Climate Change

As we have seen this week from the political and public reaction to the latest scientific report from the Climate Commission, science is not always popular.

And if you’ve come to this article hoping to see yet more thrashing of experts, you might as well stop reading now. It’s human nature to question information that’s painful, but let’s not shoot the messenger.

My role on the Climate Commission has come to an end after just over a year, so it’s a good time to reflect on my experiences working in one of the most difficult and controversial areas in the current political and economic landscape.

Continue reading "My year with the Climate Commission" »

It’s official. The climate change dialogue is getting loopier. Maybe the weirdness has been been brought on by heat-stroke.

Yesterday’s Daily Telegraph reported that Tim Flannery and the Climate Commissions’s Professor Lesley Hughes warned that mental illness and all kinds of other maladies would increase with a few extra hot days. For those of us who believe the consequences of climate change could be catastrophic on a global scale, these kinds of statements are trivial to the point of public nuisance. They are like prank calls to 000.

So here’s the real news. Scientists don’t actually believe heatwaves will send us all mad. They’re just saying stuff like this because they’re desperately fumbling for new ways to grab the public’s attention. How do I know this? Because Tim Flannery himself told me (and a small room of other people) pretty much exactly that this very weekend.

Continue reading "Climate change and the crisis of communication" »

In The Bible, Doubting Thomas famously put his hand into Jesus’ wound and had a good grope around to convince himself that the son of God had truly risen from the dead.

He was the only sceptic among the Disciples, the only one who didn’t rely on blind faith. He demanded evidence of an improbable event. For this, he copped it a bit. According to John 20:29:

“Jesus saith unto him, Thomas, because thou hast seen me, thou hast believed: blessed are they that have not seen, and yet have believed.”

Continue reading "Be a bit sceptical about the new breed of doubters" »

The biggest reader reaction I have ever had to a column involved a fight with the power company AGL, which had hit me with a baffling bill which had jumped by $700 in just one quarter.

The column examined the question of actual meter readings versus estimated readings, and the issuing of so-called “catch-up” bills by power companies which for whatever reason had undercooked an earlier bill, leaving them with no choice but to whack the consumer with a kind of one-off bill which would force you to sell one of your kidneys.

In researching the piece I was snowed with some largely (and possibly deliberately) confusing explanations from power providers as to how the meters were read by a different company which was at arms length from their business. Both the power providers and the meter readers seemed more than happy to blame each other for all the confusion, and the subsequent one-off impost.

Continue reading "The shocking truth about the Greens and power" »

The Australian Vaccination Network stuck its head over the parapet again this week, and almost immediately copped one between the eyes. American Airlines pulled the group’s anti-vaccination ad from its flights before it even aired.

It’s the latest in a series of setbacks for the controversial organisation, which is increasingly struggling for air in the Australian media.

The media has been exemplary on this topic, refusing to indulge a group that is full of rhetoric but light on evidence. Most famously, Tracey Spicer demolished the AVN’s president, Meryl Dorey, on 2UE. The well-researched Spicer gave Dorey short shrift, eventually hanging up on her.

Continue reading "We need a change in climate in the Australian media" »

It was clear from the opening titles of last night’s ABC program I Can Change Your Mind that the two protagonists were going to do nothing of the sort.

Climate activist Anna Rose and climate skeptic Nick Minchin might have finished the program celebrating their common ground, but essentially they remain on either side of a deeply divided debate. Not only did they not change each others’ minds, it’s doubtful they would have changed anyone else’s minds either.

This is hardly surprising. As pointed out by one of the people the pair in the show consulted, Anthony Leiserowitz: “We all have this tendency to look for information that confirms what we already believe.”

Continue reading "Have you ever changed your mind on a significant issue?" »

Every generation has its doomsday scenario. When my mother was studying for what she quaintly calls her “matriculation” in 1962, the Cuban Missile Crisis broke out. She downed her pen in protest. What was the point of studying, she told her unimpressed immigrant parents, if nuclear war was about to break out?

By the end of that decade, concerns over nuclear bombs were defused by The Population Bomb, the explosive book by Stanford University Professor Paul Ehrlich which warned of mass starvation and all kinds of chaos due to over-population.

That threat waned too, at least in the public mind. As eventually did the Y2K bug, mad cow, mad bird, mad pig and mad everything else. And now, it seems, climate change is waning as a serious threat in the public estimation.

Continue reading "Climate change won’t happen overnight, but it will happen" »

How does a journalist do a story on a subject they know nothing about?

This is a question which has long intrigued me. Most journalists have to cover all kinds of issues. Many don’t have the luxury of specialising in things they know about. I eventually worked out the basic technique for TV journalists.

First, make sure the names and titles are spelled correctly and assigned to the right people on the bottom of the screen, then stuff the story full of quotes. Try not to actually write anything yourself except vacuous little linking sentences.

Continue reading "A Dateline story bursting with hot air but not facts" »

Once upon a time a majority of Australians believed climate change posed a serious threat to our way of life.

Not anymore. Only 41 per cent of us thought that last year, a Lowy Institute poll found. A 27 per cent drop since 2006.

Times have changed. But the climate hasn’t stopped changing. And we’re close to reaching the point where dangerous climate change is as unavoidable as being labelled a “warmist” if you vocally express a belief in man-made climate change.

Continue reading "Climate change isn’t rocket science. Oh wait, it is." »

Reflecting on the responses to my original piece in The Punch Instead of sandstone unis, what about iron ore ones? I was struck by the extent to which the respondents viewed university education stereotypically; on the one hand as an elitist institution, out of touch with society’s needs; on the other, as a factory for young people who should be trained to do useful stuff, like engineering.

The thought that an Arts education had anything to offer was broadly dismissed. People seemed more interested in comparing the philanthropic culture of individuals in the United States business sector to Australian philanthropy, but the notion that a company could also be a social actor was not accepted.

Support university incomes and you guarantee university flexibility to respond to the expectations of their community.

Continue reading "The mining industry could graduate to a whole new level" »

Following a number of reports that implants made by the French company Poly Implant Prostheses (PIP) contain carcinogenic industrial grade silicon, and are at high risk of rupturing, the Federal Government has announced that Medicare rebates for scans will be available for women at risk of having faulty PIP breast implants.

But isn’t something missing in this debate? Are we really going to just do what we’re told by these so-called “medical professionals”, or are we going to look at the facts for ourselves? Who will stand up for the rights and livelihoods of plastic surgeons?

Look, I’m just as concerned as you about the claims of faulty implants as the next person. If the claims of toxins leaking out of the implants and into women’s bodies and even possibly into the milk that they breastfed to their children are real, then yeah, that’s a huge issue.

Continue reading "Boob job beat-up is just like the climate con job" »

Remember when weather was the most neutral topic in the world? The topic you’d turn to when all avenues of small talk were exhausted? Not any more. That notion now belongs in an age when dinosaurs may or may not have roamed the world, depending on whether you buy the science.

Weather is the new religion. The new politics. It’s the new black-listed topic that you dare not broach at dinner parties for fear of turning a pleasant occasion feral.

Feral was pretty much the tone this week, after I tackled the issue of the heavy March rainfall in SE Australia. My innocuous story last Friday was picked up by my senior News Ltd colleague Andrew Bolt, who proceeded to give me quite the intellectual shakedown on Monday, with another on Tuesday for good measure.

Continue reading "Weather: the new taboo" »

I can’t find one Coalition MP or fellow traveller who came to the defence of Cate Blanchett when last May she took part in a TV advertisement supporting a price on carbon.

