bluuebunny/crossref_metadata_2025 huggingface dataset:
Labour Force Participation, Social Inclusion and the Fair Work Act: Current and Carbon‐Constrained Contexts
Authors: Masterman‐Smith Helen
Published: December 2016

The notion that employment is a precondition for personal wellbeing and social inclusion is almost sacrosanct in Australian culture. Yet, the working and living conditions of Australia's low paid workers tells a different story. While labour market participation is a cornerstone of the Federal Government's Social Inclusion Agenda, it is recognized that low pay and poor job quality often derail this key objective. Indeed, the difficulty of ‘making work pay’ at the bottom end of the labour market is a social inclusion challenge that has yet to receive the policy or public attention that it warrants. This article considers what the Fair Work Act means for the social inclusion of disadvantaged workers, in the context of wider‐ranging strategies to address low pay. It concludes with some considerations of the challenges that a carbon‐constrained economy is likely to present for labour force participation as a remedy for social exclusion.
(Im)mobility: regional population structures in Aboriginal Australia
Authors: Morphy Frances
Published: December 2016

The socio‐cultural factors underlying contemporary Aboriginal settlement and mobility patterns are invisible to the categorisations that underpin both demographic modelling and policy that relies on that modelling. Taking the Yolngu people of north east Arnhem Land as a case study, this paper elaborates an anchored network model consisting of three tiers—an ontologically prior ancestral geography, with its associated contemporary settlements, to which kin‐based networks are anchored by nodal individuals. While the content of each tier may vary across the continent, this model can potentially be applied wherever Aboriginal Australians continue to live in kin‐based social universes. It is argued that constructing a ‘recognition space’ between conventional demographic categories and Aboriginal categorisations of their socio‐spatial universes would lead to more informed policy‐making on the part of government. Such policies would take account of the aspirations of Aboriginal people rather than imposing upon them the state's aspirations for them.
Missed opportunity: The NTER and sustainable development outcomes for Aboriginal people in the Northern Territory
Authors: Hunt Janet
Published: December 2016

This article questions why the Labor Government has failed to fundamentally change the Northern Territory Emergency Response (NTER) which it inherited from the Howard government, in the face of evidence which suggests that it is a development intervention unlikely to bring about sustained change. There are two major problems which this article highlights: the coercive and denigrating approach of the NTER, and its failure to address the need for Indigenous governance to drive lasting Indigenous development. Drawing on global research about the reduction of poverty and evidence about the social and economic development of native nations in other settler states, the article suggests that the NTER has been a missed opportunity for Indigenous development. Better policies would have been to address the barriers which Indigenous people identify as blocking their initiatives for development, and to support the essential work of building effective and legitimate community governance to drive development.
Brace yourselves: Reporting of rising food costs in the Australian print media
Authors: Henderson Julie , Foley Wendy
Published: December 2016

This paper explores media reporting of the rising food costs in five Australian newspapers in the 12 month period from 1st September 2007 to 31st August 2008. This period encompassed a Federal election in which rising food costs were identified as an election issue and a national inquiry into grocery pricing established to honour pre‐election promises. Content analysis of newspaper articles demonstrates an increasing interest in the print media in food prices at this time, with thematic analysis revealing the dominance of political concerns and the economic fears of the Australian public. This paper explores these issues. It compares the rhetoric and reality of rising food costs through reporting of the causes and impact of increased food prices and explores the apportioning of blame for rising food prices and the solutions which arise from this through media reporting of political and personal strategies for managing the risk of food insecurity. The paper will also identify the social processes that contributed to the newsworthiness of rising food costs at this time.
Willingness to Pay for Rehabilitation Versus Punishment to Reduce Adult and Juvenile Crime
Authors: Jones Craig G.A. , Weatherburn Don J.
Published: December 2016

Punitive penal policies are often justified on the assumption that members of the public demand punitive responses to crime. The current study employed a contingent valuation survey design to assess the extent to which this is true in the state of New South Wales, Australia. The survey investigated public willingness to pursue crime control policies that rehabilitate offenders versus those that punish. Using a quota‐based telephone survey, 1885 taxpaying residents in the state of New South Wales, Australia, were asked how much additional tax they would be willing to pay to produce a 10 per cent reduction in serious crime. A 2times2 randomised factorial design was employed, with one factor being the means offered to reduce crime (rehabilitation versus imprisonment) and the other factor being the population under study (adults versus juveniles). There were no significant differences in willingness to pay for crime reduction across any of the four resulting groups. The findings suggest that the NSW public are equally disposed to reducing crime by rehabilitating offenders as they are to imprisoning them for longer. There would therefore seem every reason to pursue rehabilitation with greater vigour, especially in light of the relative cost‐effectiveness of rehabilitation programs over incarceration.
Are the Homeless Mentally Ill?
Authors: Johnson Guy , Chamberlain Chris
Published: December 2016

