Easter 2017

Hand decorated Easter Eggs

Many events listed on religious calendars which share a common date frequently involve the fusion of different beliefs either inadvertantly or deliberately. Easter is one very clear example whereby the calendar event relates to a specific event in Christianity (the death and resurrection of Christ) but the practices of celebration have multiple sources including pagan and other non Christian religions.

Easter eggs are a point in case. While there is a strong connection between the Christian faith and the cruxifiction and arising of Christ, there is evidence of practices involving eggs from Ancient Egypt, Mesopotamia and Crete which provided influences on early Christians. Paschal eggs, a well established custom in central Europe, involved the exchange of gifts of hand-decorated eggs but shares its origin with the traditional symbol of springtime, fertility and rebirth. The early Christians of Mesopotamia are believed to have stained their eggs with the colours of green and yellow. The Easter egg in general is meant to represent the empty tomb of Jesus Christ.

The use of chocolate eggs originates from the 16th and 17th century in Germany where the "Easter Hare" included sweets in his basket of coloured eggs which were distributed to children. In the 20th and 21st Century, Easter now denotes a general 'chocolate festival' usually with little religious connection.

Australia Post - how much are its Executives worth ?

Following the revelation that the remuneration of the now departed Chief Executive of Australia Post, Ahmed Fahour, was $5.6M, the organisation has released a remuneration report showing that three other current executives of the organisation also earn over $1M per annum.  A fourth who has since retired earned $1.2 M per annum. These are staggering amounts for a Public Sector agency and are greater than salaries and benefits paid to Heads of Commonwealth  Departments and State Government Departments.  The CEO of Australia Post was revealed to be highest paid head of a Postal agency in the world.  

Australia Post Executives earning more than $1M per annum

Name	Base salary and fees	Short term incentives	Non- monetary benefits	Superannuation	Total $
Chris Blake	781,514	521,500	-	19,308	1,322,322
Robert Black	883,426	585,000	-	19,308	1,497,734
Christine Corbett	767,305	677,500	-	82.350	1,527,155
Ahmed Fahour	1,971,152	2,342,933	73,985	1,239829	5,627,959

 Two other Executives earned well over $900,000 per annum.

These remuneration levels stand in stark contrast to the performance of Australia Post with a rising tide of complaints received by the Commonwealth Ombudsman which also has had the role of Postal Industry Ombudsman since 2006. Delivery issues account for 30% of all complaints regarding Australia Post with failure to deliver, failure to use safe drop procedures and failure to obtain a signature on delivery being the main concerns. With rapidly declining retail surface mail business, the public are right to ask why the level of Executive remuneration is so high and why was the Federal Government been caught so flat footed. If this situation had occurred in an ASX listed company, the shareholders would have had an opportunity to vote down the remuneration report - a device which general taxpayers in contrast do not have.

2017 - A new year but continuing and increasing challenges

2017 beckons as the end of 2016 draws near. Many of the challenging issues of 2016 will carry through into the new year in areas such as the economy, foreign affairs, terrorism, national identity and disillusionment with traditional politics. The ongoing baseline issue of the environment, climate change and energy needs will continue to pose an extraordinary and existential threat to all of the planet as it has for the past two decades.

In economic terms, the world's overall GDP movement remains patchy with small but incremental growth in the United States, continued slowing expansion in China and a flat line in Europe and Japan. South America continues to experience hard economic conditions and the glut of oil has led to falling revenues for producers in the Gulf. There is little insight into the impact of the United Kingdom exiting the European Union (Brexit) or the influence of Donald Trump in the United States until he takes office from January 2017 onwards. In many respects, it is a watching game.

In terms of foreign affairs and terrorism, the war in Syria and Iraq will progress until one side is finally victorious. The only certainty is the eventual defeat of the Islamic State/Daesh group. All other scenarios are impossible to predict as most professional military and foreign relations commentators have reported.

Traditional political parties will continue to lose support if they operate on a business-as-usual basis. Across the long standing democracies, large segments of society are dissatisfied with the responsiveness and conduct with many of the ruling elites and the political class in general. Elections in 2017 will show whether this is now an established situation or merely a short-lived transit protest. It will also be a watching game.

Wherever you are, all the best for 2017.

Christmas 2016

Christmas - a time when religious and national leaders express their good wishes and desire for a better world, often couched in terms of peace, health and hope for the coming year. The choice of December 25 is associated with the birth of Jesus, the central figure in the Christian faith and part of the Holy Trinity of  Father, Son and Holy Ghost.  The actual date of birth of Jesus is unknown and hence the choice of 25 December originates from the 4th Century AD through the Western Christian Church and recorded in the Gregorian calendar. The Easter Christian Church uses the Julian calendar which would place the date at January 7, however there is little actual disagreement on the date itself. Through the mechanism of the 12 days of Epiphany both the Eastern and Western Churches are, in any case, linked.  The origin of the the use of the 25th December may also be more an influence of the pagan Romans who used this date to acknowledge the start of the Winter solstice. During the early period of the Christian Church, there was various attempts at over-running existing Roman festivals which occured at year-end thus creating an early form of spin doctoring and brand message creation.

