CityLink tunnel air so bad workers may get cancer

WORKERS attending accidents in the CityLink tunnels are being exposed to "extreme" levels of cancer-causing diesel fumes, according to documents seen by the Herald Sun.

A risk assessment by CityLink contractor TransLink warns that workers could develop cancer over 15 years.

The documents show workers were breathing in "extreme" levels of diesel particles and that there was a high likelihood they could contract cancer.
Under the heading "worst foreseeable outcome" for workers who use the tunnels, the assessment states: "Develop cancer over a period of years."
The Domain and Burnley tunnels opened in June 1999, raising fears that some workers could be close to showing signs of illness.
But CityLink and the RACV have rejected the report, saying that the tunnels met WorkSafe standards.
The RACV, which is contracted by CityLink to run its incident response trucks, have provided masks that do not seal around workers' mouths to protect them from the fumes.

The Australian Manufacturing Workers Union has demanded new full-face breathing apparatus, similar to what firefighters use, for staff clearing accidents.
State secretary Steve Dargavel said staff deserved to be given more than simple painting masks to protect health.
"The fact that the company has refused to provide effective protection is a disgrace," he said.
Mr Dargavel said he believed CityLink was concerned the heavy-duty breathing masks would highlight the poor air quality in the tunnels.
RACV general manager Guy Hummerston said air quality was monitored in tunnels.

heraldsun.com.au 14 Nov 2012

The government is also concealing the reports that scientists have put out with respect to the pollution emanating from the Sydney's tunnel's air vents and how they are effecting residents.

Another coverup by government in the name of business / profits.

Bungling Lara Bingle lets slip too much private information

SOMETHING of an awkward silence fell over the Cleo swimsuit party on Wednesday night when it came time for cover girl Lara Bingle to take to the stage. 

The bikini babe and guest of honour was doing a Q & A with the magazine's editor, Gemma Crisp
After some banter about beaches, the 25-year-old then added words to the effect of: "I also can't wait to have lots of sex with my boyfriend."

Cue awkward silence.

"It was really weird - everyone just kind of went ... 'did she really just say that?'" one party-goer remarked.
"Talk about unnecessary."

The annual event was this year held at Waterbar inside the Blue Hotel at Woolloomooloo, which had been transformed into a tropical cabana.

A very fit-looking Cheyenne Tozzi led a catwalk parade of Billabong togs straight down the middle of the crowd of over 250 people, including models Jesinta Campbell and Nikki Phillips, chef Hayden Quinn and singer Timomatic.

Also spotted among the throng was model Maddy King, the newish girlfriend of Myer man and former Mr Dannii Minogue, Kris Smith.

theaustralian.com.au  15 Nov 2012

An ambassador for the blonde bimbo image, portrayed so well by Bingle.

A foul mouthed tralier park trash with too much money.

The epitome of succes.

Bingle's reality show was a pathetic display of a spoiled brat with no sense of responsibility.

'Indoor GPS': Every step you take, every move you make, Google's got maps for you

Abuzz's technology will direct you to the store you want and pop up deals along the way.

Abuzz has offered its technology to current partners Westfield and QIC; it can direct users to shops and remember where their car is parked.

Google has rolled out indoor maps in eight countries and has 10,000 floor plans covered already.

Abuzz and Google's apps support multiple levels.

Navigating museums, airports and railway stations or finding shops, ATMs and even your car in shopping centres will soon be as simple as firing up an app as GPS moves indoors.

"Anything that's identifiable as a destination we can help you find it from where you are now ... whether it's a disabled toilet, a Westpac ATM or a store that is selling Xboxes."
Paul Pettersen, Abuzz

Google has thrown its weight behind indoor navigation and says the technology is reaching the tipping point, while Australian firms have developed competing technology that they say could roll out in shopping centres like Westfield and QIC within six months. Australian researchers are also using it to try to give independence back to the blind or visually impaired.
The technology is sometimes called “indoor GPS” but it does not use satellite navigation as this doesn't work indoors and struggles even in urban environments where large buildings block the signal.

