David Noonan confronts Australia’s politicians with critical unanswered questions on the AUKUS agreement – will they pretend not to hear this?
Federal Labor has failed to inform the SA community of the Health risks they face in imposed N-Subs at Port Adelaide and failed to carry out required nuclear accident Health Impact Studies.
AUKUS aims Australia buy existing US military nuclear reactors in second-hand N-Subs that are to be up to 10-12 years old, loaded with intractable US origin High-Level nuclear wastes that are also weapons usage fissile materials – and remain as Bomb Fuel long after decommissioning.
AUKUS will aim to compulsorily acquire and declare a High-Level nuclear waste dump site, with override of State laws through this Bill, long before the 2032 first purchase of a second-hand US N-Sub.
This Inquiry should respect and investigate the ‘Right to Know’ of affected Communities and Indigenous People facing federal imposed nuclear risks in an AUKUS Agreement requiring HighLevel nuclear waste & nuclear weapons usable fissile material storage and disposal facilities:
It is not credible for the JSCT to over rely on an AUKUS proponent in Defence Minister Marles.
Submission no. 154
Submission to Joint Standing Committee on Treaties Inquiry into the AUKUS 2.0 Agreement:
‘Agreement among the Government of Australia, the Government of the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland, and the Government of the United States of America for Cooperation Related to Naval Nuclear Propulsion’.
Public Input by Mr David J. Noonan B.Sc., M.Env.St.
Independent Environment Campaigner 1 September 2024 https://www.aph.gov.au/Parliamentary_Business/Committees/Joint/Treaties/NuclearPropulsion/Submissions
RE: National Interest, Public Safety and Indigenous Consent are compromised as the Agreement imposes N-Subs risks and untenable AUKUS military High-Level nuclear waste & nuclear weapons usable fissile material on all future generations of Australians
Dear Secretary
This Inquiry into ‘the Agreement’ (Washington, dated 4 August) goes to fundamental matters of public interest through the powers, imprimatur and pathway this AUKUS Agreement provides to an unfolding Federal Labor agenda to impose nuclear powered submarine (N-Subs) risks and nuclear reactor wastes (N-wastes), with serious consequences for Civil Society and Indigenous People in Australia.
Please consider this Public Submission, the Recommendations provided (see p.10-12) and Discussion (p.13).
I also request an opportunity to give Evidence as a Witness in a Hearing (see my Relevant Background, p.14).
This public input focuses on serious N-Sub reactor accident risks and N-waste impacts due to this AUKUS Agreement:
First: N-Subs inherent nuclear reactor accident risks & impacts are imposed on Australian Port communities without their informed consent, while the US is granted Indemnity.
Port communities face Evacuation and persons may require ‘decontamination’ and medical treatment, while children require Stable Iodine Tablets to lessen the risk of Thyroid cancer.
Second: untenable AUKUS military High-Level nuclear waste & nuclear weapons usable fissile materials are recklessly imposed as an uncosted liability on all future generations.
Continue readingChristopher Busby: New study: the cause of the cancer epidemic
15 Sept 2024, https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kMauRgvWnII
Dr Busby presents the results of a study which he carried out to identify the cause of the cancer epidemic which began in 1980. He compared cancer death rates between high fallout and low fallout States in the USA looking for an effect which identified the period of birth of the ten year age groups.
The result showed an astonishing cancer risk effect centred around the peak years of atmospheric test fallout, 1955 to 1965. The result showed a 50% excess risk of dying of cancer in the 55-64 year olds who were born during the fallout years. A earlier version of the study, whic he carried out in 2021 was presented in the journal BMJ Oncology in 2023 and can be found online. Link is https://bmjoncology.bmj.com/content/e…
What this means, he explains, is that it is likely that there is a significant probability that you, or anyone you know who has developed cancer, is a victim of the atmospheric test fallout contamination of Strontium-90 and Uranium-238. The total number of victims of this exceeds 100 million.
He says that those who have been anticipating World War should realise that it has already happened. It was the war of the nuclear military complex against humanity, as Dr John Gofman once said. Further videos in this series Science and reality will take this matter further. He belatedly apologises for placing the high fallout States in the west; they are of course in the south east of USA
COMMENT. Very important. In Australia, through the1960s and even later, repeated bursts of atmospheric fallout from the French nuclear tests . Rainfall from the East was tested for radiation – but the results were kept secret. Prof Ernest Titterton was in charge, and he cancelled the tests anyway. Interesting to study the cancer rates of East coast populations exposed at that time.
