Ets

It should be a great time to be a Green: a first term Labor Government governing from the centre; the defining local and international issue is an environmental one; our lives are being buffeted by one extreme weather event after another.

2010 is a crunch year for the third force in Australian politics and, for many, the great hope of progressive change, with a federal election beckoning, the dream of controlling the Senate is looming large

But something is not happening for the Greens right now: despite growing disillusionment in the Labor Government, their vote is flat-lining in major polls and it is twice as ‘soft’ as the two major parties. We asked voters how strong their voting intention was, and these were the results.

Continue reading "Greens struggling to grow in heated political climate" »

It’s fairly clear to anyone who watched Kevin Rudd on the ABC’s Q & A this week that a group of young Australians very succinctly exposed the shallowness and symbolism that underpins much of Labor’s “policy” argument. 

These young people displayed a healthy scepticism and an ability to see through polly-speak that many of our national journalists could learn a thing or two from. Indeed, in the aftermath, some journalists seem almost shocked by Rudd’s inability to clearly answer a question which isn’t scripted and for which he has not been briefed. 

(Despite the embarrassing prelude of the “Ask the PM” Sunrise questions, which saw Rudd floundering.)

Continue reading "Hollowmen and shallow decisions" »

The head of the UN’s climate change panel (the IPCC) Rajendra Pachauri has released a novel that combines lessons on climate change with sexy story lines.

The protagonist in Pachauri’s book is eerily similar to Pachauri himself: an environmentalist and former engineer who inexplicably has a lot of sex with women (I can’t say whether the last part as any basis in reality). According to The Times the book: “mingles lectures on climate change with descriptions of Sanjay’s sexual encounters, including frequent references to “voluptuous breasts”.

Following last week’s visit from the Skeptic Dark Lord Mockton (who looks and sounds like an evil mastermind from a new climate themed Bond film) I can’t help but wonder if some of the increasing confusion about climate change stems from the eccentric oddballs who we’re told to believe.

Continue reading "No wonder we’re confused about climate change . . ." »

Well it won’t have the same political impact as the Hewson birthday cake answer in 1993 but it was almost as unintelligible. 

It’s likely to go under the radar today with the Opposition releasing their own carbon reduction policy, but if anyone saw Kevin Rudd’s interview on the Today show this morning you’ll know what I’m talking about.

Asked by Karl Stefanovic how the ETS would affect the price of a loaf of bread, milk and petrol the Prime Minister managed to mangle all three answers.

Continue reading "Kevin Rudd cooks up a John Hewson birthday cake" »

Climate scepticism is all the rage these days and it’s become very fashionable to doubt the scientists and suspect global fraud.

The sceptics will denounce mainstream opinion for attempting to supposedly silence them, all the while loudly denouncing their opponents on talkback radio, the internet and mainstream press. They criticise minor errors in massive reports and loudly attack sloppy emails, but they play fast and loose with the facts themselves.

Sceptics are rarely accountable for their statements on temperature, on climate or carbon dioxide levels, preferring instead to rely on unsophisticated arguments like ‘it’s crap’.

Continue reading "Climate changes sceptics a threat to national security" »

Our American friends remember The Alamo, we see Gallipoli and North Africa among defining moments in national pride and self-sacrifice against seemingly insurmountable odds.

These initial bloody defeats led state and nations on to ultimate victory against powerful foes.

It’s drawing a long bow to compare any of those to the political battle now being fought on global warming, but one prominent climate realist has done that, and it’s sure to grab some attention.

Continue reading "It’s El Alamein revisited as climate war heats up" »

In a move reminiscent of John Howard’s “headland” speeches ahead of his successful 1996 campaign, Opposition Leader Tony Abbott last night delivered the first of his direction statements ahead of this year’s poll. And he adopted a decidedly green hue, saying it was time to scotch the misnomer that conservatives could not be good environmentalists.

The speech contained two policies - the national takeover of the Murray-Darling river system and the creation of a so-called 15,000-strong “Green Army”  - and a promise of more to follow, with Abbott conceding he did not yet have a finalised position on carbon emissions but would do so within the fortnight.

The first policy should have Kevin Rudd worried as if he had been acting as a decisive national leader he would already have stepped in to wrest control of our biggest river system off the squabbling states. The second policy seems more a bit of gimmickry - and expensive gimmickry at that, with a potential bill of up to $750 million to send 15,000 environmental fix-up folks into the bush at $50,000 a pop.

Continue reading "Abbott goes green with one top idea, one dodgy gimmick" »

Whatever happened to the grand promoter of the great big ETS tax – Prime Minister Rudd?  Channel 9 said it cost $1.4 million to take 68 people to Copenhagen.

What was the cost of the remainder of the 114 that actually went?

Up to Copenhagen the great tax advocates were Mr Rudd and Senator Wong who have suddenly gone very quiet and given all the running to junior Minister Peter Garrett.

Continue reading "Garrett sings from wrong song sheet on Copenhagen" »

Copenhagen certainly was the right place to hold the biggest cocktail party of the 21st century - otherwise known as the Climate Summit.

After all it was the home of Hans Christian Andersen who wrote “The Emperor’s New Clothes” in 1837.  It is truly a suitable parable.

In the story we had swindlers posing as weavers and convincing the Emperor that they could “manufacture the finest cloth to be imagined ……but the clothes made of their material possessed the wonderful quality of being invisible to any man who was unfit for his office or unpardonably stupid.”

The swindlers in the Andersen Tale demanded large sums of money in advance and asked for (and got) “the finest silk and the most precious gold cloth” and worked at empty looms until late at night.

In Copenhagen the attendees certainly got lots of money in advance and lived in great luxury.

Continue reading "The Emporer’s Copenhagen cloak: a fairy tale" »

“Doth protest too much”. The ageless quote from Shakespeare’s Hamlet comes to mind when assessing world leaders response to the Copenhagen climate conference. 

Lashings of praise have been heaped upon the Copenhagen Accord from Obama, the Chinese Premier Wen Jiabao, Kevin Rudd and other world leaders.  It has been described as a “meaningful agreement”, “a great step forward” and “significant and positive”.

What would an agreement deserving of this kind of praise look like?  The world needs a comprehensive global response that will deliver a safe climate, that is a minimally change climatic system that can support humanity to meet our needs.

Continue reading "What went wrong, from on the ground in Copenhagen" »

The last month’s political twists and turns, culminating with the Liberal Party’s extraordinary lurch to the right and populist fear-mongering on the ETS “tax on everything”, make it look increasingly like Australia may never reach a political consensus on climate change.