There were plenty who shredded the internationally successful Australian actress, making the point that among those disqualified from speaking on climate change were internationally successful Australian actresses.

None of these shredders were accused by others of instigating class warfare against Blanchett, said to be worth from $53 million to $55 million. None were dismissed as being driven by envy.

Continue reading "Classy targets cop it hardest in phony class wars" »

On February 7, the National Climate Centre announced Australia just had its wettest two years on record. It’s dangerously wet again in SE Australia this week. Many towns have had over half their annual rainfall in February alone. Some are going under.

But all this rain has very little to do with climate change, according to Dr Karl Braganza of the National Climate Centre (NCC).

“This sort of rainfall occurred in south east Australia in the early 70s. We have had two La Nina events in a row just like we did in 1973 and ’74, so it’s far too early to say whether there is a link to climate change.”

Continue reading "The frogs are croaking, but don’t blame climate change" »

This week, scientists announced that hey, you betcha, they’re darn nearly almost kinda totally sure that they’ve confirmed the existence of a thing no average person can see or hear or feel.

And the world said, okey dokey, we pretty much believe you. Not exactly sure what all this means or how it affects us, but hey, we’ll buy it. You’re the guys in the lab coats, after all, and we’re the ones stupid enough to wear cargo pants. Therefore, or “ergo” as you guys would put it, you must be right. Right?

Hands up who’s guessed where this thing’s heading…

Continue reading "We must be mugs for accepting the hoax boson" »

Climate change sceptics shouldn’t have to resort to juvenile ‘Gotcha’ tactics to get attention. But Professor Ian Plimer just did. And his target? Schoolteachers. Nice.

Prime Minister John Howard aided and abetted him, speaking at the launch of Plimer’s new book, How to Get Expelled from School: A Guide to Climate Change for Pupils, Parents and Punters.

The first bit of devious trickery is evident in the title - the ludicrous implication that a student would get kicked out of school for asking questions is just a nod to the conspiracy theorists who think the world’s scientists are engaged in an enormous scam.

Continue reading "How Plimer’s climate change book might just work" »

What happened
On March 23 some 2000 to 3000 people gathered in Federation Mall in front of Parliament House in Canberra to protest against the Government’s carbon pricing policy. This No Carbon Tax rally was the first demonstration in the national capital of a grassroots opposition to the policy, a protest movement Opposition Leader Tony Abbott had been attempting to marshall.

The event’s aim was overwhelmed by the starkly hostile and sexist signs and placards wielded by the demonstrators. Prime Minister Julia Gillard was called “JuLIAR,” as pioneered by 2GB broadcaster Alan Jones.

She was called a “bitch’’ and a “witch” and speakers at the rally reflected the tone of the signs held by listeners. Government MPs were furious, particularly women, and the rally was condemned from Labor benches in Parliament during Question Time. Tony Abbott spoke from the protest platform and embarrassingly was photographed in front of a sign reading “JuLIAR Gillard…Bob Browns (sic) Bitch”.

Continue reading "Biggest moments of 2011 #11 Carbon outrage hits Canberra" »

Climate talks in Durban, South Africa, have ended. Developing and developed countries both agreed that a deal to slash emissions “with legal force” would begin in 2020. This has been hailed by Climate Change Minister Greg Combet as a ““significant milestone”. But today on The Punch a youth delegate at the conference, Melia Condon, explains that one thing keeps getting left out of discussions about climate change: it will have a serious impact on our health.

Increases in temperature, extreme weather events and sea level rises are not the impacts of climate change we should be most concerned about in the short term.

It is often overlooked that even just a small change to our environment can have a profound impact on human health. Meanwhile, the size of endemic areas and severity of vector, food and water-borne infectious diseases are on the rise. As are tropical storms, floods and droughts that many Australians are all too familiar with and the flow on effects to malnutrition and mental health in some cases.

Continue reading "The world’s running a fever and it’s going to make us sick" »

Here’s the real problem with the climate change debate. It’s not that the deniers have hijacked the overwhelming scientific consensus, sneakily turning a huge body of evidence into what many now perceive to be a 50/50 proposition.

Neither is the problem the fact that the carbon tax will bankrupt us (which it won’t) or that Bob Brown has become our de facto prime minister (which he hasn’t) or that we’re pissing some perfectly good industries down the drain in the search for new clean jobs (which we aren’t).

The problem with the climate change debate is that this whole endless shouting match is supposedly about saving the environment, yet no one is actually talking about the environment.

Continue reading "Climate change debate is the enemy of environmentalism" »

The option of using nuclear power to reduce carbon dioxide emissions from electricity generation has been raised from time to time during the national debate on the carbon tax and climate change.

Although nuclear power it is not currently on the government’s energy agenda, Australia is a major supplier of uranium to the global nuclear industry which produces 14 per cent of the world’s electricity from four hundred and forty reactors in thirty countries. Their combined fifty year experience provides a basis on which to consider the deployment of nuclear power here.

As memories of the 1979 Three Mile Island accident and the 1986 Chernobyl catastrophe receded, a global nuclear power renaissance seemed likely as climate change concerns mounted. Then came the 2011 Fukushima nuclear disaster following a massive earthquake and tsunami.

Continue reading "Australian nuclear power: the facts, the costs, the pitfalls" »

The Labor Party is set to backflip on dealing uranium to countries that have not signed the nuclear non-proliferation treaty. At the upcoming ALP conference, Prime Minister Julia Gillard will push to lift the ban on selling to India - and chances are it will go through.

The Punch spoke to Professor Stephen Lincoln from the University of Adelaide, an expert in uranium, nuclear power and climate change, about what it all means.

Continue reading "Punch Q & A: A fraction too much fission over uranium" »

You’ve put a price on carbon and stumped up $13 billion dollars for renewable energy. It doesn’t sound very hard when you say it quickly.

Actually, it has been excruciatingly hard. Is there anyone who isn’t completely sick and tired of the whole debate?

From the moment Tony Abbott got the leadership, he and his dogged faction of supporters in the media have been biting and snarling at anyone associated with climate action. As Laurie Oakes wrote of Mr Abbott recently, “His style is pure attack dog, as feral as you’d get.”

Continue reading "The carbon tax is a done deal. Now stop your whingeing" »

Two years after Kevin Rudd’s carbon pollution reduction scheme crashed in Parliament, Julia Gillard is poised to achieve what he could not: a fixed price on carbon leading to a full emissions trading scheme from 2015.

Debate in the Senate will be “guillotined” later today to bring on a vote on the bills thereby concluding the crucial legislative phase of what has become the most divisive political argument in decades.

The 19 bill package setting a $23-a-tonne price rising by 5 per cent for the following two years is expected to pass on a combination of Greens and Labor votes.

Continue reading "Gillard’s carbon victory more toxic than sweet" »

The Australian Senate is currently debating the Government’s Clean Energy Future package and will shortly vote on these historic reforms.

Earlier this week, during debate on the legislation, I spoke about the unrivalled natural beauty of the Australian environment and landscape and of our profound relationship with the land on which we forge our lives.

We are a unique nation, and our identity stems from our landscape. We have developed our character through our values. We believe in mateship, we believe in backing the underdog and, importantly, we believe in a fair go.

Continue reading "Carbon pricing is about more than a warm, fuzzy feeling" »

The conservative radio personality Alan Jones is regarded as the most powerful broadcaster in the country. So his appearance at Canberra’s National Press Club this week would have sparked interest even if his last foray to the capital had not been so embarrassing.

