Contexts in which the word powerless was used in the House of Representatives during the 1970s

• It can be very frightening to feel totally powerless. [More…]

• Local governments virtually are powerless to provide the services which obviously should be provided for the people unfortunate enough to have thrust upon them th: task of rearing families in high rise flats or, for that matter, those passing their declining years in high rise flats. [More…]

• If local government bodies are powerless in these matters, as they arc tending to become, we can expect the public to be apathetic about them. [More…]

• The Australian export industries are powerless at present against the cancerous-like increases in costs which are destroying the economic heart of the once vital major rural industries. [More…]

• An individual employer is powerless to respond. [More…]

• As the Constitution stands at the moment this Parliament is virtually powerless to take any action in respect of companies, unless of course a company is incorporated in the Australian Capital Territory. [More…]

• The company is virtually powerless unless it can get someone to lend it money. [More…]

• If it continued for any length of time, this rate of inflation would be quite unacceptable - not just to the Government with economic responsibility to maintain balanced growth and development, but to large sections of the community who are powerless in the redistribution of income, wages, and assets which is the social vice of inflation. [More…]

• The one sector of the community that is utterly powerless to pass on this cost is the producer for export who must sell overseas with no relationship to his own cost of production but in competition with other sellers of the same products on the same market. [More…]

• The fact that they have accepted what they were powerless to reject is merely evidence of the truth of the old saying that half a loaf is better than none at all. [More…]

• The Commonwealth Film Censorship Board may put a suitable for adults only’ label on a film, but the theatres, the police and the States are powerless to make that restriction operate legally at the moment. [More…]

• Was the public once again made the victim in a needless, costly strike which should not have occurred and which was one of a series of incidents in which the unions have proved powerless to discipline their own members? [More…]

• The new Minister for Health (Senator Greenwood) enters today into negotiations with Australia’s toughest trade union having conceded in advance that its claims are reasonable and that the Government is powerless in any case to resist those claims even if it felt justified in doing so. [More…]

• Those who are powerless enjoy few of the fruits when they are abundant and are denied proportionately more when they are scarce. [More…]

• But how insignificant we feel as individuals when we are confronted with computerised accounts based on the automatic readings of little black boxes, and how powerless we feel we are to challenge the accuracy of those transistorised robots with which we are forced to deal! [More…]

• Not only do we feel powerless, but we are made to feel impotent by the ready assumption of the Post Office bureaucracy that if there are any difficulties about Post Office accounts, the computer must be right. [More…]

• While it is not particularly human for one section to satisfy its vanities at the expense of those who are powerless, it is disgusting that politicians, who by definition are people oriented should permit them to do so. [More…]

• Most of the people were powerless to react against it themselves because they did not see the implications. [More…]

• Citizens are virtually powerless and unprotected against government decisions which lead to their discomfort. [More…]

• In my view the Commissioner will be virtually powerless, under the terms of this Bill, to act in the critical areas of pay rates and conditions of employment. [More…]

• Moreover, having voluntarily relinquished effective control of immigration, a government which implemented Labor’s immigration policies would be largely powerless to redress the situation. [More…]

• It was stated that the original Bill setting up the Australian Wool Commission had no teeth and was powerless to do anything. [More…]

• We find that the authority is powerless; that it is nothing. [More…]

• We cannot tolerate the fact that government is by the Federal Conference of the ALP - not elected, not responsible to the people of Australia - while the elected representatives are powerless against its dictates and must wait on its decisions. [More…]

• With the absence of the strike weapon the worker is powerless. [More…]

• We must never accept the proposition that we must get used to political terrorism, involving bombings, murder, intimidation and that democratic governments are powerless to suppress such activities. [More…]

• It should be eradicated from their minds because it is the very people who are going to be harmed by inflation who are economically powerless. [More…]

• It was the economically powerless who elected this Government to office. [More…]

• It is in such industries that the col lective bargaining power of the employee is important; otherwise he is powerless as an individual. [More…]

• Money, of course, is the major power and there is no doubt that with the power of money vested in the Commonwealth the States will be completely powerless and impotent to exercise any authority whatever. [More…]

• In other words, if employers and employees agree on wage increases, as they have increasingly done in collective bargaining, the Commission is powerless, except by refusing to register or certify such agreements or endorse them as awards. [More…]