Advertisement

Instead of satellites, Wi-Fi has become the standard for companies such as Google to locate the user within five to 10 metres through Wi-Fi access points. Researchers at universities including the University of NSW have tapped other sensors on the phone such as the gyroscope, accelerometer and magnetometer to bring the accuracy down to within three metres.
Google has launched indoor maps in eight countries – the United States, Japan, Canada, Switzerland, Britain, France, Denmark and Sweden – and has more than 10,000 floor plans mapped including airports, shopping centres, hotels, universities and libraries (see videos).
Google software engineer Waleed Kadous, an Australian who studied at UNSW, leads Google's indoor mapping effort from California.
He told an indoor mapping conference at the University of NSW this week that the technology was approaching the tipping point of mainstream adoption.
“Are we right where we were with the web in 1997? I think we have some problems we need to address but we might very well be because in my view there's no fundamental technical obstacle now,” Kadous said.
Google has already covered large airports like Atlanta, Chicago and Narita, the entire Las Vegas strip, the Mall of America, Ikea and Macy's stores and the giant Shibuya and Shinjuku railway stations in Tokyo.
Business owners – or anyone – in Google's launch countries can upload their own floor plans and add detail to the map and customers can search for specific types of shops or products and be directed there.
Kadous showed off an example of an application that is still in development at Google that allows people to see where their friends are in the mall and easily meet them without communicating. The technology can also make Google searches more context aware such as by delivering the correct results when you search “painting” while in a hardware store.
“For all of the nice things we've done so far I still see some major flaws and there's still a lot of areas for additional work,” said Kadous, adding that one of the major problems was filling out all the “metadata” on the maps.
“My goal is people should expect and have high quality indoor location [maps] in venues the same way that they expect a business to have a website.”
Google would not say when indoor maps would launch in Australia but there are already a number of Australian firms competing in the same space.
Australian firm Abuzz already has just under 400 interactive wayfinding kiosks in 50 of Australia's largest shopping malls as well as Sydney Airport and hospitals and museums in Sydney and Melbourne.
The company is adopting indoor navigation to bring the functionality of the kiosks to smartphones, which mobile product manager Paul Pettersen said was a logical next step. It has already conducted trials at QIC Castle Towers in Sydney in May and is now in talks with Westfield and QIC about a broader rollout via the shopping centres' own apps.
“The intention is that in a large built environment – and typically we're talking about a shopping centre but it equally works for a hospital or an airport – anything that's identifiable as a destination we can help you find it from where you are now,” said Pettersen.
“Whether it's a disabled toilet, a Westpac ATM or a store that is selling Xboxes.”
With the Abuzz app – which will be tailored for each shopping centre – when users park their car they can register it using the app with one button push and can easily then navigate back to their car when they've finished shopping. The app could also offer location-based deals from nearby stores.
While Google is trying to map the world, Abuzz is focused on mapping 80 shopping centres in Australia in high detail, which Pettersen says will mean it can be rolled out to customers within six months to a year and “we're not going to direct you to a store that closed two months ago”. It will even support keyword searches for those who want to find specific products.
UNSW is working on indoor maps applications for the blind and visually impaired, allowing them to more easily get around chaotic settings like airports without assistance. It has already developed the technology including a user interface that supports Braille and will be conducting trials by the end of this year or early next year.
“GPS has already completely revolutionised their lives because it's giving them a lot more independence and they're a lot more confident moving around by themselves in the city,” said researcher Thomas Gallagher.
“Of course if you can bring these guiding technologies indoors it's a really good application.”
Another UNSW team is using autonomous robots to virtually reconstruct indoor environments. Similarly, researchers in Japan are experimenting with Nintendo Wii remotes and Microsoft Kinect to map floor plans.
Canberra-based Locata deploys ground-based local positioning systems for military and commercial applications like mining, where satellite navigation is flaky or non-existent (e.g. underground). It is more expensive but more reliable and accurate than using Wi-Fi and smartphones as base stations and antennas need to be installed.
Another Australian company, Smarttrack RFID, has developed indoor positioning technology for museums and art galleries to track their collections. Visitors can take advantage of the technology to find any artwork or piece including background information and customise their own guided tours. The technology is already installed in Otago Museum in New Zealand.

theage.com.au  15 Nov 2012

Monitoring of the masses has no boundaries, and companies like Google, are the  tools.