In Australia, it is widely believed that most homeless people have mental health issues and that mental illness is a primary cause of homelessness. This paper uses information from a study of 4,291 homeless people in Melbourne to investigate these propositions. The research found that 15 per cent of the homeless had mental health issues prior to becoming homeless. This challenges the community perception that mental illness is the primary cause of homelessness. The research also found that 16 per cent of the sample developed mental health issues after becoming homeless. Homelessness causes mental health issues for some people, particularly anxiety and depression. The claim that most homeless people are mentally ill sends the wrong message to policy makers about the services that are needed to assist homeless people.
Prisoners of Love? Job Satisfaction in Care Work
Authors: Chesters Jenny , Baxter Janeen
Published: December 2016

Previous research has established that paid care work is typically undertaken by women and that this work is often poorly rewarded in terms of pay and promotion opportunities. Much less is known about the reasons why women enter these jobs or their experiences of this work. This paper examines the motivations and experiences of two groups of care workers: childcare workers and dental assistants in Queensland in 2009 (N=1,767). We examine intrinsic, extrinsic and overall job satisfaction and the effects of job characteristics, work experience and demographic characteristics on job satisfaction. We find that childcare workers are less satisfied with their jobs than dental assistants on all three measures, despite a greater proportion nominating intrinsic reasons for entering the occupation. The most important factors predicting job satisfaction for both groups are day‐to‐day work experiences such as control over weekly rosters and entitlements that enable work‐family balance. We conclude that although love of the job may be a strong drawcard into care occupations for some women, experiences may not live up to expectations. Moreover, there is considerable diversity across these groups in motivations and outcomes indicating that it is impossible to view all care occupations as similar in terms rewards, outcomes and experiences.
‘Pushing buttons‘: an evaluation of the effect of Aboriginal income management on commercial gambling expenditure
Authors: Lamb David , Young Martin
Published: December 2016

The Northern Territory National Emergency Response Act 2007 was a radical intervention into the lives of Aboriginal residents of the Northern Territory, Australia. One of the intervention's key measures was income management – a scheme designed to limit the range of goods and services that may be purchased with social security payments. The aim of income management was to curb 'anti‐social behaviours' such as excessive gambling and alcohol consumption. In this paper, we specifically test the efficacy of income management in reducing the amount spent on commercial gambling. To achieve this we conduct an interrupted time series analysis with deflated monthly electronic gaming machine (EGM) expenditure data from July 2002 to July 2010 for hotels and clubs in the towns of Alice Springs and Katherine. We find a negative association between income management and EGM revenues for only one gambling venue in each town. However, local complexity in the form of segregated markets along temporal, spatial and racial lines, along with other policy confounders, may obscure the effects of the macro‐policy intervention. We conclude by making suggestions for locally‐based responses to problematic forms of risky consumption that may be more sensitive to local geographies.
Naming and claiming workplace sexual harassment in Australia
Authors: Charlesworth Sara , McDonald Paula , Cerise Somali
Published: December 2016

The persistence of sexual harassment in the workplace and the fact such behaviour remains significantly unreported suggest that legal definitions of sexual harassment may not be well understood. In this paper we explore the naming and claiming of sexual harassment in Australian workplaces, drawing on a unique dataset from a national sexual harassment prevalence survey. We compare a group of individuals who stated they had been sexually harassed according to a legal definition with a group who denied having experienced sexual harassment according to this definition but who went on to report sexually harassing behaviours. The study offers important insights into how workplace sexual harassment comes to be defined and understood in the Australian community, as well as some possible explanations for persistently low rates of formal complaints.
Social security law: what does the politics of ‘conditional welfare’ mean for review and client representation?
Authors: Carney Terry
Published: December 2016

This paper reflects on aspects of the meaning of new social security as ‘conditional welfare’ (such as welfare quarantining) and its implications for client rights, advocacy and public policy accountability. The paper considers the rising reliance on conditional welfare and related measures such as ‘linked‘, localised or place‐based welfare, and the increasing complexity of welfare discretions. The paper essentially makes the argument that it is past time to begin to debate the pros and cons for Australia of conditional welfare as it impacts on administrative law and new forms of welfare advocacy.
The social impact of the global financial crisis in Australia
Authors: Saunders Peter , Wong Melissa
Published: December 2016

