The Child Support Agency responds:

Deputy General Manager of the Child Support Agency, Samantha Palmer writes : Re. “Who cares about privacy or ethics when there’s an election to win?” (Yesterday, item 8). Having been a personal Crikey subscriber for many years I often enjoy Christian’s wit but not always his mathematical skills – two plus two does not equal four in the context of his “story” on Child Support in yesterday’s email. The Child Support Agency has been running Community Information Sessions across Australia regularly for many years to provide customers with an opportunity to get face to face service on their case and have their questions answered. Other service providers like Centrelink and community services often attend to help families access the information and support they need. Many of these sessions are held in regional areas where CSA does not have an ongoing presence. CSA welcomes the attendance of MPs and Senators to directly address customer concerns and issues, which I can assure Christian, are not location-specific. All MPs and Senators, no matter what “brand”, work with their constituents on a variety of child support issues and can add value to any CIS. Accordingly, invitations are generally sent to customers within the MP’s electorate. Customers outside the electorate would generally only receive an invitation to that event if they have not updated their address details on CSA’s database. Community Information Sessions are a normal ongoing part of CSA’s Service Delivery program. Christian asks in his story: “How many more are there?” If Christian had taken a moment to visit our website at www.csa.gov.au he could easily have seen the invitation to attend such a session and a link to the detailed schedule of sessions. Crikey readers who are CSA customers are welcome and encouraged to attend. I can assure the 1.5 million parents who transfer child support payments (of whom about 53% do so without needing CSA’s direct assistance) that CSA does not and would never divulge customer details in the ways Christian suggests. For us to do so would put CSA in breach of what is among Australia’s tightest privacy and secrecy legislation. Family separation can be very difficult for all involved and subsequently Child Support is a challenging area of public service. CSA has put significant effort into listening to its customers and improving its services over the past two years yet it’s a pity that Christian’s story infers that CSA staff are neither professional nor customer-focused.

Telstra responds:

Telstra’s director of news services, Andrew Maiden writes : Re. “Trujillo’s oversized, under-linked remuneration package” (yesterday, item 28). It’s tiring but necessary to again have to correct the record on Sol Trujillo’s remuneration. Claim: That a consultant once employed by Sol at US West was retained by Telstra to advise on his remuneration. Fact: Wrong. This firm has never played any role at Telstra negotiating on behalf of Sol. Claim: That Sol pockets an extra $15.5 million if he lifts the share price by $1. Fact: Wrong. Sol’s long-term benefits depend on meeting demanding hurdles aside from share price. The share price hurdle is merely a safety net. Claim  That Sol talked down the share price for personal gain. Fact: Wrong. Under this conspiracy theory, Sol would trash his personal shareholding and harm his business reputation in return for an uncertain and relatively inconsequential upside. Hardly likely. Adam Schwab would be much better advised to get the facts for himself rather than rely on rehashing Fairfax reports. Telstra has previously written to the editor of the SMH correcting their numerous mistakes in covering Sol’s pay. For their own reasons Fairfax has chosen not to publish those corrections.

Failing the citizenship test:

John Peak writes : Re. “Failing the Citizenship Test” (yesterday, item 19). Stilgherrian asks: “Will the Opening Ceremony of the 2000 Olympics really be of any relevance in five years time?” Fair go mate, look what they managed there! With the tennis and Cathy lighting that flame, they managed in the whole historical, political and cultural coverage of this wonderful country of ours, to identify the contribution of a total of three women (well, apart from the Queen, she’d have been unavoidable I imagine), and most cleverly, at the same time, no waste of words, two aboriginal people! Can’t say fairer than that, eh? Except perhaps to point out, amongst the myriad detail about the contributions of individual men to all of this, that General John Monash gained heroic status as commander of the Australian forces in WW1 France, in a part-time capacity! It’s in the book!

Mary Carter writes: I work in an office of 12 people in Turnbull’s electorate. We did the new citizenship test today that was available on -line. Only two persons passed. Maybe Malcolm Turnbull should actually go and talk to his electorate who are made up of many who went through incredible hardships in Europe in WW2 and see what they think. Most would fail the test even though they have been here since the late 1940’s. It’s a major topic of conversation at the moment. We would like to ask Malcolm what he thinks of the test. Most people in Bondi Junction would fail the test. And what does he think of Kevin Andrews?

Stephen Woods writes: An interesting point with the citizen test is to be found in the dot points on Page 5, under the nauseating title ‘Australian Values’ (As if we had exclusive rights to claim these attitudes as our own). It occurs to me that Prime Minister John Howard has failed to show leadership in any of the ‘values’. It does not take much effort to bring to mind clear examples where he has gone to great length and expense to corrupt each and every one.