FBI Sued For Withholding Files On Assange And WikiLeaks
Kevin Gosztola, Sep 12, 2024, https://thedissenter.org/fbi-sued-for-withholding-files-on-assange-and-wikileaks/
“With the legal persecution of Julian Assange finally over, the FBI must come clean to the American people,” Chip Gibbons, policy director for Defending Rights & Dissent.
The civil liberties organization Defending Rights and Dissent sued the FBI and United States Justice Department for withholding records on WikiLeaks and its founder Julian Assange.
“For nearly a decade and a half, we’ve been trying to get at the truth about the U.S. government’s war on WikiLeaks,” declared Chip Gibbons, the policy director for Defending Rights and Dissent.
Gibbons added, “With the legal persecution of Julian Assange finally over, the FBI must come clean to the American people.”
On June 25, 2024, U.S. government attorneys submitted a plea agreement [PDF] in the U.S. District Court for the Northern Mariana Islands after Assange agreed to plead guilty to one conspiracy charge under the U.S. Espionage Act.
Assange was released on bail from London’s Belmarsh prison, where he had been jailed for over five years while fighting a U.S. extradition request. He flew on a charter flight to the Northern Mariana Islands, a U.S. territory where a plea hearing was held.
The plea agreement marked the end of a U.S. campaign to target and suppress Assange and WikiLeaks that spanned 14 years and first intensified after WikiLeaks published documents from U.S. Army whistleblower Chelsea Manning that exposed crimes committed in U.S. wars in Iraq and Afghanistan as well as U.S. complicity in human rights abuses in dozens of countries around the world.
“As soon as we began publishing newsworthy stories about US war crimes in 2010, we know the US government responded to what was one of most consequential journalistic revelations of the 21st century by spying on and trying to criminalize First Amendment-protected journalism,” stated WikiLeaks editor-in-chief Kristinn Hrafnsson.
Hrafnsson continued, “While WikiLeaks has fought for transparency, the U.S. government has cloaked its war on journalism in secrecy. That’s why Defending Rights & Dissent’s lawsuit is so important, as it will help unmask the FBI’s efforts to criminalize journalism.”
On June 27, Defending Rights and Dissent requested [PDF] “all records created, maintained, or in the custody of the FBI that mention or reference: WikiLeaks; Julian Assange.”
The FBI separated the request into two requests—one for files mentioning “WikiLeaks,” one for files mentioning Julian Assange. And by August 19, the organization was informed by the FBI that it would take around five and a half years (2,010 days) to “complete action.”
Previously, on June 22, 2021, Defending Rights and Dissent submitted a nearly identical request. It took the FBI two years to respond and notify the organization that the documents could not be provided because there was a “law enforcement” proceeding that was pending against Assange.
The FBI became involved in pursuing an investigation against Assange and WikiLeaks in December 2010.
In 2011, FBI agents and prosecutors flew to Iceland to investigate what they claimed was a cyber attack against Iceland’s government systems. But as Iceland Interior Minister Ögmundur Jónasson told the Associated Press in 2013, it became clear that the FBI agents and prosecutors came to Iceland to “frame” Assange and WikiLeaks.
The FBI was interested in interviewing Sigurdur Thordarson, a serial liar and sociopath who embezzled funds from the WikiLeaks store and sexually preyed on underage boys. As I recount in my book “Guilty of Journalism: The Political Case Against Julian Assange,” Thordarson subsequently became an FBI informant or cooperating witness.
“When I learned about it, I demanded that Icelandic police cease all cooperation and made it clear that people interviewed or interrogated in Iceland should be interrogated by Icelandic police,” Jónasson added.
A little more than a year before the U.S. government’s prosecution against Assange collapsed, the FBI approached three journalists who had worked with Assange but had a falling-out with him. Each refused to help U.S. prosecutors further their attack on journalism.
“The decision to respond to reporting on U.S. war crimes with foreign counterintelligence investigations, criminal prosecutions, and dirty tricks continues to cast a dark shadow over our First Amendment right to press freedom,” Gibbons said.