Adding fuel to the fire, after much of hype and high hopes Copenhagen fizzled, failing to deliver the binding international agreement which would have delivered a resounding mandate for Kevin Rudd’s proposed course of action.

Back at home, Tony Abbott’s fiery rhetoric has been starkly reminiscent of another political turning point in 2001, which involved a hapless group of refugees in a sinking boat. Just as the 2001 Tampa election hysteria was fuelled by political opportunism and the politics of fear, so too the response to climate change appears to be heading down the same path.

Continue reading "Are older Australians more sceptical of climate change?" »

If anyone is looking forward to the Christmas break it must be Kevin Rudd. The Prime Minister who created a narrative about his administration that it’s the can-do team on climate change has had the two biggest ticket items, the ETS and Copenhagen, all but fall over in less than a month.

While neither were strictly his doing (he was in the US when Tony Abbott nabbed the Liberal leadership and killed off a deal on the ETS), the Prime Minister had placed himself at the centre of both, no doubt confident a victory on either would be a huge political win.

He calls the outcome of the closing days in Copenhagen “frustrating”. I imagine that’s just the tip of the melting iceberg for how he really feels. And now Mr Rudd needs to work out how to take an issue that until six weeks ago was a political bonus for him and stop it turning into a political nightmare. And he’d better do it quickly.

Tony Abbott wasted no time yesterday framing the debate from here on. He told Sunday Agenda: “Look, I suppose good intentions are better than nothing, but Mr Rudd has failed his own test. He said a couple of years ago that what we needed to get were real targets against real timelines.  He said, real progress means real targets against real timelines, and certainly by that standard it’s been a comprehensive failure.”

It was the words “his own test” that rammed home the point. At Copenhagen Kevin Rudd went from “friend of the chair” to the guy waiting outside the room when the three-page non-binding “meaningful” agreement was struck.

Continue reading "Nopenhagen" »

The collapse in Copenhagen shows the power of the polluters over the politicians.

The oil coal and big resource companies put off the day of action and edged the world further into super-heating.  That means worse drought, bushfires, snow- melt, tropical storm damage and accelerating sea level rises.

Penny Wong has blamed the failure to reach consensus in Copenhagen on a few “radical nations” like Venezuela and Uganda. But tiny Tuvalu has also championed real action on climate change by calling the promise of money, in return for agreement on inaction, “thirty silver coins” from the rich countries.

Continue reading "The PM needs to drop his refusal to budge on a target" »

It’s snowing here in Copenhagen, as leaders feel the heat over climate change.

In the winter gloom, the flashing lights of police motorcades snake through the city. Is it Obama, Gordon Brown, or Kevin Rudd? It’s certainly not the President of the tiny, vulnerable Maldives, the shock troops of rising sea levels.

Walkouts by developing nations, angry clashes between protesters and police, people dressed as polar bears, Greenpeace ships moored in the canal not far from The Little Mermaid statue, business leaders selling wind power, electric vehicles, even shoes with recycled rubber soles.

Continue reading "Copenhagen: let it snow, let it snow, let it snow" »

Dylan fans will be familiar with the stream of consciousness liner notes on the back sleeve of Highway 61 Revisited where the Zimmer-man writes of Savage Rose and Fixable and the Cream Judge and the Clown, of Lifelessness saving the world, of the Phony Philosophers and the Beautiful Strangers.

I was compelled to re-read this unusual piece of writing this week after subbing an opinion piece written by Barnaby Joyce and have decided that if Dylan has a literary heir in this country it is the newly-installed shadow minister for finance.

Joyce has now written seven opinion pieces for our website The Punch and the marvellous thing about all of them is that you could buy a pack of Gitanes, slip into your skivvy and beret, and recite random passages aloud in a Soho coffee shop with Miles Davis’ Kind of Blue playing in the background, and the critics would hail you as the greatest beat poet since Ginsberg.

Continue reading "Barnaby knock knock knockin’ on Kevin’s door" »

While Kevin Rudd desperately reschedules his attendance at the Copenhagen Summit in a craven attempt to ensure he’s in the presence of US President Barack Obama, there are very interesting parallels in the political scenarios on either side of the Pacific.

These are two political leaders elected in almost Messiah-style euphoria.

Their elevation was supposed to ring in “change” after long periods of conservative Government that the elites and media had openly grown to loathe.  There was little public scrutiny of the substantive skills each man would bring to the job – their popularity was a triumph of style over substance.

Continue reading "The mirror ‘Messiahs’ dogged by bad policy" »

IF climate change really represents a threat to our civilisation comparable to the Nazis than it is time for us to stop backing off in half-hearted surrender and instead tell Mother Nature to shove it.

Recently in arguing against the “disaster track” of a Copenhagen UN compromise agreement on reducing emissions, NASA scientist James Hansen - in many ways the granddaddy of climate change theory - said global warming should be treated like an evil enemy.

“This is analogous to the issue of slavery faced by Abraham Lincoln or the issue of Nazism faced by Winston Churchill,” Hansen said. How did Winston Churchill and more broadly the Allied powers defeat the Nazis and their Axis partners?

Continue reading "If climate change is a battle, let’s have a war" »

Hardline conservative Christians helped orchestrate the flood of correspondence that convinced Liberal MPs to ditch support for Malcolm Turnbull and the emissions trading scheme.

One site that published repeated calls for direct lobbying of politicians was Catch the Fire Ministries, a church whose pastor earlier this year said the Black Saturday bushfires were divine vengeance for liberal abortion laws.

It has also emerged that Cory Bernardi, one of the Liberal senators who led the revolt against Turnbull, called on supporters in late November to wage an email campaign to persuade his colleagues in the Senate that the public was outraged at the ETS. His email was published and endorsed by a website popular with fringe conspiracy theorists.

Continue reading "The holy war on climate change" »

A lot of my comrades on the Left of politics are walking around as if the ascension of Tony Abbott is an early Christmas present, but I’m not so sure.

While some see the rise of the Mad Monk as the Tory version of Latham’s 2004 election car crash, I think the risk is we are gearing up for a re-run of the 1999 Republic referendum.

That was the ballot where Abbott, as executive director of the ‘No’ vote managed to convince battlers to keep the Queen as Head of State because the alternative would be to have the nation run by a bunch of wankers - like Malcolm Turnbull. A decade later and the Left is still coming to terms with the anti-elite backlash that the Republic Referendum – and arguably the 2001 Tampa election – unleashed.

