Thursday, October 10, 2013

The British government have rejected a proposed plan for press self-regulation from a group of newspaper publishers and have said they intend to proceed with a Royal Charter supported by the three main political parties. The culture secretary Maria Miller said Tuesday in the House of Commons the proposal by the newspaper industry failed to implement fundamental parts of the recommendations of the Leveson Inquiry into behaviour and ethical standards of the press last year.

Miller announced the final draft of the Charter will become availble on Friday following revisions by the political parties, and will be discussed by the Privy Council on October 30. The proposals offered by the newspapers and the government differ on implementation details on the regulator that would replace the Press Complaints Commission. The newspapers wish to allow former editors of newspapers to serve on the “recognition panel” which would supervise the operation of the regulator while the government wishes to forbid former editors. The government wish to prevent serving newspaper editors from being on the appointments committee for the regulator while the press proposal seeks to require one of the four members of the committee to represent the press industry.

The government proposal seeks to make it so the Royal Charter can be amended by Parliament, with a two-thirds majority from both houses, while the press proposal gives industry trade bodies a say on changes to the Charter. In both proposals, an arbitration service would be provided as an alternative to going to court, but the government wishes to make the arbitration service free for claimants while the newspapers want it to be “inexpensive” because they believe free arbitration could lead to a rush in claims going to arbitration. Both proposals would allow the regulator to fine the industry up to £1 million and demand the prominent publication of corrections and apologies to news stories.

The Hacked Off campaign welcomed the rejection of the industry proposals. A spokesman described the proposals as “a wrecking manouevre by unrepentant sections of the press trying to avoid accountability and carry on with a broken system of press regulation” but condemned the delays in implementation: “Ten months after the publication of the Leveson Report and seven months after all parties in parliament endorsed its recommendations in a Royal Charter, there can be no legitimate excuse for yet another delay.”

Hacked Off was formed following the revelations in 2011 that journalists working for the Sunday tabloid News of the World hacked into the voicemail of murdered schoolgirl Milly Dowler.

The newspaper industry continue to express concern regarding the proposals. Trevor Kavanagh, a columnist for the Sun, said that the “major issue here is keeping the freedom of the press out of the sticky fingers of the politicians who want to control it”.

Kirsty Hughes from Index on Censorship said: “Establishing press regulation by royal charter could allow politicians to interfere in press regulation and threaten media freedom in the UK.”

Movie actor Hugh Grant, a director of Hacked Off, rejected criticism of the charter from the press, arguing the press object to the system because “when the press gets things wrong and harms people unfairly, the charter system will give those people a much better chance of redress. It will provide free or at least very cheap arbitration, instead of requiring people whose rights have been breached to pay mountainous high court legal bills. And it will provide a free, independent complaints service in the case of breaches of the industry code of standards.”

Grant goes on to argue that the press have attempted to reform the “old, discredited” Press Complaints Commission which Lord Leveson had found not fit for purpose. Instead, he argues, the press should welcome the new regulator as a protection from libel as joining in means “their journalists will have better protection from legal bullying by corporations and oligarchs. Because litigants are pushed towards cheap arbitration it will no longer be possible for the very wealthy to gag reporters simply by threatening high court actions. The court costs would fall to the libel bully.”

Sunday, June 11, 2006

Australia’s justice minister, Chris Ellison has said that the Australian federal cabinet did not consider security issues when it decided to setup an inquiry into nuclear power.

Speaking to the Nine Network, Senator Ellison said when considering energy, security concerns are not an issue. “When you look at sources of energy you don’t look at any potential terrorist threat,” he said.

The justice minister said that cabinet discussed measures for protecting crucial infrastructure but denies that a nuclear power station is any more of a target than the electricity grid or rail system.

Senator Ellison said that restricting the country’s use on nuclear power because of the threat of terrorism was giving in to terrorists. “Energy sources are very important for the future of any community and I think we’re not about to be stymied or restricted in that approach because of any threat of terrorism,”

“I mean, we’re going to continue living in the way we do. Once we change that, the terrorists win,” he said.

Leader of the Australian Greens Bob Brown says that the failure to consider security implications associated with nuclear power generation is “daft”.

Senator Brown accused the government of failing to consider the possibility of nuclear material becoming available to terrorists. “It’s daft to say the least and it’s really pig-ignorant of the dangers of nuclear material coming into the hands of terrorists,” he said.