• Our friends, the friends on whose support we could have relied in the past, seem now either reluctant or powerless or alienated. [More…]

• But she is powerless to do anything about the situation. [More…]

• Aggression is occuring in South East Asia on a massive scale against South Vietnam and Cambodia, and we still stand powerless. [More…]

• In IS of the 72 cases the Commonwealth was powerless to act under the legislation; in 21 of the 72 cases the takeover proceeded after the order had either been revoked or lapsed; 14 of the 72 were still under review; and 13 of the 72 cases that attracted the interim order were prohibited from takeover outright. [More…]

• Why when people in our community today - a modern bureaucratic society - feel increasingly powerless to make decisions that affect their own lives and when people feel distant from the decision making in society, they would take away decision making in this area is almost beyond belief. [More…]

• If the United Nations is powerless to resolve the dispute over the Paracels, do honourable members think it is in a position to offer security to Australia? [More…]

• When it comes to action the United Nations is not only shown to be powerless but is acknowledged by this Government to be powerless. [More…]

• Will the Minister stand up and say that in the interregnum he was powerless to grant increases in nursing home rates? [More…]

• I must say that the decision of last week to give the ACT an enlarged assembly of 18 elected people with no legislative powers initially merely means that a powerless body of 8 elected members is being replaced by an equally powerless body of 18 elected members. [More…]

• The Senate destroyed that Bill by agreeing to that amendment, because it realised that without the mining code the declaratory Part I of the Seas and Submerged Lands Bill was powerless. [More…]

• However, because of the lack of any direct controls over the fringe banks, the Government was quite powerless to do anything about the hire purchase companies. [More…]

• But under the regulations the Postmaster-General is powerless to waive these charges. [More…]

• One might argue that the poor, being socially and economically powerless, need extra political representation. [More…]

• So the argument which is being belted up by the Prime Minister and by the Minister for the Media that the Board is powerless is an argument which is not merely unattractive; it is an argument which has no substance in it whatsoever. [More…]

• On behalf of the Opposition I will move to amend clause 19 to ensure that there is Commonwealth and State co-operation in such a program and to ensure that the States are not rendered powerless in this area. [More…]

• The Opposition senatorsI certainly do not blame the Leader of the Opposition (Mr Snedden) for their conduct for he is powerless to control them- are not just attacking the Labor Government. [More…]

• He drew attention then to the fact that members of the public had been induced by false rumours to buy shares, that inside trading was rife and that selfregulatory bodies seemed either powerless or unwilling to act to protect the public against this and the many other market abuses that were prevalent at the time. [More…]

• One can see that it is a letter of a conscientious but powerless man pleading for cooperation from the jumpers. [More…]

• An approach was made by the Student Counsellor at the Methodist Ladies College to a Mr Bert Miles, who is concerned with overseas students at the Department of Education, and Mr Miles has stated that he was powerless to help in any way. [More…]

• We have to commit ourselves to all powerless minorities that need our help. [More…]

• In the name of equality is the court to be powerless to consider each case on its merits? [More…]

• If we continue to unify by the back door we will end up with an uncertain legal position and with a tortuous and inefficient administrative chain still involving what will have become a powerless and embittered State organisation. [More…]

• Can honourable members imagine a court of law with litigants standing, maybe pounding, at the door, and a judge and a tipstaff sitting inside the court but powerless to act? [More…]

• It is an enemy that the farmer is almost powerless to fight. [More…]

• He just has to sit back and watch people in every other sector of the community protecting themselves, with varying degrees of success, against inflation- and often making inflation worse in the process- while he is powerless to do anything to protect himself. [More…]

• If I may put it in a homely way, if a seaman should tell the chief petty officer to go to Bourke, and tender further advice to him, the chief petty officer is not left in some powerless, hapless state of mind unable to rectify the blemish of conduct. [More…]

• The police are powerless to do anything about it under the law. [More…]

• The disgraceful situation we have now in respect of the Governor-General of Australia is that every Government in the future will live in fear and trembling about the powers that the Governor-General has at his disposal, knowing that we have a monarch who has said that she is powerless to intervene and do anything about it. [More…]

• I draw attention to the report by the Trade Practices Commission that it is powerless to deal with unions which engage in illegal trading activities. [More…]