Continue reading "Left should beware Tony Abbott’s war on wankers" »

Tony Abbott has rejected the dominant ETS paradigm. He says he wants, though, to re-balance business and household behaviour and incentives to move the economy to new, cleaner, climate adjustment technologies, but not cripple employment in key industries in the process.

Here’s one suggestion – turn payroll taxes into ‘climate adjustment’ levies, at neutral total cost to business. Then expand business and household rebates on all expenditure on green technology – tax avoidance based on positive, environmental citizenship.

Instead of taxing jobs – always a stupid tax arrangement – treat carbon emissions as an externality and turn the tax into a levy, but allow people to neutralise this levy only through investment in emission reduction technology.

Continue reading "Power to the people on an ETS - without a new tax" »

I arrived in Copenhagen, usually a pretty, peaceful Danish city on Thursday.  As the Copenhagen Climate Conference has approached – starting tomorrow morning – a tension has been building in the air.  It feels like the calm before a storm, when the wind begins to whip up and you can just feel something coming in the air. Walking around the city there are accents from across the world, posters displaying climate change events, protests and technologies, and groups of people closely discussing and speculating.

Over the weekend I have been participating in the 3rd Annual Conference of Youth attended by approximately 1000 youth from over 150 countries. 

The youth movement has been growing exponentially over the last few years – in Australia the Australian Youth Climate Coalition has grown ten fold from 5000 to 50,000 in one year – and this is beginning to represented at the United Nations with a large youth presence at these negotiations. 

Continue reading "Youth delegates have no time for skepticism at Copenhagen" »

Australia, congratulations. We now boast a brand new opposition leader from the far-Right, who proudly declared, say, eight or nine times in a single interview on Tuesday that he would not support climate change legislation, terming it a ‘big new tax’ on the Australian people.

So here we have the new political tactic of our Right- simple, snappy, and to the point- “that other lot want to TAX you!”

This tactic is nothing new, of course. Ben Chifley once observed that the Australian public ‘votes from the hip-pocket reflex’. The Right is simply banking that this is still the case.  Shrewd.

Continue reading "Can the West really be ‘taxed’ on climate?" »

Malcolm Turnbull has left no-one in any doubt as to what he thinks about today’s defeat of the ETS with a blog entry on his website saying the Liberals have damaged the national interest - and themselves - by blocking the legislation.

It is a civil piece of writing, and in keeping with the position he doggedly stuck to this past week. But it has caught the attention of his party, which fears that Turnbull is so passionate about this issue that he could position himself as a booming voice of dissent from the backbench, keeeping the Liberals distracted and divided ahead of a poll fought over the ETS.

“Today the Senate rejected, for the second time, the Government’s emissions trading scheme legislation,” his entry began. “This is a very disappointing result, contrary to the national interest and the interest of the Liberal Party.”

Continue reading "Turnbull’s blog entry shows he won’t go quietly" »

The current debate is not about the science of climate change.

The climate has always changed, it always will. At some level man must be contributing to it.  I strongly believe that reducing pollution can only be a good thing not only for the environment, but also for the Nation’s productive capacity and our kids’ future.

However the ‘debate’ over man-made global warming has now been hijacked by those who claim that if you are arguing against the Rudd Government’s Emission Trading Scheme then somehow you are arguing against the environment.

Continue reading "The carbon tax debate Australia never had" »

We gave Malcolm a lend of the Party, but the members want it back.

This is the clear message I have received from Liberal Party members by way of 7,500 emails (and rising) and hundreds of phone calls – not to mention close encounters of the personal kind.

The claim that the Coalition Party Room agreed to support the Labor Party’s amended C.P.R.S. legislation imposing an E.T.S. Tax is not true. The Party Room rejected it.

Continue reading "Bronnie Bishop: Malcolm, we want our party back now" »

In order to help people better understand the last week, an anonymous Liberal front bencher has made available excerpts of their private diary to comedians Matt Kenneally Toby Halligan.

MONDAY 23/11/09 MORNING

Booked holiday flights to Hawaii for Friday evening.

ETS bill before senate tomorrow. Still don’t understand it.

Air conditioning was playing up. Stood in front of fridge for a while and felt better.

Continue reading "Secret diary extracts of a confused Liberal MP" »

“Australia generates 1.5 per cent of global greenhouse emissions and this ETS will reduce world levels by the smallest sliver, which self-evidently will have nil effect on global climate whether you believe in climate warming or not.” Barnaby Joyce – The Innate Problems With Labor’s Emissions Trading Scheme, 17/12/2008.

Using numbers to lend credibility to a flimsy argument is not a new tactic. In the case of those opposing serious action on climate change however, one statistic about Australia’s proportionate global emissions forms the central flimsy plank of their argument. The argument goes that given Australia is responsible for only 1.5% of global emissions, anything we do to reduce CO2 levels is hardly going to make a dent globally. We can’t save the Great Barrier Reef, so the rest of the world is going to have to.

It must test well in focus groups because everyone opposing action on climate change has been trotting it out ever since the debate began. And let’s be honest, as a message it is working.

Continue reading "If we can’t lead on CO2, we shouldn’t in sport or science" »

IT is almost two months to the day since Malcolm Turnbull defiantly proclaimed he could not lead a party that failed to act on climate change.

It could well be his epitaph because it looks increasingly likely they will be his famous last words. His war-like comments in a radio interview on October 1 will come back to haunt him tomorrow when a leadership challenge is expected to try to finally resolve the Liberal Party’s internal angst and division over the Emissions Trading Scheme.

Aside from internal manoeuvrings and mutinous rumblings within the party, the Liberals have a bigger problem. They are sending mixed signals to the electorate about where they stand on climate change and this is worse than death by a thousand swords for a party hoping to win Government at the next election.

Continue reading "Confusion reigns online over ETS and the Liberal Party" »

THERE is a hilarious moment in the Hitchhikers’s Guide to the Galaxy when it is explained to one of the last remaining humans, Arthur Dent, that things are not what they seemed.

Shattering his life-long assumptions following the Earth’s destruction - that’s intergalactic progress - a higher being explains to the hapless Dent, that all those white mice in labs that humans thought were part of various experiments, were in fact, conducting an experiment on us. Humans were not as wise as they thought and now, their planet had been obliterated to make way for a hyperspace bypass.

I thought of this on two counts in recent days. First, there is the parallel with what Malcolm Turnbull, has been telling his troops: do nothing about climate change and the Earth as we know, will be destroyed.