Senator Brown said he is concerned that the move encourages Indonesia, a country that he claims to have a terrorist problem to build nuclear reactors. “The Government doesn’t understand that their paving the way for nuclear enrichment or reactors in Australia encourages Indonesia, which has plans for up to 12 nuclear reactors and which the Government knows has real problems with terrorism.”

The Greens leader said that there is a possibility a nuclear reactor could become a terrorist target. “It does make the threat of terrorists getting nuclear materials or targeting a reactor real, and it must be a consideration for any inquiry,” he said.

The opposition has also raised concerns about security risks associated with nuclear energy. Stephen Smith said, “We don’t think that the economics are there for nuclear power stations in Australia, let alone the national security risks that go with that and the waste disposal risks that go with that.”

Thursday, March 21, 2013

Anonymous people submitted a video depicting employees of Inghams Enterprises, an Australian poultry producer, to Animal Liberation. The video displays animal cruelty at an Inghams plant in Tahmoor, Macarthur Region, south-west of Sydney. The video was recorded without the employees’ knowledge over a two-week period in February. Animal Liberation maintains that the footage is legitimate.

Spokesperson for Animal Liberation Emma Hurst stated to Sydney Morning Herald, “You can see a total disrespect of these animals. There are scenes where they’ve put the music up very, very loud, the workers are screaming, jumping about, dancing, picking up the turkeys, dancing while holding onto the turkeys, throwing them onto the shackles, and just that whole mentality as though these animals don’t have feelings, that they’re objects.”

Using CCTV, over 140 hours were recorded, depicting 136 incidences of animal cruelty as well as aggravated animal cruelty, resulting in the animals’ death or severe conditions. Ms. Hurst said, “Hanging upside down, their legs are already brittle, and we’ve got footage as well where their legs have actually ripped off from their bodies … and the legs have been tossed around.”

Animal Liberation and the Royal Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals (RSPCA) are again calling for the mandatory installation of CCTV cameras in all Australian abattoirs. RSPCA New South Wales chief inspector David O’Shannessy told the ABC that surveillance and inspections of abattoirs should be commonplace in Australia. “The CCTV would certainly send a strong signal to those people working with animals that their welfare is of the highest priority.”

Inghams CEO Kevin McBain released a statement saying that an investigation had been launched into the “intolerable incidents”. “We condemn the animal abuse we have seen in the footage and will — as a matter of urgency — work to review, retrain and reinforce our animal welfare standards throughout our organisation”

The New South Wales Police and the New South Wales Food Authority are continuing to investigate the video.

Saturday, October 3, 2009

The United States continues to implement new trade barriers; the most recent tariffs emerged on Wednesday, targeting solar panels imported from China.

The new tariff is a result of a query submitted in December 2008 by GES USA, an American solar company. The resultant inquiry sought to clarify tariffs levied on solar panels imported from China, imports which, for nearly two decades, were considered a duty-free commodity.

In early January, U.S. Customs officials reportedly informed the company that the solar panels contained electronic devices that place the panels in the electric generator import category which is subject to a 2.5% import tariff. Specifically, the ruling cited the presence of diodes on the solar panels as evidence of electric generation and hence they must be treated as an electric generator. Small solar panels already incur a 3.9% tariff. The January decision was made by a U.S. trade specialist whose rulings can be overturned.

The tariffs will be levied on imported panels that provide electricity for all uses. Additionally, tariffs will be collected dating from the beginning of 2009. The Solar Energy Industries Association estimates that the accumulated tariffs from this year may total more than US$ 70 million. This week’s tariff revelation caught many industry leaders off-guard and yesterday the Solar Industries Association moved to block the tariff. The Association president, Rhone Resch, stated “… We’re taking it [the tariff] very seriously and we will be responding. … The industry is in the process of preparing a challenge”. The Association intends to file their appeal with senior U.S. Customs officials who have the option to overrule the decision to implement the tariff. However, if the officials do not revoke the tariff, then the case must go before the U.S. Court of International Trade.

The U.S. amount spent on imported solar panels roughly matches the income from exported panels; US$ 605 million imported versus US$ 555 million exported, according to the Commerce Department figures on the first seven months of this year. Major solar panel importers have already begun to move their operations to the U.S.