Raising the Barr

The Importance of the GDP to You Recently, the game-show host currently running America gave a $1.5T gift to business by way of tax cuts.  $1.5T is more than double…

Crystal Ball Predictions For 2018 As always, I try to dedicate my first column of the year, in part, to some whacky tongue in cheek predictions for the year ahead.…

Courage and Tragedy brings down Institutional Abuse As we head toward Christmas, a particularly holy time in the Christian calendar, the Royal Commission into Institutional Responses to Child Sexual Abuse…

When Customer Service Is Sacrificed For Profit You know, the play book is pretty straight forward for the big corporates.  And we, the customers, lose out every single time.  Step…

Good News for Our Local Hospitals Our 2 local hospitals, Kurri Kurri and Cessnock, are due to get a bit of an upgrade to operating theatres in the coming months. …

How and Why Do We Have This Power Crisis? I have been asked many times in recent weeks about the option of keeping Liddell Power Station open to sure up…

Workers Compensation – There Is A Better Path Last week in Parliament I introduced a new Bill to deal with Workers Compensation.  If my Bill gets accepted and supported, then…

Where Will our Injured Workers End Up and Who Will Pay? In the coming months, in NSW, there will be more than 4500 injured workers who will cease to be…

“Water not Coal” – I didn’t Realise That I Had To Choose Protestors stood outside, peacefully and respectfully, of the mining conference and awards event just a few weeks ago.…

Is An Efficiency Dividend A Budget Saving Or A Budget Cut In 2011, the NSW Government put into place a 1.5% “efficiency dividend” for every single government department.  This meant…