Fortification Notice
Luke Eliot wrote in the West Australian last month about the Gypsy Jokers biker gang again attracting attention of the WA Police, this time about the police previously serving a "Fortification Notice" that obliged the GJ's to satisfy the police that it was NOT heavily fortified. Gypsy Jokers simply provided a key to the police to counter any claim of fortification. The GJ rep made the point that all the WA Services had a key to read the Water meter, Gas meter and the like. So it is a little difficult to say your holding the fort, while handing out keys to the front door.
The police Commissioner originally applied to the Corruption and Crime Commission for the Fortification Warning on the grounds that the premises are "heavily fortified and habitually used by a class of people reasonably suspected of being involved in organised crime".
Gypsy Jokers say the security cameras and 1.8m wall are simply to protect their toys from being stolen.
The story goes on to say that the real challenge for the gang will be to disprove part (b) of the notice; That the clubhouse is habitually used by significant number of people suspected of organised criminal activities.
...So what's the WIND-UP point of this story?
Take a look at our Whistlers' Corner, see the WA Criminal Code extracts. These are the criminal activities that we believe have frequently been breached by officers of the WA government. Like the Health Dept., Dept. Of Environmental Protection, to name some of the most regular culprits that often raise our suspicions. Are these Departments fortified? What is the definition? Well, they just don't let you walk in.
... And what of the record of some of the churches?
Some look like forts, and let's face it, one particular church has the dubious distinction of what seems like more allegations, charges, and convictions for criminal activity of (organised and concealing) criminally physically and sexually abusing more people than any other entity in modern human history.(Well, maybe discounting the Nuremberg Trials)
So why pick on the Gypsy Jokers?
WHY NOT START AT THE TOP? If one really wants to benefit society, that is the correct place, so as to lead by exemplary example. ....Dream on for real leadership.

Corruption and Crime Commission Flooded with Gripes.
Yesterday's Sunday Times carried a story by Peter Law about the new Corruption and Crime Commission (CCC) being flooded with complaints in its first 100 days of operation. The CCC takes over from the "useless as teats on a bull" Anti-Coruption Commission (ACC). Chief CCC consulant Matthew Byrne is quoted as saying, "There is always a flurry of complaints when a new body is established..., ...but we didn't think it would be this many".
This illustrate that even the professionals in the firing line have no idea about the size of the problem here.
The story goes on to state that the CCC had found about half its expected 150 staff members and the Commission would be fully operational by July.
Westralia.net is astounded that they require 150 staff to investigate the estimated amount of WA Government corruption. (We have such a small population). Now they find the number of cases is going to be larger than originally thought.
One ponders if the CCC will ever be able to get the tiger by the tail.
So far it seems they have only catered for dealings with a slightly feral moggy.
Big mistake. The offending entity is an evil beast.
Of course many cynics will believe that the CCC will be held on a very short leash, or become corrupted itself, thereby become part of the evil.
What a challenge Mr. Byrne and his collegues will face, just keeping their head above the rising cesspool of muck.
We believe the CCC had better make hay while the sun shines. At least while WA has a relatively reformist Attorney General.

If you want to read what the ethics requirement should be, you can go to our INTRODUCTION page. Click on the GRIM REAPER and "see the facade he hides behind". It is unfortunate that so, many, many people will find the statements on ethics on the linked CCC site a cruel and sad joke.
Frequent breaching of these standards over the years has cost many people their health, families, and lives.

...Maybe Alien Abductions?
The ABC Radio program "Australia Talks Back" about the WA gov workers' poisoning was postponed on Wednesday while more research is undertaken, however we do expect it again this Wednesday 28th at 4pm Westralia Time, 6pm Australian Time.
That brings us to another question of why the WA government chose Bruce Armstrong to review Professor Andrew Harper's report on the poisoning of the workers in the Kimberley?
Bruce armstrong was a former WA Health Commissioner. We believe this is a direct conflict of interest.
Additionally this is what he wrote in The Medical Journal Of Australia Vol.140, No.7, p388, about Birth Defects and Vietnam Service:

