Monthly Archives: May 2016

Alex Dimitriades was all smiles at the Logies on Sunday after he was recognised for his role in The Principal as Most Outstanding Actor.

In the SBS series, written by Kristen Dunphy and Alice Addison, the actor plays the part of protagonist Matt Bashir, a history teacher and former Deputy of a prestigious school who is promoted to Principal of Boxdale Boys High.

A troubled school with a history of conflict, Bashir sets out to turn things around, but is faced with much scepticism and hostility from colleagues, made all the worse with the death of a student on school grounds.

The four-part Australian drama series was aired over two weeks in October 2015, and marked a return to local drama production for SBS.

Dimitriades has been busy working between film, the small screen and the stage.

Aside from The Principal, in 2015 he co-starred in Ruben Guthrie, prior to which he took part in the Melbourne Theatre Company’s production of Glengarry Glen Ross.

In 2011, the actor starred as Harry in the TV adaptation of Christos Tsiolkas’ novel The Slap for which he was awarded the AACTA Award for Best Lead Actor in a Television Drama.

Source:Neos Kosmos

POLITICAL trade-offs and backdoor bloc deals between Eurovision countries mean Dami Im is unlikely to bring home the crown for Australia this weekend, but that hasn’t stopped her sitting pretty with the bookies.

Despite Russia being the standout favourite with betting agencies both locally and across Europe, Dami is sitting pretty in equal sixth place with Sportsbet offering a respectable $19 for the Aussie to take the outright win in Stockholm this weekend. Others have her as high as fifth favourite – the same place Guy Sebastian finished last year.

The X Factor Australia winner, who will sing Sound of Silence in the competition’s second semi final, has just Russia and five other countries in her way if she is to pull off the unthinkable and steal the trophy from Europe.

Russian singer Sergey Lazarev killed it in the first semi final this morning with judges and Eurovision fans across the globe praising his performance of You Are The Only One.

Of the 18 acts in the first semi, only 10 made it through to Sunday’s final with a few usual favourites, such as Iceland and Finland, being eliminated.

source:dailytelegraph.com.au

Ο ομοσπονδιακός εκλέκτορας, Μίχαελ Σκίμπε, ανακοίνωσε την προεπιλογή 31 ποδοσφαιριστών ενόψει των φιλικών αναμετρήσεων της Εθνικής ομάδας με την αντίστοιχη της Αυστραλίας, στις 4 Ιουνίου στο Σίδνεϊ και στις 7 Ιουνίου στη Μελβούρνη.

Από τη λίστα αίσθηση προκαλεί το γεγονός πως δεν υπάρχει το όνομα του Κώστα Μανωλά της Ρόμα, αλλά και κανενός παίκτη του Παναθηναϊκού!

Η έναρξη των προπονήσεων έχει προγραμματιστεί για τις 24 Μαΐου και σε αυτές θα συμμετάσχουν οι παίκτες που θα επιλεγούν τελικώς για το ταξίδι στην Αυστραλία και οι οποίοι, εκείνη την περίοδο, δεν θα έχουν αγωνιστικές υποχρεώσεις με τους συλλόγους τους.

Συγκεκριμένα, ο Γερμανός τεχνικός απηύθυνε κλήση στους:

Τερματοφύλακες: Καρνέζης, Καπίνο.

Αμυντικοί: Βύντρα, Κίτσιου, Μόρας, Μπουκουβάλας, Οικονόμου, Παπασταθόπουλος, Σιόβας, Σταφυλίδης, Τζαβέλλας, Τοροσίδης, Χολέμπας.

Μέσοι: Κονέ, Μανιάτης, Μάνταλος, Πέλκας, Σάμαρης, Ταχτσίδης, Τζιόλης, Φετφατζίδης, Φορτούνης.

Επιθετικοί: Αραβίδης, Βέλλιος, Γιαννιώτας, Διαμαντάκος, Καρέλης, Μήτρογλου, Μπακασέτας, Παπάζογλου, Χριστοδουλόπουλος.

