Saturday 30 June 2018

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Will childcare changes lead to fee rises? Some operators quietly say yes

Updated about 3 hours ago


There are big changes coming to childcare payments for hundreds of thousands of Australian families — but changes are also coming to childcare providers.
Parents will be familiar with the new Child Care Subsidy (CCS), which comes into force on July 2. It replaces two different subsidies.
Across the country families have been registering for the new system and navigating through an activity test to determine how much of a subsidy they'll receive.
For childcare providers — from the big operators that run hundreds of centres, to "mum and dad" operators that run just one — the CCS will also transform the way they run the business side of their centres.
And operators say those changes could lead to substantial fee increases.

What's changing for childcare providers?

There will be a couple of changes happening at centres around the country from July 2. They include:
  • An electronic sign-in, sign-out register
  • Updates to IT systems
Most childcare centres run on thin margins. If administration and IT costs rise, operators say eventually they will have to raise fees to recover those costs.
Paul Mondo, president of the peak industry body Australian Childcare Alliance, said the implementation of the CCS had been a "difficult journey for service providers".
"There are additional costs in implementing the requirements of the legislation," he said in a statement.
"These requirements are ongoing and add to the ever-increasing costs."

What's changing for families?

  • Two federal subsidies that helped pay childcare fees are being combined into one, called the Child Care Subsidy, or CCS
  • The Education Department estimates close to 1 million families will be better off, but about 280,000 will be worse off
  • The new subsidy is means-tested — so families have to provide an estimate of income and work hours
  • Details must be updated via the MyGov website or the Education Department's website
  • Low- to middle-income families where both parents work or with a single working parent will be better off
  • Lowest income families will be paid 85 per cent of their childcare costs
  • The annual cap on Government support will be abolished for most families

A change at drop off and pick up

The first change families will notice starts at the sign-in desk for drop off in the morning.
At centres such as Lady Gowrie in West Hobart, there's no sign-in sheet. Instead, there's a tablet.
Parents tap in their mobile number and then a PIN every time they drop off or pick up their child.
The system here has actually been in place for years. It will be coming to many childcare centres across the country with the transition to the new Child Care Subsidy on Monday.
"Embrace it," said Sarah Walton, whose daughter Eadie attends Lady Gowrie. "It makes life so much easier. It streamlines the process of kid drop off and pick up."

But for centres, the transition to electronic sign-in and out is expensive. Some operators estimate the costs could easily be more than $1,000 for each tablet.
"We've actually had to ensure that the iPad can have the software on the system. Plus, we need internet connection and secure stands," said Shannon Allocca, who helps oversee the technical systems in Lady Gowrie's 38 centres.
Operators were so concerned about this aspect of the CCS transition, the Government agreed to delay the electronic sign-in requirement until January 2019.

Detailing hours of care

The electronic change also does something else; for the first time, it lets the Government know exactly how many hours children spend in care.
The Child Care Subsidy covers up to a maximum 100 hours a fortnight, regardless of how long a child is actually in care.
"Looking at this data, when we submit it, they can see potentially we have children that are in care for five hours a day," said Kathy Cripps, Lady Gowrie's general manager of children's services.
"We still get the 10 hours. But potentially, maybe down the track, the Government may only pay the five hours.
"I think this is something operators are thinking about."

If childcare centres had to cover the difference, it would mean a huge extra cost. It's likely that cost would be passed onto families in the form of higher fees.
Education Minister Simon Birmingham said the Government had no plans to end full-day subsidies.
"Centres are still entitled to charge for a full session of care for a day," he said.
"Greater transparency in what's reported to families will ensure that they do actually know how much they're being charged for, rather than the current circumstance."

Enrolling in the new system

Data from the old Child Care Benefit and Child Care Rebate has to be migrated over to the new CCS system.
In addition, families must complete what's called a Compliance Written Arrangement (CWA) to trigger their enrolment registration with Centrelink.

Every time a child's attendance hours are changed, the new "booking pattern" has to be entered and a new CWA is generated.
All of this means more IT resources and expense, which is especially hard for smaller operators to absorb.
At the end of June, the Federal Government said more than 960,000 families were registered for the Child Care Subsidy.
But there were still up to 200,000 families who had not yet made the transition.
That means many families could learn on July 2 they were no longer receiving a subsidy for their child care — and they will be charged full fees.
Childcare centres are bracing for a few weeks of chasing up families to make sure they are properly enrolled in the new system.
"I think there will be teething problems come the second of July and I think that will take a little while to navigate through," Ms Cripps, from Lady Gowrie, said.