"Chemical exposure, however may not have been the only possible relevant aspect of Vietnam service. Could specific, potentially teratogenic, infections (for example, cytomegalovirus or herpesvirus infections, toxoplasmosis, or syphilis) have been acquired and subsequently passed on to the mother? Concern has also been expressed about the emotional and behavioural effects of Vietnam service. It is conceivable a disturbed man, prone perhaps to excess alcohol, would adversely affect the emotional and nutritional well-being of his pregnant spouse and her intake of potentially teratogenic agents - alcohol, tobacco smoke, and mood-altering drugs. Thus, while direct teratogenic effects of paternal exposures may seem far-fetched, indirect paternal effects cannot be dismissed."

While he is supposing STD's, smokin' & drinkin' of the men, and recreational drug use of the wife, we wonder why he didn't throw in Alien Abduction for good measure.

More ABC Radio Coverage
In addition to BACKGROUND BRIEFING on Radio National (AM band - 810)after the news at 9am on Sunday April 18th, Listen to AUSTRALIA TALKSBACK on Wednesday April 21st at 4pm in Westralia, 6pm in Australia. Derby Dioxin's 20 year crusader, Carl Drysdale will be interviewed.
You can ring in too, to voice how lousy the WA goverment have been in the treatment of their own workers. The talkback number is: 1800 802 341
Go forth citizens and speak!

ABC Radio National "Background Briefing"
As Westralia.net has been keenly interested in the chemical poisoning of the WA government workers in the Kimberleys, Westralia Wind-Up readers should tune in to ABC Radio National's (RN) "Background Briefing" program after the news at 0900 on Sunday April 18. Mark Horstman, Science Reporter for RN and TV's Catalyst, advises this program will be repeated at 1900 on Tuesday April 20th. The program has been researched and put together by Mark.
We will run a link to the transcript when it is available later that week.
For the record, the Catalyst science TV science program has previously run another story about Westralia.net co-founder, Frank Hansford-Miller, entitled; "Cloning Frank".

Ask no questions, ...find no evidence. How convenient.
Yet another poisoned former WA Government worker from Derby died last week, and another over Christmas (R.I.P. Brothers).
We will keep fighting for you.

Westralia.net is still asking, and has still received no answers from our earlier questions to Agriculture Minister Kim Chance.
The biggest question is why does the WA Government spend so much money when they simply refuse to properly investigate the scores of premature deaths and debilitating illnesses.
The so-called Expert Medical Panel simply dismisses the evidence of ridiculously so far off-spec 245T with extreme dioxin content(really "toxic waste", not production herbicide) being supplied to the Kimberly workers. Bruce Armstrong says he found no evidence. Well, check out the following transcript and footnote.

Courtesy of ABC TV's "7:30 Report":
MICK O'DONNELL: Both the Queensland Forestry workers and the Kimberley spray gangs believe they were victims of a rogue batch of the chemical dumped in Australia during the Vietnam War.

CARL DRYSDALE, KIMBERLEY AGRICULTURE DEPT WORKER: All of a sudden we got all of these drums and then we asked where they came from.

MICK O'DONNELL: Most of the 245T the Derby workers used had come in drums like this one, clearly labelled by the Kwinana Company which sold it to the Agriculture Protection Board.

But the batch which arrived in Derby in the early 70s was unlabelled, in second hand drums.

CARL DRYSDALE: The original stuff was sort of like a honey consistency or an engine oil consistency and this stuff was dark brown with silvery coloured streaks through it.

MICK O'DONNELL: And remarkably, workers on the other side of the country also recall a similar strange batch of the chemical arriving in the early 70s.

SID ARMSTRONG: It was a black, sludgy looking stuff.

It looked like a black treacle.

MICK O'DONNELL: And those descriptions sound remarkably like the sample Canberra professor of chemistry Ben Selinger hunted down when he investigated a rogue batch of 245T in 1981.

EMERITUS PROF BEN SELINGER, AUSTRALIAN NATIONAL UNIVERSITY: The sample we had of the fire damaged stock was black and viscous and not like you'd expect pure 245T to look.

