#Section 61 Of The Immigration Act

[itsexclusive]

More than two-thirds of the U.S. House of Representatives voted in favor of a defense policy bill on Thursday that includes a record $886 billion in annual military spending and authorizes policies such as aid for Ukraine and push back against China in the Indo-Pacific.

The House backed the National Defense Authorization Act, or NDAA, by 310 to 118, with strong support from Republicans and Democrats. It was more than the two-thirds majority required to pass the measure and send it to the White House for President Joe Biden to sign into law.

Separate from the appropriations bills that set government spending levels, the NDAA authorizes everything from pay raises for troops - this year's will be 5.2% - to purchases of ships, ammunition and aircraft.

Because it is one of the few major pieces of legislation that becomes law every year, members of Congress use it as a vehicle for a wide range of initiatives. It is also closely watched by major defense companies, such as Lockheed Martin, RTX Corp and other firms that receive Department of Defense contracts.

The vote for this year's bill, which is nearly 3,100 pages long and authorizes a record $886 billion, up 3% from last year, meant that Congress has passed an NDAA for 63 straight years.

The final version of the NDAA left out provisions addressing divisive social issues, such as access to abortion and treatment of transgender service members, that had been included in the version passed by the Republican-majority House over the objections of Democrats, threatening to derail the legislation.

The Democratic-controlled Senate backed the NDAA, also with a strong bipartisan majority - 87 to 13 - on Wednesday.

The fiscal 2024 NDAA also includes a four-month extension of a disputed domestic surveillance authority, giving lawmakers more time to either reform or keep the program, known as Section 702 of the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act (FISA).

That provision faced objections in both the Senate and House, but not enough to derail the bill. The Senate defeated an attempt to remove the FISA extension from the NDAA on Wednesday before voting to pass the defense measure.

The House and Senate had each passed their own versions of the NDAA earlier this year. The measure approved this week was a compromise between the two parties and two chambers.

The bill extends one measure to help Ukraine, the Ukraine Security Assistance Initiative, through the end of 2026, authorizing $300 million for the program in the fiscal year ending Sept. 30, 2024, and the next one.

However, that figure is a tiny compared to the $61 billion in assistance for Ukraine Biden has asked Congress to approve to help Kyiv as it battles a Russian invasion that began in February 2022.

That emergency spending request is bogged down in Congress, as Republicans have refused to approve assistance for Ukraine without Democrats agreeing to a significant toughening of immigration law.

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskiy met with lawmakers at the Capitol on Tuesday to make his case for the funding requested by Biden, but emerged from the meetings without Republican commitments.

[immigration-nz]

Partnership Based Visa Approved Directly Under Section 61

Alice is originally from the UK and was in New Zealand on a Temporary Work Visa. While in New Zealand, she got into a relationship with John, who is a New Zealand citizen. https://nzimmigration.info/case-studies/section-61-request-partnership-based-residence-visa/

[spamzineglasgow]

(REVIEW) Tongues by Taylor Le Melle, Rehana Zaman and Those Institutions Should Belong to Us, by Christopher Kirubi

In this review, Rhian Williams takes a look at Tongues, a dazzling zine edited by Taylor Le Melle and Rehana Zaman (PSS, 2018), with* Christopher Kirubi’s pamphlet ‘Those Institutions Should Belong to Us’ (PSS). 

*I [Rhian] use ‘with’ here in homage to Fred Moten’s use of that preposition in all that beauty (2019) to ‘denote accompaniment[]’. This pamphlet was interleaved in the review copy of Tongues that I received from PSS.

> Onions, lemons, chilli peppers, fractals, hands, patterns, palms pressing, tears, avocados, pomegranate, mouths, finger clicking, deserts. Screenshots, flyers, placards, transcripts, textures, temporalities. Tongues is an urgent gathering in, a zine-type publication that works as a space where Black and Brown women (bringing both their intersections and the tension of distinction) enact memorial, exchange, jouissance, resistance, collaboration, support, listening. Edited by Taylor Le Melle and filmmaker Rehana Zaman, whose work generates many of the dialogic responses interleaved in this collection, this ‘assembly of voices’ was brought together in this particular format in the wake of Zaman’s exhibition, Speaking Nearby, shown at the CCA in Glasgow in 2018. But, as Ainslie Roddick explains, in ‘an attempt to reckon with the trans-collaborative nature of “practice” itself’, Tongues resists academic mechanisms that fall into reiterating the violence of individualism, moving around the figure of the single author/editor to seek to capture ‘a process of thinking with and through the people we work and resist with, acknowledging and sharing the work of different people as practice’ (p. 3). As such, ‘[Tongues’] structure, design and rhythm reflect the work of all the contributors to this anthology who think with one another through various practical, poetic and pedagogical means’ (ibid.). Designed and published by PSS, this is a tactile, sensory production: its aesthetics are post-internet, collage, digi-analogue, liquid-yet-textural, with shiny paper pages that you have to gently peel apart, gleaming around a central pamphlet of matte, heavier paper in mucous-membrane pink and mauve, which itself protects the centrefold glossy mouth-open lick of ‘I kiss your ass’ between the leaves of Ziba Karbassi’s poem, ‘Writing Cells’, here in both Farsi and English (translated with Stephen Watts). Throughout, Tongues reiterates the sensuous, labouring body as political, as partisan.

> Tongues’ multivalency is capacious, nurturing, dedicated to archiving that which is fugitive yet ineluctable; so, inevitably, its overarching principle is labour, is work. The entire collection of essays, response pieces, email exchanges, WhatsApp messages, poetry, transcripts, journaling, and imaginings are testimony to effort and skill, to the determination to keep spaces open for remembrance and for noticing within the ever-creeping demands of production. It is not surprising that this valuable collection is stalked by perilous attenuation, the damage of exhaustion. It is appallingly prescient of the first week of June 2020. Moving my laptop so that I can write whilst also keeping an eye on what I’m cooking for later, setting up my child to listen to an audiobook so that I can try to open up some headspace for listening and responding, nervous about how to spread my ‘being with’ across multiple platforms (my child, my writing, the news, other voices), I am taken by Chandra Frank’s meditative response piece to Zaman’s Tell me the story Of all these things (2017) and Theresa Hak Kyung Cha’s Dictee (1982), which vibrates with ‘the potency and liberatory potential of the kitchen’ (p. 9) and movingly seeks to track and honour ‘what it means to both feel and read through a non-linear understanding of subjectivities’ (p. 10). But I only have to turn the page to realise my white safety. I am at home in my kitchen; my space may feel like it has turned into a laboratory for the reproduction of everyday life under lockdown, but it is manifest, it is seen in signed contracts, my subjectivity is grounded on recognition and citizenship. For Sarah Reed, searingly remembered by Gail Lewis in ‘More Than… Questions of Presence’, subjectivity was experienced as brutalisation, manifested posthumously in hashtags, #sayhername. (Reed was found dead in her cell at Holloway Prison in London in February 2016. In 2012 she had been violently assaulted by Metropolitan Police officer James Kiddie; the assault was captured by CCTV footage.) For the women immigrants engaged in domestic work in British homes, as documented here in Marissa Begonia’s vital journaling piece and Zaman’s discussion with Laura Guy, subjectivity is precarity and threat, their dogged labour forced into shadows. Lewis’s piece pivots around a ‘capacity of concern’ generated by ‘the political, ethical, relationship challenge posed by the presence of “the black woman”’ (p. 18), urging that such concern be of the order of care by walking a line with psychoanalysts D. A. Winnicott and Wilfred Bion in recognising that ‘in naming something we begin a journey in the unknown’ (p. 19). If that ‘unknown’ includes understanding how the British state is inimical to the self-determination and safety of Black and Brown women born within its ‘Commonwealth’ borders (#CherryGroce; #JoyGardner; #CynthiaJarrett; #BellyMujinga), and further, how its ‘hostile environment’ policies – named and pursued as such by the British Home Office under Theresa May – are designed specifically to threaten those born elsewhere, by reiterating Britain’s historical enthusiasm for enslavement of non-white labour (see the 2012 visa legislation, discussed here, that, for domestic workers, effectively put a lock on the 2016 ‘Modern Slavery Act’ review before it had even begun), then consider Tongues a demand to get informed. This is a zine about workers and working. It is imperative that we come to terms with what working life in Britain looks like (see the Public Health England report into disparities in the risk and outcomes of COVID-19 – released June 2 2020, censored to remove sections that highlighted the effect of structural racism, but nevertheless evidencing the staggering inequality in death and suffering that is linked to occupation and to citizen status, and therefore tracks race and poverty lines). It is imperative that we scrutinise how ‘popular [and, I would add, Westminster] culture perpetuates a notion of working class identity as a fantasy’ (p. 52) that literally spirits away the bodies undertaking keywork in the UK. The title of Frank’s piece here, ‘Fragmented Realities’, is exquisitely apt.