Then, the self-appointed champion of an ageing wedge of disgruntled Australians, was caught in what he would define (if committed by Julia Gillard) as a lie - even if it was merely an ill-informed claim rather too confidently put.

At the time, you may recall, he had railed to a smallish crowd of malcontents known as the ``Convoy of No-Confidence’’ gathered in front of Parliament House, that there would have been thousands more present if they hadn’t been stopped at the ACT border.

Continue reading "Take-no-prisoners approach could bite Abbott on the…" »

When I think of regional Australia, I think of long drives, lots of wildlife and lights in the sky not on the ground. There is another thing that now distinguishes regional Australia: an absolute rejection of the carbon tax.

Senator John Williams recently conducted a poll in the seats of New England (based around Tamworth) and Lyne (based around Port Macquarie). After receiving over 9,400 responses, 89 per cent of residents are against the carbon tax.

The reason for this is not that hard to fathom. When it comes to the carbon tax, the greater the distance, the greater the cost.

Continue reading "An unaffordable tax beyond all regional doubt" »

And you can be sure the shouting’s not over yet. Before the carbon tax begins on July 1, 2012, we may even see blood shed if Opposition Leader Tony Abbott goes through with his pledge. But the tax now just has to be rubber stamped by the Senate.

There were some histrionics on the floor of Parliament with the Liberal’s Sophie Mirabella being thrown out (we wonder which way she was planning to vote?) and THAT so-called “Judas kiss”.

The very vocal opposition to the carbon price will not settle into acquiescent bitterness, so this won’t be the last you hear of it. For now, here’s what was said on the inarguably historic day in Australian Parliament.

Continue reading "Carbon tax reax: It’s all over bar the shouting" »

The tiny nation of Tuvalu is facing a crisis. A number of the islands including the capital Funafuti are suffering acute water shortages. On the island of Nukulaelae it is estimated that without intervention the water supplies would have run out by week’s end.

Australia and New Zealand are immediately responding by shipping in temporary desalination plants and fresh water supplies and helping repair existing desalination units. Water tanks, the great bulk of which have been supplied through Australian aid, are part of the longer term solution.

Yet water tanks are only of use if it rains. And here, in the middle of the Pacific Ocean, Tuvalu is experiencing a drought.

Continue reading "Climate change poses a Pacific problem" »

Look at this graph. Each blue bar shows the peak annual snow depth at Snowy Hydro’s five official snow measuring stations at Spencers Creek, about halfway between the NSW ski resorts of Perisher and Thredbo.

The black line shows the downward trend over the last 58 years. Pronounced decline, isn’t it. The consistent big seasons of the 1950s, ‘60s and ‘70s are a thing of the past. On average, we’re losing three quarters of a centimetre of snow each year. That’s nearly half a metre since records were first kept.

Snowy Hydro has taken these measurements since the 1950s because they like to know how much snowmelt is going to end up in their dams each summer. The information is neutral, reliable, and untainted by ski resort PR. Even more crucially, it relies not on pie-in-the sky computer modelling, but on clinical, unhysterical observation.

Continue reading "The cold hard proof Australia is getting warmer" »

As the carbon tax starts to make its way through the legislative process, the Federal Opposition and peak business groups like the Australian Chamber of Commerce and Industry, the Australian Industry Group, the Master Builders Association and others claim our economy or their part of it will be ruined by a price on carbon.

A similar view was apparent at a recent Oxford-style debate organised by Tom Switzer, editor of the conservative Spectator Magazine Australia.

The topic debated was “is a carbon tax needed to combat global warming”.

Continue reading "We can’t look beyond coal without pricing carbon" »

It’s probably a bit late in the show but this still needs to be said: IT IS NOT A BLOODY CARBON TAX.

I know what taxes are. I see them every day in too many manifestations. They are everywhere, but there is no trace of a tax on carbon in the 18 pieces of legislation which will be debated in Parliament from today.

Now, I have on rare occasions come across speeding fines - penalties designed to encourage me to drive at acceptable speeds. The “clean energy” legislation has what closely resembles a speeding fine, except in this case it is intended to encourage acceptable levels of carbon emissions.

Continue reading "This is NOT a bloody carbon tax" »

Going through legislation is part of the job of a Member of Parliament. After a piece of legislation is introduced into the Parliament, it is then carefully considered by the appropriate Shadow Minister, who consults widely with stakeholders and other experts to examine how the Government’s changes will impact upon everyday Australians.

Sometimes the Parliament may choose to send the proposals to a Parliamentary committee for further inquiry. Naturally all of this takes time.

The Gillard Government introduced the carbon tax legislation in the Parliament yesterday and it is over one thousand pages and eighteen separate Bills. Today they plan to push the legislation up the list and debate it immediately.

Continue reading "Labor crashes through on carbon" »

Apologies in advance to those with fixed views on a carbon tax. It is time the majority of Australians had a say. Well over half of us have shifted from supporting carbon pricing leading into Copenhagen to now opposing. In early 2008, my seat of Bowman had the highest carbon trading scepticism of seats polled by the Climate Institute; at 16 per cent. It now runs at nearly 70 per cent and it helps to remember why.

Let’s deal with the shame issue up front. Most Australians have little interest in national shame, be it border policies, the apology, shame about our live exports or the fact we mine and smelt.

Most Aussies are tired of being told by the elite we should be ashamed of our per capita emissions. We don’t leave our vehicles on in the garage at night. Our emissions correlate perfectly with our wealth, our energy intense export profile and that with the world’s second lowest population density; we travel further. I see no shame in that

Continue reading "No guilt, no shame in rejecting this tax, Australia" »

Punchers enjoyed a carbon-tax-free week last week, but with many people still angry about the policy, we’re getting back into the discussion with gusto. Its opponents say the carbon tax will ruin the economy, cost jobs, hurt families and make the Spice Girls get back together, so what’s the alternative?

What is Tony Abbott’s Direct Action Plan for Climate Change?

The Direct Action Plan is a Coalition policy designed to reduce carbon emissions through Government-funded incentives without the need for an economy-wide carbon price.  The policy allows industry to sell carbon abatement back to the Government and also includes funding for widespread soil-carbon, solar and tree-planting initiatives. 

Continue reading "Abbott’s Direct Action Plan: Frequently Asked Questions" »

Even Julia Gillard and Tony Abbott might want to wind down a bit on their competing carbon pricing campaigns, but we certainly think the general public need a break. Therefore, this will be the first and only mention in The Punch this week of the climate change contest. Hereafter for the week The Punch will give our readers a respite from what increasingly is becoming a circular debate. But first, this is where we leave the protagonists in that debate.

It was refreshing last Sunday week when a Prime Minister was interviewed on television.

The interview was with John Howard on Insiders. Of course, he isn’t actually PM, not even an MP, after being tossed out of both jobs at the 2007 election.

But he sounded like one with answers rather than slogans, confidence rather than diffidence, and a resonance of competence across a number of issues.

Continue reading "Screw the carbon tax; let’s move forward" »

I have always been sceptical of televised people’s forums. I always assumed that the audience participants were not truly uncommitted voters and that poll results or “worm” results were not a true reflection of the event.

I have often felt the programs are simply propaganda designed for the question under review.  In this specific case - to implement a carbon tax.

An audience member of a recent ABC episode of Q & A confirmed my scepticism. They claimed the whole thing is staged from start to finish including the producers urging the audience to look thoughtful just in case the cameras panned in on their faces. This audience member claimed they were contacted by email for possible questions and every question was deliberately hand picked from those submitted.

