Australian Senate votes against repealing the carbon tax
Senate votes to block carbon tax repeal legislation ABC News By political correspondent Emma Griffiths 20 March 14, The Senate has voted down legislation to axe the carbon tax – a core election promise of Prime Minister Tony Abbott.
After months of debate Labor and the Greens combined to vote against the repeal laws 33 votes to 29 today.Labor, which introduced the carbon pricing scheme in 2012, says the Coalition’s alternative policy to tackle climate change, called Direct Action, will be ineffective and too expensive.
“Without a credible alternative, Labor cannot support the abolition of the existing clean energy policies,” Opposition climate change spokesman Mark Butler said.Greens leader Christine Milne has issued a statement saying the current law, maintaining a price on carbon, must stand.”The Senate has rejected Tony Abbott’s do-nothing approach on global warming and voted to maintain the price on pollution,” she said.
The carbon pricing scheme was brought in by the Gillard Labor government, after extensive negotiations with the Greens, and currently charges polluters about $25 per tonne of carbon emissions……..
Earlier today, the Government had already reintroduced carbon tax-related legislation that could set the stage for a double dissolution election on the issue.The Coalition wants to axe the multi-billion-dollar Clean Energy Finance Corporation (CEFC) but the Senate rejected the legislation in December…….
The laws were brought back before Parliament this morning, and if voted down again would give the Government a trigger to call an election of both houses of Parliament……….http://www.abc.net.au/news/2014-03-20/senate-votes-to-block-carbon-tax-repeal-legislation/5334020
Palmer United Party to the rescue of Australia’s Renewable Energy Target?
Renewable Energy Target – Even Clive Palmer Gets It http://www.energymatters.com.au/index.php?main_page=news_article&article_id=4227 Australia’s renewable energy sector has perhaps found an unexpected ally in Clive Palmer and the Palmer United Party (PUP). After PUP’s WA candidate, Zhenya ‘Dio’ Wang, expressed support for the Renewable Energy Target to be left as is and labelled the controversial RET review a ”waste of taxpayers’ money”, Mr. Palmer backed Mr. Wang’s views and told Fairfax Media he was a supporter of renewable energy.
Grassroots solar advocacy groups Solar Citizens applauded Mr. Wang’s public statement of support for the RET.
“Mr Wang’s media release of earlier today, which acknowledged the importance of the renewable energy target (RET) and the jobs it creates, is great news for all solar loving West Australians” said Lindsay Soutar, National Director of Solar Citizens.
“WA Senate candidates need to understand that West Australians want more renewable energy, and that’s why all parties should reveal their position on solar and the RET before Western Australians go to the polls.”
The Australian Solar Council also congratulated Palmer United Party (PUP) for pledging their support for the Renewable Energy Target to stay exactly as it is. “Politicians know Australians love solar because it cuts household power bills. They know that supporting the Renewable Energy Target at the Senate election will deliver them votes,” said Australian Solar Council Chief Executive John Grimes.
“Not supporting the Renewable Energy Target will cost them votes.”
The Council says it will be publishing a preliminary solar scorecard in The West Australian on March 22 to show where the various players stand on the issue of solar. It will also be engaging a substantial TV advertising campaign in the lead up to the WA Senate election.
“More than 12,000 Australians (1,200 West Australians) would lose their jobs if the Renewable Energy Target was axed”, said Mr Grimes.
Close to 150,000 households in Western Australia have installed solar panelsand many more have expressed and interest in doing so. Under the Renewable Energy Target, support is provided for the purchase of systems.
Hooray, Labor Leader Bill Shorten speaks out on Climate Change
Bill Shorten vows to fight climate change deniers and conspiracy theorists The Age, March 17, 2014 James Massola Political correspondent Opposition Leader Bill Shorten has lashed out at the conspiracy theorists, keyboard warriors and social media trolls who have hijacked the debate about man-made climate change. There’s an important difference between tackling the misinformation peddled by climate change deniers, and stooping to their level.
