Talking Politics | PUNT ROAD END | Richmond Tigers Forum
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Talking Politics

MD Jazz said:
Yeh, China is the biggest infrastructure investor in Africa, even before the Belt and Road initiative.

I imagine as less people are required in the manufacturing process the cost advantages of operating in low wage environments are significantly reduced. Perhaps local manufacturing will make some sort of comeback in Aust in the next decade?

With importing costs at all time highs, and unlikely to reduce anytime soon, it does incentivise businesses to look local.
Click to expand...

The cost of international shipping dropped a lot a few decades ago too. We didn't make things in China 30 years ago to the same extent and their wages were very low back then. There were other reasons of course, but the rise in fuel prices should have an impact on how viable local manufacturing can be, especially for Australia as we are a long way from cheap labour countries. You notice quite a few things have Made in Europe on them and it doesn't take much imagination to work out they are made in lower wage countries, which aren't far away.

We'll see, but higher fuel prices have been coming for a long time and there will be an impact on where things are made.

DS
 
MD Jazz said:
Yeh, China is the biggest infrastructure investor in Africa, even before the Belt and Road initiative.

I imagine as less people are required in the manufacturing process the cost advantages of operating in low wage environments are significantly reduced. Perhaps local manufacturing will make some sort of comeback in Aust in the next decade?

With importing costs at all time highs, and unlikely to reduce anytime soon, it does incentivise businesses to look local.
Click to expand...
Imagine if we took all the billions we give Gerry Harvey, Gina the Hutt et al, and invested it in incentivising and providing infrastructure for renewables. Take Garnaut's advice and make us a hydrogen superpower.
 
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MD Jazz said:
Yeh, China is the biggest infrastructure investor in Africa, even before the Belt and Road initiative.

I imagine as less people are required in the manufacturing process the cost advantages of operating in low wage environments are significantly reduced. Perhaps local manufacturing will make some sort of comeback in Aust in the next decade?

With importing costs at all time highs, and unlikely to reduce anytime soon, it does incentivise businesses to look local.
Click to expand...
DavidSSS said:
The cost of international shipping dropped a lot a few decades ago too. We didn't make things in China 30 years ago to the same extent and their wages were very low back then. There were other reasons of course, but the rise in fuel prices should have an impact on how viable local manufacturing can be, especially for Australia as we are a long way from cheap labour countries. You notice quite a few things have Made in Europe on them and it doesn't take much imagination to work out they are made in lower wage countries, which aren't far away.

We'll see, but higher fuel prices have been coming for a long time and there will be an impact on where things are made.

DS
Click to expand...
Kind of related to these points on shipping. I was reading in the AFR this morning, a piece where they were interviewing Australian wheat producers and what the sky high price spikes have meant for them. And it wasn’t the outcome popular perception would assume.

These farmers were actually finding they couldn’t tap into export markets to take advantage of the high prices. Shipping costs and disrupted supply chains meant its becoming unviable to export it. Instead they sell it locally at a lower than global market price. An example of where Australian consumers have been sheltered somewhat by the inflationary spike elsewhere. And from a selfish point of view, also means Australians are immunised somewhat from the food security issues that are rearing their ugly head in the likes of North Africa and the Middle East.

The piece did go on to say though, that Australian grain farmers were suffering from high input costs (namely fertiliser and fuel) plus a dry season in the western wheat belt. So these inflationary pressures will feed through somewhat to the domestic grain and food dynamics in a delayed format. But at least we will have food.
 
Not sure whether ScoMo follows the baseball, if he does, I reckon his team would be the LA Dodgers:)

"A huge papier mache marijuana joint sat atop a gaily painted bus parked outside the Lismore City Hall.
Local farmers, hippies, assorted townsfolk and students milled about, roaring hostile slogans through bullhorns.
The Prime Minister was in town.
It was February 2000.

