The Dark Project posted:

I've not received one yet, though I haven't been able to find anyone to hire me in years anyway. In the meantime, the demands by the JSA and Centrelink have caused me to have a breakdown twice. And now I've been diagnosed with MS, so bring on more shite, it's not like I'm not used to it by now.

I would blow Dane Cook posted:

SIDELINED Health Minister Sussan Ley is no doubt used to having her name misspelled and mispronounced.

Those familiar with the Liberal MP know to add a third “s” in the middle of her first name and that, despite the spelling, it’s pronounced “Susan Lee”, not “Suzanne Lay”.

But this confusion wasn’t always an issue for the senior frontbencher (who, to be fair, has more pressing issues to deal with at the moment anyway).

Ms Ley deliberately added a third “s” to her name when she was approaching her 20s, she revealed in a 2015 interview.

The unusual spelling didn’t draw any influence from the politician’s family or cultural background, but rather, from numerology.

“I read about this numerology theory that if you add the numbers that match the letters in your name you can change your personality,” she told The Australian.

“I worked out that if you added an ‘s’ I would have an incredibly exciting, interesting life and nothing would every be boring. It’s that simple.

“And once I’d added the ‘s’ it was really hard to take it away.”

Sounds bizarre, right? According to Chris Brazel, “Australia’s leading numerology, feng shui and colour expert”, not so.

Ms Brazel has been researching and practising numerology for more than 20 years and has seen people transform their lives and companies transform their fortunes by simply changing their names.

As she explains, numerology is the study of the numerical value in words, linking them to other events.

When it comes to numerology and names, Ms Brazel says the letters in your name and their corresponding numbers must match your birth date. When they don’t match up, it means you carry a “birth emotion”, projected on you by your mother or father at the time of your birth.

According to the theory, these birth emotions can often cause anxiety and stress in people whose names don’t pass the numerology test but, thankfully, according to Ms Brazel, that can be fixed.

“With numerology, the day you’re born tells you everything about you, and your date of birth and name should match,” she says.

“Every letter has an energy vibration, and there’s a really complex formula to use which is pinpoint accurate.”

Ms Brazel says she has worked with people whose first names didn’t match their birth date, but a simple change of a few letters, and a “domino effect” of changes that followed, led to positive changes. She told the story of a nine-year-old named Brooke whose anxiety disappeared when the “e” was dropped from the end of her name, and businesses whose profits exploded after they changed their brand name on her advice, despite their products remaining identical.

She says that Ms Ley’s story of a name change affecting her life didn’t come as a surprise.

“You’ll often need to change your name to what’s happening in your life and, really, your energy totally changes,” she said.

“It might not be just be putting another ‘s’ on the name, but by doing that, this minister — or whoever the person may be — is consciously making a paradigm shift and there is a domino effect of changes that happens after it.”

quote:

Sussan Ley charges taxpayers $13,000 for capital city charter flights

Health Minister Sussan Ley charged taxpayers more than $13,000 to pilot private charter planes along busy capital city routes and is refusing to say why she didn't use cheaper commercial options.

The embattled minister stood aside on Monday after a week of pressure over her travel to the Gold Coast and a property purchase during a taxpayer-funded visit.

But travel records reveal the licensed commercial pilot also charged $6300 to fly from Canberra to Melbourne in July 2014 and another $7000 to travel from Canberra to Adelaide in May 2015.

Ms Ley's social media accounts indicate she was in the cockpit.

On both occasions she had official ministerial business to attend to - for childcare policy meetings in 2014 and talks with GPs in 2015.

However, ministerial guidelines say charters can only be used under special circumstances "such as where no scheduled commercial services exist or a minister would be unduly delayed by the use of scheduled services".

A spokesman for Ms Ley refused to say whether any such special circumstances existed.

"Sussan Ley's travel claims are being independently reviewed by the Departments of Prime Minister and Cabinet and Finance," the spokesman said.

"Ms Ley, who has stepped aside from her ministerial position, is co-operating fully with these reviews and will await their outcomes. At this stage, it would be premature and inappropriate to be commenting before the release of the findings of these thorough reviews."

If she had flown commercially she could have done so at a fraction of the cost. Twice daily Canberra to Adelaide Qantas flights cost between $190 in economy and $815 for business-class.