Continue reading "Talking to pollies: You’re forum or against ‘em" »

Clover Moo here, reporting once again from the shady corner of the paddock.

I know what you’re thinking in that oversized human brain of yours. Wait a minute, I sound like that godawful ANZ ad.

Anyway, I’m guessing you’re sick of the carbon tax, right? Well, me too. If I read one more word about it in the old newsprint down in the chook shed, I swear I’ll start squirting Yakult out my udders.

Continue reading "Flatulence will get you nowhere" »

I was at the Press Club debate - how could I resist? I’ve also been lucky enough to see Ian Plimer talk.  Both Monckton and Plimer are wonderful, persuasive speakers. They are entirely affable, avuncular individuals who are entirely unafraid to blend fact and fiction in such a way that, to the uninformed listener, what they say can seem both reasonable and reassuring. 

Unconstrained by the need to actually tell the truth, and with a gift for cherrypicking facts that support their world-view (especially when taken out of context) they rattle off non-sequiturs and utter nonsense to support their main argument which is, in a nutshell, that the world is not warming, even if it was warming it’s not human activity driving it, and even if human activity is driving global warming, doing nothing at all about it is the best solution.

In one of two rather oblique references to the Nazi party, Monckton quoted Albert Einstein who maintained, quite rightly, that 100 people’s (ie a consensus) opinion is not needed to disprove a theory; in fact only one single fact is needed.

Continue reading "It’s time for direct action. No, not the Abbott kind." »

Lord Christopher Monckton’s determination to have a win against carbon pricing yesterday drove him to make a genuinely dopey statement at the National Press Club.

“Australia is now regarded as a sovereign risk,” he said as a jarring conclusion to his opening statement in the debate with economist Dr Richard Denniss, executive director of the Australia Institute.

It wasn’t something that a touring expert - on climate change or anything else - should have said lightly. It meant that financial centres overseas fear Australia will default on its debts and other payments, despite the AAA rating from both the major credit assessors S&P and Moodys.

Continue reading "Debunking the bunkum of that dopey Monckton" »

Climate change sceptic and mathematician Christopher Monckton has just debated economist and Executive Director of the Australia Institute Richard Denniss at the National Press Club.

The real winner was probably the weather. According to the Bureau of Meteorology, our massively overheating globe could muster just four degrees for Canberra at the time of the debate.

The Punch team watched the debate, first with (de)bated breath, then with waning enthusiasm as all the old arguments resurfaced. Then we bought a sandwich and a coffee. Our quick summary is below. Who do you think came out on top?

Continue reading "No knockout blow in great climate stoush" »

Tony Abbott has undermined his own multi-billion dollar climate change policy declaring the bipartisan target of 5 per cent emissions cuts by 2020 was “crazy” given China’s growth.

In an exercise the Government has dubbed “audience shopping”, Mr Abbott told a seniors forum in Queensland on Monday that China’s burgeoning emissions growth would wipe out Australia’s carbon efforts in days.

“The other crazy thing about this is that, at the same time that our country is proposing to reduce its emissions by 5 per cent, just five per cent, the Chinese are proposing to increase their emissions by 500 per cent,” he said.

Continue reading "Labor’s dilemma: Plan B is to stick to Plan A" »

“We shall fight on the beaches, we shall fight on the landing grounds, we shall fight in the fields and in the streets, we shall fight in the hills; we shall never surrender…”

Those are the most famous fighting words in modern history, uttered by Britain’s war-time Prime Minister, Sir Winston Churchill.

They inspired a nation to ultimate victory, but these days if he were an Australian Prime Minister or Opposition Leader, he could be talking about the Gillard Government’s controversial carbon tax.

Continue reading "Verbal battle lines drawn on carbon tax" »

The most interesting thing I’ve read all year about the climate-change debate is a book that has nothing directly to do with it.

Dan Gardner’s Future Babble: Why Expert Predictions Fail and Why We Believe Them Anyway explores, well, the title pretty sums it up. Gardner runs through a laundry list of culture-shaping fears and hopes and points out that they were almost always wrong.

Capitalism didn’t end up on the ash heap of history. World War I didn’t turn out to be the war to end all wars. Society wasn’t plunged into anarchy by the Y2K bug. The nightmare scenario of overpopulation Malthusians have been banging on about since 1798 is yet to play out.

Continue reading "Warmist or denier, ye shall pay for your beliefs" »

Australia, how low can we go? The biggest casualty of the whole carbon tax debate is not the truth, but our capacity for serious, informed debate in what once passed for our robust democracy.

It doesn’t matter which political donkey you pin your tail on, or what side of the warmist debate you’re on, or indeed how you feel about the carbon tax itself. People from both sides of all these fences have been carrying on like the proverbial pork chops. And all over a tax which, by any measure, is hardly going to bankrupt anyone.

Nothing better symbolises the moshpit than yesterday’s slanging matches in Brisbane shopping centres as the Prime Minister toured the Sunshine State.

Continue reading "The Great Dividing Rage" »

The carbon pricing plan is now a millstone around the neck of Labor, dragging it down at a rate being starkly charted by recent opinion polls.

But, to confuse rock-based metaphors, the party and its most apprehensive members have no choice but to keep their shoulders to that millstone.

To relent by dropping the policy or dropping its mistress, Julia Gillard, would condemn the ALP to a decade out of power marked by internal animosities and blame placing. If the carbon pricing scheme is abandoned between now and its scheduled start next July the Government will have established that for five years it as been incapable of implementing its highest policy priority. That is not a recommendation for re-election.

Continue reading "Carbon tax: The lady’s not for turning" »

Labor strategists believe that in normal circumstances, their Prime Minister has both sufficient time and enough fibre to turn things around.

Indeed, “fibre”, in this case “carbon fibre” is perhaps Julia Gillard’s last best hope. But first, she must get voters to listen.

And that is the hard part. As today’s Galaxy Poll suggests, many voters may never again be inclined to tune into `Gillard FM’, bruised as they are from what they see as an unforgivable breach of trust on the carbon tax.

Continue reading "No one’s tuning in to Gillard FM" »

A 20 cent piece is all that stands between the Gillard Government and electoral oblivion. Shorn of its complexities and its environmental intent and reduced to its most basic vote-driving element – its impact on the cost of living – the carbon tax proposition can be summarised as follows.

The average family will suffer a $9.90 a week increase in its cost of living and pocket $10.10 a week in tax relief. This leaves them 20 cents ahead.

The tax comes in on July 1 next year, about 12 months from the 2013 election. The Government is juggling the imposition of a new tax with the delivery of compensation and saying to average families: trust us, you won’t feel a thing. But if the cost of living impact has been underestimated, and instead of gaining 20 cents a week, families find themselves losing a few bucks, maybe 10 bucks or even 20 bucks a week, Labor will face an electoral drubbing the likes of which may never have been seen.

Continue reading "20 cents stands between Labor and electoral oblivion" »

ALP Headquarters, Canberra, Sunday 7pm

JULIA: Well, what an incredible victory. Couldn’t have gone better if we’d tried.

VOICE AT THE BACK: Shame you didn’t try in 2010.

JULIA: Is that you Kevin?

Continue reading "If you see one crappy film this winter, make sure it’s…" »

Winston Churchill once said a lie can get halfway round the world before the truth has a chance to put its boots on.

That’s what we’ve seen over the last few months when it comes to the Government’s carbon price.

