5/09/2008 | WE note with interest that a shopping centre in Tweed Heads has moved to ban hooded sweatshirts and hats in order to create a safer environment.
It is not yet known if the Tweed City shopping centre will be making the ban permanent. We hope it will.
The real concern, however, has nothing to do with people concealing their identities so they can commit crimes.
4/09/2008 | CRITICS of yesterday’s Battle for Australia observance have missed the point and run the risk of understating the contribution to Australian freedom made by hundreds of thousands of Australian and American servicemen and servicewoman.
3/09/2008 | BEFORE we get carried away with the universal wave of euphoria that has greeted the first official interest rate cut in almost seven years, it is timely to ask if yesterday’s downward move of .25 per cent might not be too little and too late.
2/09/2008 | THE people of NSW are paying a high price for the State Government’s bare faced deceit in the lead up to the 2007 election.
Mr Iemma and his motley crew went into the poll backed by a swag of election promises that they made it perfectly clear they were able to fund.
Last week it became apparent pretty much every big ticket item the Iemma Government had pledged itself to carry out between March last year and 2011 was now contingent on its being able to flog off NSW’s power generation ability.
1/09/2008 | MANY of those who awoke to a grey and wet morning yesterday would have relaxed into a day of sloth, perhaps a lazy breakfast or planning a movie with the family.
29/08/2008 | YESTERDAY was a day of wins for regional NSW residents on several levels.
Boral cut a deal with the State Government and the residents of Walcha to offer to lease the sawmill in the New England town, a decision that will hopefully enable another group to reopen the mill and give the recently unemployed staff a chance for another job.
However, for the State Government the good news stopped about there.
28/08/2008 | THE decision by the Australian Manufacturers Workers’ Union to put its hand up to join the fray to try and bring the State Government to account over the pending environmental disaster that is the Woodsreef asbestos mine should auger well for those backing the cause.
27/08/2008 | MEASURING the success of a local government or council could often be compared with the assessment of a good referee in an important rugby league game like the State of Origin.
26/08/2008 | THE dissension, backbiting and theatrics that has disrupted the smooth operation of the Armidale Dumaresq Council for the better part of the past four years has gone on long enough.
Last night’s tabling of an extensive code of conduct committee report on claims four councillors had misled the Crown Solicitor at the height of the Mosman’s Bay controversy should have been welcomed as an opportunity to draw a line under a particularly unhappy period.
25/08/2008 | COURAGE is an enigma. It is, on the one hand, almost the simplest to grasp of all the human virtues.
It remains, on the other, one of the hardest of those virtues to explain.
22/08/2008 | IT’S been a long time coming but there are signs Boral may finally be beginning to buckle in the face of public opposition to its decision to close Walcha’s timber mill.
21/08/2008 | THE BankWest Quality of Life index (see reports this edition) tells us nothing we didn’t already know.
Its principal message – and one that has been trumpeted from the rooftops by the Sydney media – is that city residents get a much better deal from their governments than we do.
20/08/2008 | WE take time out today to say thank you to three people who have done more than most people will ever know for their local communities over many years.
19/08/2008 | AGATHA Christie fans would know that when Poirot or Miss Marple begin to investigate a crime they start with the question of who stood to benefit the most?
18/08/2008 | WE make no apologies for today’s “It’s water, stupid” headline on our council candidates’ story.
15/08/2008 | THE residents of Barraba could be forgiven for thinking they are the lost tribe of the North West.
14/08/2008 | IT takes a lot to radicalise a conservative country town like Walcha but timber industry giant Boral has managed to pull it off.
13/08/2008 | WHILE there is no doubt that country people are hurting as a result of rising petrol prices, food bills and interest rates we are ahead of our city cousins in one very important respect.
12/08/2008 | WHAT is the Federal Government waiting for? That is the obvious question to ask in the wake of yesterday’s announcement it will be at least seven months before the Rudd administration even begins to think about taking action on the abysmal plight of people trying to eke out a meagre existence on the old age pension.
11/08/2008 | CHAFFEY Dam might be easing toward the 80 per cent full mark, but it is good to see the regional council is still working at maintaining water efficiency programs.