December 2005 Archives

To my three regular readers, have a safe and satisfying festive season.

The Nine TV network has thrown a grenade into the AFL TV rights negotiations with a bid of $780M. This is around $200M more than rival channels Seven & 10's combined bid. Will Seven & 10 come to the party and match it?

Frankly, I hope they do. Besides the question of whether it's healthy to have one network control the broadcasting of so much free to air sport, there's also the issue of whether it's in AFL's best interests to give the rights to a Sydney based organisation that doesn't have the code's interests at heart.

Nine is unashamedly Rugby League centric.

Nine holds the current AFL broadcast rights (with channel 10) and outflanked the AFL when it came to broadcasting Friday night AFL games in Sydney and Brisbane. The AFL (stupidly) didn't tie them down to broadcast the match at a reasonable hour. Whereas they could have shown it straight after the Rugby League game at 9.30pm, Nine chose to show it after 11.00pm.

In contrast, channel 10 broadcast Friday and Saturday night Swans and Lions games into the respective home cities.

The Seven & 10 offer includes the proposal to show games live every Friday and Saturday night on free to air TV in Sydney and Brisbane. This is in the game's best interests, as the extra exposure would help consolidate the code in those cities. If Nine wins the gig, there's the risk that these games will only be available to Foxtel subscribers.

The AFL should keep in mind that Nine has done it no favours when it comes to promoting the game in Rugby League land. They should look at the greater good of the game before automatically accepting the highest monitory bid.

Elsewhere: Liam says much the same thing at Stoush.

Last week, the ABC's PM program unearthed material that sheds some light on the new 'Fair Pay' Commissioner, Professor Ian Harper. Judging from his academic record, the future for the lowest paid in our community is bleak.

Until now, little has been publicly known about what the commission's new chief, Professor Ian Harper, thinks about wages.

But PM has unearthed a paper by Professor Harper which condemns the concept, established in the famous Harvester Judgement of 1907, of a "fair and reasonable" wage.

The Fair Pay Commission's boss also expresses approval for wage rates paid in the sweatshops of lower Manhattan some time ago.

This would indicate that the good professor is set to play his part in realising a long term goal of this miserable conservative government, ie, the creation of a under-class of working poor.

Squeezed between the new 'Work Choices' legislation and the 'Fair Pay' body, the weakest in society will experience pay and conditions erroded over time.

If, God help us, the conservatives win yet another term of government, the structure will be in place to allow unemployment benefits to be cut. Who needs them when there are so many low paid jobs available?

The future looks bright for security professionals, though. They'll be doing a brisk trade as the beneficiaries of the new order fortify their properties against the new class of have-nots.

The British High Court has overturned a decision by the Home Office that disallowed a UK passport being granted to long term Guantanamo Bay detainee David Hicks.

Hicks' mother was a British citizen so he's eligible to apply for British citizenship.

Barring a successful appeal (to the Privy Council?), Hicks should get his passport, placing the UK government in a delicious dilemma. They have already obtained the release of other British nationals from the Guantanamo Gulag. Should they do the same for Hicks?

Hopefully, they will, ending one of the most disgraceful episodes* attributable to the current Australian government, one where the authorities turned their backs on an Australian citizen who had broken no Australian law and detained without charge for years.

*And with regards to this government, that's saying something. (Is this seditious?)

As is usual at the Sty, the commentary about today's headline issue is about 24 hours behind everyone else's. To make matters worse, I think of an 'original' angle, only to find someone else has had the same thought and already written about it.

This time, Darp beat me to it. I was thinking about the ultra-parochial attitude of those who live in the Sutherland Shire, or "The Shire" as they call it. Those who live there talk about the district with a reverence quite unlike any other suburban group; God's own country, a place like no other that all others can only aspire to.

The Sutherland Shire is a very different part of Sydney. It's "the Shire", get your passport stamped at the Captain Cook Bridge and over you go.

The Shire locals are a very protective bunch. It's their Shire, their beach and their Cronulla Sharkies.

This is not a new phenomenon, first coming to my notice over 20 years ago. I never thought, however, that this civic pride would boil over into the worst kind of violent nationalistic behaviour.

What struck me most about the mob was the use of the national flag as some sort of war dress, reminiscent of National Front rallies in the UK where the Union Jack was the dominant symbol.

The whole episode makes one nostalgic for the days when nationalism was unheard of in this country ... a time when Australia Day was just another long weekend, and suburban tribal conflicts were matters of differing lifestyles and musical tastes rather than based on ethnicity and religion.

The best thing that can happen now is to limit media exposure and let the law take its course, while hoping that this is an unfortunate 'one off' and not the beginning of ongoing racial violence.

Elsewhere: Mr Lefty beautifully sums up the contestants in this post.

The Federal Opposition isn't going to have much trouble finding things to talk about over the next two years if this is typical of the standard of "Work Choices" agreements.

I was too busy to blog last week, not getting to finish this post started last weekend. It's still pertinate now that the Work Changes bill looks like passing passed with minimum ammendment.

I'm a little surprised that the anti 'Workchoices' motion passed by the Queensland parliament last week hasn't caused more comment. With Barnaby Joyce's cohorts coming out so strongly against the IR changes, I'm surprised that there wasn't more speculation that he'd apply the brakes, albeit temporarily.

Not so. The event passed with little comment. Oh well, time will tell. [Overtaken by events. Barnaby's not going to didn't save us!]

Assuming that the whole smelly mess will be passed next week, Labor strategists should be thinking how to approach the subject over the next two years. Many pundits argue that this issue makes easy for Labor to win the next election. I'm not so sure. Beasely has already come out with words to the effect that they'll repeal the whole thing. The 'broad brush announcement' strategy is very dangerous, as recent history has shown.