Sanitation and the lessons from history

I would like all of you to consider the issue of sanitation in countries that you have visited that do NOT have all of the mod cons of a first world country.

When travelling to countries with these issues did you get the same lectures that I received from concerned relatives and well meaning friends and doctors all concerned for your health?

You know what I mean, advice about what to eat, where to eat it, how to take care when washing your hands, how to take care when using whatever form of ablution and toilet facilities you were likely to encounter?

If you did then you would begin to understand the fascination that I had with the facilities that you see me sitting on in the ruins of Ephesus - a town in what is modern day Turkey - but a town that has been host over the centuries to such visiting notables who settled at Ephesus as the apostle John and Mary, Jesus' mother.

The city's fame today, as a major tourist destination, with one of the most intact of all Roman cities of the time depends on the fame of the Library or the art works or some other feature that captures the imagination of visitors.

Not so for me - what captured my imagination was the incredibly clever use of the location of the city (as it was at the time and the huge engineering works that had actually taken water from nearby sources and used them via aqueducts to channel water to the city and through it to the sea.

The process provided both running water for drinking, washing and sanitary functions like the now open air privy that is pictured.

Just imagine how these lessons from history could have benefited all of those who seem to have forgotten how the Roman Empire - so many centuries ago actually managed to bring the equivalent of modern day plumbing, sanitation and central heating to communities that today do not seem to manage to emulate what they had achieved with all the modern technology at their beck and call.

Sometimes I think it would not hurt human beings to stop and consider the lessons that they could learn from their past before they berate governments for not bringing them a better life today.

"The lucky country?" You have to be kidding!

I think it's obscene that we have a "housing crisis" in this country and that people are throwing up their hands in horror about the fact that Australia is now among the countries with the least affordable housing in the world.

All this while the the government keeps on importing over 130,000 people per annum to meet what it calls a "skills shortage "

Why is this obscene?

Because no one in the media (or at least not many in the media) have either picked up on the conundrum or actually brought it to the attention of someone in power.

It stands to reason that anyone arriving in Australia whether as an assisted migrant, part of a family reunion scheme or a refugee or indeed just a person with a temporary resident permit with a work permit is NOT going to come equipped with a home!

Thus we need at least as many NEW homes each year as it will take to house all those people we are welcoming into our country.

Add to this, all those new homes that are required to meet the needs of those families who took the last government's Treasurer seriously and as far as childbearing was concerned, had "one for mum, one for dad and one for the country."

Hello, all of these people will need different homes too.

Then there are those who are being thrown out of their homes, because they can no longer afford the rent or the mortgage and those who require different homes because of medical situations and . . . .

All in all you have a situation in which the forward planning of state, Federal and local governments is brought into sharp focus.

What they have NOT been doing is obscene!

They have not been planning to accommodate those they have invited into the country much less those who are already here who have been encouraged to increase the size of their families or whose circumstances are changing for a variety of reasons.

Did some dim wit in the Minister's office actually think that the total number of people who would die would somehow balance the total number being born or coming into the country for a mad ZPG type of scenario?

I cannot imagine this for an instant. However if someone did - for goodness' sake get them a new job carting cow manure - its more likely to appeal to their level of common sense!

Did anyone actually think of planning for the needs of all these incoming people and new born children, I mean planning for all of their needs and not just homes?

Infrastructure of all kinds is required to meet these growing demands.

Unless the required pieces of infrastructure are created in a "just in time" project management sense there will be always be one or more crises in housing, health care, roads, transport, traffic, power, water, sewerage and so on.

A lack of adequate holistic planning is slowly driving this country from one meaning of the "lucky country" to another, a darker meaning, where we are lucky to still be here and no thanks to good management!

This is probably the saddest advert I have seen

I always thought that the word "In God we trust" was one of the hallmark comments on US dollar notes. It's a sign of the times that a child from Africa, looking forlorn, is pictured on the back of bus with that slogan.

Mainly because it is highly unlikely that Yankee dollars are available so maybe only God is really left!

Walking the dogs can be a dangerous pursuit

Actually a very clever advertising gimmick for dog food. Looks real!

An interesting "QUIT" campaign

There is obviously one "QUIT" campaign in the world where people who are walking or catching public transport can all get the message.

Does anyone know WHERE this innovative campaign is or was taking place?

I thought I had heard it all!

I guess that with each day that passes and the older you get, the more convinced you can become that you have heard it all before and that anything else you are likely to hear is merely window dressing on an old theme.

I was wrong!

Today I heard something that helped me to understand the state of the economy in the USA and how insidious influences from that experience are spreading to our shores, courtesy of some of the programs of education that are being sold to government here in Australia as "Leadership Programs".

Let's just say that one of my sources has reported that at least one Australian government Department has purchased a two and a half day 'love in' otherwise referred to as a Leadership Program targeting people at the Executive Officer level 1 and 2 in the ranks of the Australian Public Service.

