The federal government has pushed through significant changes to the Medicare system, with further proposed legislation undermining the role and value of Australian general practitioners.
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With effect from January19, the government seeks to discourage "six-minute medicine" by redefining the standard consultation to be at least 10 minutes long. Additionally, Medicare indexation is going to be frozen until July 2018. Legislative changes yet to be approved include cutting the rebate by $5 for non-concession card holders. There will be no changes to rebates to specialists, pathology and diagnostic imaging. These changes will not discourage "conveyor-belt" medicine, but create increased pressure to churn through more patients per hour to maintain billings.
GPs are told to absorb the cost, or pass it on to the patient. So, either we choose to take compulsory wage cuts in the order $100 to $150 a day (depending on how many concession patients are seen), or pass the increasing costs of healthcare on to the patient, making the GP look like the bad guy.
GPs are not the cause of the budget deficit. Healthcare expenditure, in fact, fell in 2012-13 for the first time in a decade. I find it incredulous that again GPs are being made the scapegoats of bad government policy. We are being unfairly targeted, without recognition that effective primary care is the cornerstone of the healthcare system.
Dr Mike Seah, Gungahlin A
Wind power woes
While there has been no media release to inform the Canberra community, and contrary to previous statements, the renewable energy industry has been notified that an announcement of successful tenders in the wind farm auction will not be made until February ("ACT delays results of 200MW wind energy auction", December10, reneweconomy.com, accessed 18/12/14).
Based on statements made by Sustainable Development Minister Simon Corbell, the blog post's author Giles Parkinson speculates the ACT might source some of its wind power capacity from South Australia. How would this benefit the ACT and region?
John Bromhead, Rivett
Hotly debated
Peter Dark (Letters, December 18) grumbled about my criticism of his letter, in which he quoted (and obviously agreed) with the meteorologist who pointed to the trend in above 40 degrees Celsius Canberra's temperatures. His second letter reiterated what was written in his first, but he failed to recognise that I did not query the trend to which he refers, but rather its statistical significance. Perhaps he should tackle the 35 degrees and 0 degrees data issues I raised, for very long-term Canberra data (the time period for which he did not mention), and then perhaps it may then dawn on him the points I made.
He might also Google the expertise I have in science, including stats, which clearly he is unaware of or perhaps he would not have stretched his chin out so far.
Greg Jackson, Kambah
Sustainably modified
In his criticism of Graham Brady's letter on Aboriginal land management (Letters, December 17), Greg Pinder (Letters, December 19) seems unaware that Tim Flannery's take on the First Australians' environmental record, detailed in his 2002 The Future Eaters, has been largely superseded by the lengthy and meticulous research presented in Bill Gammage's 2011 The Biggest Estate on Earth: how Aborigines made Australia.
Aboriginal people undoubtedly modified the landscape, but they managed it sustainably.
Patricia Saunders, Chapman
Green ratings flawed
It is bad that owners are not checking on "building code energy-efficiency provisions" of new homes, especially with reported "non-compliance rates of up to 70per cent" ("Lethargic home owners letting draft in through the GAPS", Forum, December20, p5). Even worse is that the greenhouse rating system behind such codes takes no account of the sustainability of the materials used or of the building constructed. Eco-friendliness is a whole-of-life concept. It is about the total carbon footprint of the structure. It includes construction, maintenance and demolition. This is quite important, because "the building sector accounts for some 19per cent of Australia's energy use and 23per cent of our greenhouse gas emissions". It is not just a matter of the owner squandering money and energy heating and cooling a thermally inefficient home. It is also about the carbon cost of the materials used and the expectable lifetime of the building.
Gary J. Wilson, MacGregor
Floral dilemma
People laying floral tributes in Martin Place looked sad – perhaps for two good lives lost without reason and to show support for the families. Is Noelle Roux (Letters, December 21) suggesting that people stop spending money on flowers and other discretionary items and give it instead to countries where there are poor people who do not have enough money to spend on the basics?
Under that reasoning, we should do away with all festivities such as Christmas, as this involves discretionary spending, and give the money we would otherwise have spent on the poor. A complex ethical and economic dilemma, but too much to deal with right now.
Robyn Vincent, McKellar
Help the poor
At long last, a powerful piece by Barnaby Joyce that identifies areas of real social and economic disadvantage that are too often ignored ("Tasmania's poor and the scourge of living in the ice age", canberratimes.com.au, December 20).
