Terry Ryder
Ever wonder why you pay so much in rates, taxes, electricity and phone bills? Or why it costs $1 billion-plus to build a motorway or $3 billion for a tunnel?
Part of the answer is explained by this word: waste.
Here’s an example of what I mean. As I turned into my street the other day I was stopped by a stop/slow sign-waver. The street was blocked off for apparently major council work. There were five trucks, a jeep, two bobcats and nine workers.
They were there most of the day. I saw the outcome of this considerable expense of human and machinery resources: they’d trimmed trees and cleared drains along a 50m stretch of roadway.
But that was small change compared to the heavy artillery an electricity company deployed to trim a smallish tree on my street. There were 12 heavy vehicles, two cherry-pickers, 15 labourers in hard hats and of course the mandatory brace of stop/slow sign-wavers.
This week I engaged a local tradesperson to chop down a large tree at the end of its life and to trim two others. The total bill was $300. The electricity company spent tens of thousands of dollars on a lesser task.
The waste involved in these examples is a key reason why we pay so much for government services. People who know tell me it’s all to do with workplace safety and insurance issues.
My travels have taught me there are few nations so obsessed with safety as Australia. Every time there’s a freak accident the laws change to impose more safety precautions. In Darwin in December a construction worker, who wasn’t wearing a safety harness, fell from scaffolding and broke his leg. Stand by for a tightening of safety regulations.
It’s good we value human life as much as we do. But often we take it too far. In Sydney last month apartment dwellers got worried about a crane on a building site next door. Police, WorkCover and fire crew were called in. Occupants of five apartment blocks and a hotel were evacuated. An inspector found that the crane posed no threat to public safety.
Some other examples of waste for which we all pay…
• I recently drove through road works controlled by traffic lights – but with a team of stop/slow personnel for those who don’t understand the system of red and green lights.
• Driving along the Bruce Highway I passed three sets of road works, each off road, but with a total of six police vehicles with flashing lights for those who missed the multiple warning signs.
• A Melbourne commuter who fell and broke his wrist while running from ticket inspectors was awarded $571,000 in compensation.
• Telstra recently devoted five months to pursuing a Melbourne customer over an unpaid account totaling eight cents.
• Gold Coast City Council spent $127,000 erecting a welcome sign on the Pacific Motorway. The council boundaries have changed and now Logan City Council is spending $12,000 to remove it.
This kind of nonsense helps explain why Queensland households have just been hit with a 24% increase in power bills.
Terry Ryder
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