If elected, Tony Abbott will find it hard to dismantle Clean Energy Finance Corporation (CEFC)

Greens find clean energy sticking point SMH, September 4, 2013 Paul Osborne, AAP Senior Political Writer A federal coalition government won’t be able to immediately stop clean energy grants being paid out without amending legislation, the Australian Greens say. Opposition Leader Tony Abbott has said if the coalition wins the election on Saturday it will order the Clean Energy Finance Corporation (CEFC) to stop paying out grants and then abolish the $10 billion fund.

But Greens Leader Christine Milne has received advice from the Clerk of the Senate showing Mr Abbott and finance spokesman Andrew Rodd can’t stop the corporation carrying out its work without the parliament amending legislation. “Mr Abbott and Mr Robb are arrogantly assuming they can usurp the role of the parliament to direct the CEFC to halt its legislative function. They can’t,” Senator Milne told the National Press Club.

“Only the parliament can repeal the carbon price and only the parliament can stop the roll out of renewable energy by the CEFC.” She said that was why voters should support the Greens on election day.

“We will protect the environment, address global warming and continue Australia’s path to a clean energy economy,” she said in Canberra on Wednesday. Senate clerk Rosemary Laing said in her written advice a minister could decline to authorise payments to the CEFC “and so starve them of funds”.

“However, a minister who declined to carry out a statutory function … contrary to the will of the parliament, would risk serious legal consequences, in addition to any legal action that could arise if lack of funding led to defaulting on specific contracts,” she wrote.

“It seems unlikely, in my view, that any government would contemplate such a course of action……. http://news.smh.com.au/breaking-news-national/greens-find-c

1.This month

For international nuclear news go to https://nuclear-news.net/

THE HUMAN EFFECTS OF THE NUCLEAR INDUSTRY – theme for June 2019.

Before we enter “a new nuclear age” – learn from the newly declassified Chernobyl health records April 7, 2019

Fortunately, Chernobyl health records are now available to the public. They show that people living in the radioactive traces fell ill from cancers, respiratory illness, anaemia, auto-immune disorders, birth defects, and fertility problems two to three times more frequently in the years after the accident than before. In a highly contaminated Belarusian town of Veprin, just six of 70 children in 1990 were characterised as “healthy”. The rest had one chronic disease or another. On average, the Veprin children had in their bodies 8,498 bq/kg of radioactive caesium (20 bq/kg is considered safe).

For decades, researchers have puzzled over strange clusters of thyroid cancer, leukaemia and birth defects among people living in Cumbria, which, like southern Belarus, is an overlooked hotspot of radioactivity from cold war decades of nuclear bomb production and nuclear power accidents.

Currently, policymakers are advocating a massive expansion of nuclear power as a way to combat climate change. Before we enter a new nuclear age, the declassified Chernobyl health records raise questions that have been left unanswered about the impact of chronic low doses of radioactivity on human health.

Chernobyl’s disastrous cover-up is a warning for the next nuclear age

https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2019/apr/04/chernobyl-nuclear-power-climate-change-health-radioactivity, Kate Brown , 5 Apr 19, Before expanding nuclear power to combat climate change, we need answers to the global health effects of radioactivity

https://www.3cr.org.au/radioactive

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Australian news, and some related international items