Minister confident issues will be resolved

The Government is also anticipating problems. It's put in place a "back pay" provision that will allow families 12 weeks to claim back the CCS they are entitled to once they're registered.
But Senator Birmingham is confident the transition problems will be solved. He believes it's worth the trouble to replace the often-confusing old system.
"One single childcare subsidy … has got to be far simpler," he said. "This is a vastly better system for the vast majority of Australian families."
The Australian Childcare Alliance isn't so sure.
"It would be incorrect to say that by simply combining the existing two payments into one, the system is simpler," Mr Mondo said in a statement.
"For families, they will need to ensure that they are constantly meeting and reporting the requirements to maintain access to subsidy."

How close are you to being homeless because of cancer?

Posted about 2 hours ago


The link between a person having a major health problem such as cancer and becoming homeless is increasing, according to homeless support groups.
Among this group are people who have good jobs, but when diagnosed with a long-term illness and using all their sick leave, lose their job and find themselves unable to pay the rent or the mortgage.
The Everybody's Home Campaign is a coordinated call for increased public housing for people in need, representing more than 20 Australian organisations.
Spokesperson Kate Colvin said people with chronic illness were overrepresented in people who were homeless.
"Perhaps 20, 30 years ago homelessness was most common for people who had another difficulty in their life," Ms Colvin said.
"Now we see someone who has had an ordinary job but through illness doesn't have employment any more and they can't find a place they can afford — that's the sad reality now in Australia."
She said this shift was something that surprised most people.
"Australians expect that if we ever get seriously unwell there will be houses we can afford and if we can't afford the private market there will be social housing," Ms Colvin said.
"We need government to invest so that very reasonable expectation is being met by government investment."
Colleen, 62, became homeless nine months ago after intensive chemotherapy for Non-Hodgkin's Lymphoma.
Now she sleeps in her car in Coffs Harbour.
"Before the cancer I was a prolific painter, I was an art teacher at a primary school, I was a prolific bush walker. I was a very healthy person, a very happy person," she said.
Colleen was no longer able to work once she started chemotherapy treatment, and fell out of the private housing market.
"My whole life's changed since having cancer," she said.

A lack of affordable housing

Ms Colvin said people could wait years for public housing to become available.
"Even with a serious illness like cancer you might be on a priority list, but it might take over a year to be housed," she said.
Colleen has been told she is on a priority list for public housing but has not been told how long it will take before she has a home.
"The cancer's in remission but I'm not supposed to have any stress and I find living in my car extremely stressful," she said.
"Last night I had two young fellas at the back of the car and shaking the car, so I didn't get much sleep."
Cancer Council Australia CEO Sanchia Aranda said while she was not aware of specific data showing an increase in homelessness linked to cancer, research showed there were inequalities when it came to financial status and cancer outcomes.
"The poorest among us are 30 per cent more likely to die after a cancer diagnosis than the richest," Professor Aranda said.
"We often hear of individuals mortgaging their homes to afford treatments and that financial strain can impact individuals' treatment decisions.
"We also know that cancer can impact an individual's ability to work and this loss of income can mean they also lose their ability to pay for essentials, like rent."
Coffs Harbour Neighbourhood Centre coordinator Anna Scott said governments needed to start looking for solutions, such as raising the Newstart allowance and building more affordable housing.
"We need to see more one-bedroom dwellings being built so they're affordable for people who are single," she said.
"Housing affordability is a big question.
"I think Local Government, State Government, and Federal Government all need to work together to tackle this because it's a big issue and it's not going away."

A mix of people becoming homeless


Todd has been homeless for five months. He has a rare form of degenerative, terminal cancer and has had more than 200 tumours removed over the past seven years.
He also has sensitive skin that is affected by UV light, so while he is homeless he also needs to avoid the sun.
He has never been homeless before and he does receive a Newstart allowance, but he cannot find a room or a flat that he can afford.
"When it comes to $600 a fortnight, $300 a week, if you take $170 out for rent it doesn't leave you with much," Todd said.
He lives in a camp with about 15 other people.
"It is stressful at times but there are some wonderful people who really help out," he said.
"Like all of life, you have some good and some bad [people] and you just have to make the most of it."
According to the Australian Bureau of Statistics, homelessness has risen 14 per cent since 2013.
The Coffs Harbour Neighbourhood Centre has helped 250 people who are homeless already this year.
Todd and Colleen both sleep near the centre and rely on the centre for food, blankets, advocacy, and support.
Coordinator Anna Scott said the centre was not only seeing an increase in people needing help, but an increase in the diversity of clients.
She said more women were ending up homeless after losing income when they retired or became ill.
"A lot of people I've seen recently are living on Newstart and they've lost their jobs in order to focus on their health."