All is done naturally for the benefit of the consumer.

Cash 'put into Gillard's account'

JULIA Gillard's past continued to haunt her last night, with allegations emerging that in June 1996 a union employee told the national head of the Australian Workers Union that he deposited $5000 cash into her account.

The allegation, outlined exclusively in The Australian today, is that the cash had come from the Prime Minister's then boyfriend, AWU official Bruce Wilson.

Ms Gillard has always denied any wrongdoing over the creation of a union slush fund on behalf of Mr Wilson and union official Ralph Blewitt during her time as a lawyer for Slater and Gordon.

The allegation comes as Mr Blewitt indicated he is willing to speak openly about his role in the union scandal but wants the police to guarantee him immunity from prosecution.

The Australian reports that then national AWU head Ian Cambridge, now a Fair Work Australia Commissioner, recorded in his 1994-1996 diary allegations by union employee Wayne Hem that Mr Wilson, after a night at a casino, had given him a wad of cash totalling $5000 along with Ms Gillard's bank account details and told him to deposit it.

The report also states that Mr Hem's allegations formed part of a statutory declaration sworn to the newspaper in Melbourne three days ago during a lengthy interview.

The report stressed it was not known from where Mr Wilson got the funds and there was no evidence, nor was it suggested, Ms Gillard asked for the payment or knew of its origins. Ms Gillard yesterday repeated her denial of any wrongdoing.

Her spokesman issued a statement to The Australian saying: "The Prime Minister has made clear on numerous occasions that she was not involved in any wrongdoing.

"I also note that despite repeatedly being asked to do so, The Australian has been unable to substantiate any allegations of wrongdoing."

Mr Hem told The Australian that he told Mr Cambridge about the bank deposit on June 7, 1996, during a drive to Melbourne. During this time Mr Cambridge was investigating AWU fraud.

Mr Cambridge's June 7, 1996 diary entry notes Mr Hem telling him "about an event that took place in about July last year (1995)", The Australian reports.

"This event involved Bruce Wilson handing Wayne an envelope which contained approximately $5000 in $100 and $50 notes and Wilson instructed Hem to deposit this $5000 into a personal account of Julia Gillard."

Mr Hem provided further detail on the allegation in his statutory declaration to The Australian, saying he had been asked to attend Mr Wilson's office. "I went down and he handed me about five grand," Mr Hem said in the report.

"Then Bruce handed me a piece of paper with the account number and a name on it, and it was Julia's name.
"He said 'Go put this in Julia's account'. I said 'OK'.

"He (Wilson) made a comment about not saying anything. I just went down to the bank, put it in, came back, gave him the receipt.

"I didn't know if it was for Julia or if the account was a private account or a Slater and Gordon account. It just had Julia Gillard's name on it and I put it in the bank account."

 Read more on this story at The Australian.

optuszoo.com.au 16 Nov 2012

The true extent of Julia Gillard's criminal activities will never be known to the general public.

Politicians and law makers are above the laws that they create.

A current example of this was the handling of the Craig Thomson matter.

Julia Gillard was not elected a Prime Minister by the Australian people, but rather bribed her way into office with secured votes from other party members.

The English are laughing at the deplorable way the elections were held that put Gillard into power.

Corruption and fraud at the highest level in politics, and 'nothing' will be done about it.
 
An indication of how corrupt the system really is.

Government job advertisement fraud

The Australian government via its various departments, e.g. Department of Education (DoE), Department of Justice (DoJ), Australian Taxation Office (ATO), etc is responsible for a nationwide job advertisement fraud that has been going on for decades.

When a position is made available, it must be advertised externally, where all applicants have to be considered. 

The process for filling in a vacant position is that usually in the early stages internal staff are considered as suitable candidates. If the position cannot be filled internally, then the staff is asked if any relatives are able to fulfill the role. If relatives are unavailable then friends, acquaintances or business colleagues are considered and so on.