MICK O'DONNELL: The mystery of the rogue batch takes us back to this plant, south of Perth.

Chemical Industries Kwinana was importing 245T during the Vietnam War.

A report by the Tariff Board in 1971, tabled in Parliament, found the company was importing fire damaged 245T from Singapore, dumped here at low prices.

EMERITUS PROF BEN SELINGER: Fire damage, particularly at the stage it was being transformed at in Singapore, would increase significantly the levels of dioxin in the 245T.

MICK O'DONNELL: Is it possible that some of that ended up in the Kimberley, used by those workers?

PROF BRUCE ARMSTRONG: I think it's certainly possible.
We found no evidence of it but nobody seems to know what happened to it.

READERS, PLEASE NOTE:
Professor Bruce Armstrong did not meet or interview any of the affected workers in Derby, nor did he access their medical records held there.
"We found no evidence.."
He clearly states in his report that the Panel did not call for submissions and none were received. Similarly, the Panel did not seek to interview any APB workers.
...But still the experts managed to gain five (5) psychiatric reports on the affected workers!
Absolutely stunning stuff!
Come on people, where's the critical analysis of this joke?

Bruce, you won't find evidence if you refuse to look or ask questions.
...but then again, maybe you knew that already.

We have been told the cost of this is around $160,000.
Bloody great inquiry paid for by the WA public while our poisoned citizens continue to die.
Shamefully sad.

These people today, your children tomorrow.

That sounds dramatic, but this is why we are here, because as you can see, there is no sign from the WA Government that lessons are ever learned year in year out.
Why face problems when you can sweep them under the carpet? ...so it will continue to the next generation. Why shouldn't it?
Wittenoom asbestos M.O. lives on. People die.
What are you going to do about it?

Feds keep our money. ... Again.
As a follow on from the recent electricity bungle, the National Competition Council (NCC) is about to impose more multi-million dollar penalties on WA for the State's failure to enact electricity reforms.
$41 million was held back last year due to failure of the State to enact other reforms, such as in Retail Trading. The latest indications are this next penalty will be more serious.

Aside from the alleged "good intentions" of the NCC and incompetence of the State government in avoiding these penalties, WESTRALIA.net questions the whole acceptance of this situation.
Dickheads or not, the State Goverment was elected by the people here. Penalaties on the WA Treasury and public, simply because Canberra does not see the policies it wants should not be tolerated.

WESTRALIA.net suggests:
If the Feds in Canberra and the NCC want to see REAL COMPETITION, they should sacrifice their own positions and encourage true competition between the States by returning State Taxation rights hijacked for the Commonwealth war effort in 1941 and never given back.
Imagine.
Firstly, Westralia virtually generates biggest bucks per capita by far. So we need not have any fear of our own poverty.
#2, We, and the Australian States should be rationing our money to the Federal Government for the provision of literally, Commonwealth Services. This was the original intention.
#3, How would Westralia be then, competing with each Australian state for business and generally making Westralia an attractive location by way of provision of services and lifestyle.
Likewise those States would compete with us and each other. You could not short cut on services and infrastructure spending, nor could you over tax the citizens. Whatever provided the best outcome for the citizens would dictate their choice.

That is "National Competition".
This was demonstrated a few decades ago with all systems go in Queensland after they abolished Death Duties. Meanwhile the other States continued to tax you even after you died. They soon woke up when big slabs of tax paying population moved north to Queensland. That demographic shift fueled the development of that state we see today.
No one seems to have suffered due to loss of Death Tax.
Remember, that was the original intention. Not to be raped and pillaged, then every year go back rattling our little cup; "Please Sir, can I have some more?"

...And for Death Taxes, well in the whole scope of humanity, people might actually want to leave a contribution to their own caring society if they knew it would never be wasted. In fact they might even compete to see who would bequest the most.
...But that is another Westralia.net story for another time.

More Iron to China - More Big $$$ to Westralia
Congratulations to BHP Billiton's new $11.6 Billion iron-ore sales deal to China!
Together with Rio Tinto's bigger output it is almost like the "Glory Days" of the seventies for our iron producers.