Wherever you may be, happy holidays.

Exhibition review - Nude: art from the Tate Collection - Art Gallery of NSW

Pablo Picasso
Nude woman in a red armchair

(Femme nue dans un fauteuil rouge) 1932
oil paint on canvas

For this year's major Summer exhibition, the Art Gallery of NSW has partnered with the Tate Gallery in London to bring a selection of over 100 works representing the nude image over two centuries of art. The exhibition is titled, not surprisingly, Nude: art from the Tate collection.

The exhibition’s main highlight, placed centre-stage is Auguste Rodin’s sculpture The kiss 1901-04 which is being displayed for the first time outside of Europe. Other works of note include Pierre Bonnard’s The bath 1925, Picasso’s Nude woman in a red armchair 1932 (very standard abstractive Picasso), Sylvia Sleigh’s Paul Rosano reclining 1974, Ron Mueck’s Wild man 2005 (as with most Mueck works it's an enormous semi life-like sculpture) and Rineke Dijkstra’s Julie, Den Haag, Netherlands, February 29 1994.

The exhibition is themed in nine rooms in the Gallery with titles such as The Historical Nude, The Private Nude, The Modern Nude, Real and Surreal Bodies, Paint as Flesh and so on. The titles of each segment predominantly correspond to periods of time demonstrating the evolution of the nude through different art interpretations and representations. Given the scale and depth of the Tate collection, this is a relatively small, thin veneer selection of works of major artists worldwide who have used the nude human form.  Although much lauded, Rodin's sculpture, the kiss, is quite underwhelming, as quietly whispered by many members of the Art Gallery of NSW Foundation at a private viewing. Its more representative of the general physical movement of a man and woman kissing whilst in the thralls of an embrace but an awe inspiring sculpture it is not.

The exhibition runs from 5 November 2016 to 5 February 2017.

Donald J Trump's America - 10 reasons why Americans should think about moving to..... Australia

Donald J Trump  - President-elect of the United States

With the election of Donald Trump to be the 45th President of the United States, its understandable that many Americans may be considering where they may wish to spend the next few years. The Canadian immigration website crashed in the first few hours of the election result, but there is another option available and that is - Australia. There are ten good reasons to think about moving to Australia if you're an American of good heart and sound mind -

1.  Australia's political system is understandable to Americans. We have two Houses of Parliament for our National Government - the House of Representatives and the Senate. In fact, this was based on the US system and Congress which we copied. Our national capital, Canberra, was designed by an American, Walter Burley Griffin. We have States and State Governments, just like the US, only smaller and less crazy. 
2. Our voting system is compulsory and if you don't vote, you get a fine. None of this voter registration stuff and the need to get people out to vote. We have a very high turn-out and the silent majority can vote, all the time, so absolute surprises are rare. 
3. You can own a gun here but we have gun control laws - there is no Constitutional Right-to-Bear Arms and assault rifles are banned. You can have a firearm but you're on a register and the police can find you.
4. We have a public health care system called Medicare which is the envy of many people in the US. If you work here and pay taxes, you also pay a contribution called a levy to fund Medicare but everyone is covered. The Democrats in the US wanted the Australian system and even used it as an example in Congress but were unable to get Republican support.
5. We use the metric system like most of the rest of the World. The US does not, so you would need to learn how to measure things differently.
6. We have Australian Dollars which are similar to the US Greenback currency.
7. We have our own football codes and occasionally watch American football but it's not as big here. Our national summer sport is cricket which also uses a bat and a ball similar to baseball - except our bat has a flat surface and the batters don't have to run around a diamond shaped field.
8. We have public transport systems of rail, light rail and buses. Many US cities have similar services but many cut back on this public spending but we think its essential to have it.
9. We have national parks just like the US. In fact, Australia was the second country after the US to establish national parks and protect our flora and fauna.
10. Our official language is English, not so different to American English but its our own version with its own local words. Not too hard to learn

So there it is..... ten reasons why Australia is a good option if a Trump America does not appeal. Our politicians can be a bit silly but nothing compared to the parties with an elephant and a donkey as their logos.

Blockchain - coming to a database near you

Blockchain is the latest development in secure database and transaction systems, operating on the principle that the recording and storage of every transaction only occurs through a consensus mechanism across the connected computer network. Blockchain is best described as a distributed database system in contrast to the conventional, centralised systems with which we, the consumers, are generally aware.  In simple terms blockchain operates as follows -

• data, for example a single transaction, is encrypted as it is stored,
• access to that data is also encrypted,
• each block within the system is only generated once multiple parties (best described as nodes) reach a consensus and validate the data, 
• as a distributed database, multiple copies of data exist across multiple computer systems which together create the peer-to-peer network,
• the loss of one node means that Blockchain can survive as the master copy is shared via its distributed design,
• it is impossible to alter historical records meaning the data points are immutable. This is one of the strengths of the system as its means that in order to attack the ledger, simultaneous attacks would need to be launched on all copies.

