PHOTO: AUSTRALIAN MARRIAGE EQUALITY

It’s official – Kevin Rudd has come to his senses, officially changing his stance on marriage equality. In a blog post on his site last night, the former prime minister wrote: “I have come to the conclusion that church and state can have different positions and practices on the question of same sex marriage. I believe the secular Australian state should be able to recognise same sex marriage.”

The reversal follows his vote against a marriage equality bill last year – he was one of 98 MPs who voted against the bill. The change, he says, is a result of “a lot of reflection” and “conversations with good people grappling with deep questions of life, sexuality and faith.”

It’s a move that will most likely make the controversial politician more popular with the people, but get him into strife with his party as he upstages Prime Minister Julia Gillard once again.

Opposition Leader Tony Abbott says Mr Rudd is entitled to his change of mind.

Speaking on Sydney radio, Mr Abbott said: “People are entitled to change their mind. I know it’s a difficult position.

His post continues in typical Rudd-fashion: the arguments against marriage equality are teased out and he offers rational reasons why they don’t compute in 21st century, secular Australia.

One of the fundamental arguments against changing marriage legislation is the issue of children: will granting same-sex couples the right to marry mean we extend rights to them to adopt and raise children? In France this was the case, with President Francois Hollande signing into law a bill that legally allows same-sex couples to marry and adopt children just this week.

Miranda wonders if seeing Penny Wong and partner, Sophie Allouache with their daughter Alexandra helped Mr Rudd come to grips with his new belief?

Mr Rudd identifies that there are many children being raised by same-sex parents already, the scientific evidence acknowledges that same-sex families do not compromise children’s development and that Commonwealth legislation already recognises the legal rights of children being brought up in same-sex relationships under the terms of Australian family law.

He asks: “Therefore, the question arises that given the state has already recognised and facilitated children being raised in same sex relationships, why do we not afford such relationships the potential emotional and practical stability offered by the possibility of civil marriage? ”

The conclusion Mr Rudd draws is a pretty simple one: the Church and the State should be separate and therefore the two should be able to have separate definitions of marriage.

He wrote:

“Further, under no circumstances should marriage equality legislation place any legal requirement on the church or other religious institutions to conduct same sex marriages. The churches should be explicitly exempt. If we truly believe in a separation of church and state, then the church must be absolutely free to conduct marriage ceremonies between a man and a woman only, given the nature of their current established theological and doctrinal positions on the matter. This should be exclusively a matter for the church, the mosque and the synagogue. It is, however, a different matter for a secular state. The Church must be free to perform marriages for Christian heterosexual couples without any threat of interference from the state. Just as the state should be free to perform marriage services for both heterosexual and same sex couples, and whether these couples are of a religious faith or no religious faith. “

Mr Rudd acknowledges that the Labor Party currently has a conscience vote on this issue, and says the Liberals and the Nationals must follow suit. He argues that if this doesn’t happen a “national referendum” may be required.

Foreign Minister Bob Carr says Mr Rudd’s change of heart is part of an underlying trend, with parliamentary numbers shifting in support of legalising same-sex marriage.

“For the record, I will not be taking any leadership role on this issue nationally. My core interest is to be clear-cut about the change in my position locally on this highly controversial issue before the next election, so that my constituents are fully aware of my position when they next visit the ballot box. That, I believe, is the right thing to do.”

While his change of heart will still be examined as suspicious by many of his fellow politicians and political analysts, I welcome the change, and congratulate Mr Rudd for being a big enough person to acknowledge he was wrong. We continue to look forward to the time when other politicians – namely Julia Gillard and Tony Abbott – do the same and when we can offer “a more dignified and non-discriminatory future for all.”

To read Kevin Rudd’s post, visit his website.

Cheaper Than Rubies is honoured to have former Sky News journalist, and now globe trotter, Jess as our guest contributor. Jess is a CSU Communications graduate and has worked in the media in Tamworth and Sydney. This year, Jess ditched the workforce and ventured overseas. Here she shares her latest adventure with us.

Ireland had always been at the top of my list of countries to visit, so I feel very fortunate to actually be in the land of Irish luck, leprechauns and Guinness. After a whirlwind three day tour of Southern Ireland, I found myself volunteering on an organic farm just north of Dublin in the hope it would help me experience the real Ireland.

I’ve been away from home a while now and one thing I have come to appreciate is the fact that almost anywhere you go in the world, there are people willing to welcome perfect strangers into their home. After a matter of minutes the owner of the farm where I was staying, Paddy had already brushed aside my apologies for being late, told me a condensed version of his life story and urged me to ‘make myself at home’.