While the government has sat down with industry and business, unions and community groups to painstakingly sort out the details of the carbon price, how it will work and who will be compensated, fear campaigns have been able to dominate the agenda.

Continue reading "The only thing to fear from the carbon tax is fear itself" »

With the debate on the carbon tax getting very emotive it’s essential to understand the economics of the tax and whether it will achieve what it’s setting out to do.

Here the issue is very simple. Will the introduction of a carbon tax lead to a significant reduction in carbon dioxide and other greenhouse gas emissions?

Given that the stated objective of a carbon tax is to reduce greenhouse gas emissions, it’s clear that the success or failure of the tax will depend on the whether or not a reduction is achieved and at what cost. Understanding the cost of the carbon tax is fundamental to understanding its impact on the consumer, particularly given that it’s the consumer who will ultimately pay the tax.

Continue reading "Carbonomics is nice in theory but does it add up?" »

Julia Gillard is asking many in middle Australia, maybe half of the electorate, if they are prepared to forego around $1 a day to prevent climate change getting a lot worse.

She is arguing that the $1 is a fair and realistic investment with a worthy and guaranteed dividend.

That’s the essential message from the huge bundle of spending and levying and tax cutting announced yesterday with the release of the carbon pollution pricing scheme.

Continue reading "Gillard’s won this skirmish but there’s a battle ahead" »

The Carbon Tax? It’s all about the vibe. Whether the Prime Minister stands or falls and whether the damn thing works, it’s all about the vibe.

First, the PM vibe – since her survival seems to be a topic for more immediate concern than the survival of the planet.

There are two crucial questions to ask about that. Are voters still listening to what Julia Gillard says or have they already switched off and are just waiting for an election? And just how much credibility does she have?

Continue reading "Carbon tax is no answer for all these questions" »

Julia Gillard has attempted the political equivalent of cold fusion - making a big new tax popular. Having backflipped on a promise not to introduce a carbon tax, and against trenchant opposition from a barnstorming Tony Abbott, Ms Gillard had little choice but to plough on, to crash or crash through.

Her solution after months of tortuous negotiations and endless parried questions on the details, is either genius or lunacy. Time will tell.

It has involved transforming what was expected to be a painful exercise in de-carbonising the economy into a big win for most voters.

Continue reading "Spoonful of sugar helps carbon medicine go down" »

It’s been a long journey, people, from the days when there was not going to be a carbon tax to now, when there very much is going to be a carbon tax. So what will it all mean?

Ask political reporter Gemma Jones in this Cover It Live, or head to news.com.au where they’ll have all the details and analysis.

Share your thoughts above in the live blog, or below.

Continue reading "Carbon tax: Open thread and live blog" »

It should be possible to sell Julia Gillard’s climate change package to voters. Despite Tony Abbott’s alarmist claims, it can be portrayed as a good news story.

Take what Treasurer Wayne Swan has dubbed the “battlers’ buffer” - an undertaking that low-income families will be generously over-compensated.

The promise is that these people will be reimbursed in full for the extra costs they face under a carbon tax, and then get an extra 20 per cent on top of that. They will, in other words, be financially better off. The Prime Minister and the Treasurer told us a couple of weeks ago that around three million households would be in this category.

Continue reading "Gillard’s hanging out at the Last Chance Saloon" »

Christopher Monckton – the British hereditary peer formerly known as ‘Lord’* – has revealed plans of a possible Government plot to silence him.

The renowned climate change sceptic has had a turbulent visit to our shores, with a string of appearances cancelled, an on-air dust up with Adam Spencer, and a reported order from Fairfax to remove the title ‘Lord’ when referring to his Monckness.

This morning, Monckton told the taxpayer-funded public broadcaster (please do note the irony here) that he had wind of a plot to shut him up. He told Adelaide breakfast radio duo Matthew Abraham and David Bevan:

Continue reading "Oh Lordy, Monckton, it’s a Government plot" »

If the price of freedom is eternal vigilance, for Canberra reporters this weekend the price of vigilance will mean surrendering their freedom - albeit temporarily.

The “lock-up” as it is known in Canberra parlance, will be in play this weekend to release the Government’s carbon tax / emissions trading plan.

Commonly deployed for the federal Budget, they work like this: Reporters agree to shed all communications devices, phones, wireless computer connections etc. and enter a secure windowless room in Parliament House for a period of several hours leading up the official public release of a policy or reform.

Continue reading "Carbon tax: A lock up or a stitch up?" »

The second most appallingly idiotic consequence of the Greens’ decision to block an emissions trading scheme – and let’s face it there is some very strong competition – is that it has managed to turn a debate over what to do about climate change into a debate over whether it is even real or not.

It’s hard to believe, but just a couple of years ago the vast majority of the public overwhelmingly supported action on man-made global warming and a comprehensive carbon pollution reduction scheme was all but inevitable, with strong bi-partisan support led by the top minds of the Labor and Liberal parties.

But then the flat-earth faction of the Coalition revolted and Malcolm Turnbull was assassinated in one of the more disappointing but thoroughly entertaining episodes of Australian politics. (Remember when Kevin Andrews was going to be Opposition Leader? Good times.)

Continue reading "ETS backflip makes me feel green about the gills" »

It’s time for a quick quiz.

1. In Italy, people marched and voted against nuclear power recently. Every Australian news service carried the story. But did they mention how many nuclear power stations Italy will need to close as a result of this courageous decision?

2. Following the Fukushima failure the Chinese suspended approvals on new nuclear power stations pending a safety review. Did the Chinese stop work on any of the 26 reactors currently under construction? How much nuclear power are the Chinese planning for in 2050?

3. The recently announced Moree Solar Farm will take 4 years to build and will be, so far, the largest solar photovaic power station on the planet. How many food producing hectares will it displace? How many such “farms” would you have to build to replace a large coal-fired power station like Victoria’s Loy Yang A?

Continue reading "China is leading the way in tackling climate change" »

One day in the near future the world as we know it will come to an end.

Australia will have become a series of atolls populated only by Gold Coast property developers and surrounded by smug hippies snorkelling past saying “I told you so”.

I speak of course about climate change, which is now certain to drown us in saltwater and self-pity and consign our grandchildren to interbreeding with dugongs in a bold but unbecoming attempt to keep the species alive.

Continue reading "The humanimals in our government will kill us all" »

I’m going to go out on a limb here. I reckon Opposition Leader Tony Abbott would get the result he’s looking for if a vote on the carbon tax goes ahead.

As with Royal Commissions, you don’t start them unless you’re pretty sure of the outcome.

So it’s a mighty stunt he’s pulling, then, calling for a plebiscite on the carbon tax. It aims to solidify all the damage he’s already done to Prime Minister Julia Gillard’s cause, to drive the wedge deeper than mere polls can go.

Continue reading "Carbon tax vote: Democracy, but not as we know it" »

Islands may sink beneath seas; coral may die; species may become extinct. Floods and droughts and heat-related deaths may soar. But sit down, people – climate change is also threatening our wine industry!

Such a shame that the so-called chardonnay socialists are probably on the climate change bandwagon already – but maybe all those doctors’ wives we hear so much about at election time will see their beloved niche varietals under threat and decide the time to act is upon us.

According to climate change scientist and wine expert Leanne Webb temperature increases mean grapes ripen earlier, creating more full-bodied wines, while consumers are keener on more elegant drops.

Continue reading "Who would you turn ‘warmist’ for?" »

Who is Labor listening to when it comes to policy?

