Greetings Minister, I write to you concerning fairness and in your capacity as Minister for Local Government.
I note with keen interest your recent moves in order to legislate for increased powers to local councils. Examples that come to mind include compulsory voting for members of the third tier of government and allowing councils (apparently the arbiters of neat and tidy) to issue Infringement/Abatement notices when they deem properties to be dilapidated. You will recall headlines informing your loyal subjects of the possibility of fines in the order of $390 for the heinous ‘crime’ of having a car body in the front yard.
You made a statement about there being a right of appeal against any adverse decision by council on the matter of car bodies and dilapidated dwellings. Now most of the folk that I know think that’s a tiny bit disingenuous of you, given that no one can remember the last time anyone won any appeal against any council unless they ran the gauntlet of the RMPAT and that’s a lottery at best. The old saying that goes something like “you can’t fight city hall” is pretty much right, in my opinion.
Now you and your good mate AG Wightman have been, of late, churning out the legislation like a steam train. Things like the dangerous dog law that can see you jailed for 21 years. I mean why use a dangerous dog when you’d be better off committing manslaughter with a knife (that’s good for 12 years only) but I digress.
Since when did councils become the judge of dilapidated vs rustic, vehicle restoration vs abandoned car body, lawn vs grassland? Do you think it fair and just that citizens without access to their back yard cannot keep a restoration project (car body on their front lawn)? Is it right that native animals can no longer feed and seek sanctuary from roaming cats in the long grass at my place because the council has issued me with an Abatement Notice? Meanwhile roadside verges and reserves (council responsibility) remain high and dry as a vector for bush fires. Not down here but, because during the January bush fire crisis that’s exactly the way the fire moved in places. A very expensive hazard reduction burn but OK now because there’s not much left to combust!
As an aside how is AG Wightman going with the cat legislation? Those filthy little critters continue to decimate native birds, bandicoots. potaroos, blue tongue lizards, skinks etc on my suburban (rural, third world really) 465 square metre block, and the poor buggers that aren’t killed or mauled get to die an agonising death due to toxoplasmosis from cat poo. Cats also wreck my veggie garden but I’ve strayed off topic, again!
Let me give you an example of the injustice that’s being wrought on the poor in Tasmania. A citizen gets pinged by council for the Morris Minor body in the front yard. He appeals. Appeal denied. Kaaaching $390 thank you. He’s poor (income sub $20,000) and there’s a $700 Aurora bill, $350 quarterly rates bill (overdue), the kid’s school fees are due, the missus just lost her job, and he’s expecting the rego’ bill for the Commodore any day now. The Infringement Notice ($390 remember) goes to the bottom of the pile or perhaps he takes the family for an extended overseas tropical holiday and forgets about it!
Either way the Infringement Notice goes unpaid (a whole fortnight) before it’s flicked over to the Fines Collection/Recovery Unit (or whatever it’s called this week) and Kaaaaching it’s now ‘worth’ about $510. Our friend, wanting to do the right thing heads down to Service Tasmania in order to pay rego’ on the Commodore. Imagine his surprise when he’s told that he must clear the outstanding $510 before the Commodore gets rego’. And so, he uses the car, gets caught, gets fined, probably now looking at a debt to the state of well in excess of $1000, still got the other ‘cost of living’ bills, trouble with the police and his world (and that of his family) has just turned to sh*t.
Amusing eh? But you shouldn’t laugh. You and your driver pass by these people’s houses every day and while they are living out their lives in quiet desperation, and possibly resorting to crime, you and your mates on the hill are doing VERY NICELY. They work hard too Bryan, it’s just that government imposed costs are sinking them and there’s no lifeboat in sight.
Now do you see where I’m going with all of this. The system is totally stacked against the individual. The resources, processes and might of the state are all designed, approved and run by the state and are designed to render the individual almost powerless and broke.
Therefore I have some suggestions, below, that are designed to redress the ‘balance’ in some small ways.
An immediate cut of say 15% for all fees, charges, fines. tariffs, licences, applications, transfers, duties, utility charges etc . Remember, they’re not revenue raisers, they’re punishment.
A process that links politician’s pay rises to reductions in the areas described immediately above. For example, if you get a 10% ( yeah pretty miserable, I know) pay rise awarded by the ‘independent’ body and with no conditions trade-offs, productivity requirements, unrealistic KPIs etc, then we get a 10% reduction in costs.
A scheme whereby folk can work-off fines through work at the level of the fine, For example, a state government fine gets worked-off in a state government area (polishing and detailing your car maybe), and council fines could involve picking up litter along municipal roads or cleaning council chamber windows. Now I’m suggesting a fine pay back rate linked to politicians pay rates. A $390 fine should be expunged by around morning tea time on day one.
