By reaching majority
government — 76 seats out of 150 — the
Coalition will not have to rely on independent MPs to pass controversial
legislation.
It was a foregone conclusion, everyone said so.All the polls and the bookies said Labor was
going to win the election and we believed them.
That’s why it was a total shock to learn the following day that they
were all wrong.
Labor was so confident of winning, they partied on the eve of
the election and Chris Bowen - who would have been treasurer if
the ALP won - even posted a photo of key party figures as if they were already
in government.
'We're ready,' Mr.
Bowen captioned an image of himself with Mr Shorten and key advisers Tanya
Plibersek, Penny Wong, and Jim Chalmers.
So what happened? Some say it was Bowen’s franking credits
that did them in, others think Labor’s push for renewable energy turned people
off but there are many other theories and of course nobody really has a clue.
But for me, it was seeing the same old faces of
the Rudd/Gillard government, reminding me of the incompetent mess they made when
last in power.
A new face is needed and Jim Chalmers could be just the man to give the opposition a new look. He's served as Shadow Finance Minister since 2016 and unlike Mr Albanese, he's from the party's right faction.
Both men agree that Labor needs to reconsider its policy platform to restore trust with voters, including the contentious franking credits policy.
In February last year,
Samoa's Prime Minister Tuilaepa Sailele was photographed alongside Warren
Meyer, the "humanitarian ambassador" for a group called Applied
Scholastics.
Key points:
·An investigation
revealed that Scientology material is being taught in six Samoan schools
·Experts warn
Scientology is covertly pushing its ideology in schools across the world
·It uses affiliate
groups like Applied Scholastics and ABLE to obscure its involvement
·There are two schools
here in Australia that use the works of Applied Scholastics
The two were holding a
textbook titled Learning How To Learn — one of 10,000 copies gifted to the
small Pacific island nation.
But the friendly
photograph belies a more bizarre and complex reality.
The much-needed
educational resources for the children of Samoa were in fact books containing
the teachings of L Ron Hubbard, the founder of the controversial Church of
Scientology.
Applied Scholastics
has also told the ABC that more than a dozen Samoan educators have travelled to
the group's headquarters in Missouri for training.
The deeply Christian
island nation of Samoa may seem an unlikely destination for Scientology to
promote its teachings, but it's just one of many far-off corners of the globe
Applied Scholastics is seeking to expand to.
But according to
critics, Applied Scholastics is somewhat of a Trojan horse for religious
indoctrination, and is being covertly rolled out across the globe.
David Touretzky is an
academic and researcher at Carnegie Mellon University who has spent years
uncovering and criticising the workings of the Church of Scientology and its
partner organisations.
"One of the
reasons it's objectionable is that it's covert religious instruction, it's
teaching people Scientology," he told the ABC.
But the organisation
is also believed to be exaggerating its reach and the success of its
operations, a marketing ploy experts say is aimed at shoring up donations back
in the United States.
Study Tech a form of 'covert religious
instruction'
Applied Scholastics
was established in 1972 by Church of Scientology members, and is one of many
umbrella organisations that obscure or outright deny their links to the Church
of Scientology.
The company claims to
be a non-aligned and secular group "dedicated to the broad implementation
of learning tools researched and developed by American author and educator L
Ron Hubbard".
"What they don't
say is that [Hubbard] was a sociopath and a cult leader," Dr Touretzky
said.
Applied Scholastics
uses a teaching method known as Study Tech — an idea formed by Hubbard — which
he described as "[Scientology's] primary bridge to society".
On its websites,
Applied Scholastics provides several "research reports" published by
the organisation itself while highlighting a number of anonymous testimonials.
"Study Tech is
not a gimmicky 'quick-study method' but an exact technology that anyone can use
to learn a subject or to acquire a new skill," reads an explanation on
Scientology's website.
"Your ability to
learn depends on a willingness to learn. The biggest single block to learning
is your decision that you already know all about it," a sample of Study Tech's work reads.
According to Dr
Touretzky, Study Tech is not supported by any legitimate scientists or
educators.
"You can't find
any school of education or psychology department in the world that supports
these ideas — the only place where these concepts are taught are in the
religious scripture of the Church of Scientology," he said.