Barnaby should discuss with Richard Denniss ("Team Australia's mantra: in times of trouble tax the poor", canberra times.com.au, December 20) how to adjust the federal government's financial policies to address the growing divides between the super-rich, the comfortable majority, and those who are cast aside in the 21st-century scramble to attain capitalist nirvana.
Then, instead of replacing no jobs with bad jobs (the wheel turning full circle in rural communities), he should consider how best to fund well-designed initiatives to provide worthwhile and meaningful employment in rural areas.
There's lots of scope for conserving and restoring the natural environment (after decades of agricultural/industrial misuse), increasing carbon capture and storage, and building resilience to the adverse effects of climate change.
David Teather, Reid
Issues of religion not so straightforward
Crispin Hull's writing in his Saturday column is always interesting, and his recent take on religion and violence in the light of recent events displays his trademark style "Terrorism or terrible act" (Forum, December20, p2). The assumptions he makes, though, about the nature of religion are the subject of long-standing academic research within the sociology of religion and anthropology. A couple of empirically grounded insights from those disciplines might disturb the confident simplicity of his argument.
In the various "ways and traditions of being in the world" (ie, religion), the roots of social creativity and community building are intertwined with those that can generate violence. Which dimension prevails depends upon the choices people make in appropriating the specific tradition. The civil rights movement in the United States in the 1950s and '60s is a good example of how peaceful, morally directed political engagement rooted in the Black churches could morph into political violence. It gets more complicated. The sacred displays a dismaying propensity to migrate across boundaries that we assume separate "religion" from the "secular".
The resultant sacralising of the "secular" is evident in the emergence of the nation state, generating civil religions, which call us to kill, or be killed on its behalf. In Australia, this form of the sacred has become manifest in the civil religion of "Anzac" with its shrines, occasions of worship, state-funded "remembering" of World WarI and the call to unite ourselves to the event of Anzac as the core of our Australian identity.
Doug Hynd, Stirling
Prime ministers in limelight cannot be blamed for acting
I'd like to ask Royal Commissioner Dyson Heydon ("Former PM seeks an apology from accusers", December 20, p11) when being well prepared, familiar with the material and acute in your answers became a bad thing? Perhaps he should have issued instructions to those appearing before him that they should be unprepared, know nothing about the subject and be obtuse in their answers.
As for containing an "element of acting", gosh, really? The most scrutinised figure in Australian politics at the time behaving as though people were watching. How suspicious.
Unable to find any substantive wrongs, Justice Heydon has attempted to cast virtues as faults. This reads like a personal rather than a professional assessment. I'd call that a lapse of judgment.
Kate Roediger, Melba
With astonishing chutzpah, Julia Gillard calls on her critics to apologise after the royal commission found her not guilty of committing a criminal offence. She seems oblivious to the fact that her brush with union corruption exposed her as a person of questionable character, and had she been a run-of-the-mill lawyer, one wonders if the finely drawn verdict would have been so generous.
Rather than asking her detractors to apologise, Gillard [should] apologise for her participation and facilitation of yet another grubby chapter of union corruption.
H.Ronald, Jerrabomberra, NSW
In calling for her accusers to show "decency" and apologise after the royal commission found there were no grounds for criminality over her involvement in a union slush fund, Julia Gillard conveniently disregards that the commission also found she had erred in professional judgment, gave evasive and forced evidence, and that her demeanour during the hearings contained an element of acting.
Mario Stivala, Spence
Ministerial changes
The appointment of Sussan Ley as Minister for Health should be seen as a justified reward for previous efforts based on a strong work ethic – with the expectation that past successes will be repeated by this minister, [who is] worthy of the role. Ley is not there as a gesture for fairer representation for women. The opposite, in fact. She has the runs on the board and a well-respected record.
In so many ways, that makes her somewhat unique in 2014.
Rhys Stanley, via Hall, NSW
The news that Scott Morrison has been appointed as the Minister for Social Services fills me with foreboding. Social services are accessed by people who need a helping hand, not a kick in the teeth.
To put a person with such a demonstrated lack of compassion into this ministry, the department that deals with some of the most vulnerable citizens in our society, sends a very clear message of intolerance for those who are struggling.
Katherine Owen, Downer
Torture never justified
Objective readers must surely be puzzled how the words of my December 15 letter – such as "CIA's undoubted breaches of international humanitarian law", and "there is no doubt CIA torture seriously contravened IHL, and the ethical standards expected of any liberal-democracy" – could somehow be misconstrued by Geoff Barker (Letters, December 18) as "an attempt to justify the atrocities of the CIA".