Continue reading "Libs adrift in a hostile galaxy" »

Australians expect their political leaders and their political parties to take effective action on climate change because it is an important issue for them and their children.

The Opposition has always had significant concerns with the Rudd Government’s CPRS legislation. That is why we fought for changes to the proposed scheme, to improve its design and protect Australian jobs.

As a result of the changes secured by the Opposition, tens of thousands of Australian jobs have been saved, farmers have been protected by permanently excluding agriculture from the scheme, $1.1 billion in direct support to small and medium businesses will be delivered, and the threat of blackouts and interruptions to the electricity supply has been removed.

Continue reading "Climate debate a turning point in Liberal Party history" »

The honour of being elected as a member of the Federal Parliament carries with it very serious responsibilities.  Each of us are charged with seeking to do what is right, to listen to the views of our constituents, to represent the political parties that endorsed us, and ultimately determine what is in the nation’s interest. 

My decision to resign from the Shadow Ministry yesterday is one I did not take lightly. I felt compelled to do so because I reached the conclusion that it is not in Australia’s interests to support Labor’s Emissions Trading Scheme (ETS). 

This is a position which was only strengthened by the fact that there was a clear majority in the Coalition Party Room in favour of voting against this legislation, despite what our leader concluded.

Continue reading "Why I quit shadow ministry and won’t back Labor’s ETS" »

The Liberals are currently staggering around the corridors in Parliament House like a bomb has gone off. In political terms it kind of has. The past 36 hours has smashed Malcolm Turnbull’s authority, failed to produce a viable alternative candidate for the leadership, transformed manageable differences of opinion into bitter personal hatreds, left the frontbench a mess with three resignations already and possibly more to come, not to mention a looming reshuffle just to add further fire to an already incendiary situation.

Liberal MPs are openly talking about their sadness at the way the whole thing crashed around their ears. They are worried about their seats and had wanted one of two things to happen - to achieve a quiet consensus on a CPRS deal and to quietly pass the legislation, or for the talks with the Rudd Government to fail and to vote against it. Instead they have got open internal warfare.

Their biggest fear is how it will play out with traditional Liberal Party voters who cannot fathom the logic of what the party has done in embracing a lose-lose situation, whereby people who believe in climate change will give full credit to the Government for introducing a CPRS, while people who do not believe in climate change will punish the Opposition for backing it.

Continue reading "Grass roots revolt the biggest fear for battered Libs" »

Last night Malcolm Turnbull announced his party’s support for the ETS bill with the resigned cheerfulness of a man who knows his days are numbered.

He looked more like a defeated leader at the end of a campaign thanking his supporters than someone who had just prevailed over the Opposition old guard.

It was a pyrrhic victory and nothing he said could disguise that fact.

Continue reading "Malcolm Turnbull: ideology’s latest victim" »

Malcolm Turnbull has retained his position as leader of the Liberal Party after winning a secret ballot on a motion to spill the leadership by 48-35. Punch editors will be posting the latest developments, commentary, pictures and video here as they come to hand. Times are AEDT. Refresh this page for updates.

4pm: Question Time over, the Libs limped their way through it the poor sods, they looked like a footy team that had just got thumped in the GF. Read our coverage of the day unfolded below. I will post a new piece later today wrapping up Turnbull’s two days of hell, and his future from here.

1.55pm: Time for Question Time. The Punch will be covering it live here - join in, should be fun.

1.50pm: Battered Libs limping their way towards chamber for QT. One MP just told me this is their equivalent of DLP split. Total and unabiding fury between the two camps. MPs also talking up hockey as best consensus candidate for leadership change in new year.

1.41pm: News round-ups of the events at the partyroom meeting now available at news.com.au and The Australian.

1.33pm: It’s certainly a better result than yesterday on the CPRS - but it won’t give Turnbull any security. Almost half the party still out to get him…

1.31pm: Joe Hockey speaking after the meeting. “Clearly this issue has done us incredible damage and I hope the Australian people forgive us…”. Emphasises the Liberal Party is a progressive party. Says given the mood of the party the 48-35 result was a good result for Turnbull.

1.29pm: It’s understood Joe Hockey was sounded out by the right for leadership on condition he opposed the CPRS. Said he’s not interested in starting his leadership career by selling his soul.

1.28pm: Kevin Andrews says he accepts the result of the ballot, but 35 is a significant number in the party room, which makes a strong point about the position on the CPRS. He says of Turnbull: “of course he has my support, he’s the leader of the party.”

1.23pm: No spill. Motion lost 48-35 in a secret ballot.

1.14pm: Cannot find a single Lib who is taking Kevin Andrews’ candidacy seriously or as a genuine threat. With Abbott not in the mix Turnbull shouldn’t get rolled.

1.13pm: Parliament security, at the request of the Opposition Leader’s office, are preventing journalists from congregating near the party room. Not sure why, as people inside the meeting will text developments to the press gallery anyway.

12.56pm: Samantha Maiden of The Australian writes on Twitter: turnbull has just walked into office with dep COS credlin. looks really upset

Continue reading "Live blog: Liberals in crisis" »

HIS voice hoarse and breaking from arguing his case over 12 hours of solid meetings, a haggard Malcolm Turnbull declared “I’m the leader” six times last night at a defiant but probably futile press conference aimed at asserting his authority over a political party which is split almost exactly in half.

By the end of the press conference he looked like a doomed man, almost resigned to his likely demise as he faces betrayal by members of Shadow Cabinet, abandonment by the National Party, with almost half the party now canvassing a leadership spill as early as this Thursday - or protracted sniping ahead of his execution at a later date.

The press conference started in bullish fashion. Flanked by deputy leader Julie Bishop and chief climate negotiator Ian Macfarlane, Mr Turnbull declared he had won “overwhelming” party support for his deal with Kevin Rudd over the Carbon Pollution Reduction Scheme.

Rubbish, rebel MPs were saying to reporters via SMS and in corridor chats, explaining that 40 MPs had spoken against the package and just 33 in favour - and that Mr Turnbull had inflated the numbers by arbitrarily including Shadow Cabinet in its entirety in the yes camp, getting him the paltriest possible majority at 47 to 46.

Continue reading "Last plea of a doomed man" »

UPDATE 8.20pm: Total chaos as meeting ends, set to resume at 8am tomorrow, strong talk that he will be challenged, massive press pack outside Party Room, Turnbull apparently has 41 MPs behind his ETS Plan and 33 against, MPs saying it is not a strong enough mandate to back the ETS, Turnbull has apparently blown up inside meeting, says nothing to press on way out. More to follow.