Πηγή:in.gr

Πρωτάκουστο, αλλά αληθές

Πρωτάκουστο, αλλά αληθές. Νέος που δεν έμαθε γρι στα θρανία του σχολείου, μηνύει την πολιτεία που τον “αδίκησε” και τελικά αποζημιώνεται με ποσό που δεν αναφέρεται, επακριβώς, πλησιάζει εντούτοις το εκατομμύριο (και τι είναι ένα εκατομμύριο σήμερα;), ένα αυτοκίνητο και τη συμβουλή να φροντίσει “αυτή τη φορά να μάθει κάτι για να μην πάνε τα λεφτά στο βρόντο”.

Για να πάρουμε τα πράγματα από την αρχή, το 2007, ο 22χρονος Beau Abela, υπέβαλε μήνυση κατά της Πολιτείας, συγκεκριμένα κατά του Υπουργείου Παιδείας, γιατί απέτυχε να του μάθει γράμματα. Ως αποζημίωση, τότε, ζητούσε $300.000. 

Στην καταγγελία του ανέφερε ότι δεν μπορούσε να κάνει ούτε τα πιο απλά πράγματα, όπως να διαβάσει οδηγίες ή να μετρήσει χρήματα.

Μετά από διαδικασίες και δικαστικούς αγώνες 7 χρόνων, πληροφορούμαστε ότι έλαβε σχεδόν ένα εκατομμύριο, κατόπιν μυστικής συμφωνίας με την κυβέρνηση, καθώς επίσης και ένα ολοκαίνουργιο αυτοκίνητο.

Με αυτά τα χρήματα θα έπρεπε να φροντίσει, έστω και σ’ αυτό το στάδιο να λάβει τα απαραίτητα εφόδια που θα του εξασφάλιζαν μια αξιοπρεπέ θέση στην κοινωνία.

Να όμως που δεν συνέβη και συνελήφθη να κλεβει ένα αυτοκίνητο γιατί το δικό του είχε χαλάσει.

Στον δικαστή Tim Burke δήλωσε ότι ήταν δύσκολο να βρει δουλειά, δεδομένου ότι έχει βασικές ελλείψεις, είναι όμως διατεθειμένος να προσπαθήσει.

Η Πολιτεία ανέλαβε να επιβαρυνθεί με όλα τα έξοδα για την εκπαίδευσή του, έστω και σ’ αυτό το στάδιο, την κοινωνική του αγωγή και ανάπτυξη ώστε να μπορέσει να ενταχθεί ως κανονικός πολίτης στο κοινωνικό σύνολο.

Πηγή:Νέος Κόσμος

The Reserve Bank has expressed concern about negative gearing and the tax concession for capital gains, saying any change that discouraged negative gearing might be “a good thing” from a financial stability perspective.

Labor has come under sustained attack from the Coalition for promising sweeping changes to Australia’s negative gearing and capital gains tax regime to save $32 billion over 10 years.

But an internal bank memo released under freedom of information laws runs counter to Prime Minister Malcolm Turnbull’s warnings that Labor’s proposal to ban negative gearing except for new properties would deliver “a massive shock” to the property market.

Mr Turnbull repeated those warnings on day one of the campaign, saying that Labor’s policy would hold back the Australian economy.

The Reserve Bank memo says negative gearing and capital gains tax rules affect property more significantly than other investments “as it can be purchased with higher leverage than shares”.

A move against negative gearing, the memo says, would trigger a large-scale sale of negatively-geared properties “only if the changes were not grandfathered”.

Labor’s policy plan would grandfather its changes, meaning properties that are negatively geared would remain so until they were sold, preventing a rush of sales as negative gearers offload homes.

The memo is a “Q&A” brief dated December 2014, meaning it was written before Labor announced its policy to wind back negative gearing and before the government pledged to continue it.

Since the December 2014 memo Sydney house prices have climbed a further 11 per cent. Loans to investors account for 46 per cent of all money lent for housing.

The Coalition has positioned itself as the protector of Australia’s existing negative gearing and capital gains tax regime, which it argues is largely used by average, “mum and dad” wage earners, and signalled its willingness to launch a scare campaign over the issue.

But Labor argues its proposed changes will improve housing affordability, particularly for first home buyers, while also improving the budget bottom line.

