Tuesday 2 October 2007
The tryanny of time and distance
Working as I do in remote and rural schools, I’m in a position to feel the pulse of the bush. At the moment it’s beating as strongly as ever despite the drought and anger about council amalgamations.
The quality of life for bushies has, on the face of it, improved a great deal with the advent of better communications and more efficient transport systems, but in so many ways the bush is discriminated against.
Imagine, for example, that you have a child with a disability in the bush. The dearth of allied health services creates a situation for many families where they have to make hard decisions about staying put, or moving off their properties because their child isn’t getting the required level of support.
These people are taxpayers the same as everyone else, but they receive a fraction of the services, both in terms of quality and choice, available to their city cousins.
This is a major issue in Queensland, the most decentralised state.
The significant infrastructure decisions, those that impact on people in the bush, are generally made by bureaucrats who have their homes and lives in the city. This phenomenon persists irrespective of politics, as all the senior bureaucrats with the real clout live in the city.
I have a simple and effective solution – declare Longreach the state capital.
Why Longreach? Well basically because it’s almost at the geographical centre.
Imagine the difference it would make to decision-making if all the Directors General, all the Ministerial Advisers, and the Governor had a postcode of 4730.
The politicians could please themselves, but they would at least have a Longreach residence during parliamentary sittings.
Subscribe to:
Post Comments (Atom)
Taken for Granted
Pic courtesy Leader Today Yesterday I went to the state school down the road, and voted in the local government elections, something I'v...
-
It's difficult, gentle reader, to ignore the soap opera in train across the Pacific, and once again, I am drawn like a moth to the fla...
-
Fascism as a political movement exhibits four basic criteria. First, fascism it is not an ideology, but an activity. Secondly, it...
-
A cartoon doing the rounds in the first conscription referendum over 100 years ago. There has been recent media accusing proponents of bot...
No comments:
Post a Comment