Update 8.15pm: Sky News reports the back bench vote actually came out 41-33 against the CPRS, but Turnbull declared with the shadow ministers he could get a majority in favour. According to David Speers he made this announcement while some Senators were outside the room. To say they’re unhappy is an understatement.

Update 8pm: Apparently the No vote disputes the party room numbers on the CPRS and are going to move a leadership spill. Kevin Andrews confirms he would put his hand up if the spill gets up.

Update 7.40pm: Malcolm Turnbull says he’s won the support he needs in the Coalition party room. But they’re reconvening at 8pm and there’s rumours of a leadership spill.

Update 5.10 pm: Perhaps not surprisingly Tuckey couldn’t get enough hands up for his motion.

Update 4.50pm: Wilson Tuckey has just moved for a spill of the leadership in the party room. The motion won’t get up without a majority show of hands. But it’s sure to make Malcolm Turnbull’s day just that much worse.

Continue reading "Next two hours could seal Malcolm Turnbull’s fate" »

Update 10:55am: Shadow Cabinet signed off this morning on Malcolm Turnbull’s deal with the Government over the CPRS, and it is now being debated by the Coalition Party Room.

No. But he’s the Right Faction’s stalking horse should Malcolm Turnbull falter in his handling of the CPRS - which in the eyes of the more skeptical and conservative Libs he is already doing. And if there is a blow-up in the Party Room today, Kevin Andrews is expected to run for the leadership.

In what is looming as a chaotic and unpredictable day, the Right Faction is positioning itself to inflict a potentially mortal wound on Turnbull by moving a spill in protest at his excessive concessions over the carbon pollution reduction scheme.

Kevin Andrews is not the Right’s preferred candidate - but he is the one who has volunteered to go over the top on behalf of the party’s conservatives. He told SkyNews ominously yesterday that “At the moment we have a leader but I am a loyal servant of the party and I will do any job that I am asked to do,” Mr Andrews told Sky News.

Continue reading "Is this the next Leader of the Liberal Party?" »

Today The Punch celebrates the ground-breaking policy work being undertaken by visionaries within the Coalition party room in an effort to address global warming.

With 31 per cent of the population now signing on as climate change deniers these fine Australians are leading a national movement that can make us all feel better in the face of those flighty Nobel Prize winners who insist on preaching Armageddon.

In saving the planet by denying there’s a problem, the likes of Nick Minchin, Tony Abbott and Barnaby Joyce are contributing to a global body of work that has cured cancer, ended domestic violence and prevented the Holocaust.

Continue reading "Elvis has left the building: a brief history of denialism" »

The Climate Justice Fast!, an international hunger strike for action on the climate crisis, is currently on day 17.

Let’s be frank. Australia’s response to climate change so far is a disgrace. It is well understood, by even Kevin Rudd and Penny Wong, that the emissions reduction targets of the carbon pollution reduction scheme (CPRS) are scientifically inadequate to effectively respond to climate change.

Even if it’s maximum reduction target of 25% by 2020 is implemented, and other nations make similar efforts, atmospheric greenhouse gasses will still overshoot a safe level, very likely pushing us past tipping points that lock into place disastrous runaway climate change.

And once we take into account our world-beating per-capita emissions, combined with our chart-topping standard of living, our nation’s token efforts on climate change become simply impossible to justify.

Continue reading "It’s our fault not enough’s being done on warming" »

While there is a lot of heat surrounding the climate change debate, one issue that has received less public attention is the impact of global warming on our health.

Adelaide is currently experiencing a record breaking heatwave and has been on catastrophic fire danger alert, and this even is before summer has even begun. These events provide a timely reminder of the consequences of extreme weather on the health and safety of the population.

With global warming, inevitably we will suffer more heatwaves with longer and hotter summers. Australia - more than almost any other country- will be vulnerable to climate change-related illness and death.

Continue reading "The health risks from climate change are mounting" »

UNLESS Malcolm Turnbull is Harry Houdini, he is about to join the likes of John Hewson as another `almost was’ wealthy businessman who promised much but ultimately could not manage the politics.

Things could hardly have gone worse for him this week. Just when he had the Government under real pressure over its faltering management of the Oceanic Viking crisis, problems on his own side overwhelmed him. Next week looks harder again.

He must be wondering why he left a perfectly successful career in business for this. He may not be wondering for much longer.

Continue reading "Holding our breath to see if Malcolm survives" »

Momentum is a fundamental concept in both physics and politics.

It’s a concept climate change skeptics like Barnaby Joyce just don’t get.

As Penny Wong and Greg Combet shepherd the sensible people in the Australian Parliament towards a bipartisan agreement on a CPRS, Barnaby is still out there howling at the moon to his diehard audience of deniers.

Continue reading "Climate challenge missed by Coalition howlers" »

The introduction of the CPRS Bill or the ETS, whichever you choose to call it, is a mechanism where the Government will collect in excess of $70 billion tax revenue in the first six years and potentially hundreds of billions of dollars thereafter.

The commission earned by bankers and brokers will amount to multiple billions of dollars and the financial imperative for them to support the scheme is overwhelming.

This new tax will not save the Great Barrier Reef; it is not going to end the droughts; it will neither contribute to Greenland freezing nor thawing.

Continue reading "Why I am still voting no to this ridiculous CPRS" »

The patrons leaning on the bar at bustling country pub Flannery’s and Gore were shocked when a wild-eyed man with a slide-rule in his pocket burst in the door.

The man leaps on the bar and shouts: “Everybody, this pub is about to collapse.

“I’m an engineer and I’ve just been looking at the walls outside - they’re about to give way.” In the stunned silence, some punters think they hear a faint creaking noise from the walls, but can’t be sure it’s just not the crickets.

Continue reading "A climate change parable, where you write the ending" »

With another boat load of asylum seekers intercepted and reports there are at least 10 Coalition MPs vowing to cross the floor on the ETS there’s plenty happening in Federal Parliament. You can see our Question Time coverage after the jump.

Continue reading "Question Time Live: 17/11/09" »

Are you feeling left right out of the political debate in Australia?

As the parliament prepares to consider the Rudd Government’s ETS and the global bureaucracy invades Copenhagen, I’m getting a little tired of the forced and clichéd polarisation of the climate change and other important debates, such as border protection.