And Mr Shorten has pledged to be a “disciple of science and innovation”, promising the Labor Party will encourage risk-taking and entrepreneurialism and warning “Australia can either get smarter or get poorer – we can choose to compete or give up”.
The Opposition Leader has been under sustained political pressure from the federal government to support the repeal of the carbon tax, but he has promised to vote against repeal if the alternative is the government’s Direct Action policy. He has also committed to taking a market-based system for pricing carbon to the 2016 election.
“Labor won’t be walking away from our action on climate change – or bowing to the will of a Prime Minister who offers cynical nostrums that emissions trading is rendered meaningless because it deals with an ‘invisible, odourless substance’,” he said.
Mr Shorten told the annual Science Meets Parliament conference in Canberra on Monday the climate change debate was a “cautionary tale for what happens if we abandon the field to the conspiracy theorists and keyboard warriors, the social media trolls and the angry shouts of talkback radio”.
“Too many of us took the popular support for action on climate change for granted,” he said.
“A mistake that has seen Australia move from a co-operative conversation on the best international method for dealing with the causes of climate change and mitigating against its effects to an argument poisoned by allegations of conspiracy and alarmist ‘warmism’.”… http://www.theage.com.au/federal-politics/political-news/bill-shorten-vows-to-fight-climate-change-deniers-and-conspiracy-theorists-20140317-34×01.html
Abbott govt shows its allegiance to BHP and Rio Tinto
Taxpayers fund $110m loan to venture run by BHP, Rio Tinto The Age, March 18, 2014 Peter Ker, James Massola Australian taxpayers will lend $US100 million ($110 million) to a mining joint venture run by BHP Billiton and Rio Tinto in Chile, under the latest funding deal by Australia’s controversial Export Finance and Insurance Corporation.
The loan to two of Australia’s largest and most profitable companies is being made despite recent criticism of EFIC by the Productivity Commission. It advised the corporation to focus more on small exporters who were unable to secure finance rather than wealthy multinationals.
It also comes at a sensitive time for the Abbott government, which has denied financial assistance to companies such as Alcoa and Holden, amid its campaign to ”end the age of entitlement”.
Under the terms of the latest loan, the $US100 million will be lent to a holding company called Minera Escondida Limitada, which is 57.5 per cent owned by BHP and 30 per cent owned by Rio. Japanese companies Mitsubishi and Nippon Mining own the rest…..http://www.theage.com.au/business/mining-and-resources/taxpayers-fund-110m-loan-to-venture-run-by-bhp-rio-tinto-20140317-34y5u.html
Labor’s miserable silence on Climate Change
Bill Shorten was right when he called it a defining issue for our parliament and our nation. It’s also a defining issue for Labor, and for 
him
Climate change bad guys apply heat to Labor, The Age March 14, 2014 Gay Alcorn While the vocal sceptics have free rein on climate change, Labor is disturbingly quiet. “……..The conservative Lord Deben, the head of Globe International which assesses climate laws worldwide, told the Financial Times last month that the Australian government’s policies were ”so unintellectual as to be unacceptable; I mean it is just amazing”. Of its survey of 66 countries, Australia was one of only two winding back climate change laws.
But what of Labor, whose supporters and parliamentary members overwhelmingly do accept the mainstream science and the need to take strong measures to minimise damage to our economy and our way of life?
[Bernie] Fraser’s criticism of the ALP stings because Labor lacks the excuse of ignorance or the hard right’s conviction that climate change is a left-wing plot to destroy capitalism. Continue reading
Awkward for Abbott govt – nuclear power will need carbon tax!
This is interesting stuff for Tony Abbott’s conservative government. Many of his advisors favour nuclear
if Abbott was ever to entertain nuclear as a serious option – it could only do so by abandoning the idea of a cheap fuel source, accepting the need for loan guarantees, and for a carbon price.