Gibbons concluded, “We will work tirelessly to see that all files documenting how the FBI criminalized and investigated journalism are made available to the public.”
Albanese has a second chance with AUKUS
Australia is to spend mind-boggling money to weaken its own security. Marles has released a National Defence Strategy which centres on what he calls “projection”. That is, Australian forces threatening China from China’s surrounding waters.
it is America which now sets our defence policy,
By Mike Gilligan, Sep 14, 2024 https://johnmenadue.com/albanese-has-a-second-chance-with-aukus
Australia is to spend mind-boggling money to weaken its own security. Minister RIchard Marles has released a National Defence Strategy which centres on what he calls “projection”. That is, Australian forces threatening China from China’s surrounding waters. The Albanese Government’s defence policy manufactures grievous risk for Australia. That risk must be understood by the government.
The weekend Sydney Morning Herald (7 September) front page said: “Australia key to new US security scheme” by Peter Hartcher in Washington.
Hartcher is known as part of the Herald’s China-threat scare in March 2023, telling Australians that we face war with China within three years. Today that leaves just 18 months at the outside before war breaks out. Clearly ill-founded, it was a sensationalist attempt to panic Australians into embracing America’s planning for conflict with China.
The Americans are still at it, of course. And Hartcher is their messenger – boasting that his access in Washington is special because his interview at the White House is the only one which President Joe Biden’s National Security Adviser, Jake Sullivan, has given to Australian media in his 3-1/2 years in the role. Hartcher followed up with another report a few days later explaining that the Americans are looking for another big technology project to foist on Australia. In a hurry, because progress against China has been too slow.
Sullivan wants the new scheme stitched up before Biden leaves office. And by the way, Australia must spend more on defence for its role against China.
America is accustomed to dealing with its allies in that way. Europe’s NATO forces always have been shaped by US close oversight. Its member states are regularly hectored to spend more on defence against a common enemy. Sullivan is treating Australia just as he would another NATO ally. Without a second thought. And Australia’s leaders have fallen into line obsequiously.
Again it has to be said – Australia is not like the NATO countries. NATO was set up in response to an agreed security threat, the USSR.
We have no security threat. No Australian Government has declared, much less demonstrated, that China is a security threat. We had decades of understanding with the United States that our defence spending should be directed to Australia’s own defence with our own forces. Without relying on America. In situations where Australia supported the US militarily overseas, it would be with forces which we held for our own priorities. Nothing special would be done for America. America agreed. That was Australia’s independence in action.
It worked for 35 years until President Barack Obama visited in 2010 effectively requiring Australia to do an about-face. Signalling that henceforth Australia’s defence would be done America’s way.
The Albanese Government’s defence policy manufactures grievous risk for Australia. That risk must be understood by the government.
It is Australia’s experience with the US itself which defines the risk. No need to look elsewhere for examples. Ever since the ANZUS treaty was signed in 1953, America has told Australia not to rely on it if attacked. Again in contrast to NATO, ANZUS deliberately avoids American commitment to assisting Australia if attacked. It was the proof of that American reluctance (over Indonesia) and the Vietnam tragedy which led to Australia facing reality – bipartisanly adopting a self- reliant defence policy in 1976. The risk of not embracing self- reliance was deemed intolerable. To not pursue self-reliance feckless. And that initiative came with America’s enthusiastic endorsement, for 35 years.
Today it suits America to use Australia’s forces for its own ends against China. Yet it won’t commit to our security by dignifying us with a genuine treaty. The obvious risk is that America’s interest in Asia will decline, for many reasons. Then Australia will be left with defences of little use for our own need. What good is an island-hopping army dependent on US Marines, who have gone home? It’s been said before. But the profound risk hasn’t sunk in.
At the business end, the Albanese Government is spending heavily to dump Australia ever deeper into the risk predicament. Marles flaunts the financial cost. Noting that the Defence budget was $48 billion in 2022-23, the Albanese Government will raise it to $55.7 billion in 2024-25:
“These increases will see annual Defence spending almost double over the next ten years to $100 billion in the financial year 2033-34. Taken over a 10-year period, it will be the largest sustained growth in the Defence budget since the Second World War.”
This is the spending which Sullivan says should be increased. Australia’s defence budget of $58 billion is the same as Japan’s, also accelerating because of US pressure.
