Fire Sales in NSW

Selling Off OUR KIDS Assets

Can anyone explain why the NSW government is hell-bent on selling all of our assets such as stock routes, crown land and the state lotteries? These are but a few of our publicly owned or controlled assets being actively sold off by government.

How can selling such assets be a solution? These have been accumulated over hundreds of years for future generations and should not be made available for sale. Short of nationalising assets, they can't be recovered once they have been sold. Where is the outcry and outrage?

Why is there such a need for funds that such "fire sales" are thought to be warranted? Are the policians in fear of losing their over generous benefits and perks? The drive to quit these assets resembles a stampede.

We have observed these actions for some time and can't believe it is continuing. Now the lotteries are going to be put up for sale. The result will affect hundreds of small businesses that use them as a pillar of their structure. When they eventually end up in the hands of giant corporations like Woolworths, it is likely that small business will get excluded. Another step towards a huge retail monopoly created by governments.

Maxine and Peter

Rare Event

Double Lottery Luck

In $2 jackpot lottery 9246 both 1st and 2nd prize were sold at Narellan Newsagency. Even though the lucky ticket numbers were about 65,000 tickets apart, they were the first two numbers out of "the barrell" in this lottery.

These days the lotteries are drawn by random number selection on a computer but it must be really unusual for the top prizes to come from sales at one Newsagency! We wonder if it has ever happened before in the history of the NSW Lotteries.

Maxine and Peter

Bunny Winners

Our Store Easter Winners

Our store is decked in row upon row of wonderful easter bunny colouring entries. Obviously many children had great fun completing their entries. Some took so much care and presented a very high standard of work. Our judges had great difficulty selecting the final store winners.

The infants and primary winners have each won a giant cuddly easter bunny. Their entries have been sent to Sydney for further judging at state level where they can win a parcel of Texta products valued at $200 and an even bigger parcel of Texta products for their schools.

Our infants winner is Ella-Bleu Ford from Tamworth South Public School.

Our primary winner is Beccy Davies from St Edward's Primary School.

Thankyou to all the children who spent time completing their entries. Congratulation to everyone. Call in to see the wonderful collection of hundreds of entries on display until the end of the school holidays. Children can collect their entries from us after this time. The display is well worth checking out in our Hillvue Road store.

Maxine and Peter

Close Secret

Easter Publishing

It seems that the newspaper publishers want to keep their Easter arrangements close secrets until the last moment and then expect everyone to adjust their lives based on this late information. We try to organise at least a month ahead to give our staff a chance to arrange their personal lives with minimum upsets.

At first the Leader informed us that they were to publish for the first time ever on Good Friday. Then they decided that they would not and return to their normal publishing schedule.

The Telegraph published last year on Good Friday but only recently revealed that this year they would only supply the metropolitan area and as far north as Newcastle. This will also apply to the Australian. Naturally, all our customer accounts will be adjusted to accommodate these late alterations.

The Herald continues to publish a version of the papers on Good Friday. The form guide will be inserted in the Thursday edition (normally an extra on Fridays) but the Newcastle Herald will not have it inserted. The Friday Herald will be $2.40 and have the Saturday extra. On Saturday there will be a new news wraparound but the same extra. The Financial Review will not be published again until Tuesday after the Thursday edition.

If you are confused, imagine how we feel. Each year we are kept guessing until the last minute and then get pressured to provide supply figures in short time because the admin staff of the papers are having time off for Easter!

Maxine and Peter