UK nuclear power plant builders want higher carbon tax http://reneweconomy.com.au/2014/uk-nuclear-power-plant-builders-want-higher-carbon-tax-28916 By Giles Parkinson on 12 March 2014
The Telegraph in the UK is reporting that EdF, the mostly French government owned nuclear giant that is proposing to build the $26 billion Hinkley Point C, is now pushing the UK government to increase its carbon tax so the financials for the first nuclear plant in the UK for nearly three decades adds up. Continue reading
South Aust election: Mr Van Den Brink candidate for Fisher opposes import of nuclear wastes
By Dennis Matthews, 11 Mar 14 Three to four weeks ago I sent a questionnaire to the candidates in Fisher. Of the five candidates only Bob Such and Daryl Van Den Brink responded.
On the issue of expanding the nuclear industry in South Australia, both candidates wanted more debate on nuclear power and uranium enrichment but Mr Van Den Brink was opposed to importing nuclear waste.
In relation to electricity, Mr Van Den Brink supported the feed-in tariff for electricity from solar cells, tighter regulation of the electricity network business, and government incentives for energy efficient homes. He opposed making exporters of solar electricity pay more for the electricity network or higher tariff for users of air conditioners. Dr Such considered that the National Electricity Market needed an overhaul.
Dr Such opposed recent changes to the South Australian Electoral Act but Mr Van Den Brink opposed only the increased nomination fees.
Neither candidate supported an official apology to Aboriginal people for past injustices. Mr Van Den Brink wanted more debate, whilst Dr Such supported alternative measures.
Liberal leader in Tasmania will fight Abbott govt’s push to remove Renewable Energy Target
As Rare as Tassie Tiger: Coalition leader advocates renewable energy REneweconomy By Giles Parkinson on 5 March 2014 Last weekend was an exciting one for the Australian renewable energy industry: a sighting as rare as the Tasmanian Tiger, an Australian conservative political leader willing to talk out in support of renewables. They were thought to be extinct.
Tasmania’s Liberal leader Will Hodgman, seeking to get elected in a state poll on March 15, told The Australian on the weekend that he would fight Tony Abbott’s attempts to dilute or remove the renewable energy target.
He planned a “strong” push to ensure RET changes did not stymie the state’s key wind and hydro energy sectors.
Naturally, his position was welcomed by the Clean Energy Council, which pointed out that renewables will be a useful hedge against surging gas prices, and the current review is causing uncertainty for investors that want to back major solar, wind, bioenergy, hydro and other projects.
“Mr Hodgman clearly recognises the benefits renewable energy has brought to Tasmania,” CEC CEO David Green said in a statement. “The Apple Isle sources the majority of its power from renewables such as hydro, wind and solar.”
That Hodgman’s position is at odds with his colleagues on the mainland could be explained by the fact that, unlike other states such as Victoria, NSW, Queensland, and Western Australia, Tasmania is not beholden to a powerful domestic fossil fuel industry. It is no accident that the areas with the most progressive renewables policy, Tasmania, South Australia and the ACT, are those where the fossil fuel industry is non existent or not powerful………. http://reneweconomy.com.au/2014/rare-tassie-tiger-coalition-leader-advocates-renewable-energy-28150
Preference fixing for the South Australian election
The Editor The Advertiser from Dennis Matthews, 2 March 14 John Patterson has the right idea (The Advertiser, 1/3/14), there is a lack of transparency in what happens to our vote in the Legislative Council.
However it is not as simple as requiring the minor parties and independents to let us know how their preferences are distributed. This is already done and the information can be found on the South Australian Electoral Commission’s website.
The problem is that some candidates participate in a preference fixing cartel, the members of which agree to give preferences to each other. On their own, none of the cartel members are likely to get a seat, but together they are assured of enough votes for at least one member of the cartel to get a seat.
You would think that preference fixing would be illegal, but it is not, and recent changes to the Electoral Act have not solved the problem but instead gave the Liberal-Labor duopoly an equally anti-competitive advantage in the House of Assembly.
Abbott govt ignores Chief Scientist, takes advice from climate denier
Tony Abbott’s scientific and business advisers at odds over climate change, Guardian 28 Feb 14, Chief scientist says it is not an illusion while head of PM’s business advisory group refers to ‘groupthink’ Tony Abbott’s top scientific and business advisers are at odds over the science of climate change with the chief scientist, Ian Chubb, strongly rejecting assertions that climate science is a “delusion” or a result of “groupthink”.