John Howard was on what he called a country listening tour. He had a lot of listening to do up there in the NSW Northern Rivers region.
Apart from the hippies who’d come down from the hills around Nimbin in the cause of freeing marijuana, there was anger boiling among rural Australians who were going backwards while Howard’s government boasted about a strong economy.
Country people who could only dream of city dwellers’ access to telecommunications were furious about Howard’s plan to sell the remaining half of Telstra.
There was fear over what the coming introduction of a GST would mean to people whose incomes lagged way behind those of other Australians.
Unemployment in the Lismore area was 11 per cent, almost twice the national average. Some farmers still simmered about having their gun rights taken away. Rural bank branches were closing; health services were thinning out.

About the only trouble missing was a flood.
Instead, rural Australia was beginning to be gripped by the Millennium Drought. Howard knew he was going to cop it.
And so he set off to the city hall to listen to all those protesting voices. When he took the stage before the packed ranks of angry faces and journalists expecting a prime ministerial pratfall, he made an announcement. He would take every question. He promised he wouldn’t leave until he’d answered every one.
More than an hour later, there were just three people left in the hall: John Howard, a woman whose rage at an unfair world could not be satisfied, and me.

Outside, there seemed an exhausted respect, even among the hippies. The PM had at least listened, hadn’t he?
This week, another prime minister went to Lismore.
A flood had become a catastrophe, and shock had turned into anger.
Morrison, everyone knew, had been in enforced isolation with COVID-19, but to many rendered homeless and worse around the Northern Rivers for two weeks, the government had gone missing with him.
Where was the declaration of a state of emergency?

Why, Morrison had promised and delivered a giant planeload of weapons and aid to Ukraine in less time than it had taken for the Australian Defence Force to be sent in worthwhile numbers to an Australian disaster.
It was time for national leadership. Beyond time.
Scott Morrison, however, knew what it was to be scorched during a national emergency.
He was surely haunted by the memory of his post-Hawaii arrival in the bushfire-ruined community of Cobargo in January 2020, only to be heckled by survivors.

Worse, there was toe-curling vision of him grabbing the limp arm of a firefighter who told him he didn’t want to shake his hand. He was reduced to all but forcing a distraught young woman to accept the day’s second-most awkward handshake.
The vision has followed him around like a vengeful wraith ever since.
And so, when Morrison arrived in Lismore on Wednesday, a federal election a couple of months down the track, he didn’t initially announce he was there.
He went off to visit flood-struck households and a farmer, or so it was told later.
Abandoned reporters and TV crews learnt he had taken with him his ever-present, taxpayer-funded personal photographer.

Outrage ensued, and there was talk of boycotting any pictures that emerged from the PM’s office. (This masthead has a policy of not using such pictures anyway).
The PM’s office, perhaps sensing a public relations disaster in the making, sent a message that the people being visited by Morrison hadn’t wanted cameras intruding, and, by the way, no pictures from the personal photographer would be issued.
So why had the PM’s photographer been tagging along in the first place?
Hadn’t the PM’s office heard of the tradition that when a prime minister and his guests didn’t want a media circus, a “pool” would be arranged: one press photographer and one TV crew would record the event, and all media organisations would agree to use their work? It satisfied competing demands: the PM’s movements would be recorded without a media whirl.
After much silence, the PM’s office issued a media alert by email.

Morrison, it advised, would visit the Lismore Emergency Operations Centre at the city council chambers at 1.45pm.
The email went to the media at 1.36pm. After waiting around all morning, reporters and camera crews had precisely nine minutes to scramble.
When Morrison eventually arrived, he was driven around the back of the council chambers, shielded by a line of police.
Out the front, protesters chanted “the water is rising, no more compromising”. But having waited hours, they didn’t get to see their Prime Minister, let alone ask questions.
Finally, much later, still safely sealed away in the council chambers, Morrison announced to the gathered media the declaration of a state of emergency.

