Information within government is the people's information. The starting point for access rights and openness must be that the people are entitled to see and hear everything, with very limited exclusions. Currently, the reverse is true, certainly in WA, says Dr Johan Lidberg.

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Authorities should stop pursuing former Customs officer Allan Kessing, who blew the whistle on major securityy lapses at Sydney Airport. He deserves a reward rather than a conviction. The treatment of Kessing shows how governments treat the public's right to know with contempt, writes Dr Norman Abjorensen.

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The man who cleaned the corruption pigsty in Queensland two decades ago, Tony Fitzgerald, has been back in the news warning that the bad old days for the State might be on the way back...or was it an alert that the same thing could happen federally, given some people who learned their Cabinet tricks in the Sunshine State now operate in Canberra's corridors? And Premier Anna Bligh has also spoken out.

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John Brennan, security advisor to the Obama-Whitehouse and respected former senior CIA agent, affirmed that America performed "extraordinary renditions" and hid people in "black site" prisons overseas.

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You might think the head of the Public Service Commission would take some responsibility for a decade of failed federal government FOI and whistleblowing systems - but not Lynelle Briggs. She's happy to blame the media, lobbyists, the Opposition!

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CLA has launched a campaign to stop the Rudd Government imposting mandatoring internet filtering - censorship - on adult Australians' access to the internet. The campaign consists of a new website - http://www.censorfree.com.au/ - and a series of events, activities and media releases to be rolled out over the coming few months.

The government wants to stop children accessing pornography, a move CLA is entirely in agreement with. But the government has backed down on a promise to do so under an 'opt-in', voluntary system for parents, and instead plans to impose mandatory censorship, cutting adult Australians' access to information (and dramatically reducing internet speeds as a by-product).

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As the Australian Government gets ready to censor the internet, CLA is fighting back with 'Action Email Cells' - groups to take the fight to the government. (See Home page article, and lead story in newsletter).

Meanwhile the November newsletter also covers the annual reports of ASIO and the Australian Federal Police, who have notched up more than 1000 complaints against them in the past year, including 19 at the very serious end of the scale.

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The best way to encourage people to blow the whistle on waste and corruption was to pay them part of the money they helped to save, according to ANU legal experts, Prof Tom Faunce and research associate Tim Vines (pictured), a CLA member. They explained how it works in this Canberra Times article.

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