The town of Skerries as seen from the window of the kitchen at Paddy’s farm PHOTO: JESS FAGAN

As we turned into the driveway he told me ‘you’re in for a treat in a minute’. His words proved true: the view as we drove up to the house made the whole trip worthwhile on its own. The ocean stretched out directly below the farm, with the town of Skerries off to the right. The farm runs right down to the water and you’d think this would be enough, but to top off the beautiful location, the farm’s neighbour is a national park, complete with its very own castle.

Before I arrived in Skerries, I had visions of eating baskets full of fresh produce I had picked myself (especially strawberries!), but of course, it was my luck to arrive in Spring: planting season, not picking season.

Brushing aside those glorious visions of eating strawberries, I planted rows and rows of broad beans, peas and turnips. I felt a strange sense of satisfaction once they were all in the ground, and also a curiosity that made me want to come back in a few weeks and see how the crops had grown. We had to cover them with cloth straight away so the hens, who are let out as soon as it gets dark every night, didn’t pick at the seeds. The white sheet seemed to do the trick, but it was less effective in stopping Sammy the Labrador bounding over them!

The farm came complete with its very own shop front, from which its home-made produce: eggs, jams, chutneys and baked goods were sold. A lot of the time it is run on an honesty system: regulars leave cash on the counter and take what they need, and nobody seems too bothered if it’s a couple of euro over or under; they know they can just fix it up next time they come in.

On my first weekend on the farm, I decided to explore Skerries, home to a Paddy population of ‘maybe as many as 10,000, I don’t really know’ and an actual population of 8,333 (according to the 2011 census).

The picturesque Ardgillan Castle PHOTO: JESS FAGAN

The town was only a couple of kilometres from the farm, so I gave the bus a miss and walked in. The stroll took me down through the park, which at the right time of day is packed full of families having picnics, people exercising and walking their dogs. I followed the  trail past Ardgillan Castle and its beautiful grounds and gardens, down to the ocean, which you can follow all the way around to Skerries. The beaches are not as classically picturesque as our own in Australia: rocks replace our glittering golden sand, but the coastline still provides some stunning views.

The town seemed relatively quiet as I walked through at 11am on Saturday morning, but the old mill was hosting the weekly farmers markets. I had been told it only consisted of a few farmers – I think I counted about four stalls in total – but all of the stallholders clearly placed a very high importance on providing access to fresh produce. The mill also operates as a visitor centre and café, and a general meeting point for locals and tourists alike.

Paddy wasn’t my only company on the farm – a Swiss volunteer gave me someone to talk to as we planted rows of broad beans, and offered company during the evenings. I never tire of swapping stories with someone from a different culture; especially one that I know next to nothing about.

While it’s quiet at the farm now, we were told in the busier summer months there can be as many as eight or nine helpers needed to pick all the crops.

This experience has certainly thrown up its fair share of unexpected delights – walking down to the beach with a picnic lunch and falling asleep on the warm rocks was definitely not on my list of things I thought I’d get to do in Ireland. In fact, since I arrived there has been such perfect weather that a lot of people thanked me for bringing it with me from Australia.

After doing work that largely consisted of staring at a computer screen for the last few years, it’s nice to be working outside and getting my hands dirty. Paddy is an excellent host, ever willing and ready to share his knowledge with the volunteers. Among other things I’ve learnt about producing organic fruit and vegtables, I now know the basic process for making Crabapple Jelly. While I have a lot of travelling still ahead of me, I have the feeling that helping out on the farm will remain one of my fondest memories.

Share with us your favourite travel experiences in the comment section below, via Twitter or on Facebook.

Fairfax Media has reported the Opposition Leader has sent a letter to Prime Minister Julia Gillard demanding she not name a replacement for Governor-General Quentin Bryce, whose term will end next March.

The government is suspicious that Mr Abbott is hoping to keep the G-G position vacant in order to appoint his former boss, former primer minister John Howard.

But would former prime minister John Howard, the second longest serving PM in Australia’s history, be a suitable choice for the position?

Quentin Bryce has held the position of Governor-General since September 2008 and was appointed to the position by former prime minister Kevin Rudd.

If John Howard were to become the Governor-General, and thus the Queen’s representative in Australia, and while various politicians and former state premiers have held the position; Mr Howard would be the first former prime minister to become Governor-General.

While the role of the Governor-General is mostly symbolic these days, the G-G’s duties include:

• Issuing writs for new elections;
• Commissioning the Prime Minister and appointing other ministers;
• Appointing federal judges, Ambassadors and High Commissioners to overseas countries;
• Establishing royal commissions of inquiry;
• Giving assent to laws that have passed through both houses of parliament;
• In the role of official Commander-in-Chief of the Australian Defence Force, the G-G appoints the chiefs of the armed services and commissions officers in the navy, army, and air force. These duties are undertaken on the advice of the Minister for Defence;
• Receiving visiting heads of state;
• Opening sessions of parliament;
• Awarding honours for community service and bravery; and
• Attending community services and functions.

