Moderators: Alyrium Denryle, Edi, K. A. Pital
Thanks for the hot tip? The city already smelled like mangroves so...Broomstick wrote:Normal except for the clean. That will take awhile and be messy. And expensive.
Can you give an example of old vs modern Queensland architecture?weemadando wrote:Well, at least there's plenty of water to hose everything down with now.Broomstick wrote:Normal except for the clean. That will take awhile and be messy. And expensive.
I wonder how many people just realised what the old Queenslander house design was actually good for? In addition to looking great and being a nice place to sit and watch the slaves cut sugar cane...
SYDNEY (AFP) – Australian Prime Minister Julia Gillard has raised the prospect of a one-off levy on taxpayers to pay for rebuilding after epic floods, as she refused to back away from bringing the budget to surplus.
Crops, roads and railway lines were washed away and thousands of homes destroyed by vast floods which swamped northeast Australia this month in what the government has said could be the nation's most costly natural disaster.
Gillard said difficult decisions lay ahead as the government rebuilds devastated Queensland state but recommitted herself to bringing the budget back into surplus in 2012-2013.
"There will be spending cutbacks and there may also be a levy," Gillard told ABC Television on Thursday.
"I am working on those decisions now and when I'm able to I will announce them at the appropriate time. We obviously have more work to do, we don't have the total damage bill yet."
Gillard warned that the flood devastation, which economists say could have caused $20 billion in damage, may result in higher food prices and hurt GDP but insisted the mining-driven economy was resilient.
"We've got to remember our economy is strong with a large pipeline of investment coming through," she said.
"That means by 2012-13 our economy will be running hot and when your economy's running hot that's the right time to be having a budget surplus and saving for the future."
The opposition attacked the idea of a flood levy, saying it was an unnecessary tax and called on Gillard to rein in "out-of-control government spending".
"There will have to be very substantial Commonwealth government spending as part of the recovery and reconstruction, phase but there's a right way and a wrong way to find that money," opposition leader Tony Abbott said.
Isn't the budget projected to be in surplus by 1012-13? How can that be deemed "out-of-control"? Oh wait, I forgot, this is the Liberal Party talking. Spending on infrastructure bad. Tax cuts to buy votes good.The opposition attacked the idea of a flood levy, saying it was an unnecessary tax and called on Gillard to rein in "out-of-control government spending".
Huh? They were told a decade ago that keeping the damn at max supply level (ie about 40% of dam capacity) as a matter of course was a bad idea and reduced the flood mitigation ability of Wivenhoe.Broomstick wrote:I thought that the floods that recently happened were twice the volume/extent predicted by anyone - if the Queensland government built in accordance with the worst-case projections but it still wasn't sufficient that is not the fault of the government. That is a failing of predictive ability, which is inherently imperfect.
In other words, if these floods were of unforeseeable extent then the government is not at fault.
This would be in contrast to what happened in New Orleans during Katrina, where there had been multiple warnings that the flood control/hurricane systems and multiple calls to improve the system prior to all hell breaking loose.
However, I do not feel I can make a definitive statement in regards to the preparedness of the Queensland government. Does anyone have sufficient factual information to determine that?
Yes, so much easier to howl that it's someone's fault when really it's a matter of the unforeseen. With the impending climate change it would not surprise me one bit to this sort of protesting happening on a regular basis in the future.Chris OFarrell wrote:I mean you can argue 'but they should have been emptying the water storage as WELL to create more capacity!' but honestly, they used the Dam exactly as it was designed, and because of that, the damage to Brisbane was a hell of a lot less then it would have been if the Dam was not there. Its like that Futurarma episode with that massive oil tanker and its 5000 hulls, and when they are all breached, Fry starts screaming 'The Fools! When will they build a tanker with five thousand and ONE hulls?!'
I'm assuming that one damn alone wasn't the full extent of Brisbane-and-area's flood control - how did the rest of the system perform?The Dam was ultimately run exactly as it was designed and did its job well, a HELL of a lot more damage to Brisbane would have been done without it in place, WAY beyond the 1974 floods in area, and vastly beyond it in property damage.
This is all true (especially given the drought and limited water supply etc) but there's a LOT of finger pointing going on, and some engineer telling council to keep the dam level lower (below '100% supply') to enhance flood protection is making a lot of people look bad - and so is shit like this. Its just sad that people are seriously saying the dam engineers were wrong to release water when it looked like the dam would overflow and totally fuck the city. No gratitude for professionals in difficult situtations.Chris OFarrell wrote:Correct me if I'm wrong, but wasn't Wivenhoe Dam designed with roughly 50% of its total capacity for water storage, and 50% beyond that for flood mitigation measures?
And they did EXACTLY that with the dam? Kept the levels of water in it at 50% at maximum, and this is coming off something like 7 years of drought when water total supplies went down to 10% mind you, and only used the extra capacity when the floods happened to mitigate it?
I mean you can argue 'but they should have been emptying the water storage as WELL to create more capacity!' but honestly, they used the Dam exactly as it was designed, and because of that, the damage to Brisbane was a hell of a lot less then it would have been if the Dam was not there. Its like that Futurarma episode with that massive oil tanker and its 5000 hulls, and when they are all breached, Fry starts screaming 'The Fools! When will they build a tanker with five thousand and ONE hulls?!'