Senator John Faulkner last week blasted his party for setting its policies based on focus groups tapping public opinion, instead of heeding the voices of its own members. He warned that Labor risked losing a generation of supporters and voters if it did not listen to its inner voice and accept that internal debate was not disunity.

In that case, whose opinion is Labor heeding in persisting with its pursuit of a proposed carbon tax?

Continue reading "Carbon tax: Labor’s not listening to the people" »

As a chartered aircraft carries Tony Abbott into Nauru this weekend he will have asylum seekers on his mind, but his first glimpse of the island should remind him of another type of refugee.

It could be that in 20 to 30 years the 10,000 folk of Nauru (maximum height above sea level: 65 m) will be climate change refugees looking for somewhere dry to live.

As the Opposition Leader lands seeking a pledge that under an Abbott government Nauru would again be available as a processing centre for boat people detained on the western flank of the Australian continent, the locals might be preparing a few demands of their own.

Continue reading "Pacific solution: Abbott may live to Nauru the day" »

“This is enough to choke a horse,” confided Bill Clinton - “this” being climate change, “one of the two or three biggest challenges in the world”. Clinton was speaking in April in a joint interview with New York mayor Michael Bloomberg.

Together, the “big dawg” former president and the diminutive, billionaire mayor have formed what amounts to an informal, two-man committee to save the world.

It’s not a new concept. The original ‘committee to save the world’ was conjured up in 1999 by the journalist Joshua Cooper Ramo, who appointed the then-Federal Reserve chairman Alan Greenspan, US Treasury secretary Robert Rubin and the man who would succeed him, Larry Summers.

Continue reading "Political dream team unite to save the world" »

A spat this morning over the release of Treasury modelling which showed the marginal economic impact of a carbon price is indicative of what is wrong with the current ultra-consultative process.

A mini-tantrum ensued after the modelling was made public with some members of the Multi-Party Climate Change Committee (MPCC) reportedly upset that they’d not been given first dibs. What this showed in turn was that even the morally righteous supporters of action on climate change are so convinced of their role that they’ve lost sight of the goal.

Labor’s halting, stumbling, uncertain progress towards decisive action on climate change has been a lesson in serial dissembling. Yet despite that, progress apparently is being made. The self-imposed July 1, deadline for finalisation of the carbon tax details, looms large.

Continue reading "Climate Committee is arguing for argument’s sake" »

The Labor Government’s carbon pricing plans have come under fire again, with polls showing most Australians think they’ll be losing out - but does the Liberal Government have an alternative plan? Last night Q and A showed a clip of Opposition Leader Tony Abbott convincingly arguing that a carbon tax could work… Here, Amanda Rishworth casts her eye over Tony Abbott’s Direct Action Plan.

In recent weeks Tony Abbott has stepped up his hysterical tour of dry cleaning services, cereal factories, fish markets and even nappy factories to tout the potential increase in cost of living pressures under a carbon price. However, during these visits he pointedly avoids making any mention of his own climate change policy - a policy which Professor Ross Garnaut has said in his recent report will cost more and do less.

Tony Abbott continues to mount his fear campaign about the Government’s plan to price carbon in the Parliament, and yet you would be hard pressed to recall him ever mentioning his own plan.

Continue reading "Naysayer Abbott’s plan is no alternative" »

In a telling intervention which will change the dynamics of the debate, thirteen of the nation’s leading plumbers have spoken out about the carbon tax.

The group of 13 took time out on Friday from digging ditches and unblocking toilets to issue statements about the tax. The eminent plumbers represent more than two centuries of combined plumbing experience and have worked on hundreds of plumbing jobs across our nation. It is the first time a group of plumbers has united in commenting on such a seismic public policy issue.

Their position can be summarised as follows:

Continue reading "13 eminent plumbers speak out on the carbon tax" »

So the left-wing apologists from Get Up and the ACTU are now imploring us to just “say yes” to Labor’s Carbon Tax. 

They may as well have added “this won’t hurt a bit, honest” to their patronizing new advertisement.

I’ve often thought that the moral supremacists at Get Up occupied a very different Australia to the one in which I live.

Continue reading "A carbon price? Tell ‘em they’re dreaming" »

The Government will be hoping that the convoluted and dense reckoning of professor Ross Garnaut will counter the slick and glib one-liners of Tony Abbott.

The Opposition has successfully been telling the public that a “carbon tax” - or on occasion the “toxic tax” - will wreck household budgets already flattened by other cost-increasing factors.

The proposed carbon price has been depicted as a financial horror which would dwarf those already-punishing family expenses.

Continue reading "Carbon pricing: At least Garnaut hasn’t been gagged" »

Not since the Federated Actors Guild launched a musical campaign against the AIDS virus in the movie Team America has a group of celebrities caused such a stink.

The decision of actors Cate Blanchett and Michael Caton to front advertisements supporting the Federal Government’s climate change policies has been denounced as a shocking act of impertinence by a pair of cashed-up lefties who have no right to enter the debate.

The attacks on the pair have been over the top and underscore the increasing shoutiness of modern discourse. On news and opinion websites (including the two I work for, The Punch and news.com.au) we have seen the usual procession of anonymous haters line the pair up over their supposedly unwelcome foray into publc policy arena.

Continue reading "Climate critics should play the ball not the (wo)man" »

Now we are means-testing people for the right to have an opinion in television commercials, it seems that only those who struggle with absolute penury can speak for Australians.

Everyone else is tainted by the bias of success and salaries.

Billionaires can’t complain about higher taxes on super-profits; screen stars can’t complain about pollution.

Continue reading "It’s a bit rich to gag the wealthy on carbon pricing" »

Like a niggly married couple, Australia’s increasingly divided populace is having a big, dirty spat this morning. And just like parents split on how best to discipline a naughty child, the warring parties are united on the goal but divided on the methods employed to achieve it.

The goal we’re united on is the need to cut carbon emissions. Even the staunchest anthropogenic global warming denier would surely concede there are all sorts of benefits in cutting carbon emissions, not least cleaner air and the transition to smarter industries and renewable energy sources.

But thanks to the “Say Yes Australia” ad, made by a coalition of leftist groups and starring popular actors Michael Caton and Cate Blanchett, the carbon tax debate has been turned into the equivalent of a he says/she says marriage dispute. Or in this case, a we pay/they pay issue.

Continue reading "Shoot the messengers, and send them to Bonnie Doon" »

The climate change debate has never been hotter, with family groups outraged that Cate Blanchett (among others) has thrown her not-particularly-substantial weight behind carbon pricing. Here, the Australian Youth Climate Coalition’s Anna Rose talks about the need for urgent action.

Sixteen-year-old Alana volunteers with the Australian Youth Climate Coalition. When asked why, she tells the following story: “When I was 14 my brother was born. When I first saw him, I thought about his future and I almost couldn’t face it. I couldn’t bear to think about the world that he was going to grow up in to. So I decided to do something about it.”

Life is very different for young Australians today. Gone are the days when young people can plan our futures without factoring in an ominous shadow looming over our plans for our lives, careers and families. Not since the Cold War have young Australians faced a future so uncertain.

Continue reading "Climate change: Bugger Cate, we must ALL act" »

It should come as no great surprise that the Federal Government’s Climate Commission has produced a new report with dire warnings backing Labor and the Greens’ case for a carbon tax.

The report would really have created headlines if it said climate change was not real or that a carbon tax was not a necessary part of measures to prevent it, along with carbon sequestration.