Getting healthcare while homeless

The Everybody's Home Campaign's Kate Colvin said people who were homeless were less likely to eat healthy food, to exercise and look after their health generally, so their health became worse.
"People are more likely to access emergency medicine and not have the kind of ongoing relationship with a GP that may make it more likely to pick up something that develops, like cancer," she said.
Neighbourhood coordinator Anna Scott said getting medical help was complicated for people who were homeless, because getting to appointments or paying for medication was challenging for people who did not have stable housing.
"We've had people who have medication that needs to be refrigerated, we can refrigerate it for them but we're only open 9–4 Monday to Friday, so people just don't buy medication.
"Medication and belongings also get stolen very quickly when you're homeless," she said.

Todd is on a trial medication that should shrink the 90 tumours he currently has, but he's just been told that medication is no longer free, so he will have to stop taking it.
Now, as the cold weather sets in, Colleen is due for her next three-monthly check to see if her cancer is back, and she is delaying the visit, because she just can't face hearing any more bad news.
"I was so fit and strong I actually got through the six-hour doses of chemo I had for eight months," she said.
"I don't feel that strong now, or that fit. I feel quite weak actually, because I'm sleeping in my car."

BBC says radio broadcasts being jammed in China



“The BBC strongly condemns this action which is designed to disrupt audiences’ free access to news and information,” the BBC said in a statement.
China, which enforces strict restrictions on its domestic media, has been accused by several prominent foreign media of seeking to stop their news reports reaching Chinese audiences.
“The BBC has received reports that World Service English shortwave frequencies are being jammed in China,” said the London-based public service broadcaster.
“Though it is not possible at this stage to attribute the source of the jamming definitively, the extensive and coordinated efforts are indicative of a well-resourced country such as China.”
A duty officer at China’s foreign ministry had no immediate comment.
It was not the first time the BBC had complained of disruption to its services in China, where its website has been consistently blocked.
Last year, it accused the Chinese authorities of jamming its BBC World News TV channel when it broadcast stories regarded as sensitive, such as reports on dissident Chen Guangcheng, who escaped from house arrest and sought refuge in the U.S. embassy.
Other foreign broadcasters including U.S. state-funded radio stations Voice of America and Radio Free Asia have also complained of Beijing blocking access to their programs.
The New York Times reported on January 30 that Chinese hackers had been attacking its computer systems while it was working on an investigative report in October last year on the fortune accumulated by relatives of outgoing Premier Wen Jiabao.
The BBC said in its statement on Monday that it had experienced jamming of satellite broadcasts over the past two years, and that while shortwave jamming was generally less frequent, it did also affect Persian-language transmissions in Iran.
“The jamming of shortwave transmissions is being timed to cause maximum disruption to BBC World Service English broadcasts in China,” said Peter Horrocks, director of BBC Global News.
“The deliberate and coordinated efforts by authorities in countries such as China and Iran illustrate the significance and importance of the role the BBC undertakes to provide impartial and accurate information to audiences around the world.”
China is listed at number 173 out of 179 countries on the World Press Freedom Index compiled by campaign group Reporters Without Borders.

Reporting By Estelle Shirbon; Additional reporting by Lucy Hornby; Editing by Tom Pfeiffer

VOA, BBC Protest China Broadcast Jamming

Extract from Voice of America News

February 26, 2013 6:15 PM



The Voice of America is protesting new jamming of its English broadcasts in China.

VOA Director David Ensor condemned the new interference and said the U.S. government broadcaster is working with experts to determine the precise origin of the jamming. He said "the free flow of information is a universal right and VOA will continue to provide accurate and balanced information on platforms that can reach audiences in areas subject to censorship."

The U.S.-funded VOA is not the only victim of jamming. The British Broadcasting Corporation said this week its shortwave English radio broadcasts also are being jammed in China.

The BBC said that while it is not possible to know who is doing the jamming, "the extensive and co-ordinated efforts are indicative of a well-resourced country such as China."