Geoff also ignores my two key points about needing to differentiate between the detention and interrogation records of different US agencies, and the ground-breaking effect of US Supreme Court rulings extending some Geneva Convention protections to those captured belligerents who do not qualify as prisoners of war (such as David Hicks). None of these points excuse the CIA for anything. Indeed, they further highlight the culpability of the CIA, and those meant to supervise them and restoration of the rule of law.
Finally, like many, Geoff also seems to misunderstand key facts and applicable international law.
■ The US military and the FBI have not allowed abusive CIA interrogations at the Guantanamo Bay Detention Centre – operated by the former under the Geneva Conventions and regularly inspected by the International Committee of the Red Cross.
■ CIA torture occurred at overseas "black sites" and, according to the US Senate Report, ceased in 2006.
■ While always inexcusable, IHL breaches by US troops in Iraq and Afghanistan have not been prevalent proportional to the numbers deployed or in comparison to most countries in the coalition.
■ Abuses at Abu Ghraib were by a few ill-disciplined guards, and were reported and punished.
■ Hicks' detention and his criminal trial are entirely discrete issues legally and ethically.
■ Hicks was never tortured by the CIA or, it seems, anyone else.
Neil James, executive director, Australia Defence Association
Palestine must budge
Selwyn Baines (Letters, December 19) wants Jewish people to tell Israel to "give the Palestinian people freedom to run their own affairs in their own borders" for the sake of peace. Most Jewish people understand that Israel tried that three times, in 2000, 2001 and 2008, to no avail, because the Palestinian leadership wouldn't compromise. They also remember that Israel did exactly that in Gaza, and received thousands of rockets and mortars, not to mention infiltration tunnels, in return.
Israel can't simply give the Palestinians a state until the two sides have negotiated the issues such as borders and security, and the Palestinians accept that their state is the end of all claims against Israel, not just a starting point to demand Israel commit national suicide by letting in 5 million or more descendants of Palestinian refugees.
Baines compares the Israelis now to those oppressing the Jews in 160BC, when the Maccabeans rose up. The Maccabeans were forced to fight for independence. The Palestinians need only negotiate in good faith.
Athol Morris, Forde
TO THE POINT
SHOW OF CONTEMPT
Fancy it requiring a Freedom of Information request to unearth data about public housing stock ("Public housing properties on the slide in the ACT", canberratimes.com.au, August17). Why isn't this information being made openly at least annually, I ask rhetorically? This once more demonstrates the contempt politicians and bureaucrats have for the public they are supposed to serve.
Bill O'Connell, Waramanga
DUOPOLY TO BLAME
The answer to the query to Mr Coles (and Woolworths) from P.Gibbons (Letters, December19) about a diesel fuel price difference of 26cents a litre between Temora and Canberra is quite simple. It is a well-established duopoly gouging the customer. I doubt he will get that answer from them.
R.Richards, Weston
A NEW ARMS RACE
Senator David Leyonhjelm's call to make our country safer by encouraging gun ownership smacks of the pre-World WarI naval arms race, one of the causes of World WarI : "We must build a bigger navy than the enemy will build when he hears we're building a bigger navy than his." In this centennial year of the beginning of the War to End Wars, Leyonhjelm has obviously learnt nothing from history.
Brendan Whyte, Curtin
MATHS ALL THE WAY
John Birmingham wrote a good article with which I very much agree ("Leyonhjelm's fantasy not borne out by cold realities", Forum, December20, p2), but could someone please ensure he doesn't again ever get away with "the math" instead of "the maths". It isn't trendy. No one in this country uses it. It is surely as ugly an Americanism, to Australian ears, as one could get.
Ian Clark, Reid
JUST BRIGADIER
Court reporter Michael Inman ("Mass killer denied time to question army chief", December20, 5p) is wrong. He stated that Julian Knight "has been denied the chance to cross-examine an Australian Army brigadier general"; he then goes on to refer to a particular officer as "Brigadier General".
Our army hasn't had the rank of brigadier general since 1921; the current rank is that of "brigadier".
Christopher Jobson, Monash
SPOUSE, NOT HOUSE
In this bizarre news week, readers of the Canberra Times are now being urged by Daniel Scott ("Sand-sational", Weekend Travel, Forum, December20, p12) to "mortgage your spouse".
John Milne, Chapman
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