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ACT deputy opposition leader Alistair Coe. Photo: Jay Cronan

An administrative tribunal challenge to freedom of information charges brought by ACT deputy opposition leader Alistair Coe will begin this week, as he seeks information on profits made by the Labor Party from changing the status on the lease of a Weston Creek club.

In August, bureaucrats from the ACT Environment and Planning Directorate asked the Liberal opposition to pay $2087 for the release of documents about the Weston Creek Labor Club, citing the need for 65 hours of work to collate information.

The charge included provision for nearly 29 hours to deciding what could be released, at a cost of $614.56.

Locating the required documents would take public servants 36 hours and cost $376.62, as well as charges of $1096 for photocopying.

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Mr Coe applied to the ACT Civil and Administrative Tribunal for the cost decision by the directorate's deputy director-general to be reviewed, arguing the release of the information was in the public interest.

He had previously sought for the fees to be waived by the directorate in keeping with long-standing convention that members of parliament are not charged for freedom of information requests.

The matter has been listed for consideration at a directions hearing on Wednesday.

Debate about concessional leases resumed in the ACT after a tribunal challenge over the Canberra Raiders' planned redevelopment of asite adjacent to Northbourne Oval in Braddon.

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Canberra Liberals challenge costs decision on Labor club FoI request

October 9, 2014|10:05 am

A protester dressed as a copy of the Bible joins groups demonstrating outside the U.S. Supreme Court in Washington June 30, 2014.

"Why do so many liberals despise Christianity?" liberal columnist Damon Linker pondered Wednesday.

In citing two recent examples, Linker was not writing about despising Christians, although that could be part of it, but despising Christianity as a belief system.

In the first example, Brian Palmer wrotefor Slate, a liberal news website, about the discomfort he feels over the fact that missionary doctors are helping people in developing nations, motivated by their Christian faith. Palmer believes that their medical work should be separate from their religion, even though they are engaged in the medical work, at great personal sacrifice, because of their religion.

Palmer's distaste for religion leads him, Linker wrote, to an illiberal notion of separating religion from health care.

In the second example, Gordon College, a Christian college in Massachusetts, is being investigated by its accreditation agency for upholding a Christian understanding of sexuality. More specifically, it forbids homosexual practice. (It also forbids all sexual activity outside of marriage, and those with same-sex attraction are welcomed to be part of the Gordon College community.)

"The accreditation board is not so much objecting to the college's treatment of gays as it is rejecting the legitimacy of its devoutly Christian sexual beliefs," Linker wrote.

Linker is a former conservative. He previously edited First Things, a conservative Catholic magazine. After rejecting conservatism and becoming a liberal, he wrote The Theocons: Secular America Under Siegein 2007, a book critical of the Christian Right.

Many of his recent articles have dealt with the recent trend of illiberal liberals, or, as he wrote in July, "how liberalism became an intolerant dogma."

Excerpt from:
Do Liberals Really Despise Christianity?

The Napthine Government has been reliant on balance-of-power MP Geoff Shaw. Picture: CHRIS SCOTT Source: News Limited

THE State Government is set to dump more than 20 pieces of legislation it had committed to deliver, including a Bill to strengthen child protection, and laws it promised as part of the Governments response to the child abuse inquiry.

With only three sitting days left before the election, the Government will enter the final sitting week with more than 40 pieces of outstanding legislation on the notice paper of both houses.

The Government hopes to pass more than 10 Bills this week, but will be limited to two days of debate.

In the last sitting week of 2010 the Brumby Government had seven Bills on the list to be debated.

Among the legislation set to be dumped is a Bill which paves the way for the old Melbourne Market site to be handed over to the construction company building the East West Link tollway, which could further delay the project.

Laws to ban synthetic drugs and a Bill to improve the conduct of councillors spruiked by the government as some of the most significant reforms to local government in 20 years will also be binned.

And in a bizarre move, more legislation will be introduced on Tuesday to the already bulging legislative agenda.

Government spokesman Mark Lee said the government would bring forward priority Bills and other legislation would be reintroduced if the Government is re-elected.

The ditched Bills. Source: News Corp Australia

The rest is here:
Liberals ditch 20 Bills in legislation backflip

Rush Limbaugh: Obama / Liberals Want Ebola to Spread to Punish Whites!
Rush Limbaugh believes that President Obama and liberals want Ebola to spread in the United States to punish whites for slavery... This clip from the Majority Report, live M-F at 12 noon EST...

By: Sam Seder

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Rush Limbaugh: Obama / Liberals Want Ebola to Spread to Punish Whites! - Video

ABC Prime Minister Tony Abbott addresses Tasmanian Liberal Party delegates in Launceston

Tasmania is a better state than its poor performance on key economic and social indicators suggests, Prime Minister Tony Abbott has told delegates at a Liberal Party meeting in Launceston.

Mr Abbott has used his keynote speech at the annual state council of the Tasmanian branch of the Liberal Party to pledge a turn-around in the state's economic fortunes.

The Liberals are meeting to review their policy platform and take stock after successful state and federal election campaigns.

It is the first time since 1982 the Liberals have held a state council while holding a majority of seats in both State and Federal Parliament.

Mr Abbott told a gathering of about 200 delegates at Launceston's Hotel Grand Chancellor on Saturday that confidence in Tasmania's prospects was increasing.

"Tasmania has to be an economy as well as a national park," he said.

"Everything this government is doing in Hobart, everything my government is doing in Canberra, is designed to give the people of Tasmania the strong and prosperous future that you want and you deserve.

"For too long you've had our nation's highest unemployment, our nation's lowest gross domestic product per person, our nation's lowest life expectancy, and our nation's lowest educational attainment.

"I know you are better than that, and I know that under good government you will be better than that," he told party members.

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Tasmanian Liberals rethink Hare-Clark electoral system at state conference