The straw that broke the camel’s back was on Friday when #KRudd tweeted the world at 6.54pm saying “Time for the “do nothing” climate change skeptics (sic) to stop playing roulette with our kids future. KRudd.” It was one tweet too many. Seriously, what a silly and juvenile thing for a PM to say.

Continue reading "Rudd tweets insults to every fair-minded Australian" »

Clean coal is in essence, an oxymoron. Much like ``friendly fire’’ or Kevin Rudd’s ``tough and hardline but humane’’ asylum seeker policy dubbed ``compassionate brutality’’ by one wag recently.

Of course, in the case of ``clean coal’‘, the term is used to suggest that it actually exists. Yet it doesn’t -  least not yet.

Doubtless, it is a fine aspiration, especially given the world’s heavy reliance on coal, and it’s central part in global warming. But an aspiration is pretty much all it is.

Continue reading "Clean coal doesn’t exist, but nuclear power does" »

IF you squinted in a particular way, it was just possible to see last Sunday’s extraordinary meeting of the Coalition joint party-room as a triumph for Malcolm Turnbull.

But the bar was set pretty low. He may have emerged from the four and a half hour marathon armed with the authority to negotiate with the Government on emissions trading, but it was a Clayton’s mandate.

Consider for example its qualified nature - remembering at the same time, the Government’s pre-condition that it would only conduct talks with the Opposition if its negotiators had the authority to deliver its numbers in the parliament. On this score, Mr Turnbull’s authority looks shaky. Theoretically at least, he could get 100 per cent of what he asks for from the Government, and still not be able to say yes without a separate party-room meeting to approve it.

Continue reading "Dejected opposition all at sea over border protection" »

Note: ABC Breakfast host Virginia Trioli made this “you’re crazy” hand twirling gesture after interviewing Senator Barnaby Joyce on the issue of the ETS. Trioli obviously didn’t realise the cameras were still on. She later rang Senator Joyce to apologise, he quipped to the Punch that he couldn’t quite hear because he had been placed in an asylum.

Apparently some television commentators think that I’m the insane one.

Maybe that explains the place where I work.

Obviously, if I’m not me who am I?

Continue reading "If you think I’m crazy, have a look at the ETS" »

If Malcolm Turnbull achieved nothing else yesterday he may have at least shut Wilson Tuckey up for five minutes.

Yesterday’s five hour joint party room meeting was a victory for Malcolm Turnbull but it was one that doesn’t leave a great deal of time for basking in the afterglow.

Malcolm Turnbull and Ian MacFarlane now have the right to sit down and discuss a set of agreed amendments with Penny Wong and Turnbull’s leadership is safe until at least the end of the year.  And while it’s not much Malcolm Turnbull will take any small mercies at the moment and they’re ones he has fought hard for.

Continue reading "This is the tiniest little victory of them all" »

Editor’s note: Malcolm Turnbull has a huge fight on his hands this Sunday when the Coalition has an extraordinary party room meeting to decide whether to negotiate with the Rudd Government on the Emissions Trading Scheme. Kevin Andrews is one of many Liberals who, contrary to Mr Turnbull, think the Bill should at least be delayed until after Copenhagen.

Let me pose a simple question about the ETS. By how much will the price of a litre of milk and a loaf of bread increase once the ETS is introduced?

And let me give you the simple answer: No-one knows! But increase in price they will, because Mr Rudd’s ETS is a tax on everything.

Continue reading "You wouldn’t let Rudd up the GST, so don’t accept his ETS" »

In conventional Wayne Swan fashion, he was triumphant as he unveiled Treasury’s stern rebuttal of Frontier Economics research report into an alternative emissions trading scheme.

Given the Rudd Government’s deeply flawed Carbon Pollution Reduction Scheme, the Coalition had commissioned the report in order to inform discussions about a better carbon trading scheme. But yesterday Mr Swan informed reporters that a $3.2 billion hole had been found in Frontier’s alternative by the Treasury Department.

So where is the modelling? Mr Swan has refused to release it and until he does, Treasury’s alleged rebuttal amounts to zip.

Continue reading "Hey Wayne, show me the money problem with our ETS" »

The reason the job of federal opposition leader is the toughest gig in politics, is not simply that it’s a hard thankless slog with endless headaches and slim prospects of success.

Or that outside the immediate pre-election period, you are largely irrelevant to voters. Sure, these aspects don’t make the job much fun, but at least they are relatively predictable.

No, the real reason is that to have any chance of success, you need a team focused on winning when in reality, you’re more likely to be heading up an ill-disciplined rabble.

Continue reading "The bitter irony for Turnbull’s leadership" »

One of the more infuriating moments in sport is when your opponent invites you to “look at the scoreboard’‘.

This smarmy gesture suggests a quick punch to the midriff might be called for but you know how that would end up. In politics, this “look at the scoreboard’’ taunt is delivered daily.

And it too produces some fairly self-destructive responses including infighting, silly public comments, and acts of straight-out treachery.

Continue reading "The score: Brendan Nelson, 1, Malcolm Turnbull, 0" »

The appointment of Brendan Nelson as Australia’s ambassador to NATO and the EU is good news for him and good news for Kevin Rudd, but it is an embarrassment for Malcolm Turnbull.

While Nelson maintains that there was no offer made prior decision to leave Parliament – the deal was apparently struck over a cup of tea after Nelson decided to leave Parliament with the Prime Minister and only finalised last week – it does cast his decision to leave Parliament early in an entirely new light.

In choosing to leave Parliament early Brendan Nelson has caused a headache for Malcolm Turnbull in having to hold a by-election for his seat of Bradfield, has dropped several mischievous bombs on coalition policy on ETS and is now going to work for the Government that only one year ago he was the leading the charge against.

Continue reading "Nelson just dropped the bomb on Malcolm" »

UPDATED 6:20 PM Following valedictory speech:

A dignified and teary eyed Brendan Nelson bid farewell to Parliament today, but as it’s also the anniversary of the end of his leaderhsip his ghost will be determined to haunt Malcolm Turnbull for quite a while yet.

Like Jacob Marley to Ebenezer Scrooge, tonight the ghost of Brendan Nelson will wake Malcolm Turnbull rustling pages of a complex ETS policy that he has been tasked with finding appropriate amendments on for eternity.

At the end of the apparition Nelson tosses the bundles to petrified Turnbull and tells him in a spooky whisper “of course you could do better couldn’t you?” – cue a screaming Turnbull who wakes up with a pile of ETS legislation at the end of his bed.

Continue reading "The ghost of Brendan Nelson will haunt Turnbull" »

We are in a very interesting time in politics where malleable positions are starting to solidify.