The Australian economy has weathered the storm that followed the global financial crisis (GFC) better than most other OECD countries. The reasons for this are complex, although the fiscal stimulus measures introduced by the federal government in 2008 and 2009 boosted domestic consumption and investment and helped to sustain economic growth. However, even with these measures, concerns have been raised over the social impact of the financial crisis, with a number of studies suggesting that those with lowest incomes and/or reliant on welfare services for support were most adversely affected. This paper presents new estimates of the social impact of the GFC using data from two national surveys, conducted in 2006 and 2010 – before and after the crisis hit Australia. The impact is assessed using a range of different approaches, including people's own perceptions of the impact, changes in their subjective wellbeing, reported changes in financial stress and changes in deprivation and economic exclusion. The results suggest that the social impact of the crisis has been small, although some evidence suggests that those already facing the most severe levels of social disadvantage were most adversely affected. In this sense, the GFC may have led to greater inequality in living standards, at least in some dimensions.
Reinforcing substantive religious inequality: a critical analysis of submissions to the Review of Freedom of Religion and Belief in Australia Inquiry
Authors: Nelson Jacqueline K. , Possamai‐Inesedy Alphia , Dunn Kevin M.
Published: December 2016

The parties contributing to the Freedom of Religion and Belief in Australia Inquiry had a strong interest in the role of religion in society. Those making submissions were parochial about the status and importance of their own faith, less positive about religious diversity, more likely to be culturally supremacist, and more likely to independently express anti‐Islamic sentiment than the general population. A large proportion of submissions (40 per cent) included the religio‐centric assertion that Australia is a Christian nation. Alternative voices – that Australia is a multi‐faith country or those that saw Australia as secular – were much less ‘present’ in the submissions. Most submissions argued for the retention of religious exemptions from anti‐discrimination laws and against anti‐religious‐vilification legislation that would protect religious minorities. Christian‐centric voices purposefully undermined movement towards more inclusive social policy and protection of rights. The Christian majority insisted that their position of dominance be affirmed in Australia. The failure of the inquiry to advocate for policy and legislative change to expand religious freedoms (especially to minorities) was a performance of professed ‘state neutrality’ that reproduced substantive inequality. The public submission process was an effective mechanism for reinforcing a privileged relation between the state and Christian organisations, and fails the tests of both fairness and more substantively equality.
The influence of faith‐based organisations on Australian social policy
Authors: Howe Brian , Howe Renate
Published: December 2016

This historical overview explores the crucial and changing relationships between faith‐based organisations and governments, not only in the implementation of social services but also in the formation of social policy. Historically Australian governments have left large areas of social provision to the non‐government sector. For example, income support for the unemployed was not taken up by governments until World War II and income support for sole parents remained largely a responsibility for non‐government organisations (NGOs) until the 1970s. Prior to governments taking responsibility for income support, most of these NGOs were religious organisations surviving on donations, philanthropic support and limited government funding. It is argued that the dominant, semi‐public role of religious organisations in service delivery and social policy formation is an important but largely overlooked aspect of the Australian historical experience.
Just deserts? ‘Privatisation’ and the history of deservingness in Australia's retirement incomes system
Authors: Hamilton Myra
Published: December 2016

Over the last few decades, changes in Australia's retirement incomes policy, including the introduction of compulsory superannuation, have seen governments encourage individuals to provide for their own old age from private means. This process has been described as ‘privatisation’ of retirement incomes. However, beyond the ‘privatisation’ thesis, there has been little critical examination of what these changes have meant for the nature and relative importance of the different principles underpinning Australia's retirement incomes system. This paper aims to provide such an examination. Drawing on the principles of deservingness and need, the paper provides an historical analysis of the development of Australia's retirement incomes system, tracing how these two principles underpinned the first age pension and subsequently contributed to the emergence of compulsory superannuation. This approach provides a deeper understanding of how contemporary policy changes have altered the structure of Australia's retirement incomes system, arguing that there are important historical continuities as well as changes. It argues that the phrase ‘state‐supported private saving’, rather than ‘privatisation’, captures the nature of this contemporary reform process.
Public housing and the politics of stigma
Authors: Jacobs Keith , Flanagan Kathleen
Published: December 2016

