Federal govt watering down Aboriginal land rights, betrayal by Minister for Aboriginal Affairs Nigel Scullion
Northern Land Council accuses Senator Nigel Scullion of breaking election promise on land rights, ABC News By the National Reporting Team’s Kate Wild 11 Dec 14 Australia’s largest Aboriginal land council has accused Minister for Aboriginal Affairs Nigel Scullion of breaking a promise that the Coalition, if it won government, would not review or amend the Land Rights Act.
Holding a copy of Senator Scullion’s press release, titled No changes to NT Land Rights and dated August 14, 2013, Northern Land Council (NLC) deputy chairman John Daly accused the Minister of proposing a review of land rights legislation without the consent of traditional owners.
“Prior to him getting in as the Minister, this here says he wasn’t going to do any reviews or anything like that without the consent of traditional owners and the land council,” he said.
Really there isn’t, and hasn’t been, any conversation with Aboriginal people about the future of the Land Rights Act.
Joe Morrison, NLC chief executive
“And this is just another broken promise from this government.”
The comments were made today at a full council meeting that Senator Scullion did not attend………..
NLC’s questions are ‘pressing for the nation’
NLC chief executive Joe Morrison said council members wanted to put questions to the Minister they believed were “pressing for the nation”.
These included Federal Government plans to water down the Land Rights Act, pressure on Aboriginal towns to sign 99 year leases, and the Federal Government’s use of Aboriginal money earned from mining royalties, he said.…………. Continue reading
Lima talks drag on: rich nations slow to help poor countries address climate change
Lima climate summit extended as poor countries demand more from rich, Guardian, Suzanne Goldenberg in Lima 12 Dec 14 Leaders of rich nations have been lampooned by environment activists at the Lima talks, but developing countries are also frustrated by their apparent lack of commitment.
Talks stumble amid rising frustration over ‘ridiculously low’ cash commitments offered by rich nations to help pay for emissions cuts Climate talks in Lima ran into extra time amid rising frustration from developing countries at the “ridiculously low” commitments from rich countries to help pay for cuts in greenhouse gas emissions.
The talks – originally scheduled to wrap up at 12pm after 10 days – are now expected to run well into Saturday , as negotiators huddle over a new draft text many glimpsed for the first time only morning.
The Lima negotiations began on a buoyant note after the US, China and the EU came forward with new commitments to cut carbon pollution. But they were soon brought back down to earth over the perennial divide between rich and poor countries in the negotiations: how should countries share the burden for cutting greenhouse gas emissions, and who should pay?
The talks were designed to draft a blueprint for a global deal to fight climate change, due to be adopted in Paris late next year. But developing countries argued that before signing on they needed to see greater commitments that the industrialised countries would keep to their end of a bargain to provide the money needed to fight climate change. After 10 days of talks, developing countries argued that those assurances were not strong enough.
By midweek, a little over $10bn had been raised for a green climate fund, intended to help poor countries invest in clean energy technology. That was below the initial target of $15bn and many of those funds will be distributed over several years………http://www.theguardian.com/environment/2014/dec/12/lima-climate-change-talks-stumble-cash-emissions-cuts
Audio: Abbott cuts foreign aid, again, transfers money to UN climate fund
AUDIO: Green fund contribution comes at expense of aid budget ABC Radio PM David Mark reported this story on Wednesday, December 10, 2014 1 MARK COLVIN: There’s been a tentative welcome for the Australian Government’s announcement that it would contribute $200 million to the UN’s climate fund.The catch is that the money will come from Australia’s international aid budget.
The announcement by the Foreign Minister, Julie Bishop, in Lima came on the same day that a coalition of aid groups implored the Federal Government not to cut the aid budget any more.
Australia’s foreign aid budget has already been cut by $7 billion over the next five years and the fear is there could be more to come in the mini-budget.
David Mark reports. DAVID MARK: They came together in Melbourne to demand the Federal Government stop cutting foreign aid. A mass meeting of businessmen and women, the chairmen and CEO’s of Australia’s major aid organisations.
And one by the likes of Gerry Hueston, the former president of BP Australia and chairman of Plan Australia, George Savvides, the CEO of Medibank Private and chairman of World Vision Australia and Simon McKeon, the former Australian of the year, chairman of AMP and chairman of Global Poverty Australia, spoke out.
GERRY HUESTON: As someone who’s worked internationally all my life, I find it inconceivable that one of the richest countries in the world can’t do at least its bit in foreign aid, you know, when you’re supporting some of the poorest people in the world.
GEORGE SAVVIDES: The Australian aid budget has already been cut twice, it already has contributed well above its weight in terms of a fiscal responsibilities in front of us and also in terms of the consideration by government. But really its purpose isn’t to save dollars, its purpose is to save lives.
