Business is on the menu Woodford Folk Festival ready for a big 2023

ORGANISERS of The Woodford Folk Festival have a spring in their step, with online ticketing for the forthcoming festival now open.

Festival Director Amanda Jackes said, “It feels great to be able to plan ahead this year with more certainty and more creativity”. This year, Woodfordian Citizens were given the first opportunity to purchase tickets, resulting in a record level of tickets being sold in the first few days.

“We have been enthusiastically working through the many areas which we want to improve – it is a luxury to have the time this year to make changes which will improve the experience for our patrons,” Ms Jackes said.

THE Glasshouse Country Chamber of Commerce held its monthly women in business lunch last week where they welcomed Ethel Burgess, whose family were among the earliest settlers in the Glass House Mountains area.

Ethel shared cherished memories and captivating stories of her family’s connection to Bankfoot House.

Glasshouse Country Chamber president Jenny Broderick gave a heartfelt thanks to Sharon Chapman, a wonderful businesswoman and relationship coach based in Glass House Mountains, who graciously opened her home to host the event.

Those unfamiliar with Sharon can find more information about her services on her website, sharonkchapman.com.

The lunch was expertly organised by

Horoscopes

GEMINI

MAY 21 – JUNE 21

Geminis are known for their wistful ways. It’s fine to have the occasional daydream - but don’t let fantasy replace reality. A hard ask, I know. But in order not to be exploited, you really must be able to deal with the cold, hard facts of life - and there may be a few to contend with this week. Know who your true allies are.

CANCER

JUNE 22 - JULY 22

This week encourages Cancerians to give ambitions a nudge. But you first must discard any debilitating doubts. Over time, it can become very easy to fall into a safe and familiar rut. This could be fuelled by fear of failure, or simple lethargy. Neither suit your usual determined nature. So, while the cosmic coast is clear, make changes.

LEO JULY 23 – AUGUST 23

A dazzling cosmos showcases Leos’ unique talents this week, so work or business options could suddenly soar skywards. You leave a lasting impression on others, who now notice how you well perform your duties. A new friendship or romance comes special delivery, although it might not arrive in the package you expected.

VIRGO

AUGUST 24 – SEPTEMBER 22

Routine has become a way of life for many. If life has become too predictable, it’s time to try something new - even if you’re still stuck at home. Start by making one small change every day or so. Initially, the choice may not feel comfortable, but it’s important to realise how long old patterns have been fixed in place. Be bold, Virgo.

LIBRA

SEPTEMBER 23 – OCTOBER 23

Stand by for a maximum dose of claustrophobia - the madding crowd invades your personal space, and you haven’t a hope of hitting the escape hatch. Up until now, you’ve been the epitome of patience. If still dealing with a situation that defies reason by week’s end, perhaps the simplest solution is to just walk away.

SCORPIO

OCTOBER 24 – NOVEMBER 22

The truest test of character often arises in emergencies. But is there really a crisis happening now, or is someone being overly dramatic? Step back from the hysteria surrounding you and calmly reassess the situation. Even if the week presents challenges, it’s a fairly safe bet that the future’s not totally doomed.

We’re forever planning for the future, forgetting that in order to manifest what we want - we must live in the present. Of course, it’s worry that usually clouds our judgement. This week reminds you not to fret. Mostly, you have all you need and you’re moving in the right direction. Everything will fall into place soon enough.

CAPRICORN

DECEMBER 22 – JANUARY 20

Unexpected visitors or friends could become the bane of your life. Although you might feel you can cope with whoever turns up, a certain blast from the past may still have the power to blind-side. Not a problem. Simply charm, and then disarm. The more accommodating you are, the sooner you realise who deserves to be shown the door.

AQUARIUS

JANUARY 21 – FEBRUARY 18

Aquarians are known for their stubborn streak. And as compromise isn’t your top priority this week, expect some heated discussions. You’ve had a taste of freedom and want more. Though the planets counsel a degree of care, you want to throw caution to the wind. Just as well your cash supply looks plentiful - even if it is borrowed.

In the past six months, festivals and cultural events have played a significant boom to the economy, with spending up following cultural events re-emerging from the darker days of the pandemic.

“The festival is an economic powerhouse for the region,” she said.

The festival is one of Queensland’s major events and last year delivered a record economic impact of $21.25m. This economic activity is responsible for generating 167 FTE jobs in the Moreton Bay region and a further 101 FTE jobs in other parts of Queensland, the organisation stated.

Tourism Minister Stirling Hinchliffe said the festival is a major event for Queensland.

