(We) can do better

LEGISLATIVE COUNCIL COMMITTEE INQUIRY SUBMISSION

Question on notice and response: posed by Clifford Hayes (Sustainable Australia Party) to Richard Wynn, Minister for Planning, about proposed Connex Capital high-rise towers above the train lines between Flinders Street Station and Richmond Station:

Questions on Notice No 4760

1. INQUIRY INTO THE PROTECTIONS WITHIN THE VICTORIAN PLANNING FRAMEWORK.

As I previously reported, the Environment and Planning Committee of the Victorian Legislative Council is conducting an Inquiry into the adequacy of the Planning and Environment Act 1987 and the Victorian planning framework, in relation to planning and environment protection.

The Planning and Heritage Inquiry submissions are up and running and we are hoping you will be able to add something to this, and/or share with other residents.  Submissions are due by 31 Jan 22. Anyone who wants to contribute to the adequacy on the Planning and Environment Act 1987 and the Victorian planning framework in relation to planning and heritage protection is welcome to make a contribution. Areas covered include population policy, state and local; housing costs, vegetation protection, height limits, Green Wedges, concerns about VCAT, protecting heritage.

For four days now my old body is fighting the COVID19. In this I had joined some 360 million fellow human beings. I was reluctant to write on this for many reasons including that the experiences of many others is far more poignant. Two faculty members at the university and two close relatives andseveral friends lost their lives already tp this virus. Dozens of friends and relatives also survived it and described the experience to me in detail.

Moscow has been handed the American response to its earlier proposals concerning collective security in Europe, the Russian Foreign Ministry confirmed on Wednesday evening. 

US ambassador John Sullivan delivered the feedback from both Washington and NATO on the Russian draft bilateral treaty made public in mid-December. Moscow proposed eight points in the draft, and expected a detailed reply to each one.

Melburnians have been told to save water to ensure that the city’s population can double in size:

Greater Western Water, Melbourne Water, South EastWater and Yarra Valley Water have launched a campaign to help Melburnians cut their water use…

Australians, and others, may be interested to compare costs and conditions in Norweigan hotel quarantine, as related and experienced by travel-blogger, Anton - who does some excellent film work with drones, in this and in his other videos, and has an original point of view. This video is highly informative about how Norway manages its oil profits and energy supply.

“[If the] root cause of the current crisis was post-Soviet Western triumphalism that resulted in the rapid and inexorable growth of NATO and the EU, then current NATO deployments all over eastern Europe will confirm for even previously sceptical Russians that the 20-year old complaint about NATO expansion was a prescient one.

A Provocate press release dated Thursday 20 January 2022 claims that Australia has just passed two million official Covid cases today (Thursday), with one-in-10 New South Wales and Victorian residents now living with a diagnosis leading into the upcoming Federal Election, according to "the latest VaxEnomicTM Forecaster from C-suite strategy group."

"Official Western institutions have never recognised Assange as a prisoner of conscience,why do you think that is?" Oksana asks Greg Barnes. After almost a decade in confinement, Julian Assange is still fighting against extradition requests to the United States, at cost to his physical and mental health, while also compromising WikiLeaks’ ability to continue its operations.

Last century, before the Internet, if I wanted to buy a foreign language book, I would have to get it through a 'foreign bookstore'. It would cost a fortune and the titles would be limited to what they had on display or on a limited number of catalogues they could access.  The only way round this was to have someone overseas send you the book, or go overseas yourself.

Senior representatives of the five peak general practice organisations, including Presidents and CEOs, met yesterday with Minister for Health Greg Hunt and Minister for Regional Health David Gillespie to discuss the challenges facing general practice and the support needed to ensure GPs can stay open and deliver the essential high quality care Australians need at this time. 

Kelvin Thomson reports on Kilmore Racing Club; Wattle Park, Fiji monument;N.E. Link; Green Wedges; Richard Wynn overide-VCAT-Stonnington; LG apprehended bias opinion; Melbourne population & housing affordability - and more.

