us to move forward in as practical and functional a fashion as possible. It is becoming apparent that Scott Morrison’s approach to leadership doesn’t fit either of these models. It is different again. It is becoming clear that it wasn’t a matter of idleness that Morrison went the to the 2019 election without any policy. Rather he was working hard on a different kind of politics. It is now evident the Coalition was working feverishly identifying every possible pot of money they could find, and setting out how to distribute it for political advantage, rewarding friends and wooing foes in marginal seats. At the time, it was deemed a matter of pragmatism that he had no policy, as he attempted to lead a fractured party that was split upon almost every issue of substance. It was also thought to be stroke of marketing genius, that he ran the campaign as a one man band focused entirely on himself and his relatability as suburban dad. It is now increasingly clear that the strategy reflected deeper features of his political style. Morrison doesn’t do the vision thing. Big picture long term thinking is not in his repertoire. Indeed looking down the road and recognising the challenges of the vaccination rollout and the inevitability of needing quarantine facilities seem to have been beyond his time horizon. Short-term perspectiveMorrison also does not seem to see politics as getting people together to solve problems. He is a solo operator that tends to bully and bluster and cajole. This week’s own goal on announcing that under 40s could get Astra Zeneca was entirely avoidable. The national cabinet could have discussed it. They could have consulted with the doctors and the medical specialists and got everyone on the same page. Instead, one gets the sense Morrison thought the announcement would be popular, and under pressure over the rollout, wanted the political win of the announcement all to himself. His actions sparked fury and retaliation from premiers, and the big loser is the public health messaging to the community. Even as the country is being thrown into crisis, Morrison was still focused on getting the short-term win over his political rivals, rather than solving the health crisis facing the nation. Morrison has a different model of politics. He see politics as about gathering numbers and building networks of patronage. He understands leadership as a carrot and stick exercise. You win backers by granting largesse to those that please you. You punish those that dare cross you. The vaccine rollout debacle and the carpark slush fund scandal are not unrelated. They are both a product of how Morrison views politics, and his beliefs about how you secure power. One can’t help but wonder how long his political moment will last. Nothing he has done so far suggests he has the skills to manage the challenge Barnaby Joyce represents. Dr Lindy Edwards is an expert in Australian politics at the University of New South Wales. Dr Edwards has worked as an economic adviser in the Department of Prime Minister and Cabinet and a press gallery journalist for the Sydney Morning Herald
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Post by matte on Jul 4, 2021 20:58:29 GMT 10
The rest of the world 'is opening up' while Australia is again 'in a period of lockdown'
Labor MP Matt Thistlethwaite says unfortunately while Australia is again in a period of lockdown, with millions being impacted, the rest of the world "is opening up".
"The reason for that is we don't have enough Australians vaccinated," Mr Thistlethwaite told Sky News.
He said many businesses are suffering because "they can't get the restrictions lifted until we get the vaccination numbers up".
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Post by ponto on Jul 4, 2021 21:06:10 GMT 10
So Castrumpian Trump who wanted to be President for life who incited an act of insurgency to remain in power is someone who had/has the makings of a dictator wannabe undermining democracy. ...a President who proclaimed he was not going to leave office. Biggest climate denying fucknut on the planet its no wonder he is your messiah. Trump’s Coronavirus Infection Was Much Worse Than We Knew By lying about it, he led others to their deaths. BY WILLIAM SALETAN JUNE 25, 20215:09 PM Trump coming down helicopter stairs President Donald Trump exits Marine One at Walter Reed Medical Center on Oct. 2. Brendan Smialowski/Getty Images Little by little, we learn more about Donald Trump’s schemes and lies during the coronavirus pandemic. A few days ago, we found out from excerpts of a new book—Nightmare Scenario: Inside the Trump Administration’s Response to the Pandemic That Changed History—that Trump proposed to quarantine sick Americans at Guantánamo Bay, Cuba, so they wouldn’t