Court complex construction announcements ignore unfolding realities

Recent announcements to spend $73 million on a new court complex in Shepparton ignore quickly approaching realities.

Part of the existing and soon to be
 replaced court complex in Shepparton.

The present need is blatant, but unfolding needs are not near so obvious.

Administering justice within the walls of what exists in High St is, from all reports, staggeringly difficult, but the tightening of world realties will make it impossible, even after digging deeply into our pockets to build a “sheer concrete and glass” court complex.

The collision of world events, which will be upon us within a decade or so, will demand, even on a regional basis, decentralization rather than the energy-intensive centralization of institutions, even something as seemingly remote from energy as our courts.

Resources upon which we now habitually depend and undergird our modern lives are finite and yet we continue to reinforce institutions and create processes whose usefulness and durability depend, and hinges upon the false belief of the infinitude of those resources.

Even within just decades, a brief time compared to the more than 70 years of what exists has served our community, the movement of people around even the Goulburn Valley will become increasingly difficult, and expensive.

Rather than investing in and building one monolithic structure we need a totally decentralized legal system in which justice can be administered in all the smaller centres that make up Greater Shepparton.

Many argue, from a position supported by indisputable facts that the world has already passed that moment from which oil resources inevitably decline to become fearfully expensive and so the province of the wealthy.

The burning of fossil fuels, deforestation and the breeding of animals for human consumption, have damaged our atmosphere and extensively changed weather patterns to such a degree that we will have to live where we live.

Meaning that travel, even in a limited sense within the Goulburn Valley, will be more difficult, expensive and time consuming, suggesting the administration of justice should be dispersed in our smaller communities rather than a centralized, shimmering concrete and glass complex in Shepparton.

Ideas driving Shepparton’s new court complex are from the dying energy-rich carbon era and so rather than further embedding those, we should be working toward and building an institutional and structural system that will endure in an energy-poor post carbon society.

Electricity produced by renewable energy will ultimately be abundant, but only if we stand together and disable the intent of Australia’s present decision makers and so a mosaic of court houses linked by the National Broadband Network will provide local justice for local people, in local institutions staffed by local people.

It means more jobs for more people in more places throughout Greater Shepparton and builds resilience in more communities wrestling with the dilemma of the post-carbon era.

 

Complexity is wonderful, but we need to simply it - urgently!

Complexity brings many bonuses, but benefits we urgently need to simplify.

The wonderful advances arising from that complexity can only be realized and made a lasting positive if we are able to better understand how we go about claiming our space.

Geo-engineering - Taking a
spanner to the world.

The prevailing idea that humankind is of pre-eminent importance and therefore justified as it stomps about the planet building an uncaring military/industrial complex is one that abhors decency.

Physics insist that everything seeks equilibrium and it is only through the application of energy that humans can escape the hard-edged boundaries of those scientific limitations.

And it has been with an alarming degree of indecency that we, you and me, have used fossil fuels to disable those equilibrium-seeking scientific realities.

Subsequently, while we wallow in the wonders of a lavish life provided by our unrealistic and unhealthy dependence on hydrocarbons, the thin envelope surrounding earth and upon which we depend, is quickly, in geological terms and even human terms, becoming less effective.

It has become an abused commons into which we have dumped the residue of our fossil fuel-energized lives disrupting the finely-tuned balance that allowed life on earth, from the microscopic to the massive, to procreate and prosper.

In more than a decade of listening to, and participating in, the climate change conversation, discussion has shifted dramatically, particularly in past year or so, from mitigation to adaptation.

Mitigation, because of our greed, quite bluntly, was never going to happen and now even those who blatantly deny the human finger-print, at least on the public stage, are championing geo-engineering to stabilise a climate they said in the previous sentence was not in need of repair.

Adaptations using even more of the processes that are the essence of our troubles reflect Einstein’s view that “We cannot solve our problems with the same thinking we used when we created them.”

Beyond that geo-engineering is unproven and brings with it consequences which we don’t yet understand and we may well not be able to grasp the meaning of the emerging difficulties until it is too late.

Scientists are sceptical by training and so rarely, if ever, present their work in terms of blunt ultimatums, but ever so slowly that is changing and more and more they are telling us that life on earth, and that includes you and me, is under severe threat.

I weep as I write for it is not evident that we have the needed courageous intellectual athleticism to step back from what it is that drives industrial civilization.