This paper considers the problem of stigmatisation towards tenants residing in public housing. It draws on the findings of a research panel investigation set up to explore the opportunities available for activists and campaigners to address stigma and engender a more positive understanding of public housing and its contribution to ameliorating economic disadvantages. The deliberations of the panel highlighted that, even within a forum sympathetic to the goal of addressing stigma, many conceptual, strategic and practical differences arise and need to be worked through. The paper reviews these challenges through a discussion of recent academic literature and a commentary on the contributions made by participants in the panel discussions. It concludes with the argument that the problem of stigma needs to be contextualised in a wider political setting that takes account of the contested aspects of the policy process and the role that powerful interest groupings have in agenda‐setting, alongside material factors such as poverty. The stigmatisation of public housing tenants is best understood as a symptom of systemic forms of inequality and asymmetrical power relationships. These difficulties also apply to campaigns to tackle the problem. Supporting forums that allow these power relationships to be interrogated is the first step towards change.
Domestic violence, housing and employment: Workers' perspectives on employment assistance in supported accommodation
Authors: McLaren Helen
Published: December 2016

In response to contemporary understanding about the association between financial security and women's ability to escape domestic violence and homelessness, this paper reports on a small scale pilot study conducted with workers from generalist homelessness services and domestic violence‐supported accommodation services in South Australia on responding to women's requests for assistance to seek employment. Workers from both accommodation service types advised that approximately one third of women at their services asked for employment‐related assistance at the point of service intake or soon after. Although relatively few women received employment support following their requests, assistance was four times more likely at the generalist homelessness services than the domestic violence services. Agency priorities, philosophies and workers' assessments of women's capacity to engage in employment were cited as reasons for not responding to women's employment requests. Women who secured employment prior to service exit, whether helped to do so or not, were perceived as more confident with the prospect of supporting their families independently following exit and more able to secure suitable housing when compared to other women. Follow‐up and outreach visits indicated that women who worked had a stronger sense of financial security, housing stability and social connectedness, but that maintaining employment following service exit was difficult.
Refugees and asylum seekers living in the Australian community: the importance of work rights and employment support
Authors: Fleay Caroline , Hartley Lisa , Kenny Mary Anne
Published: December 2016

While Australian legislation allows for the mandatory detention of asylum seekers arriving without a valid visa, in recent years the Australian Government has released thousands from immigration detention prior to their protection claims being finalised. This article outlines the results of interviews with eleven men who had been released into such community‐based arrangements after long periods of immigration detention. The major challenge for most of the men who had been granted the right to work upon their release was securing employment, while being denied the right to work was the major challenge for those released without this right. This article explores the social and personal benefits that employment can offer asylum seekers and refugees and the implications it has for integration into their host country.
Place‐defending and the denial of racism
Authors: Nelson Jacqueline
Published: December 2016

This paper introduces the concept of place‐defending and articulates its implications for locality‐based social policy. Place‐defending is the protection of one's local area from unfavourable assessments, in this case of being labelled or perceived as a racist space. Place attachment and identifications with place are drivers of place‐defending. Person‐place relationships and their implications for locality‐based social policies have not yet received sufficient consideration in the literature—a significant oversight considering the current policy focus in Australia and the United Kingdom on locality‐based social policy. In this study of local anti‐racism in the Australian context, place‐defending involved the denial of racism and performances of place that reproduced the discourse of tolerance. Print media coverage of the release of national data on racism was analysed alongside a series of interviews with individuals working on anti‐racism at both local and state/federal levels. Four tools of place‐defending are discussed: direct action to defend place; spatial deflections; use of minority group members to discredit claims of racism; and critiques of those who make claims about racism. The tools of place‐defending operated to construct localities as places of tolerance, potentially undermining the case for anti‐racism.
Equipping child protection practitioners to intervene to protect children from cumulative harm: legislation and policy in Victoria, Australia
Authors: Broadley Karen
Published: December 2016

Many children are repeatedly reported to statutory child protection services, but do not receive the protection they need. Many such children are suffering chronic maltreatment, which is likely to result in cumulative harm. Chronic maltreatment encompasses emotional abuse and chronic neglect. As a result, children can experience a range of cognitive, emotional, and behavioural problems that are more serious than those associated with other abuse types.

This paper focuses on the Victorian statutory child protection system, and considers why cumulative harm is not receiving the attention the legislation intends. Under the Victorian legislation cumulative harm must be proven on grounds of emotional abuse and/or neglect. However, it is difficult for child protection practitioners to place before the court the necessary evidence to establish these grounds.