> Bookended by Roddick’s and Zaman’s radical re-orientating of the apparatus of academia – the introduction that resists assimilating each of the forthcoming pieces under one stable rubric, instead simply listing anonymously a sentence from each contributor in a process of meditative opening up, and ‘A note, before the notes. The end notes’ that counter-academically reveals weaknesses and vulnerabilities, is open to qualification and reframing, is responsive ­– Tongues constitutes a politics and aesthetics of ‘shift’. Collated after a staged exhibition, anticipating new bodies of work to come, and ultimately punctuated by a pamphlet that segues from reporting on an inspiring event that took place at the Women’s Art Library, Goldsmith’s University of London to imagining a second one in paper (the ‘original’ having been thwarted by bad weather), the entire collection has a productively stuttering relationship with temporality and with presence. As Shama Khanna writes about working groups and reading groups, workshops and pleasure-seeking in gallery spaces, this is the moving ground of the undercommons. It is testament to its intellectual lodestars – Sara Ahmed, Fred Moten, Stefano Harney, and, especially, the eroto-power of Audre Lorde. Along with Christopher Kirubi’s pamphlet, ‘Those Institutions Should Belong to Us’, which comprises a series of seven short ‘prose poems’ documenting the anguish of writing a dissertation from a marginalised perspective, the entire project of Tongues with Those Institutions is to upend academic practice, to recognise the ideological thrust of academic method, to stage fugitive enquiry. Kirubi’s plain sans-serif black font on white pages rehearses the anxious dialectics of interpellation and liberation (‘there is a need to see ourselves reflected in position of agency power and self determination in a world which does not really wish to see us thrive at all’ (part 3)) afforded by their academic obligations, but inarticulacy is a higher form of eloquence:

Even though I know at some point I am going to have to yield to these demands I feel I have to say now that I want to take in this dissertation a position of defending the inarticulate, defending the subjective and defending the incoherent, without having to arrive at a point of defence through theoretically determined foundations, but to feel them.

> Since its structuring principles are those of women’s work, and of Black and Brown experience, nurturing and shielding within the exhaustingly cyclical nature of toiling for recognition, respect, and protection, Tongues dances in the poetics of circles, of loops and feedback, of reciprocity and exchange. Recognising, however, that circularity is also the shape of repetitive strain, Zaman leaves us with a spiralling gesture, in homage to the Haitian spiral, ‘born out of the work of the Spiralist poets’ (p. 61). This ‘dynamic and non-linear’ form insists on the mutuality of the past and contemporary circumstances, is ‘a movement of multiplied or fractured beings, back and forth in time and space demanding accumulation, tumult, and repetition, adamant irresolution and open endedness…’. We are in that spiral now. Such demands must be heard, power must be relinquished, established forms of control – enacted in the streets and on our pages – must be terminated. Writing in early June 2020, this feels precarious; no one is exempt from giving of their strength.

Please pursue further information here. If you are able, these organisations thrive (given the paucity of state support) on donation:

Voice of Domestic Workers: https://www.thevoiceofdomesticworkers.com/

Cherry Groce foundation: https://www.cherrygroce.org/

BBZBLACKBOOK (a digital archive of emerging & established black queer artists): https://bbzblkbk.com/

Reclaim Holloway: http://reclaimholloway.mystrikingly.com/

~

Text: Rhian Williams

Published: 16/6/20

[megatorrenthd]

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[keywestlou]

BAR OWNERS WIN AGAIN

The Key West City Commission met last night. Changes in rules intended to protect against coronavirus were adopted. Overall, a win for bar owners and restaurants.

There is the old saying that a squeaky wheel gets the oil. So it was last night.

There were about 40 demonstrators outside City Hall carrying signs supporting open bar seating. Some, a removal of the requirement to wear masks.

I assume that certain bar owners did their lobbying for liberalization of the rules.

From my perspective, the City Commission did bad and good.

The Commission voted to allow bar counters in restaurants to open. Open seating permitted. With restrictions. Groups of 6 seated at bars are allowed with 6 foot social distancing between the groups. Food must be ordered. No drinking without eating.

Who enforces the new rule. Prior to last night, police and code enforcement officers were the enforcers. No more. Now it is the bar owner.

Is the buck being passed here? Concededly not a pleasant job.

Failure of the bar owner to enforce the new rules can result in being closed down for up to 10 days in the first instance. A second time and the penalty is extended for up to 30 days.

I disagree with permitting the bars to open as indicated. Coronavirus is no where under control. Allowing drinking and eating at the bars means more customers. The additional customers will primarily be those driving down for a few days.

Recognize that it is impossible to wear a mask while eating and drinking.

Labor Day weekend a few days away. There will be an onslaught of tourists. Guaranteed a couple of weeks down the road and coronavirus cases in Key West will be on the rise.

Face masks. The Commission delayed loosening mask restrictions for 61 days.

Such will not make much difference. The tourists who have been visiting recently generally disregarded the mask wearing rule. Probably will continue to do so.

One hundred eighty thousand plus have died in the U.S. Key West will make a significant contribution in sick and dead in the second half of September.

The History Section in today’s Key West Citizen made mention of a Carnival Stag Show involving the Navy which resulted in a sex orgy in 1953.

Search as I could, I could find no additional details than those set forth in the Citizen.

The event was called a Charity Carnival Stag Show. It took place 9/3/53.

Whatever occurred had to be flagrant. The Secretary of the Navy gave reprimands to Admiral Irving T. Duke and Lt. Commander Benjamin Berry.

No rest for the alleged “wicked.”

It was reported ICE worked hard in arresting illegal immigrants in July and August. Two thousand were arrested. The largest sweep during the Pandemic.

Two thousand a large number to be apprehended over a 2 month period. Where were they confined during processing? Had to take several days or longer. Was any protection provided to protect them against coronavirus?

The President of the United States is the most powerful person in the world. A President’s health is of extreme importance.

Recall last year when Trump was suddenly taken to Walter Reed Hospital. Whatever the purpose, he was in and out in less than a day.

The public has never been told what the President’s problem was. The public has a right to know. Especially if Trump’s cognitive abilities were impaired.

The issue as to what was wrong has resurfaced. Yesterday, Trump in a tweet denied having “mini-strokes.” No one said he had mini-strokes. Trump was the first to even use the term as he did yesterday.

Trump apparently refuses to let us know. However, he did have the White House physician issue a statement. The White House physician is considered the Physician to the President. His name Dr. Dean Conly.

Conly wrote yesterday that the President was “healthy…..I expect him to remain fit to execute the duties of the Presidency.”

A California State Judge issued an opinion affecting those applying for admission to University of California schools. The decision to the effect that SAT and ACT tests could no longer be used in determining admission.

The decision’s reasoning was that the tests disadvantaged low income students and students with disabilities.

The decision bugs me a bit. I and many I know come from “low income” families. Many with disabilities. Like blind. We made it. Those deprived today can make it also.

Not even 7 this morning and today’s blog done. Woke around 2 and could not sleep. Did my research and then grabbed some sleep. Up and at the blog itself at 6. Done!

The reason I am an eager beaver with today’s blog is I have a doctor’s appointment later this morning.

Tomorrow more testing. A 2 1/2 hour one at the hospital. Hope I can get tomorrow’s blog out.

Enjoy your day!

  BAR OWNERS WIN AGAIN was originally published on Key West Lou

[humanrightsupdates]

Update Australia: Refugees forcibly removed from detention centre

There are ongoing concerns for hundreds of refugees as authorities forcibly relocated men from the Lombrum detention centre on 23 November, three weeks after all essential services were shut down. These refugees and asylum-seekers remain at further risk of violence from members of the local community and security forces.