The potential appointment of John Howard to the role of Governor-General is an intriguing conundrum: is someone as politically minded as a former prime minister right for the job?

The Governor-General, despite being appointed by the Queen upon the advice of the Prime Minister, belongs to neither the Federal Government or the Opposition. Whenever the G-G makes a public statement, they must remain neutral, avoiding personal opinions and not commenting on political or other controversies.

To the average punter, it would seem difficult for Mr Howard, a former prime minister, and a Member of the Liberal Party, to remain so neutral in the public eye. Since the Coalition’s loss, and his own defeat by Maxine McKew in the 2007 election, Mr Howard has provided political commentary for various media outlets and is currently working on a second political book for publisher, Harper Collins.

If Mr Abbott were to nominate Mr Howard if he wins the September election, it would be a controversial choice – something Mr Abbott would be trying to avoid in his first term as prime minister.

The rumours could be just that. It would be beneficial for the Labor Party if disillusioned lefties thought this were a remote possibility; they could be convinced to vote for Labor, rather than the Greens or an independent. Furthermore, Mr Abbott will want to create his own legacy, and while Mr Howard has been his friend, his mentor and his leader, he should aim to create his own, unattached from the legacy of John Howard.

Would you like to see John Howard as Australia’s Governor-General? Let us know in the comment section below, on Facebook or via Twitter. 

Chrissy Amphlett, Divinyls frontwoman and queen of Australian rock, is gone.

The hole she has left behind is enormous. I’m stuck in a loop of watching old Divinyls videos on YouTube and reading tributes on Facebook and Twitter. It isn’t making me any less sad, but it is fortifying to see just how spectacular she was, and to know this is how she will be remembered. She truly was amazing.

However, because she was such a phenomenon, Amphlett’s legacy is both a blessing and a curse for those women who dream of fronting their own rock bands.

On one hand, she was proof that it is (I refuse to say ‘was’) possible to be a rock god and wear a skirt at the same time. She gave girls something to aspire to that was full of power and spice without being horribly commercialised and exploitative. She had a voice that was instantly recognisable in one context, yet could completely transform into another role when the need arose. She could turn on every person in a room with a look, irrespective of sexual preference. She demanded your attention. She was, undoubtedly, a force to be reckoned with.

On the other hand, she set an impossibly high benchmark for those to come. She had so much presence and confidence on stage, and was so incredibly unique as a performer that those who came after her were always bound to suffer comparisons to her greatness. I can vividly remember the first time I saw Bloody Lovely Audrey play, and how I was immediately struck by the lack of “Chrissy factor” in the performance. (If you see them these days, you’ll notice that they no longer need worry about me thinking that ever again.) There was so much to Amphlett’s performance that it is a massive task to even attempt to do justice to the expectations her ability put on female rock singers in general.

She was also a woman of excess. Her stage persona was aggressive and wild, and that bled into her private life, making her famously difficult to live with. However, she was also delightfully cheeky and sexy, right up until her last years, proving that it was worth weathering the storm to see her true magnificence.

Chrissy Amphlett was a remarkable singer, songwriter and woman. Those who had the chance to see her perform live are truly blessed; those who met and knew her, even more so. As a lass who counts her as an inspiration to jump into the male-dominated world of radio and music writing, I wish I had been one of either number.

It is unlikely we will ever see a lady as wonderful as her ever again. That should not stop us hoping, however, that she will inspire a new wave of frontwomen to take up the torch, bringing forth a new wave of feminine power in rock dedicated to doing her proud.

Chrissy Amphlett blazed a trail for women in rock music. Now she is gone, there is a big hole that needs filling, and I look forward to encountering the next great lady of Australian rock and roll destined to fill it. I get the feeling it’s what she would have wanted.

Chrissy Amphlett, former lead singer for Divinyls, actress and author, passed away Thursday 21st April in New York, after a long battle with breast cancer and multiple sclerosis. She is survived by her husband, Charley Drayton, and leaves a legacy as one of the great voices of Australian rock music. She was 53.

Curtis Stone – the face of Coles Supermarkets’ advertising.

It took me a while to put my finger on why I don’t like Coles advertising. Sure, it’s annoying and it’s repetitive.

But, the crunch came when I realised that it’s because Curtis Stone is the representative of Coles, a company that likes to pride itself on its Australian grown produce.

