ETS CHANGE WON'T HIT BUDGET, COMPO: LABOR

AAP
The federal government has scrapped its planned floor on the carbon price under a deal which links Australia to the European Union emissions trading scheme (ETS), the world's biggest carbon market.
However, Climate Change Minister Greg Combet said it would not create a budget shortfall and households would still be compensated even if the price falls.
Mr Combet told reporters Australia's price on carbon from July 1, 2015 will be linked to the European Union ETS and the planned floor price of $15 per tonne "won't be implemented".
He said a second change would put a 12.5 per cent limit on the use of cheap Kyoto carbon units, which can sell for a third of the cost of European units, which are trading around $9.80.
"From 1 July, 2015, Australia's carbon price will effectively be the same as that that operates in our second largest trading bloc," Mr Combet said.

The carbon tax debate

Full linkage of the markets will occur no later than July 1, 2018.
Mr Combet was asked if it would create a budget shortfall, rather than the estimated $9.4 billion of revenue a market-based price was predicted to generate in the 2015/16 budget.
"We stand by the budget as it was announced in May," he said.
"How about we have a bit of trust in that, than some ridiculous allegation made by (Opposition Leader) Tony Abbott about the impact of carbon pricing."
Mr Combet said the government would not cut household assistance payments and tax cuts set up to compensate for the price impacts of the carbon tax in the economy.
"We committed to it and you might recall that there are further tax cuts that have been legislated from 2015 as well," he said.
Mr Combet had previously said a floor price would provide certainty, confidence and stability for business.
But business chiefs wanted to move to a fully flexible market price as soon as possible.
"This delivers certainty to businesses that will have a liability under the Australian scheme because they will have access to largest carbon market in the world," he said.
"There are sophisticated markets that have developed in Europe - futures markets that will give businesses a great deal of confidence, access to financial organisations expert in dealing with those matters to allow them to reliably predict what their carbon price liability might be."
Under the full arrangement, businesses will be allowed to use carbon units from the Australian ETS or the European Union ETS for compliance under either system.
Mr Combet said businesses would be able start buying European units from Tuesday in order to comply with the scheme from July 1, 2015.
He said it would not be in Australia's national interest for Mr Abbott to scrap the scheme if the coalition wins power at the federal election due in late 2013.
"This is a manageable, rational, reasonable economic and environmental reform," Mr Combet said.
"And he cannot, and will not, repeal it - this only demonstrates further why he won't."
But Mr Abbott said there would be a "huge hole" in the budget as a result of the decision and recommitted to scrapping the tax.
http://au.finance.yahoo.com/news/ets-change-won-t-hit-budget--compo--labor.html

VETS BEING ROUNDED-UP NATIONWIDE, PEOPLE EVERYWHERE JUST DISAPPEARING: IT'S BEGINNING TO LOOK A LOT LIKE HITLER

• Posted by Gerry Emery on August 25, 2012

Marine Veteran Brandon Raub’s Attorney says he is getting calls from veterans and people all over the country reporting psychiatric detention for political speech.

Last Thursday, decorator form US Marine Brandon Raub, who served two tour of duties in Iraq and Afghanistan, was detained by the FBI and local authorities for posting controversial anti-government political comments on the social media site Facebook.
Although 26 year-old Brandon Raub was forcefully detained against his will for his political views he was not charged with any criminal misconduct, a hallmark of the NAZI gestapo tactic of indefinite psychiatric detention which was used to crush political dissent.
John Whitehead, a constitutional attorney representing Raub, discussed how the US government violated his client’s first amendment rights with RT yesterday.
He also made an appearance on GBTV with Glen Beck in which he made even more shocking revelations.
Whitehead tells Beck that he is getting calls from military veterans all over the country subjected to the same Nazi style psychiatric detention for their political views.
More alarming, is when Beck asked if people of left-wing ideology – specifically members of Occupy Wall Street – are being detained Whitehead responded  saying he can’t say for sure because people all over the country are just disappearing.
He also reveals that while Raub was in psychiatric detention one of the psychiatrists that he was seeing threatened to “brainwash” him and force him to take medication.
Watch the entire interview with Glenn Beck>>
http://blog.alexanderhiggins.com/2012/08/24/vets-nationwide-people-disappearing-174701/
http://wramsite.com/profiles/blog/show?id=3567481%3ABlogPost%3A1371670&xgs=1&xg_source=msg_share_post

ISRAELI VETS CONFESS TO 'NO MERCY' ABUSE OF PALESTINIAN 'TERRORIST' KIDS

Published: 26 August, 2012,

A young Palestinian protester runs away from Israeli soldiers during a demonstration against the expropriation of Palestinian land by Israel in the village of Kafr Qaddum, near the West Bank city of Ramallah (AFP Photo / Jaafar Ashtiyeh)

Israeli veterans have spoken out, describing a degrading culture of abuse and harassment of Palestinian children in the West Bank and Gaza. A report containing 30 veterans’ testimonies details numerous cases of violence committed by Israeli soldiers.
The report was released to world media on Saturday by Breaking the Silence, an organization made up of Israeli army veterans formed in 2004. They compiled more than 850 accounts from current and former Israeli soldiers describing abuses they committed or witnessed.
The investigation seeks to serve as “a witness to the ongoing decline of the military system into increasing immorality."
“The words of the soldiers included here constitute an urgent call to Israeli society and its leaders: We must foster a serious discourse regarding the price of military rule of the Occupied Territories,” said the report.
A number of reports pertain to the detention and abuse of minors who pelt Israeli soldiers with stones and the imposition of Israeli control in occupied areas.
A first sergeant in an armored corps unit described his job as “population control,” in a testimony entitled "What is that job, really?" His unit would enter Palestinian villages on a daily basis to “make their presence felt” and to show the local residents that the area did not belong to them.
“A patrol goes in, or two patrols, two Hummers secured by a jeep, and raise hell inside the villages. A whole company may be sent in on foot in two lines like a military parade in the streets, provoking riots, provoking children,” said the first sergeant.
He said that his commander’s aim was to “grind the population down” so that they would not even think of throwing stones at their occupiers.
­

‘Whoever is slow to run gets beaten up’

One testimony describes in detail a camouflaged ambush on Palestinian children in Qalandiya in the West Bank following a riot. The platoon corned the children and beat them with wooden clubs as they tried to escape.
“People were made to fall to the ground, and then the soldiers with the clubs would go over to them and beat them. A slow runner was beaten, that was the rule,” said a first sergeant in the Engineering Corps.
According to the sergeant such ambushes were carried out about four or five times sometimes on the same children. The aim of the exercise, the sergeant said, was to discourage the children from throwing stones at the Israeli soldiers, but he did not believe it had any effect.
­

‘Not considered kids’

The report documents numerous cases of children under the age of 16 being taken into custody, blindfolded and deprived of food and water.
A first sergeant from a Paratroopers Brigade who regularly took children of 12-14 years of age into custody for attempting to cross the border into Israel said they were taught to treat the children not as small children, but as assisting terrorists.
“The intelligence officer saw two soldiers beating one of the detainees. I think they were about 16 years old, if I remember correctly,” he said.
­