By then, of course, with a vacuum to be filled, those old scenes from Cobargo had been replayed on every TV screen.
The implication, fair or not?
Prime Minister Scott Morrison is afraid to face Australians when they are hurting. They might embarrass him.
He needs a new adviser.
John Howard might be a good start."

www.theage.com.au

Fire and rain: Scott Morrison seems paralysed by disaster

John Howard went to Lismore and faced his numerous critics head-on. Scott Morrison went to Lismore, haunted by a previous disaster, and dodged face-to-face scrutiny.
www.theage.com.au www.theage.com.au
 
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The Big Richo said:
Bloody great time for those of us with electric cars as well!
Click to expand...

I read a month ago $3/litre is the point were EV's make economic sense at current prices.

That could happen before round 1.

High fossil fuel price is good for planet.

Although Lithium extraction will probably cause volcanoes to errupt or something
 
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tigerman said:
Not sure whether ScoMo follows the baseball, if he does, I reckon his team would be the LA Dodgers:)

"A huge papier mache marijuana joint sat atop a gaily painted bus parked outside the Lismore City Hall.
Local farmers, hippies, assorted townsfolk and students milled about, roaring hostile slogans through bullhorns.
The Prime Minister was in town.
It was February 2000.

John Howard was on what he called a country listening tour. He had a lot of listening to do up there in the NSW Northern Rivers region.
Apart from the hippies who’d come down from the hills around Nimbin in the cause of freeing marijuana, there was anger boiling among rural Australians who were going backwards while Howard’s government boasted about a strong economy.
Country people who could only dream of city dwellers’ access to telecommunications were furious about Howard’s plan to sell the remaining half of Telstra.
There was fear over what the coming introduction of a GST would mean to people whose incomes lagged way behind those of other Australians.
Unemployment in the Lismore area was 11 per cent, almost twice the national average. Some farmers still simmered about having their gun rights taken away. Rural bank branches were closing; health services were thinning out.

About the only trouble missing was a flood.
Instead, rural Australia was beginning to be gripped by the Millennium Drought. Howard knew he was going to cop it.
And so he set off to the city hall to listen to all those protesting voices. When he took the stage before the packed ranks of angry faces and journalists expecting a prime ministerial pratfall, he made an announcement. He would take every question. He promised he wouldn’t leave until he’d answered every one.
More than an hour later, there were just three people left in the hall: John Howard, a woman whose rage at an unfair world could not be satisfied, and me.

Outside, there seemed an exhausted respect, even among the hippies. The PM had at least listened, hadn’t he?
This week, another prime minister went to Lismore.
A flood had become a catastrophe, and shock had turned into anger.
Morrison, everyone knew, had been in enforced isolation with COVID-19, but to many rendered homeless and worse around the Northern Rivers for two weeks, the government had gone missing with him.
Where was the declaration of a state of emergency?

Why, Morrison had promised and delivered a giant planeload of weapons and aid to Ukraine in less time than it had taken for the Australian Defence Force to be sent in worthwhile numbers to an Australian disaster.
It was time for national leadership. Beyond time.
Scott Morrison, however, knew what it was to be scorched during a national emergency.
He was surely haunted by the memory of his post-Hawaii arrival in the bushfire-ruined community of Cobargo in January 2020, only to be heckled by survivors.

Worse, there was toe-curling vision of him grabbing the limp arm of a firefighter who told him he didn’t want to shake his hand. He was reduced to all but forcing a distraught young woman to accept the day’s second-most awkward handshake.
The vision has followed him around like a vengeful wraith ever since.
And so, when Morrison arrived in Lismore on Wednesday, a federal election a couple of months down the track, he didn’t initially announce he was there.
He went off to visit flood-struck households and a farmer, or so it was told later.
Abandoned reporters and TV crews learnt he had taken with him his ever-present, taxpayer-funded personal photographer.