For a few years I have advocated a four-hour work day, no overtime, no double shifts in a neighbourhood, all powered by renewable energy, where walking and cycling is commonplace and in which you work and share with your neighbours – that is more urgent now than ever.

Chests thrown out, back-slapping, strutting and preening, 'Team Australia' arrives home

“Team Australia” arrived home recently, chests thrown out, amid much back-slapping, strutting and preening.

The Washington Consensus makes
 puppets of all it
touches, including whole nations.

The travelling party from the big end of town, the business boys (and they were mostly boys) who lock arms in a club that understands, and cares only about growth and profit, toured with Prime Minister Tony Abbott to Japan, Korea and China.

Surrounded by a phalanx of billionaires, Mr Abbott visited that trio of Asian countries to talk up Australia and point out it is “open for business”.

He went to sign-off on free trade agreements; deals he believes will benefit all Australians, but which history has shown will only enrich his already rich fellow travellers.

Free trade is integral part of globalization, which has done nothing but make the wealthy wealthier, worsening inequality and ripping the rug out from under small businesses.

The stance taken by Mr Abbott and his rich cohort reflects the Washington Consensus, a 10-point plan that the U.S. Government and international economic institutions have successfully used to rob resource-rich underdeveloped countries.

The oddities of Mr Abbott’s thinking are intriguing as usually it is the less developed countries that fall into economic traps set by wealthy and influential nations, but in this case Australia, under the PM’s insistence, has been a part of its own deception.

Third-world countries that fall under the spell of Washington Consensus-like programs are stripped of their resources, and natural trading advantages, bringing on bankruptcy from which they are allowed relief only by agreeing to punishing trade arrangements.

Forced into free-trade agreements that favour, invariably, the developed countries; and the small businesses in the target country are pillaged and forced to align with huge corporations and so are destroyed and vanish – they go broke.

Driven by what appears to be a hint of desperation to demonstrate his promise of Australia being “open for business”, our PM has played the country itself as his trump card and has laid us bare on the trading table.

The people who could make a meaningful social difference to Australia are being treated like criminals and secreted to the likes of Manus Island, while those whose only interest is in exploitation, profit and growth are ushered into our dining room with a flourish reserved for royalty.

Money, it seems, can easily cross international borders, no papers, no passport and no identity required, but should you be a struggling individual or family escaping a life of oppression and you bring no riches other than who they are, then Abbott’s Team Australia throws up the barricades.

Speaking during his Asian tour, Tony Abbott puffed out his chest and declared “Australia has had a very good day”, failing to acknowledge that it was really his rich friends who had a very good day.

Anzac Day further militarizes Australian culture

Australian culture will be further militarized on Friday.

Poppies have become aligned
with the Anzac legend. 

Anzac Day is a right and proper way to remember those who donned our colours to protect values important to Australians, but what happens on Friday is little more than the exploitation of populist sentiment for political gain.

That will be an unpopular view as many are clearly unable to separate the brutality, violence, death and catastrophe of war from the sentimentality they experience for events such as Anzac Day.

War is clearly a human failure bringing only sadness and while we should recall that fragility in our thinking, our focus should be on those things we have done well, and going to war is certainly not one of them.

Next year is the centenary of the ANZAC landings at Gallipoli and its recognition is going to cost you and me money; cash that could resolve many national social problems, and maybe even ease the apparently overwhelming budgetary problems Federal Treasurer Joe Hockey repeatedly bleats about.

It is correct that what is forgotten is repeated, but let us remember those who wore our colours in a dignified, simple, and cheaper way, and turn our attention, resources and innovative ideas toward today and the creation and building of a nation best equipped to deal with such things as energy scarcity, climate change and an economy teetering on disarray.

Rather than pander to populist views about something that has become distorted by a century of myth, we should break loose from the past and prepare ourselves for a future quite different from what was.

Greens leader, Christine Milne.

Greens leader, Christine Milne, has said that what is happening in Australia presently is a struggle between the past and the future and although she wasn’t referring directly to events such as Anzac Day, she was making reference about our inability to escape the past and willingly acknowledge the challenges of tomorrow.

Tony Abbott’s strange decision that saw him reach into the past and drag into today the considered long-dead idea of Sirs and Dames along with his perverse unwillingness to accept the unfolding realities of climate change gives another clear hint why his government prefers the certainties of the past rather than confronting the dilemmas of tomorrow.

The militarization of Australia suits the dated ideologies of the neo-liberals, such as the present Australian government, for with it come understandings that the men of yesterday can grasp.