‘We’d lost all sense of mercy’

Another veteran described how his troop would trash shops and buildings because they were bored, purposely triggering riots.
He related an incident where Israeli soldiers waiting for civilians outside a mosque began to fire rubber rounds in order to spark a riot. He said that if Arab children threw stones at them they would use them as human shields.
“You know how badly beaten they get? You catch him, push the gun against his body, he can’t make a move, he’s totally petrified. He only goes: "No, no, army." You can tell he’s petrified.”
­

Report slanders IDF

In response to the report the Israeli Defense Forces (IDF) said that Breaking the Silence had revealed its true intentions “to generate negative publicity regarding the IDF and its soldiers, rather than facilitating a proper investigation."
"As a matter of policy, the organization chooses not to provide the IDF and other relevant bodies with the critical material necessary for investigation. By compiling testimonies over long periods of time and refusing to provide additional detail, [Breaking the Silence] proves its true intentions – rather than facilitating proper investigation, the organization seeks to generate negative publicity regarding the IDF and its soldiers.” the IDF told The Weekend Australian.
Breaking Silence member Yehuda Shaul hit back at the IDF, saying "over 70 of our testifiers have come out publicly with their names and identities revealed, and I'm one of them."
“If the IDF was interested in investigating our claims, we probably would have already been summoned to interrogations," concluded Shaul.
http://rt.com/news/israeli-soldiers-abuse-children-581/

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HOW RON PAUL WINS TAMPA AND ROMNEY GETS DISQUALIFIED, ARRESTED OR FLEES TO FRANCE

9/11 COULD HAVE BEEN PREVENTED, SAYS COUNTERTERRORISM CZAR

Published: 13 August, 2011,

Hijacked United Airlines Flight 175 from Boston crashes into the south tower of the World Trade Center and explodes at 9:03 a.m. on September 11, 2001 in New York City (Spencer Platt / Getty Images / AFP Photo)

A former White House official is speaking out about an alleged cover-up perpetrated by the CIA to cover-up information that could have prevented the September 11 terrorist attacks.
Richard Clarke, former counter-terrorism czar under President George W Bush, told radio documentarians that former CIA Director George Tenet and two other top-ranking officials tried to keep both the White House and the FBI from coming into possession of information that he says could have prevented the 9/11 attacks from ever happening.
The conversation with Clarke, first reported by The Daily Beast, was conducted for an upcoming radio special to commemorate the tenth anniversary of the al-Qaeda attacks.
In the interview, Clarke says he believes that “there was a high-level decision in the CIA ordering people not to share information,” and that he suspects that the Central Intelligence Agency was aware that the hijackers that later participated in the 9/11 attacks had been operating in America because the government had unsuccessfully tried to recruit them as al-Qaeda informants. When asked who he believes would have been behind such a cover-up, Clarke tells journalists, “I would think it would have been made by the director,” referring to Tenet.
Clarke neglects to pin-point any specific pieces of evidence to back-up his claim, but says that it is “the only conceivable reason that I’ve been able to come up with” that would explain why the CIA neglected to keep the FBI and White House in the know. He added, however, that even if Tenet and his associates were behind a cover-up, they would never come clean, “even if you waterboarded them.”
In response, Tenet has fired back that Clarke has “suddenly invented baseless allegations which are belied by the record and unworthy of serious consideration.”
“Richard Clarke was an able public servant who served his country well for many years,” reads a statement from Tenet, “but his recently released comments about the run-up to 9/11 are reckless and profoundly wrong.”
“Clarke starts with the presumption that important information on the travel of future hijackers to the United States was intentionally withheld from him in early 2000,” he adds. “It was not.”
The producers of the piece, documentarians John Duffy and Ray Nowosielski, had provided Tenet with a copy of Clarke’s interview before the finished product was released.
The interview conducted with Clarke took place in October of 2009, but is only now being readied for public consumption as the documentary is released in conjunction with the anniversary of the 9/11 attacks.
http://rt.com/usa/news/terrorism-clarke-911-tenet-249/

PREPARING FOR AN APOCALYPSE IN AMERICA

Published: 11 August, 2011, 01:01

Some Americans are preparing for an end of the world.

(25.0Mb) embed video

TAGS: Arms, Health, Military, Natural disasters, Nuclear, Terrorism, USA, Culture

The American Preppers Network is a group of people storing supplies, equipment and ammunition in case an end of the world disaster strikes the U.S. RT visits one such family.
­A typical house in a regular suburban town, but here – a family is preparing for the end of the world.

A German Mauser and P-38 from the Second World War, a twelve-gage shot gun, a forty caliber pistol and an AR-15 – weapons and ammunition are key.

“If we are carrying this out on the street for some reason – all hell broke out. It’s an end of the world type situation. You can’t walk around with these guns here,” said Keith Proskura.

A certified NRA instructor and owner of two businesses, he stores food and supplies to help him survive no matter what disaster might hit.

“Brake down of government is one thing a lot of people are preparing for now. We are facing possible pay delays for social security. I am not going to need all of this stuff for that, but you are going to have a lot of Americans who are upset,” he explained.

The 37 year old is among thousands of American preppers who would rather be ready than sorry. RT spoke with Tom Martin – the founder of the Preppers Network – from inside his truck.

“It’s not so much political, but more economic. I see people every day lose their jobs and have to rely on food that they have stored up previously to live on that food, just because they’ve lost their jobs,” said Martin.

Gas masks, bullet-proof vests, canned food, tents and helmets fill basement like this one.

A prepper’s survival bag is not a regular first aid kit. It includes things like a parachute cord, a survival knife, a meal ready to eat, a body heat-retaining space blanket and bagged emergency drinking water. According to preppers, one must also be ready for chemical catastrophies, or a large-scale terrorist attack.

“If contaminates land on top of you, you’ve got to have a couple of pairs of gloves on. Your feet will slip into a chemical-proof boot. If you go into an unknown situation you are going to want to have one that’s fully incapsulated. So that you are 100 percent sure that nothing will get through to you,” said Keith Proskura.

A variety of walkie-talkies are ready for use if the communication network shuts down. On the other end of the line is Keith’s father, John Proskura, who is actually in the next room. A police officer for 25 years, he is now retired; his main past time is operating a ham radio. For him, communications will be key if disaster strikes.

“The tsunami and earthquake in Japan a couple of months ago – amateur radio played a big part in that in providing emergency communication. And the big hurricane in Haiti a couple of years ago,” said the man.

There is one scenario he fears more than others.

“If there was some kind of a nuclear fall-out, radio wave propagation would probably for all practical purposes seize,” said John.

Around $10,000 is the hefty price tag for these supplies.

But to preppers, it’s not just ten grand sitting in a basement – with uncertainty taking over the US, they say those who seem paranoid today may end up being the smartest tomorrow.
http://rt.com/usa/news/preparing-preppers-apocalypse-world/

AL-QAEDA FOR THE SECOND AMENDMENT?