The Dam was ultimately run exactly as it was designed and did its job well, a HELL of a lot more damage to Brisbane would have been done without it in place, WAY beyond the 1974 floods in area, and vastly beyond it in property damage. If they need to look in the future at bigger initial releases that cut into its drinking water supply as well to make 'more room' will be looked at in the commission going on, but its perfectly understandable why after years of worry about running OUT of water why they might have hesitated for that 12 hour window they had to simply flush a big chunk of the water supply down the river. But they'll have to look at that in detail; they simply followed procedure to the letter.
Oh and Tony Abbot is a complete moron, but we all know THAT.
You're such an asshole most of the time I usually don't bother reading your posts, but since you posted something of actual substance I'll go back and check it out. Thanks.Stark wrote:Hey Broomstick, I posted links and statistics about how the dam system performed last page. Did you miss it?
Broomstick wrote:You're such an asshole most of the time I usually don't bother reading your posts, but since you posted something of actual substance I'll go back and check it out. Thanks.
State's in Australia have a very close link to their capital city and actually have a major part of running the entire "city"'s long term goals. A good example is the Perth City in Western Australia is a larger geographically area than "City of Perth". The "City of Perth" is basicly the CBD and surrounding area, while Perth City is the entire region which "Perth" covers, which includes a few dozen shires & towns.Phantasee wrote:How does your city council work? I see you have an actual Council Opposition?
If there was gross mismanagement it would be on the State government of Queensland. The idea of a tax was floated by the Federal government, and even then its not confirmed. Its just something they will consider.Chardok wrote:
This seems....wrong. One COULD make the case that it was the governments failings that contributed to the seriousness of the floods and the populace shouldn't have to pay a tax on their stupidity and lack of foresight (and apparently gross mismanagement) Maybe I'm way off base here, but it seems like there should be other ways a country can recover from something like this outside of forcing it's citizens to fork over (even more) money.
Already the bitching begins (if you read the comments). Blah blah blah blah blah. What, can't they afford $5 a week? And since I am in a higher income group I will be slugged more, but whatever. We are a Federation so we have to support those who have been hit. Oh, I already donated $200 to the flood victims. So the whiners who aren't affected by the floods can STFU. Maybe if they budgeted better they won't be struggling with an extra $5 a week. My god, the sky is falling.INCREASING taxes to pay for the huge flood damage bill is a "dumb idea" when Australians are already struggling with flood-related price rises, the Coalition says.
Julia Gillard is set to announce tomorrow that Australians will pay a one-off levy to raise $3.5 billion for the flood recovery. It is understood the favoured option is to increase the existing 1.5 per cent Medicare Levy.
However, Joe Hockey, the Opposition Treasury spokesman, said it was absurd that the Prime Minister was asking Australians to donate to the flood relief fund and planning to raise taxes, The Australian reports.
"What's even worse is that flood victims will have to pay this levy, they have been affected by the floods and then they are now going to have to pay the levy," he said.
Ms Gillard and senior ministers, including her deputy and Treasurer Wayne Swan, Infrastructure Minister Anthony Albanese and Finance Minister Penny Wong, met yesterday to sign off on the new levy.
While government sources remain tight-lipped about the level of any increase, it is understood ministers are keen to keep the rise as small as possible and for it to be accompanied by significant savings from scrapping or deferring billions of dollars worth of spending proposals.
One suggestion is that the increase would be 0.5 per cent or less, which would take the current Medicare Levy to 2 per cent or below.
If it was 0.5 per cent, it would cost an average salary earner about $5 a week and give the Government just under $3.5 billion in a full year to be spent on rebuilding damaged infrastructure, such as roads, bridges, rail and other essential community amenities.
Applying the increase to the Medicare Levy would mean single taxpayers earning less than $18,488 and couples on $31,196 would be exempt. Each dependent child or student would add $2865 to the threshold.
Mr Swan yesterday made his most forceful case yet for a levy, saying: "The only responsible thing to do is to have all options on the table."
He also said cutting spending could only provide so much.
"In responding to this crisis . . . we will have to make further savings but I don't think the Australian people would want us to respond by hacking into essential expenditure in health or education, sacking teachers or nurses," he said.
Mr Swan said the Government was determined to return the federal Budget to surplus as soon as economic growth returned to normal levels and this was not "some vague objective", but rather "the responsible thing to do".
While the Government expects general community support for a levy, especially in those states hardest hit by the floods, ministers are ready for a fierce political battle with the Opposition, which has been ramping up its rhetoric against "another great big new tax".
Opposition Leader Tony Abbott said the flood costs could be funded by cutting fat in the system, such as scrapping the "cash for clunkers" car scheme, redirecting remaining stimulus money and taking money out of the funds for the National Broadband Network.
Mr Swan criticised the Opposition for "playing politics", which he said the country could not afford.
He said any decision would be discussed with the Opposition and other parties and Independents in Parliament.
"When the Government takes its decisions we will naturally consult with all of the parties in the Parliament, we'll put it forward and we'll have hopefully a very productive and intelligent discussion about what the options before us are."
. On the other hand, a flood damage levy would be increasing the tax burden 
and constitute out of control govmt spending , the destination of which would be... well, stimulating the economy and supporting Australian businesses by "rebuilding damaged infrastructure, such as roads, bridges, rail and other essential community amenities." Maybe Australia should have some kind of big permanent federal disaster fund, which people can donate to early and often, to avoid this sort of debate. 
