COME CLEAN ON CRIMINAL TEACHERS

WHEN appointed the state's top educator in April last year, new
Director-General Michael Coutts-Trotter was only too happy to reveal
he was screened for his suitability to work with children due to a
criminal conviction for a serious drugs offence.

As Mr Coutts-Trotter told The Daily Telegraph at the time, it was
"utterly legitimate in the public interest" for questions to be asked
about his criminal background.

Sadly, the same level of public accountability does not apply to 128
new classroom teachers with criminal records who have been hired for
government schools.

The public - in particular parents of the children in these schools -
have every right to know the backgrounds of these teachers entrusted
with the care of young students.

In six months between November 2006 and May last year 263 applicant
teachers in NSW were found during screening checks to have criminal
pasts - and almost half of them were given a job.

But under an agreement with the criminal history checking agency
CrimTrac, all teachers' police files are destroyed by the department
after 180 days.

The reasons advanced for this extraordinary secrecy - protection of
teachers' privacy and fears that publicising details could prejudice
the flow of personal information to departmental chiefs - just do not wash.

We are being asked to take the screening process on trust but it
carries zero transparency for those most affected - students and parents.

If it is good enough for the Director-General to publicly air his
criminal past, then the same rules should apply to classroom teachers.

It is time to come clean.

Watchdog blind

POLITICAL rumblings in Venezuela. Cyclones off Mexico. A pipeline
explosion in Nigeria. A cold snap in the US.

The oil companies are never short of an excuse for when the price of
petrol shoots up.

There is always an explanation - and it's always something beyond
their control.

Petrol was nearly $1.50 in most parts of Sydney yesterday - higher in
regional and rural NSW.

Yet only 24 hours earlier it was below $1.40 in metropolitan areas.

That's a rise of 10c or more in a day.

It's the one thing for which the oil companies never have an explanation.

They would have us believe that that they are merely passive
beneficiaries of costlier crude.

Rubbish.

One need only look at the Australian website of Shell, whose parent
company makes close to $100 million profit a day.

The margin on a litre of petrol yesterday was 16.1c, compared with an
average of 10.5c over the past four weeks.

If that is not price gouging, then what is?

Australia is the only country in the world where petrol prices shoot
up uniformly in the middle of the week.

Yet our watchdog, the ACCC, can find no evidence of collusion at the
end of a six-month investigation.

You wouldn't want that watchdog guarding your house, would you?

And another thing . . .

THREE cheers for Diff the bull mastiff, who was plucked from a rocky
ledge last night after spending two lonely days in the bush.

The 65kg beast was reunited with his master after rescuers saved the
humans but left their canine friend behind.

The decision drew howls of outrage from animal lovers across the
country, but it's all turned out for the best.

Needless to say it will be some time before Diff (what kind of name
is that anyway?) will list bushwalking among his leisurely pursuits.