Chubb said the scientific evidence for human-induced global warming was so overwhelming that those who reject it are usually forced to “impugn the messenger” with “stupid expressions like ‘groupthink’” or “silly” arguments that global warming is a “delusion”.
Among those who have used the phrase “groupthink” in relation to the debate about climate science are the head of the prime minister’s business advisory group, Maurice Newman, and the man chosen by the prime minister to head the review of the renewable energy target, businessman Dick Warburton. Two months ago Newman wrote a newspaper article describing climate science as a “scientific delusion”.
Chubb, who as chief scientist is supposed to provide high-level independent advice to the prime minister and other ministers, was speaking at the launch of the final report on Australia’s greenhouse gas reduction efforts by the independent climate change authority, a body the Abbott government is seeking to abolish.
“Climate science is one of the most heavily scrutinised areas of science I have ever experienced,” said Chubb.
“The overwhelming bulk of it has stood the test of that scrutiny … I find a lot of the science compelling.”…
The chairman of the climate change authority, Bernie Fraser, a former governor of the Reserve Bank, said he agreed with Chubb’s assessment of the compelling nature of climate science and said he thought those who did not accept it were either “mavericks at the fringes” or “those who speak in the short-term interests of industry”.
And Fraser also took issue with the “uncivilised” nature of Australia’s climate debate, including “the wild assertions blaming every lost job on the carbon tax … assertions not based on any objective consideration of the evidence”. http://www.theguardian.com/environment/2014/feb/27/abbotts-advisers-at-odds-climate-change
Bizarre election in South Australia, rigged by Liberal-Labor duopoly
Dennis Matthews, 27 Feb 14, Thanks to dangerously defective changes to the Electoral Act rushed through the South Australian Parliament at the last minute by the Liberal-Labor duopoly, organized harvesting of preferences in the 2014 Legislative Council elections appears to be in full swing.
This “gaming” of the system produces unpredictable preference flows such as those that gave bizarre results in the recent Senate elections.
It is highly likely that gaming will result in the balance of power being held by a party that the vast majority of voters had no intention of electing to the Legislative Council.
Thanks to the Liberal-Labor duopoly, governing South Australia could soon become more difficult.
Support Independents in South Australian election
The Editor. The Advertiser from Dennis Matthews, 25 Feb 14 Now that the positions on the Legislative Council ballot paper have been chosen by lottery people are starting to become aware of something very odd.
Apparently by chance, all the independents are listed at the end of the ballot paper. This is not bad luck but a deliberate act of the Liberal-Labor duopoly.
This discriminatory act , like the large increases in nomination fees and large increases in nominators required for each independent nominee, appears designed to marginalize independents.
However the duopoly may have done the voters a favour because it is now easier to find the independents amongst the 25 groups listed from A to Y on the ballot paper. The independents are those listed at the end of the ballot paper from O to Y.
If you feel that the Liberal-Labor duopoly have abused their power through undemocratic changes, at very short notice, to the Electoral Act then you can show your disgust by voting for one of the independents listed in the columns O to Y.
Now that the positions on the Legislative Council ballot paper have been chosen by lottery people are starting to become aware of something very odd.
Apparently by chance, all the independents are listed at the end of the ballot paper. This is not bad luck but a deliberate act of the Liberal-Labor duopoly.
This discriminatory act , like the large increases in nomination fees and large increases in nominators required for each independent nominee, appears designed to marginalize independents.
However the duopoly may have done the voters a favour because it is now easier to find the independents amongst the 25 groups listed from A to Y on the ballot paper. The independents are those listed at the end of the ballot paper from O to Y.
If you feel that the Liberal-Labor duopoly have abused their power through undemocratic changes, at very short notice, to the Electoral Act then you can show your disgust by voting for one of the independents listed in the columns O to Y.
Labor-Liberal skullduggery in coming South Australian election
To The Editor The Advertiser, 25 Feb 14
from Dennis Matthews
Nominations for the March 15 state elections have now closed and the magnitude of the Labor-Liberal skullduggery are now clearer.