Published: 07 July, 2011, 01:04

Terrorists are urging insurgents to take advantage of US gun laws.

(31.0Mb) embed video

TAGS: Arms, Conflict, Crime, Military, Scandal, Accident, Terrorism, USA, Culture

Following a recent al-Qaeda issued video in which terrorists are instructed about “how easy” it is to obtain guns in America, New York City Mayor Michael Bloomberg is asking his citizens to complain to Congress about lax legislation.
“Close the loopholes that let terrorists buy guns,” reads a message in Bloomberg’s campaign, which rebroadcasts in part the al-Qaeda video and cautions America that rules need to be changed before another tragedy occurs.
RT’s Adam vs. The Man host Adam Kokesh says that making people afraid won’t help the debate over gun rights in the States. “You shouldn’t be afraid that someone is taking advantage of you for being disarmed, but that there is a massive government effort to keep people disarmed,” he says.
Kokesh debates RT host Lauren Lyster, who is in favor of more stringent gun laws. Kokesh, however, thinks that civilian firearm use isn’t really a problem. “When civilians use firearms, they are much less likely to fire arm. They are much more likely to be used to prevent crimes,” he says. Kokesh adds that, “in this country you are eight times more likely to be killed by a police officer than a terrorist.”
Lyster asks, though, if owning a gun might give authorities a reason to shoot. She recalls the case of a former Military member residing in Arizona that was surprised by a SWAT team earlier this year. He allegedly had a gun when they stormed into his house, and, though he rightfully owned it, opened fire. “Granted, perhaps he is allowed to do that by law,” says Lyster, “but if he wasn’t pointing an AR-15 at the police when they banged down his door, do you think he’d be alive?'' 
“I think one of the arguments is you need to be able to protect yourself, but in this case, having a gun — is that what contributed to him being killed?”
Do gun rights backfire on people, she asks? “No, I think you can look at a freak case and always make that argument,” responds Kokesh, who says that taking away the Marine’s Second Amendment right wouldn’t solve anything. Rather, it would take the police to reevaluate their policies.
Does Bloomberg’s message scare Kokesh? He says he is affected by any tragedy in America that is caused by guns that doesn’t have to happen. “There is a potential for tragedy that this al-Qaeda video points out,” he says, but adds that the logical fallacy behind this would be the equivalent of outlawing air so that terrorists wouldn’t be able to breathe.
http://rt.com/usa/news/al-qaeda-amendment-gun-kokesh/

FBI ORGANIZES ALMOST ALL TERROR PLOTS IN THE US

Published: 23 August, 2011,

FBI organizes almost all terror plots in the US

The Federal Bureau of Investigation employs upwards of 15,000 undercover agents today, ten times what they had on the roster back in 1975.
If you think that’s a few spies too many — spies earning as much as $100,000 per assignment — one doesn’t have to go too deep into their track record to see their accomplishments. Those agents are responsible for an overwhelming amount of terrorist stings that have stopped major domestic catastrophes in the vein of 9/11 from happening on American soil.
Another thing those agents are responsible for, however, is plotting those very schemes.
The FBI has in recent years used trained informants not just to snitch on suspected terrorists, but to set them up from the get-go. A recent report put together by Mother Jones and the Investigative Reporting Program at the University of California-Berkley analyses some striking statistics about the role of FBI informants in terrorism cases that the Bureau has targeted in the decade since the September 11 attacks.
The report reveals that the FBI regularly infiltrates communities where they suspect terrorist-minded individuals to be engaging with others. Regardless of their intentions, agents are sent in to converse within the community, find suspects that could potentially carry out “lone wolf” attacks and then, more or less, encourage them to do so. By providing weaponry, funds and a plan, FBI-directed agents will encourage otherwise-unwilling participants to plot out terrorist attacks, only to bust them before any events fully materialize.
Additionally, one former high-level FBI officials speaking to Mother Jones says that, for every informant officially employed by the bureau, up to three unofficial agents are working undercover.
The FBI has used those informants to set-up and thus shut-down several of the more high profile would-be attacks in recent years. The report reveals that the Washington DC Metro bombing plot, the New York City subway plot, the attempt to blow up Chicago’s Sears Tower and dozens more were all orchestrated by FBI agents. In fact, reads the report, only three of the more well-known terror plots of the last decade weren’t orchestrated by FBI-involved agents.
The report reveals that in many of the stings, important meetings between informants and the unknowing participants are left purposely unrecorded, as to avoid any entrapment charges that could cause the case to be dismissed. Perhaps the most high-profile of the FBI-proposed plots was the case of the Newburgh 4. Around an hour outside of New York City, an informant infiltrated a Muslim community and engaged four local men to carry out a series of attacks. Those men may have never actually carried out an attack, but once the informant offered them a plot and a pair of missiles, they agreed. Defense attorneys cried “entrapment,” but the men still were sentenced to 25 years apiece.
"The problem with the cases we're talking about is that defendants would not have done anything if not kicked in the ass by government agents," Martin Stolar tells Mother Jones. Stolar represented the suspect involved in a New York City bombing plot that was set-up by FBI agents. "They're creating crimes to solve crimes so they can claim a victory in the war on terror." For their part, the FBI says this method is a plan for "preemption," "prevention" and "disruption."
The report also reveals that, of the 500-plus prosecutions of terrorism-related cases they analyzed, nearly half of them involved the use of informants, many of whom worked for the FBI in exchange for money or to work off criminal charges. Of the 158 prosecutions carried out, 49 defendants participated in plots that agent provocateurs arranged on behalf of the FBI.
Experts note that the chance of winning a terrorism-related trial, entrapment or not, is near impossible. "The plots people are accused of being part of — attacking subway systems or trying to bomb a building — are so frightening that they can overwhelm a jury," David Cole, a Georgetown University law professor, tells Mother Jones. Since 9/11, almost two-thirds of the cases linked to terrorism have ended with guilty pleas. “They don't say, 'I've been entrapped,' or, 'I was immature,’” a retired FBI official remarks.
All of this and those guilty pleas often stem for just being in the right place at the wrong time. Farhana Khera of the group Muslim Advocate notes that agents go into mosques on “fishing expeditions” just to see where they can get interest in the community. "The FBI is now telling agents they can go into houses of worship without probable cause," says Khera. "That raises serious constitutional issues."
From the set-up to the big finish, the whole sting operation is ripe with constitutional issues such as that. A decade since 9/11, however, the FBI is reaching through whatever means it can pull together to keep terrorists — or whom they think could someday become one — from ever hurting America.
http://rt.com/usa/news/fbi-terror-report-plot-365-899/