SIMON MCKEON: These are times to be very careful about what we spend and what we don’t spend, but I’ve got to say as an Australian I am struggling at the moment with the possibility that the aid cuts that were announced earlier this year may well be further cut in the New Year……..http://www.abc.net.au/pm/content/2014/s4146238.htm
Recognition in our region that Australia’s uranium deal with India is not safe
Indo-Oz N-deal under cloud: Ex-Aussie chief N-watchdog “warns” pact lacks safeguards, South Asia Times 12 Dec 14 The International Business Times (IBT), Australia, has reported that Australia’s uranium deal with India has come under severe scrutiny following warning of a former Aussie chief atomic watchdog that the treaty “did not have all the safeguards necessary to prevent India from fuelling its nuclear bombs.” The top business paper said, while the treaties committee of the Australian Parliament was “urged” to endorse the deal signed by Australian Prime Minister Tony Abbott with Prime Minister Narendra Modi in September, enabling exports of uranium to begin, things seem to be changing now.
Reporting the development, the paper said, John Carlson, former head of Australia’s nuclear safeguards organisation, told the Parliament committee recently that “the nuclear weapons programme of India is expanding with complex links to non-government reactors”. Basing on what Carlson told the Parliament committee, the paper quotes unidentified analysts to say that there is “fear” that the warning may become a reason for the Australian Labour Party to “scale back its support” to the nuclear deal……….. http://www.southasiatimes.com.au/news/?p=5275
Huge majority of Australians back solar and wind energy
Solar and wind energy backed by huge majority of Australians, poll shows, The Guardian, Oliver Milman, 9 Dec 14 Renewables among top three energy choices and a separate review debunks fears of health damage from wind turbines Solar and wind energy enjoy strong support from the Australian public, with 80% of people putting them both among their top three energy choices in a poll for the Australia Institute.
By contrast, coal and coal seam gas were chosen by 35% and 38% of those polled as being among the best three future energy sources.
A separate review of medical literature by the Australia Institute debunked the fear that wind power damaged people’s health, finding “no credible evidence” directly linking exposure to turbines with negative health effects.
The poll of more than 1,400 people showed that solar was the popular energy choice of the future, cited by 63% of respondents. Nine out of 10 people said they wanted more solar energy. Six in 10 people said they were concerned about the impact of coal and coal seam gas on the landscape.
Despite this apparent desire for renewables – as well as the country’s vast capacity for such energy – the Australia Institute report states that Australia now produces “only the world average level” of solar energy.
While the production of solar PV panels is relatively energy intensive, the report concedes, solar’s output of greenhouse gases, and its impact on air quality, is completely overshadowed by the burning of coal.
Wind has the potential to supply 40% of Australia’s energy needs, the report says, but the industry has been blighted by the “considerable attention” placed on the perceived health effects of wind turbines.
The Australia Institute points out that the National Health and Medical Research Council recently conducted a review of the scientific literature on the connection between windfarms and health and found there was “no consistent association between adverse health effects and estimated noise from wind turbines”……….http://www.theguardian.com/environment/2014/dec/08/solar-wind-energy-sources-huge-majority-australians-poll-shows
Australian businesses lose $millions as action on renewable energy is delayed
RET Impasse Costing Australian Renewables Millions http://www.energymatters.com.au/renewable-news/ret-impasse-cost-em4594/ December 11, 2014 Energy Matters The Federal Government’s drawn-out review of Australia’s Renewable Energy Target is costing the sector between $400 and $500 million a year in lost investment, according to the Clean Energy Council.
An analysis by the CEC says the ongoing impasse will continue to wreak more than $400 million of damage every year to renewable energy projects already operating.
CEC Chief Executive Kane Thornton said the RET had delivered $10 billion worth of investment in large-scale projects to date; investments made in good faith that the legislated target would continue unchanged.
“A breakdown in that bipartisanship has had a material impact on the market confidence in the policy and is affecting the revenue that flows to those projects,” Mr Thornton said.
“We are staring down the barrel of job losses, business closures, negative financial effects on the $10 billion of renewable energy projects already operating, and a halt in the development of new large-scale renewable energy projects across the country.”
Referring to 2014 as a dark year for large scale renewables, Mr. Thornton points out more than $2 billion was invested in 2013, but the first three quarters of this year has seen a comparatively paltry $238 million invested – directly the result of the Federal Government’s apparent determination to gut the RET.
“If the government is genuine about its intent to resolve the current political impasse, move beyond its previous position and support a target that delivers a strong future for renewable energy in Australia, we would encourage Labor to return to negotiations,” said Mr. Thornton.n November, the ALP walked away from negotiations with the Federal Government that would have resulted in the dilution of the RET.
The CEC briefing paper “Lost opportunity and big costs: The impact of an unresolved RET review” can be downloaded here.
