Health care has ranked as one of the key issues in every recent Australian election. Post-election surveys indicate that Labor has done best when it presents a clear and distinctive reform message, including firm support for universal access to Medicare.
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Monthly Archives:: September 2005
Is it safe to be sick?
Professor George Rubin and Professor Steven Leeder ask what progress have we made to ensure that our hospitals do not kill us
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Using consumer power to stop the IR ‘race to the bottom’
The proposed changes to Industrial Relations legislation have understandably caused confusion and uncertainty in sections of the community. Chief among the concerns are that without adequate protection, workers will be forced to negotiate conditions away in order to obtain or retain employment. Some business people have also expressed concerns that workers’ rights will be eroded as businesses are forced into a race-to-the-bottom in order to remain competitive with the ‘guy down the street’.
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What Are Human Rights?
People talk a lot about 'rights' these days. The language of rights is powerful because it implies a minimum standard that marks a boundary between what is acceptable and unacceptable in society.
But people have been talking about rights in one way or another since at least the time of the Ancient Greeks. We can trace philosophical dialogues about the nature of rights back to at least 500 BC.
A Crude Diet Might Lead to Gas
Noel Child believes beating the crude oil habit may well require ‘cold turkey’ therapy of an immediate and substantial shift to alternative fuels and technologies
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Health: Did you know?
Did you know…
That in their recent submission to the Senate Select Committee on Mental Health, the AMA listed mental health as one of the ‘two weakest links in the Australian health care system’, the other being indigenous health?
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Wayward Reform: Voluntary Student Unionism
Michael Richardson acknowledges that not all student organisations are perfect but explains why the federal government's proposed Voluntary Student Unionism Legislation goes too far more
Values, not markets
Ian McAuley writes, 'When politicians in the major parties do attend to the citizens, it is in the way of the marketing executive, determined to sustain or gain market share. The marketing executive offers trinkets such as cash-back vouchers and extended credit terms, supported by glitzy advertising.' more
Australia and the World: Healthy, Wealthy and Unwise
Jane Caro writes, 'Generosity by the West, by rich countries like Australia, particularly in the areas of health and education, will do more to help our long-term security than all the Australian Federal Police in the world.' more