“The Woodford Folk Festival is a favourite on the It’s Live! in Queensland events calendar, with crowds of more than 120,000 coming back each year for this iconic Queensland event,” he said.

Pisces

FEBRUARY 19 – MARCH 20

Life’s harsher lessons can now turn to your advantage. Although you still feel the pressure of responsibility, don’t lose your sense of fun. Work and play can overlap. The cosmos also heightens financial instinct, inspiring you to find imaginative ways to improve income. And there’s truth in that old cliché: “It’s not what you know, but who you know.”

ARIES

MARCH 21 – APRIL 20

There’s a huge happening in the heavens, Aries. You’ve just completed a long cycle in which priorities revolved around relationships. Finally, you can concentrate on your own needs. Indeed, you’ve a deep instinct that something special is on its way - including a complete overhaul of self-image. Expect a leaner, more fit, you.

Taurus

APRIL 21 – MAY 20

You often produce your best results when working in a team effort. Of course, it takes the right combination of people to bring about success, and this is where some problems might arise. Finances, however, promise a much-needed boost. Or someone close does well in the cash stakes, and you get to share some of their spoils.

Connection is vital

MANY weeks ago my bank shut me out of my online account without warning, because I could not provide a security code via mobile phone.

It look several phone calls (lengthy wait times), emails, even a real letter to the bank CEO (usually works, but didn’t) and then a 60minute trip to the nearest branch.

I was so badly shaken that fortunately a staff member sorted it, at least I hope, as I’m wary of trying to access my account.

We will not be able to receive emergency warnings and, because we live surrounded by forest and bushland, there is always a risk.

I am unable to track goods I’ve ordered and it took a long time for me to realise I was unable to obtain goods and services abroad, as I did not provide a mobile phone number attached to that bank account.

In addition, because I am very inexperienced with the one mobile phone we use, I missed a call from an airline advising me my early morning flight was cancelled and to reschedule.

The result was hanging around the airport for more than 12 hours for the last flight and arriving so late to our destination, a very expensive taxi ride to our accommodation, then more problems accessing our apartment.

I am embarrassed to ask help from strangers when I cannot receive SMS information.

I am amazed the number of times I am not believed.

I usually say if I clamber up on top of my roof, as builders used to do, I can usually receive SMS, but at 82 it’s a tad risky, but few appreciate the joke.

Telstra has failed us

ARW

Glass House

I am writing about the ongoing problems with Telstra – Beerwah has been a dead zone for two weeks!

Our dance school business has been severely affected as our teachers need the internet to play music on Spotify.

And I witnessed first-hand the problems at The Maleny Show when people couldn’t pay via EFTPOS at the entry gate.

It’s absolutely ridiculous in this day and age that our mobile phone and internet reception can be disrupted for such a long period of time. I understand brief interruptions for maintenance but two to three weeks is crazy. I urge all Telstra customers to contact the company and lodge a case to request a credit for compensation.

Hopefully through sheer numbers from an avalanche of complaints they will realise the significance of this disruption. This might also be a good time to mention the importance of cash and a warning against ploughing us headlong into digital currencies. We’ve become so dependent on technology to the point that we are incredibly vulnerable when it doesn’t work properly.

Name and address supplied

Remove Religion From Schools

Delegates at the Queensland Labor Party’s state conference, held in Mackay a fortnight ago, unanimously passed a resolution that they want Religious Instruction (RI) classes to be moved outside of class time and teaching time given back to professional teachers.

The motion put to delegates asked that RI be removed from lesson time to lunch time or before or after school, or, alternatively, that non-participating students continue with learning the curriculum.

The resolution among others came after the recent public backlash to the comments by Christian missionaries, that they use public schools to harvest children.

In March, the Courier Mail reported on how RI teachers from Citipointe Church West in Brisbane have, in a video published online, talked about using their access to public schools to “harvest hundreds (of children) for the Lord” and “disciple” them.

Currently, the normal curriculum is put on hold at public schools each week to allow religious missionaries to take over classrooms to deliver RI to those children whose parents or carers have given consent for them to take part.

Mark Robinson, a Christian MP in the Liberal-National Party, has called on Minister Grace to “hold the line and keep RI in public schools.”

Secular advocacy group Queensland

Parents for Secular State Schools has argued that acting on RI should be low hanging fruit for the Palaszczuk government, which has successfully tackled religious issues such as decriminalisation of abortion and legalisation of voluntary assisted dying.

Labor Minister Grace has been continually urged to reconsider the government’s position on RI and to take the opportunity to conduct a proper review of the program, with the view to making much-needed reforms.Recently, in NSW a Special Religious Education manual was discovered that promotes the creationist myth and is used by Anglican SRE instructors.