Outrage ensued, and there was talk of boycotting any pictures that emerged from the PM’s office. (This masthead has a policy of not using such pictures anyway).
The PM’s office, perhaps sensing a public relations disaster in the making, sent a message that the people being visited by Morrison hadn’t wanted cameras intruding, and, by the way, no pictures from the personal photographer would be issued.
So why had the PM’s photographer been tagging along in the first place?
Hadn’t the PM’s office heard of the tradition that when a prime minister and his guests didn’t want a media circus, a “pool” would be arranged: one press photographer and one TV crew would record the event, and all media organisations would agree to use their work? It satisfied competing demands: the PM’s movements would be recorded without a media whirl.
After much silence, the PM’s office issued a media alert by email.

Morrison, it advised, would visit the Lismore Emergency Operations Centre at the city council chambers at 1.45pm.
The email went to the media at 1.36pm. After waiting around all morning, reporters and camera crews had precisely nine minutes to scramble.
When Morrison eventually arrived, he was driven around the back of the council chambers, shielded by a line of police.
Out the front, protesters chanted “the water is rising, no more compromising”. But having waited hours, they didn’t get to see their Prime Minister, let alone ask questions.
Finally, much later, still safely sealed away in the council chambers, Morrison announced to the gathered media the declaration of a state of emergency.

By then, of course, with a vacuum to be filled, those old scenes from Cobargo had been replayed on every TV screen.
The implication, fair or not?
Prime Minister Scott Morrison is afraid to face Australians when they are hurting. They might embarrass him.
He needs a new adviser.
John Howard might be a good start."

www.theage.com.au

Fire and rain: Scott Morrison seems paralysed by disaster

John Howard went to Lismore and faced his numerous critics head-on. Scott Morrison went to Lismore, haunted by a previous disaster, and dodged face-to-face scrutiny.
www.theage.com.au www.theage.com.au
Click to expand...

Howard, for all his faults, was not a coward. He did this kind of thing, and he also addressed big pro-gun crowds after the gun ban and buy-back - he wore a bulletproof vest, but even so, that took guts.

Morrison is a bully when he knows he can't be threatened and a coward when things turn sour. The electorate can see and smell this.
 
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FNmZzuJaQAINQSR
 
So the government have released a lot of refugees that they've kept locked up for years. No explanation why, no press, no announcement.

I guess they expected their treatment of refugees to be a talking point during the election.
 
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Baloo said:
So the government have released a lot of refugees that they've kept locked up for years. No explanation why, no press, no announcement.

I guess they expected their treatment of refugees to be a talking point during the election.
Click to expand...
They must be desperate.

Scomo may preside over the biggest wipeout in LNP history. Can only hope.
 
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So anyway, the new logo for the Prime Minister and Cabinet's "Women's Network", which is supposed to empower women and promote gender equality in tne workforce,

looks like a *smile* and balls....

1647326663497.png


well done
 
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larabee said:
So anyway, the new logo for the Prime Minister and Cabinet's "Women's Network", which is supposed to empower women and promote gender equality in tne workforce,

looks like a *smile* and balls....

View attachment 14761


well done
Click to expand...
Now taken down by PM's office. I wonder how many million it cost to draw a *smile* and balls?
 
Baloo said:
Now taken down by PM's office. I wonder how many million it cost to draw a *smile* and balls?
Click to expand...
Just dropped a *smile* load of tax payer shekels on some artistic meedjia guru to drop a *smile* n balls into the public domain n see if anyone noticed.
 
larabee said:
So anyway, the new logo for the Prime Minister and Cabinet's "Women's Network", which is supposed to empower women and promote gender equality in tne workforce,

looks like a *smile* and balls....

View attachment 14761


well done
Click to expand...

F*ck me, they just keep outdoing themselves. How could there be no-one in the PM's office who looked at this and went WTF?

Looks like the blue duck the designer came up with, but wouldn't be the first blue duck to make it to production.

I am absolutely stunned.

DS
 
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