There was nothing much new, apart from a claim that sea levels could now rise up to one metre by the turn of the century, which is higher than even the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change’s top range forecast of 0.18m to 0.76m.

Continue reading "The Climate Commission report is full of it" »

The internet’s made everyone an expert, so now all these self-professed sceptics believe climate change is bunkum because Google told them so.

The vast sea of information online means that any conclusion is possible; just phrase your search string carefully and it will tell you what you want to hear.

And then you have all sorts of links as ‘evidence’ that you are right and all the world’s top scientists are wrong. Without the right tools of critical thought, a poorly written blog by Dr Bumfluff from the Convenient Truthiness Association trumps anything the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change could come up with.

Continue reading "All climate change theories were not created equal" »

Australia must act immediately on climate change or risk social, economic and environmental disaster, the Climate Commission’s first major report says. Here’s your quick and easy guide to the rest of the good news.

The report, The Critical Decade, reviews the latest climate science and says it unambiguously shows the climate is changing, and humans are “almost surely” the cause. It slams the sceptics, saying there is no debate within the scientific community on the reality of climate change.

It argues a carbon pricing mechanism is necessary to curb emissions and says we must act urgently or “we will struggle to maintain our present way of life”.

Continue reading "Climate change report: A busy person’s guide" »

This week in federal politics might in later years be seen as decisive to the elevation of the next Prime Minister of Australia.

That’s because the Government will have to deal publicly and intensely with the two principal issues shaping its fate – border protection and carbon pricing.

The Opposition will launch a demand for a wide-ranging inquiry into the cost and administration of detention facilities and of asylum seeker management generally, starting with the no-holds-barred premise that the centres are now places of “havoc, chaos and riots”.

Continue reading "Will the next Australian PM please stand up?" »

Julia Gillard must find it hard to imagine coalition politics ever resulting in Government commitments to radically reduce carbon emissions. This week, however, the UK Government, run by a Conservative-led coalition presiding over an era of recession and budget cuts, confirmed their commitment to green the UK economy.

UK Cabinet approved a reduction in emissions to around 50 per cent in 2025 in its decision on the “Fourth Carbon Budget”, which is a level of allowable emissions for the 2020s. This builds on the UK’s previous commitments in the nearer term – the first three carbon budgets.

Taken together, the carbon budget’s framework puts the UK economy on track to contributing its share to keeping warming to under the internationally recognised benchmark of around two degrees Celsius.

Continue reading "The Poms cut carbon without whingeing, why can’t we?" »

Australia’s climate change policy debate is far from over. Earlier this month Kevin Rudd conceded it was a mistake to shelve the ETS, and yesterday Rio Tinto joined the fray, warning Australia not to go it alone on pricing emissions. At The Punch we realised we hadn’t heard much about the international experience, so we spoke to Scott Wyatt, Energy and Environment Advisor at the Delegation of the European Union, about how carbon pricing (they have an ETS) has gone in the EU.

Q. How does carbon pricing work in the EU? Is it similar to the proposed Australian system (what details we have!)?

A. There are differences in scheme design, but the principle is very much the same as (the cap and trade system) proposed under the Carbon Pollution Reduction Scheme White Paper.

Continue reading "Q & A: How does carbon pricing work in practice?" »

In search of mates for their unloved climate tax, Labor phoned a friend and the ACTU answered on The Punch last week. That was predictable. But it was the shallowness of Ged Kearney’s contribution which surprised many, because it demonstrated a limited understanding of the debate and scant regard for the best interests of her members.

The ACTU case is simple enough; it’s Labor’s case. Belief in the climate science and that someone must pay. The ACTU’s more nuanced perspective is that their members shouldn’t pay a cent. In the pantheon of climate hypocrisy, that places Kearney right up there next to Paul Howes. Someone must pay; so long as that someone isn’t me.

Credit to Kearney for conceding she isn’t an expert in the field. Nor am I. But ignorance is no excuse for refusing to seek simple answers to fair questions on behalf of her members. It is implausible that an ACTU president could be both unaware of membership doubts around both the science and the tax. It is breathtaking that she is unwilling to address them with reasoned reflection.

Continue reading "Unions abandon their members on carbon" »

The “Statement of Principles” signed by the timber industry, the timber union and environmental organisations late last year is easily the best chance for decades to end Tasmania’s debilitating “forest wars”.

Every single organisation that signed on took a risk.  A risk that the process would founder through Government intransigence, a risk of being outflanked and denounced by opportunists within their own constituencies, a risk that circumstances may deliver outcomes for their traditional opponents, but not for their own interests.

One of the most fascinating issues now that we have started to move into the ‘delivery’ phase, however, is the high stakes power play developing between the “environmental” greens and the “political” greens.

Continue reading "Environmental Greens versus Political Greens" »

The carbon debate at the moment is a bit like the story of Chicken Little. Just as Chicken Little declared that the sky was falling, we’re seeing a lot of people in the business community claiming that the introduction of a carbon price will spell disaster for Australian exports, jobs and industries.

(We cheated here and went for the Hokey Pokey rather than Henny Penny. But the clip is worth a re-visit.)

BHP Billiton and Xstrata want protection on coal exports; BlueScope Steel and OneSteel want steel manufacturing exempted from a carbon price; Woodside Petroleum want LNG exports to be exempted from a carbon price.  To top it off, we’ve had the Australian Workers Union declare its opposition if a single job is lost as a result of a carbon price. And the Australian Food and Grocery Council is now calling for exemptions and running the line that food prices will rise.

You would be forgiven for thinking the Chicken is right.

Continue reading "The Chicken Littles will have egg on their faces" »

Pssst – want to make an easy ten grand?

Believers in the science of global warming, you now have the chance to spread the word and at the same time make yourself $10,000 richer.

This has to be really simple, as almost everyone from PM Julia Gillard down, including much of our mainstream media, has been telling us it’s a fact - the science says so, anybody who thinks otherwise is a fringe-dwelling extremist, a denier who won’t accept the evidence and doesn’t deserve to be heard.

Continue reading "REWARD: Take the climate change challenge" »

I’ve got a confession to make: I’m not a climate scientist. Nor am I an economic modeller.  I am the president of the ACTU, representing every Australian union and nearly two million Australian workers and their families.

In that capacity I think I have an important role to play in the climate change debate. Our members and their families have a big stake in this debate because they are the ones who have the most to lose if we don’t get it right.

Their job security and income security must be protected as we change our use of carbon; but more profoundly we should resist inaction, because this is an even greater threat to their jobs and their income.

Continue reading "Climate change is real, and someone must pay" »

On Monday, March 28, the Department of Climate Change offered a briefing on carbon pricing and business executives flew in from around the country to get longed-for insights.

They were ``peak stakeholders’’ from 45 companies and organisations in a liaison group plugged directly into the Government. This would be the big moment for a run-down on the carbon tax big picture for representatives of the biggest energy generators, retailers, and users.

It was a case of so many questions, so many points of interest, so few chairs.

Continue reading "Carbon pricing: We’re being treated like mushrooms" »

Greg Combet has more policy hounds on his tail than any other minister. He is in charge of the introduction of a “carbon tax”, and the arguments against him have been outnumbering those for.

So the Climate Change Minister went to the National Press Club to highlight—and he hoped erase—some of those policy problems which are dogging this attempt to get up a pricing mechanism for carbon pollution.

He all but ticked them off, one by one, in front of the audience.