Papua New Guinea authorities sent police and immigration officials, armed with sticks and knives, into the Lombrum detention centre on Manus Island, Papua New Guinea (PNG) at around 8am on 23 November. Officials announced that the estimated 420 remaining refugees and asylum seekers had one hour to prepare for relocation. However, after several hours of peaceful resistance by the men, the officials destroyed their food and rainwater supplies and forcibly moved some refugees onto buses to transport them to other detention facilities on the island.

PNG officials arrested and detained for more than two hours a refugee, Behrouz Boochani, who is also a leading human rights activist and journalist. Around 40 men were forcibly removed from Oscar Compound on 23 November, with some refugees saying they witnessed others being beaten or injured in the move. Police are threatening to forcibly move the hundreds of men still at the centre.

On 31 October, the Australian government withdrew all personnel and services from the Manus Island detention centre at Lombrum, where refugees and asylum-seekers were sent as part of Australia’s cruel and illegal ‘offshore processing’ policies. The more than 600 men were told to move to so-called ‘transit’ centres closer to town, increasing risks to their safety. The new facilities at Hillside Haus and West Lorengau are not yet complete and do not have secure fences or a proper power supply.

The refugees and asylum-seekers have peacefully resisted moving as they fear for their personal safety. Locals have previously attacked refugees in the town of Lorengau, sometimes with machetes, and left several individuals badly injured. No action by the authorities has been taken to adequately protect the refugees from such violence.

Please write immediately in English or your own language urging the PNG and Australian authorities to:

Ensure the safety and security of all refugees and asylum-seekers, including from violence by local communities, security forces or private security contractors and for police to refrain from arresting peaceful activists;

Ensure all refugees and asylum-seekers have access to acceptable living conditions, including access to adequate medical care, sanitation, food and water, electricity and other essential facilities;

Immediately bring all men to Australia and ensure all those granted refugee status have the right to settle in Australia or safe third countries.

PLEASE SEND APPEALS BEFORE 4 JANUARY 2018 TO: Minister of Immigration and Border Protection Mr Peter Dutton PO Box 6022 Parliament House Canberra ACT 2600 Fax: +61 (02) 6273 4144 Email: minister@border.gov.au Twitter : @PeterDutton_MP Salutation: Dear Minister

Minister for Immigration and Border Protection (PNG) Mr Petrus Thomas National Parliament Parliament House, Waigani Port Moresby, NCD Papua New Guinea Salutation: Dear Minister

And copies to: Assistant Minister for Immigration and Border Protection Alex Hawke Phone: 02 6277 4430 Email: minister@border.gov.au OR alex.hawke.mp@aph.gov.au Fax: +61 (02) 6277 8522 Twitter: @AlexHawkeMP

Also send copies to diplomatic representatives accredited to your country. HIS EXCELLENCY MR ALEXANDER DOWNER, Australian High Commission, Australia House Strand WC2B 4LA, 020 7379 4334, Fax 020 7240 5333, www.uk.embassy.gov.au

Please check with your section office if sending appeals after the above date. This is the third update of UA 184/17. Further information: https://www.amnesty.org/en/documents/asa12/7380/2017/en/ ADDITIONAL INFORMATION Since Tuesday, 31 October, all water, food and power supplies have been cut off from the centre and the men have resorted to digging for ground water and catching rain in bins as their supplies run low. With severely limited access to medical care, and a rapid deterioration of sanitary conditions, these men have faced serious risks to their health and well-being.

In August 2012, Australia introduced its offshore detention regime, under which everyone arriving by boat to an external Australian territory would be detained in a Refugee Processing Centre on Nauru or Papua New Guinea. In mid-2013, Australia enacted further legislation that meant anyone who arrived by boat anywhere in Australia – including the mainland – would be barred from seeking asylum in the country. The Government however has not publicly recognized that this offshore detention and procession policy is in fact punitive and has subjected thousands of men, women and children to systematic abuse on Manus, PNG and on Nauru.

Asylum-seekers and refugees have been sent to Manus Island, 300km off the coast of Papua New Guinea, as part of a bilateral agreement between Australia and PNG. Nearly 800 refugees and asylum-seekers are currently in Papua New Guinea. However, on 26 April 2016, the Supreme Court of Papua New Guinea ruled that the transfer and detention of asylum-seekers in Manus Island are both illegal and in breach of the right to personal liberty recognized by the constitution of Papua New Guinea. This led to the announcement by the Australian Immigration Minister that the Manus refugee centre at Lombrum would be shut down but that the people detained in the centre would not be brought to Australia.

The East Lorengau Transit Centre was reportedly built to accommodate 300-400 people, but there are around 700 people in total on Manus Island, currently at two centres. Not only would the move lead to dangerous overcrowding, the East Lorengau transit centre also moves the refugees closer to local communities, some of whom have perpetrated attacks on them. The recent violence has exacerbated refugees’ concerns about the forcible relocation to the so-called transit centre. There are four centres for refugees and asylum seekers on Manus Island – the original detention centre, which the Australian government refers to as a ‘Regional Processing Centre’ based at Lombrum Naval Base (around 20 kilometres from Lorengau, the main town on Manus Island); the East Lorengau Transit Centre (around 5 kilometres from Lorengau), and two new facilities on the one site, located at Ward One, referred to as ‘Hillside Haus’ and ‘West Lorengau’ (around 10 kilometres from Lorengau). The last two facilities are still under construction and are not ready for refugees to live there.

The refugees have been subjected to periodic physical attacks and verbal abuse by some local people and members of the PNG police and armed forces. This has left them highly vulnerable but unable to leave PNG except to return to the countries from which they originally fled. Refugees cannot work or travel to other parts of PNG without permission from immigration officials. Amnesty International has documented several incidents of violence, including on 14 April 2017 when multiple bullets were fired into the Manus refugee detention centre by PNG soldiers.

Amnesty International has called for the refugee detention centre on Manus Island to be closed and all refugees and asylum-seekers to be brought to safety in Australia. The closure of the detention centre only to move refugees to other so-called transit centres on Manus Island increases the already grave risks to their human rights. The UN Refugee Agency, UNHCR, has publicly expressed its concerns over the deteriorating situation and has said that “the planned closure of the Manus […] Centre must only take place in the context of continued critical services and in line with Australia’s ongoing responsibility for the refugees and asylum-seekers it has transferred to Papua New Guinea and Nauru”.

Further information on UA: 184/17 Index: ASA 12/7499/2017 Issue Date: 23 November 2017

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WE WANT TO HEAR FROM YOU!  Please let us know if you have taken action on this case.  You can either include us - iar@amnesty.org.uk - in the email you send to the authorities or send us a seperate email if you've sent your appeal by post or fax.  Tell us any way you like!  All we need to know if that you've sent an appeal and the UA number - which is at the top of each email.  Thank you.

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You can view all UAs on our website here. To download your copy of the Urgent Action Participation Guide that will tell you everything you need to know about the Network click here. To see latest updates, blogs and our quarterly news round up on Urgent Actions please visit our Urgent Action blog here.

[adelineadkin]

The Discipline of Vavilov? Judicial Review in the Absence of Reasons

By: Nigel Bankes

PDF Version: The Discipline of Vavilov? Judicial Review in the Absence of Reasons

Decision commented on: Alexis v Alberta (Environment and Parks), 2020 ABCA 188 (CanLII)

One of the “wait-and-sees” following the Supreme Court of Canada’s decision in Canada (Minister of Citizenship and Immigration) v Vavilov, 2019 SCC 65 (CanLII) was the question of whether or not (and if so, to what extent) the Court’s guidance as to reasonableness review (where applicable) would result in a greater degree of scrutiny of the reasoning supporting administrative decisions. Another but related question was the application of that guidance to decisions for which there is no duty to provide reasons, and where the decision-maker provides no such reasons. This recent decision of the Court of Appeal (unanimous in terms of the decision to quash – some difference between the members of the Court as to the remedy) provides guidance on both questions.