In Brisbane on Monday, Mr Turnbull stepped up pressure over Labor’s capital gains tax policy as he described it as an attack on all investments and said it would make Australians invest and employ less.

“Bill Shorten wants to have less investment in Australia, can you believe that? He wants Australians to invest less and if they invest less, they’ll employ less. That’s why he is putting up the tax on capital gains. That’s why he is seeking to ban negative gearing, standing in the road of entrepreneurship,” he said.

Last week, Mr Shorten said he could not understand why the Turnbull government “was happy to give a tax cut to a millionaire, happy to give a tax cut to a billion dollar company, happy to die in the ditch over the ability of property speculators to get paid by the taxpayer to subsidise their property investment. But there is no plan for housing affordability.”

In Cairns on Monday, Mr Shorten hammered the government for wanting to hand business a $50 billion tax cut over 10 years – a key promise in the budget it released last Tuesday – and argued that more money should instead be spent on education funding.

The Opposition Leader was on the back foot, however, after his candidate in the seat of Melbourne contradicted party policy on turning back asylum seeker boats and offshore detention, insisting five times that the ALP’s policy was clear and would not change.

The Labor policy would restrict future negative gearing to investment income, meaning new investors would still be able to write off losses on properties and other investments, but only against investment income rather than wages. Investors in new properties would be exempt and the discount on capital gains tax would be cut from 50 to 25 per cent, but only for new investors.

In a boost for the ALP, the bank says in the memo it isn’t concerned about negative gearing in its own right, but about its interaction with the capital gains tax discount introduced by the Howard government in 1999.

The change meant “only half of any capital gains are taxed at your marginal rate, however the loss on the investment initially is 100 per cent tax deductible”.

The lopsided arrangement “may encourage chasing of capital gains” and “investors bidding up housing prices”.

The memo says negative gearers are more of a threat to the stability of the financial system than owner-occupiers because they are more likely to have interest-only loans and so won’t have “as much of an equity buffer in the situation where prices fall”.

The bank has made its views known previously in submissions to the financial system inquiry and House of Representatives home ownership inquiry, although not in such blunt terms. Q&A briefs are prepared by senior officers to arm officials such as Governor Glenn Stevens with answers to questions likely to be asked in parliamentary hearings or public functions.

A spokesman for Treasurer Scott Morrison said the note cited was a briefing memo, not an official RBA document.

“It was prepared in late 2014, well before the Australian Prudential Regulation Authority instituted measures that slowed housing credit growth considerably,” the spokesman said.

“Nowhere has the Reserve Bank endorsed Labor’s policy and Bill Shorten and other opponents of mum and dad investors who use negative gearing should be careful not to verbal the RBA.”

Touring the inner-Sydney electorate of Grayndler on Monday Greens leader Richard Di Natale said he would go further than Labor and abolish the capital gains tax discount altogether.

Source:smh.com.au

Greece’s creditors are considering concessions such as capping interest rates and extending maturities for debt

Eurozone countries should extend maturities, limit annual repayments and cap interest rates on Greece’s second bailout, along with other measures, according to a document being discussed by Athens’s creditors Monday.

The document was prepared by the eurozone’s bailout fund, European Stability Mechanism, and reviewed by The Wall Street Journal. It says implementing all the proposed debt relief measures would bring Greece’s debt to 74 per cent of gross domestic product by 2060, provided Athens fully implements its bailout program and if economic growth and government funding costs develop as expected.

Without these debt relief measures, Greece’s debt would be at 105 per cent of GDP under such a scenario, according to the document.

The measures proposed in the document mostly focus on loans given to Greece under its second bailout from the now-defunct European Financial Stability Facility. Greece still owes the facility EUR130.9 billion.

Average maturities on these EFSF loans should be extended by an average five years to 37 1/2 years, the document says.

Annual payments on the principal of the European Financial Stability Facility loans should be fixed at 1 per cent of GDP until 2050, while interest rates should be capped to 2 per cent of the loans until then, the document says. Any outstanding debt and interest payments would then be split into equal instalments to be repaid after 2050.

The document suggests two other measures. National central banks in the eurozone as well as the European Central Bank should give any profits they have made on Greek bonds back to Athens. Those payments would amount to around EUR8 billion, the document says.