"It's harmful,
it's bad educational theory and it's covert religious instruction."
'Not part of the Church of Scientology':
Applied Scholastics
Applied Scholastics
has consistently rejected allegations that it takes directions from the Church
of Scientology, and a spokesperson told the ABC it was an independent
organisation that is "not part of the Church of Scientology or any other
religious organisation".
However, the
spokesperson did say the Church of Scientology's "parishioners are some of
the biggest supporters of Applied Scholastics activities" and that
donations funded its headquarters in St Louis, Missouri.
According to its
website which the spokesperson referred the ABC to for more information,
Applied Scholastics is run by the Association for Better Living and Education
(ABLE), another group created and managed by the Church.
ABLE oversees and
manages a handful of programs — Applied Scholastics, Narconon, Criminon and The
Way To Happiness — and says that its "mission is to rid the world of its
most devastating social ills — illiteracy, drugs, crime and immorality —
through the social betterment methods and principles of author and humanitarian
L Ron Hubbard."
Tony Ortega, a
prominent Scientology critic and author, said ABLE's organisations act as
surrogates for Scientology's ideology, and are also staffed by members of Sea
Org, the religious arm of the Church of Scientology.
"ABLE is the key
— Applied Scholastics cannot do anything without ABLE's approval," Mr
Ortega said, adding that the Church has used umbrella groups for decades in a
bid to obfuscate its activities.
"These groups are
not affiliated with Scientology, they are Scientology."
In Australia, there
are at least two schools using the work of Applied Scholastics: Yarralinda
Primary School, an early learning centre in Melbourne, and the Athena School in
Sydney.
Both have only a handful of students, and do not present
themselves as being associated with the Church of Scientology while maintaining
that they are non-aligned, secular institutions.
A former Yarralinda
Primary School board member alleged in 2011 that the school had taken out a
mortgage of $1 million dollars to help fund a new Church of Scientology
headquarters, and was using government funding to service the debt.
In a statement,
Yarralinda Primary School principal Christel Duffy told the ABC "Yarralinda
was not owned, operated or run by any religious body or entity".
'Scientology never tells the truth about
itself'
Applied Scholastics
claims on its website to have "760 affiliates" as well as
"100,000 educators and 28 million students" worldwide.
Those numbers would
indicate the group has substantial reach and influence, but not everyone agrees
that the figures stack up.
"Scientology
never tells the truth about itself, including its facts and figures about its
reach around the world," Mr Ortega said.
"I've spoken to
people who used to create those numbers, they say they just pull them out of
thin air."
Asked for evidence of
its claims, Applied Scholastics reiterated the figures on its website, but did
not provide the ABC with any proof of their veracity or details of the
material's educational successes and instead referred the ABC to a page that
could not be found on its website.
"Applied Scholastics
has been delivering services for more than four decades with the end result of
millions of students and tens of thousands of teachers helped with our
educational tools," it maintained.
The fact that
organisations like Applied Scholastics claim generalised but huge success in
far-off lands makes it difficult to establish exactly if or how they might be
genuinely expanding the reach of Scientology's influence and ideas.
"They always pick
these remote locations where it's hard to fact check — they haven't managed to
train every teacher in Missouri, but they've got every teacher in Gambia,"
Dr Touretzky said.
He said organisations
with apparent links to the Church had plenty of reasons to exaggerate their
success.
"It's all just a
show for wealthy donors … they give incredible amounts of money, it's just
insane," he said.
"It's all being
photographed and recorded so at the next big event [they can] show these donors
their success … whether or not they gain new members, that's less important
than having something to show."
But according to Mr
Ortega, years of abuse revelations and some high profile defections have
dwindled the Church's membership significantly.
"Scientology is
dying … in 1990 they had about 100,000 active members, they've never had the
million that they claimed," he said.
"The two most
recent defectors who had access to the numbers say it's probably around 20,000
active members."
As for Samoa, Scientology may have gained a foothold and
the PR it needs to maintain a sense of ubiquity, but in an overwhelmingly
Christian country, observers say it's unlikely to get much more than that.
The Church of
Scientology has been contacted for comment but did not reply at the time of
writing.