The position on the Government’s Save The World policy, the indomitable ETS or CPRS, the Cunning Plan to make the economy RS, will in the near future no doubt deliver us another acronym so we will have a form of rolling acronyms to keep the truth at bay all the way to the second vote in November.

All the polls on the ETS prior to this period have been rather pointless because no one knew what on earth it was beyond a thought bubble that they hoped would pop and go away.

Continue reading "People won’t cop a tax on food, so won’t buy the ETS" »

Don’t worry if you don’t understand what the ETS is supposed to do or what the letters even stand for. You’re not alone.

Peter had no idea what the letters E, T and S stood for when we asked him, but did manage his own summary of the policy:  ‘It’s gonna cost extra. You don’t get anything for free. Soon they will be taxing the air that we breathe.” Well they kinda are actually Pete, at least what we put into it.

With all the debate about Climate Change and the focus very much on the ETS, here at The Punch we decided it would be a good idea to go out and see what people actually knew about it.

Continue reading "Punch survey: 15% of us know what the ETS is" »

In 2007, Chris Goodall contended that walking may cause more environmental harm than driving.

A noted that a 5km drive would add 1kg of carbon to atmosphere while a walk would seemingly add nothing if you just looked at its direct effects. However, Goodall contended that for many people, they would need more energy to sustain a regular 5km walk. To make up the 180 calories would likely generate 3.6kg in carbon emissions. The trade-off wasn’t even close.

What is significant is that Goodall wasn’t some member of an anti-environmental think tank but himself a strong environmentalist and the author of How to Live a Low-Carbon Life.

And it was he who was suggesting, contrary to one of Al Gore’s dicta in An Inconvenient Truth, that substituting driving for physical transportation might not be environmentally-friendly at all; even if it is friendly to your physical health.

Continue reading "How and why the ETS could cost you" »

The debate over climate change is an odd one in that you have to back an argument of zealots on one side or the other to make a policy decision – middle ground is not really an option. 

You have to either accept that the there is such a thing as global warming caused by carbon emissions and is a threat to the planet and our lives or you don’t. Given that most of us don’t actually know anything about climate and weather we have to believe one or other group of people who claim they do.

The thing about the Emissions Trading Scheme as it stands is that neither side agrees that Kevin Rudd has it right, which, unlike most debates in this country, is an indicator you have it all pretty wrong.

Continue reading "The polite ETS that offends all and achieves nothing" »

The Rudd Labor Government was elected with a mandate to take action on climate change.  The Howard Government had been frozen in time while the world warmed around it for twelve long years. This was symbolic of the Howard Government’s failure to embrace a future agenda.

Our first action in Government was to ratify the Kyoto Protocol and gain a seat at the international negotiating table. We followed that up with a whole-of-government response which has included investment in public transport, increased support for renewables and the home insulation initiative.

At the centre of our response is the Carbon Pollution Reduction Scheme. This has been through an extensive process of development which has included a green paper, a white paper, an exposure draft and legislation that passed the House of Representatives months ago. This week we saw the future of the Liberal Party – and his name is Wilson Tuckey.

Continue reading "You’re in strife when Wilson Tuckey is setting the pace" »

Big retailers are scared, it was reported this morning, to say what they think about the checkout-counter effects of the Federal Government’s plan to help save the planet with its emissions trading scheme.

The supermarkets are worried they will enrage environmentally-conscious customers if they dare to so much as suggest there might be some unpleasant side-effects to the ETS.

In case you’ve missed it, The Australian reported retailers are worried the cost of groceries will go up, by about 5 per cent, under the Rudd Government’s plan.

Continue reading "Food for thought - will the ETS hit us at the checkout?" »

There’s a school of political thought that goes something along the lines of, if you say something loud enough and long enough it’ll stick in people’s heads – true or not.

It’s a calculated tactic embraced most fervently by practitioners of conservative politics, which probably reached its nadir in U.S. style attack ads such as the Swift Boat Veterans.

Mind you, this week’s efforts to smear Barack Obama as a granny-killer over his health care reforms and depict him as a socialist Joker are giving the Swift Boat Vets a run for their money.

Continue reading "Trying to stick non-designer labels on the government" »

Eighteen months ago, the world was in peril.

Ice shelves were melting and sea levels rising as a future threat to our cities.

Everyone from the G-8, Al Gore, Stern and Garnaut were warning us.

Continue reading "At least the states aren’t copping out on climate" »

Australians are inspired by the great mirror fields of solar energy in California and Nevada.  That vision is possible in Australia.  But it is a vision now at risk.

For over a year now, the government has delayed renewable energy legislation which would establish a 20% renewable energy target by 2020.  We have an end date but not a start date.

The renewable energy target was a promise made back in 2007.  Yet, here we are in the second half of 2009 without any debate on the legislation yet. 

Continue reading "Time for bipartisanship on renewable energy" »

We already have two classes of citizens in our country - those with shared loyalties having dual citizenships and those with only loyalty to Australia.

Only the latter can be elected to the Australian Parliament.

This shared loyalty concept raises interesting questions when someone commits a heinous crime or crimes in Australia.

Continue reading "On dual citizens, ETS hot air and the magic of the web" »

Whether you sit on the left or right side of the political spectrum, it is important the Australian public are aware of the coalition’s current agenda. It is an agenda which puts at risk everything this country has worked hard to achieve, including financial prosperity and security. It is an agenda which is self interested and is not in the best interests of this country.

The job of any opposition is to hold the government of the day to account and to stand up to legislation it believes is not in the best interest of the Australian people.

This is a job the Labor Party did extremely well towards the end of Howard’s reign as Prime Minister. However, since that fateful day on 24 November 2007, the Coalition has done nothing to help this country or hold the government to account.

Continue reading "How the Coalition gave up on the national interest" »

Malcolm Turnbull’s presentation on his plan B for an emissions trading scheme got a “gratifying grunt of approval” from his party room this morning - which is really the best he could have hoped for.

In fact he’s lucky the meeting did not get a lot worse than Wilson Tuckey’s outburst, he was angrily railing against any ETS whatsoever according to Coalition sources.

While on the one hand the Coalition has released the Frontier Economics report as plan B to the Government’s ETS legislation it is failing to commit to the plan as part of its own alternative. The Coalition is just setting itself up for a savaging of the kind it received from the Government in question time today.

Continue reading "Is it an ETS model, idiot?" »

Politicians are severely testing the patience of Australians on climate change.