The decision does suggest that reasonableness scrutiny will be more searching and that the failure to provide reasons may not render the decision inscrutable or presumptively reasonable. One possible result of this is that it might lead government lawyers acting for statutory decision makers to advise their clients to provide reasons, even where not obliged to do so by statute or natural justice. The rationale for doing so would be to make sure that as convincing a case as possible can be made for the decision in question, and to forestall the possibility that a reviewing court will draw inferences or identify unbridgeable gaps in reasoning between an application and an ultimate decision. If so that would be a good outcome. As another panel of the Court of Appeal has observed in another recent decision (Mohr v Strathcona (County), 2020 ABCA 187 (CanLII) at para 35 (per Slatter JA)), reasons serve “(a) to tell the parties why a decision was made; (b) to provide public accountability for that decision; and (c) to permit effective appellate review.” See also an earlier post on the importance of reasons in administrative decision-making in a somewhat different context: “Reasons, Respect and Reconciliation.”

Wayfinder Corp. was the proponent of a project (Big Molly) to develop a deposit of silica sand for use as a proppant for fracking purposes in the oil and gas industry. The project included development of a sand pit with a production of about 500,000 tonnes/year of sand and an estimated 15 year life. The project would also involve lined ponds, a slurry pipeline, and closed loop facilities for de-watering, washing, drying, and storage of the produced sand. Trucks would take the product to customers in Fox Creek and northern Alberta.

In October 2017, Wayfinder’s environmental consultant wrote to the Director of Environmental Assessments under s 44 of the Environmental Protection and Enhancement Act, RSA 2000, c E-12 (EPEA) requesting a ruling as to whether the project required EPEA registration or approval and thus whether or not an environmental impact assessment (EIA) would be required. The request consisted of a covering letter, a map showing the location of the extraction site, a one-page project summary and a one-page project description.

For present purposes, the question of whether or not the project was a mandatory activity. If the project is a mandatory activity the Director shall “direct the proponent by order in writing to prepare and submit an environmental impact assessment report in accordance with this Division”. The Environmental Assessment (Mandatory and Exempted Activities) Regulation, Alta Reg 111/1993 provides a list of mandatory activities including “[t]he construction, operation or reclamation of… (b) a quarry producing more than 45 000 tonnes per year”.  Section 1 of EPEA defines “quarry” as meaning “any opening in, excavation in or working of the surface or subsurface for the purpose of working, recovering, opening up or proving (i)  any mineral other than coal, a coal bearing substance, oil sands or an oil sands bearing substance …”. EPEA defines minerals in s 1(ll) as meaning:

all naturally occurring minerals, including, without limitation, gold, silver, uranium, platinum, pitchblende, radium, precious stones, copper, iron, tin, zinc, asbestos, salts, sulphur, petroleum, oil, asphalt, bituminous sands, oil sands, natural gas, coal, anhydrite, barite, bauxite, bentonite, diatomite, dolomite, epsomite, granite, gypsum, limestone, marble, mica, mirabilite, potash, quartz rock, rock phosphate, sandstone, serpentine, shale, slate, talc, thenardite, trona and volcanic ash. (emphasis added)

The EPEA definition of minerals therefore has two components: “one exhaustive and the other nonexhaustive” (at para 61). The majority notes at para 84, “We do not understand why the definition of minerals includes a nonexhaustive enumerated list of minerals.” “Sand” is not included in the definition of minerals, but then neither are other substances that would universally be recognized as minerals, such as lead and zinc.

In addition to these definitions, the minority (Justice Dawn Pentelechuk) also considered that the project might be classified as a pit (at para 149). EPEA defines a pit to mean “any opening in, excavation in or working of the surface or subsurface made for the purpose of removing sand, gravel, clay or marl and includes any associated infrastructure, but does not include a mine or quarry.” It is notable that this definition expressly references “sand” but it also makes it clear that a project cannot be a quarry and a pit; i.e. a project must be one or the other.

Less than a month after receiving the application, the Director informed Wayfinder that it did not have to submit an EIA for the Big Molly Project. The following seem to be the entire “reasons” for the decision (at para 28):

I wish to advise you that … I have considered the application of the environmental assessment process to your proposed Wayfinder Corp., Big Molly Project. This activity is not a mandatory activity for the purposes of environmental assessment. Having regard to the consideration set out in Section 44(3) of EPEA, I have decided that further assessment of the activity is not required. Therefore, a screening report will not be prepared and an environmental impact assessment report is not required.

Further inquiries from Mr. Alexis adduced the following additional comment (at para 30): “[Environmental impact assessment] … is discretionary since the Project involves the recovery of sand using a pit greater than 2 hectares.” At this point, Mr. Alexis applied for judicial review (JR) of the Director’s decision not to require an EIA.

The JR judge, Justice Paul Jeffrey, in oral unreported reasons and applying a standard of review of reasonableness, concluded that it was “within the range of acceptable outcomes” for the Director to conclude that sand was not a mineral within the meaning of EPEA and that therefore an EIA was not required (quoted at para 32 of the CA decision). In doing so, it seems fair to say that Justice Jeffrey, in a pre-Vavilov decision, effectively identified a line of reasoning that might have justified the conclusion by, inter alia. referring to the definitions of minerals in the Mines and Minerals Act, RSA 2000, c M-17 (MMA), and the Law of Property Act, RSA 2000, c L-7 (LPA).

On the appeal, the majority emphasized that the Director gave no reasons for her key conclusion that the proposed project was a pit and not a quarry. In the absence of any reasons on that crucial point, the majority engaged in its own analysis of the statutory interpretation issue, concluding that the open definition of minerals in EPEA could not be confined by the non-exhaustive list of examples. As a result, sand had to be a mineral. Furthermore, the proponent’s own description of the project made it clear that the project was a quarry, and since it was a quarry it could not be a pit.

Given that the project passed the volumetric threshold in the regulation for a reviewable project (i.e. it would produce more than 45 000 tonnes per year of sand), an EIA was required. In the majority’s view this was the only possible interpretation and thus it saw no need to refer the matter back to the Director. Instead, it ordered the Director to notify Wayfinder that it would need to submit an EIA report. The majority reinforced this analysis by noting that it was not permissible to reference either the LPA or the MMA in construing the definition of mineral in EPEA since neither statute was in pari materia with the EPEA. The majority also took comfort from classifying the project as a quarry rather than a pit on the grounds that this interpretation would increase the number of projects requiring environmental review, which is consistent with the purposes of EPEA (at para 101).

It is difficult to avoid the conclusion that the majority’s analysis is, in effect, a correctness analysis. It can be justified on the basis that the Director’s decision gave the court very little to go on (i.e. the were no reasons to provide a starting point) but that’s the nature of a decision without reasons. Post-Vavilov, and in a case which can be framed as a pure question of statutory interpretation, it may be fairly easy for a Court to question the major premise on which an administrative decision-maker’s decision turns: in this case, quarry or pit.

Justice Pentelechuk’s minority judgment is more nuanced and perhaps, because of that, more consistent with the instructions of the Vavilov majority. In particular, she notes that the distinction between a pit and a quarry might depend upon the scope of activities associated with the project (at para 178). Given that, the apparent failure of the Director to make additional inquiries along these lines, despite concerns raised by staff (at para 183), brought into question (at para 184) “the reasonableness of the Director’s decision.” The following three paragraphs expand upon this point:

[185]      As already noted, while the Director did not provide reasons, the record does show that the Director’s staff contemplated the Project as involving more than the simple removal of sand. They considered whether the “washing plant component” would need an approval under the Activities Designation Regulation, rather than simply a registration. As a pit only requires registration under that Regulation, they were necessarily considering whether the scope of activities at the plant might constitute more than a pit. This leads to a contradictory conclusion; the Project cannot both be something more than a pit and also be only a pit.

[186]      In their discussions regarding the Project, the staff seemed to treat the extraction of sand and the treatment of the sand as two separate projects with different requirements. However, in the result, the Director lumped the Project activities together, deciding that because the sand removal did not require an EIA, the treatment of the sand at the plant did not either.

[187]      As established in Vavilov, “a decision will be unreasonable if the reasons for it, read holistically… reveal that the decision was based on an irrational chain of analysis”: para 103. While the reasons for the Director’s decision are not complete or transparent, the parts that are discernable from the record reveal precisely such an irrational chain of analysis.

As a result, Justice Pentelechuk was able to join the majority in concluding that (at para 188), “the dearth of reasons, lack of information on the record, and contradictory conclusions made by staff members render the Director’s decision unreasonable.” But she could not join the majority in concluding that there was only one inevitable outcome. In particular, her analysis revealed the need for a more careful and fact-based examination of the distinction between a quarry and a pit in light of the activities included within the project description. As indicated above, this seems to me to be more consistent with the deferential, but more searching, analysis that Vavilov demands than is the majority opinion, which reads more like a correctness analysis.