Australia is to spend mind-boggling money to weaken its own security. Marles has released a National Defence Strategy which centres on what he calls “projection”. That is, Australian forces threatening China from China’s surrounding waters. Sam Roggeveen in his elegant essay “The Jakarta Option” describes the influences which render Marles’ strategy foolhardy. He presents evidence of a structural shift in warfare which renders maritime attack on an opponent’s territory increasingly hazardous. The exchange ratio of maritime forces to land-based weapons has swung heavily to the defender ie China in this case. Marles strategy of “projection” is squarely on the wrong side of this asymmetry.
So, what to do about this latest American “initiative”? Albanese tells the tale of having just one day to consider AUKUS when in opposition. He now has the full resources of Cabinet and can set his own timetable. He can require Marles to talk to the risks and costs to Australia of his National Strategy of power projection. And this latest directive from Washington. Ministers, especially the treasurer, should work through the risks, costs and consequences so that they genuinely know what Australia is being led into at vast cost.
Back to Hartcher. He unwittingly does us a service, demonstrating yet again that Australians have to rely on the candour of American leaders to see through the murky verbiage of Defence Ministers, confirming that it is America which now sets our defence policy, down to project detail. Hartcher will have something to brag about when he has the level of access in Beijing which he claims in Washington.
Labor claims Aukus nuclear waste dumping issue just a Greens scare campaign
the amendment did not specifically mention “high-level radioactive waste” and it “still allows the US and UK to dump intermediate-level waste, and Australian high-level waste, anywhere in Australia”.
Matt Thistlethwaite, an assistant minister, said Australia would “not manage, store or dispose of spent nuclear fuel from the US or the UK submarines”.
Legislation before Australian parliament covers the way the country’s nuclear-powered submarine program will be regulated
Guardian, Daniel Hurst Foreign affairs and defence correspondent, 13 Sept 24
The Albanese government has bowed to pressure to close an Aukus loophole, insisting that the newly revealed changes will ensure Australia will not become a dumping ground for nuclear waste from US and UK submarines.
The Greens argued the government’s latest amendments did not go far enough and it was becoming increasingly clear the Aukus security pact was “sinking”.
But Labor MPs later told the parliament Australia would not become “a dumping ground for nuclear waste for other countries” and argued such claims were part of “a scare campaign”.
The legislation before the Australian parliament covers the way the country’s nuclear-powered submarine program will be regulated. It includes the creation of a new statutory agency, the Australian Naval Nuclear Power Safety Regulator.
The bill – in its original form – talked about “managing, storing or disposing of radioactive waste from an Aukus submarine”, which it defined broadly as Australian, UK or US submarines.
This prompted concerns from critics that the bill could pave the way for Australia to eventually store nuclear waste from other countries, regardless of a political commitment from the incumbent government not to do so.
In May, a Labor-chaired inquiry called for a legislative safeguard to specifically rule out accepting high-level nuclear waste from the US and the UK.
New amendments circulated by the government on Wednesday include a “prohibition on storage and disposal of spent nuclear fuel that is not from an Australian submarine”.
The wording says the regulator “must not issue a licence” for the storage or disposal in Australia “of spent nuclear fuel that is not from an Australian submarine”.
The government is also amending the bill to prevent appearances of conflicts of interest at the new naval nuclear safety regulator.
The legislation will ensure anyone who has worked in the Australian defence force or the Department of Defence in the previous 12 months cannot be appointed to be the director general or deputy of the new regulator.
The defence minister, Richard Marles, said the amendments would “reaffirm the government’s already-established commitment that Australia will not be responsible for the storage or disposal of high-level radioactive waste from the US, UK or other countries”.
He said the government would “continue to build the foundations to safely and securely build, maintain and operate conventionally armed, nuclear-powered submarines”.
Greens say changes ‘far from clear’
But the Greens defence spokesperson, David Shoebridge, said the amendments were “far from clear”.
“The Albanese Labor government tried to sneak through a loophole that would allow the UK and US to dump their nuclear waste in Australia,” Shoebridge said.
“We called the government out and people around Australia pushed back, now Albanese is quickly putting through a half-measure to shut everyone up.”
Shoebridge said the amendment did not specifically mention “high-level radioactive waste” and it “still allows the US and UK to dump intermediate-level waste, and Australian high-level waste, anywhere in Australia”.