The manual states: “Genesis tells us who started life and why God made the world. It tells us what he is like and why people were created.”

It contrasts this with, “Evolution … is a theory that has been worked out by some scientists. It tries to explain how life has developed and changed over time.”

Do parents in Queensland really want their children to be taught non-scientific creation myths rather than evolution through natural selection, that should be taught in science classes because it is the only scientific explanation of why the universe is the way it is today?

Ken Dyer Landsborough

Setting record straight

Oh dear! I disagree with almost everything that Sel Hopley writes in GCM News 30 May.

Sel has a short-sighted view of the history of climate science―it did not start with the IPCC 35 years ago. It started 196 years ago when Fourier showed that the atmosphere keeps our planet warm.

Then 164 years ago Tyndall showed that CO2, methane and water vapour were the gases responsible.

Then 127 years ago Arrhenius handcalculated that if we burnt enough fossil fuel to double CO2 concentration the planet would eventually heat by 5 - 6 degC (later revised to 4 C). This was the world’s first climate model and a magnificent intellectual achievement. Amazingly, current estimates of “equilibrium climate sensitivity” have not changed much.

We are on track to reach a doubling around 2060.

Eight years ago in Paris, politicians started talking about doing something, but the Keeling Curve shows that there has been no perceptible slowing of our global emissions.

I hope politicians keep their promises and not rely on a dodgy book keeping to get to net zero.

David Lowry Witta

Renewables is junk policy

Energy minister Chris Bowen must have all the information on energy costs detailed below, so why is he trying to ruin our economy with his renewables ideology ?

Global warming is far less than the IPCC predictions and he should ask the CSIRO why it always coincides with entirely natural Pacific Ocean EL Niño warming events.

Research into the corrected overnight capital costs of electricity in Australia shows that solar and wind generation is far more expensive than gas, coal and nuclear.

Costs per kW over the longest energy source lifetime are, CCGT Gas-$4,112, USC Coal$4,800, Nuclear SMR-$5,596, Wind-$12,372 and Large-Scale Solar-$14,882.

Bloomberg NEF estimates that to achieve Net Zero CO² emissions by 2050, Australia would need to spend $413 billion on renewables and their back-up, plus $300 billion on transmission.

Existing coal-based supply would cost only $80 billion on plant and around $30 billion on transmission.

Germany is a good example of a country which tried to build a reliable renewable energy grid, which has failed.

It has close to the highest electricity prices in Europe at 49.5 € cents/kWh and had to provide energy cost support of €3179 euro per capita to households and firms between September 2021 and January 2023, which was 7.4% of Germany’s GDP or €265 billion euro.

Pragmatic Japan tried renewables but is now building 3 new HELE coal power plants, with more planned to maintain the reliable, affordable energy it needs for its industry and has not agreed to Net Zero by 2050.

Some144 coal plants are under construction world-wide with 192 in pre-construction, by countries which have realised that the IPCC science on CO² gas is badly flawed.

Sel Hopley Maleny

Let’s just get along

In a diamond that has no flaws, even if it does, it sparks with spirituality, which would be our purpose relative to humanity before the flaw in the diamond become its Western financial cost.

The true value for me would be to walk into a cave deep under a mountain full of diamonds.

It would spark with pure natural beauty. A joy to behold. So relating that to something not religious, which could be the analogy of the political worlds behind the yes or no votes for the voice.

The political world is where the flawed difficulties lie for the voice.

Not in the one harmonious united voice leading us. I am, you are we are (country) Australia.

Look around us at what our superior evolution leading minority is doing and has done to the earth.

It is not your comprehensive system of government if every race does not have equal say.

Regardless of numbers, one vote for Indigenous or every Indigenous tribe. One vote for English. One for each European nation and so on. All these individuals are now of mixed blood from another country.

And what about the ones who are going to leave this country in a better condition than it is now.

So Jacob Pruden votes for a political world that goes around in a circle from Labor to Liberal each one trying to change what the other did.

Who really adds to and what really adds to the spiritual evolution of this planet in the time we have left.

And who speaks for all the non humans in their track record.

Constiutionally entrenched voice versus an English law and non republic government in a English law multicultural society of country first, Australia second.

Everything Jacob says is what English law says “no matter how much the public disagree, it stands”.

Each Indigenous tribe is only concerned with their tribal land.

The big issues country wide and Australia wide to global issues is done in decentralised voting. What if we spend less on war and NASA space travel and put our earthling needs first.