The paper concludes that the legal definitions of emotional abuse and neglect should not require evidence of a link between the abusive actions of the parent and the poor outcomes for the child. The evidentiary focus should be on the actions of the parent. Furthermore, legislation should focus on abusive parental behaviours that are likely to result in cumulative harm, which are more concrete and measureable than emotional abuse and neglect, such as intimate partner violence and parental illicit drug use.
Evidence for the use of an algorithm in resolving inconsistent and missing Indigenous status in administrative data collections
Authors: Christensen Daniel , Davis Geoff , Draper Glenn , Mitrou Francis , McKeown Sybille , Lawrence David , McAullay Daniel , Pearson Glenn , Rikkers Wavne , Zubrick Stephen R.
Published: December 2016

Measures of the gap in living standards, life expectancy, education, health and employment between Indigenous and non‐Indigenous Australians are primarily derived from administrative data sources. However, Indigenous identification in these data sources is affected by administrative practices, missing data, inconsistency, and error. As these factors have changed over time, assessing whether the gap between Indigenous and non‐Indigenous Australians has changed over time, based on data unadjusted for these sources of error can potentially lead to misguided conclusions. Combining administrative data on the same individuals collected from different sources provides a method by which a more consistent derived Indigenous status can be applied across all records for an individual within a linked data environment. We used the Western Australian Data Linkage system to produce derived Indigenous statuses for individuals using a range of algorithms. We found that these algorithms reduced the amount of missing data and improved within‐individual consistency. Based on these findings, we recommend our Multi‐Stage Median algorithm be used as the standard indicator of Indigenous status for any reporting based on administrative datasets when multiple datasets are available for linkage, and that algorithmic approaches also be considered for improving the quality of other demographic variables from administrative data sources.
Grandparents raising grandchildren: impacts of lifecourse stage on the experiences and costs of care
Authors: Purcal Christiane , Brennan Deborah , Cass Bettina , Jenkins Bridget
Published: December 2016

Grandparents who have primary responsibility for raising their grandchildren are increasingly on research and social policy agendas in Australia and elsewhere. Little is known, however, about the diversity in circumstances and experiences among grandparents in these caring relationships, and assumptions about the homogeneity of grandparents are often embedded in policy prescriptions and academic discourse. This paper explores the experiences and circumstances of grandparent carers at different ages and lifecourse stages, focusing on income, employment, housing, health, and social relationships. The analysis also considers the gendered nature of grandparent care, which is predominantly carried out by women. Findings are derived from an Australia‐wide survey of 335 grandparent carers. The analysis distinguishes between younger (under 55 years), middle‐aged (55–64) and older grandparents (65 and over) in order to explore differences and similarities in the interconnections of age and care. The article contributes to an age‐sensitive theory of care and to considerations of social policies that recognise the costs to grandparents of raising their grandchildren at different ages and lifecourse stages.
Social Work and AJSI
Authors: Alston Margaret
Published: December 2016

AJSI had its genesis in the Department of Social Work at the University of Sydney in 1961. Since that time both social work and the AJSI have developed and drifted apart. This paper charts this journey and points to a future where social work and AJSI will function as partners in critiquing social policy and social issues.
A reverse form of welfarism: some reflections on Australian housing policy
Authors: Jacobs Keith
Published: December 2016

In this paper I argue that we have been amiss in diagnosing the role played by government, which has exacerbated the housing problems afflicting low‐income households in Australia. However, I argue further we have placed too much faith in the capacity of managerial interventions to ameliorate what are far more deep‐rooted and systemic challenges. It is suggested that researchers need to adopt a more critical account of the conduct of contemporary government policy making, one that casts aside a view of the State as a benevolent agency whose primary objective is to ameliorate the conditions of the disadvantaged. Instead, the State should be understood as an agency that sustains the conditions necessary for the finance industry, developers and real estate agents, along with well‐off householders and landlords, to reap profits. The political economy of Australian housing, in its current incarnation, performs a form of reverse welfarism that exacerbates social inequality.
Why do tenants leave social housing? Exploring residential and social mobility at the lowest rungs of Australia's socioeconomic ladder
Authors: Wiesel Ilan , Pawson Hal
Published: December 2016

Historically, social housing in Australia operated as a springboard for social mobility. For many working families, public housing tenancy was an opportunity to save for a house purchase deposit. Latterly, tenant exits from public to private housing have declined to very low levels. This has raised concerns about systemic barriers to residential and social mobility for social renters, and about the consequent longer waiting times for applicants in need of social housing. Drawing on administrative data collected by social housing providers in NSW and Victoria, and in‐depth interviews with 95 former and current social housing tenants in both states, this paper examines tenant attitudes, intentions and motivations as regards future house‐moves. We argue that the primary disincentives to exit relate to affordability and security of tenure in private rental, rather than factors related to the social housing system itself.
How many Australians have slept rough?
Authors: Chamberlain Chris , Johnson Guy
Published: December 2016