VOA broadcast engineers say Radio Australia also is being jammed.

At VOA headquarters in Washington, engineers say that while the agency's Chinese-language broadcasts are routinely jammed in China, its English broadcasts usually are not. They noticed the jamming of the English programs about a month ago and say it appears to use a new technology.

Many countries have used various methods to jam VOA broadcasts for decades, especially during the Cold War when VOA broadcast heavily into the former Soviet Union and other countries under Communist control. Now, its Persian satellite television broadcasts into Iran are frequently jammed, as are VOA Horn of Africa broadcasts to Ethiopia. 

Broadcast group condemns China over radio jamming

Updated 8 Mar 2013, 4:09pm

An international broadcast association has condemned the deliberate jamming of shortwave broadcasts, including those from the ABC's Radio Australia service, into Asia. 
The Association for International Broadcasting (AIB) says English-language broadcasts from Radio Australia, the BBC World Service and the Voice of America are being jammed.
Chief Executive Simon Spanswick has told Radio Australia’s Connect Asia program research has indicated the jamming signals appear to be coming from within China.
"It appears to be quite wide," he said.
"We've been talking to some monitors who keep ears on the shortwave bands around Asia and they say that it's certainly audible well outside China.
"So, one imagines, even with the geographic scale of China itself, that this is right across the region."


The AIB says broadcasts in Mandarin from broadcasters including the BBC, Radio Free Asia and Voice of America have been interfered with for many years.
Mr Spanswick says while the methodology appears to be the same, this is the first time English-language services have been targeted.
"Essentially what you do if you're trying to stop people listening to a program on shortwave is you transmit another audio feed on the same frequency.
"What the Chinese have done for a long time is actually broadcast Chinese folk music...what's happening in this case is that they're transmitting a different sort of noise.
"The aim is to simply make it so uncomfortable to listen to that people switch off and don't bother trying to listen to the program that they wanted to get."
The AIB has lodged protests over the jamming with the Chinese embassies in Washington, London and Canberra.
Mr Spanswick says it's particularly concerning at a time when China is expanding its own international radio and television services.
"They're going global...and nobody is trying to stop them from making available information about what the Chinese Government wants the rest of the world to hear," he said.
"So there's go to be a level playing field...there's a universal right to fair and free information and freedom of speech.

"Jamming is simply so contrary to that sort of notion that it simply can't be allowed to continue."

The great firewall of China: Xi Jinping’s internet shutdown

Extract from The Guardian




In December 2015, thousands of tech entrepreneurs and analysts, along with a few international heads of state, gathered in Wuzhen, in southern China, for the country’s second World Internet Conference. At the opening ceremony the Chinese president, Xi Jinping, set out his vision for the future of China’s internet. “We should respect the right of individual countries to independently choose their own path of cyber-development,” said Xi, warning against foreign interference “in other countries’ internal affairs”.