A very recent example of the impact the situation is having is in the NSW Southern Tablelands where a fourth generation farmer had hit tough times – and wind turbines were to be his saviour. However, with the continuing RET uncertainty,the farmer may still have to sell his property – one that has been in his family for four generations. This particular situation goes beyond this single farmer’s woes, with jobs and investment in the local region also at stake.
In October, a major wind turbine tower manufacturer in Victoria announced it will be shedding 100 jobs; partly due to the RET situation.
Even where concessions have been made concerning the RET, there still appears to be a great deal of devil in the detail. Yesterday, ClimateSpectator reported Environment Minister Hunt’s office communicated that “solar up to 100kw is proposed to stay in the SRES due to the red tape that would be involved if it moved into the LRET.”
There had been fears commercial solar would be lumped in with the large-scale target. Even this good news came with a potential barb. It’s unclear if up-front deeming will remain; i.e. whether the full government subsidy will continue to be made available upfront when a system is installed; rather than incrementally as the power is generated – as is the case with projects under the LRET
Australians wimped out, lost our chance to be a global solar energy leader
The renewable energy boom is coming, but Australians are too gutless to lead the way, WA Today, December 10, 2014 Julian Cribb
Government after government of technological illiterates is holding us back from being true champions of renewable energy. Problem is, we elected them to do just that.
In the Olympics of energy, Australia just won two gold medals. Martin Green at the University of NSW announced his team had cracked a world-beating 40.4 per cent efficiency in solar cells, and a solar racing car designed by the university’s engineering students set a new world record of 107km/h over 500 kilometres.
Yet here we are, undisputed world front-runners in solar efficiency, poised to abandon or water down our own target for renewable energy. And, as builders of the world’s finest solar-racing machine, dismantling our car industry.
There is a global boom in renewable energy coming down, and sun-drenched, wind-rich, tide-girt, hot-rocking, algae-pulsing Australia is doing all it can to miss it.
If this was sport, there’d be a national outcry. Coaches’ heads would roll like Jaffas. Governments would topple. Huge new taxpayer subsidies would pour into training, facilities, equipment, staff, junior development, research. The media would be engulfed in a tsunami of soul-searching, breast-beating and unsubstantiated opinion.
But it isn’t sport. It’s science and technology. You know, the stuff that generates prosperity, defines human progress and keeps our economy efficient and competitive.
The media of late has been thick with opinion polls and opinions to the effect that the problem is the Prime Minister, Tony Abbott. But what if this isn’t true? What if the problem is actually us?
Abbott is a convenient scapegoat, but it is no good trying to pretend that we didn’t elect him, or his predecessors. We are the ones who are choosing the governments, and the political types, that we deserve. We are the mugs who willingly suspended disbelief when told things that, with hindsight, were simply incredible.
The disillusion of Australians with politics, exemplified in the current comic-opera Senate house, is in fact a symptom of a deeper malaise. A nation that has lost its way. A people who, basking in wealth for which few of them had to work, have simply lost the knack of making it or of sharing it even relatively equitably…………
Years ago, not long before he died, I interviewed one of our great physicists, Sir Mark Oliphant. Mark was known to most Aussies for his role in the Manhattan project, but his major scientific contribution was the discovery of the element tritium, which led to our current understanding of the potentiality of nuclear fusion. Mark recounted to me that in his boyhood in the 1910s he roamed far and free in South Australia’s Flinders Ranges – and anyone who has ever done that will be forcibly impressed by how many photons drop on you out of a clear blue sky, the energy emitted by the fusion reaction in the sun. From his early career, Mark was convinced that solar fusion, in one form or another, was the answer to Australia’s future energy needs, and their entirety could be met from a rather small area of collectors…………..
in Australia we have compounded that by electing government after government of technological illiterates, who believe the first thing that some rich lobby group tells them, rather than the impartial scientists who can show them the objectivelyvalidated facts.
Worldwide, use of solar power has been doubling every two years for the past 30, as costs fall and efficiency rises. If that rate of growth is sustained, solar alone can supply the Earth’s entire energy needs in less than 20 years, US analyst Ray Kurzweil suggests. In Germany, Spain, Portugal and the southwest US, solar electricity is already market-competitive with other sources. According to Australia’s Climate Council, 144 countries worldwide now have solar energy targets – while our chosen government is doing its best to scrap or disable ours……….
Put bluntly, there is a global boom in renewable energy coming down, and sun-drenched, wind-rich, tide-girt, hot-rocking, algae-pulsing Australia is doing all it can to miss it. http://www.watoday.com.au/comment/the-renewable-energy-boom-is-coming-but-australians-are-too-gutless-to-lead-the-way-20141210-122ikf.html
1 This month
of the week – Disrupting War & Militarism in Oceania. Active solidarity. Radical practice.
Antinuclear 