Religion & Ethics Australia Daily

A twice-weekly public affairs review from the Centre for Christian Ethics, Morling College

No. 017, 10-13 December 2004  ² edited by Rod Benson

News reports

Aboriginal issues

The Aboriginal parents who struck a deal promising to force their kids to wash in return for community petrol bowsers yesterday delivered a powerful message to political opponents – the plan was literally saving their kids’ lives. Aust 10 Dec 04

John Howard has warmly welcomed proposals to change the system of indigenous communal land holding, as a way of spurring private ownership by Aborigines. Responding to the latest call for radical moves to counter indigenous disadvantage, Howard yesterday advocated “a more entrepreneurial” indigenous culture. SMH 10 Dec 04

Abuse – child

The NSW Department of Community Services has been criticised for its handling of cases that have led to the deaths of children, with the NSW Ombudsman saying its failures cannot simply be put down to a lack of resources. SMH 10 Dec 04

Abuse – sexual

A shocking case of child sexual abuse by two known pedophiles involving the death of a three-year-old boy and the rape of his six-year-old sister has exposed the glaring failings of the NSW child protection regime. One of the men, William Thomas Clare, was sentenced in October to 16 years’ jail for the rape, but no one has yet been charged with her brother’s death. Aust 10 Dec 04

Fighting child sexual abuse required the same coordinated approach used to tackle terrorism, NSW Police Commissioner Ken Moroney said yesterday as his call for a national summit on the issue received growing support. In the past year, reported child abuse cases in NSW had risen by 26 per cent, and in the past 11 months NSW police had dealt with 650 cases involving 130 offenders. Aust 13 Dec 04; see also the leader in the Weekend Aust 11-12 Dec 04

Agriculture

Organic produce was worth $141 million in revenue for farmers last year, with demand often outstripping supply, according to the first detailed government study of the sector. SMH 11-12 Dec 04

Bioethics – stem cells

One of the most heated biotechnology battles in the US and Australia has been the ethical stoush over killing human embryos to obtain stem cells. But you can also take stem cells from adults, and Australia leads the world in research to extract them from young adults and use them to grow body parts. If successful, it will revolutionise the treatment of heart disease, bad bone breaks and some forms of arthritis, writes Robert Gottliebsen. Aust 13 Dec 04

Christmas

Santa’s monopoly on Christmas photography is being challenged by a new player in the Yuletide picture opportunity market the Nativity Photos. Nativity Photos offers children the chance to dress up as Mary, Joseph or the three wise men and be photographed in a life-size nativity setting at St. Paul’s Anglican Cathedral in Melbourne’s CBD. Nativity Photos is the brainchild of Anglican cleric Reverend Howard Langmead of St John’s West Brunswick who wanted to offer an alternative to the man in the red suit with the bag of presents. “The spirit of Christmas isn’t found by sitting on Santa’s lap in shopping mall,” said Langmead. “This way kids can enjoy dressing up but also learn a little about what it was like 2004 years ago.” Media release 13 Dec 04

Consumerism

Shop to your heart’s content: no one cares any more. You might even be saving society. Matt Wade investigates how good greed can be. SMH 10 Dec 04 *

Drugs

Marijuana retains its image of peace and love, despite growing evidence it can unleash severe mental torment – especially among the young. SMH 13 Dec 04 *

Environment

Australian states are looking at forming an emissions trading club with their US counterparts in defiance of the federal government’s refusal to ratify the Kyoto Protocol. AFR 10 Dec 04

Property developers will not have to provide detailed evidence of how the environment and threatened species will be protected under the Carr government’s new plan for almost 80 new suburbs on Sydney’s fringes.

SMH 11-12 Dec 04

Federal Environment Minister Ian Campbell will push for talks on tackling climate change after the Kyoto Protocol era at an international conference in Argentina this week, but the US believes it is too soon to consider what response should succeed the Kyoto Protocol when it expires in eight years’ time. Australia and the US are the only industrialized nations to have refused to sign the agreement to reduce 2008-12 carbon emissions to 5.2 per cent less than 1990 levels. AFR 13 Dec 04

Failure to make rapid and radical changes on global warming would put our civilization at stake, writes new president of the Australian Conservation Foundation, Emeritus Professor Ian Lowe. SMH 13 Dec 04 *

Ethics – business – Australia

Australian Competition and Consumer Commission chief Graeme Samuel yesterday promised further court action against illegal cartels after busting a price-fixing ring in the NSW scrap metal market. Aust 10 Dec 04

In one of the stiffest jail terms handed down for white-collar crime in the past 20 years, a former executive director of Macquarie Bank was sentenced yesterday to seven years’ imprisonment. Robert Geoffrey Walker, 56, had pleaded guilty in the NSW District Court to 21 charges of making misleading statements about investment returns to investors. SMH 10 Dec 04

What started with the departure of one Amcor employee led to the sacking of a chief executive and an investigation that threatens to bust open a nationwide cartel, reports Richard Gluyas. Weekend Aust 11-12 Dec 04

Ethics – politics

John Howard has refused to sack embattled Veterans Affairs Minister De-Anne Kelly despite admitting she had breached his ministerial code of conduct. Mrs Kelly, under fire over her administration of regional grants, admitted yesterday she breached the code by failing to seek a declaration of personal interests from a former staffer, Ken Crooke. Aust 10 Dec 04