“Everyone can see Aukus is sinking,” he said.
Matt Thistlethwaite, an assistant minister, said Australia would “not manage, store or dispose of spent nuclear fuel from the US or the UK submarines”.
He told the parliament’s federation chamber that the government’s new amendments were intended to “put the matter beyond doubt”.
A fellow Labor MP, Rob Mitchell, said: “We will not be, as some have suggested, a dumping ground for nuclear waste for other countries. And it’s important that we put that scare campaign to bed very quickly and very clearly.”……………. https://www.theguardian.com/world/article/2024/sep/11/labor-aukus-nuclear-waste-loophole-greens
Record weeks for renewables blow up Dutton’s nuclear con
The record high of low-cost wind and solar in the grid comes as we are still waiting for the costing on the Coalition’s plan to nationalise the eye-watering cost of seven nuclear plants.
Tim Buckley and Annemarie Jonson, 12 Sept 24, https://www.afr.com/policy/energy-and-climate/record-weeks-for-renewables-blow-up-dutton-s-nuclear-con-20240910-p5k9e4
It’s been a red-letter few weeks for renewables in Australia. In the last week of August, coal dropped below 50 per cent of electricity generation for the first time, as renewables’ share rose to a record high 48.7 per cent, boosted by windy conditions and low grid demand.
In August last year, coal contributed 57 per cent and renewable energy held a 37 per cent share
As in the US and Britain, where zero-emissions supply is burgeoning as fossil fuels’ contribution to generation falls, this threshold moment in Australia symbolises that the inevitable shift to clean energy is well under way and accelerating here and globally. China is deploying 23 gigawatts of renewables every month, four times what Australia does in a year.
The record-high renewable energy penetration in our national electricity market was accompanied by near record-low wholesale prices, averaging $57 per megawatt hour in the last week of August, versus $91 in August last year. This shows that more renewables equals cheaper power.
South Australia is the standard-bearer for Australia’s renewable energy future. In the past seven days, more than 75 per cent of its power use was generated by renewables, at average wholesale prices of just $37 per megawatt hour, way below the $123 average over the past year.
South Australian Energy Minister Tom Koutsantonis has revised the state’s renewables target to 100 per cent by 2027, off the back of the continued rollout of clean energy infrastructure.
This includes three big batteries announced last week under Federal Energy Minister Chris Bowen’s flagship Capacity Investment Scheme – a key driver of investment momentum underpinning the renewables build-out nationally – and major grid developments, with concomitant projected residential and business energy bill savings.
The federal government and its state counterparts are getting on with the job of accelerating our national energy transition, working to deliver the federal 82 per cent renewables by 2030 target and the resulting energy bill relief. The lower house passed the Future Made in Australia Act this week, key to the government’s vision for a renewables-powered economy.
Still no nuclear costings
Meanwhile, the federal Coalition continues to perpetuate its nuclear con, designed to blow up progress on the transformation of our energy system to low-cost, reliable firmed renewables and entrench decades more of volatile, expensive fossil fuel-based power while we wait … and wait.
Next week marks three months since Opposition Leader Peter Dutton and chief nuclear spruiker Ted O’Brien released their fact- and costings-free, one-page nuclear memo, effectively a note proposing to nationalise the eye-watering cost of construction of seven nuclear plants nationwide – in a country with zero history and expertise in nuclear power generation, on a timeframe that, by all expert accounts, will not result in any material delivery before the mid-2040s. We’re still waiting for their budget projections on this excuse for a policy.
Only this week, Dutton was reported as dismissing questions about budget impacts because he didn’t want to overload Australians with too much information, as the government released an ad citing calculation by industry body the Smart Energy Council that the nuclear energy build would cost up to $600 billion and add $1000 annually to household electricity bills.
Our estimate is that the public cost would be a minimum of $100 billion, and this would inevitably be taxpayer-funded because, unlike firmed renewables, into which private capital is increasingly flowing, there is zero investor interest in nuclear in Australia without massive government subsidies, risk transfer and guarantees.
The Coalition plan involves a fiscally negligent impost on consumers already struggling with cost-of-living pressures. The global history of huge cost blowouts and bailouts in every Western economy building nuclear exacerbates this, and should discourage even the most credulous believer.