A legislated QUID PRO QUO SCHEME whereby if council (the lawn police) issues me an Abatement Notice to cut my long grass (all 36 square metres) and I don’t comply, and they then send in a contractor (effectively allowing any bastard access to MY PROPERTY), then charge me the $600 recovery cost, then I should have a similar right to issue them with a CITIZENS ABATEMENT NOTICE (CAN) and with regard to council’s own roadside/reserve/whatever long grass. Failure, by council, to act within the specified period on the notice would see me authorised to enter and remain on their patch for so long as necessary in order to ameliorate the aforementioned hazard and send them the bill. Again I’m thinking of about $170 per hour. Council’s failure to pay me and within a fortnight would see the matter referred to the Fines Collection/Recovery Unit and council would be unable to do any statutory stuff requiring payment of fees etc until the amount is cleared. Council would, in effect, be CANNED. Now AG Wightman should, with his virtually unlimited resources and in his current legislative frenzy, be able to knock this one off before the inevitable happens in March next year.
A sliding scale of fines. Who gets burned baddest with a state/council fine? The chap on $180,000 or the guy on $20,000 and, yes I know it’s the poor persons fault because he’s poor. There are so many well paying jobs around at the moment, anyone can get one if they try. If fines are meant to be a deterrent (we should not think of them as revenue raising, remember) then for the rich they sting, for the poor they can be catastrophic! I keep saying “remember” because someone told me the joke about politicians being like goldfish, you know, one lap around the bowl and when they arrive it’s all new again and the trip forgotten. Pretty funny even if it’s not true. AG Wightman may need to investigate the asset/income hiding tricks of corporate criminals and those with smart accountants. Good luck with that one.
In order to protect us from legislation overload and to protect the ever diminishing freedoms that we enjoy then I propose a TWO FOR ONE RULE wherein for every new piece of legislation that makes it onto the ‘books’ then immediately two pieces are retired (for good).
Bring back .08 for us aged experienced drivers. DUI at .05 is a joke, you know that because you’ve been there already.
Depower councils, they can’t use the power, responsibly and equitably, that they have already, Empower citizens. In fact use that rule in any state or council sphere. We know what we’re doing. We put you there didn’t we? Oh dear I’ve just shot myself in the foot.
Now in the fight, government against citizen, the odds are totally stacked against the citizen and you know that’s true. Not for us the mere mortals, the luxury of a small army of advisers, minders, legal experts, funded fact finding holidays (sorry missions), money, power, armaments, everything. My suggestion, to address the imbalance, is THE CITIZENS BUREAU (TCB) organised by us, staffed by us and paid for by you lot (yep, us again). We would have accommodation, free and immediate FOI access, yep even to cabinet papers so that we can see what governments got cooking for us. I mean why does cabinet need more than a week to ‘consider’ the “warts and all” Bushfire Inquiry Report before its release to the peasants? Would that be so that an army of bureaucrats have time to prepare briefs, legal opinion, excuses etc. I mean we paid for the report and we demand it ASAP. Again I digress. Back to the TCB, we’ll need vehicles (self drive not chauffeured), a library, dining room. We will need the facility to bring stuff to parliament, initiate referenda (CITIZEN INITIATED REFERENDA), and so on.
I recognise that our elected members have the right to stuff things up, move into non-mandated agenda etc but 3 to 4 years without any real say (beyond bleating) is not fair, hence the TCB. If you guys can create QUANGOS with ease then the TCB should be a snack. Take start-up and on-going costs from the $28 million (annually and indexed) from the gambling, sorry, horse racing industry. They don’t have too many champions getting around at the moment. Sell Spreyton racetrack, it’s in good nick and practically unused, and recover the $12 million, TCB will load up the petty cash tin with that. We plan to employ Saul Eslake (a good Tassie boy from up your way) because we think he has the smarts necessary to pull us out of the hole created by your lot.
The TCB already has a legislative agenda that includes, but is not restricted to, establishment of a hemp industry, decriminalising cannabis for personal use, alcohol advertising and distribution controls, relaxing gun laws, establishment of a coast guard, free ferries for locals, no toxic dump at Copping, fracking for gas near your ‘shack’ up at the lakes etc. You guys are doing a great job of homosexual marriage and dying with dignity so you can keep those.
I’d like to go on but I’m tired and I need the energy to think about how I’m going to pay my Hydro bill.
Although this missive may appear irreverant and/or flippant I am deadly serious. Your early reply to the questions above, and comments on my suggestions would be appreciated.
I wish you good health and good luck.