No one was surprised by what they heard. Xi had already established that the Chinese internet would be a world unto itself, with its content closely monitored and managed by the Communist party. In recent years, the Chinese leadership has devoted more and more resources to controlling content online. Government policies have contributed to a dramatic fall in the number of postings on the Chinese blogging platform Sina Weibo (similar to Twitter), and have silenced many of China’s most important voices advocating reform and opening up the internet.
It wasn’t always like this. In the years before Xi became president in 2012, the internet had begun to afford the Chinese people an unprecedented level of transparency and power to communicate. Popular bloggers, some of whom advocated bold social and political reforms, commanded tens of millions of followers. Chinese citizens used virtual private networks (VPNs) to access blocked websites. Citizens banded together online to hold authorities accountable for their actions, through virtual petitions and organising physical protests. In 2010, a survey of 300 Chinese officials revealed that 70% were anxious about whether mistakes or details about their private life might be leaked online. Of the almost 6,000 Chinese citizens also surveyed, 88% believed it was good for officials to feel this anxiety.
For Xi Jinping, however, there is no distinction between the virtual world and the real world: both should reflect the same political values, ideals, and standards. To this end, the government has invested in technological upgrades to monitor and censor content. It has passed new laws on acceptable content, and aggressively punished those who defy the new restrictions. Under Xi, foreign content providers have found their access to China shrinking. They are being pushed out by both Xi’s ideological war and his desire that Chinese companies dominate the country’s rapidly growing online economy.
At home, Xi paints the west’s version of the internet, which prioritises freedom of information flow, as anathema to the values of the Chinese government. Abroad, he asserts China’s sovereign right to determine what constitutes harmful content. Rather than acknowledging that efforts to control the internet are a source of embarrassment – a sign of potential authoritarian fragility – Xi is trying to turn his vision of a “Chinanet” (to use blogger Michael Anti’s phrase) into a model for other countries.
The challenge for China’s leadership is to maintain what it perceives as the benefits of the internet – advancing commerce and innovation – without letting technology accelerate political change. To maintain his “Chinanet”, Xi seems willing to accept the costs in terms of economic development, creative expression, government credibility, and the development of civil society. But the internet continues to serve as a powerful tool for citizens seeking to advance social change and human rights. The game of cat-and-mouse continues, and there are many more mice than cats.
The very first email in China was sent in September 1987 – 16 years after Ray Tomlinson sent the first email in the US. It broadcast a triumphal message: “Across the Great Wall we can reach every corner in the world.” For the first few years, the government reserved the internet for academics and officials. Then, in 1995, it was opened to the general public. In 1996, although only about 150,000 Chinese people were connected to the internet, the government deemed it the “Year of the Internet”, and internet clubs and cafes appeared all over China’s largest cities.
Yet as enthusiastically as the government proclaimed its support for the internet, it also took steps to control it. Rogier Creemers, a China expert at Oxford University, has noted that “As the internet became a publicly accessible information and communication platform, there was no debate about whether it should fall under government supervision – only about how such control would be implemented in practice.” By 1997, Beijing had enacted its first laws criminalising online postings that it believed were designed to hurt national security or the interests of the state.
China’s leaders were right to be worried. Their citizens quickly realised the political potential inherent in the internet. In 1998, a 30-year-old software engineer called Lin Hai forwarded 30,000 Chinese email addresses to a US-based pro-democracy magazine. Lin was arrested, tried and ultimately sent to prison in the country’s first known trial for a political violation committed completely online. The following year, the spiritual organisation Falun Gong used email and mobile phones to organise a silent demonstration of more than 10,000 followers around the Communist party’s central compound, Zhongnanhai, to protest their inability to practise freely. The gathering, which had been arranged without the knowledge of the government, precipitated an ongoing persecution of Falun Gong practitioners and a new determination to exercise control over the internet.
The man who emerged to lead the government’s technological efforts was Fang Binxing. In the late 1990s, Fang worked on developing the “Golden Shield” – transformative software that enabled the government to inspect any data being received or sent, and to block destination IP addresses and domain names. His work was rewarded by a swift political rise. By the 2000s, he had earned the moniker “Father of the Great Firewall” and, eventually, the enmity of hundreds of thousands of Chinese web users.

Security outside Google’s office in Beijing in January 2010.
Security outside Google’s office in Beijing in January 2010. Photograph: Diego Azubel/EPA

Perhaps the most significant development, however, was a 2004 guideline on internet censorship that called for Chinese universities to recruit internet commentators who could guide online discussions in politically acceptable directions and report comments that did not follow Chinese law. These commentators became known as wu mao dang, or “50-cent party”, after the small bonuses they were supposedly paid for each post.
Yet even as the government was striving to limit individuals’ access to information, many citizens were making significant inroads into the country’s political world – and their primary target was corrupt local officials.
In May 2009, Deng Yujiao, a young woman working in a hotel in Hubei province, stabbed a party official to death after she rejected his efforts to pay her for sex and he tried to rape her. Police initially committed Deng to a mental hospital. A popular blogger, Wu Gan, however, publicised her case. Using information gathered through a process known as ren rou sousuo, or “human flesh search engine”, in which web users collaborate to discover the identity of a specific individual or organisation, Wu wrote a blog describing the events and actions of the party officials involved.
In an interview with the Atlantic magazine at the time, he commented: “The cultural significance of flesh searches is this: in an undemocratic country, the people have limited means to get information … [but] citizens can get access to information through the internet, exposing lies and the truth.” Deng’s case began to attract public support, with young people gathering in Beijing with signs reading “Anyone could be Deng Yujiao.” Eventually the court ruled that Deng had acted in self-defence.