Adrian Ridgway writes : Stilgherrian must be an idiot – my eight year son old got thirteen of the sample questions right – without referencing the booklet! My guess Stilgherrian must have gone to Grammar or one of those other special schools where the only skills necessary are football and socialising with the right sort of people- he’s probably a lawyer or stockbroker these days. Or maybe an immigration broker. Latte-set liberals (small l) need to pull their heads in – being invited to become an Australian citizen is a privilege – not a right, just as Stilgherrian probably exercises the right to invite who he chooses to a party in his into his home, we as a society should be allowed to exercise the right to determine who, and under what circumstances, immigrants are allowed to enter Australia. The point of the test is not to put up a barrier to anybody, but to enshrine in law as part of the process Immigrants understand they are joining an established society, not establishing colonies. (Many apologies to Aboriginal Australia – we knew not what we did at the time).

Stilgherrian writes: Yesterday’s story on the Citizenship Test omitted two links to YouTube which are, naturally, of vital national significance: Apu from The Simpsons doing his US citizenship test and John Howard’s hopeless attempts at cricket.

A Howard spending spree:

David Havyatt writes: Re. “The last rock is crumbling for Howard” (yesterday, item 2). The one error in Mungo MacCallum’s analysis is that even if Howard goes on a spending spree it might not do much damage to the actual surplus. The reason is simple – every year the actual surplus has exceeded the budget surplus because every government program is underspent – usually because the rules are simply impossible to follow. Examples include the Broadband programs, and what will be the case of the $700 literacy/numeracy grants. So an incoming Government just needs to leave the Howard implementation teams in place and nothing will get spent.

Margaret Pomeranz and SBS:

John Winter writes: Re. “Margaret Pomeranz: There has been a cultural genocide at SBS” (yesterday, item 1). Having spent many years in the PR game – and the great majority of those doing interviews with all forms of news journos – I really have to ask who is kidding who with the current bout of indignation about the dumbing down of SBS news? Ask anyone who has ever been interviewed for a news bulletin – and especially in doing live crosses – and I doubt you will find anyone who would speak highly of SBS news. Interviews with SBS journos always left me, and my staff, wondering if we wasted our time totally. The questions were, without fail, ill-informed and they never ever put you under pressure for your answers. In short, they were complete fluff interviews. No matter how strong their international news feeds were, SBS news never cut it when it came to the quality of their journalists or presenters in asking questions on local stories. Privately, any spinner (and most honest journos) would tell you that SBS news have been a joke for many years. What we are seeing now regarding the departure of Kostakidis is just empty posturing. SBS news long ago breathed its last, if unremarkable breath, in the serious journalism stakes.

Darlene Taylor writes: While I’m not against getting a little Paris Hilton with my news, I concede that lots of people watch SBS World News to get information that won’t appear in the next edition of Who Weekly (since David Flint is writing for Crikey these days, I feel compelled to call these folks “elites”). With Mary Kostakidis storming out of the multicultural broadcaster how long will it be before we see one of those Paris-like presenters we have come to know and loathe on the commercial channels appearing on SBS? Yes, how long will it be before Stan gets to crack inane jokes with someone of the calibre of Jessica Rowe or, gasp, Naomi Robson? That would be, like, you know, errr, hot.

A multicultural naturalised Australian writes : How about some balance about SBS – the B part of the name … people seem to forget that SBS is also a radio broadcaster in 68 languages where multicultural Australia and the world via the net and podcasting can hear the latest news in their first language and keep up with what’s going on in various communties around the country. SBS Radio also gets out and about, broadcasting live from a different festival or event nearly every week. SBS radio has more hits for podcasts and radio ratings than TV and is a unique service in Australia with no commercials. Want to see an electoral backlash for Multicultural Australia – touch SBS radio. Labor should be seizing on this fact.

Crikey Policy Comparison Part 6: Climate change:

Mark Byrne writes : Re. “Crikey Policy Comparison Part 6: Climate change” (yesterday, item 17). Luke McKenna makes a useful comparison of the climate polices of the Coalition and Labor. But there is one item to add that won’t appear in the media statements of either major party; that is the ongoing $9 billion in subsidies granted for the use of fossil fuels in Australia each year. This huge figure overshadows the major parties modest promised investment for green energy.

Ratbag Peter Singer:

John Poppins writes : Re. “1994: the year a stripper ran in Kooyong” (Friday, item 14). In his item, Christian Kerr refers to “Ratbag Peter Singer” who got 28% of the vote. It would seem that Christian has missed out on the pleasure of getting to know Peter. Such an intemperate description hardly describes the careful thought, language and example which encourages people to think more carefully of their long term responsibilities for themselves, others and our environment.

David Flint:

Phil Garratt writes : Re. “David Flint: journalism failing the hate test” (yesterday, item 22). Whose idea of a joke is it having David Flint write for Crikey? To add insult to injury he quotes Gerard Henderson and Piers Akerman when writing a piece on journalism and finishes with a snide comment about Howard haters. As a proud Howard hater I would like to point out that I also hate Flint, Henderson and Akerman and do everything possible to exclude them all from my daily life. Grrrrr.