How many Australians have experienced homelessness during their lifetime and how many people have slept rough? This paper draws on evidence from a random sample of the Australian population to answer these questions (N=1349). First, we explain the methodology for the research. Then we focus on the number of people who have experienced homelessness and the different experiences of men and women. Next, we investigate how many people have slept rough. We conclude that about 2.35 million people have experienced homelessness during their lifetime, and that 59 per cent of them (about 1.4 million people) have slept rough.
Facilitating the professional transition of migrants in Australia: does gender matter?
Authors: O'Dwyer Monica , Colic‐Peisker Val
Published: December 2016

This article explores the provision and effects of a program devised to facilitate the professional transition of skilled migrants from non‐English‐speaking backgrounds (NESB) arriving in Australia on permanent visas. The program (‘Skilled Professional Migrants Program’—SPMP) was delivered by AMES Australia and internally evaluated through a telephone survey of 337 past participants. A report of survey results, primarily gauging short‐term post‐program employment outcomes, presented a very positive picture. In this paper we take a fresh look at the quantitative and qualitative survey data in order to analyse the success of the program from the perspective of gender. The paper focuses on gender differences in professional employment transition post‐program in the context of the structural impact of the gendered labour market. We found a significant difference between NESB men and women in their post‐program labour market incorporation into professional jobs that matched their skills. The gendered structures also influenced the ‘networking effect’ of the professional transition program.
Recent public policy and Australian older workers
Authors: Taylor Philip , Earl Catherine , McLoughlin Christopher
Published: December 2016

This article considers the characteristics and utility of pro‐work policies targeting Australian older workers that have emerged in the context of population ageing, amid concerns that this will lead to labour shortages and an increasing social welfare burden. There has been a recent surge in public policy regarding the ageing workforce, the efficacy of which has not been tested by evaluation studies. After considering the conceptual foundations and objectives of various government initiatives, it is argued that the present public policy approach may have serious flaws that are not only detrimental to the stated overall objective of prolonging working lives, but may, in fact, be harmful to older workers and fail to address the needs of business. This stems from programs reaching only a small proportion of those older people who would potentially benefit from assistance, and from misdirected effort aimed at encouraging behavioural change on the part of employers or industries. It is argued that there is a need for greater targeting of policy efforts on the actual needs of industry and for public policy itself to become more age‐aware.
Shaping attitudes to disability employment with a national disability insurance scheme
Authors: Hemphill Elizabeth , Kulik Carol T.
Published: December 2016

Approximately twenty per cent of the world's population has some form of disability, but workforce participation of people with disability has been intractably low. In an effort to improve the economic and social participation of people with disability, the Australian Government introduced legislation in 2013 designed to provide individualised support and encourage communities and employers to be more receptive to people with disability. The authors surveyed 1,230 workforce members and 715 employer decision‐makers at three points in time (2010, 2012, and 2014) to examine how attitudes to people with disability and employer hiring behaviour are changing in response to the legislation. The evidence demonstrated that both groups are experiencing greater contact with people with disability, reporting more positive interactions with people with disability, and endorsing more reasons for employers hiring people with disability. However, these positive attitudes have not been accompanied by improvements in hiring: there was a decline in decision‐makers' hiring of people with disability from 2012 to 2014.
Mind the gap: the extent of violence against women with disabilities in Australia
Authors: Dowse Leanne , Soldatic Karen , Spangaro Jo , van Toorn Georgia
Published: December 2016

A comprehensive national response to violence against women with disabilities is long overdue in Australia. Work to date suggests that the issue is endemic yet largely invisible. Responses at the national level are hampered by the lack of information regarding violence against women with disabilities due to under‐reporting and inadequate capture of the prevalence of this violence. This article explores approaches to collecting data regarding violence against women with disabilities in Australia and adds to the limited body of knowledge about the prevalence of violence for these women through interrogation of available data. Further analysis of the 2012 Personal Safety Survey data indicates that among women with disabilities aged under 50, 62 per cent have experienced violence since the age of 15, and women with disabilities had experienced three times the rate of sexual violence in the past 12 months compared to those without disabilities. These findings still do not represent the full extent of violence against women with disabilities, since the Personal Safety Survey samples only women who reside in private dwellings and excludes those living in disability care settings. Insight is offered as to what is needed to comprehensively capture the required data and the implications for policy.
Seven years of evaluating income management ‐ what have we learnt? Placing the findings of the New Income Management in the Northern Territory evaluation in context
Authors: Bray J. Rob
Published: December 2016

Income management programs ‐ which restrict how some recipients of government transfers can spend these funds ‐ have operated in Australia since 2007. The nature of the programs implemented varies, especially in regard to the combination of voluntary and compulsory elements, and there are also differences in scope and targeting. A number of evaluations and other studies of these programs have been undertaken. These vary in rigour, methodology, and the set of programs considered. This has led to an apparent diversity of findings, which has been exaggerated by selective use in public debate. The largest and most in depth evaluation has been that of ‘New Income Management’ in the Northern Territory. This found that the program had not achieved its objectives and appears to have created dependence. The relative outcomes of the studies are considered.
Blind‐sided by Basics: three perspectives on income management in an Aboriginal community in the Northern Territory
Authors: Altman Jon
Published: December 2016