During this period, in the final years of Hu Jintao’s presidency, the internet was becoming more and more powerful as a mechanism by which Chinese citizens held their officials to account. Most cases were like that of Deng Yujiao – lodged and resolved at the local level. A small number, however, reached central authorities in Beijing. On 23 July 2011, a high-speed train derailed in the coastal city of Wenzhou, leaving at least 40 people dead and 172 injured. In the wake of the accident, Chinese officials banned journalists from investigating, telling them to use only information “released from authorities”. But local residents took photos of the wreckage being buried instead of being examined for evidence. The photos went viral and heightened the impression that the government’s main goal was not to seek the true cause of the accident.
A Sina Weibo poll – later blocked – asked users why they thought the train wreckage was buried: 98% (61,382) believed it represented destruction of evidence. Dark humour spread online: “How far are we from heaven? Only a train ticket away,” and “The Ministry of Railways earnestly requests that you ride the Heavenly Party Express.” The popular pressure resulted in a full-scale investigation of the crash, and in late December, the government issued a report blaming poorly designed signal equipment and insufficient safety procedures. As many as 54 officials faced disciplinary action as a result of the crash.
The internet also provided a new sense of community for Chinese citizens, who mostly lacked robust civil-society organisations. In July 2012, devastating floods in Beijing led to the evacuation of more than 65,000 residents and the deaths of at least 77 people. Damages totalled an estimated $1.9bn. Local officials failed to respond effectively: police officers allegedly kept ticketing stranded cars instead of assisting residents, and the early warning system did not work. Yet the real story was the extraordinary outpouring of assistance from Beijing web users, who volunteered their homes and food to stranded citizens. In a span of just 24 hours, an estimated 8.8m messages were sent on Weibo regarding the floods. The story of the floods became not only one of government incompetence, but also one of how an online community could transform into a real one.
While the Chinese people explored new ways to use the internet, the leadership also began to develop a taste for the new powers it offered, such as a better understanding of citizens’ concerns and new ways to shape public opinion. Yet as the internet increasingly became a vehicle for dissent, concern within the leadership mounted that it might be used to mobilise a large-scale political protest capable of threatening the central government. The government responded with a stream of technological fixes and political directives; yet the boundaries of internet life continued to expand.
The advent of Xi Jinping in 2012 brought a new determination to move beyond deleting posts and passing regulations. Beijing wanted to ensure that internet content more actively served the interests of the Communist party. Within the virtual world, as in the real world, the party moved to silence dissenting voices, to mobilise party members in support of its values, and to prevent foreign ideas from seeping into Chinese political and social life. In a leaked speech in August 2013, Xi articulated a dark vision: “The internet has become the main battlefield for the public opinion struggle.”
Early in his tenure, Xi embraced the world of social media. One Weibo group, called Fan Group to Learn from Xi, appeared in late 2012, much to the delight of Chinese propaganda officials. (Many Chinese suspected that the account was directed by someone in the government, although the account’s owner denied it.) Xi allowed a visit he made to Hebei to be liveblogged on Weibo by government-affiliated press, and videos about Xi, including a viral music video called How Should I Address You, based on a trip he made to a mountain village, demonstrate the government’s increasing skill at digital propaganda.