As a general rule, most positions are occupied within the early stages of employment recruiting. Since laws have been put in place, that require positions to be advertised externally, a staggering 70% of job vacancies are falsely advertised, as they have already been filled internally. This information has been obtained via various sources within employment / government sectors which has been verified to be accurate and correct.

The largest perpetrator of this job advertisement fraud is the government. The government places nonexistent vacancies to desperate job seekers, which it re-advertises, further adding the falsified figures of the so called advertised jobs market.

Once candidates apply for those positions, they receive a courteous letter informing them that they have been unsuccessful in their application, which has already been filled internally prior to the advertisement.

The corporate media, being the official government lap dog, curiously omits any reporting on this type of fraud which has been going on for decades.

The corporate media also curiously omits reporting on the actual jobless numbers, which are falsified by the government. The current official jobless rate is at approx 5.7%, whereas the more realistic rate used by economists is approx. 8.5%, which still falls short of the more realistic figure of 10%.

Another taboo is that members within the Masonic brotherhood are considered a priority, even though the individual may not have the skill set to perform the duties required for the role, rather than choosing the more qualified external applicant.

This type of job advertising fraud is not limited to the government only, but is also rampant in the corporate / private sector as well.

There could never be an inquiry to the nationwide government job advertising fraud, as this would implicate too many senior figures.

Most mature aged job seekers dissatisfied with recruiters

ALMOST nine out of 10 job seekers aged over 45 say they are treated badly by recruiters. 

A survey by Adage.com.au, a job site for the mature aged, has found 88 per cent are dissatisfied with the level of response received from recruiters and a further 77 per cent are dissatisfied with the response of employers.

Adage.com.au managing director Heidi Holmes said mature-age workers have it "extremely tough" in Australia.

"Once you are past 45, no one wants to know you," Ms Holmes said.

"It’s incredible to me that there is so much discussion about skills shortages in Australia, while so many highly qualified and experienced workers are being overlooked simply because they’ve got a bit of grey hair."

The survey of more than 800 job seekers also found 78 per cent refused to put their age on their CV.

Ms Holmes said many do this because they are scared their age will disadvantage them.

"We aren't talking about 'seniors' here," she said, adding that one third of the respondents surveyed were under the age of 55.

"Many of these workers are in their 40s," she said. "For some, that's more than 20 years until the official retirement age."

Peter, 52, worked in marketing for a company for 16 years before it shut the Australian operation and he was made redundant in 2010.

"Pretty much since then I’ve been looking for a job," he said.

He has put in almost 400 job applications in that time, but they have only translated to six direct interviews with a company.

"Most of the feedback I’ve got is that I have a terrific resume, fantastic achievements, I gave a great interview but ‘we’re looking for someone who can grow into the role’," he said.

"Or ‘we think you’re too senior, you’ll be dissatisfied, the work is beneath you, you’ll get bored’."

Peter said he thinks recruitment agencies don’t do enough to engage managers in discussions about the type of candidates they need.

"Most [recruiters] are lazy and they’re cowards - I have been told by recruiters that they give resumes a 10 second glance and that’s it," he said.

He said he gets frustrated by the fact that recruiters often think he is too old to adopt new technology.

"If you want to know anything about the Twitterverse or Facebook or social media I’m across it," he said.

Ms Holmes said in the last few years there had been a large focus on Gen Y in recruiting.

"That has fed not only the focus around youth, but potentially leads to an unconscious bias," she said.

"There’s this immediate assumption [mature workers] are not engaged online, or they don’t know what’s happening in the digital space."

Simon Schweigert, project manager at the Recruitment and Consulting Services Association, said there was "a reasonable degree of lack of understanding" of the value of mature age workers among recruiters.

"In a large majority of cases that is probably unconscious rather than an employer specifically discriminating against a mature age candidate," Mr Schweigert said.

Mr Schweigert said there has been a lot of research that has shown there is a disconnect between mature age candidates and young recruiters.

The RCSA, which represents more than half of the mainstream recruitment agencies in Australia, runs workshops to teach its members how to work with mature age candidates.

