The Northern Territory news Fri 14 Jun 2013
NT news
The Northern Territory news; NewspaperNT
2013-06-14
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English
Community newspapers -- Northern Territory -- Darwin; Australian newspapers -- Northern Territory -- Darwin
News Limited
Darwin
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News Limited
https://www.legislation.gov.au/Details/C2019C00042
https://hdl.handle.net/10070/246059
https://hdl.handle.net/10070/804119
www.ntnews.com.au Friday, June 14, 2013. NT NEWS. 51 P U B : NTNE-WS-DA-TE:14-JGE:51 CO-LO-R: C-M Y-K Local Jobs initiative employed outsiders SYDNEY: A $300 million jobcreation scheme failed to guarantee work for the locals in Australias jobless hot spots as employers recruited workers from out of town. The Federal Governments Local Jobs Fund was set up to create work in areas of high unemployment at the height of the global economic crisis in 2009-10. Companies were given taxpayer grants to build local community infrastructure but skills shortages forced some to recruit workers from out of town. The Auditor-General found significant overachievement in terms of job creation, as Local Jobs created 3819 paid jobs, compared to the original target of 3230 jobs. But Department of Education, Employment and Workplace Relations counted all jobs equally, whether they lasted a day or a year. The extra workers included the owner and part time office staff of a pest control business that had worked for one day on a contract to upgrade a building. And three council workers who spent between one and five hours a week supervising a project were counted as workers even though they already had jobs. For a number of projects, the majority of participants were subcontracted tradesmen, service providers and incidental support staff who were not engaged on the project either full-time or for an extended period, the audit report said. This approach runs a significant risk of overstating the employment stimulus. A hotel is demolished in Qingdao, in east Chinas Shandong province. The World Bank has tipped an economic slowdown for China Picture: AFP World Bank warns China slowdown could worsen BEIJING: The World Bank has slashed its growth forecast for Chinas economy this year to 7.7 per cent from 8.4 per cent, warning of a potential sharp slowdown triggered by a fall in investment. The projection is lower than the 7.8 per cent expansion the country recorded in 2012, which was its weakest in 13 years, and comes as a slew of fresh data indicate the economy is struggling to pick up pace. The main risk related to China remains the possibility high investment rates prove unsustainable, provoking a disorderly unwinding and sharp economic slowdown, the World Bank said. It tipped growth to pick up to about 8 per cent next year and in 2015 unchanged from the banks previous forecast as global conditions improve. Chinese household debt is sitting around two to three times higher than the level before 1997 when the Asian Financial Crisis hit, the report said. While the headline inflation rate is mild, price pressures remain in certain rapidly growing segments of the economy, including real estate, it added. AUDITOFAUDITORS MELBOURNE: The nations six largest audit firms have pledged to clean up their act after the corporate regulator threatened a legislative crackdown if standards kept slipping. The Australian Securities and Investments Commission yesterday welcomed the audit firm response to its request following a damning report in December. ASIC chairman Greg Medcraft said each firm had developed genuine and comprehensive plans to improve audits. Auditors are gatekeepers that play a critical role in ensuring Australian investors can be confident and informed, Mr Medcraft said. $51MSHAREOFFER ADELAIDE: South Australian exploration company Iron Road has turned to shareholders to raise $51 million to complete a definite feasibility study on its $2.5 billion Central Eyre project. The one-for-one nonrenounceable entitlement offer at 18 a share will help the company complete the study by the end of this year and progress to the financing stage. It will also help Iron Road to continue strategic acquisitions of property to support a combined mining, processing, rail and port operation. BIDDINGBATTLE BRISBANE: A wave of highnet-worth private investors circled one of Byron Bays best known retail properties before it was snapped up for $5.25 million. A Melbourne investor beat the pack to the two-level building at 2 Jonson St that was purposebuilt for surfwear brand Quiksilver. Jones Lang LaSalles Sam Hatcher, who struck the deal with colleague Stuart Taylor, said the property was on a 618sq m site. It had 70sq m ground floor retail space and two 60sq m units on the upper level. UNI CONTRACT SYDNEY: Leighton Holdings subsidiary John Holland has won a $180 million contract to build a business school for the University of Sydney. Construction is due to begin in July and finish in early 2015, the company said yesterday. The project, on Abercrombie St, Darlington, includes more than 34,000sq m of building gross floor area, the company said. ntnews.com.aul l l l l l l l l l l l l l l l l l l l l l l l l l l l l l l l l l l l l l l l l l l l l l l l l l l l l l l l l l l l l l l l l l l l l l l l l l l l l l l l l l l l l l l l l l l l l l l l l l l l l l l l l l l l l l l l l l l l l l l l l l l l l l l l l l l l l l l l l l l l l l l l l l l l l l l l l l l l l l l l l l l l l l l l l l l l l l l l l l l l l l l l l l l l l l l l l l l l l l l l l l l l l l l l l l l l l l l l l l l l BUSINESS Long service leave slipping away SYDNEY: Only one in four Australians will ever qualify for long service leave. This is due to the rise of casual work andmore frequent job switching. Unions are preparing a push for a national portable long service leave scheme to enable workers to accrue leave entitlements withmultiple employers. Australia is the only country in theworld to offer long service leave, typically consisting of twomonths paid leave for every 10 years worked for the same company. Rio to sellmetalsmine project SYDNEY: Rio Tinto has agreed to sell its Eagle project in the US to Lundin Mining Corporation for an estimated $US35million ($A37.26million) in cash. The transaction, which is subject to regulatory approval, is expected to close in the third quarter of 2013, Rio says. Construction on the project, which includes a high-grade underground nickel-copper mine in the Upper Peninsula of Michigan, is about 55 per cent complete after beginning in 2010, it says. Super amount of lostmoney SYDNEY: Australians have a pot of gold totalling $18.1 billion lingering in lost super accounts. New figures released by SuperannuationMinister Bill Shorten show the amount of lost super has climbed from $17.4 billion to $18.1 billion in the past year. Super funds had until May 31 to transfer lost or inactive super accounts across to the Australian Tax Office if theywere unable to contact members who had super balances of less than $2000. Aussie bio-fuel chance AUSTRALIA could reap tens of billions in revenue by becoming a world leader in the supply of green fuels for the aviation and marine sector, according to a new report. The Green Growth Energy Report, to be launched by Australias chief scientist Ian Chubb today, will call on government assistance for green energy companies to tap into a fuel market worth about $500 billion last year. The report by the Australian Academy of Technological Sciences and Engineering, says the global aviation and marine industries are committed to switching to sustainable fuels like biofuels and Australia has an opportunity to fill demand. We have demand from customers for these fuels and Australia is good on the growing side of things and good on the processing side of things, said the reports lead author, Bruce Godfrey. No rise yet in jobless SYDNEY: Everyone is expecting the unemployment rate to rise this year, but it looks like the increase might be fashionably late. The May jobless rate was 5.5 per cent, slightly better than the 5.6 per cent economists had forecast. The number of people with jobs rose by 1100 in the month, despite expectations of a fall of 10,000. A number of forecasts, including one from the federal treasury, are expecting the proportion of people out of work to rise to 5.75 per cent in the coming 12 months. RBC Capital Markets senior economist Su-Ling Ong said the unemployment rate has so far managed to resist a big rise but she still expects it to increase later in the year. We have job creation averaging about 20,000 a month so far this year and thats been enough to hold unemployment fairly steady, she said.