Labor Aviation Policy
 

Ladies and Gentlemen. I am going to sound old here but it has to be said. I think the last time there was an aviation policy in Australia was when we decided to send to pilots to help out in the Battle of Britain. I have been in this industry for 35 years and have watched it blunder along like a young calf always looking for direction back to its (or anyone's Mum). Sorry to disappoint you but the bad news is that no politician of any pursuation gives a big rats boogly about anything other than getting re-elected. OK, maybe that and their post-career perks. The only direction you will probably ever encounter in regard to direction is that shown by some die-hard aviation enthusiast who refuses to give up. If you encounter someone like that, make every effort to support him or her before they are threatened with dire consequences by the Government appointed support agency designed specifically to bring him or her down.

How quickly people forget AWA's and National Jets b-scale....... think before you vote......

Australian workplace agreement - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Guys, guys, guys,

The reasons neither major political party have any strong policies on aviation in Oz is because:

- none of the pollies actually understand aviation, for instance I'm sure that the Libs think pilots are equal to overpaid bus drivers, and Labor thinks that ATCs are the guys that wave the bats at aircraft as they park at the terminal.

- the media only report on the big issues like the 1% of illegal immigration into Oz by boat. Not the 99% of illegal immigration by aircraft. That is, the media don't see aviation as a significant election issue and hence barely report it. Our pollies are media tarts driven by spin doctors and special interest groups that make lots of noise (usually in the media).

In a recent poll of Australians, on who was seen as Australia's most trusted, the top ten included Dick Smith. Dick placed 6th. Number one was Fiona Wood, the surgeon who specialises in burns. So the perception is that Dick knows what he is talking about and you can trust him.

Over my 30 years in aviation, talking to politicians about aviation it just feels like this.............:ugh:

At least you mob don't have a PM who is in the developers pocket, like Hawky and Abeles, I hope.:\

DirtyPeirre, what's scary about those stats is that if we moved to a republic, and I happen to be an avowed republican, guess who we could get under the 'popularly elected' model!! The electorate is that thick. Maybe Mark Taylor and Fujitsu would be a close-run second.

Your summation on pollies and aviation is spot-on. Neither side knows squat.

Mirage 3 - was it not ever so! I could not agree more.

Not all the media like Dick
 

As to Dick Smith making a noise about aviation, here's what the Editor in chief of The Week magazine (David Salter) said in the latest editorial.

" It's time to call Dick Smith's bluff. Here's a man who's relentlessly used his access to the media to promote a nerd-made-good, honest-little-Aussie image and push a succession of barrows, each more hyprocritical than the last. In the 1970s and '80s, while local manufacturing industries withered, this champion of local enterprise made millions importing cheap electronic goods from Asia and retailing them to us at hefty mark-ups. Then he established Australian Geographic magazine (printed in Japan), while doing TV commercials for Holden (owned by General Motors in the US). Next came the preposterous Dick Smith foods - another business venture dressed up as patriotism.

Now he's tried to elbow his way into the election campaign by jumping on the "small Australia" bandwagon. This born-again Malthusian wants to "stabilise our population" by cutting immigration to just 70,000 a year and encouraging a drop in the natural birth rate. He put his case in a polemical television program which - to its great discredit - the ABC accepted for broadcast even though it knew Smith had instituted the project with substantial personal funding. One man's insatiable appetite for media attention apparently now overwhelms the principles of independent public broadcasting. But we shouldn't be surprised. It is, to my mind, just the last in a long sequence of unattractive dissemblings Dick Smith has pulled on Australia."

It seems not all in the media are enamoured with Dick.

BTW, "Malthus has become widely known for his theories concerning population and its increase or decrease in response to various factors. The six editions of his An Essay on the Principle of Population, published from 1798 to 1826, observed that sooner or later population gets checked by famine, disease, and widespread mortality. He wrote in opposition to the popular view in 18th-century Europe that saw society as improving, and in principle as perfectible. Malthus thought that the dangers of population growth would preclude endless progress towards a utopian society. As an Anglican clergyman, Malthus saw this situation as divinely imposed to teach virtuous behaviour. " - a little research on the net came up with this.