Qantas typically runs Canberra to Melbourne flights once every hour on weekdays for between $180 and $770.

Ms Ley is a prodigious user of charter flights around her own electorate, racking up 120 charter flights at a cost of about $210,000 since 2014. She has previously justified these expenses on the basis she has a big electorate and it's the only way to efficiently serve her constituents.

"It's not an extravagant form of transport," she told the ABC in 2015.

"It's a third of New South Wales, and I love every inch of it," she said of her electorate at the time. "If I don't have the chance to talk to my constituents, my contribution is of a lesser value, I feel."

Ms Ley also regularly charters planes between Canberra and her home base of Albury, with costs ranging from $1500 to $4000 per flight - even though it's only a three and a half hour drive.

Other MPs from the area, including neighbouring crossbench independent Cathy McGowan, regularly make the drive.

According to Civil Aviation Safety Authority guidelines commercial pilots must fly three flights every 90 days to maintain their licences.

Ms Ley's social media indicates she also flew herself on a charter plane from Canberra to Melbourne on September 2 last year so she could attend an AFL women's match in her capacity as Sports Minister.

However it's unknown what she charged taxpayers for this flight because records for that period haven't yet been publicly released.

The Dark Project posted:

I've not received one yet, though I haven't been able to find anyone to hire me in years anyway. In the meantime, the demands by the JSA and Centrelink have caused me to have a breakdown twice. And now I've been diagnosed with MS, so bring on more shite, it's not like I'm not used to it by now.

quote:

Last week the department quietly changed advice on its website requiring welfare recipients to keep evidence of income including pay slips for six months.

The advice now requires evidence of income to be kept indefinitely.

quote:

Last week the department quietly changed advice on its website requiring welfare recipients to keep evidence of income including pay slips for six months.

The advice now requires evidence of income to be kept indefinitely.

quote:

Last week the department quietly changed advice on its website requiring welfare recipients to keep evidence of income including pay slips for six months.

The advice now requires evidence of income to be kept indefinitely.

Anidav posted:

Jesus loving Christ

SuddenCactus posted:

I got the text from Centrelink before Christmas but can't login to the website because it's been five+ years since I had to and don't remember my password or ID number.

I would blow Dane Cook posted:

SIDELINED Health Minister Sussan Ley is no doubt used to having her name misspelled and mispronounced.

Those familiar with the Liberal MP know to add a third “s” in the middle of her first name and that, despite the spelling, it’s pronounced “Susan Lee”, not “Suzanne Lay”.

But this confusion wasn’t always an issue for the senior frontbencher (who, to be fair, has more pressing issues to deal with at the moment anyway).

Ms Ley deliberately added a third “s” to her name when she was approaching her 20s, she revealed in a 2015 interview.

The unusual spelling didn’t draw any influence from the politician’s family or cultural background, but rather, from numerology.

“I read about this numerology theory that if you add the numbers that match the letters in your name you can change your personality,” she told The Australian.

“I worked out that if you added an ‘s’ I would have an incredibly exciting, interesting life and nothing would every be boring. It’s that simple.

“And once I’d added the ‘s’ it was really hard to take it away.”

Sounds bizarre, right? According to Chris Brazel, “Australia’s leading numerology, feng shui and colour expert”, not so.

Ms Brazel has been researching and practising numerology for more than 20 years and has seen people transform their lives and companies transform their fortunes by simply changing their names.

As she explains, numerology is the study of the numerical value in words, linking them to other events.

When it comes to numerology and names, Ms Brazel says the letters in your name and their corresponding numbers must match your birth date. When they don’t match up, it means you carry a “birth emotion”, projected on you by your mother or father at the time of your birth.

According to the theory, these birth emotions can often cause anxiety and stress in people whose names don’t pass the numerology test but, thankfully, according to Ms Brazel, that can be fixed.

“With numerology, the day you’re born tells you everything about you, and your date of birth and name should match,” she says.

“Every letter has an energy vibration, and there’s a really complex formula to use which is pinpoint accurate.”

Ms Brazel says she has worked with people whose first names didn’t match their birth date, but a simple change of a few letters, and a “domino effect” of changes that followed, led to positive changes. She told the story of a nine-year-old named Brooke whose anxiety disappeared when the “e” was dropped from the end of her name, and businesses whose profits exploded after they changed their brand name on her advice, despite their products remaining identical.