Confrontations of a century ago, or even recent contemporary history, are as dead as those who died in them, and so rather than spending time, money and our creative energy on remembering them, we should be switching our attention to the future.

Celebrate Anzac Day if you must, but then turn your attention to tomorrow, the future.

Tradition doesn't foil Mayor's chance to "sell' her city

Jenny Houlihan is not stopped by tradition when given an opportunity to “sell” Shepparton.

City of Greater Shepparton Mayor,
Cr Jenny Houlihan.

The mayor of the City of Greater Shepparton exploited an opportunity at the University of Melbourne to talk about the benefits of living in Shepparton.

She was one of a panel of four, along with the keynote speaker at the Melbourne launch of Beyond Zero Emissions (BZE) report on a high speed train for Australia.

Shepparton is included on the route for the BZE-proposed train and Cr Houlihan was invited to attend and respond to questions about the importance of the train to regional areas.

Chair of Wednesday night’s event at the university’s Carillo Gantner Theatre was the chief executive officer of BZE, Dr Stephen Bygrave, who asked specifically about benefits brought to Shepparton by high speed rail.

Cr Houlihan thanked the keynote speaker, the Federal Member for Bennelong, Mr John Alexander, who has Liberal Party responsibilities for regional development, high speed rail and development of polices to address urban traffic congestion, for “almost” accepting an invitation to visit Shepparton.

The Federal Member for Bennelong,
Mr John Alexander.

Answering question from the chair, Cr Houlihan ignored tradition and told the near full auditorium about the wonders of life in Shepparton, rather than directly answer the question.

She talked about her council’s involvement with the project to date and in admitting that it now felt at little out of the loop, she was excited to be at the Melbourne event and hear Mr Alexander’s enthusiasm for high speed rail.

Cr Houlihan told those at the launch that she would like to “drag” him for Shepparton as we need to keep our community engaged and inspired.

She then talked about why it is great to live in Greater Shepparton, pointing to the fact that “our city” acts a major industry and employment centre pointing out that the city has many smaller towns nearby.

According to Cr Houlihan Shepparton services about 250 000 people around the area.

She said many in the audience may have followed our fight to save SPC Ardmona and, she added, we are prepared to fight just as hard to get high speed rail.

“We are reliant on a strong transport sector to support our activities and we are home to a very large migrant and refugee population, including many humanitarian refugees who presently have no other means of transport, particularly when they arrive, other than public transport,” she said.

Cr Houlihan said her council was thrilled when it saw is had been included on the fast train route and “don’t anybody try to get us off that, or there will be big trouble”.

She said the fast train will “quite frankly be transformational for our region, (it) absolutely will change who we are and what we do”.

Economic benefits from the high speed rail project will, according to Cr Houlihan, include the ability to attract other businesses to the area and allow for increased efficiencies of existing businesses, improved property values and increase the enrolment of students in existing tertiary institutions.

She said tourism in the area would benefit, the high speed rail was environmentally friendly and council had already considered matters relating to construction of the high speed rail and, she noted, council already has a strong working relationship with the Goulburn Broken Catchment Management Authority.

Alluded to the fact that council, and the people of Greater Shepparton, are proud of their rivers and waterways and “we know we want to keep the health of those” and in any infrastructure we will ensure that environmental features are proactively considered in any of the high speed rail planning,

“It is anticipated that a high speed rail station located at Shepparton will provide a significant impetus for population growth as people take advantage of the opportunity to reside in a well serviced regional city with lots of sunshine and open space and keep that in mind as you might be able to shift there one day, and we would love to have you” she said.

According to Cr Houlihan a very fast train would enhance Shepparton’s competitiveness and she could only see ”huge benefits” from the proposed high speed rail.

She argued that the high speed rail would better integrate our communities, ease congestion on our roads, as well as provide the foundation for a low-carbon activity econ

“Greater Shepparton needs to be a part of this and the direct benefit which will flow on form it is really exciting for us, – very pleased to be here to rt you from a regional city point of view and we will be with you all the way, please take us along for the ride,” Cr Houlihan said.

In answer to a question from Dr Bygrave, Cr Houlihan talked about the present poor public transport service to and from Shepparton and explored the massive benefits of a fast train to many in the community.

We should be concerned about limiting growth, not just closing roads

An idea beyond the comprehension of most never really found its way into the discussion at last week’s public meeting about the closure of Shepparton’s Andrew Fairley Avenue.