Fraud

For some gangs, your credit card number is the main prey. Elizabeth Wynhausen reveals how identity thieves operate. Weekend Aust 11-12 Dec 04

Gambling

Betfair is expected to gain a permanent wagering licence within six months after the federal government refused the racing industry’s last-ditch bid to have the internet-based company banned from operating in Australia. Kerry Packer’s Publishing & Broadcasting Ltd has signed a deal with Betfair said to be worth $30 million. Aust 10 Dec 04

Homosexuality & faith

Regional executive directors of American Baptist Churches have called on member churches to cease ordaining homosexuals and blessing same-sex unions in a plea aimed at bridging differences that could split the 1.5 million-member denomination. EthicsDaily 8 Dec 04

Human trafficking

Keith Windschuttle’s claim that blackbirding is a myth is not new, writes Leisa Scott. But historians disagree on how many South Sea islanders were kidnapped and forced to work on Queensland canefields. Aust 10 Dec 04 *

International relations

Iran is more of a threat than Iraq ever was, but the case for intervention is weak, argues diplomatic and defence editor of The Spectator, Andrew Gilligan. Aust 13 Dec 04

Judiciary

Getting criminals to plead guilty by cutting them a deal may unclog the courts and save a lot of money. But plea bargaining’s good points are lost on the outraged families of the victims of crime. SMH Good Weekend 11 Dec 04

Parenting

Memories are best made from love and bonding, not by pressing the ‘record’ button on the video camera, writes Daniel Donahoo. SMH 10 Dec 04 *

Politics – Australia

Prime Minister John Howard shares the secrets of his political success with Paul Kelly. Weekend Aust Magazine 11-12 Dec 04 *

Poverty

Half the world’s children suffer from poverty, conflict and the scourge of AIDS, the UN Children’s Fund (UNICEF) revealed yesterday in its annual report. Aust 10 Dec 04 *

Racism

Since the death in police custody of his blood brother Cameron Doomadgee, Aboriginal “firebrand” Murrandoo Yanner has outraged white Australia with Malcolm X-style calls for “racist cops” to be bashed and police stations to be burned. Weekend Aust 11-12 Dec 04

Roman Catholic Church – Australia

In a new book, Be Not Afraid: Collected Writings, Sydney’s Catholic Archbishop Cardinal George Pell seems to endorse Manning Clark’s view of Australian civilization as a struggle between Catholicism, Protestantism and the Enlightenment. His objective is to ensure that the Catholic side of the story is not ignored, but most pieces are “unlikely to engage secularists,” writes reviewer Baron Alder. SMH 11-12 Dec 04

Spirituality

Churchgoers who carefully wrestle with their faith have a greater sense of wellbeing than those who uncritically hold to their beliefs, according to groundbreaking research in a joint study undertaken by the National Church Life Survey, Edith Cowan University, Deakin University and Anglicare Sydney. “Those who are reflectively religious . have the highest purpose in life,” principal author, Dr Peter Kaldor, said. SMH 11-12 Dec 04

Trade

The recent announcement that Australia has signed an accord to begin negotiations on a free trade agreement with the ten-member Association of Southeast Asian Nations is an historic and long overdue shift in policy, argues trade lecturer at the University of NSW, Bryan Mercurio. Aust 13 Dec 04 *

Transport

The number of trucks on Sydney’s roads is set to double to almost 2 million within six years, and they are also getting much bigger. New road tunnels and levies on shipping containers carried by trucks are seen as the answer. SMH 13 Dec 04

War crimes

Australian terrorism suspect David Hicks claims he was forcibly injected with drugs, had his head smashed into asphalt while blindfolded, was threatened with firearms and other weapons, was beaten for hours at a time during interrogations, was deprived of food and sleep, and was forced to run in leg shackles that ripped the skin off his ankles as part of his interrogation at Guantanamo Bay. AFR 11-12 Dec 04; Weekend Aust 11-12 Dec 04

Workplace relations

Workers’ compensation schemes should be fully funded and charge premiums that reflect an individual employer’s risk, argues the AFR leader. AFR 13 Dec 04

Other items of interest

David E. Anderson examines whether the US condones torture at the highest level of the government. http://www.pbs.org/wnet/religionandethics/week814/exclusive.html

Last month novelist John Updike spoke at the Center for Religious Inquiry at St. Bartholomew’s Church in New York City. New York writer Benedicta Cipolla reports. http://www.pbs.org/wnet/religionandethics/week812/exclusive.html

Laura Duhan Kaplan, professor of Philosophy at the University of North Carolina at Charlotte, makes the case for conscientious objection from the Hebrew Scriptures. http://www.tikkun.org/magazine/index.cfm/action/tikkun/issue/tik0411/article/041112a.html

READ is published by the Centre for Christian Ethics, Morling College, 120 Herring Rd, Eastwood NSW 2122 AUSTRALIA. Telephone (02) 9878 0201. The content and views expressed in articles do not necessarily represent the views of the Centre for Christian Ethics, Morling College or the Baptist Churches of NSW & ACT. Subscription is free. To subscribe, email with the words “subscribe to READ” in the subject line. You may use the same email address to request more information. Abbreviations: AFR=The Australian Financial Review; Aust=The Australian; SMH=The Sydney Morning Herald.