Income management was introduced into the Northern Territory in 2007. Despite much rhetoric around evidence based policy making and constant reviewing of income management, there has been little grounded research about Aboriginal responses at the community level to this new institution. In this article I report on the operations of income management from a longer term perspective, working with Kuninjku people and retail outlets in the Maningrida region in Arnhem Land. My argument is that from a local perspective income management is just one of a suite of new measures that have been introduced to alter the norms and values of people to correlate more closely with Australian mainstream norms. This view is based on participant observation rather than direct questioning. Income management is a low priority issue for the Kuninjku people in the current policy maelstrom that seeks to shift policy from ‘self determination’ back to a form of assimilation now heavily influenced by a neoliberal ideological agenda. Local responses vary from indifferent acceptance to resistance. I ponder the crucial policy question, how can we allow substantial financial resources to be squandered in unhelpful income management when they could be deployed productively to enhance wellbeing for Indigenous Australians?
Therapy of primary and metastatic liver cancer by human iPS cell‐derived myeloid cells producing interferon‐β
Authors: Sakisaka Masataka , Haruta Miwa , Komohara Yoshihiro , Umemoto Satoshi , Matsumura Keiko , Ikeda Tokunori , Takeya Motohiro , Inomata Yukihiro , Nishimura Yasuharu , Senju Satoru
Published: December 2016

Background

iPS‐ML are myeloid lineage cells with a proliferative capacity derived from induced pluripotent stem (iPS) cells. This study aimed to examine therapeutic effect of iPS‐ML producing interferon‐β (iPS‐ML/IFN‐β) towards primary and metastatic liver cancer and investigate the mechanism of that effect.

Methods

We established a xenograft model of liver metastasis by injecting the spleen of SCID mice with MKN‐45 human gastric cancer cells and also a primary liver cancer model by injecting SK‐HEP‐1 human hepatocellular carcinoma cells into the liver. After cancer lesions were established, iPS‐ML/IFN‐β was administered by intraperitoneal injection, and therapeutic effect was evaluated.

Results

The i.p. injection of iPS‐ML/IFN‐β resulted in a significant retardation of cancer progression and prolonged mouse survival. The infiltration of i.p. administered iPS‐ML into tumor lesions located below the liver capsule was observed, suggesting tumor‐directed migration and penetration of the liver capsule by iPS‐ML. The IFN‐β concentration in the liver was maintained at levels sufficient to exert an anti‐cancer effect for at least 3 days post‐injection, accounting for the potent therapeutic effect obtained by injection two to three times per week.

Conclusions

This study demonstrates the therapeutic potential of the iPS‐ML/IFN‐β in patients with liver cancer.
Discovery of novel potent nuclear factor kappa‐B inhibitors (IKK‐β) via extensive ligand‐based modeling and virtual screening
Authors: Al‐Sha'er Mahmoud A. , Almazari Inas S. , Taha Mutasem O.
Published: December 2016

Inhibitor kappa‐B kinase‐beta (IKK‐β) controls the activation of nuclear transcription factor kappa‐B and has been linked to inflammation and cancer. Therefore, inhibitors of this kinase should have potent anti‐inflammatory and anticancer properties. Accordingly, we explored the pharmacophoric space of 218 IKK‐β inhibitors to identify high‐quality binding models. Subsequently, genetic algorithm‐based quantitative structure activity relationship (QSAR) analysis was employed to select the best possible combination of pharmacophoric models and physicochemical descriptors that explain bioactivity variation among training compounds. Three successful pharmacophores emerged in 2 optimal QSAR equations (r12175 = 0.733, r12LOO = 0.52, F1 = 65.62, r12PRESS against 43 test inhibitors = 0.63 and r22175 = 0.683, r22LOO = 0.52, F2 = 72.66, r22PRESS against 43 test inhibitors = 0.65). Two pharmacophores were merged in a single binding model. Receiver operating characteristic curve validation proved the excellent qualities of this model. The merged pharmacophore and the associated QSAR equations were applied to screen the National Cancer Institute list of compounds. Ten hits were found to exhibit potent anti‐IKK‐β bioactivity, out of which, one illustrates IC50 of 11.0nM.
Spatiotemporal variability of Hokkaido's seasonal precipitation in recent decades and connection to water vapour flux
Authors: Duan Weili , He Bin , Sahu Netrananda , Luo Pingping , Nover Daniel , Hu Maochuan , Takara Kaoru
Published: December 2016