Either way, both opinions seem to demand a harder look at administrative decisions post-Vavilov than pre-Vavi­lov, whether reasons or no reasons; and if this is the start of a trend then that is some cause for optimism that discretionary decisions under environmental statutes will need a harder look and will need to be scrutinized in light of the object and purposes of those statutes. But, as with the saying “one swallow does not a summer make,” we likely need to “wait-and-see” a little longer before reaching any more definitive conclusions.

This post may be cited as: Nigel Bankes, “The Discipline of Vavilov? Judicial Review in the Absence of Reasons” (May 12, 2020), online: ABlawg, http://ablawg.ca/wp-content/uploads/2020/05/Blog_NB_Alexis.pdf

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[mlleedom]

White Frights - The Villains and the Fall Guys

White Frights - The Villains and the Fall Guys

February 2002

I don't know what it is, but every time I see a white guy walking towards me, I tense up. My heart starts racing, and I immediately begin to look for an escape route and a means to defend myself. I kick myself for even being in this part of town after dark. Didn't I notice the suspicious gangs of white people lurking on every street corner, drinking Starbucks and wearing their gang colors of Gap turquoise or J Crew mauve? What an idiot! Now the white person is coming closer, closer - and then - whew! He walks by without harming me, and I breathe a sigh of relief.

White people scare the crap out of me. This may be hard for you to understand - considering that I am white - but then again, my colour gives me a certain insight. For instance, I find myself pretty scary a lot of the time, so I know what I'm talking about. You can take my word for it: if you find yourself suddenly surrounded by white people, you better watch out. Anything can happen. As white people, we've been lulled into thinking it's safe to be around other white people. We've been taught since birth that it's the people of that other colour we need to fear. They're the ones who'll slit your throat!

Yet as I look back on my life, a strange but unmistakable pattern seems to emerge. Every person who has ever harmed me in my lifetime - the boss who fired me, the teacher who flunked me, the principal who punished me, the kid who hit me in the eye with a rock, the executive who didn't renew TV Nation, the guy who was stalking me for three years, the accountant who double-paid my taxes, the drunk who smashed into me, the burglar who stole my stereo, the contractor who overcharged me, the girlfriend who left me, the next girlfriend who left even sooner, the person in the office who stole cheques from my chequebook and wrote them out to himself for a total of $16,000 - every one of these individuals has been a white person. Coincidence? I think not.

I have never been attacked by a black person, never been evicted by a black person, never had my security deposit ripped off by a black landlord, never had a black landlord, never had a meeting at a Hollywood studio with a black executive in charge, never had a black person deny my child the college of her choice, never been puked on by a black teenager at a Mötley Crüe concert, never been pulled over by a black cop, never been sold a lemon by a black car salesman, never seen a black car salesman, never had a black person deny me a bank loan, and I've never heard a black person say, "We're going to eliminate 10,000 jobs here - have a nice day!"

I don't think that I'm the only white guy who can make these claims. Every mean word, every cruel act, every bit of pain and suffering in my life has had a Caucasian face attached to it.

So, um, why is it exactly that I should be afraid of black people?

I look around at the world I live in - and, I hate to tell tales out of school, but it's not the African-Americans who have made this planet such a pitiful, scary place. Recently, a headline on the front of the Science section of the New York Times asked Who Built The H-Bomb? The article went on to discuss a dispute between the men who claim credit for making the first bomb. Frankly, I could have cared less - because I already know the only pertinent answer: "It was a white guy!" No black guy ever built or used a bomb designed to wipe out hordes of innocent people, whether in Oklahoma City, Columbine or Hiroshima. No, friends, it's always the white guy. Let's go to the tote board:

· Who gave us the black plague? A white guy.

· Who invented PBC, PVC, PBB, and a host of chemicals that are killing us? White guys.

· Who has started every war America has been in? White men.

· Who invented the punchcard ballot? A white man.

· Whose idea was it to pollute the world with the internal combustion engine? Whitey, that's who.

· The Holocaust? That guy really gave white people a bad name.

· The genocide of Native Americans? White man.

· Slavery? Whitey!

· US companies laid off more than 700,000 people in 2001. Who ordered the lay-offs? White CEOs.

You name the problem, the disease, the human suffering, or the abject misery visited upon millions, and I'll bet you 10 bucks I can put a white face on it faster than you can name the members of 'NSync.

And yet, when I turn on the news each night, what do I see again and again? Black men alleged to be killing, raping, mugging, stabbing, gang banging, looting, rioting, selling drugs, pimping, ho-ing, having too many babies, fatherless, motherless, Godless, penniless. "The suspect is described as a black male... the suspect is described as a black male... THE SUSPECT IS DESCRIBED AS A BLACK MALE..." No matter what city I'm in, the news is always the same, the suspect always the same unidentified black male. I'm in Atlanta tonight, and I swear the police sketch of the black male suspect on TV looks just like the black male suspect I saw on the news last night in Denver and the night before in LA. In every sketch he's frowning, he's menacing - and he's wearing the same knit cap! Is it possible that it's the same black guy committing every crime in America?

I believe we've become so used to this image of the black man as predator that we are forever ruined by this brainwashing. In my first film, Roger & Me, a white woman on social security clubs a rabbit to death so that she can sell him as "meat" instead of as a pet. I wish I had a nickel for every time in the past 10 years that someone has come up to me and told me how "horrified" they were when they saw that "poor little cute bunny" bonked on the head. The scene, they say, made them physically sick. The Motion Picture Association of America gave Roger & Me an R [18] rating in response to that rabbit killing. Teachers write to me and say they have to edit that part out of the film, if they want to show it to their students.

But less than two minutes after the bunny lady does her deed, I included footage of a scene in which police in Flint, Michigan, shot a black man who was wearing a Superman cape and holding a plastic toy gun. Not once - not ever - has anyone said to me, "I can't believe you showed a black man being shot in your movie! How horrible! How disgusting! I couldn't sleep for weeks." After all, he was just a black man, not a cute, cuddly bunny. The ratings board saw absolutely nothing wrong with that scene. Why? Because it's normal, natural. We've become so accustomed to seeing black men killed - in the movies and on the evening news - that we now accept it as standard operating procedure. No big deal! That's what blacks do - kill and die. Ho-hum. Pass the butter.

It's odd that, despite the fact that most crimes are committed by whites, black faces are usually attached to what we think of as "crime". Ask any white person who they fear might break into their home or harm them on the street and, if they're honest, they'll admit that the person they have in mind doesn't look much like them. The imaginary criminal in their heads looks like Mookie or Hakim or Kareem, not little freckle-faced Jimmy.

No matter how many times their fellow whites make it clear that the white man is the one to fear, it simply fails to register. Every time you turn on the TV to news of another school shooting, it's always a white kid who's conducting the massacre. Every time they catch a serial killer, it's a crazy white guy. Every time a terrorist blows up a federal building, or a madman gets 400 people to drink Kool-Aid, or a Beach Boys songwriter casts a spell causing half a dozen nymphets to murder "all the piggies" in the Hollywood Hills, you know it's a member of the white race up to his old tricks.

So why don't we run like hell when we see whitey coming toward us? Why don't we ever greet the Caucasian job applicant with, "Gee, uh, I'm sorry, there aren't any positions available right now"? Why aren't we worried sick about our daughters marrying white guys? And why isn't Congress trying to ban the scary and offensive lyrics of Johnny Cash ("I shot a man in Reno/just to watch him die"), the Dixie Chicks ("Earl had to die"), or Bruce Springsteen ("I killed everything in my path/I can't say that I'm sorry for the things that we done").

Why the focus on rap lyrics? Why doesn't the media print lyrics such as the following, and tell the truth? "I sold bottles of sorrow, then chose poems and novels" (Wu-Tang Clan); "People use yo' brain to gain" (Ice Cube); "A poor single mother on welfare... tell me how ya did it" (Tupac Shakur); "I'm trying to change my life, see I don't wanna die a sinner" (Master P).

African-Americans have been on the lowest rung of the economic ladder since the day they were dragged here in chains. Every other immigrant group has been able to advance from the bottom to the higher levels of our society. Even Native Americans, who are among the poorest of the poor, have fewer children living in poverty than African-Americans.