It is great to see how Kelvin Thomson has leapt into action on behalf of Planning Democracy.  Here he reports on Fawkner Park; Melbourne tree-canopy; Queen Vic Market; Mary-Lous Howie's letter to Mayor Capp; RESCODE; Buxton on Sub Loop Bill; Blackburn Village Res group; Herald-Sun cover of Planning Democracy...(Candobetter Ed.)

Dear Planning Democracy supporter,

Here is my third Convenor’s Report. As you can see, it’s been a busy couple of weeks.

Recently the Serbian President Aleksander Vucic accused Australian Prime Minister Scott Morrison of a "political witch hunt" and of harassing the world's best tennis player. 

Novak Djokovic's parents also slammed this decision to refuse their son's entry into Victoria for the Australian Tennis Open.

His mother claimed the anti-vaxxer and her multi-millionaire son was being wrongly detained in an immigration detention hotel with bugs and poor food.

The New South Wales Australia Premier, Dominic Perrottet, a practising Catholic with six children and a seventh on the way, took over from Gladys Berajicklan, a childless, unmarried woman.

Bizarrely, this has hardly been reported anywhere! It was Putin's initiative and Biden has signed up to it along with the other countries, excepting Israel, India, and Pakistan and North Korea.

Australia will reach one million people officially living with a Covid diagnosis within days – more than lung disease and cancer – with one in every 20 New South Wales and Victorian residents already contracting the virus, the latest VaxEnomicTM Forecaster from C-suite strategy group Provocate reveals. 

There is not much comparison between the situation of the multi-millionaire tennis player Novak Djokovic and his fellow detainees in the Park Hotel, Carlton (in Victoria, Australia.)  Petitioners for the release of the long term detainees and those for Djokovic have coincided over the last day but probably have little in common. 

Most of us will remember the second pandemic year of 2021 more with regret or anger than fondness.  For the nature lovers among us, its closing days delivered a triple whammy, for they also proved to be the closing hours in the lives of three venerable conservation champions of international renown whom we had long revered.  By sheer coincidence, Thomas Lovejoy, E. O.

This is an allegorical poem about some creatures on a farm during a covid-like lockdown.

THE BARNYARD’S ARK by Sandra Garnier

Once upon a time in a land of endless sunrises and sunsets …

There lived a barnyard of animals

Of all descriptions, some large and some small

Some short and some tall.

They made up the barnyard family,

Amid the laughter, fun, and calamity

Two years ago on 3 January 2020, US President Donald Trump ordered a drone strike to kill General Qassem Soleimani, commander of the Quds Force of the Iranian Islamic Revolution Guards Corps (IRGC) alongside Abu Mahdi al-Muhandis, Commander of the Iraqi Popular Mobilisation Forces. The drone struck just after they had disembarked from an airplane at Baghdad Airport as both were due to meet Iraq's caretaker Prime Minister Abdul-Mahdi.

We've isolated, disinfected,  distanced, masked and tested 
Lined up for any nasal itch or throat with stitch In case we were infected 
We've vaccinated, validated, Q R coded with dedication
Whilst cancers in our organs run rampant, undetected 
 

If the Australian government chose to end the illegal imprisonment and torture of Julian Assange they could do it now, because it has no basis at law - UK law, international law, and even American law. "The Australian Government could end this tomorrow." Barrister Greg Barns to Leigh Sales, ABC 7.30 Report

This article was previously entitled "The Secret Trials of Julian Assange."

Chris Hedges discusses ‘The Trial of Julian Assange,’ a new book by Nils Melzer, UN special rapporteur on torture, in this edition of Hedges show, On Contact.

Commentator Alexander Mercouris, who has an excellent and original grasp of foreign affairs, geography and history, talks us through Russia's Proposal for a draft treaty to curb US global aggression and NATO expansionism.