This alone makes nuclear unviable here. But the clincher is ongoing generation costs feeding into retail prices. The 2024 GenCost report by the CSIRO and the Australian Energy Market Operator prices large-scale nuclear energy at $155 to $252 a megawatt hour. That is double their estimate of the cost of fully firmed renewable energy of $90 to $100, even after factoring in grid transmission, curtailment and battery firming costs.
The renewables surge is the way of the future. We cannot afford to entertain the Coalition’s damaging nuclear distraction.
Any government proposing nuclear here would be robbing Australians three times: once via a $100 billion public capital subsidy for nuclear reactors; again by locking in long-term hyperinflated energy prices; and third to compensate owners of the former coal power sites the Coalition has slated for nuclear, which have already built new clean energy assets, such as batteries onsite.
Progress is building on transforming our grid with superabundant wind and solar energy, distributed across rooftops and utility-scale, backed up by battery storage and modernised transmission. This now needs further acceleration, particularly given looming closures of breakdown-prone, expensive end-of-life coal power clunkers.
The evidence that firmed renewables win on cost is irrefutable, and double-digit annual deflation of battery and solar costs widens this advantage every year. The energy market operator last month confirmed it sees no energy supply reliability gaps to 2030 in the national electricity market, assuming planned renewables projects proceed on time and at the targeted scale.
The renewables surge we have experienced is the way of the future. We cannot afford to entertain the Coalition’s damaging nuclear distraction. For the sake of Australia, let’s hope that as the renewables reality rises, the Coalition’s domestic nuclear pipe dream is consigned to oblivion, where it belongs.
Any government proposing nuclear here would be robbing Australians three times: once via a $100 billion public capital subsidy for nuclear reactors; again by locking in long-term hyperinflated energy prices; and third to compensate owners of the former coal power sites the Coalition has slated for nuclear, which have already built new clean energy assets, such as batteries onsite.
Progress is building on transforming our grid with superabundant wind and solar energy, distributed across rooftops and utility-scale, backed up by battery storage and modernised transmission. This now needs further acceleration, particularly given looming closures of breakdown-prone, expensive end-of-life coal power clunkers.
The evidence that firmed renewables win on cost is irrefutable, and double-digit annual deflation of battery and solar costs widens this advantage every year. The energy market operator last month confirmed it sees no energy supply reliability gaps to 2030 in the national electricity market, assuming planned renewables projects proceed on time and at the targeted scale.
The renewables surge we have experienced is the way of the future. We cannot afford to entertain the Coalition’s damaging nuclear distraction. For the sake of Australia, let’s hope that as the renewables reality rises, the Coalition’s domestic nuclear pipe dream is consigned to oblivion, where it belongs.
TODAY. What is behind all the drama of long range missiles for Ukraine to send to Russia?
It certainly looks like a dramatic development – as globe-trotting master of ceremonies Antony Blinken, strongly hinted that the US, UK, and NATO might soon allow Ukraine to have long-range missiles attacking deep inside Russia.
Jubilation all round – this is what Zelensky has been clamouring for! It’s the next exciting development, following all the joy of Ukraine’s incursion into the Russian area of Kursk. Best to get over that one quickly, with its huge cost in Ukrainian troops’ lives, without any actual military usefulness to Ukraine.
The dramatic need for these missiles is emphasised as Blinken confirmed that Iran was sending ballistic missiles for Russia to use against Ukraine. These are in fact Project 360 close-range missiles. But no matter – it sounds like a good reason for Ukraine to get long- range ones.
Anyway the point is – we all have to be reassured that Ukraine is winning this war. The Western media dwells on each exciting new development like this, rather than the unpalatable facts that Ukraine is falling back in the critical Donbass area, and that it’s running out of troops, that Zelensky’s survival as president depends on the war continuing a losing fight.
Meanwhile Putin is strongly warning of severe repercussions if the West lets Zelensky attack Russia with long-range missiles. USA and NATO are well aware of the danger of the war expanding into a Russia versus NATO and USA. They don’t want this. Russia doesn’t want this.
The dilemma is for the USA to demonstrate its “iron-clad” support for Ukraine, without actually really upsetting Putin too much. Hence there’s a lot of debate in the West about how to go about sort of sending long-range missiles for Ukraine, but sort of not really using them too much. And how to train and support Ukrainians in the use of them?