Based on 169 stations, annual, seasonal and monthly precipitation trends for the northern Japanese island of Hokkaido were analysed for the period 1980–2011 using the Mann–Kendall test and geostatistical interpolation techniques. Possible association with water vapour flux was explored usingERA‐Interim reanalysis data. Precipitation increased in Hokkaido over the study period at both the annual and seasonal scales. In general, the northwest had higher precipitation than the southeast in winter, autumn and on an interannual basis and precipitation tended to be concentrated in the southeast in both spring and summer. There was also more precipitation during warm times of the year. For example, precipitation occurred mainly during the summer, ranging from 233 to 751 mm and autumn, ranging from 218 to 724 mm, while precipitation was significantly less in winter and spring. Most stations with declining precipitation trends were located in areas with higher precipitation, such as the west in winter and autumn and the southeast fringe in summer and scattered across the areas with lower precipitation in spring. Increases in precipitation were mainly seen in February, May, June, July, September, November and December at more than 100 stations. Amongst these, almost all of the stations showed positive trends in May (168 stations) and July (165 stations). Finally, the changes of the water vapour transport and budget in whole‐layers between the period 1980–2011 possibly explained the spatiotemporal distribution of precipitation trends in Hokkaido.
The effect of radiation parameterization schemes on surface temperature in regional climate simulations over the MENA‐CORDEX domain
Authors: Zittis G. , Hadjinicolaou P.
Published: December 2016

We investigated the effect of radiation schemes on the performance of a climate version of the Weather, Research and Forecasting (CLWRF) model over a domain covering the Middle East and North Africa (MENA), so often called the Arab domain. The ability of the model to reproduce recent past climate conditions was tested with 30‐year simulations that cover the 1981–2010 period. The model was driven by the ERA‐Interim reanalyses at a horizontal resolution of 50 km. We explored the sensitivity of the model to the short‐ and long‐wave (LW) radiation parameterizations by testing the RRTMG and CAM3 schemes in order to optimize the model performance as a contribution to the MENA‐CORDEX initiative. The results have been compared with gridded surface observational data and satellite measurements for several variables, including mean, maximum and minimum 2‐m air temperature, total cloud cover and surface short‐ and LW radiation fluxes. The model is found to capture reasonably well the inter‐annual variability and the observed warming trends over the last three decades. Although we generally found that CAM3 driven simulations are relatively cooler than the RRTMG driven ones, each radiation scheme can give better results depending on the season, location and dominant land use type of each of the model's grid point. The largest discrepancies between these hindcast simulations are found over the desert part of the domain while they are found to closely agree over southern Europe.
FT‐Raman and surface‐enhanced Raman scattering (SERS) spectroscopic study of a methyl red@palygorskite hybrid nanocomposite: isomerization and protonation of the guest dye
Authors: Giustetto Roberto , Idone Ambra , Diana Eliano
Published: December 2016

An extremely stable hybrid composite, useable as a pigment in the Cultural Heritage and Materials Science fields, can be obtained by grinding and heating 2 wt% methyl red with palygorskite, a fibrous microporous clay mineral. Dye molecules are incorporated within the clay nanotunnels and/or superficial grooves, partly sheltered from the external environment and forming specific host–guest interactions that stabilize the composite. The molecular structure and surrounding interactions of the encapsulated methyl red molecules were studied by means of Fourier transform (FT) and surface‐enhanced Raman (SER) Spectroscopies – useful techniques to analyze adsorbates even at very low concentrations. Comparison between Fourier transform and SER spectra of the pristine dye and the hybrid composite shows that methyl red exists, after encapsulation in palygorskite, in its neutral (azo) and protonated (hydrazo) forms, both with planar morphology. Incorporation in the host framework favours significant transformation of the guest dye molecule from the azo to the hydrazo species, consistently with the composite synthesis being performed in acidic environment. The incidental addition of plasmonic substrates, used in SER spectra to enhance the Raman signal, further accentuates this conversion. Diffusion in the clay nanotunnels is expected to cause moderate ring deformations/distortions in the methyl red molecule, as reflected by the perturbation of selected Raman modes. The details about the specific orientations and interactions of the dye with the Ag colloid are discussed, as well as their effects on the Raman signal enhancement. Although a feasible quantification of their mutual amounts is impracticable, because of the too many variables involved, presence of several dye species in the host framework, each contributing to the nanocomposite colour, qualifies the studied complex as a polyfunctional organic/inorganic hybrid composite. Copyright © 2016 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.