Doctor and activist
26/04/2020
Sometimes we have little experiences that are wake up calls. We need to note them, and act on them. I have little to do with Centrelink. Like most North Shore doctors I assume it does its job, and also tacitly assume it has nothing to do with me. It wrote to me about 6 months […]
25/04/2020
25 March 2020 The trial of Witness K, the whistleblower who told of Australia’s bugging of the East Timorese Cabinet room during the maritime border negotiations has been going on in secret in Canberra. What has Australia come to? This is what we heard Russia did during the Cold War. The government does dirty deals […]
25/04/2020
24 April 2020 It is ANZAC Day again and we are urged as always, ‘Lest We Forget’. It is right and proper to remember the heroism and sacrifice of our troops, and to reflect that we are lucky to have lived our lives without having to risk them in battle. But the distorted perspective of […]
31/05/2019
31 May 2019 Roosevelt in 1941 spoke of the 4 Freedoms, freedom of speech, freedom of worship, freedom from want, and freedom from fear. This was before the UN Declaration of Human Rights. I spent 10 years in boarding schools from the age of 8 where religion was most definitely in charge. Many of the […]
25/07/2018
25 July 2017 It is good to have a health record available for a complicated case. It saves doctors a lot of time. When Records started to be computerised in the early 1980s the people at North Shore Hospital where I worked had a working party. I offered to help, but they said that they […]
19/06/2016
19 June 2016
The House of Welcome had a fundraising dinner in North Sydney Community Centre tonight that I attended. Great food cooked by refugees in a variety of national recipes, with folk singing and dancing.
The House of Welcome started from people who were visiting detainees at Villawood Detention Centre and then became aware that they were being let out the gate with $10 and no benefits. The continuing support evolved and they now have 26 properties and 96 people housed. They feed a lot of people, trying to get food banks food with mainly ingredients so that the refugees can cook themselves. They also help with CVs to get jobs and setting up small businesses selling crafts or food at fairs, or home careering for entertainment.
North Sydney Community Centre staff came in and helped free, and have done so for some years. It is great and gutsy stuff, but I could not help thinking that in the 1950s, Australia took hundreds of thousands of post-war refugees and had programmes for them. Now we have expensive deterrence programmes, and the arrivals have no welfare or Medicare. The House of Welcome is doing a great job- I just wonder why the government is doing so little. Australia should do better.
Donate at:
www.stfrancis.org.au/house-of-welcome/make-donation-house-welcome