"A large number of mature aged candidates have never used a recruitment agency before," Mr Schweigert said.

"What the recruiter then ends up doing is educating them about how the process works and walking them through that, as well as trying to find the right role for them."

He added all member agencies were governed by a code of professional conduct.

"They must be meeting all requirements legal and moral, and their conduct should be fair and balanced and even," Mr Schweigert said.

Any individuals who think may be have been treated incorrectly can make a complaint through the RSCA, he said.

dailytelegraph.com.au  13 Nov 2012

Not all jobs are for everyone.

The corporate media (deliberately) does not mention the taboo of the influences of the masonic brotherhood.

Many an employee has obtained their position with the help from their Freemason's brethren.

Businesses 'held to ransom' by Facebook's paid Promoted Posts

AUSTRALIAN business owners have accused Facebook of holding them to ransom by effectively forcing them to pay to communicate with their followers. 

Businesses have reported a dramatic decline in the number of people viewing their posts since the US social media giant last month began pushing its paid promoted posts service, in which users pay up to $400 to have each status update appear prominently in their audience's newsfeed.

Chris Cassella, managing director of Science Alert, said Facebook informed him recently that unless he signed up for the service, there was only a very small chance his posts would reach all of his two million fans.

"Facebook said in their marketing press release that there was a 15 per cent chance my audience would see my posts show up in their newsfeed,'' Mr Cassella said. "It's ugly. It is an ugly business tactic.''

Mr Cassella has spent thousands of dollars on the service but has decided to stop.

"I did a calculation and found that if I was to reach all of my audience on all of my posts, it would cost Science Alert over $9 million a year,'' he said. "I told Facebook that I couldn't give them money for them to hold me hostage.''

Melbourne woman Hayley Deerfield, who runs vintage fashion business Deerfield Vintage via Facebook, said she had to increase her marketing budget from $100 to $350 a month to ensure her posts got through to her 5200 followers.

"In most cases, only 10 per cent of my followers actually see the post,'' she said.

"Choosing to promote a post is extremely expensive when I'm making two to three posts a day. This is totally unaffordable.''

Facebook said it had changed the newsfeed, but had not done so on order to charge to promote posts.

However Karalee Evans, APAC digital strategist at communications agency Text 100, said a sudden drop in audience reach at exactly the same time promoted posts were introduced was "no coincidence''.

"It seems like Facebook is double dipping,'' she said. "From a brand's perspective it's unfair to be charged to reach a community of people that are already there.''

However, Shai Roitman, general manager of Melbourne fashion website MIISHKA, said it was up to business owners to communicate more effectively with their audiences.

"I don't mind spending money on ads because I'm grateful for what Facebook has done for us. I get why this has happened,'' he said.

Facebook issued a statement when asked about the change.

"There's a lot of misinformation going round about changes to news feed. To be clear - we did not change news feed so we could charge to promote posts. This meme is totally false," Facebook said in the statement.

"News feed is built to show relevant content. A few times a year we perform quality checks on the news feed algorithm to ensure high-quality and relevant posts. Based on a recent quality check, we made an adjustment to the news feed algorithm to respond to the negative feedback signals of spam and people hiding posts. Current signals show the adjustment has been successful - median reach of Pages has remained the same, while spam complaints and stories hidden by users have fallen significantly.”

In essence, Facebook altered their algorithm to ensure that "liked'' pages were not disappearing - but this fails to account for the dramatic drop off in audience reach.

The controversy comes less than a year after Facebook admitted its existing advertising around the site wasn't working.

heraldsun.com.au 13 Nov 2012

Corporations are allowed to give false information without any repercussions.

They are part of the 'untouchables', i.e. above any laws.

Paedophile on top of school

The authorities are in full swing on a propaganda (false advertisement) campaign centred on child abuse.

The current news trend is to expose child abuse, and (allegedly) give justice to the victims. A current catch phrase is for example “We must protect our children”, which could not be further from the truth. (illustration: generic picture of faceless man)

The ‘children’ that the authorities are referring to are the children of the masses, a disposable item, in the view of the ruling elite. Most child abuse actually occurs whilst under the ‘care’ or supervision of government or authorities.