It has taken more than a decade of wrangling for politicians to finally deliver some detailed policy to the floor of Parliament. Yet, when action appears close enough to touch, there is further delay or prospects of more unconditional handouts to big polluters.

An Auspoll survey taken last week shows that only 13 per cent think Australia’s Parliament is moving too fast on addressing climate change. Around half believe progress is too slow and only a solid, sceptical core of seven per cent thinks we should do nothing at all.

Continue reading "Enough! People are sick of dithering on climate change" »

Update 1pm: Ashleigh Gillon on Sky just said the MP who got up in party room and spoke in Turnbull’s defence got a standing ovation. That should make Malcolm feel a bit better.

Malcolm Turnbull had a particularly trying 13 or so minutes on the 7.30 Report last night. If you didn’t see it you can watch it here.

It started pretty badly for the Opposition leader and it was all down hill from there.

But it was just a light pre-game sparring session compared to what he’s likely to face in the joint Liberal/National party room meeting today. You could forgive Mr Turnbull for actually looking forward to Question Time, if only because if he makes it there he’s survived the meeting this morning.

Continue reading "7.30 smackdown a warmup bout for Coalition party room" »

The most baffling aspect to the entire debate surrounding the Carbon Pollution Reduction Scheme is how so many who agree on a problem can be so divided about the best solution.

With the exception of a few mavericks in the Nationals and the Liberals and one lone Senator from Family First, parliament accepts that the scientific debate is over.

Anthropogenic climate change presents us with the most pressing and complex policy problem humankind has faced. Ever. And personally, I can’t help wondering what planet climate change denialists are living on.

Continue reading "Rudd acting like a used car salesman over ETS" »

I’ve just spent a punishing 30 minutes reading Malcolm Turnbull’s climate change plan and I think I need a bit of a lie down. If you want a reasonably concise explanation of what it means here’s The Australian’s noble effort. The unedited and unfathomable version can be found here at the Liberals’ site.

These are the questions which struck me while reading it: Is Turnbull’s plan a sincere and reasoned attempt at compromise - and if so was Labor wrong to dismiss it out of hand?

Or is it purely an internal measure to silence his critics within the party - and if so should he butt out of the debate and let the government of the day exercise its mandate? We’ve asked some of the players to file, so there’s more to come but for now, over to you.

I recently rang my electricity company to discuss GreenPower. I knew I wanted 100% GreenPower but I didn’t want it now. I wanted it in January 2010. Right now, I want to do my bit to keep the government’s 2009 GreenPower baseline as low as possible – so my efforts towards emissions reductions really count.

‘Give me the dirtiest coal electricity you have,’ I said to the operator.

I explained that under the government’s proposed emissions trading scheme, me paying extra for GreenPower wouldn’t actually reduce Australia’s carbon emissions – beyond what would happen if I didn’t take any action at all.

Continue reading "Operator, give me the dirtiest electricity you’ve got" »

In 21 days, the Senate will vote on the Government’s climate change legislation that will – for the first time ever – turn the corner on rising carbon pollution in Australia.

.

This means Malcolm Turnbull has 21 days to get his party into shape on climate change.

We have seen a diverse parade of positions from the Liberal Party on climate change this week, not to mention the views put forward by their coalition partners in the National Party.

Continue reading "The Coalition don’t know what they’re doing on ETS" »

The Rudd Government, recognising that their Emissions Trading Scheme (ETS) is a lemon, has followed the same strategy as a car manufacturer and rebadged the product under the label of a Carbon Pollution Reduction Scheme (CPRS). 

They have not, however, improved the product nor does their ETS comply with its new label.  The ETS remains a process whereby the Government sells or gifts the right to continue polluting the atmosphere to those industries most notorious for so doing.  Rudd further expects to gain $11bn of Tax Revenue from the process.

He sells this proposal under the delusion that there will be a market based response from those so taxed, which will cause them to reduce their emissions. 

Continue reading "Malcolm, most Libs think you’re wrong on climate" »

The polls on climate change are in and Australia is speaking as one, in a consistent and unwavering voice, sending the government a clear message it ignores at its own peril. That message? “We don’t know”.

Over the past few months ‘Don’t Know’ has emerged from the pack to be the most popular answer to a series of questions around climate change posed in the weekly Essential Report. Where once we were clear on the need for decisive action to stop global warming, now we are all at (rising?) sea. And the source of our confusion can be summed up in the ugly little acronym, ETS. Here’s a snapshot from recent polls:

June 29: Should the Opposition vote in favour or against the Government’s ETS legislation? - 40 per cent Don’t Know
June 22: Is the Government’s ETS strong enough? – 47 per cent Don’t Know
June 15: Should the Greens support the ETS in the Senate? – 37 per cent Don’t Know

This collective confusion represents a victory for the climate change deniers, notably the industry groups who have created their own doomsday scenarios around job losses in carbon-reliant industries.

Continue reading "“Don’t knows” rising faster than the polar ice caps" »

Well I suppose there are so many things one could talk about this week but if we didn’t talk about the ETS being Emission Trading Scheme, or the Employment Termination Scheme depending on your opinion, then we would definitely be ignoring the political elephant in the room.

For Australians working in the productive section of the economy like our farmers and those working in the mining industry and are part of the economy that actually puts produce on the boat to pay for the standard of living in Australia, then for this scheme to have affect you will have to be affected.

China and the US have now got themselves into terminal mire as they try to work out how to look good without going broke.

Continue reading "Only winners from an ETS will be cashed-up traders" »

A review of the United States’ Waxman-Markey climate change bill by Australia’s Parliamentary Library has exposed some interesting facts on safeguarding industry.

Handed down on Monday, the parliamentary report on the US Emissions Trading Scheme (ETS) says: “Industries with proportionally high import or export values are potentially fully shielded from the scheme until the majority (greater than 70 per cent) of global production in that sector is subject to emissions pricing.

“The (Waxman-Markey) bill allows for up to 100 per cent compensation for all direct and indirect costs to industries that are assessed as emissions intensive and trade exposed.”

Continue reading "ETS will cost jobs - just ask Barack Obama" »

It’s supposed to be order in the House, but last week it was chaos in the House.

Why, because an inarticulate Prime Minister resorted to signs, pictures and placards to try and get his point across.

The Government from Mr Rudd down seems to be rattled, so when not using props both the Prime Minister and Deputy Prime Minister resort to personal abuse rather than just the usual political invective.

Continue reading "Kev the builder’s silly stunts turn chamber into chaos" »