To further complicate this issue, it is important for Joe Biden in his last months as President to demonstrate that he’s a tough guy – not some sort of weak sop who would – heaven forfend! sink to negotiations with Putin and end the carnage. So – a forceful decision about long-range missiles for Ukraine would look pretty good in that context.
Only you need some intricate diplomatic footwork to spin it all – which is where the silver-tongued skills of manipulators like Antony Blinken come in. It all has to look very hard and dangerous, without actually being so – without too much provocation of Wladimir Putin, who probably understands all this, underneath his bombastic pronouncements.
So – the war drags on, the deaths continue, Ukraine faces a winter with possibly great suffering, as Russia continues not only its troop attack, but also attacks on Ukraine’s power supply.
But – look on the bright side – it’s great for the USA’s weapons companies and their investors. And we, distant media-watchers continue to be awed with the drama, wait for the next development, and wonder if it’s a dress rehearsal for the Taiwan-China one to follow this.
Barnaby Joyce — nuclear energy not as cheap as he thinks it is
Independent Australia, By Belinda Jones | 14 September 2024,
Barnaby Joyce jumps on the nuclear energy bandwagon but gets his facts wrong, writes Belinda Jones.
THE COALITION’S NUCLEAR PLANS suffered another setback this week when it revealed that the Member for New England, Barnaby Joyce, got key nuclear facts wrong in a recent debate.
As part of the annual Bush Summit, presented by Gina Rinehart’s Hancock Prospecting and News Corp, Joyce took part in a debate with Chair of the Climate Change Authority, Matt Kean.
The Bush Summit has been an annual event on the bush calendar since 2019, which meets in rural and remote locations around the country and brings together leaders in politics, mining, agriculture and many other fields……………………………………..
Joyce had jumped on the nuclear energy bandwagon a few years earlier and has been there ever since. Joyce’s position was supported in 2019 with a push for an inquiry into the feasibility of nuclear energy by fellow National Keith Pitt and L-NP Senator James McGrath.
In 2022, Coalition donor Rinehart invested $60 million in Arafura Rare Earths. Arafura’s Nolans Project outputs involve exploration and processing of rare earths, including uranium ‘as a minor product’. A minor product that could be very lucrative if Australia had nuclear energy.
According to the Minerals Council of Australia ‘Australia’s uranium reserves are the world’s largest, with around one-third of global resources’, which might explain mining billionaire Rinehart’s embrace of nuclear energy as the transition away from coal continues…………..
Joyce’s passion for nuclear energy does beg the question — why didn’t the Coalition seize the opportunity to begin a transition to nuclear energy while they were in government from 2013 to 2022? One government minister said at the time it was because ‘financially it doesn’t stack up’.
In 2021, Morrison rejected nuclear energy because of a lack of bi-partisan support. Joyce revealed at the recent Bush Summit debate with Matt Kean that the real reason Morrison had rejected nuclear energy was because internal polling said nuclear energy was unpopular, as it still does, not because of a lack of bipartisan support.
During the recent Bush Summit debate, Joyce claimed that France and Finland’s energy is cheaper than Australia’s because they use nuclear energy.
This claim has since been fact-checked by AAP as wrong:
‘The National Party MP was responding to a suggestion that Russia’s invasion of Ukraine in 2022 had driven up power prices globally.
When asked to provide evidence for the claim, Mr Joyce’s office sent AAP FactCheck an article from the Australian Energy Council comparing household electricity prices internationally.
The analysis is from February 3, 2022, which predates the beginning of Russia’s invasion of Ukraine by three weeks.’
Currently, the Coalition has released scant details about their nuclear energy ambitions. In the absence of a clear, comprehensive, costed nuclear energy plan from which Coalition politicians can work, misinformation or disinformation is more likely to spread on the nuclear issue…………………………….
Joyce has become the self-appointed poster boy for groups opposing renewables, particularly the New England, Illawarra and Hunter regions. He will be a panelist on ABC’s Q and A next Monday. Advertised shuttle buses will likely be ferrying anti-renewables activist audience members from Muswellbrook and Port Stephens to the Newcastle studio. Joyce will be at his theatrical best, knowing he has an audience full of supporters………………………… more https://independentaustralia.net/politics/politics-display/barnaby-joyce–nuclear-energy-not-as-cheap-as-he-thinks-it-is,18977
Award-winning Australian film-maker David Bradbury detained in India (he exposed India’s repression of its peaceful anti-nuclear activists).
