Podcast: Anti-anti-vaxxers and 20,000 listens

Forgive us for patting ourselves on the back this week but, having surpassed 20,000 downloads and listens to the podcast, I reckon we’ve earned a little self-indulgence.  Suffice it to say that the audience for our weekly ramblings is growing steadily, and that has to be good.This week we turn our attention to the extended moratorium on rental evictions and the compensation for landlords who reduce the rents of tenants who are doing it tough. You can read all about that HERE.Then we discuss France’s vaccine passport and how people are taking that up with gusto (or should that be elan?).  Sue thinks the idea of vaccine passports is complicated – Jimmy vehemently disagrees. You can also read some other arguments, both pro and con, HERE.LISTEN HEREWe talk about how and why rental vacancies are going up in Melbourne but have plateaued in Sydney.We dig into Building Commissioner David Chandler’s latest attempts to expose the shonks and swindlers in the building trade, this time by focussing his laser vision on the worst of the worst certifiers and sending them a collective “My office, now!”Jimmy talks about the odd letter from Kerry Chant’s office that took a week to confirm it was real. By the way, it came out after this podcast was in the can but we now know why it was issued, as NSW Health gets ready blitz apartment blocks.We ask why 90 per cent of strata professionals and committee members would not recommend buying off the plan to friends, family or colleagues.Sue takes us to Green Square where the population density is greater than in New Delhi but the facilities there make it a very nice place to live.And we discuss why cats are OK for apartment blocks but not so great at ground level. That’s all, and more, in this week’s Flat Chat Wrap.TRANSCRIPT IN FULLJimmy  00:00We achieved quite a milestone this weekend, as regards this podcast.Sue  00:05Yeah?Jimmy  00:05Overnight, we had our 20,000th download.Sue  00:11Wow! 20,000?Jimmy  00:12Yeah, so that's spread over 138 podcasts, but still, it's okay.Sue  00:18Oh, that's amazing. Congratulations, Jimmy.Jimmy  00:23We have probably more than 50% more listeners, than we had this time last year.Sue  00:28Oh, fantastic!Jimmy  00:30I read something that said, if you get more than 135 listeners in your first two weeks, you are in the top 50% of podcasts in the world and we're way ahead of that.Sue  00:47That's great. Well, thank you, everybody listening, for supporting us. Thanks for listening in.Jimmy  00:52It could be one person, listening to it 20,000 times. I doubt that that's the case;  I'd be a bit worried if it was.Sue  00:58They'd be in hospital by now, I'd imagine.Jimmy  00:59Getting back to this week's podcast, we're going to talk about David Chandler's battle to build confidence in apartment building. Things like certifiers; he's putting certifiers under the microscope and the irony of trying to build confidence by pointing out problems. Before that, we're going to talk about the continuing payments for rent reductions available to landlords. The evictions moratorium has also been extended. And, we're just going to talk about high-density living. I'm Jimmy Thomson, I write the Flat Chat column for the Australian

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Recorded by Jimmy Thomson & Sue Williams; Transcribed by Otter.ai.
Find out more about Sue Williams and Jimmy Thomson on their websites.