Continue reading "Combet on carbon: What he said and what he meant" »

When it’s framed as a global insurance policy issue, you don’t even need to believe passionately in the likelihood of catastrophic climate change to support doing something about it.

When Kevin Rudd said climate change was the greatest moral challenge of our time he framed the issue as one of conviction and belief. Tony Abbott’s response has been similarly framed by the opposite – disbelief and skepticism. 

It comes as no surprise to many who know these two leaders that they would frame the debate around themes such as faith and belief.

Continue reading "Act on climate change, even if you don’t believe in it" »

George Orwell’s 1949 novel, Nineteen Eighty Four, foretold of a futuristic world where technology was used by an oppressive state to enforce order. The book is a giant of social science fiction providing an invaluable cautionary tale against the creeping control tendencies of the state.

The term “big brother” is among the many ideas from the book that have seeped into the public mind.

But in the real year 1984, another fictional work of let’s say, marginally less literary note, achieved its own worthy feat of prediction, albeit metaphorically: Ghostbusters.

Continue reading "Abbott ain’t the only one turning the dialogue ugly" »

Any proposed tax will initially concern people. Markets and the prospect of competition often scare people.

Sacrifice is always attractive and acceptable in the abstract and gets less appealing once defined. These are hurdles that any reform government must face, but reason and logic eventually prevail.

Global warming is an existential threat that the world must face up to. All nations can find an excuse to delay citing the alleged lack of action by others. Delay and denial are arguments that go hand in hand. Eventually the scientists will be proved right, and you won’t be able to find those who preach denial with such conviction.

Continue reading "Abbott’s Direct Action plan a direct con job" »

Protest rallies are never occasions for finessed policy expositions, but increasingly they seem to be about kicking the man or woman, rather than kicking along debate.

That was made obvious by a quick scan of the forest of home-made placards raised at the No Carbon Tax rally in Canberra today.

The personal bitterness was summed up neatly by the chap with the large sign reading: “JuLIAR…Bob Browns BITCH.” For some reason the word “bitch” was encased in a drawing of flames.

It was all his own work—although JuLIAR might have been borrowed from broadcaster Alan Jones—including the absence of an apostrophe in “Browns”, and he was somewhat proud of it.

Continue reading "Playing the woman not the carbon tax" »

On the eastern side of Geelong is Point Henry. On it stands a fifty-year-old aluminium smelter and accompanying rolling mill.

This complex provides jobs for a thousand people and contributes to the livelihood of thousands more. Operated by Alcoa, Point Henry is, along with the Ford plant, one of the largest economic centres in Geelong.

The electricity consumption of Point Henry is massive. This is not Alcoa’s fault. While other industrial processes may use combustion or a chemical reaction, aluminium is made by passing a very large electric current though alumina.

Continue reading "Not pricing carbon would cost us dearly" »

It is well known that in politics you don’t interrupt your enemy when he is busy making a mistake. Yet it is a rule routinely forgotten.

Coalition MPs were surprised when Julia Gillard suddenly bobbed up on February 24 to announce Australia would indeed have a carbon tax as a prelude to a full emissions trading scheme.

Much of the commentary since has been about the bizarre politics of the announcement rather than the substance of the policy. This is because there was no substance (beyond it being a blatant broken promise) and because the whole event raised serious questions as to who in the PM’s inner sanctum is in charge of strategy and who, beyond the PM’s office, is shaping policy. As to the latter, the Opposition’s claim that the Greens are the tail wagging the dog was hardly contradicted by their presence in the PM’s normally exclusive courtyard.

Continue reading "Gillard’s half-baked carbon tax stink bomb" »

There was a telling first line from Professor Ross Garnaut during the launch of his latest carbon trading paper: “Well, here we are again.”

It was the release of what is now Garnaut’s sixth paper, and his tomes are beginning to take on the appearance of some tragic existentialist in terms of both their size and themes. “We are living through an awful contest of knowledge versus ignorance,” was one of his more memorable lines.

Like Garnaut’s previous presentations it was worthy, intelligent and held a message that the Government itself has been unable to articulate: that a price on carbon won’t raise your cost of living. Putting aside some problems with that theory, the real problem for Garnaut’s latest volume lies in the political realities it exists in.

Continue reading "It’s deja vu all over again for Garnaut’s carbon price" »

The health effects of radiation in the wake of Japan’s disaster are still unclear - see here or here for more information. But, closer to home, it is a good time to look at the health impacts of carbon, with Professor Ross Garnaut set to release his next carbon pricing update today at the National Press Club. David Shearman says the health of millions of people is affected by coal.  UPDATE: Professor Garnaut told the National Press Club taxpayers will be better off under a carbon pricing scheme.

Coal has powered a welcome evolution of society, but as the ill-effects of burning coal have become increasingly apparent, so too it seems, has the temptation to neglect the real costs including the ill health conferred on millions.

This ill-health has remained an externality of coal combustion. Like the tobacco companies, Big Coal has not paid restitution for the human morbidity and mortality. Surely this must be re-examined when compensation for the forthcoming carbon tax is claimed by an industry which already receives government subsidies?

Continue reading "Big Coal: A burning economic and health issue" »

Tony Abbott does not accept the concept of human-induced climate change, even though he says he does and has presented a policy to combat it.

He has merely acknowledged enough of the concept to, he hopes, stall the scientific debate in mainstream politics. It is a convenient truce.

Or, to borrow a condemnatory phrase from his mentor John Howard, he is trying to walk both sides of the street.

Continue reading "Abbott blows hot and cold on climate change" »

Australian politics took on a Groundhog Day feel today as an old debate returned over human-induced climate change, nuclear power, and perhaps, the Liberal leadership.

Leading the backwards march were courageous and revealing comments from Opposition Leader, Tony Abbott questioning the role of C02 in driving global warming.

``Courageous’’ because Mr Abbott had gone to great lengths as leader to live down his earlier assertion that man-made climate change was ``absolute crap’.

Continue reading "Groundhog Day in Australian politics" »

On the day in the August election campaign that Julia Gillard chose to announce the ``real Julia’’ would be on offer to voters, she also gave an insight into her political style, now being tested more than ever.

It came during a conversation with SMH journalist David Marr and me on a bus ride out of Sydney, and the impetus was a joke by me which neither found funny.

I had suggested that an old anti-Vietnam war chant be adapted for Labor’s campaign: ``One is right, one is wrong, Victory to Penny Wong.’’

Continue reading "Julia Gillard: A practically left-wing PM in every way" »

Julia Gillard is engaged in the most prized foreign assignment for an Australian Prime Minister - the lavish hospitality of an American president in Washington.

But at home opinion polls are sending the much less hospitable message that Ms Gillard is Prime Minister in name only, that voters want her out of the job.

By any measure, an election right now would see Liberal Leader Tony Abbott replace her. Labor has hit a record low in its primary result in polling.

Continue reading "Gillard is now Prime Minister in name only" »

Since the Multi-Party Climate Change Committee made its announcement regarding a price on carbon late last month, Australians may well be feeling a slightly creepy sense of déjà vu.

An increasingly frenzied federal Coalition is foaming at the mouth and making ludicrous predictions about the future of the country. CEOs of multibillion-dollar companies are wailing about the certain demise of their industry. And a small group of right-wing cheerleaders is screaming from the sidelines, predicting nothing short of the complete collapse of the Australian economy.

Does this scenario feel familiar to anyone else? Of course it does, because we saw the exact same thing last year over the proposed mining tax.

Continue reading "Creepy sense of déjà vu over carbon tax" »