TIME N TIDE JANUARY 2022
CHANGE TO NBN OR BE CUT OFF!
Anyone on the island’s who have not yet switched over to the NBN since it was connected to the islands over a year ago, will soon be in for a shock. Your connection will be cut off some time from February onwards! Believe it or not, there are some islands who have not switched over to the new technology on the islands. NBN advises that they will be disconnecting the old generation technology starting next month. If you happen to be one of these people, you need to get into contact with your technology supplier. They can assist you in the switch over to the new NBN fibre technology. Depending on where you live, you will have either fibre to the kerb or fibre to the node connection. They will advise and organise it for you. Please do not delay!
AND THE RAIN CAME DOWN
Boy, didn’t the rain came down in November and December on our islands. We have a water gauge up to 250 mm in our yard and it has so far filled up three times. That’s well over a half a metre of water! And it has been everywhere. Australia being a ‘flat’ country compared to many others, means it is difficult for huge volumes of water to get away. That’s why extensive areas of the country experience floods and water moves very long distances to inland seas or, eventually to the Coast. The rain has certainly been great for inland communities and dams are brimming full. Lake George near Canberra has always had a fascination for us. We can remember it in the 1960’s full and to the brim hosting boating and water ski events. We have also seen it dead dry. Great to see it is filling up again. There have been various calls for more dams in Australia over the years with State Governments doing very little to expand them. Had there been more, they would be pretty ‘damn’ (sic) full today after our most recent El Nina deluge! (By the way, El Nina means The Girl in Spanish)
EARLY LEARNING MISSES OUT ON KINDY UPLIFT PROGRAM
The Early Learning Centre has missed out on funding from the Queensland Government’s Kindy Uplift program. The program is designed for selected kindergarten services to respond to the educational and developmental needs of kindergarten children. Almost 400 kindergarten program providers are taking part from Term 2 (April) 2022. Early Learning on Macleay Island will not be one of them, despite the program being designed to assist some of the lowest economic demographics in Queensland, Kindergarten services on North Stradbroke Island (Minjerrabah) have been included.The 3-year pilot will target kindergarten services, including community kindergartens and long day care services, to improve early learning outcomes for up to 13,500 children each year. Kindy uplift funding will be used to respond to children’s learning and development needs through evidence-based initiatives that lift outcomes for kindy children. The initiative will fund programs, resources, supports and professional development to build educator capability, support inclusion and improve children’s learning and development. Needless to say Petrae McLean from the Early Learning Centre is disappointed at missing out. “We did everything we could to be included in Kindy Uplift. It is disappointing to see some private colleges included in the program, but we miss out,” she said. “It could have done so much for our island children.”
BIMSARA COVID RULING
Recently the islands’ BIMSARA organisation was notified by insurers to make member clubs aware of the BIMSARA policy for determining a Covid vaccination policy for their members, volunteers and guests. Currently there is no mandate from Council that excludes non vaccinated people from hall hire or attending any function , meeting or event at the Resilience Hub nor the Jetty Hall. These are council owned buildings. It states: “BIMSARA will be required to follow any future mandate but our policy is to encourage safe Covid practices which we are all familiar with by now, and use the QR check-in app when using these facilities. All BIMSARA members and any guests need to be advised, however, that BIMSARA will NOT be responsible for any checking of vaccination status at our functions or sports practices. “Anyone who may wish to participate is invited to use the hand sanitiser provided, as well as masks if they are unable to socially distance indoors. This is our recommendation to keep our members safe.Checking in with the QR code is mandatory and we ask that everyone comply with this procedure.”