You probably thought things had got better for blacks in this country. After all, considering the advances we've made eliminating racism in our society, one would think our black citizens might have seen their standard of living rise. A survey published in the Washington Post in July 2001 showed that 40%-60% of white people thought the average black person had it as good or better than the average white person.

Think again. According to a study conducted by the economists Richard Vedder, Lowell Gallaway and David C Clingaman, the average income for a black American is 61% less per year than the average white income. That is the same percentage difference as it was in 1880. Not a damned thing has changed in more than 120 years.

Want more proof? Consider the following:

· Black heart attack patients are far less likely than whites to undergo cardiac catheterisation, regardless of the race of their doctors.

· Whites are five times more likely than blacks to receive emergency clot-busting treatment after suffering a stroke.

· Black women are four times more likely than white women to die while giving birth.

· Black levels of unemployment have been roughly twice those of whites since 1954.

So how have we white people been able to get away with this? Caucasian ingenuity! You see, we used to be real dumb. Like idiots, we wore our racism on our sleeve. We did really obvious things, like putting up signs on rest-room doors that said WHITES ONLY. We made black people sit at the back of the bus. We prevented them from attending our schools or living in our neighbourhoods. They got the crappiest jobs (those advertised for NEGROES ONLY), and we made it clear that, if you weren't white, you were going to be paid a lower wage.

Well, this overt, over-the-top segregation got us into a heap of trouble. A bunch of uppity lawyers went to court. They pointed out that the 14th Amendment doesn't allow for anyone to be treated differently because of their race. Eventually, after a long procession of court losses, demonstrations and riots, we got the message: if you're going to be a successful racist, better find a way to do it with a smile on your face.

We even got magnanimous enough to say, "Sure, you can live here in our neighborhood; your kids can go to our kids' school. Why the hell not? We were just leaving, anyway." We smiled, gave black America a pat on the back - and then ran like the devil to the suburbs.

At work, we whites still get the plum jobs, double the pay, and a seat in the front of the bus to happiness and success. We've rigged the system from birth, guaranteeing that black people will go to the worst schools, thus preventing them from admission to the best colleges, and paving their way to a fulfilling life making our caffe lattes, servicing our BMWs, and picking up our trash. Oh, sure, a few slip by - but they pay an extra tariff for the privilege: the black doctor driving his BMW gets pulled over continually by the cops; the black Broadway actress can't get a cab after the standing ovation; the black broker is the first to be laid off because of "seniority".

We whites really deserve some kind of genius award for this. We talk the talk of inclusion, we celebrate the birthday of Dr King, we frown upon racist jokes. We never fail to drop a mention of "my friend - he's black..." We make sure we put our lone black employee up at the front reception desk so we can say, "See - we don't discriminate. We hire black people."

Yes, we are a very crafty, cagey race - and damn if we haven't got away with it!

I wonder how long we will have to live with the legacy of slavery. That's right. I brought it up. SLAVERY. You can almost hear the groans of white America whenever you bring up the fact that we still suffer from the impact of the slave system. Well, I'm sorry, but the roots of most of our social ills can be traced straight back to this sick chapter of our history. African-Americans never got a chance to have the same fair start that the rest of us got. Their families were willfully destroyed, their language and culture and religion stripped from them. Their poverty was institutionalized so that our cotton could get picked, our wars could be fought, our convenience stores could remain open all night. The America we've come to know would never have come to pass if not for the millions of slaves who built it and created its booming economy - and for the millions of their descendants who do the same dirty work for whites today.

It's not as if we're talking ancient Rome here. My grandfather was born just three years after the Civil War. That's right, my grandfather. My great-uncle was born before the Civil War. And I'm only in my 40s. Sure, people in my family seem to marry late, but the truth remains: I'm just two generations from slave times. That, my friends, is not a "long time ago". In the vast breadth of human history, it was only yesterday. Until we realize that, and accept that we do have a responsibility to correct an immoral act that still has repercussions today, we will never remove the single greatest stain on the soul of our country

© Michael Moore, 2002.

https://www.theguardian.com/books/2002/mar/30/features.weekend

I read this excerpt from Moore’s book at an open mic night at a coffee shop shortly after the book release in 2002. Moore has been labeled contentious and divisive. He was at the cutting edge in helping those impacted by the water crisis in Flint, MI. I can relate to this piece as I have never been harmed by a black person and what I have seen in the media throughout my 4+ decades has been a complete disconnect. 

[politalysis]

# Immigration, Politics and Culture

The year is 1959. Britain has never had a black MP before. There were three mixed race upper class MPs about a century ago, one of them a former slave owner who opposed abolition in 1833, but such a radical idea as a black MP in the House of Commons is absurd. An African immigrant named Dr David Pitt stands as the Labour Party’s only black candidate. Standing for the seat of Hampstead, Labour are expected to win and Pitt is expected to become the only black member of the UK Parliament. 90 years after the USA achieved the milestone of their first black politician, Britain is fighting for it’s life to prevent the same thing from happening on their own soil. The Conservative Party and the more radical and racist far right parties are doing everything they can to stop this madness.

Oswald Mosley is now the most infamous British fascist in history. A man who supported Adolf Hitler’s rise to power and attempted a fascist uprising in Britain based on the one that had taken place in Germany. During Pitt’s political campaign, Mosley was a figurehead of the ‘White Defence League’, and so when a black man had the audacity to stand as the Labour candidate for Hampstead in the 1959 general election, Mosley and his supporters were outraged. Mosley’s supporters successfully disrupted meetings and violent protests accompanied by the chant “Keep Britain white” forced Pitt to seek police support as threats and abuse made his life uncomfortable and difficult. Pitt did not win the seat, but he didn’t give up on his efforts to introduce racially diverse political ideologies into Britain, such as more black police officers and an end to the stigma of black immigration. Pitt was a founder member of the Campaign Against Racial Discrimination (CARD) who pushed for legislation in race relations to be changed drastically or newly introduced. His continued hard work as a councillor gained him recognition and in 1970, Pitt ran again in the safe Labour seat of Clapham.

After his failure in 1959, Pitt knew what he’d be up against. The colour of his skin would be his largest obstacle to overcome, and sure enough, the National Front and the more radical Tories had a lot to say about the idea of electing a black man. In 1968, Enoch Powell made the controversial claim that in 15-20 years time, the black man will have the whip hand over the white man. All the evidence shows that white working class people were listening to Enoch Powell, they chanted his name in the streets and harassed immigrants of colour in his name. Newspapers point out that Powell’s ideas for stopping immigration would have prevented Pitt from ever making it onto British shores. An anonymous leaflet circulates in Clapham that reads: “If you desire a coloured for your neighbour, vote Labour. If you are already burdened with one, vote Tory.” Conservative Party leader Edward Heath decides it would be best for him to distance himself from this racism and particularly from Enoch Powell, since both he and Labour leader Harold Wilson saw Powell as a threat. The Conservatives won the election and Heath became Prime Minister, Labour were defeated heavily and David Pitt lost his fight for the seat of Clapham to the Conservative candidate William Shelton.

One of my favourite quotes around the issue of immigration is from David Pitt himself:

“Nobody in authority has the courage to tell the immigrant what his contribution is to the economic life of the country.”

This quote subtly highlights the institutional racism that Britain suffered back then and still suffers now. Immigrants are seen by a large section of white working class people as nothing more than a problem. Contributing to nothing more than overpopulation and a shortage of jobs. When we are struggling, we want to know who is to blame. The establishment classes and the media will always have people like Oswald Mosley and Enoch Powell. People who dedicate their careers to blaming someone else for the economic problems we face as a nation, all the while hoarding money they saved by not paying their fair share of taxes. The narrative that immigrants are a problem and nothing more is not just a poor excuse for economic problems, but it distracts us from what immigration really has given us.

Everyone cheered for Mo Farah winning the gold at the 2012 Olympics, a man who came to this country from Somalia and became a British icon. Raheem Sterling was born in Jamaica to Jamaican parents, and has represented England’s football team 61 times, scoring 14 goals. We all love a Kebab or a Chinese after a night out, or maybe you prefer to eat in at a restaurant for a chicken tikka masala or have a day out at a sushi bar. These are delicacies we would not have without immigration to Britain from Asia. Music genres such as reggae, hip hop, garage, jungle and grime could not exist without its creators who were inspired to create passionate and powerful art by their roots in Africa or the Caribbean and their history as descendants of immigrants, refugees and slaves. These music genres have come a long way over the past half a century, and now a culture exists around them in the UK. Everywhere you look, immigration and cultural diversity has given us something that we love and cherish as people who live here, and without it this wouldn’t be the country that we know.