But Curtis Stone is Australian right? Right. But, Curtis Stone lives in LA, with his partner and their son. So, what? Good on him, right?

Well, yes, good on Mr Curtis, but shouldn’t Coles be using an Aussie chef who lives and works in Australia, who employs Australians, and who purchases and uses Australian produce in their cooking?

For me, it’s a simple principle: support those who are supporting the Australian economy. Qantas got it right when they brought Neil Perry on board as their consulting chef. Mr Perry not only has seven restaurants in Australia, but he also lives in Sydney. Mr Perry employs Australians in his restaurants, he purchases Australian produce and contributes to the Australian food scene. While I congratulate Mr Stone on his successes overseas and acknowledge that he is a wonderful ambassador for what Australian chefs can do, I question Coles choice to cast him as their ambassador.

However, it seems selecting someone who embodies Australia isn’t high on the priority list for Coles – the band featured in some of their more annoying ads (you know it: “Down down/prices are down”) is not an Aussie band. No, Status Quo are from England and none of the band members even call Australia home.

This crucial mistake by Coles in their advertising has only been further highlighted since IGA has launched their new campaign featuring comedian Anh Do. The ad celebrates Australia’s unique multicultural community, and with “The Happiest Refugee” at the helm, the ad celebrates the cultural mixing pot that makes Australia great. And, the music – well that’s ARIA award winning musician Ben Lee, born and bred in Sydney. While Ben Lee has admittedly lived for many years in various overseas locations, his music is not the key focus of the ad campaign unlike that of Status Quo in the Coles campaign.

The IGA ad celebrates Australia’s diversity and what Australia can offer, while the advertising campaign from Coles seems to treat its customers with a certain amount of disdain, with more recent ads even mocking viewers’ reaction to previous ads.

I’m not arguing for nationalistic advertising in which we parrot on about how good Australia is – we are a flawed country and I know that, but if you are going to encourage customers to buy Australian grown food, at least support Aussies who are supporting Australia.

What do you think of the advertising campaigns from Coles and IGA? Let us know in the comment section below, on Facebook or via Twitter.

This is my town. She is tidy, quiet, and restrained. To this would-be free spirit, she has never truly felt like home. She can be hot and dry and barren, occasionally exploding into short bursts of colour that remind me of all the potential she has.

We have a complicated relationship, my town and I. When she is raised in conversation, I often blush and avoid the speaker’s gaze, stuck on the fence between the disdain dealt out by strangers and the almost excessive praise heaped upon her by her most devoted residents. I want to fall somewhere in the middle, recognising her strengths without whitewashing her shortcomings. I rarely feel at peace in her embrace; I have often found my adventures elsewhere.

But for better or for worse, she is my town. Seventeen years of residence mean that I can never shake that fact. She is mine, and I am hers.

Dubbo is my town.

And yet, for almost 48 hours, I barely recognised her.

She had been shivering for weeks with an excitement I have never seen before, like electricity was running through her streets, bringing all who pass through her to life with a new, thrilling enthusiasm. There have been endless front pages and national attention focused on this tiny part of the universe where I just happen to spend most of my time. It was invigorating and glorious to see her celebrate live music so joyously; it was something I wished she could have done when I was a teenager, lusting for new experiences. It was incredible to see this town so full of vigour. It made me giddy with optimism, but bewildered that this was the same place I had grown up in.

This was my town. She was alive. She was awake.

She was a place that I knew, yet no longer felt familiar.

Midnite Café.
Image: triple j

When the end of the week rolled around, the buzz was just background noise, ready to be overtaken by the main event. I eased myself into its embrace with a familiar setting: Midnite Café. I was sure it would just be a slightly more energetic version of the local live music staple I have come to know and love, and for the most part, it was.

By the halfway point, the venue was thrumming. The mixture of the usual and the gloriously new and novel in the line-up had led to a magnificent atmosphere settling over the Old Dubbo Gaol, furthering the anticipation for the next day’s event. It was exciting and it was new, but it was still familiar.

Then they walked in, all those famous faces with the voices to match. They weren’t from round here, that’s for sure. These were people who lived in our radios and in our televisions. How could they be at this event that I had been attending since I was 16? Alex Dyson, Lindsay ‘The Doctor’ McDougall, Zan Rowe (holy shit, my hero), Lewis McKirdy: I had met famous people before and it had been cool, but they were always in far away places, never in the Old Dubbo Gaol courtyard where I had frolicked with my sister in our witch outfits, my dad had launched a coupon booklet, where I had sold biscuits with my Girl Guide unit.

My head was all muddled. This was my town, so why did it feel so surreal? What was happening?

