The Australian community and state and federal government are being seriously manipulated by the GM industry into rushing unthinkingly into the brave new world of GM food. Despite pumping millions of dollars into research on genetically manipulated crops, government has not properly questioned the industry's claims, looked at the facts or put in place an appropriate regulatory system.

The safety of GM crops and GM foods has not been established. In fact there is considerable scientific evidence of GM health risks. And yet there are inadequate safeguards to ensure that we are not exposed to such risks. In surveys over decades, Australian consumers have repeatedly stated that they do not want to eat GM foods and have called for labelling so that they might avoid GM ingredients. Unfortunately, our GM food labelling laws fall well short of those of the European Union and there is virtually no policing of the laws we do have.

Massive upheaval is occurring to Australia's standard employment conditions and minimum wages, with little to no understanding or public attention.

The ‘award modernisation' process currently underway in the AIRC, following a request from the Workplace Relations Minister, Julia Gillard, will impact on all Australian workers ... either directly through loss of conditions or indirectly through lowering the base from which agreements can be made.

While the Rudd Government likes to compare its IR policy with Work Choices (...so it can say things are slightly better than they might have been), a better way of evaluating their policy is to look at the industrial relations system that existed in Australia before the aberration of Work Choices. On this test the Government is failing to provide adequate protection for workers.

Surprisingly, when it comes to stripping awards, this ALP Government is going further than Howard and Reith were able to (before the Coalition had the numbers in the Senate) in reducing award conditions and fundamentally changing the nature of the award system.

Last Saturday marked the first anniversary of the Northern Territory Intervention, but it is far from something we should be celebrating. It has been a long year for those living with this paternalistic, top down policy; one that will no doubt make future generations ashamed.

This legislation was a knee-jerk reaction that seemed designed purely to gain an election bounce for the Coalition (made even more ludicrous by the recent admission from former Indigenous Affairs Minister Mal Brough that the whole plan was thought up in one 48-hour session), but it is the Rudd Government's decision to stay the course that has been most disappointing. Frankly, we expected better.

A quick scan of the recently released Northern Territory Emergency Response: One Year On report shows a fanciful set of claims boasting dramatic improvements, without the figures to back them up.

At the end of March, Environment Minister Peter Garrett finally announced the Government's new environment funding package ‘Caring for Our Country'. I say ‘finally' because the funding under the Natural Heritage Trust (NHT) was coming to an end, and they had been dragging their heels so long that nobody had any idea about the future funding of environment and natural resource management projects.

Up to that point, the Government had not announced an overarching vision for environment and natural resource management, and all we had to go on was a small number of ad hoc election commitments.

It was obvious that the announcement, once it was finally made, was a rushed response that hadn't been thought through. The program is not strategic. It is unfocused and is in danger of undoing much of the progress we have made over the last three decades in conservation and natural resource management (NRM). Unfortunately it takes us right back to the bad old days, of disconnected one-off short-term ‘bitsy' projects, and it is clear that the Government is still scrambling to work out what to do.

I've just been on the road with the Senate Inquiry into the NT Emergency Response Consolidation Bill - the Government's proposed changes to Howard's original legislation.

It has been obvious for a while that there are some serious flaws with the NT Intervention and some alarming unintended consequences of the emergency response - but now it is becoming increasingly so.

It has become particularly apparent what a mistake the new Government made in Opposition, when they unreservedly and enthusiastically signed up to the Intervention without knowing the detail.

Despite a commitment, as part of the national apology to the Stolen Generations, to an evidence-based approach to Indigenous affairs - and assurances that never again would such an injustice be perpetrated on Aboriginal Australians - the Rudd Government has done little to date to moderate or curtail the Intervention juggernaut. Instead, everything still hangs on the promise of a 12 month review, to take place post June this year.

Governor-General Michael Jeffery formally proclaimed the end of Australian Workplace Agreements at 10:45am yesterday, an event coinciding with the second anniversary of the introduction of the former Howard government's WorkChoices legislation.

The proclamation means that as of midnight last night, no new AWAs can be made. However, there seems to be some confusion in the media as to whether "Forward with Fairness" actually means the end of AWAs and the overturning of the WorkChoices regime.

Let me tell you - it doesn't. They will be with us for some time to come.

Now that the fanfare of the announcement out of COAG of a 'historic' Murray-Darling Basin agreement has died down, it's time to look past the rhetoric and back-patting to ask what is in fact being delivered, how does this differ from Howard's previous water plan, and when will we see some real change for the better in the basin?

It seems to me that the big difference is that all the states are now on board, which, in itself, is a good thing. Whether what they have signed up to can actually ensure the fair and sustainable use of our limited water resources in the basin, or whether the political compromises it took to get all the States onboard undermine it, is another question.

Just what it is that has been signed up to is a concern - but the far bigger worry is not just 'what' but - when?

It is fair to say that there is general agreement by practically everyone that the system is in crisis and urgent action is needed to save the Murray-Darling system.

Post-apology, Prime Minister Kevin Rudd has asked us to "embrace the possibility of new solutions to enduring problems where old approaches have failed," asserting that the mistakes of Indigenous policy of the past won't be repeated. His Government, however, is persisting in the ill thought-out and ideologically driven Northern Territory Intervention - despite a promise to pursue evidence-based policy.

The NT Intervention is racially discriminatory, which is why the previous government had to exempt it from the Racial Discrimination Act. It takes away Aboriginal land and quarantines people's money without cause, forcing them to use 'ration' cards. Hasn't this approach already failed? Aren't we simply repeating the mistakes of the past?

The quarantining of income support is particularly hurting Aboriginal communities. Aboriginal people speak of their deep shame of having this system inflicted on them, and how this feels like a return to the ration days when their parents and grandparents got their rations in sugar bags.