PROBE DOES LITTLE TO EXPLAIN NYPD TIES WITH CIA

Published: 17 October, 2011, 23:05

Justin Sullivan / Getty Images / AFP

TAGS: Crime, Religion, Scandal, Information Technology, Corruption, USA, Culture

Facing questioning through an internal affairs investigation, the New York Police Department is attempting to explain what a CIA operative was doing on the force’s controversial Demographics Unit.
Despite this probe, however, the answers are still not so clear.
The Associated Press revealed in August that the NYPD was operating a top-secret unit that was performing clandestine surveillance on the Big Apple’s Muslim community without any probable cause other than targeting them for their religion. Officials on the force had originally denied the existence of the Demographics Unit, but as more and more documents surfaced through the AP’s investigation, the force eventually revealed a handful of details on the division. Now with an internal affairs probe looking to see why a CIA operative was working in cahoots with a municipal police department, an explanation, unfortunately, still seems a ways forthcoming.
The unit has reportedly singled out ethnic Muslims as high-terror-alert citizens, and sent undercover agents within the Police Department into Muslim-majority neighborhoods to conduct secret surveillance and report back with information on businesses, residences and habits. Serious questions have arisen over the legality of the operations, given that the CIA is prohibited from spying domestically in the States. Also called into question, however, has been why the NYPD has been sending officials overseas to gather intellect in foreign nations, creating much confusion as to why the two agencies have been cooperating.
Defending the Demographics Unit upon the opening of the AP’s investigation, Mayor Michael Bloomberg told reporters, “We live in a dangerous world, and we have to be very proactive in making sure that we prevent terrorism," adding, “I think most Muslims want police protection. They don't want their kids … falling off the … train and going down the wrong path.”
Retired-CIA Chief David Cohen told the AP, however, that surveillance occurred on unsuspected citizens with use of language-capable agents and “ethnic officers,” to which he called the department’s “secret weapon.”
In the latest news regarding the operation, NYPD Commissioner Raymond Kelly acknowledged the placement of the CIA operative on the force, and noted that the agent provides officers with “technical information” but “doesn’t have access to any of our investigative files.” On the contrary, CIA Director David Patraeus said that the operative would make sure that information pertinent to both departments was properly shared, opening up many questions about what affiliation the agent has and who is actually coming clean.
If the operative is indeed sharing information between forces, it could only be strengthening ties between the agencies. The AP reports that a CIA liaison in New York already shares intel with the Joint Terrorism Task Force, however, which is staffed by hundreds of members of the NYPD.
A senior US officially speaking anonymously to the AP says that the CIA agent is working alongside the Police Department as a means of gaining managerial training, but with the agency denying he has any access to the NYPD’s files, it is unclear how ha is supervising anyone and to what extent.
"It's really important to fully understand what the nature of the investigations into the Muslim community are all about, and also the partnership between the local police and the CIA," Rep. Jan Schakowsky, D-Ill., a member of the House Intelligence Committee, said in a statement.

BLOOMBERG DEFENDS SECRET SURVEILLANCE OF NYC MUSLIMS

Published: 08 September, 2011,

New York Mayor Michael Bloomberg (R) speaks at a press conference as construction continues at the World Trade Center site on September 7, 2011 in New York City. (Mario Tama/Getty Images/AFP)

Mayor Michael Bloomberg has exposed a haunting Orwellian outcome for the future of New Yorkers in a recent interview where he defends alleged ethnic profiling among the NYPD.
The Associated Press has been continuing an investigating into the New York City Police Department following revelations that exposed undercover operations that spied on Muslims in the Big Apple. The AP last month unearthed information on a mysterious “Demographics Unit” inside the NYPD that, under the guidance of a CIA operative, installed clandestine cops in Muslim-majority neighborhoods to infiltrate the community and identify factors that could signal an eventual terror attack.
The NYPD originally denied the existence of any such unit, but in the days since the AP first exposed the operation they have produced documentation that served as training manuals within the Department’s Intelligence Division that points towards profiling. Now Mayor Michael Bloomberg is defending surveillance such as this and says that even more monitoring is soon to come.
"As the world gets more dangerous, people are willing to have infringements on their personal freedoms that they would not before," Bloomberg responds to the AP.
Instead of agreeing to allegations that the surveillance is spying on Muslims without specific reasoning, Bloomberg says rather that the techniques coming out of the NYPD are meant to be preventative.
“We live in a dangerous world, and we have to be very proactive in making sure that we prevent terrorism," he told reporters recently. The mayor remarked that he believes in being true to both the Constitution of the United States and the personal rights of people in America, but implied that he would go to any means to insure the safety of New Yorkers.
Bloomberg also adds that Muslims welcome the police into their community — even if more than 250 mosques have been secretly surveyed in the decade since the September 11 attacks unbeknownst to the worshippers.
"I think most Muslims want police protection. They don't want their kids … falling off the … train and going down the wrong path," Bloomberg says.
The protection, he adds, will only become more intense as his administration progresses. The mayor tells the AP that facial-recognition technology will soon allow authorities to monitor and identify anyone walking down a street, which while potentially nipping any 9/11-repeats in the bud also eliminates privacy as the people of New York know it.
Author Mordecai Dzikansky added to the AP’s initial report by confirming that he spied for the NYPD as far away from Manhattan as Israel and said it was merely a matter of “going where the problem could arise.” The author thanked God for the NYPD’s diversified squad which he said made it easy for officers of different makeup to infiltrate varying Muslim communities undetected.
“That’s our secret weapon,” saus Dzikansky.
Officers were installed in disguise outside of the jurisdiction of NYC — entering Pennsylvania, New Jersey and even abroad — to spy in mosques, coffee shops, community centers and other places of worship since September 11. Earlier this month, NYPD spokesman Paul Browne denied that his force was working in conjunction with the CIA.
http://rt.com/usa/news/bloomberg-surveillance-nypd-muslim-113/