• Thus, whether it be in a matter as trivial as the refusal to issue certificates of decrees of divorce, as required by Federal legislation, or as important as the prompt and efficient dispatch of litigation under the Trade Practices Act, the Federal government is powerless to intervene in the administration of State courts. [More…]

• But where there is a report that no urgent action can be taken the Minister is powerless to do anything. [More…]

• One would think that it was not the Government making these accusations because it appears to be powerless now and unable to do anythingunable even to pay this man’s debt. [More…]

• -Such a policy took from those prepared to work, risk and invest and created a new class of dependent drones- of which I see one or two examples here tonight- and a bloated bureaucracy without giving any substantial help to the really poor and powerless. [More…]

• People feel powerless in society. [More…]

• No matter where one looks, in relation to the United States market or other markets, this Government has been powerless to do anything. [More…]

• At present the unemployed are virtually powerless and voiceless. [More…]

• They desperately want to learn how to teach but they are powerless to change the content and structure of their courses. [More…]

• Is the Minister completely powerless in this matter, as Dr Davis and PSI appear to think? [More…]

• So we have this powerless minority whose condition obviously has been contributed to by the inadequacy of education. [More…]

• It is by no means an exhaustive treatment but provides some insight into Labor’s thinking at a time when the Fraser Government seems increasingly bewildered and powerless, and the return of a Labor Government increasingly likely. [More…]

• The Speaker was clearly uncomfortable but powerless. [More…]

• There are many people whose problems do not hit the headlines and who suffer in silence in the face of injustices which they feel powerless to challenge as individuals. [More…]

• Genuine unionists feel powerless to resist the communist machine. [More…]

• Those who favour the withdrawal of the Government from the industry use the argument that the Australian Stevedoring Industry Authority has been powerless to intervene and should be abolished because it is just a useless anachronism. [More…]

• Under the banner of choice, power and freedom, the so-called fundamental belief of the Government, more Australians are denied economic freedom and the right to work and are rendered unproductive and powerless as unemployment is deliberately increased. [More…]

• Conciliation and Arbitration Commission has power to direct resources and the Government through no fault of its own is virtually powerless to stop it. [More…]

• The Labor Party can get away with that only if it creates a situation in which the States become so weak, so mendicant, so powerless and so subservient that they can do nothing about it. [More…]

• The charge was not mentioned but if anyone doubts that Queensland is a police State, they should see the Premier when he comes face to face with powerless people out of the range of the media. [More…]

• It is not going to let anyone- I repeat, anyone- especially deprived and powerless groups of Aboriginal people, stand in the way of the interests the Government represents. [More…]

• Quite clearly, Australian producers acting individually are powerless to withstand the unified strength of the Japanese steel mills when the mills make a take it or leave it non-negotiable offer. [More…]

• It is not as though the Government did not know what was going on or was powerless to act. [More…]

• It is quite powerless to exist and produce without liquid fuels. [More…]

• In other words, if the Northern Territory environment is damaged to an unexpected extent or in an unforseen way by uranium mining at Ranger then the Commonwealth would be powerless to improve the relevant environment protection conditions laid down in association with the authority to mine. [More…]

• Thus, the powerless victims of the crisis have somehow come to stand accused of having created their own unemployment- a twist of logic which represents a classic example of blaming the victim. [More…]

• Vietnam was attempting to free itself from the powerless, triangular balancing between China and the Soviet Union. [More…]

• It is there in name only; a powerless symbol of what might have been. [More…]

• I found out just how powerless it was when what seemed to be an unnecessary increase in beer prices was recently foisted on the Brisbane public without any notice, let alone investigation by a public body. [More…]

• Whilst the efforts of the Aboriginal Land Fund Commission are heroic, it is powerless to purchase land when certain vested State government, mining or pastoral interests would prefer to keep that land within what they call sound land use planning guidelines. [More…]

• In the meantime my constituents are left up in the air and I, their elected representative, am left frustrated in that I am powerless to help them. [More…]

• We are powerless to change the price of the onethird of our requirements of oil which is imported. [More…]

• He drew attention then to the fact that members of the public had been induced by false rumours to buy shares, that insider trading was rife and that selfregulative bodies seemed either powerless or unwilling to act to protect the public against those market abuses and the many other market abuses that were prevalent at the time. [More…]

• So wild was the fever of speculation they deliberately kindled that even honest brokers and harassed officials felt powerless to arrest the festering dishonesty on which it was based. [More…]