Customs fiasco - My Year 12 students could do better!

That a $200 million dollar computer system was rolled out in the Customs department without adequate testing beggars belief, and no amount of ministerial spin can cover up this blatant incompetence, mismanagement and negligence. Year 12 Information Technology students around Australia are examined on this very matter every year. They identify the various methods for implementing a new information system and for ensuring that there is always fallback strategy. They recognise that replacement of a major system needs to be either phased in over time or that the new system must be run in parallel with the old until its reliability has been tested in real-time. The Minister and the system providers responsible for this fiasco should resign and be sent back to school.

Another one published!

My earlier blog about Howard's done deal on a nuclear industry for Australia was published in The Age today. And now that Howard has appointed former Telstra CEO Ziggy Switkowski and 'well-respected' nuclear physicist we await the final composition of his panel. No doubt there will be no shortage of merchant bankers plus a token scientist or two. As Howard said today, he thinks there's been a shift in public opinion, but before announcing the go-ahead, he is waiting for the evidence (like weapons of Mass Destruction). So now the enquiry has been briefed - 'give me the evidence I need!'

eBay Ashes scalping

There has to be a better way of selling event tickets on-line. Having read about the scalping of 2006/2007 Ashes Cricket Tests in the press I had a look for myself. There are asking prices of $10,000 for a pair of 4-day reserve tickets. In disgust I emailed the only address I could find for eBay - mediaaustralia@ebay.com.au. I suggest others do so too.

"Come on eBay -– do the morally correct thing and ban Ashes ticket scalping (or any other on-line ticket sales for that matter). Just because some sleazy low life can buy up a heap of Reserve Level 1 seats for re-sale, and someone with more dollars than sense will buy them doesn'’t make it right. I don'’t even like Cricket, and probably wouldn't go to a Test if you paid me, but this kind of exploitation is just plain wrong and indefensible. eBay is a great service and highly regarded -– don'’t sully your reputation with this dubious nonsense.

Being the Cricket Tragic that he is, don'’t be surprised if the Prime Minister ends up acting on this kind of illegal activity. Preserve your reputation by acting as a good corporate citizen now -– don'’t wait until the Government forces your hand."

A Google search revealed this little snippet about Cricket Australia:

'CA, which unsuccessfully requested eBay scratch any postings for Ashes tickets, wants to see sports scalping made illegal. "One of the things that we would be keen on is exploring a national approach, a national legislation that can be applied across all sports to ensure that this approach introduces legislation so that this sort of thing is illegal," said CA chief executive James Sutherland.

CA's problems prompted Prime Minister John Howard to note he was watching the situation closely. That's the world we live in - where people think it's completely reasonable to make money without actually earning it or producing something. A bit like investment banking and hedge fund managers I suppose.

Nuclear - Howard's 'done deal'.

Judging by the composition of John Howard’s parliamentary enquiry in to the viability of an Australian nuclear energy industry it looks like a ‘done deal’. Perhaps we could save the expense of the enquiry for the tax-payer funded advertising campaign that’s sure to follow? It’s over to the people to ensure commonsense prevails. Remember the Snowy!

Howard makes a virtue of necessity

Before the government spin doctors kick in to tell us otherwise, Howard did not back-down on the Snow River privatisation out of consideration of public opinion or the sheer stupidity of the plan. He did it to avoid the impending back-bench meltdown which would have seen the legislation rejected by the Senate. Disunity is death and Howard once again attempts to make a virtue out of necessity. Power to the people!

A critique for Crikey's Christian Kerr

Christian Kerr’s lazy dismissal of Acacia Rose’s opposition to privatising the Snowy River (Crikey May 30, 2006) smacks of blind faith and economic ideology. Without evidence, he simply asserts that privatisation does it better.

He states that government owned and funded infrastructure is an outmoded concept (sooo last century!) and that opposition to privatisation must be green inspired xenophobia. Please explain? Since when did not wanting to sell your nation’s natural heritage to foreign investors become xenophobia? It is revealing that Christian only sees privatisation of the Snowy River as being about delivering services. What about the ecologically sustainable management and preservation of the Snowy River? And since when has the value of natural heritage and iconic status been meaningless (unless viewed only through the rosy prism of economic dogma)?

Enthusiasts of privatisation seem to regard public ownership as an affront to economics, depriving astute middlemen and spin-doctors of their right to take a cut of the action. To keep shareholders happy, privatised infrastructure has to perform at least 10-15% more efficiently than public infrastructure just to maintain the status quo. If the public infrastructure is already run efficiently then the profit margin must come from less efficient service or by running down capital assets (presumably to be rectified with government handouts a decade or two down the track). In the case of the Snowy River, we are also risking the already fragile health of a major ecosystem. Poorly managed, a privatised Snowy will have long term and irreversible consequences paid for by the nation as a whole for generations to come.

How does putting an entire river in private hands benefit the nation? Regulation to limit foreign ownership will be changed by a future government with the numbers and desire to do so. Regulating a major river system owned by several corporations with competing interests is not a recipe for efficiency or effectiveness. If the government has to be the regulator it may as well be the owner.

Rather than serving up glib assertions of an increasingly discredited economic ideology would Christian please provide even one example where water privatisation has resulted in a better long-term outcome for the common good and wealth of a nation? Privatisation vaporises expensive public assets into short term profits for shareholders and consultants rather than creating true investment and economic growth.

For a rigorous and insightful analysis of the state of free market globalism, may I suggest Christian have a good read of Ralston Saul’s The Collapse of Globalism: And the Reinvention of the World. Only an unreconstructed ideologue could fail to reflect on Saul’s informed and thoroughly researched erudition.

The exception proves the rule

Ironcially, The Age decided to publish the The Snowy letter from my previous blog, the day after I decided to call my blog, Letters The Age won't publish. Just goes to show you never can tell.