Blockchain's development has been centred on a consortium called R3 which comprises 45 banks including J.P. Morgan and Goldman Sachs. Other major non-banking corporations now involved include, not surprisingly, Microsoft, American Express, Visa, Mastercard, NASDAQ, NYSE. At the moment blockchain is used for making international financial transfers however the intention is to use it for online transactions. Apps are already being trialled for music distribution, sports betting and a new type of financial auditing. Proposed expansion of the platform will include services such as smart contracts, crowdfunding and auctions.

So what are the weaknesses of this system ? There are quite a few, for example in the legal and regulatory sphere, data privacy (being a foremost one), cyber security (albeit the possibility of breaching the network if not able to corrupt it) and cost-benefits are not fully established. The very fact that large banks like the system, is perhaps reason enough for the wider community to be wary.

2016 Australian Federal Election - The count goes on

The 2016 Federal election is now over and the citizens of Australia can ponder the reasons for the inconclusive result which eventuated from the ballot count. The current Liberal /National Party Coalition Government under the leadership of the Prime Minister, Malcolm Turnbull, was not immediately returned to office and  will have to wait for a further two days to establish how many seats in the House of Representatives it has won.

The Australian Labor Party (ALP) under the leadership of Opposition Leader, Bill Shorten, likewise did not achieve enough seats to immediately claim victory in the election either however their recovery of seats in previous lost heartland electorates has given them considerable hope that they are close. ALP members and campaign support staff had predicted the Liberal/National Government would be returned to office but with a slender 2 to 3 seat majority only. Given the uncertainty of many seats and the need to count a large number of postal votes that may or may not be the case. A national-wide average swing of 3.68% away from the Coalition and to the ALP was recorded with some seats showing margins of over 7%.

The real winners initially are the independents or minor parties (referred to in Parliamentary terms as the 'cross bench'). In the Upper House, the Australian Senate, the number of cross bench members was 18 members prior to the election. Senate voting reforms passed this year were due to reduce this number but the converse has occured as a result of the double dissolution election. On present trends, there are likely to be more cross bench members not less.

The current ballot count shows the Liberal/National Parties [LNP] have 70 seats, the Australian Labor Party [ALP] with 71 seats, the Greens with 1 seat, 4 seats to other Independents and 4 seats still undecided. In order to take Government, 76 seats are needed. The possibility of a minority Government remains strong.

UPDATE - 6 July 2016
Amusing to see how confusing the tally count has been going: the ABC has the LNP on 70, the ALP on 67, Independents on 5 with the remaining seats undecided. The Australian Electoral Commission  has the LNP on 68, the ALP on 68, Independents with 5 with the remaining seats undecided.

Age and disability discrimination in the workforce - barriers to participation

In 2015, the Federal Attorney-General, Senator George Brandis asked the Age and Disability Discrimination Commissioner, Susan Ryan, to undertake the Willing to Work: National Inquiry into Employment Discrimination Against Older Australians and Australians with disability. The Terms of Reference for the Inquiry required the Commissioner to examine practices, attitudes and Commonwealth laws that deny or diminish equal participation in employment and make recommendations to address employment discrimination against older Australians and Australians with disability. Some of the report's key findings are summarised below: 

• People aged 55 years and over make up roughly a quarter of the population, but only 16% of the total workforce. This age cohort is the fastest growing in Australia, and will remain so for the foreseeable future. While labour force participation for older people has been growing in recent years, particularly for older women, labour force participation continues to decline with age.

• In November 2015, 73.8% of Australians aged 55–59 years were participating in the labour force, with 56.5% of 60–64 year olds and 12.7% of those aged 65 years and over in the labour force
• While mature-age people have a lower unemployment rate than younger people, they tend to have greater difficulty finding subsequent employment when they do become unemployed.
• In November 2015, the average duration of unemployment for mature-age people was 68 weeks, compared with 30 weeks for 15–24 year olds and 49 weeks for 25–54 year olds.

Of note, benefits to the Australian economy as a result of increased workforce participation are well established including increased gross domestic product (GDP), reduced overall welfare expenditure and increased self-reliance in retirement. A 7% increase in mature-age labour force participation would raise GDP in 2022 by approximately $25 billion, while an estimated $50 billion could be added to GDP by 2050 if Australia were to move up into the top eight OECD countries for employment of people with disability.

Commissioner Ryan has grouped her recommendations for change into three themes: Priority Government Commitments; improving existing systems; and what employers and businesses can do. Underlying all the recommendations is the need for societal attitudes to change.

With the Age Pension qualifying age increasing every year to reach 67 years in 7 years time, it's become essential to enable people to remain in the workforce as long as possible.

The Commissioner's Report to the Attorney-General can be accessed at this link:

Willing to Work - National Inquiry Report