MAINSTREAM MEDIA WHITEWASHES THE FACTS BEHIND TRAPWIRE SCANDAL

Published: 14 August, 2012,

Reuters / Joshua Lott

The discovery of a surveillance system named TrapWire has connected state and federal law enforcement agencies with a vast intelligence infrastructure, raising questions everywhere — except in the mainstream media.
The New York Times finally brought TrapWire into discussion late Monday in an article published on their website that has journalist Scott Shane discarding initial reports made about the surveillance system as “wildly exaggerated.” A piece published hours earlier in Slate says stories about TrapWire are “rooted in hyperbole and misinformation” and “heavier on fiction than fact,” and even Cubic Corporation, the San Diego, California company reported as the parent company to developers Abraxas Corp., have been driven to dismiss that rumored relationship with a formal press release.
“Cubic Corporation acquired Abraxas Corporation on December 20, 2010,” a Monday afternoon statement from Cubic claims. “Abraxas Corporation then and now has no affiliation with Abraxas Applications now known as Trapwire, Inc.”
But four days after RT first broke the news of a nationwide surveillance system operated underneath the noses of millions of Americans — and even citizens abroad — the mainstream media and the major players are going to great lengths to abolish any and all allegations about TrapWire. As private researchers, journalists and hacktivists correspond with one another over the Web, though, the information becoming increasingly available about Cubic, Abraxas and TrapWire — facts meant to be left under wraps — is opening up details about a vast operation with strict ties to the intelligence community, the federal government, the US Defense Department contractors and countless others across the globe.
While the New York Times has indeed finally come forth with a story on TrapWire, their rushed exposé about a story sparked by “speculation” contains references to allegations that are argued directly in emails obtained from Strategic Forecasting, or Stratfor, the intelligence company that was hacked by the Anonymous collective last year. Emails uncovered in the attack were provided to WikiLeaks, who on their part published the trove in installments, including a dump last week. Thanks to a red flag being raised by independent researcher Justin Ferguson last week, the TrapWire system was linked to Stratfor staffers, in turn causing a colossal investigation to be launched from all corners of the Internet.
So far, that probing has proved at least one thing: that the allegations made by both Cubic and sources speaking to the Times are either dead wrong or represent a quickly snowballing attempt at a cover-up.
Speaking to the Times for Shane’s article, New York Police Department chief spokesman Paul Browne says that rumors the city’s subway system is covered by 500 cameras linked to TrapWire are false. Explicitly, Browne says, “We don’t use TrapWire,” but the Times stops short of printing a quote from the NYPD that exceeds six syllables. While Browne has not publically weighed in yet as to if the NYC surveillance cams were formerly part of the TrapWire system, emails uncovered in the Stratfor attack seem to suggest exactly that.
In an email dated September 26, 2011, Stratfor Vice President of Intelligence Fred Burton is believed to have responded to a memo about the NYPD’s counter-terrorism efforts by writing, “Note their TrapWire intuitive video surveillance capabilities. NYPD has done what no US Govt Agency has been able to do in the CT [counter-terrorism] arena.”
In a separate correspondence sent one year earlier on July 16, 2010, Burton writes that “TrapWire may be the most successful invention on the GWOT [Global War on Terror] since 9-11.”
“I knew these hacks when they were GS-12's at the CIA. God Bless America. Now they have EVERY major HVT in CONUS, the UK, Canada, Vegas, Los Angeles, NYC as clients,” he adds, referring to “high-value targets.”
Contrasting the statements made by the NYPD rep and Stratfor’s VP open up nothing more than a he-said-she-said scenario that makes it impossible, at this point, to put a finger on who exactly is in the right. Since New York City has readied their own domain-awareness-system, openly admitted to conducting undercover surveillance of Muslim residents and installed thousands of cameras on the island of Manhattan alone, though, it doesn’t seem all that odd that Mayor Bloomberg would have authorized the use of TrapWire in at least some capacity during the past few years.
Also brought into question are the merits behind Cubic Corporation's claims about their relationship with TrapWire. “Abraxas Corporation then and now has no affiliation with Abraxas Applications now known as Trapwire, Inc.,” the company claims in their press release issued this Monday. According to a 2007 report in the Washington Business Journal, though, that as well is a full-on fib.
“Abraxas Corp., a risk-mitigation technology company, has spun out a software business to focus on selling a new product,” the article reads. “The spinoff – called Abraxas Applications – will sell TrapWire, which predicts attacks on critical infrastructure by analyzing security reports and video surveillance.”
Published more than five years before the Stratfor emails prompted a probe into TrapWire and its affiliates, the Washington Business Journal article answers a lot of questions that are being asked today.
“Reston-based Abraxas Applications will seek federal, state and local government clients as [well] as companies in financial services, oil and gas, chemicals, transportation and other industries with critical infrastructure,” the article alleges.
Just as today, though, Business Journal also acknowledges a cloud of secrecy that keeps the juiciest part of TrapWire under wraps: “The 300-person company has spent millions of dollars developing TrapWire, but won't say precisely how much,” their article reads.
Elsewhere, the Journal adds another piece to the puzzle involving the surveillance system and the NYPD: “Abraxas Applications hits the ground running. Abraxas Corp. previously won contracts to test TrapWire with the New York Police Department, Los Angeles Police Department, Department of Energy and Marine Corps.”
Meanwhile, current investigations conducted by RT and other outlets have suggested that TrapWire may be connected to as many as thousands of cameras in Washington, DC and others in London, Las Vegas as elsewhere.
http://rt.com/usa/news/trapwire-surveillance-abraxas-times-671/

BRITS TO PAY $3 BILLION TO BE SPIED UPON ON WEB, EMAILS, TEXTS

Published: 03 April, 2012,

Police to gain access to who you call, what sites you surf and how you play video games.

UK taxpayers will have to pay billions of dollars to have their web surfing, email exchange, text messaging, and even Skype calls, monitored. In addition to the hefty price-tag, innocent Brits risk being misidentified as terrorists.
The shocking data comes ahead of the plan announcement in the Queen's speech, which is scheduled for May. Meanwhile, the Home Office, Britain’s interior ministry, said ministers were preparing to legislate "as soon as parliamentary time allows".
More than $3 billion over the first decade alone is the extraordinary sum the British taxpayer will have to pay to be legally spied upon, reports the Daily Mail. In addition, annual running costs of roughly $320 million – $610 a minute – to store the data gathered from private communication.
Moreover, the above figures are based on 2009 estimates, which means the actual price, if it were estimated now, would be higher still.
British security agencies are pushing for a law, which would allow police to gain access to who you call, what sites you surf and how you play video games.
The government wants details about text messages, phone calls, email, visited websites, Facebook and Twitter exchanges and even online game chats.
The bill is aimed at finding potential terrorists and criminals in the name of protecting British citizens. However, Brits themselves might need protection from the side-effects caused by the new policy. According to the Information Commissioner’s Office – an independent watchdog upholding information rights in the public interest – once implemented, the bill may lead to innocents being wrongly identified as criminals. Or worse still – terrorists.
According to ICO internal documents uncovered by Tory MP Dominic Raab, this misidentification may lead to regular people being barred from flying along with terrorist suspects and criminals alike.
"Individuals may be wrongly identified, subject to identity fraud or there may just be a mistake. How do they put this right? Intelligence can be used to put people on no-fly lists, limit incomes or asset grabs by government agencies," the documents read.
Rights activists fear potential abuse of the surveillance, as well as hacker threats to the database storing the personal details collected. It will be a responsibility of providers to store the data for two years. ICO documents cover this sensitive subject too, warning of the potential for abuse by service providers.
These revelations have caused an upheaval among British politicians, with both Tories and Liberal Democrats standing their ground as opponents of the policy, which was first suggested by the Labour government back in 2006. Six years on, MPs are raising their brows at the estimated cost of the project, in the wake of financial hardships that push UK government to make cuts elsewhere.
The plan is said to have been prepared by the Home Office in collaboration with home security service MI5, the foreign intelligence service MI6 and the Government Communications Headquarters (GCHQ), the body responsible for signals intelligence and information assurance for UK’s government and armed forces.
The plan is expected to be announced in May in the Queen's Speech. It is a rewrite of a similar plan, which was developed by the Labour Party, but had been shelved in November 2009 due to lack of public support. Then in opposition the Conservatives criticized Labour’s “reckless” record on privacy.