She says that Ms Ley’s story of a name change affecting her life didn’t come as a surprise.

“You’ll often need to change your name to what’s happening in your life and, really, your energy totally changes,” she said.

“It might not be just be putting another ‘s’ on the name, but by doing that, this minister — or whoever the person may be — is consciously making a paradigm shift and there is a domino effect of changes that happens after it.”

Anidav posted:

"Labor is demanding we cease a process that has successfully recovered over $300 million of incorrectly paid taxpayers' money since July and, frankly, I don't think many taxpayers would support that call," Mr Tudge said.

Anidav posted:

In his first comments about the controversy, Mr Tudge stressed debt notices were only issued after recipients had clarified any possible discrepancy or ignored an initial notice.

quote:

He said recipients had three opportunities to correct inaccurate information.

quote:

"Labor is demanding we cease a process that has successfully recovered over $300 million of incorrectly paid taxpayers' money since July and, frankly, I don't think many taxpayers would support that call," Mr Tudge said.

quote:

"Centrelink is simply doing what has been done for years: cross-checking Tax Office income information against what welfare recipients have self-reported to Centrelink.

"The only major change is that it is more automated so we can complete more checks.

quote:

"People who work hard and pay taxes to assist those in need expect there to be integrity in the welfare system, and that is exactly what we are ensuring."

DancingShade posted:

When you say "scumbag" or "liar" to which LNP member are you referring?

I tried narrowing it down using those words as wildcard criteria and that filter must be bugged or something because it didn't eliminate anyone.

Higsian posted:

Tarantula posted:

Man my story isn't anything like yours but it did remind me how long I've now been unemployed and receiving unemployment and I think all that messaging has been worming its way into my mind because I started to feel incredibly guilty even though I know I really shouldn't but that feeling has started chasing me of late.

Frogfingers posted:

To add to this, there's a beat-up story about jobseekers basically every week on ACA et al, so it's being drilled into people constantly. If I didn't have an unemployed stint to give some perspective to my parents about that kind of life, I'm sure they would have some deformed opinion they would spout off about like they do everything else.

The plus side is you have what most people don't: time. You can use that to volunteer, get really loving good at card tricks, get into politics, blog, cook, bird-watch, whatever. Just do something other than wallow in front of the Nintendo. Being unemployed will give you plenty of excuses to sleep in late, and sleeping in late will give you plenty of excuses to not leave the house for the day. Just try and get into as many sympathetic ears as you can in situations where the things people know about you is a little more substantive than what's on your drivers licence and that fact you don't have a job at the moment.

Higsian posted:

Yeah that feeling of guilt and shame is what they want you to feel. If the government really wanted people to have jobs they'd set up an organisation to straight up link employers and employees instead of this requiring boilermakers (I ran into more than a few of these looking for work) and whatnot learning interviewing and resume writing skills they will never use on their actual jobs. The way we do it is terribly inefficient even before you get into the morality of it. But it's not designed to help people find work, or even help employees find workers, it's designed to grind down your pride so you'll never realise you deserve far more than you get. The whole of society is backwards and it's nothing to do with you. I know it's tough with all the propaganda but hopefully knowing the obstacles set up in front of you and the knowledge that there are people out there that know it's not your fault helps you keep your head up.

Magog posted:

After waiting 3 months to get Newstart I got a job a week before my first payment. I expect to receive a letter from Centrelink any day now.

Magog posted:

After waiting 3 months to get Newstart I got a job a week before my first payment. I expect to receive a letter from Centrelink any day now.

Recoome posted:

This is exactly the problem, in my opinion. I think that while actually knowing how to interview and put together a resume is actually usefull, the system right now is not actually designed to help and that's v hosed up

I would blow Dane Cook posted:

First dog:

https://twitter.com/JohnJohnsonson/status/818797433517785088

I would blow Dane Cook posted:

First dog:

https://twitter.com/JohnJohnsonson/status/818797433517785088

Doctor Spaceman posted:

The title of the actual article is "Is Meryl Streep’s Golden Globes speech really why Trump won?", so thanks to Betteridge's Law I didn't have to read the rest.

I would blow Dane Cook posted:

Where's the terrible graphs thread?