Peter Rosier writes: David Flint’s “piece” in which amongst other things he regurgitates the much masticated Heiner story, somewhat like trying to breathe life into a corpse by vomiting in its mouth, was yet another stunning piece of hypocrisy from this dainty wee fellow with the rounded vowels and pointed tongue. I don’t see a word from Flint about Akerman’s imbalance, in fact, au contraire . That would probably have something to do with the fact that Akerman has turned bias into an art form.

Mark Hardcastle writes: David Flint is right. His assessment of the media bias brings clarity. Moreover, the source of the media bias is structural. There is a constant selective pressure, which overtime works like evolution to establish/reinforce operations that are aligned with the dominant selective power. Howard Haters will falsely claim that the dominant selective pressure is the profit motive, concentrating wealth, and self-reinforcing corporate interest. They will create arguments of big media suppressing stories that conflict with the interest of big advertisers. They will select the research that shows that advertisers influence the editorial content. They will misinterpret the market and claim that cost cutting is creating a pressure for less independent journalism and more press release regurgitation or PR packaged advertorials. The lunar left will use the heavy reliance of media on government and major business firms as information sources, to allege that a certain degree of solidarity develops (for reasons of efficiency and Realpolitik) among the government, major media, and corporate interests. The elites will do everything in their power to deny themselves (and distract the battling Mums and Dads) from the reality that dominant selective pressure is the Maoist culture of the ABC and public schools. In truth, the sooner we liberalise both, the sooner we can be transformed into an era of fair media. Australia needs more people with the courage to speak truth to power, and David Flint is full of it.

APEC and the spirit of Ben Hall et al:

Shirley Colless writes : Re. “Welcome, APEC delegates, to Supermax Sydney” (yesterday, item 18). No, Jeff Sparrow, Peter Kocan did not shoot Arthur Caldwell in nice, straight Melbourne, but rather in Sydney in the very very nice and extremely straight Mosman, an incident that the blue rinse, 4WD matrons of that salubrious suburb are still trying to forget. Oh, and incidentally, on that other subject of APEC mania, the water cannon, overheard at a rather large gathering of conservative cockies in a large rural town: “It’s un-Australian and they should turn it on the visitors”. Whoever said the spirit of Ben Hall, Captain Thunderbolt, Captain Starlight and Darkie Gardiner is not alive on t’other side of the ironstone curtain?

Giving 101%:

Steve Martin writes : Re. “Howard … you got us into this” (yesterday, item 13). Just nitpicking – but isn’t that 101%?

Crikey bias, etc:

Michael Walker writes: In response to Michael Drenth (yesterday, comments) who wrote: “its mindless ramblings such as this from Helen Razer that cause me to stay a “squatter”!” Garbage – it’s your unwillingness to pay for independent journalism that keeps you on the outer. If your decision to subscribe is based on the populist articles provided to squatters, you are missing out.

Neville Clifford writes: You people are as biased as Kerry O’Brien. Do you honestly believe that this new Labor mob can do any better than previous Labor drongos? Give us a break.

Kel Griffiths writes: With the greatest respect, there is no alternative to Howard. My vote and my wife’s are going there.

Waltzing Matilda :

Harold Thornton writes: Rick Speare (yesterday, comments) takes Norman Abjorensen to task for the unpardonable error of stating that Waltzing Matilda was among the offerings at the 1977 National Anthem plebiscite. Sadly for Rick, the error lies in his own memory or research and Norman can celebrate his vindication. According to the Australian Electoral Commission, and my memory, Waltzing Matilda was indeed one of the four songs on the paper. Nearly a third of voters chose it, myself included, but it went down to the forgettable dirge of Advance Australia Fair. Another opportunity wasted.

Poor Ray:

Kay Gallegos writes  Re. “Ray Martin’s pain: “I couldn’t take it any longer”” (yesterday, item 20). Well done, Glenn Dyer, boohoo indeed, poor Ray. He’s always irritated me over the years, you are the first person I’m aware of who’s actually said or written anything negative about him. Talk about sitting on the fence, Ray’s an expert. I didn’t realise he was on such huge money.

Better things to do:

Tony Berry writes: Re. “Media briefs and TV ratings” (yesterday, item 23). The one consolation from the TV ratings showing more than 2 million watched Kath & Kim is that this means 18 million Australians found better things to do with their time than tune in to this insult to the once good name of comedy.

Of Mitron and Mitterand and Mitterrand:

Nic Maclellan writes : In comments and corrections yesterday, you were chastised by Gavin Robertson and Patrick Belton for not recognising “Mitron” as “Mitterand” – sorry about further pedantry, but the correct spelling is “Mitterrand.” This highlights another danger in using Wikipedia or Google (where there are a million examples of people making the name mistake).

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