Daily Archives: September 2, 2014

Τουλάχιστον 20 χρόνια θα χρειαστεί η ελληνική οικονομία για να φθάσει η ανεργία στα επίπεδα του 2009, δηλαδή στο 9,5% και 450.000 άνεργους, σύμφωνα με την ετήσια μελέτη της ΙΝΕ-ΓΣΕΕ.

Μάλιστα, αυτό είναι το αισιόδοξο σενάριο βάσει του οποίου θα υπάρχει ετήσια ανάπτυξη 3,5%-4%!

Αναφορικά με τον ασφαλιστικό τομέα, η μελέτη της ΙΝΕ-ΓΣΕΕ αναφέρει πως για να πληρωθούν οι συντάξεις και οι υποχρεώσεις το 2016 θα χρειαστούν επιπλέον 950 εκ. ευρώ, το 2017 θα χρειαστούν 1,4 δισ. ευρώ και το 2018 θα χρειαστούν 2,5 δισ. ευρώ.

Η έρευνα εκτιμά ότι περίπου 850.000 εργαζόμενοι καθυστερούν να πάρουν το μισθό τους από 1 έως 12 μήνες, ενώ -σύμφωνα με τα στοιχεία της έρευνας- ο μέσος πραγματικός μισθός στο ιδιωτικό τομέα είναι 750 με 800 ευρώ μεικτά, από 1.100 που ήταν στην αρχή της κρίσης (μείωση 23% κατά μέσο όρο).

Τέλος, η μελέτη επισημαίνει ότι η αγοραστική δύναμη των μέσων αποδοχών ανά μισθωτό κατά την πενταετία 2010-2014 μειώθηκε κατά 23%, με αποτέλεσμα στο τέλος του 2014 να επιστρέψει στα επίπεδα του 1995.

Πηγή: madata.gr

Former NSW premier Kristina Keneally talks to the media as she leaves the Independent Commission Against Corruption on Monday. Photo: Getty Images/Daniel Munoz

“It is the ultimate act of betrayal,” former premier Kristina Keneally told a corruption inquiry.

That was her damning assessment of her former factional ally Joe Tripodi’s involvement in a dirty tricks campaign against their Labor colleague Jodi McKay.

The Independent Commission Against Corruption has heard that Mr Tripodi orchestrated an anonymous leaflet-drop which made damaging claims against the then Newcastle Labor MP days before the 2011 state election.

“Goodness, no,” Mrs Keneally said on Monday when asked if she was aware at the time of Mr Tripodi’s involvement in the campaign.

“What would have been your response as premier if you’d heard that?” junior counsel assisting the inquiry, Greg O’Mahoney, asked.

“I’m not entirely sure the language I would have used should be repeated in this room,” Mrs Keneally said.

“It is the ultimate act of betrayal as a member of the Australian Labor Party to campaign against or work against the endorsed member, the endorsed candidate. It just is unthinkable.”

It was an all-star lineup of Labor witnesses on Monday as the ICAC probed allegations that Mr Tripodi and the then NSW treasurer Eric Roozendaal “quite improperly took steps directly to benefit Buildev”, a company part-owned by embattled coal mogul Nathan Tinkler.

The company, which funded the leaflet campaign against Ms McKay, was pushing for a coal terminal in the Newcastle suburb of Mayfield. The project was fiercely opposed by Ms McKay and was contrary to government policy.

Mr Roozendaal said it was Mr Tripodi who was “advocating” for Mr Tinkler’s proposal.

Mr Roozendaal’s former adviser, economist Sam Crosby, has given evidence that the coal loader was a “dog of a project” and “truly woeful” but he could not dampen the then treasurer’s enthusiasm for it.

“Like Lazarus, this thing just kept climbing back up out of the ground,” Mr Crosby has said.

“The treasurer kept asking me to look at it again.”

Mr Roozendaal told the inquiry he regarded a project which was a rival to the coal loader as a “marginal project at best”.

Asked who was the source of that opinion, he said it was Mr Tinkler’s company, Buildev.

Mr Roozendaal, who will return to the witness box on Tuesday, was asked in the final minutes of the hearing if either he or anyone else had “erased” his emails relating to the coal loader proposal.

“I don’t recall giving any instructions,” he replied.

Mr Tripodi, who claimed he did not recall events 74 times on Monday, admitted he had a role in the anti-Jodi McKay smear campaign but distanced himself from the anonymous flyer.