On top of that, Greece should be allowed to use any leftover money from its third bailout of EUR86 billion to repay early loans from the International Monetary Fund. IMF loans carry higher interest than money borrowed from the eurozone bailout fund.

The document says that eurozone countries could choose to just implement some of the proposed measures. However, Greece’s debt will remain higher if not all measures are implemented.

Greece’s debt may rise to as much as 258 per cent of gross domestic product by 2060 or fall to as low as 63 per cent of GDP, according to an official analysis of the country’s debt trajectory that heralds tough talks ahead on potential measures to ease Athens’ payment burden.

The so-called debt sustainability analysis was drawn up by Greece’s European creditors. The wide divergences in the debt predictions are due to different forecasts on how much Greece’s economy will grow in the coming decades and how much money it can put aside to pay down debt.

Under all but the most optimistic scenarios, the document points to serious concerns over Greece’s ability to repay its debt, which stood at 176.9 per cent of GDP at the end of last year. The results of “this analysis point to serious concerns regarding the sustainability of Greece’s public debt in the long term,” the document says.

The document was distributed to officials from eurozone finance ministries Monday morning for discussion later in the day.

To reach a deal, the ministers will also have to bring on board the IMF, one of Greece’s biggest creditors. The IMF has consistently had more pessimistic forecasts for Greece’s debt ratio and demanded far-reaching measures to cut the country’s payment burden. Here it has clashed with Germany, which has opposed further debt relief.

“Today we will only have a first discussion on what, when, if and how the debt sustainability or debt relief measures could take place,” said Jeroen Dijsselbloem, the Dutch finance minister who presides over the group of ministers, on his way into Monday’s meeting.

The debt sustainability analysis looks at four different scenarios for Greece’s economy and assesses how the country’s debt-to-GDP ratio will fare in each case for the decades up to 2060.

source:theaustralian.com.au

Greek MPs have passed a controversial package of pension reforms and tax hikes despite mass public opposition, bowing to creditor demands in the hope of unlocking the next round of badly needed bailout funds.

Greek parliament approves controversial austerity measures amid violent protests, riot police clashes – ABC News (Australian Broadcasting Corporation)

The unpopular measures were adopted thanks to the slim parliamentary majority held by Prime Minister Alexis Tsipras’s coalition government — the main New Democracy opposition party voted against the austerity package.

Earlier outside parliament, Greek riot police fired tear gas to disperse demonstrators throwing Molotov cocktails to protest against the reforms.

Greek television showed police firing volleys of tear gas in response to projectiles lobbed by masked youths during the demonstration, which attracted about 10,000 people.

Mr Tsipras’s government was seeking to adopt the new measures ahead of a crunch meeting of eurozone creditors in Brussels on Monday.

The reforms will reduce Greece’s highest pension payouts, merge several pension funds, increase contributions and raise taxes for those on medium and high incomes.

The austerity measures are part of a package demanded by the EU and IMF in exchange for the next round of an 86 billion euro ($133 billion) bailout agreed in July, the third for the debt-laden country since 2010.

Central Athens was largely closed to traffic with riot police vehicles parked in front of the parliament ahead of the vote.

Days of strikes cripple public transport

Elsewhere in the city there was a strong police presence, although numbers were significantly down on February protests when 40,000 people marched in Athens alone.

Mr Tsipras defended the reforms on Friday, telling politicians from his left-wing Syriza party — which holds a slim majority of 153 seats in the 300-seat parliament — that they would spare the poorest.

Reforming Greece’s bloated pension system was crucial to prevent “the system collapsing in a few years”, Mr Tsipras added.

Greece’s budget deficit has ballooned as it struggles to keep up with mammoth debt payments.

The country is in the grip of the third day of strikes that have paralysed public transport across the country.

During the stoppages, the fourth general strike since Mr Tsipras came to office in January 2015, the public sector has operated at a snail’s pace, while most TV and radio stations have refused to air news bulletins.

Despite the pressure from the strikes, Employment Minister Georgios Katrougalos stood by the pension overhaul, pointing to a funding shortfall of 2 billion euros ($3.1 billion).

“This reform should have been done decades ago,” he said.

Source:abc.com.au