count as U.S. infections. Now comes another revelation from the same book, this time about Trump’s own COVID-19 infection last fall. He lied about his ordeal, ridiculed precautions, and told people not to worry about the virus, thereby accelerating the worst wave of the pandemic. Trump pretends he caught the virus because it was inescapable. In reality, he caught it because he sabotaged mask use and social distancing, endangering everyone around him. He didn’t just hold big campaign rallies. He told aides to remove their masks at the White House. The book’s authors, Washington Post journalists Yasmeen Abutaleb and Damian Paletta, report that Trump specifically objected to masks in staged appearances: “If someone was going to do a news conference with him, he made clear that he or she was not to wear a mask by his side.” In these situations, the no-mask rule did nothing to help Trump hear or see anyone who was speaking to him. All it did was signal to the public that masks were unnecessary or disapproved. On Sept. 29, shortly before Trump officially tested positive, he went to Cleveland to debate Joe Biden. Circumstantial evidence suggests that Trump suspected, or should have suspected, that he might already be infected. But the book adds an incriminating quote: After meeting with military families at the White House on Sept. 27, Trump told his staff, “If these guys had covid, I’m going to get it because they were all over me.” That remark, combined with his accumulating symptoms, suggests he knowingly endangered Biden and others at the debate. Once Trump tested positive, the infection could no longer be concealed. But he could still try to hide its severity, and he did. The authors report that he agreed to go to Walter Reed Medical Center only after aides presented a choice: He could walk to the helicopter on his own, or he might be wheeled out to it later, in which case “there would be no hiding his condition.” Trump was already being treated in the White House, so his reluctance to go wasn’t about bravery. It was about vanity and deception. That’s why his aides framed the choice as they did. Trump got much sicker than he or the White House acknowledged. Normal blood oxygen levels range from 95 percent to 100 percent. According to the book, Trump’s levels fell into the 80s. Aides feared for his life, and doctors administered a flurry of experimental treatments that were rarely combined. He was rescued by measures no ordinary person could expect: cutting-edge drugs that were in short supply, supervision and advice from the nation’s top physicians, and a direct phone call to the head of the FDA to get authorization for a novel therapy. It’s not surprising that the president of the United States got extraordinary care. But when you read the details of what it took to keep him alive, it’s dismaying to go back and look at what he told the public afterward. On his return from Walter Reed—while “still probably contagious,” the authors note—he defiantly removed his mask for the cameras, and he “strode into the White House, passing staffers” and potentially exposing them to the virus. Then he made a video, telling Americans that his recovery proved they shouldn’t fear the virus. “Don’t be afraid of it. You’re going to beat it,” he assured them. “We have the best medicines. … Get out there.” Three days later, Trump gave his first interview since getting sick. He said he felt “perfect” and would soon resume his campaign rallies. The lesson of his infection, he told Fox News viewers, was that precautions were pointless—since even the president had been infected—and that the virus was nothing to worry about. “No matter how good the security, you’re not going to protect yourselves from this thing,” he concluded, “unless you just literally don’t come out.” In fact, he argued that people who stayed home instead of congregating with others were just as likely or more likely to get sick, and he noted that some politicians who wore masks got infected anyway. “You catch this thing,” he shrugged, but “when you catch it, you get better. And then you’re immune.” As to the lifesaving drugs he had received, Trump scoffed, “I think I would have done it fine without drugs.” As a White House employee, Trump imperiled everyone around him. As president, he interfered in every aspect of the government’s response to the pandemic, contributing to a death toll that had passed 200,000 by the time the virus caught him. Despite this, America—its best doctors and its best medicines—saved Trump’s life. He repaid that gift not by warning Americans to learn from his mistake, but by encouraging them to follow his recklessness. Since then, another 400,000 have died. Now closer to 600,000 Yanks have died from covid ...1 in 5.