David Pitt never ran in another general election, but in 1975, after Labour made it back into power, Harold Wilson recommended Pitt for a peerage in the House of Lords. As Baron Pitt of Hampstead, he successfully campaigned for the 1976 Race Relations Act which prevented discrimination against race in employment, education and the provision of services and goods. So he was never elected, he wasn’t the first black MP and his legacy is barely remembered in this country, but his principles and his dedication to ensuring people wouldn’t have to go through what he did to get to his position did succeed. It is thanks to the hard work and the stoic resilience of David Pitt and others like him that in 1987, Paul Boateng, Bernie Grant and Diane Abbott managed to become the first black MPs in the House of Commons. And it’s not just people of colour who benefit from diversity in authority. It’s you scoffing your kebab at 3am after a night out at a jungle rave, it’s you heading to the curry house for a birthday meal, it’s you celebrating when your favourite African footballer scores a last minute winner for your team, it’s you rapping along with your favourite grime artist. This country wasn’t just built by stiff upper lipped white men with cigars and monocles, it was built by all of us. Everyone that is here. Our National story has so many more pages than we’re ever really given, and there has never been a better time to give that story a read.

[myallywynn]

Protocols for safe crew change and travel during COVID-19 released

We have read many articles, extolling the virtues of Seafarers who are considered the backbone of the shipping industry and how they are important to the industry etc and rightfully so.

However, due to the ongoing COVID-19 restrictions, these Seafarers are facing significant challenges with extended service on board, unable to go ashore for a bit of fresh air after many months at sea, unable to be relieved of their duties and go home to be with their loved ones among others.

This is despite international maritime compliance regulations which require Seafarers to be changed on a regular basis from ships they work in to ensure safety, crew health, welfare, and the prevention of fatigue.

There have been calls from many quarters for appropriate action to be taken to address these issues faced by Seafarers.

On the 5th of May, the International Maritime Organisation (IMO) released a circular entitled “Coronavirus (COVID-19) – Recommended framework of protocols for ensuring safe ship crew changes and travel during the coronavirus (COVID-19) pandemic”.

The aim of the circular is to facilitate safe crew changeovers amidst the Covid-19 pandemic. This 61-page document details the safe measures and best practices through which companies can arrange for crew changes.

Largely affected are seafarers in the Philippines (40,000), India (20,000), Ukraine (15,000) and China (10,000). The International Chamber of Shipping (ICS) and the International Maritime Employers Council (IMEC) have found that 150,000 seafarers are in need of crew change by the 15th of May 2020.

However, since the crew change process involves a lot of parties, a great deal of synergy and cooperation is required to ensure safety and success during such times.

The Secretary-General of the IMO, Mr.Kitack Lim stated that the “current situation is unsustainable for the safety and wellbeing of ship crew and the safe operation of maritime trade”.

This recommended framework of protocols was proposed by a broad cross-section of global industry associations in consultative status with the Organization representing the maritime transportation sector such as ICS, IAPH, BIMCO, IFSMA, INTERTANKO, P&I Clubs, CLIA, INTERCARGO, InterManager, IPTA, IMCA, INTERFERRY, FONASBA, ITF, and WSC with inputs from the International Air Transport Association (IATA).

Representatives of the International Chamber of Shipping (ICS) and the International Transport Workers’ Federation (ITF) highlighted their work in leading a call for “hub” airports and seaports to be established, so that crew changes could take place more easily.

Work is ongoing with governments, port authorities, health authorities, and others to develop protocols for crew changes and crew movements.

In a Press Release dated the 6th of May, Guy Platten, Secretary-General of the International Chamber of Shipping (ICS) said: “We have seen from the heroes at sea shoutout that seafarers are doing their bit to keep trade flowing. We stand ready to support our seafarers and we are working with political leaders so that they can steer a steady course and allow safe crew changes to take place.

The problem is simplistic, but the solution is complex. So, we have stepped up and done the homework and developed the protocols. We are now working with governments to implement this roadmap.

Seafarers continue to work really hard, day-in, day-out, and far away from loved ones, but if we are not able to free our seafarers from their COVID-19 lockdown we could start to see disruption to trade and more importantly we increase the risk of accident and occurrences of mental health issues. Putting this off is no longer an option.”

  Image Credit: The International Seafarers’ Welfare and Assistance Network (ISWAN)

  Stephen Cotton, General Secretary, International Transport Workers’ Federation (ITF) said: “Today seafarers’ unions, industry and the ILO and IMO are jointly calling on governments worldwide to put an end to hardships faced by the 150,000 seafarers currently stranded and pave a way for them to return home.

This is about governments recognising the critical role that seafarers play in global supply chains, recognising them as key workers, and providing immediate and consistent exceptions from COVID-19 restrictions to allow crew changeovers.

International seafarers are bearing the burden first-hand as governments turn a blind eye to the ‘forgotten sector’. The ITF, ICS, and IMO have a clear message, governments cannot continue with a mentality of out of sight, out of mind, and we strongly urge governments to use this roadmap to act now before we suffer more serious consequences.”

During a virtual IMO-industry meeting hosted by IMO (30 April), The International Association of Classification Societies (IACS) highlighted the efforts of IACS member surveyors to continue to certify ships for compliance with international treaty and class requirements, sometimes using techniques such as remote surveying where this was feasible.

This another matter that requires due care and attention in light of the current situation. When surveyors do go onboard, the provision of personal protective equipment is critical.

The Secretary-General has expressed support for these protocols and has urged its implementation. Accordingly, Member States and international organizations have been invited to disseminate these protocols among the relevant national authorities who are responsible for maritime issues, health, customs, immigration, border control, seaport, and civil aviation.

This coming together of forces and streamlined dissemination of information is the need of the hour and sheds light on the collaborative efforts that are taking place across the maritime ecosystem with a view to improving the conditions and providing relief to the thousands of affected seafarers across the globe.

The post Protocols for safe crew change and travel during COVID-19 released appeared first on Shipping and Freight Resource.

from Moving https://shippingandfreightresource.com/safe-crew-change-and-travel-covid-19/ via http://www.rssmix.com/

[deafblindblast]

Anti-Asian Racism in the Time of COVID-19

Link: https://youtu.be/LELS_izhnag

[video description/transcript (by Leang Ngov):

Black background with white bold font text, centered, that reads, “Anti-Asian Racism in the Time of COVID-19

Black fade out

Black background with white bold font text, centered, that reads, “Content warning: Graphic Images and Descriptions of Violence”

Noel King is a deaf queer Korean-American adoptee cisgender womxn with black short hair. She wears a dark plum purple long sleeved shirt. She sits on a black plastic chair with white wall in the background.

“Dear friends, family and community. We need your attention.

With this COVID-19 pandemic happening right now, you know that viruses do not discriminate against people. But people can. We are seeing the rapid global spread of what?

Anti Asian Racism. Means violence, bullying, assaults, harassments happening against Asian people, no matter if from China or not.”

background: light purple wall; Kimberly, light-skinned Korean American, wears black long sleeved sweatshirt and red glasses. Her long brown hair is in a ponytail. She is standing in front of a light purple wall.

“From schools, commutes to work, trips to the grocery store, Asian-Americans have experienced verbal and physical attacks with getting dirty looks, being coughed at, spat on, blocked from getting in motels, gas stations, getting services, Asian restaurants and businesses suffer huge loss of customers and money.

This is also called xenophobia (black font text that reads, “Xenophobia” is shown on upper left - this text pops up as Kimberly fingerspells the term and fades away) and sinophobia (black font text that reads, “Sinophobia” is shown on upper left - this text pops up as Kimberly fingerspells the term and fades away.

Means what? Fear and hatred of foreigners, people from different cultures. A negative sentiment against China, its people, overseas Chinese, or Chinese culture.”

Background: Lina, a light-skinned Chinese-Taiwanese-American cis woman, appears in a solid black top. Her hair is pulled back in a low ponytail. She is seated on a stool (not shown in this video) with a white wall as the backdrop.