Saturday morning was just as bewildering. My boyfriend and I wandered the streets as I did my best to maintain my tour guide role while being constantly surprised by the sheer number of young people pre-drinking on the back streets, setting up tents, careering along the main street in their inter-state-plated vehicles, or just relaxing at local cafés in preparation for the night ahead. I had never seen Dubbo so full of young folks, especially long, slim, tanned, fashionable ones. It quickly became a game: Pick The Non-Local.

It was starting to become clear: this was not my town, not any more.

Through the most fantastic stroke of luck, I had the pleasure of seeing the backstage area before the One Night Stand kicked off. It was incredibly bizarre to wander through the Dubbo Showground canteen that afternoon, a place that during the Show would be full of farmers and truckers and elderly folks sipping tea and eating meat pies with sauce. Instead, it was full of broadcasting equipment, band riders and more of those famous faces we’d glimpsed briefly at Midnite Café. The sheep shed out the back, where I had admired prize-winning stock, seen Killing Heidi play back in high school and experienced Questacon’s live touring show, was transformed into a meet and greet area, where we were herded for signatures and all too brief chats with musicians and radio announcers.

Image: triple j

I marvelled from afar at their beautiful technical set-up, mouth near watering at their radio panel alone. I lost myself in the whirl of free t-shirts and magazines and freaking out Sarah Howells with how excited I was that she was in town. Any other day this canteen would be in use, it would be all scones and sausage rolls, but on that afternoon, it had become my own little personal heaven.

This was definitely not my town. I simply refused to believe it. Stuff like this doesn’t happen in Dubbo. I must be somewhere else. Some of this place just looks the same.

As we wandered out into the Showground, waiting for the influx of punters that were already hundreds deep at the front gate, my spiral of disbelief got more and more out of control. Where we were standing was the same place where the trots happen, where ponies do their dressage, where the Show fireworks are launched every year. To see a giant stage, promising magnificent sets from some of the year’s biggest acts, all broadcast live across the country? It was too much for my brain to handle.

When the crowds finally started flooding in, somebody told me they were expecting 20,000 people to be in attendance. That’s more than half Dubbo’s population. I could have fainted.

I watched in awe as each set washed over me. Despite my previous doubts, Peoples Palace played the best set of their lives. I found myself letting go of any cynicism I’d been bottling up and lapped up their offerings, and the rest of the crowd did the same. It was thrilling to see four young blokes from the same place as me performing to so many people, yet also incredibly strange. It was like watching a butterfly emerge from a cocoon; they were undoubtedly at the peak of their powers, but it was almost like it was an occurrence that wasn’t meant for my eyes. I couldn’t help wondering if they would perform a show quite as spectacular ever again. It certainly won’t happen again in their home town.

A view of the One Night Stand stage.
Image: Dubbo City on Facebook

Seth Sentry was loud and brash. I have no doubt he got a few local grannies’ knickers in a twist with his foul language, but it was all in good fun. Dubbo isn’t known for being particularly partial to non-mainstream hip-hop, so the massively positive reception he got was magnificent. I couldn’t help wondering if it would mean that the garage rock band sound that is the staple of the Dubbo live music scene might be in for a makeover, care of some beats and hard lyrics.

Ball Park Music were cheeky, cheerful and undoubtedly endearing, bringing back memories of drama classes and light-hearted high-school ridiculousness. Even at our spot in the less-sardine-packed part of the crowd, their energy and enthusiasm was infectious. “Surrender” brought me to the brink of tears, only to have my soul set alight by the joy-filled young lasses next to us, bouncing up and down and singing all the words at the top of their lungs.

The Rubens made me realise how marvellous they truly are, exposing a richness in the sound of their live set that never quite wriggled through in their recordings. I do hope they make a return visit; I would love to see them live again.

By the time Flume took to the stage, the Showground had become a dust bowl, the air heavy with particles kicked up by the crowd. It filtered down through the lighting, making speckled reflections in the sky above the stage and choking anyone who dared breathe too heavily. It turned our shoes a different shade and felt gritty on our skin and in our hair. But none of us cared. We were all too busy dancing the night away before it slipped through our fingers.

This was not my town any more. For one night, Dubbo was completely dissolved.

Instead, we were a new town, patched together from all across the country, stitched together by live music. All 18,000 or so of us, sealed into one community by the beats and the notes floating out through the dust-clouds. It was as glorious as it was surreal, and a feat that will never again be repeated in that place. People often say things are “once in a lifetime”, but this was exactly that. My town had come alive and become something thrillingly new.

Then, as these things tend to do, it all came to a close. The music faded to just the ringing in our ears, the crowd filed out to find their next adventure, and the lights were dimmed. That was it.

My town had awakened. Now she felt the need to sleep again.

