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What we're talking about
- bigfella on The Burkha Albert, The passage that you have taken from Ms Haussegger's blog is actually from the Australian constitution. It would ... more
- Albert on The Burkha Bigfella, what is our responsibility when we know of women and young girls who are beaten because they do not want to wear ... more
- Jason on The Burkha Bigfella, before we get back to the burka, i'm entitled to reply to your logic and insults. Which you leftards are so well ... more
- john on The Burkha New product aimed at the Muslim market The Burkhie more
- Albert on The Aboriginal Disgrace When the Prime Minister was making the Sorry Speech, 13 February 2008, I was reading his face, it was saying, as from Kath ... more
- bigfella on The Burkha Hey Jason, The great thing about the Austrlian culture is that it draws from so many other cultures. That's why we embrace a ... more
- Jason on The Burkha Hey Bigfella, Why do you want to change Australia so much? If you want to see mosques and Islamic schools going up every ... more
- bigfella on The Burkha Michael, So Virginia Haussegger works for the ABC, is a feminist, and has won a United Nations Association award. I would ... more
- Phil - Springwood on The Welfare State Anna Campbell -29.06.09 - The more I read this article, the angrier I become; and I call to arms my practice of ... more
- bigfella on The Burkha Michael, Perhaps the debate has moved on for some. However, I suspect that many will simply jump on the bandwagon with this ... more
- Norm on The Burkha Most of these women don't have a choice and if we in the West don't put a stop to it, for their sake,I fear we will see more ... more
- Jeff MAURICE on The Burkha I like many other Aussies believe that if you come here to our fair land, you should be ready to join our society, our ways, ... more
- rick on The Burkha this is australia, not the middle east. the burqa was designed to protect oneself from desert sand storms.(it has nothing to ... more
- Albert on The Burkha Al Qaeda vows revenge on France over plans to ban the burqa. I suggest they study they Koran, then be the first to applaud ... more
- Phil - Springwood on The Welfare State Anna Campbell - 27th. June. 09 I was the person who used the word scum; See Anna, I am on Disability Support, I have told my ... more
- bigfella on Wages Breakout Gayle, As the online poll on the AMWU website overwhelmingly indicates, the most important issue for employees at this point ... more
- Gayle on Wages Breakout Like Julie Gillard I too was born in Wales and migrated here in 1966. My father was a union man both in Wales and Australia ... more
- Trevor Russel on Tradition? Firstly I want to say Congratulations to 4BC for having the guts to put a single woman in a wheelchair on the airwaves, ... more
- bigfella on Wages Breakout Three questions... Where can I find the phrase "businesses that can afford it"? I am having trouble finding this quote ... more
- Christine on This Traffic! Smithy, it takes me about an hour to go 60 kilometres (using the Logan and Gateway motorways). If I head towards the city ... more
Rip-off merchants
It beggars belief but there are maggots amongst us who will use any opportunity - including the terrible storms last week - to go jack. To rip-off the rest of us.
There's clear evidence that dishonest Queenslanders are putting in dodgy claims for the emergency payments on offer for the victims of the storms.
This stinks to high heaven.
The Federal Government is providing $1000 per adult and $400 per child through Centrelink.
The state government is handing out cheques on a needs basis. So far Queensland taxpayers have handed over $4.7M
As you would imagine there's no great system in place to administer these payments. Let's cut to the chase, it's predominantly an honour system. State Government volunteers have been manning the 6 community recovery centres. They haven't been putting people through too many hoops to establish how badly their homes have been hit.
There's now very clear evidence of maggots gaming the system. Trying it on. Police are investigating allegedly fraudulent claims at the community recovery centre at Everton Hills. And volunteers at the other sites tell similar stories.
Residents have to fill in a form providing their name address and the damage caused by the storm.
There are lots of stories. People who have spun cock and bull stories. Dozens of callers yesterday to my program talking about people receiving hundreds of dollars improperly - money that's meant for storm victims.
Imagine walking into one of those centres. Amongst people who have genuinely lost everything. Roofs off the house. Water through everything that's left. And the small amount of money we as a community have decided we'll hand over - well rip-off merchants have been getting stuck into that.
We used to have pride. There's no way any Australian I know would go jack on his or her mates like that. No way. And decent Australians would sniff them out. If you got a sense that someone was ripping off the system - we'd be all over them.
Can we be trusted? Has our community changed so much that we can't be trusted not to abuse the community's generosity?
Many of my listeners call for us to name and shame people who've taken this money when they're not entitled to it. And why not? It's our money - the community is entitled to know who's got it. Today I'll speak with the minister Lindy Nelson-Carr and see what it will take to set that up.
