FAR REACHING GLOBAL CHANGES

An article, FAREWELL TO AUSTRALIA, in the October-December issue of The Australian Ethnic Reporter, by Hungarian born Dr. Anthony Endrey, is an illuminating example of the dramatically changed state of the world. Dr. Endrey has lived in Australia for 40 years and has made a distinguished contribution to the anti-totalitarian movement in Australia. Like many others who sought refuge in Australia from Eastern Europe following the Second World War, Dr. Endrey became increasingly concerned with the progressive retreat of the Liberal Party from its founding principles, with alarm replacing concern when the Liberal Party failed to take an unequivocal stand on the immoral "War Crimes" legislation.

It was suggested that Australian ethnic communities should form their own political party, the suggested title, The Christian Party, reflecting the fact that the majority of Eastern European migrants to Australia are products of traditional Christianity. But Dr. Endrey now says that after a recent visit to his homeland, Hungary, after an absence of 40 years, he has decided to return to Hungary.

He writes, "... I was presented with an undreamed of view of my native country and an entirely new vista of my life. What surprised me during my visit were not the bad things about Hungary - I was prepared for them - but the good, which I found. I had heard a great deal of the changes in the political system in Hungary, a Communist State, and was fairly well informed about them, but I did not expect the almost daily loosening of the shackles of the Hungarian people which I witnessed with my own eyes during the six weeks I spent in the country."

The dramatic changes inside the Communist nations, including China, confirm what the more farsighted observers have been stressing for some time: Socialism as a Faith has been increasingly discredited, no longer capable of attracting people, particularly the young. Dr. Endrey makes the significant comment that the young people of Hungary are now questioning every aspect of the Communist regime, "and are thirsting for knowledge about their own past, about the values which once animated the Hungarian nation, about life in the West, and yes, about God".

It was Solzhenitsyn who observed after experiencing the West at first hand, that it was suffering from basically the same type of disease which had afflicted his own people under the type of naked totalitarianism imposed by the Communists. But Solzhenitsyn also envisaged that the very intensity of the disease throughout his own country would result in a deeper regeneration of the Christian Faith.

Gorbachev and those supporting him have experienced the discipline of Truth. In spite of the continuous flow of economic blood transfusions from the West, particularly the massive food supplies since 1972, the Soviet economic system has been a disaster. The Chinese Communists faced the reality even before the current Soviet leaders, and have completely abandoned Marxist theory. The Soviet defeat in Afghanistan, after ten years of using massive military power, has also made a far reaching contribution to the ferment now sweeping all parts of the Soviet bloc.
The fact that the Afghans are dedicated Moslems has had a profound effect upon the large and growing Moslem communities inside the Soviet. The threatened break up of Jugoslavia could prove relatively minor compared with the explosions which threaten the Soviet bloc. If Gorbachev and his supporters are to successfully retain control while permitting a degree of self-determination, they desperately need the assistance of the West.

The deeper student of international politics was not surprised that one of Gorbachev's first acts was to demonstrate that he accepts the major role of Zionism in international affairs. First there was the dramatic permission for prominent Soviet Jews to leave the Soviet, with Prime Minister Bob Hawke playing a significant role. But this has been followed with even more dramatic developments as international Zionist leaders like Isi Leibler collaborate in Moscow with Soviet leaders in the establishment of Jewish cultural activities in the Soviet Union. All the evidence indicates that the great majority of the Jews living in the Soviet Union have no intention of leaving, while those who do show little inclination to live in Zionist Israel.

Contributing to the rapidly changing global situation is the growing disillusionment inside Israel, which is now also starting to find itself isolated internationally. The Palestinian challenge and the naked aggression by Zionist Israel, is producing a completely new situation, with Western politicians for the first time starting to criticise Israel's policies. Jewish communities around the world are becoming divided about the changed situation in both the Soviet and the Middle East, with anti-Zionist Jews starting to at least be heeded.

