NOW GONSKI HAS GONE AS WELL

FROM THE DESK OF ROLAND ALONG

I’ve got a bit of a bone to pick with Centrelink. I don’t have to worry about that mob of pricks so I can say what I like without retribution.

The latest benefit changes for young people mean that if you’ve got a teenager at home then you’re going to responsible for them until they are 22. I expect that this will change in the near future to say that you are responsible for your kids until you enter either a psychiatric facility or a nursing home whichever comes first. That is of course if you don't die working until you are 70. With the cost of private rental it’s all nigh impossible to throw them out to fend for themselves so you’re stuck with them maybe until they marry or find a life partner.

There is also a requirement that if you have not completed your Year 12 Certificate or an equivalent Certificate II qualification (whatever that means) you will need to undertake study or training to qualify for Youth Allowance. On the surface that looks pretty fair until you realise that the training can be in anything they say it is.* It does not necessarily mean you are being trained for any particular job THAT YOU ARE CAPABLE OF, OR INTERESTED IN but whatever the Training Provider is profiting from most.

Say you are a wiz at computers. Do they find you a job or some training in that field. No. They put you into a Fork Lift Driving Course. (Called Logistics?) But wait for it there is more. The agency that trains you for the Course does not require you to drive a forklift. You can get photographed in one but you cannot drive one. To help you out they give you a Test Sheet in one hand and an ANSWER SHEET in the other. You don’t get to learn to drive one but just pass the Theory Exam. Why is this so? (see also Prof. Julius Sumner Miller). Because you have to be 18 years of age for a Licence. You do the course, you pass the exam but you do not get your Forklift Licence until you are 18. To top it off they say it will be posted to you in 9 weeks (Hand Made Paper?) eventually you have to go and demand your Certificate otherwise it is not given to you. To top it off the Training Providers who I will name—SARINA RUSSO TRAINING CENTRE - DANDENONG** have refused to issue one of the trainees any certificates which are now demanded by Centrelink on pain of losing their benefits. I may also be exposing the inexplicable antics of Job Centres Australia in a later issue.

Now, so say Centrelink, even though you have spent about 3 months of school IN YOUR LIFE, you have the equivalent of Certificate III. Any further training you will have to pay for and that could be upwards of $5,000. What unemployed child let alone a parent can afford this money. I can see why young people are frustrated. I can feel sympathy for them when they drink themselves stupid. I understand why they are becoming increasingly violent towards society in general.

When you see that T.A.F.E's and Universities are being defunded to pour more money into these private money-making companies, many of whom have close contact with the decision makers then it makes me sick to the stomach. Government of all persuasion have one thing to consider and one thing only and that is the welfare of their citizens, and apart from some instances in the A.C.T I see little evidence of that anywhere in Australia. 

You can't get a job without training, you can't get training unless you front up with $5,000 and the training you get is next to useless anyway. What is it with business today? Where a kid starts is usually where they will be most loyal. What does it cost employers to keep hiring and firing half-trained young people?

Now I, and you hopefully, will understand why the young person serving your Coffee is so bloody surly and uncooperative. It's the only sodding job they can get with their University Degree. The next time a Barrister spills coffee on you just remember why they’re so pissed off.

* This is typical of government. It is on the Statute Books that the Commissioner of Taxation has the right to define what is a Tax and what is not. So if you appeal to them about being Taxed they can declare that what you paid is not a Tax or vice-versa depending on whether they’ve had afternoon tea or not.

** To demonstrate how well these slave traders are doing the Sarina Russo Group own at least five commercially valuable buildings in Brisbane which is their base of operations as well as 219 Johnston Street, Fitzroy in Melbourne. The course participants spend their nine weeks not in training but loading water bottles for some African Charity. Is this slavery outside Africa? It’s our taxes that are funding these private concerns to the tune of millions of dollars of Taxpayers money supposedly training people AND placing people in employment instead they are used to increase the profits of the providers. The former Prime Ministers wife is a multi-millionaire from ownership of a group of these same quasi-training centres. I know of one project in NSW which places on the ground 72 employment projects worth around $3,444,000 which actually carried a State Budget of over $7,000,000. More than half of the cost was tied up paying the bureaucracy to supervise the projects.

Post Script: 

Australia only has a stable government and compliant citizenry because the majority of Australians are so complacent they can't even get out of their own way.  You get what you vote for, you cop what you don't fight against.