The Limits to Growth"
by Donella Meadows.

In our modern business world efficiency mostly equates with growth for it is through those improved processes that profits are further boosted.

The idea of efficiency/growth is good was never questioned for viewed through the prism of most, it is revered ground and to think otherwise brings only scorn.

Efficiency/growth is not necessarily a good thing and to close a public space in the furtherance of its name is simply the wrong thing to do.

Consistent growth in a finite world is statistically impossible as unequivocally explained by Donella Meadows in her 1972 book, “Limits to Growth”, published by the Club of Rome.

About 200 people listened as the SPC Ardmona’s chief financial officer, Mr James Harvey, explained why the company needed exclusive use of the avenue; then to the Mayor of the City of Greater, Cr Jenny Houlihan, who talked about why, how and what processes the council had followed to reach its present position; and then the president of the Greater Shepparton Better Local Government Association, Mr Gordon Hamilton, talked about why his group opposed the road closure proposal.

Questions and discussed ensured, frequently damning the probity and processes of the city council, along with suggestion from a few of a conspiracy between SPC Ardmona and city council.

Sadly the idea that both organizations, along with the community, needed to settle on a future not aligned with efficiency and growth was never discussed.

Yes, we need efficiency, but not of the type that produces only profit, rather we need a style of efficiency that will ensure the resilience of this community as the world steps into an energy-depleted future, a future that science has shown will be hotter, drier and decidedly different from the energy-rich post World War Two decades.

Success in the future for this community, and all others on the planet, will hinge on what is known as ‘localism” – that is the turning inward of all villages, towns and cities to ensure they provide for themselves, wherever possible, all their food, energy and other critical needs.

Last week’s meeting uncovered a restlessness for here was something many saw as unnecessary, something that could be resolved with innovative thinking and something in which the benefit was not worth the cost.

Importantly, we are headed for even more interesting times for the realities described by Meadows in her Club of Rome book once hidden beyond the horizon are now in full view.

Rather than gathering at public meetings to discuss the closure of one road, we should be meeting to talk about building resilience and adaptation.

Civility and maturity are inexticably linked

Civil conversation and maturity are inextricably linked.

Language and its use, indicates something about the user’s wisdom.

That being true, Wednesday’s public meeting to discuss the proposed closure of Shepparton’s Andrew Fairley Avenue was civil, wise, and a sea of good sense.

From the chairman, former councillor and public thinker, John Gray, right through to the fork-lift driver who welcomed the closure, there was an admirable degree of decency.

Civility springs obviously from maturity, but Wednesday’s meeting had another ingredient, the little something extra that ensured it was rooted in the common man’s experience, and so wisdom borne of familiarity.

The meeting, called in response to a decision made at the March meeting of the City of Greater Shepparton, was held using a trestle table and chairs set out in a space usually occupied by buses at Ford’s Shepparton Bus Services Depot in the heart of the city’s industrial area.

The meeting’s reason for objecting to the avenue’s closure was articulated by the environment in which it was held – the road’s closure would dramatically increase costs and difficulties for the bus company – a sentiment reflected by nearly all at the meeting.

It was obvious that all at Wednesday’s meeting agreed that the community needed to stand with SPC Ardmona as it confronted competition from around the world, but most were concerned, and rightly so, that public space it seeks is precious and once sold to a private enterprise, it is lost forever.

Most thought that innovative planning and thinking could see the company retain, and improve on its competitiveness and the community retain its use of the avenue.

Although never mentioned, there appeared to be a status quo-style of thinking that aligned most at the meeting with the business as usual paradigm; a model that has, in the minds of many, taken the world down a dead-end street.

Wednesday night’s warm example of civility will be needed on a hitherto unseen scale as our community wrestles with a collision of circumstances, such as energy and resource depletion, an injured atmosphere, economic disarray and a burgeoning population.

Wisdom and resilience will be in high demand and rather than limping toward a solution that is about continuing what we have done for centuries and has not only seriously disrupted earth’s ecosystem, gouged the planet’s finite and irreplaceable resources, but has brought down a pervasive and alarming inequality, we need to do it differently.

The modern world is responsible for many good things, but accounts for the cost are coming and an even cursory examination of world events suggest we have to change our ways.

It is right and proper to protect the sovereignty of Andrew Fairley Avenue, but it should be just the beginning of a civil and mature conversation to protect what is public from private enterprise.