Xi Jinping at the World Internet Conference in Jiaxing, China, in 2015.
Xi Jinping at the World Internet Conference in Jiaxing, China, in 2015. Photograph: Aly Song/Reuters
Under Xi, the government has also developed new technology that has enabled it to exert far greater control over the internet. In January 2015, the government blocked many of the VPNs that citizens had used to circumvent the Great Firewall. This was surprising to many outside observers, who had believed that VPNs were too useful to the Chinese economy – supporting multinationals, banks and retailers, among others – for the government to crack down on them.
In spring 2015, Beijing launched the Great Cannon. Unlike the Great Firewall, which has the capacity to block traffic as it enters or exits China, the Great Cannon is able to adjust and replace content as it travels around the internet. One of its first targets was the US coding and software development site GitHub. The Chinese government used the Great Cannon to levy a distributed denial of service attack against the site, overwhelming it with traffic redirected from Baidu (a search engine similar to Google). The attack focused on attempting to force GitHub to remove pages linked to the Chinese-language edition of the New York Times and GreatFire.org, a popular VPN that helps people circumvent Chinese internet censorship.
But perhaps Xi’s most noticeable gambit has been to constrain the nature of the content available online. In August 2013, the government issued a new set of regulations known as the “seven baselines”. The reaction by Chinese internet companies was immediate. Sina, for example, shut down or “handled” 100,000 Weibo accounts found to not comply with the new rules.
The government also adopted tough restrictions on internet-based rumours. In September 2013, the supreme people’s court ruled that authors of online posts that deliberately spread rumours or lies, and were either seen by more than 5,000 individuals or shared more than 500 times, could face defamation charges and up to three years in jail. Following massive flooding in Hebei province in July 2016, for example, the government detained three individuals accused of spreading “false news” via social media regarding the death toll and cause of the flood. Some social media posts and photos of the flooding, particularly of drowning victims, were also censored.
In addition, Xi’s government began targeting individuals with large social media followings who might challenge the authority of the Communist party. Restrictions on the most prominent Chinese web influencers, beginning in 2013, represented an important turning point in China’s internet life. Discussions began to move away from politics to personal and less sensitive issues. The impact on Sina Weibo was dramatic. According to a study of 1.6 million Weibo users, the number of Weibo posts fell by 70% between 2011 and 2013.
The strength of the Communist party’s control over the internet rests above all on its commitment to prevent the spread of information that it finds dangerous. It has also adopted sophisticated technology, such as the Great Firewall and the Golden Shield. Perhaps its most potent source of influence, however, is the cyber-army it has developed to implement its policies.
Private companies also play an important role in facilitating internet censorship in China. Since commercial internet providers are so involved in censoring the sites that they host, internet scholar Guobin Yang argues that “it may not be too much of a stretch to talk about the privatisation of internet content control”. The process is made simpler by the fact that several major technology entrepreneurs also hold political office. For example, Robin Li of Baidu is a member of the Chinese People’s Political Consultative Conference, an advisory legislature, while Lei Jun, founder and CEO of mobile phone giant Xiaomi, is a representative of the National People’s Congress.
Yet Xi’s growing control over the internet does not come without costs. An internet that does not work efficiently or limits access to information impedes economic growth. China’s internet is notoriously unreliable, and ranks 91st in the world for speed. As New Yorker writer Evan Osnos asked in discussing the transformation of the Chinese internet during Xi’s tenure: “How many countries in 2015 have an internet connection to the world that is worse than it was a year ago?”
Scientific innovation, particularly prized by the Chinese leadership, may also be at risk. After the VPN crackdown, a Chinese biologist published an essay that became popular on social media, entitled Why Do Scientists Need Google? He wrote: “If a country wants to make this many scientists take out time from the short duration of their professional lives to research technology for climbing over the Great Firewall and to install and to continually upgrade every kind of software for routers, computers, tablets and mobile devices, no matter that this behaviour wastes a great amount of time; it is all completely ridiculous.”

More difficult to gauge is the cost the Chinese leadership incurs to its credibility. Web users criticising the Great Firewall have used puns to mock China’s censorship system. Playing off the fact that the phrases “strong nation” and “wall nation” share a phonetic pronunciation in Chinese (qiangguo), some began using the phrase “wall nation” to refer to China. Those responsible for seeking to control content have also been widely mocked. When Fang opened an account on Sina Weibo in December 2010, he quickly closed the account after thousands of online users left “expletive-laden messages” accusing him of being a government hack. Censors at Sina Weibo blocked “Fang Binxing” as a search term; one Twitter user wrote: “Kind of poetic, really, the blocker, blocked.” When Fang delivered a speech at Wuhan University in central China in 2011, a few students pelted him with eggs and a pair of shoes.
Nonetheless, the government seems willing to bear the economic and scientific costs, as well as potential damage to its credibility, if it means more control over the internet. For the international community, Beijing’s cyber-policy is a sign of the challenge that a more powerful China presents to the liberal world order, which prioritises values such as freedom of speech. It also reflects the paradox inherent in China’s efforts to promote itself as a champion of globalisation, while simultaneously advocating a model of internet sovereignty and closing its cyber-world to information and investment from abroad.

Adapted from The Third Revolution: Xi Jinping and the New Chinese State by Elizabeth C Economy, published by Oxford University Press and available at guardianbookshop.com

Quit the EU for better trade deal, Trump reportedly told Macron

Extract from The Guardian

US president offered France improved terms in effort ‘to undermine the EU’