American expert on :Israel. Grace Halsell, author of Prophecy and Politics (Price $14.00 posted from all League bookshops) has recently pointed out that it is the "Christian Zionists" who are now providing the major support for Israel. He would be a very foolish person who would attempt to predict in any details what is going to unfold in the developing global situation. But it can be said that it is certain that the dramatic changes under way are going to gain momentum and cannot be stopped.

The International Planners, desperately attempting to manipulate Finance Economics, are all too aware of what is taking place, and can be relied upon to attempt to bring the whole world inside the orbit of their proposed New International Economic Order. We visualise mounting economic sabotage and growing social disintegration as the attempt is made to make the unworkable work. But just as their long years of suffering have forced the enslaved victims of Communism to go back to their roots and basic values, events will challenge Western peoples like Australians also to pay greater attention to their own history and traditions. The emergence of the Australian League of Rights at the centre of the Australian political stage is one of the significant signs of the times.

BRIEF COMMENTS

Prime Minister Bob Hawke says that Australia should aim at a population of 20 million by the year 2000. For this objective to be reached, Australia would have to increase its population by approximately 400,000 per year over the next eleven years. Primarily as a result of the financial policies imposed by the Hawke Government, during the past four years, Australia's rate of natural increase has averaged only 0.8 percent. As there is no indication that the Hawke Government is about to make it financially possible for more young Australians to obtain their own homes and to have the number of children they would genuinely prefer, perhaps Mr. Hawke plans a substantial increase in the immigration rate? The immigration question must be made a major issue at the next Federal Elections.

A report by the Australian Institute of Family Studies formally confirms what Australian families on middle incomes have known for some time: they are the main victims of the Hawke Government's financial policies. The Institute report shows that a family with two children, on average weekly earnings, paid $27-$34 more tax than in 1976-77. The real disposable income of such a family had fallen by $41 a week since 1985. Australia's enormous productive capacity is capable of providing all the basic requirements for civilised living, including housing, for all Australians. The major thrust of present financial policies, including taxation, is polarising society, with Big Business becoming bigger, and with increasing numbers dependent on the State to survive. Traditional middle Australia is being destroyed. While there is plenty of stupidity about concerning financial realities, the destruction of the traditional middle class is a deliberate policy, part of what is euphemistically described as "restructuring" the nation. This destructive policy must be vigorously challenged.

Australia's foreign debt continues to soar. Figures released last week by the Australian Bureau of Statistics reveal that the foreign debt reached a record new level of $95.4 billion at the end of the December quarter. Mr. Andrew Peacock, Opposition spokesman on Treasury matters, comments that the increase in the foreign debt is more "bad news", and that the latest debt figures meant that every man, woman and child in Australia now had an external debt of $7,000 each. But what do Mr. Peacock and his Opposition colleagues propose to do about the external debt if elected to form a government? They subscribe to the black magic, which insists that Australia needs foreign investments in order to survive. Unless this black magic is rejected by the Australian people, independent Australia will not survive.

Described by some as a prominent member of the "Canberra rat pack", political commentator Michelle Grattan seems to be losing some of her enthusiasm for the "world's greatest Treasurer", Paul Keating. She contributes an article in The Age of March 3rd, entitled, KEATING'S DILEMMA; TOO MUCH PROSPERITY. The article is a classic example of jargonese, explaining how Keating is hoping that there will be a "soft landing" for the Australian people as a result of current problems. Michelle Grattan does make a valid point that the Opposition has not "fully spelled out its economic policy". That policy is basically the same as the Government's policy.

