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Liberal Senator Barnett proposes abolishing fair trials

08 February 2010 in Politics by Stilgherrian | 4 comments

Tasmanian Liberal Senator Guy Barnett today called for an end to fair criminal trials. Well, effectively.

In Senate Estimates today, Senator Barnett discovered that the government had spent around $10 million on the legal defence of nine people charged with terrorism offences. They were eventually found guilty. So Senator Barnett reckons that legal defence was a waste of money.

Senator Barnett, who chairs the Scrutiny of Government Waste Committee, issued a media release earlier today headlined $10 million spent on legal aid to defend the rights of terrorists.

Apparently if someone is to be found guilty — which he must assume can be known in advance — then the cost of their legal defence is “government waste”.

Now people who are capable of joined-up thinking may see the logical problem and risk to human rights here. Like, you know, innocent until proven guilty and the right to a fair trial and all that stuff. So I’ve just sent the following email.

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Yes, Episode 44 is tonight!

23 April 2009 in Stilgherrian Live by Stilgherrian | 19 comments

Screenshot from Stilgherrian Live episode 43

I seem to have forgotten to tell you that episode 43 of Stilgherrian Live is online for your viewing pleasure. It has been for nearly two weeks! So does that mean there’s another episode tonight? It does.

This means I need to do a number of things.

First, I need to tell you that last program’s “Cnut of the Week” finalists were: 4th Miranda Devine (18%); equal 2nd Jane Schulze and Associated Press, and The Cuffs Guy (24% each); 1st The Liberal Party Generally (34%).

Second, I need to tell you that…

Nominations are now open for this week’s “Cnut of the Week”.

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Super Hornets are Go

18 March 2008 in Defence, Politics by Stilgherrian | 8 comments

Photograph of US Navy F-18E Super Hornet aircraft

Defence minister Joel Fitzgibbon has announced that the controversial purchase of 24 Super Hornet aircraft will go ahead.

The review of the Howard government’s decision to buy the aircraft — at a total cost of $6 billion even though the RAAF hadn’t wanted them — reached some damaging conclusions, including:

  • There has been a lack of sound, long-term air combat capability planning decisions by the former Government over the course of the last decade.
  • The retirement of the F-111 was made in haste but is not irreversible. The cost of turning the F-111 back on would be enormous and crews and skills have already moved on.
  • The former Government’s decision to leave Australia’s air defences in the hands of the Joint Strike Fighter project was a flawed leap of faith in scheduling terms and combined with the quick decision to retire the F-111 early, allowed an air combat capability gap to emerge.
  • The subsequent timetable the former Government put on the acquisition of an interim fighter left Defence planners with no choice but to recommend the Super Hornet. No other suitable aircraft could be produced to meet the 2010 deadline the former Government had set. One year on, that is now even more so the case.

Cancelling the order would still incur a financial penalty and create “undesirable tensions”, and the final conclusions is that “the Super Hornet is an excellent aircraft… and is the only aircraft which can meet the small delivery window created by the former Government’s poor planning processes and politically-driven responses.”

As a shareholder in Australia Inc, I’d like to know why the former “board members” allowed this to happen. When company directors are negligent they become personally liable so why, given the report’s damning conclusions, does Brendan Nelson not become personally liable?

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What hope the Liberal party?

23 February 2007 in Politics by Stilgherrian | No comments

Forget my last post about the Libs’ shoddy campaign in Marrickville, they can’t even organise a decent scandal any more!

While the Americans bring us sordid tales of evangelical ministers doing meth with rent boys and astronauts in diapers in kidnapping allegations, all the NSW Liberal Party can manage is sending a schoolboy-standard lewd SMS message. Pathetic.

What hope the Liberal candidate?

16 February 2007 in Enmore, Politics by Stilgherrian | 6 comments

OK, the Liberals have a snowflake’s chance of winning our local seat of Marrickville in the forthcoming NSW state election, so they can let any muppet have a go. But if this is the best election flyer you can come up with, Ramzy Mansour, then who are you kidding?

Photo of Ramzy Mansour's election flyer

Consider:

  • If you can’t even organise someone who can cut paper in a straight line, what makes you think you can run the state of New South Wales?
  • If you can’t raise the $3000 to professionally print the 45,000 leaflets necessary to hit your electorate, how little support do you actually have?
  • If you can’t do the basic financial management to understand that for large print runs, offset printing is a lot cheaper than photocopying, why on earth would I trust you with a billion-dollar state budget?

1 out of 10, can do much, much better.

Costello Snark 2003

11 July 2006 in Politics by Stilgherrian | No comments

This week’s spat between John Howard and Peter Costello over the prime ministership is all over the media, so no need for me to comment. But, thanks to Crikey I was reminded of one of Costello’s wond’rous snarky interviews — from 2003, again on the subject of the Liberal party leadership…

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