The recent changes to the Electoral Act have failed to do anything about voting problems in the Legislative Council. The voting paper will still be very large, comprising some 25 columns. If you want to vote below the line you will have to correctly number some 63 boxes.
There are 20 micro parties or groups of independents totaling some 40 candidates, many of whom will be involved in preference deals that have outcomes that even experienced political commentators will be unable to decipher. Most of these candidates will lose their $3000 deposit, netting the state government a handy $120,000.
Meanwhile in the House of Assembly, for which the voting paper was straightforward, democracy has been dealt a serious blow. Thanks to the exorbitant nomination deposit the number of micro parties and non-sitting independents has been decimated.
Abbott’e review panel is stacked against renewable energy !
Renewable Energy Target Review Panel – Further Doubts http://www.energymatters.com.au/index.php?main_page=news_article&article_id=4191 25 Feb 14, The Federal Government promised an open and transparent RET review – but to some it’s appearing as a rigged game from the get-go.
The Sydney Morning Herald reports former Caltex chairman and climate change sceptic Dick Warburton, who is leading the panel, has declined to comment on whether he or his family hold any interests in fossil-fuel companies that might benefit from a reduction in the Renewable Energy Target.
It’s also been revealed that while Environment Minister Greg Hunt said all panel members had completed private interests declarations, “as is required to identify potential conflicts of interest,” Shirley In’t Veld, said she had not been asked to make such a disclosure.
Professor Ross Garnaut, economist and former advisor to the Labor Government, believes the Climate Change Authority should be carrying out the Review. According to RenewEconomy, Professor Garnaut believes the current panel is “comprised of people who have neither the independent status, nor the professional capacity of the executive in the CCA”.
Greens Leader Senator Christine Milne has labelled the Review a “hatchet job” and an “anti-renewable energy review”. Others have expressed similar sentiments.
The Small-scale Renewable Energy Scheme (SRES), a component of the RET, will have zero net cost impact on household power bills. Even so, the continuation of the program after the Review is anything but assured given the circumstances under which the Review is occurring; including recurring negative signals from Prime Minister Abbott.
The Review is already having somewhat of a dampening effect on Australia’s renewable energy industry, with some large scale projects being put on hold until the results are in and actions decided.
If the RET is abolished, up to 6,750 solar PV jobs could be lost and foregone nationally in under 5 years says the Australian Solar Council. If the RET remains unchanged, approximately 30,000 more jobs in the renewables sector will be created and another $18.7 billion in investment will occur.
Conflict of interest in Abbott’s panel to review Renewable Energy Target ?
Mr Warburton declined to say whether he or his family held any interest in fossil-fuel companies that might benefit from a reduction in the renewable energy target.
The Abbott government’s handling of the RET review may come under Senate Estimates scrutiny on Monday
‘
‘I have zero confidence in the independence or rigour of this anti-renewable energy review,” Greens leader Senator Christine Milne said. ”It is no more than a hatchet job on the RET by a team of people notorious for their opposition to strong action on global warming or the roll-out of renewables.”
Disclosure doubts cloud renewable energy target panellists, February 24, 2014 – Peter Hannam Environment Editor, The Sydney Morning Herald Doubts have arisen over potential conflicts of interests of a controversial panel appointed by the Abbott government to review the Renewable Energy Target after contradictory statements about the process used to select its members.
The appointment last week of former Caltex chairman and prominent climate change sceptic Dick Warburton to head the panel had already ignited fears in the renewable energy sector that the government intends to slash the target of sourcing at least 20 per cent of electricity from clean energy sources by 2020. Continue reading
1 This month
17 October, Free Public Talk on Nuclear Issues in South Australia
David Noonan will speak on public interest concerns over the new Roxby Downs Indenture Act 2026 on BHP copper-uranium mining and ore processing in SA, and on how AUKUS may face SA with a High-Level nuclear waste agenda.
Dr Jim Green will discuss international developments in the field of nuclear power including ‘small modular reactors’ and Generation 4 ‘advanced’ nuclear reactor concepts.
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