TRAPWIRE TIED TO WHITE HOUSE, SCOTLAND YARD, MI5 AND OTHERS, CLAIMS HACKED STRATFOR EMAIL

Published: 16 August, 2012

AFP Photo / Mario Tama

An email hacked from Stratfor that discusses the use of the TrapWire surveillance system has been decrypted, revealing insider claims that the widespread spy program was adopted by the White House, Scotland Yard, Canadian authorities and others.
When WikiLeaks published a trove of correspondence last week reported to be from the servers of Strategic Forecasting, or Stratfor, included in the data dump was at least one email that initially appeared as pure gibberish. The communiqué, sent from Stratfor Vice President of Intelligence Fred Burton to seven other staffers within the private firm, has now been decoded, however, and its content suggests that the TrapWire surveillance program was put into the hands of the most elite and powerful governments and law enforcement agencies in the entire world.
The email, dated September 23, 2010, includes a string of correspondence between Burton and more than half-a-dozen colleagues exchanging information for a full day about how Stratfor is distributing feeds from its TrapWire system and with whom. Although encoded, the emails are encrypted in Base64 format, which can easily be decoded online. A decoded copy has also been uploaded to the Web by hacktivists aligned with Anonymous.
“Chatted with Mike M, the TW [TrapWire] operator and former CIA crony,” Burton writes in the first email included in the encrypted chain. “He said our feed was taking up 25% of the TW screens inside the client command posts and that the feedback they are getting is that the info being pushed in is more geo-pol centered vice tactical-security.”
“How can we fix?  Who is auditing what is going in the pipe?” Burton asks his cohorts.
Stratfor is reported to have had a contract directly with the developers of TrapWire that allowed them a substantial cut of their profits in exchange for their assistance in promoting their product to high-ranked customers, other emails published by Wikileaks as part of the Global Intelligence Files suggest. One file included in the trove, a partnering agreement between Stratfor and TrapWire’s parent group, Abraxas, provides Burton and company with an 8 percent referral fee for any businesses they help sign on to the surveillance system [pdf].
The first reply to the encrypted Burton email is from Beth Bronder, whose public LinkedIn profile documents her as serving as the senior vice president of government & corporate solutions at Stratfor until November of that year. She was only at the agency for ten months before moving to Bloomberg Government and then the CQ – Roll Call Group, where she is listed as an employee today.
According to the decrypted emails, Bronder says that Stratfor is on top of trying to fix the feed being streamed to TrapWire clients in order to make it more “security focused” per his superior’s suggestion, but when Burton responds with the names of customers involved in the surveillance program, it is no wonder why Stratfor was so eager to entice their buyers with the best material available.
“This audience is the who's who of the CT world,” the email from Burton reads, referring to counterterrorism. “TW has RCMP, MI5, Scotland Yard SO15, USSS White House and PPD, LAPD, NYPD, Las Vegas PD and Fusion, Seattle PD, SEA-TAC…etc.”
Since breaking the news of TrapWire last week, the science-fiction-like surveillance system has slowly but surely penetrated the mainstream media, although few agencies have responded to the attention by addressing their connection with TrapWire. Earlier this week, though, New York Police Department spokesman Paul Browne flatly refuted on behalf of the NYPD to the New York Times, “We don’t use TrapWire.” According to Burton’s claim, however, the NYPD was indeed a customer as of September 2010, as were the Royal Canadian Mounted Police, British intelligence and the US Secret Service and White House.
Other information collected in the last week have also suggested that the NYPD was in cahoots with TrapWire, but no correspondence is believed to have been published linking the surveillance system with the Executive Branch of the United States or any agencies in Canada. Although an unencrypted email from Burton that was circulated by hacktivists last week includes the claim that TrapWire was installed on the site of every major high-value target in the continental US, UK and Canada, no other correspondence is thought to have put these specific agencies in direct connection to TrapWire.
In the next line, Burton explains that intelligence caught by TrapWire was being fed directly to these high-profile customers, bypassing any complication that could arise by a more bureaucratic distribution. He even acknowledges that problems could be put in play if they relied on sending their surveillance to the US Department of Homeland Security or lesser government agencies.
“Our materials are on their screens INSIDE the walls,” Burton writes. “We circumvent the dysfunctional DHS/DC by having our info already on their 24x7 screen.”
“We need to laser focus pieces to capture their attn.  Maybe even a video,” Burton adds. “Trust me, the agents and cops watching the TW feed WANT something interesting to see.”
In a 2005 interview with The Entrepreneur Center, Richard “Hollis” Helms, co-founder of TrapWire developers Abraxas, says the system “can collect information about people and vehicles that is more accurate than facial recognition, draw patterns, and do threat assessments of areas that may be under observation from terrorists.” He calls it “a proprietary technology designed to protect critical national infrastructure from a terrorist attack by detecting the pre-attack activities of the terrorist and enabling law enforcement to investigate and engage the terrorist long before an attack is executed,” and that, “The beauty of it is that we can protect an infinite number of facilities just as efficiently as we can one and we push information out to local law authorities automatically.”
In a unencrypted email from September 26, Burton writes that the “NYPD has done what no US Govt Agency has been able to do” in the counterterrorism arena because of TrapWire.”
Since the TrapWire scandal broke, Stratfor has kept mum on the allegations that they were directly affiliated with a widespread, international surveillance program, and are probably inclined to follow the tactic proposed by the head of the security firm earlier this year. In February, Stratfor CEO and founder George Friedman addressed the hack credited to Anonymous, saying, “Some of the emails may be forged or altered to include inaccuracies,” but, also, “Some may be authentic.”
“We will not validate either, nor will we explain the thinking that went into them. Having had our property stolen, we will not be victimized twice by submitting to questions about them,” Friedman said.
http://rt.com/usa/news/trapwire-stratfor-email-burton-786/

CONVICTED AL-QAEDA TERRORISTS LAUNCH HUMAN RIGHTS BID AGAINST UK

Published: 26 August, 2012,

The European Court of Human Rights in the French eastern city of Strasbourg (AFP Photo / Johanna Leguerre)