The current agenda is to implement internet censorship, so that the children (of the cannon fodder) do not have access to material that may have an influence in the child forming an ‘unhealthy attitude’. No government or authority cares what attitude the children of the cannon fodder have. If this were the case, many videos of self harm would be have to be censored, which will not happen.

In the outer eastern suburb of Bayswater, the government release a paedophile into a recently developed office suite above a school.

The community at large may not be aware of the treachery involved that a convicted paedophile, is not only released back into the community, to re-offend, but also place directly above a school.

There is no real policy to protect the community, but rather to create friction amongst the masses to keep them occupied, and to divert their attention from the corrupt and fraudulent dealings of the authorities and their business counterparts.

United Nations wants control of web kill switch

AN unfettered internet, free of political control and available to everyone could be relegated to cyber-history under a contentious proposal by a little known United Nations body.

Experts claim that Australians could see political and religious websites disappear if the Federal Government backs a plan  to hand control over the internet to the UN's International Telecommunications Union (ITU).

A draft of the proposal, formulated in secret and only recently posted on the ITU website for public perusal, reveal that if accepted, the changes would allow government restriction or blocking of information disseminated via the internet and create a global regime of monitoring internet communications - including the demand that those who send and receive information identify themselves.

It would also allow governments to shut down the internet if there is the belief that it may interfere in the internal affairs of other states or that information of a sensitive nature might be shared.

Telecommunications ministers from 193 countries will meet behind closed doors in Dubai next month to discuss the proposal, with Australia's Senator Stephen Conroy among them.

The move has sparked a ferocious, under-the-radar diplomatic war between a powerful bloc of nations, led by China and Russia, who want to exert greater controls on the net and western democracies determined to preserve the free-wheeling, open architecture of the World Wide Web.

The battle for control has also seen a cartel of telco corporations join forces to support amended pricing regulations  changes which critics warn will pave the way for significant increases in the cost of day-to-day internet use, including email and social media.

While Senator Conroy said this morning he would not be supporting any changes to the current arrangements, the decisions made by other powers could also have a huge impact on Australian web users.

"We don't believe the existing system needs any significant or radical change. We don't believe a case has been made at all," a spokesman for Senatory Conroy told News Ltd.

Simon Breheny, Director of independent thinktank, The Legal Rights Project, told News Ltd that Australia would end up with a "lowest-common-denominator situation" whereby what Australians could view on the internet could be controlled by dominant member countries.

"If we sign it, it will mean we won't have the freedoms we have no regarding commerce and sharing of ideas," he said.

"That's the greatest concern - rather than going beyond commerce, it comes into the field of sharing political and religious ideas." 

In a show of unity, civil rights groups, big communications corporations including Google and international labour unions are to meet in London today to launch a global campaign and petition titled Stop the Net Grab.

Led by the International Trade Union Confederation, it will appeal to the UN and ITU itself to immediately open the plan for global debate and demanding a delay of any decision until all stakeholders - not just governments  are given a voice.

Two influential Australians are at the centre of the move - Dr Paul Twomey and Sharran Burrow.

They will be joined to launch the campaign by Vinton Cerf, one of the fathers of the internet and now chief Google evangelist.

Ms Burrow, the General Secretary of the International Trade Union Confederation, warned urgent global action is now needed as the "internet as we know it" comes under very real threat.

"Unless we act now, our right to freely communicate and share information could change forever. A group of big telecommunications corporations have joined with countries including China, Egypt and Saudi Arabia that already impose heavy restriction on internet freedoms," she said.

"So far, the proposal has flown under the radar but its implications are extremely serious. Governments  and big companies the world over  may end up with the right not only to restrict the internet and monitor everything you do online but to charge users for services such as email and Skype."

Dr Twomey is former CEO of the International Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers, the US body that governs domain names and addresses, and he ed the Australian Government's National Office for the Information Economy.

He warned that as the internet enters its third decade in mass use, the need to defend its founding open model is more urgent than ever.