Image: triple j

Dubbo has returned to being the place I knew before. The streets have calmed, and while the smiles and the memories remain, the great carnival that is the One Night Stand has moved on.

But I don’t want Dubbo to fall into her slumber again. I want to see that vibrancy she was so keen to show raise its head again and again. I want to see the same enthusiasm that greeted triple j’s ordained acts fall at the feet of those local artists who are plugging away, week in and week out, trying to convince local venues that original music can bring in crowds. I want to see locals going out and seeing bands they’ve not yet heard of, in the hope that they’ll rediscover the thrill of that Great Weekend that has now passed into Dubbo’s history. I want people to talk about local musicians, and to book local musicians, and to become local musicians.

One night stands have a reputation for leaving you feeling used and wasted, and as a supporter of Dubbo’s music scene, I don’t want triple j’s event of the same name to have that same effect on this community. While the name suggests it’s just a quick fix, I want to see the same level of commitment for live music shown in the long term.

Together we can do it.

This is our town, and together we can make her sing.

Under the propoal, school funding would be increased by $14.5 billion over six years – $12 billion of that will be directed to public schools with Cathloic schools picking up an extra $1.5 billion in funding and independent schools getting an extra $1 billion.

The proposal aims to create a school resource standard; that is an amount of money the Government says is required to educate a child. According to the proposal the base amount of funding for primary students is $9 271 per child and $12 193 for secondary pupils. These figures are based on what it could cost to raise 80 per cent of students above the national minimum standards for literacy and numeracy.

The funding will only be provided if the states and territories join the Gonski party and boost their spending by three per cent. The changes will be put to the Premiers at a COAG meeting this Friday.

“I make an offer to premiers and chief ministers around the country which is for the extra money required to get us to the school resourcing standard for every $1 they are prepared to put in to get there, I am prepared to put in $2,” Ms Gillard said.

But, the Gonski reforms are already facing a hurdle: No states or territories have indicated they will support the reforms at COAG. Western Australia is even insisting they will reject the current plan.

This will mean the already embattled Federal Government will have to enter into one-on-one negotiations with each state and territory to ensure the funding plan can work.

Opposition education spokesman, Christopher Pyne, has unsurprisingly slammed the proposals and has promised that if the Coalition wins the election in September – something that is looking more and more likely with each passing day – and all the states and territories haven’t signed up, then the deal will be canned.

“If the Gillard Government can’t get all the states and territories to sign up at COAG on Friday, her school funding model is dead in the water,” he said.

“Education is not like health; we’ve never operated that way. We’ve always had a nationally consistent model and we will not have different states operating under different models.

“So no state should sign up thinking that they will have that agreement honoured if the other states do not… It’s all in or none in.”

And it’s not just Christopher Pyne that isn’t happy.  Surprisingly, David Gonski himself has expressed his disappointment. For Mr Gonski, Chancellor of the University of NSW, and chair of the Review of Funding for Schooling, the announcement must have been a stab in the heart. The recommendations he headed, and had given his name to, were going to be implemented, but at the cost of university funding.

“As chairman of the review of school funding, set up by the Federal Government, my fellow panellists and I were not asked to consider how our final recommendations should be funded,” he said.

David Gonski

“As chancellor of a leading Australian university, the University of NSW, I fervently believe in and will continue to advocate that increases be made in funding the university sector, to ensure Australia is able to provide quality teaching and research in its universities.”

As of next year, universities will be hit with an efficiency dividend of two per cent and 1.25 per cent in 2015 which will save about $900 million. Of more concern to the average voter, especially those of university age, the Federal Government will save a further $230 million by cutting the current 10 per cent discount students enjoy if they pay university fees up front. In another disappointing move, the Federal Government will save $1.2 billion through changing the Start-up scholarship into a loan-type scheme. This will mean students who receive the scholarship will have to pay the money back once they reach an earning threshold. For the 2012-13 income year, the compulsory repayment threshold is $49, 095.

It’s the changes to the HELP discount scheme and changing the start-up scholarship to a start-up loan that voters need to concern themselves with, as these will directly hit university students, and parents of university students, in the hip pocket. The removal of the HELP discount scheme removes the incentive for students to get on top of their university loans through paying upfront, while the changes to the Start-up scholarship just put another roadblock in front of financially challenged students, as the prospect of having to pay more money back could discourage them from entering higher education.

Dr Chandra Sha

While changes to benefits students received are of concern, changes to direct university funding aren’t as negative as some interested parties are making out. The direct changes to university funding actually only amounts to $900 million, which Dr Chandra Shah from Monash University says is the figure we should be looking at.

