November 2016 Guest Speaker, Penny Lockwood

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November’s guest speaker was Vintage Red member Penny Lockwood.lockwood.jpg

Penny spoke about her father Rupert Lockwood (1908-97), a respected journalist who became prominent during the Cold War at the time of the Petrov affair in the mid-1950s.

[Photo by Jack Hickson: Rupert Lockwood at the Royal Commission on  Espionage, 1955. Mitchell Library, NSW]

Lockwood came from a Chartist family, and his father ran the West Wimmera Mail. He moved to Melbourne, working on the Herald (a Murdoch paper, like the Wimmera paper in later years), which sent him to Spain in 1937, and then called him back to a job in the Canberra press gallery. After he called Robert Menzies “Pig Iron Bob” in 1938, during the dispute between Menzies and waterside workers who objected to being forced to load iron to be shipped to Japan, he was recalled to Melbourne to administrative work. Continue reading →

Public forum on ACT water prices

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Members of the public are urged to come along next Tuesday evening, 6 December 2016, to a Public Forum on proposed significant increases to the cost of water in Canberra.

The public forum will be held at 5:00 p.m. at the Waldorf on London, 2 Akuna Street, Canberra City, and will include a presentation by the Independent Competition and Regulatory Commission, followed by a question and answer session.

Icon Water, an ACT government-owned corporation which has a monopoly on providing water to the ACT, currently sets a higher price per kilolitre for higher water usage. But since we are apparently no longer trying to send a message of water-saving to consumers (now that the drought is over and we have more water available in dams which are almost full), and since some higher water usage customers have turned to cheaper alternative sources, Icon has fewer customers and wants to charge them all much more.

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October 2016 Guest Speaker, Sue Wareham

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20161018_Wareham.jpgWe were very pleased to welcome Dr Sue Wareham as our guest speaker. Dr Wareham is the Vice-President of the Medical Association for Prevention of War (Australia).

The Arms Trade as Promoted at Canberra Airport

Visitors arriving at Canberra Airport currently receive a “welcome” in the form of big display ads for some of the world’s biggest arms manufacturers. Raytheon, BAE Systems, Lockheed Martin, ThyssenKrupp and others have all been promoted there. So have Austal, proudly stating that its vessels are “delivering Australia’s border patrol capability”.

The ads are inappropriate. They help to normalise warfare and big military spending, and present a sanitised image of what weapons do. They do not represent Canberra.

Canberra has many beautiful natural and cultural attractions and great people. Let’s showcase them at our airport!

Travel author Pico Iyer, quoted on Canberra Airport’s website:

“Airports say a lot about a place because they are both a city’s business card and its handshake: they tell us what a community yearns to be as well as what it truly is.”

Don Dwyer’s What’s on in October

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Don’s starred event for followers of his Calendar is the screening of Children of the Revolution, part of the Canberra International Film Festival, on Friday 4 November at 8 p.m., in the Arc Cinema, National Film & Sound Archive. This 1996 “historic comedy” film stars Judy Davis, Sam Neill, Richard Roxburgh and Geoffrey Rush, and the music is by Nigel Westlake.
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Don Dwyer’s What’s On in October

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Don’s starred event for followers of his Calendar is the screening of Children of the Revolution, part of the Canberra International Film Festival, on Friday 4 November at 8 p.m., in the Arc Cinema, National Film & Sound Archive. This 1996 “historic comedy” film stars Judy Davis, Sam Neill, Richard Roxburgh and Geoffrey Rush, and the music is by Nigel Westlake.
Continue reading →

Ten questions for ACT politicians

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“Do our Aspiring Politicians Really Care about Old People?

…. or do they lack Political Courage!”

Jane Timbrell (Convenor of the Vintage Reds) asked, “Do our politicians really care about old people?” when she examined the returns from aspiring Canberra politicians to a survey we conducted in the lead up to the Territory’s elections.  Jane went on to ask “… or do they just lack political courage!”

The Liberal Party made no responses to the survey at all; ACT Labor sent a pro-forma response to half the questions on behalf of all their candidates (which regurgitated party policy). This left a majority of Green candidates; most of the Sex Party candidates and a group of Independents.  The candidates who did respond, responded very well and very caringly!  But, what about the rest?

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September 2016 Guest Speaker, Alan Foskett

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photo – SMH

At the September Vintage Reds meeting we were delighted to be addressed by the well known and well loved Canberra historian, Alan Foskett.  Janice welcomed him to our group and introduced him as an historian who focusses on ‘ordinary people’.  Alan arrived in Canberra in 1950 and so has enjoyed a long liaison with our beautiful city.

Alan took up residence at Reid Hostel which gave him a first hand insight into the exciting world of ‘hostel’ life.  Of course this set off sparks in the audience who were all bursting to share their ‘escapades’ at various hostels around the capital.