I know, a bit of thread drift, but I thought I'd share this with you all. :)

DP

Dirty Pierre - I second those remarks. Mr Salter has a refreshingly honest perspective on the endless self promotion of Mr Smith and his capacity to continue to make a dollar from this technique. Serial offenders are best ignored! So nothing more will ever be typed again about it less I get the richards!!

"Preposterous Dick Smith Foods? Why? - because it promotes Australian farmers and manufacturers?

So far assisted 100's of Aussie farmers and given all the profits- now over $4 million to worthwhile causes.

Also 9 out of 10 Australians believe there should be open discussion about our optimum population levels and we should have a safety plan.

I bet most on pprune agree.

Poor Salter- I see a chip on the shoulder- didn't he once earn money from the ABC as a producer of Media Watch?

PS Malthus will be very likely proven correct if we don't correct our addiction to the exponential growth in the use of material resources and energy!

Seeing you brought it up see Dick Smith Population

While we are drifting,I have a question for Dick - peanut paste or peanut butter, preference ??

paste--more aussie

Admirable sentiments Dick; however, I just question how we function as a society without renewal.

How does an increasingly aging population exist, on a narrowing tax base, without the necessary next-generation contributions from those able to earn - and pay their taxes in turn. We are getting older by demographic; immigration is the only solution.

My generation is funding the retirement of many, including those that went through the Depression. I have my own super, but more don't. Who funds that societal obligation without a workforce that can pay - and have confidence that when their turn comes, they will get the same consideration?

Maybe I missed it.

There is quite a bit of self analysis from Media Watch on their own networks performance etc. Dick, perhaps you could look at a little self analysis?

I also watched your 'debate' with Singo on that paragon of virtuous reporting Today/Tonight. On it you pasted the Americans for their disgraceful waste, lifestyle, medical system, crime etc, yet you show them as a shining example when it comes to airspace? So they do everything wrong EXCEPT airspace?

Howabout, you are correct- only way of solving our aging population problem is to keep growing forever!

Jack, Airspace and the 747.

Huge thread drift..I see Warren jumped at your shadow on cue, Mr Smith.

Has it also occured to you that training those thousands and thousands of international students...cheaper than the US... is putting downward pressure on pay and conditions for local jobs.

The answer isn't a training industry...you are creating a sausage factory...the answer is a robust, high profile, highly valued GA industry. The industry desperately needs more consumers. More people using a pilot licence to hire aircraft, buy aircraft, buy consumables, do commerce, see things and visit places. Aviation is way below critical mass in Australia and that is the danger...sausage factories are not the answer.

And none of our political parties have understood aviation for decades. They see aviation as a cash cow that must pay its way...and who helped them in no small way back a few decades get that little earner set up?

.

Well, Dick, that's a neat comeback; but the problem is that you raise a 'problem,' but don't offer a solution. If we can't handle increased immigration, to support an increasingly aging Australian one, what's the alternative? Compulsory euthanasia for those over 65 who aren't self-sufficient?

In response to what I regard as scaremongering, I suggest you get hold of a book by a well known American journalist. He's no bleeding heart, is conservative and Republican, and is a champion of minimal government interference in the free economy. Some of those traits may be familiar to you.

I am sure you have heard of P.J. O'Rourke. Have a read of his 1994 book - it's called All the Trouble in the World, and is sub-titled The Lighter Side of Famine, Pestilence, Destruction and Death. It might cheer you up a little.

At the very least, read the chapters on Overpopulation and Famine. They blow holes in what I regard as your simplistic, Chicken Little approach to this issue.

Mods: Apologies; but DirtyPierre and Dick started it Mum.