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Post by Gort on Jul 5, 2021 0:37:54 GMT 10
What a joke. Carpark "rorts"? Zero difference to any other election promise designed to win seats. Remember this one from Albo at the last election ... ? What a co-incidence that these outer South-Eastern suburbs are marginal Liberal seats that Labor wanted to win. Labor's Roads Upgrades For Melbourne's South EastA Shorten Labor Government will invest more than $850 million to upgrade congested roads, create new jobs and slash travel times for residents in Melbourne’s south-eastern suburbs.Federal Labor will partner with the Andrews Labor Government to deliver this major infrastructure package to tackle traffic congestion and make Melbourne’s suburbs more liveable for families. Labor will help upgrade more than 300 kilometres of road, including: Adding an extra lane in each direction to Healesville-Koo Wee Rup Road in Pakenham South, between Princes Freeway and Manks Road, with a new bridge over Deep Creek; Adding an extra lane in each direction to Lathams Road in Seaford, between Oliphant Way and Dandenong-Frankston Road, with a new bridge over the Peninsula Link; Adding an extra lane in each direction to Hallam North Road in Endeavour Hills, between Heatherton Road and James Cook Drive; Adding an extra lane in each direction to Narre Warren-Cranbourne Road in Cranbourne, between Thompsons Road and the South Gippsland Highway; Adding an extra lane in each direction to Pound Road West and Remington Drive in Dandenong South, between Abbotts Road and South Gippsland Highway, and building a new bridge over the Cranbourne train line; Upgrading Golf Links and Grant Roads in Langwarrin South, and upgrading the six-way roundabout at Golf Links, Grant, Warrandyte and Baxter-Tooradin Roads. Work on these six priority road projects will commence in early 2020 and be completed by 2025. In addition, a Shorten Labor Government will help duplicate Racecourse Road in Pakenham between the Princes Highway and the Princes Freeway, supporting the Andrews Labor Government’s work to remove all level crossings in Pakenham. This stretch of road is used by over 20,000 motorists daily. We want them moving, not stuck in traffic. Federal Labor will contribute $787 million to these upgrades. Beyond those seven priority projects, we will also contribute $65 million towards the completion of the upgrade and duplication of the 10.7 kilometre stretch of Thompsons Road between Dandenong-Frankston Road and Berwick-Cranbourne Road. This will complement the removal of the level crossing near Merinda Park Railway Station. We will make sure that one in 10 of the jobs on the new project sites are filled by an apprentice – delivering training and job opportunities for young Victorians. Federal Labor will also invest $2 million to expand the parking capacity at the Officer Railway Station from 100 to 150 spaces. This funding will be delivered from Federal Labor’s National Park and Ride Fund, and matched by the state government. Traffic congestion isn’t just frustrating for families – its hurts our economy. Without proper investment in roads and rail, the annual economic cost of congestion will triple to $9 billion by 2031.anthonyalbanese.com.au/media-release-labors-roads-upgrades-for-melbournes-south-east-sunday-24-march-2019Just normal electioneering.
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Post by ponto on Jul 5, 2021 0:52:03 GMT 10
Just normal....big difference in needed upgrade infrastructure than something designed to promote self interest.
There we have it a diversion to excuse criminal coalition behaviour.
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Post by pim on Jul 5, 2021 6:45:10 GMT 10
Around Morrison’s cabinet table sits: Michaelia Cash, who refused to fully cooperate with police investigating leaks from her office; Angus Taylor, who was caught trading in a falsified annual report; Bridget McKenzie, the architect of sports rorts; Alan Tudge, whose car park rorts put McKenzie to shame; Linda Reynolds, who mishandled an alleged rape in her office, then called the complainant a lying cow; Peter Dutton, another pork-barreller who wouldn’t let Border Force officials appear at the Ruby Princess inquiry; Christian Porter, who resisted an inquiry to establish that he was fit and proper for ministerial office; and the list goes on. They are now all part of political blur – in fact that’s Morrison’s strategy. But in the process he has effectively destroyed an essential Westminster convention. www.smh.com.au/national/greg-hunt-has-failed-to-vaccinate-the-nation-and-must-go-20210703-p586jq.html
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Post by Gort on Jul 5, 2021 9:33:06 GMT 10
Just normal....big difference in needed upgrade infrastructure than something designed to promote self interest. There we have it a diversion to excuse criminal coalition behaviour. As for the station carparks ... All those in the outer South-Eastern suburbs in Melbourne were completely full. Cars were being parked on median strips and side streets because the train station carparks were chockers by 7:30 AM. Very much needed spaces at: Officer; Beaconsfield; Berwick; Narre Warren; Hallam; Dandenong; Yarraman; Noble Park; Sandown Park; Springvale; Westall; Clayton; Huntingdale; Oakleigh; Hughesdale; Murrumbeena; Carnegie and Caulfield that I know of from personal observation.
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