Two Al-Qaeda members serving life sentences in Britain have lodged a complaint against the UK at the European Court of Human Rights. They claim Britain’s MI5 security agency was complicit in their being tortured while in Pakistan to get a confession.
­Salahuddin Amin and Rangzieb Ahmed, both born in the UK, are doing life terms in British prisons. Amin was convicted in 2007 for plotting a massive explosion at the Bluewater shopping center in Kent and another at the Ministry of Sound nightclub in Central London in 2005.
The other man, Rangzieb Ahmed, is viewed as the highest-ranked Al-Qaeda operator put on trial in the UK. He was the first person to be convicted of “directing terrorism” and as a center of Al-Qaeda’s global web was found to have had links with every one of Al-Qaeda’s terrorist cells in the UK.
Both were arrested in Pakistan and handed over to the UK for further trial.
Now the men allege that the British domestic intelligence service, MI5, were complicit in their torture by Pakistan’s security services who were trying to beat testimony out of them, reports the Daily Telegraph.
Thus, Amin claims in his request to the EU human rights court that Pakistan’s security agents used pliers to remove three of his fingernails. Then, as prosecution began in the UK, Pakistani files were withheld from him and his defense team. Moreover, he asserts, the court knew the evidence had been obtained by torture and “inhuman degrading treatment”.
Ahmed alleges he was allowed to leave Britain for Pakistan before MI5 tipped off local intelligence services on his person. He says the UK was aware of the torture which followed his arrest by Pakistani agents in 2006. He also claims a fair trial was denied to him since his defense team also had no access to Pakistani materials.
The complaints have already been rejected by British courts, but the European Court of Human Rights has given them the green light. As a result, UK officials will have to give explanations to a panel in Strasburg.
The British media view the complaint as a last-ditch attempt for Amin and Ahmed to be freed from jail. If Strasburg rules the men's human rights were breached during their prosecutions, their case in Britain will get a review.
This is not the first time MI5’s reputation has been smeared with allegations of torture. Last summer, human rights groups boycotted an inquiry into reports that the agency sanctioned its staff to use harsh interrogation methods in overseas operations, if valuable information could be gained.
As MI5 refused to disclose relevant documents, the inquiry was slammed as lacking credibility even before it started. All this was taking place as “interrogation” victims were alleging having been tortured or kept against their will at length at Bagram or Guantanamo military bases at the wish of the UK.
http://rt.com/news/terrorists-human-rights-uk-598/

‘OPERATION FREE ASSANGE’: ANONYMOUS TAKE DOWN INTERPOL WEBSITE

Published: 27 August, 2012

Interpol

Hactivist group Anonymous claims to have taken down the websites of Interpol and a British police force as part of a campaign calling for the freedom of WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange.
Several Twitter accounts associated with the loose-knit Anonymous collective have announced that the website of International Criminal Police Organization was taken down. The site was unavailable as of 9:18 pm GMT but resumed functioning soon after.
The hackers also claim to have taken down the website of the Serious Organised Crime Agency (SOCA), a UK police unit responsible for operations against serious and organized crime.
Assange, the founder and editor of whistleblower website WikiLeaks, has been ordered by Swedish authorities to be extradited from the UK where he had been under house arrest. Two women from Sweden have accused Assange of sex crimes, although he has yet to be charged.
In fear of being sent to Sweden and then extradited to the US to be tried for his role with WikiLeaks, Assange applied for political asylum in Ecuador, which the Latin American country finally granted him earlier this month.
Regardless, British authorities have refused to give Assange safe passage out of the Ecuadorian Embassy in London so that he may travel overseas.
http://rt.com/news/anonymous-interpol-free-assange-607/

NON-INTERVENTION POLICY: HUNDREDS WATCH AS DOZENS OF JEWISH YOUTHS ATTACK PALESTINIANS

Published: 20 August, 2012

Reuters / Suhaib Salem

Hundreds of people watched but did not intervene as a gang of Israeli youths attempted to "lynch" a group of Palestinian children in the center of Jerusalem's Zion Square, police said on Sunday. Five suspects have been arrested so far.
­Four Palestinian youths were badly beaten in the incident in central Jerusalem on Friday. The attack was short and the gang fled after knocking one victim to the ground and kicking him unconscious before police arrived.
There were several dozen attackers, according to witnesses, who say that the Jewish youths were shouting “death to the Arabs” and seemed to be on the hunt for Palestinian victims. 
Some witnesses described the attack as a “lynch,” while Israeli authorities claimed the attack was a typical brawl between Israeli and Palestinian young people. However, on Sunday, police called the event a “lynching,” Haaretz reports.
Hundreds of people watched the assault but did not try to help the victims, a police representative said on Sunday.
“The victim lost his consciousness and was thought to be dead until [an emergency paramedic crew] arrived and resuscitated him,” Haaretz cites Sergeant First Class Shmuel Shenhav as saying. “For several days he was anesthetized and artificially ventilated in the hospital.”
“This was an extremely severe crime,” he added. “Only a miracle saved him from death.”
Jamal Julani, a 17-year old Palestinian, still remains in serious condition in the intensive care unit at the Hadassah University Hospital. He regained consciousness but does not remember details of the event.
His two cousins, who suffered medium injuries, explained that the incident was extremely brief, as police arrived quickly and the perpetrators did not have much time to beat them or the unconscious Jamal.
Four teenagers between the ages of 13 and 15 were arrested Sunday in connection with the attack. Another suspect was arrested shortly after the attack on Friday.
A special investigation team has been set up in an effort to find all the perpetrators, and police believe further arrests will follow.
http://rt.com/news/israel-youths-lynch-palestinians-078/ 

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PRIME MINISTER JULIAR GILLARD ADVISES BUSINESS TO PASS ON CARBON TAX PRICE RISES

MATT JOHNSTON and KEN McGREGOR The Daily Telegraph August 21, 2012

Sharman Stone. Picture: Kym Smith Source: The Daily Telegraph

JULIA Gillard says small businesses hit by carbon tax power price hikes should pass costs on to consumers, who are getting compensation.-What about those who are not getting compensation? As long as back-stabbing Juliar gets hers, we can all go to blazers, which is a remarkably similar attitude to the evil warmonger, who may have had pre-knowledge on the 9/11 false flag, John Coward. And this happens the day after she and Roxon pass legislation that lets them spy on your private internet affairs. Is she worried about public perception? Or, is this another step towards the new world order. 

But companies in some sectors have questioned the Prime Minister's advice-haven't we all?, saying they simply cannot lift prices.
One apple and pear grower said its electricity bills now had a "carbon charge" attached that was more than 15 per cent for one packing plant, but the supermarkets it supplies won't accept price rises in a competitive market. More carbon tax concerns have been raised by small business owners after a Daily Telegraph survey revealed some retailers are starting to feel the pinch.
The survey found many businesses were not passing costs through to consumers despite being hit by carbon tax-related power price hikes.
In parliament, Liberal MP Sharman Stone asked Ms Gillard about Victorian pear and apple grower Geoffrey Thompson Holdings, which has specific carbon tax components added to its July bills, totalling $23,000.