Donald Trump suggested to Emmanuel Macron that he pull France out of the European Union in return for a bilateral trade deal, it has been claimed.
The offer, aimed at destroying the Europe alliance, was reported to have been made during a private meeting when Macron visited the White House at the end of April.
The Washington Post said the US president asked Macron: “Why don’t you leave the European Union?” In return, Trump suggested the US could offer France a substantial bilateral trade deal.
The article claimed that Trump promised to give France better trade terms than the EU as a whole gets from the US.
The columnist at the Washington Post, Josh Rogin, cited two unnamed European officials as the source of his report, adding that the proposition revealed “a basic lack of understanding of Macron’s views and those of the people who elected him”. It was “an instance of the president of the United States offering an incentive to dismantle an organsation of America’s allies, against stated US government policy”.
Neither the White House nor the Elysée Palace has confirmed the report or commented, but the offer is consistent with Trump’s wider suspicion of international organisations and treaties.
Since taking office, Trump has questioned America’s membership of Nato, withdrawn from the Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP), pulled out of the Paris climate agreement and earlier this month withdrew the US from the United Nations human rights council. In the last few weeks he has taken a tough line with Canada and Mexico in the hope of forcing them to renegotiate the North American Free Trade Agreement (Nafta).
  Trump and Macron share an awkward handshake and a kiss - video
Instead, the US president has promoted “America first” policies, insisting that foreign countries – allies and adversaries alike – have been taking advantage of the US.
While imposing trade tariffs on countries and the EU, he told some of his country’s closest allies that they might lose access to American markets if they did not reduce tariffs on US companies’ services and goods.
The Washington Post said Trump was attempting to inflict “enormous” but pointless damage on European allies.
“Trump has been trashing the EU and Nato since his campaign, but the pace and viciousness of his attacks have increased,” Rogin wrote. “Trump doesn’t believe in the continued sanctity of the European Union and Nato as well as the United States’ commitment to both.”

He added that Trump’s “intentional and egregious actions to undermine the EU, Nato and the United States relationship with both can no longer be discounted, rationalised or seen as anything but what they are – a brazen attempt to undo the strategic infrastructure both America and Europe need more than ever”.

Canada hits US with retaliatory tariffs: 'We will not back down'

Extract from The Guardian

Country announced taxes on items including ketchup, lawnmowers, whiskey and yoghurt amounting to $12.6bn

Canada has announced billions of dollars in retaliatory tariffs against the US in a tit-for-tat response to the Trump administration’s duties on Canadian steel and aluminum.
Justin Trudeau’s government released the final list of items that will be targeted beginning 1 July. Some items will be subject to taxes of 10 or 25%.
“We will not escalate and we will not back down,” the Canadian foreign minister, Chrystia Freeland, said.
The taxes on items including ketchup, lawnmowers and motorboats amount to $12.6bn.
“This is a perfectly reciprocal action,” Freeland said. “It is a dollar-for-dollar response.”
Freeland said they had no other choice and called the tariffs regrettable.
Another product on the list is whiskey, which comes from Tennessee and Kentucky, the latter of which is the home state of the Republican Senate leader, Mitch McConnell.
Freeland also said they are prepared if Donald Trump, the US president, escalates the trade war.
“It is absolutely imperative that common sense should prevail,” she said. “Having said that, our approach from day one of the Nafta negotiations has been to hope for the best but prepare for the worst.”
Trump has explained the steel and aluminum tariffs by saying imported metals threatened the United States’ national security – a justification that countries rarely use because it can be so easily abused. He is also threatening to impose another national security-based tariff on imported cars, trucks and auto parts. That threat could be a negotiating ploy to restart talks on the North American Free Trade Agreement (Nafta).
Freeland said there are no grounds for further US tariffs in response to Canada’s actions.
Canadians are particularly worried about auto tariffs because the industry is critical to Canada’s economy. Freeland said such tariffs would be “absurd” because the North American auto industry is highly integrated and parts made in Canada often go into cars manufactured in the US and then sold back to Canadians. “Any trade action is disruptive on both sides of the border,” Freeland said.
Freeland said an “intensive phase” of Nafta renegotiations will resume quickly after Sunday’s elections in Mexico.
“I don’t think we’ll see any reaction from the Trump administration. They are prepared for this,” said Dan Ujczo, a trade lawyer in Columbus, Ohio. “Candidly, the Canadian retaliation is a drop in the bucket compared to the retaliation that we’re going to see from China and elsewhere.”
Ujczo doubts Trump will announce auto tariffs because that would be a “red line for the US Congress” before the midterm elections. He said the hearings for possible auto tariffs are in late July.
“I don’t think Congress right now is expected to get engaged until after the midterm election. They’ve given the president a long leash and will continue to do so. The auto tariffs would disrupt that. It would change the calculus,” he said.
The Canadian government also announced $1.5bn in subsidies for Canada’s steel and aluminum industries.