Dr Shah, an academic specialising in the economics of education, believes the money will be better spent on schools and argues that the scale and impact of the cutbacks on tertiary institutions has been overstated.

“It’s not going to suddenly stop universities from operating, and it is over two years and then it reverts back,” he told the ABC.

“Generally there is higher pay-off into spending money into good quality primary and secondary education, and then you have set up a good base for further education for those students.”

The Greens education spokeswoman, Lee Rhiannon disagrees with the views of Dr Shah, saying it’s ludicrous to cut one education sector to fund another.

“So many of our students at schools in coming years will want to go to university and when they arrive there they will find under-resourced institutions with overworked staff, overcrowded classrooms,” she said.

“This is no way to build an innovative nation with an educated population.”

Despite the widespread criticism, the Prime Minister has committed to getting the Gonski reforms through parliament and into legislation by September; before the election that is likely to see her and her government ousted.

Prime Minister Julia Gillard’s announcement that she will cut university funding to fund the Gonski education funding reforms hasn’t been a popular one, with politicians and academics condemning the move, which is really just a simple shuffle of funding. Education has always been a priority of the Labor government, both under Kevin Rudd and Julia Gillard, and with these reforms dividing politicians and academics alike, education funding is certain to be another 2013 election issue.

What do you think of the proposals? Let us know in the comment section below, on Facebook or via Twitter.

•  About a day of battery life
• An HD display “the equivalent of a 25-inch high definition screen from eight feet away”
• Voice-recognition technology
• 12 gigabytes of usable storage
• 5-mexapixal camera that can record video in 720p HD
• Micro USB port for charging the batter
• Can connect over Bluetooth or Wi-Fi through an application called MyGlass that runs on newer versions of Android
• Adjustable nose pads

Google is betting that it can convince consumers to adopt a wearable-computing device, but I have my doubts. I don’t understand why you need a smart device interfering with your view on the world. The consequences of a device such as the Google Glass becoming mainstream will only be negative and create an almost dystopian, dysfunctional society in which humans move around each other interacting through a non-existent world. Society as we know it could turn into the one predicted in that awful 2009 Bruce Willis movie Surrogates. (Okay, so maybe I’m being a bit extreme.)

The Pebble E-Paper Watch is one of the leading catalysts behind this new wearable technology trend – it also is the gadget that raised $10.2 million in 48 days to become the richest project in Kickstarter history.

•  A 1.26-inch, 144×168-pixel, black-and-white E-Paper display: this helps extends the battery life and ensures it can be read outdoors
• The watch is controlled with four buttons – a menu button on the left; up, down and selection buttons on the right. Contacts for its USB-ended charger also line its left side
• Can be used with an iPhone or Android devices
• Users can choose which notifications appear on the smart watch screen: incoming calls, text messages, calendar reminders, emails, Tweets and more.

For me, the girlfriend of a computer geek who MUST own every device invented, the attraction in the smart watch is that it’s less invasive: it notes the role a smart device can play in your life but it also doesn’t feel the need to take over your life.

We can’t reverse the damage smart devices are already waging on the way we interact with each other as a society, or our faltering attention spans, but surely we can say no to a device that is only going to make the situation worse. When it comes down to it, I can handle a watch but I don’t think I can handle Google Glass.

What do you think of Google Glass? Are you interested in owning the wearable computing device? Let us know in the comment section below, on Facebook or via Twitter.

I was lucky enough to have a very exciting week last week. Three concerts in four days, starting with a “red-headed yeti with multiple arms” that goes by the name of Newton Faulkner, then my favourite band, Counting Crows and finishing up with amazing young talent, Birdy. All concerts were amazing; I didn’t want any if them to end. On Monday morning, a co-worker said he wanted to see Birdy live again before he even said hello. It was a very good week.

Yet, something lingers… something I can’t quite understand and I don’t know if it’s because I am “old” or not “cool”: why did everyone watch the concerts through their phones?

Don’t get me wrong, I understand it’s actually exciting tagging or checking-in. I did check-in to all three concerts on Facebook and I’m only mildly ashamed. The thing is though, I did it before the concert started, and I didn’t film the entire thing.

I can already hear you say it. “Ugh, they didn’t film the whole thing surely!”

Oh, they did. One woman even went through her old holiday snaps and started deleting them so that she could film even more of Birdy. While she looked down and sorted through those pictures she was missing the concert. But she has some of it forever, so does that cancel itself out?

I hope not, because it’s annoying for everyone else!