FROM HANSARD

The Senate, October 12th, 1988, Census & Statistics Amendment Bill, Senator Glenister Shiel (Nat.-Qld.):
The Ombudsman largely sides with the Statistician in considering a person's privacy should be sacrificed because of the obligation owed to the community at large and it would only be in exceptional circumstances that official action could properly be taken pursuant to the statutory powers characterised as oppression. It is difficult to assess the implications of overtly voluntary collection. However, the ABS says there is ample evidence of severe consequences for the quality of statistical data:
1) the drop in response rates would have an unknown impact;
2) movements between the results of regular surveys would be different because voluntary respondents have different characteristics from involuntary respondents. This applies particularly to businesses. Voluntary respondents are therefore not typical;
3) it would have dire consequences for statistical indicator collections. The largest 1,000 businesses comprise 60% economic activity.
4) a high non-response would render surveys on agricultural, manufacturing and retail industries non-viable. This would limit data required by Governments and regional bodies; in which case State governments would probably use their powers to bring in compulsory surveys;
5) voluntary household expenditure survey implications would also be serious. The non-response rate would be high, as shown by the experience of other countries - Australia and Canada .. compulsory non- response rate 5%, Netherlands and Sweden .. non-response rate 20%, West Germany .. overtly voluntary .. non-response rate 40%. Again the difference in the characteristics of voluntary and compulsory respondents is stressed by the Bureau.
6) the Australian Bureau of Statistics says voluntary surveys would cost more, as seeking to persuade people to co-operate would cost more, and it would place an unfair burden on those people and businesses willing to co-operate. None of these reasons carry sufficient weight to counterbalance the invasion of personal privacy and harassment occasioned by the ABS.
"The only reason the consumer price index keeps escalating is because the Government keeps spending more than it reaps, and this devalues people's money. People invented government to protect their personal privacy, not to violate it. Certainly governments need certain information in order to make responsible decisions. But when the information is forced out of people in order for the government to engage in social engineering schemes that is going too far. It is even worse when a government uses these forced confessions to advance its own political purposes, as the Hawke Government has done, and is doing, with this extended survey.
"Privacy is a precious possession. That is why we have fought to preserve it since the beginning of democracy. It is the reason we invented government - to do those things for us which we could not do ourselves, such as defence of the nation and maintenance of law, both of which are largely to protect our privacy. Privacy is so important that the people have been willing to give up enormous power to governments to protect it. Governments in their turn are only interested in maintaining the power that has been given to them. In order to maintain that power they have descended to practice of promising handouts in exchange for votes. In order to capture those votes they need information on where best to buy them.
"As the process develops they need so much information that the means of acquiring it becomes an invasion of privacy. This is where Australia is today. The process of acquiring information is not new. Generations of governments have initiated all sorts of spy networks in order to maintain power: for knowledge is power in our world. Catherine de Medici organised a network of courtesans, pimps and peepholes in order to maintain her influence. Signal towers and ships dotted nations and oceans. Laird's Lugs can still be seen in many Scottish and Irish castles. The history of government power and control of people abounds with the means of acquiring information.
"In Australia today this power is called the Australian Bureau of Statistics and it is being used cynically, callously and ruthlessly to extract personal information from people by force of law. Apart from governments using the power of the ABS to acquire information from people by compulsion, many outside agencies are using the ABS because of its power of compulsion.
"I have cited the examples previously in my speech. The officers of the ABS are revelling in their position of power and privilege. Their bureaucratic arrogance is only exceeded by their intemperance.
"Our people are now willing to go to jail and challenge the ABS officers in court rather than submit to their inquisition. The fact that the people are winning in court has not deterred the ABS from proceeding because it presumes it has the impenetrable barriers of the Public Service to protect it.
"The ABS has attempted to use the power of its bureaucratic position to savage the procedures of the democratic process and the Parliament. It has attempted to bypass parliamentary scrutiny by crafty interpretation of the Acts under which it operates. It is attempting to compel answers from the people without notifying the Parliament, on the grounds that it has already notified the Parliament about previous surveys that were made by another department, under a different Act and in any case were voluntary. This is the performance of civil servants that are no longer civil and no longer servants."

Our Comment
All actionists should congratulate Senator Glenister Shiel on his attempt to introduce legislation to curb the powers of the Australian Bureau of Statistics. We remind all actionists that the Minister responsible for the ABS is PAUL KEATING! The ABS is responsible to the Treasurer. The Australian Bureau of Statistics must be stripped of all its draconian powers of compulsion.