“This is not my pamphlet,” Mr Tripodi said. “I didn’t sign off on it, I didn’t commission it.”

Asked whether he felt any sense of duty to the ALP, Mr Tripodi replied: “Of course.”

“Did you feel any sense of loyalty to Jodi McKay?” counsel assisting the inquiry, Geoffrey Watson, SC, asked.

“No, none at all,” Mr Tripodi replied.

Mr Watson repeatedly put it to Mr Tripodi that he leaked a highly confidential Treasury document to Buildev executive Darren Williams, who then leaked it to the Newcastle Herald to cruel Ms McKay’s re-election prospects.

“I have no recollection of receiving that Treasury document and no recollection of giving to anybody,” Mr Tripodi said.

“Mr Tripodi, it will be my submission in due course that you declined to deny that you leaked the Treasury document,” Mr Watson said.

The commission will switch its focus back to Liberal Party figures on Tuesday, with former energy minister Chris Hartcher and MP for Swansea Garry Edwards among the witnesses listed to give evidence.

Both men are sitting on the crossbench with five of their colleagues as the ICAC probes allegations that the Liberals received illicit donations from Buildev, among other sources, before the last election.

Kurdish fighters fire towards Islamic State positions during clashes south of Kirkuk, Iraq. Photo: AFP

The prospect of Australian participation in a war against Islamic State fighters in Iraq is edging closer with both Tony Abbott and Bill Shorten in lockstep yesterday branding the militants respectively “a death cult” and “an enemy of humanity”.

In powerful statements to Parliament, the two leaders took a common position in declaring that Australia and its allies and partners could not stand by while innocent people were slaughtered.

Building the moral case for intervention, Mr Abbott said that Australians “in good conscience … cannot leave the Iraqi people to face this horror, this pure evil alone, or ask others to do so in the name of human decency what we won’t do ourselves”.

Mr Shorten went beyond the declarations by both Mr Abbott and US President Barack Obama, designating the atrocities carried out by the Islamic State as “genocide”.

Australia is yet to receive a request from Washington for deeper military involvement such as help with air strikes. But the RAAF is poised to begin deliveries of weapons and munitions to the Kurdish Peshmerga forces, who are bearing the brunt of the fight in northern Iraq against heavily armed Islamic State fighters.

But there is little doubt Australia would respond favourably to any such request, with Mr Abbott insisting that a failure to act was both morally unconscionable and strategically dangerous.

“Doing anything involves serious risks and weighty consequences,” he said. “But doing nothing involves risks and consequences too.

“As things stand, doing nothing means leaving millions of people exposed to death, forced conversion and ethnic cleansing.

“I refuse to call this hideous movement ‘Islamic State’ because it’s not a state, it is a death cult.”

The issue dominated Parliament on Monday, with MPs in both houses debating further involvement, underscoring the growing momentum towards a military campaign.

Mr Shorten left no doubt as to the Opposition’s support for intervention, describing national security as “above politics”.

“The inescapable fact is that genocide is being perpetrated against defenceless people and we cannot co-operate with this evil by refusing to support the innocent,” he said.

Mr Shorten branded the Islamic State, “an enemy of humanity, engaged in crimes against humanity”.

The Opposition Leader pointedly dismissed any suggestion that the current situation was similar to the 2003 “Coalition of the Willing” invasion of Iraq.

“In 2003, we went to Iraq without international support and without the support of the majority of the Iraqi population,” he said.

“Today, the Iraqi government is speaking with the international community, seeking our humanitarian assistance.”

Rodger Shanahan, a former Army officer and now a Middle East expert at the Lowy Institute, said the arms deliveries would go a long way to bolstering the Kurdish forces, in concert with the US air strikes, but warned the conflict would be brutal and bloody.

“They’ll be a blip in history but they’ll be a bloody blip and they’ll be nasty to get rid of,” he said. “They’ll go, but somebody’s got to get rid of them.”

Foreign Minister Julie Bishop said the aim of the arms deliveries was to “make the Peshmerga strong enough so that they can defend themselves”.

But she also acknowledged the risk of arms provided by Australia falling into the hands of other terrorists.

“There are always risks but as I’ve said, we’ve been weighing these carefully, not only in Australia but all of the nations involved.”

source:theage.com.au