Generally, I do not comment on such matters - they are generally something that I leave to the public service to sort out.

However, what I am hearing about the content, set off my bullshit recognition radar.

Considering how much of this I have heard in a lifetime of devoted service THAT is serious!

If my source is to be believed, then I have to say that not only is the Public Service wasting money on a program that is totally out of touch with the reality on the ground, but more to the point, is teaching helpless and hapless young and aspiring public servants management techniques that are set to duplicate the disastrous situation which is engulfing the USA as we speak.

Apparently there is some notion, borrowed from the former CEO of a large American banking organisation, that people at a managerial level need to spend a pretty large proportion of their time looking after themselves, with even more large percentages of the time left over being spent in managing upwards, coordinating the work of others and networking. Leaving something like 10% of the total time at work for doing things like - what's the word I am looking for - oh yes "WORK."

The reality is that in Australia where we already have a skilled labour shortage and in the Public Service in particular, where the planned departure of the so called "Baby Boomer" generation into retirement is leaving a gaping hole of experience and expertise as well as sheer hard working people, messages like this are or at least should be total anathema to any Secretary or CEO or any of the people actually responsible for generating learning and development programs programs.

The reality for most people working in the Australian Public Service at present is that everything has be there NOW especially with the change in government that has seen Kevin 07 being swept into power.

There is an urgent need to prepare briefing papers, research and write policy documentation research and write responses to questions and just the sheer drudgery of working in teams of people whose numbers are continually lower than establishment, who are so new that they know nothing, who continually search for financial incentives being offered by jobs in other departments and who have a work ethic that is substantially different from those in previous generations.

The concept of having equal pay for equal work across the public service has been dealt a death blow by the previous government and now people at the same level, doing virtually the same kind of jobs with the same sort of responsibilities and duties are being offered very different levels of remuneration in different departments. One of the things that this means is that in many instances, it takes some time to recruit someone and train them in what is expected of them in a given department and during this period the work of the team or the section or the Branch or indeed the Division continues. It's unrealistic to expect new starters who are learning about their duties and responsibilities and learning about the policies and practices of the Department that they have joined will be fully functional for at least 3-6 months. Given that recruitment processes can also take something like 3 months - this means that with all the best intentions in the world it is unlikely that senior managers will actually have a full complement of staff on deck so that they CAN do just their managerial jobs of managing their staff.

For most, the reality is that they have to pick up the slack during this period to enable their staff to acquire the level of competence that is required or assign sensitive work to people who are not ready for it and then suffer the consequences of having to re-do the work to meet basic organisational standards. What then happens is one of the tragedies of this new work environment. Just when you have a staff member fully trained and functional he or she finds a more lucrative position in another location and the merry go round starts again.

Why are people looking for better remuneration? Well it's simple really, as the cost of living and interest rates goes up so does their need to earn more money to maintain their life style. Given that the current situation in the APS actually encourages this movement it's clear that no amount of razor gang activity or "leadership courses" that seem to exhort senior manager to fail in their responsibilities to get the work done and produce some measurable work outcomes from their teams is not helping.

What would help?

If I heard correctly, Kevin Rudd the new PM used to believe in having a public service that was hard working, capable of providing fearless and frank advice and being paid the same levels of remuneration for people working at the same levels within the Service.

Australians are already world leaders in working hard. With the world economy heading towards the toilet - this is NOT the time for some management "gurus" to spread the message that was
suitable for some senior Banking honcho around 20 years ago!

Bring back some of the honesty in government that seems to have lapsed over the last 11 or so years under a previous government, bring back equal pay for equal work by suggesting to the people in the Public Service that as from a certain date all Public Service jobs would be remunerated at the SAME level for each classification regardless of which department the job is situated in.

Remove all of the contracts that have made the public service seem to work like the private enterprise models that now seems to be proving through their failure elsewhere in the world that it was always a bankrupt system.

Let's by all means have programs to prevent stress and overwork in the workplace, but at the same time let's also remember that there are other issues out there that do not lend themselves to a public service that CAN be independent and provide fearless and frank advice much less just hard and honest work outcomes that can be relied upon by the Minister in charge as well as the public that these people serve!

A new day is dawning

What an interesting day it's going to be. The Poms are changing their immigration system. The BBC reports that they are implementing stage 1 of their four stage plan for immigration at present those HIGH skilled workers already inside the country who want to extend their stay can now do so using a new points based system.

I hope that by what they are doing they are not dooming the existence of the very British institutions that they have protected for all these years!

"By the end of 2008, every graduate with good English, on £40,000 or the local equivalent, will potentially have enough points to seek work in the UK.

But low skilled workers from outside the EU will be barred for the foreseeable future. The government believes it can fill all manual work vacancies from EU countries which, with the exception of Romania and Bulgaria, face no restrictions on working in the UK.

That is all very interesting news!