Westralians familiar with BHP Iron Ore's previous life as Mt. Newman Mining Company will recognise WESTRALIA.net's black swan logo as being the obsolete centrepiece of MNM's famous "Back Duck".
BHP kindly provided permission for our continued use.

No Electricity - a good example of DUMB.
After Perth's rolling power cuts of last week or so, the media are still wondering why no heads in State government have rolled.

From WESTRALIA.net's perspective, the big issue here is that WA Government blows the trumpets after securing a $25 Billion Gas deal to supply China's energy market, but has not enough brains to realise you don't put contractual caps on your own gas supplies from your own resources supplying your own city. DUMB.

Update - Derby Poisoned workers
...And now for the latest slap in the face.
Of the minority of workers who will be eligible for their Worker's Compensation entitlements, they will only be able to receive upto the 1982 (when the saga began) maximum available of around $60,000.
Beter than a poke in the eye with a hot stick, you might think, but not so.
Even if they were to receive today's maximum amount of around $120,000 for lost pay, they are obliged to REPAY all the Social Security payments they have claimed for being too sick to work for all these years.
So after the whole exercise they still get NOTHING, unless they only became incapacitated recently.
Another classic tragedy initiated by the State of WA.

Derby - Poisoned workers not impressed.
Today after more than 20 years of fighting, the former state government Agricultual Board workers who were exposed to Chemicals that was supposed to be 245T during the 1980's were told their Worker's Compensation claims would be fast-tracked.
Trouble is, of 90 odd affected workers, 36 are already prematurely dead. Also the WA authorities say it is only the cancer-struck workers who will get the fast-track deal. (Gee Whiz, after 20 years, what's the normal speed?)No guarantees for the others, some who have not been able to work for several years. Minister Chance coceded that perhaps one worker who received contact bindness after only 3 months work will probably get something. He's been blind for nearly twenty years.
The WA gov's "Expert Medical Panel", who didn't even interview or ask for the workers medical records, concluded there is no evidence of a link from 245T exposure to the other debilitating illness suffered by the workers.
We believe that the offending chemical used was no longer in fact production herbicide, but after being fire-damaged had extremely elevated levels of dioxin. If so, it was then "TOXIC WASTE", not herbicide. Sampling evidence and research shows this to be likely, but the WA gov's panel has simply dismissed all eye witness accounts of the product that the gov illegally supplied to their own workers in unmarked drums, telling them, "it was safe enough to drink", when workers feared for their personal safety.
Most of the workers boycotted the meeting, once again feeling well in advance that they were going to be left for dead.

WESTRALIA.net put these questions to Mr.Chance:

How are workers Comp claims going to work when Armstrong says there is no firm evidence of link?

The real issue was not explored: This was not Herbicide, but allegedly "toxic waste" being so far off specification with dioxin content.

The real question of where the rogue batches (as evidenced in the Federal tariff investigation) finished up was simply dismissed.

We know it came in to Australia in large enough quantities. This has been researched by competent people. Where did it go?

We still need to know even if it did not go to Derby. The stuff is a known disaster and it has supposedly disappeared into thin air.

Why were the chemicals supplied illegally to the workers in unmarked drums?

Why were workers' accounts of witnessing completely different physical characteristics of these drums contents not researched?

The same claims by workers in Qld and Vic over a similar period?

What was wrong with Harper's Report?

Why did it need a review?

Why was a specialist used who had already published work in medical journals dismissing Viet vets Agent Orange claims, and went on to supposing blame on the vets and their spouses living habits as a more probable cause of birth defects?

Why is there such a concentration on cancer links, when the symptoms many workers suffer are not indicative of cancer?

How did Armstrong and co. manage a report on these workers when he did not interview them and did not access their medical records?

What was the public cost of the Armstrong Inquiry?

What was the public cost of flying the circus to nearly 2000 Km to Derby, when only about 8 of about 50 workers attended?

More waiting, less answers no doubt.