"The ongoing disputes about control have also been compounded by concern in national security and political elites in the wake of recent events such as the Arab Spring and London Riots where social media were key tools," he said.

"And there is the accelerating pace of cyber espionage, targeting North American and other developed countries intellectual propertyas well as the global rise of hacktivism.

"The danger is that there is now a growing likelihood of the interests of more traditional forces for Internet control overlapping with, and even seeking further to align with, national security and law enforcement agenda."

news.com.au 12 Nov 2012

Since the masses have the ability to publish raw information without any editing that can expose government fraud, corruption or information that is contrary to government policy, as examples, this does not sit well with the authorities.

As a result, the idea of the "KILL SWITCH", in conjunction to internet filtering, is needed to shut the masses up.

The masses are seen as an enemy of the state and are treated accordingly.

Government gives up plan for internet filter

LABOR has abandoned its controversial plan to introduce an internet filter, but is banning all websites related to child abuse.

The federal government will use its powers under the Telecommunications Act to block hundreds of child abuse websites already identified by Interpol, Fairfax reports.

Communications Minister Stephen Conroy said blocking these websites met "community expectations and fulfils the government's commitment to preventing Australian internet users from accessing child abuse material online".

"Given this successful outcome, the government has no need to proceed with mandatory filtering legislation," he said.

Kevin Rudd promised to introduce an internet filter when Labor won office at the 2007 election, but it was always a controversial policy.

RECOMMENDED COVERAGE

Govt gives up plan for internet filter

Internet lobbyists argued against censorship and predicted a filter would be ineffective and would slow internet speeds.

Both the coalition and the Greens opposed the plan.

The internet filter would have required Australian internet service providers to block overseas-hosted "refused classification" material as identified by the Australian Communications and Media Authority (ACMA).

The list of banned websites would have been based on public complaints to ACMA.

Fairfax said Internet Industry Association chief executive Peter Lee welcomed the decision as "a positive step".

But the Australian Christian Lobby insisted a filter was needed because "it is important to prevent unwanted access to pornography".

"We must protect our children from forming unhealthy attitudes towards women and sex," lobby spokeswoman Wendy Francis said.

heraldsun.com.au 9 Nov 2012

The suppress the masses ability to have the freedom of speech, the slogan "we must protect our children" is used.

There is no policy to protect the children of the masses, as this can be seen in the execution of certain actions.

The law releases paedophiles into the community, is the action, as opposed to the propaganda "we must protect our children".

Internet censorship is always the agenda, and another method will be employed.

The great data charge rip-off

WHILE our phones are getting smarter, Australians are losing out as the major mobile carriers offer contracts providing less data at greater cost, a consumer group has warned.

Elise Davidson, a spokeswoman for the Australian Communications Consumer Action Network, said advances in mobile phone features meant people were using more data-hungry services, such as video calls and streaming, which put pressure on network infrastructure and had caused congestion issues.

Ms Davidson said one response the carriers had to cutting congestion had been to offer contracts that dropped data limits while increasing the monthly cost.

She said Optus was the biggest offender, but Telstra and Vodafone had made similar moves.

"They want to slow down the amount of data that people are using and also pick up some extra data charges which they can put back into their network," Ms Davidson said.

She said one of the biggest issues facing consumers was the confusion over mobile phone plans and estimating how much data they needed.

She said many customers underestimated the data they would use and were hit with hefty extra data bills at the end of the month.

Other customers played it safe by going for a contract with a large data cap but then not using their allotted amount.

The Australian Communications and Media Authority reported Australians fork out $1.5 billion a year more than they need because they choose the wrong phone plan.

Optus marketing managing director Michael Smith said changes in Optus plans reflected a usage study which showed its customers were using, on average, less than 500MB a month.

"We recognise that some customers may use more data as their situations change and to combat bill shock, we've rolled out usage alerts, across these plans, that will help customers control their spend," he said.

"Customers will receive an SMS alert when they've reached 50 per cent, 85 per cent and 100 per cent of their data usage."

 heraldsun.com.au 5 Nov 2012