Counting Crows is my favourite band ever. I cried in utter despair back in 2003 when they cancelled their Sydney concert one day beforehand. The universe was obviously against me and it was devastating to my 15-year-old self. I was cut for quite some time. So when the 50-something guy in front of me was “recording” (I’ll get into that soon) with his phone held up in front of him, I was getting frustrated. It’s hard for your eyes to not be drawn to the glowing lights in front of you, but it’s also hard to not laugh at the guy who thought he recorded the entire concert but was actually just watching it through the camera live view. Yep, he was “recording” but wasn’t recording. When he wanted to stop, he hit the “take photo” button and took a photo with a flash each time, then went looking for the video, never found it and just attached the photo to an email and sent it to someone. Then started “recording” again.

Even though Counting Crows were streaming the entire concert live on YouTube and his wife yelled at him a couple of times, he persisted. Let’s just say I didn’t feel bad that he didn’t know how to use an iPhone.

The best example of this is the announcement of Pope Francis’ succession this year. Only 8 years before, everyone just watched with their eyes. Suddenly, this year all the phones are out. It never happened if it isn’t on Facebook, after all!

People are also having to ask guests on their wedding invitations that, during the ceremony and reception, to please refrain from taking their own photos. Why? They pop up suddenly in front of the professional photographer (who is being paid well into the thousands for the day.)

I thought it was just me who got annoyed, but after Birdy there were several people who piped up saying they wanted to ask the people in front of them to put their phones away. The demographic was much younger because of the support acts, so young girls through the whole show had phones up. One support act took a panoramic of the audience to put on Instagram, then afterwards phones went up to take a photo of him after taking the photo! Isn’t the ticket stub enough of a memory?

I don’t know why people do it, especially when the photos end up like they do to the right, a big ball of blurry light. I don’t remember any more of that concert because of that photo. So if you are at any sort of show, treat it like being at the cinema: once the lights go down, put your phone on silent and do not touch it. It shouldn’t need to be said. Should it?

What are your live event gripes? Do people taking snaps on their phones make you want to snap their fingers? Have you ever wanted to strangle someone talking in the middle of a set? Let us know on Twitter, Facebook or in the comments below.

The most anticipated television show of the year has finally aired, smashing records in the US; not only on the ye ‘olde television set but online as well. With the season premiere shown three times in the one night on HBO, around 6.7 million people in the US watched one of the three airings. This doesn’t include more than one person sitting around the TV, so the figure could very well be more.

In Australia, the show is “fast-tracked” onto Foxtel each week. While this next statement could cause arguments in itself, Australia’s free-to-air television has pretty substantial quality on its own without the need to pay for a cable service.

Cue the new record that TV aims to break: the premiere episode was estimated to have been downloaded at least one million times (illegally) in less than a day through BitTorrent. This doesn’t mean it wasn’t downloaded through other websites, so again the figure could very well be much more, especially since there’s no way to know how many people passed the file on to another in person via USB. The only TV show to beat this record was the very first episode of Heroes back in 2006.

A quick technical lesson that won’t be too technical before I continue.

BitTorrent is a way of downloading files that uses the practice of peer-to-peer file sharing. It is used for distributing large amounts of data over the Internet; typically movies, television shows and software (like Windows, Microsoft Office or Photoshop).

Peer-to-peer means that one person uploads a movie for people to download. Once people have downloaded it, they are also sharing parts of the file for other people to download. This means that everyone who is downloading is also part of the “server” for you to get files. This is called a swarm, so the more people uploading and downloading bits of a movie, the bigger the swarm.

HBO Programming President, Michael Lombardo

Game of Thrones made a very, very big swarm.

Technically this is illegal; all of these people could have hopped on to iTunes and downloaded the episode for $3. In Australia, where we have plenty of free-to-air channels, we seem to take the mentality of “why would I pay?” Why buy the cow when I can have the milk for free? I’m not getting Foxtel, sifting through MTV’s Jersey Shore marathons just to watch Game of Thrones. I’ve read the books, I know what happens anyway!

Movie and television studios and record labels are notorious for telling us that they are losing money because of online piracy.  I guess it makes sense that they would be losing money, but I have no idea how much fluff there is in that statement. HBO’s own programming president Michael Lombardo said himself that he finds the free downloading a huge compliment to the show and that it does not affect DVD sales.

This is true. If the show is good enough it will gather a merchandise-crazy fan-base and GoT merchandise is everywhere. So how are they losing money? Is it money that isn’t going into the back pockets of the big-wigs at the studios?

Here is my argument: make a good enough show or movie and people will pay. They will either buy tickets, the DVD, a poster, a figurine… people are actually happy to pay. I don’t need my Stark scarf, yet I have one. But I won’t pay for a bad show.

Did you download Game of Thrones or did you watch it on Foxtel? What shows would you be happy to pay for? Let us know in the comment section below, on Facebook or via Twitter.