“Federal law enforcement/FBI recently announced a warning of hate crimes against Asian people that is increasing in the US. Online reports on racial & xenophobic attacks counted more than 1,000 incidents in less than two weeks. Also, there are estimates of an average of 100 per day all over the country, from LA to NYC to Texas. Surprising fact is that 61% of those reports were from non-Chinese people.

(cropped close up image of a SouthEast Asian male with his face stitched showed up in upper left - this image remains in the video as Lina retells this incident) In West Texas, a 19 year old teenager stabbed a Southeast Asian family members and slashed across their face, including a 2 year old and a 6 year old. Why? He thought the family is Chinese and infecting people with coronavirus.”

Nayo is a deaf queer Korean adoptee cisgender womxn with black short hair. She is wearing a black v-neck long sleeved shirt and is seated on a dark brown/black high stool in front of dark gray drawn curtains.

“A 16 year old Asian boy was bullied & physically assaulted by high schoolers in California and ended up in the Emergency Room.

(On the upper left, a cropped image that is split into two images is being shown. Left split is close up image of an elder Chinese man visibly distressed; right image of an elder Chinese man in black jacket and pants with light grey hat, holding a white bag in the middle of a couple of folks surrounding him) A 68 year old elder Chinese man was robbed, attacked and was struck in the back of his head in SF while collecting recycled cans.

(On the upper left, three images shown in one image is being shown. Left image is of male in black clothes in the subway and right image is of Chinese woman with orange face mask and black hooded jacket. In the lower image that is inbetween these two images shows the physical alternation between these two individuals) An Asian woman was attacked out of the blue and was kicked, punched & hit with an umbrella by a man in NYC at the subway station for wearing a face mask, calling her a “diseased bitch.”

(On the upper left, an image of three individuals surrounding a Filipno man in a store) A Filipino man in Bay Area California was harassed because he coughed at Target.

(On the upper left, an image is split into three images is shown. Left image is a close up image of the person holding a camera, while holding a sanitizer with another hand; with a partial view of an elderly Korean woman. Middle image is a close up image of an elderly Korean woman being harrassed. Right image is a close up image of a person holding a camera attempting to sanitize an elderly Korean woman within face distance) An elderly Korean woman was chased around and was told to “Sanitize Your Ass!”

(On the upper left, an image is of a screenshot from a night vision camera that shows a woman putting out a trash in front of the house with an assailant wearing a hooded jacket behind her and is pouring something on her. This image is shown as Nayo narrarates this incident) Just outside of her Brooklyn home, an Asian woman suffered burns on her face, body, and hands after an unknown assailant approached her from behind and poured an unknown substance over her head.

Many stories like this are happening all over US reported in various media. You know, this is not new?”

Janele, a Flilipina American womxn, is wearing a black long sleeve with her hair wrapped in a bun and strands of hair in front of her face. She is also wearing brown acrylic geometric earrings. Janele is signing with a light brown wall behind her.

“For more than 200 years, Asian Americans have been denied equal rights, experienced harassment, had their rights revoked, and imprisoned for no justifiable reason, physically attacked, and murdered. The last 20 years or so has seen Asian Americans become the fastest-growing targets for hate crimes and violence.

Throughout U.S. history, whenever there is a problem, political or economic like the public health crisis or, in wartime, there always seems to be the need for a scapegoat to unjustifiably blame and target with severe hostility. And, certainly, that's been the experience of Asian-Americans, Muslims, Black, Indigenous, and Latinx communities.

Aside from being blamed, Black and Brown bodies have been disproportionately impacted by the pandemic. We need to acknowledge as well that more Black and Brown people are dying from COVID-19.”

Anna is a relatively light-skinned Filipino/Chinese/Taiwanese/Spanish queer cisgender deaf female immigrant with long, dark curly hair parted in the middle. She has on red lipstick and a gray v-neck sweater and is seated on a brown/black high stool in front of dark gray drawn curtains.

“Because of the stereotype of Asian Americans as quiet, weak, and powerless, more and more Asian Americans are victimized, not just today but for many, many years.

(On the upper left, an image is of a comic strip that demonstrates Uncle Sam holding up a government bill while kicking Chinese people, which were drawn as offensive caricature, off the cliff.) For example, Chinese Exclusion Act of 1882 was passed to forbid Chinese people from entering the country, and it lasted for a total of 20 years.

(On the upper left, an image of an older, faded black background with white handwritten text that reads, “x Get rid of all Filipinos or we’ll burn this town down) The Watsonville Riots of 1930 involved white men committing violent acts against Filipinos and killing Fermin Tobera.

(On the upper left, B&W image of Japanese Americans being imprisoned at the internment camps is shown here) During World World Two in 1942, about 120,000 Japanese Americans were imprisoned in the internment camps for about four years.

(On the upper left, B&W image of Vincent Chin smiling for the camera is shown here) In 1982, Vincent Chin, a Chinese American was beaten to death by two White men who were enraged by the Japanese auto industry causing the closure of their car plants. They assumed Vincent is Japanese. They had no jail time at all.”

Background: light grey wall; Leang, Khmer-American womxn, is wearing a dark grey sweatshirt with medium length dark brown hair down. She signs as she is standing in front of a light grey wall.

“I am sure it is also happening to people we already know, and who are in the signing community.

The Covid-19 spread is already scary for everyone but in the last two months, with the increasing violence toward Asian Americans, is it justified to add additional fear in our lives as Asian individuals because the virus happened to be first discovered in China? Or because President Trump declared this disease to be called Chinese Virus or Kung Flu?

So how does attacking Asian people help stop the spread of the coronavirus? Does blaming us for what is happening to us help you feel better?”

(this section has a brief compiled video clip, which shows an individual signing a word, to demonstrate this sentence: “No, I am not a virus.”)

Nayo: “No,”; Kimberly, “I am,”; Lina: “not”; Desiree: “a virus”; Anna: “No,”; Noel: “I am,”; Leang: “not,’; Janele: “a virus.”

The narrator, Desiree, is a Chinese-Vietnamese Deaf Amerian cisgender womxn with dark borwn long hair and she is wearing a black top with ¾ sleeves. Behind Desiree is a black background and she is sitting on her light grey chair.

“So there've been over 100 hate crimes reported a day against Asian Americans.

More than 260 civil rights groups demanded Congress to step up in countering this rise of violence. Means, we do need more leaders out there to take a stand in solidarity to defend the safety of Asian Americans’ lives. Our community must come together to raise the alarms about racism that is actually contagious and put a stop to it. Xenophobia will not make our communities safer. Listen to your doctor and public health officials.

When you see it happening in public, do you choose to be a bystander and turn your head away? It might be easy for you to dismiss racism when it does not impact you. But this is about people’s safety and it is affecting our lives.

We need to address Anti-Asian racism as a society.”

background: white wall; Korean-American female with short black hair and dark purple long sleeve shirt is sitting on dark brown chair.

“Remember, the danger is if we don't speak up for each other, the number of people being targeted is going to be expanding and if they don't intervene, that kind of violence or that kind of incident becomes normalized. No, we are not the virus. Hate is the virus. If you step up to put a stop to this to show that the harassment and attacks should not be tolerated, together we can move forward to heal as a safer and healthier community.” (this section has a brief compiled video clip, which shows an individual signing a word, to demonstrate this sentence: ““With love / and hope / and justice / and solidarity, Your Asian / friends, / family, / community””) Kimberly: “With love,”; Lina: “and hope,”; Nayo: “and justice,”; Janele: “and solidarity,”; Anna, “Your Asian,”; Leang: “friends,”; Desiree: “family,”; and Noel: “community.” (slowly fading to black with white font text for rolling credits which reads, “In order of appearance: Noel King Kimberly Han Lina Hou Nayo Lim Franck Janele Alarcon Anna Lim Franck Leang Ngov Desiree Duong. *Thank you so much for your collaboration & participation in this video * Dragon Grrrls Production Written & Edited: Nayo Lim Franck Anna Lim Franck Leang Ngov Lina Hou © April 15, 2020]

[nzimmigration20]

Section 61 Requests on Visa Process | Immigration NZ

You cannot stay away from the immigration consultants at NZ Immigration if you have been an unlawful resident in NZ. We can help you with a Section 61 request! https://nzimmigration.info/immigration-problems/section-61-requests/

[nzimmigration]