A power bill for one of the company's packing plants has gone up 15 per cent from the carbon tax charge alone. Lucky these essential services were privatised, otherwise we might have to get it to run at a loss so it could provide affordable services to business' and consumers alike.
Ms Gillard told parliament that businesses such as this could pass those costs through. Am I the only one who feels that she is out of touch with the common man? Reminds me of when that warmonger John Coward said that all Australian's could afford to buy a new car.
"That small business is dealing with consumers that have received tax cuts, family payment increases and pension increases because our anticipation is that small businesses would pass those modest price impacts $23,000 IS A MODEST AMOUNT TO THIS LIAR AND SERVANT OF THE ELITE. Most of us probably have that much or more in gold coins in the car ashtray. Especially those that are being raped on the dole. on," she said.
But Geoffrey Thompson Holdings managing director Garry Parker said that was not realistic because the company supplied major supermarket chains with fruit -- and they would not accept price hikes. That is the way supermarkets operate. The other thing that they like to do is make a deal with a company to get x amount of a stock at y price. Then, without warning they announce that they want to run a special and will only pay z amount. If the company refuses, they lose the contract. Now, should we expect that if I know this, that the "person in charge"-well behind the Governor-General, who actually is the Queen when she is out of Australia- ought to know this as well.
"We will have to look at ways of taking cost out of the business, we will look at staffing -governments love it when people are sacked and have to beg them for the dole-and other areas," he said.
http://www.dailytelegraph.com.au/news/prime-minister-julia-gillard-advises-business-to-pass-on-carbon-tax-price-rises/story-e6freuy9-1226454492044

POLICE REAL TIME ONLINE MANAGEMENT INFORMATION SYSTEM (PROMIS), AUSTRALIAN CAPITAL TERRITORY

DASHBOARD METADATA

Geographic Coverage	Frequency	Data Availability
National New South Wales Victoria Queensland Western Australia South Australia Tasmania Northern Territory ACT Regional LGA ASGC Remoteness Other	More than annual Annual 2-4 yearly Less than 5 yearly Once only Ad hoc	Detailed publication / report publicly available Data cubes / spreadsheets publicly available Agency annual report Customised data - free upon request1 Customised data - charged consultancy1 Not published - may be available on request1 Not publicly available

[1] May be subject to release conditions

DETAILED METADATA

Contact

Data custodian: Australian Federal Police

Contact: Policy, Performance and Planning section

Address: C/O Winchester Police Centre, PO Box 401, Canberra City, ACT, 2601

Telephone: 02 6256 7777

Facsimile: n/a

Email: ACT-PPP-Statistics@afp.gov.au

Internet: http://www.police.act.gov.au

Publications

FDV data not routinely published.

Purpose

Police Real Time Online Management Information System (PROMIS) is the Australian Federal Police administrative system used to record crime and police incidents.

Description

PROMIS is the primary corporate system for recording investigations and operational information.

Collection Type

Administrative by-product

Family and Domestic Violence related content (data items collected)

Data Item	Victim	Secondary victim	Offender
Demographics
Age
Sex
Indigenous Status
Disability
Country of Birth
Language spoken
Employment
Education
Income
Geography
Other
Personal data item
Services used / referrals to services counselling legal financial housing crisis other
Health factors pregnancy alcohol use / substance use mental illness
FDV-related perceptions satisfaction with police response seriousness/ regarded as criminal whether problem in neighbourhood feelings of safety / fear
Prior history of victimisation / offending
Known outcomes application for violence order violence order issued offender charged offender went to court offender found guilty offender sentence type child protection involvement time off work / economic costs medical treatment received / type changed routine other
Other personal data items

Data Item	Incident
Location home workplace school/place of education/institution public place other	Licensed premises; Hotel/motel; Shop
Relationship between parties married/de facto spouse current / former partner/boyfriend/girlfriend parent-child sibling other member of household other relatives relationships of personal or financial dependency
Weapon use type of weapon
Alcohol involved Substance use involved	1
Physical injury sustained type of injury
Reported to police reasons for not reporting
Other	Mental illness involved1

1 Alcohol involved data available from April 2010, and mental illness data from September 2010.
Note that mental illness and/or alcohol use cannot be linked specifically to the victim or offender.


Definition of Family and Domestic Violence

Family violence can include criminal and non-criminal behaviours. A Family Violence tick box is used within PROMIS to identify if an incident is a Family and Domestic Violence incident. To be considered an FDV incident, two elements must be present:

1. a relevant Family Violence relationship which must include relevant person(s) which are defined as in relation to a person (the original person). A relevant person means a domestic partner of the original person (but need not be an adult), or a relative of the original person (father, mother, grandfather, grandmother, stepfather, stepmother, father-in-law or mother-in-law; or son, daughter, grandson, granddaughter, stepson, stepdaughter, son-in-law or daughter-in-law; or brother, sister, half-brother, half-sister, stepbrother, stepsister, brother-in-law or sister-in-law; or uncle, aunt, uncle-in-law or aunt-in-law; or nephew, niece or cousin); someone who would have been a relative, or a child of a domestic partner or former domestic partner of the original person, or a parent of a child of the original person, or someone who is or has been in a relevant relationship with the original person.
   
   A relevant relationship is defined as the extent to which each is personally dependent on the other, the extent to which each is financially dependent on the other, the length of the relationship, if there is, or has been, a sexual relationship, the extent to which each is involved in, or knows about, the other's personal life, the degree of mutual commitment to a shared life, the two people share care or support for children or other dependents; and
2. a relevant Family Violence offence is threatened or committed. A list of the 58 Family Violence offences can be found at Schedule 1, Domestic Violence and Protection Orders Act 2008, and include but are not limited to murder, manslaughter, assault, driving offences, threats, forcible confinement, stalking, abduction, kidnapping, sexual assault, destroying or damaging property, arson, trespass on government premises, weapons offences, offensive behaviour and burglary
3. Police will also tick the Family Violence tick box when there has been a threat to commit an offence or where there is evidence of the use of power and control within the relationship.

Aspects of FDV captured in the data are:

• Physical abuse
• Sexual abuse
• Psychological / Emotional abuse
• Verbal abuse
• Economic abuse
• Social abuse
• Property damage
• Harassment and stalking

Relationship to Conceptual Framework for Family and Domestic Violence (Cat. No. 4529.0)

Conceptual Framework Element / Sub-element	Amount of Information Available
	None	Some	Detailed
Context
Environmental Factors
Individual pyscho-social factors
Risk
Community prevalence
Community incidence
Understandings and acknowledgments of risk and safety
Incident
Responses
Informal responses
Formal system responses
Impacts/Outcomes
Programs, Research & Evaluation

Collection methodology

Information is entered into PROMIS by police officers. Each week the ACT Policing Intervention team search PROMIS using date and offence fields and read through the result text of about 380 jobs. From this approximately 60-70 FDV incidents are confirmed in Canberra each week. To be confirmed, a Family and Domestic Violence incident must meet the definition of a relevant Family Violence relationship and a relevant Family Violence offence (see definition above). Currently the quality of the Family Violence tick box data item is not sufficient for this field to be used as an indicator of Family and Domestic Violence incidents alone.

Other details about the incident may be stored in the case note but these details are not readily accessible (free text field) for statistical purposes. For example, the case note usually includes information on whether persons involved in the family violence incident were referred to support services by police, what type of support services and whether they were accepted or declined. Incident type, any offences attached to Family Violence incidents and offenders apprehended from incidents flagged as family violence related are accessible.

Scope / target population

Victims and offenders.

Coverage

n/a

Geographic coverage and disaggregation

Australian Capital Territory. Full address recorded.

Data available for:
Australian Capital Territory

Frequency / Timing

Updated continually
Statistics produced as requested

Collection history

Collection commenced: December 1998

Breaks in series: no

Other details: n/a

Data availability / Dissemination

Access to data may be available upon request.

Other data sources held by this agency

n/a
http://www.abs.gov.au/ausstats/abs@.nsf/Look /F88512C94FAA64D6CA25794F001211E6?opendocument