The police used riot tactics and baton charges, mace and teargas to bludgeon the good people of Indinthakarai into submission. Which is the situation today. They are too scared to come out of their homes in mass protest. The Government of India, of Prime Minister Modi has become a terrorising state of its own people.
David Bradbury 14 September 24
I flew from Bangkok to Chennai Tuesday night with my two children – Nakeita Bradbury (21) and Omar Bradbury (14).
We all have visas issued by the Indian Govt in Australia before we left Sydney, last Saturday, Sept 7th.
After three days in Bangkok we flew to Chennai to begin what was to be a family holiday to remember: five major tourist destinations in two weeks.
Accommodation and internal flights (non refundable…) booked in advance in several locations.
(In Bangkok I showed my latest doco – a tribute to Neil Davis who was tragically killed in a 24 hour coup in Bangkok 39 years ago. Death is a Lady was shown at the Foreign Correspondents Club and we raised $Aust407 for the children of Gaza).
Arriving at Immigration counter at Chennai airport, my two children got their passports stamped and were able to go through no problem. When it came my turn, the perplexed official had to call for help as he laboured over his computer terminal.
Putting in my details had obviously triggered alarm bells. He called for his Supervisor who similarly winced as he looked over his shoulder. It was
2am in the morning. My kids waited patiently on the ot her side of the glass barrier between us.
Eventually I was told it would not be possible for me to enter India. I asked why not? I had a legitimate visa I told them.
And my kids were on the other side of the barrier separating us.
We were here on a family holiday we’d planned and saved for many months. With the usual Indian courtesy of avoiding the question:
‘Why not? What is wrong with my visa..?’
My kids were on one side of the border…and I was on this side. I could not join them. As they waved sadly, reluctantly Goodbye to me, I was led off down a corridor to a small room with high ceilings. Pretty disgusting room with papers and rubbish on the floor under a bed which had a filthy mattress on it, no sheets. A metal grill window that looked out to a blank corridor wall.
Occasionally a guard would come and stare through it at me.
During the course of the rest of the day and into the night various Immigration
Plainclothes police would come and interrogate me. What was I doing in India? What did I do here before in previous visit in 2012? Who did I know here in India and who have you been talking to before I came to India this time. Can you open up your phone and give it to us, please? Can we have their phone number?
I was cold and asked for my long trousers and socks which were in my suitcase and some medication I was taking for an enlarged prostrate. They never got them for me, only an hour before they forced me back onto the flight to Bangkok. My bag still hasn’t arrived here in Bangkok.
I asked if I could make a phone call to the Australian embassy in Delhi but that request was ignored.
As the plane took off from Chennai yesterday morning for Bangkok at 1.30am, it hurt my world weary heart to accept being separated from my kids and our plans to have a grand tour of the Indian subcontinent which included going to Varanasi to show my Omar how Hindus deal with death and farewelling their loved ones into the next life.(Omar lost his mum, my wife to breast cancer five months ago. We both feel strongly attached to each other).
What had caused the cancellation of my Indian Visa? Over the course of the afternoon and being interrogated by Indian Immigration plainclothes, I quickly concluded the Indian Govt had not forgiven me for writing an article for my local newspaper back in Australia and daring to enter a ‘No-go’ zone for both Indian national press and foreign media like myself in 2012.
Back then after I’d done my duties on the jury of the Mumbai International film festival, with wife Treena (Lenthall) and son Omar, then aged 3, we went and stayed in a small fishing village on the southern most tip of India. At a village called Indinthakarai where thousands of locals led by Dr Udayakamur, Catholic priests and nuns. Since the 1980’s the good fisherfolk of Indinthakarai had maintained a David and Goliath struggle against the pro-nuclear designs of the central Govt in far away New Delhi.
These people embraced Treena, Omar and I because we felt for them in their struggle against the central Government 3,000kms away in New Delhi who had run roughshod over their rights and their community. We lived in the village for the next two weeks and filmed their everyday lifestyle, their fishing in the ocean which their livelihood depended upon. I interviewed their leaders on why they were so upset with the Government. One of them, a wonderful man called Dr Udayakamur stood out. He told me why they were determined to keep on with their struggle.
It was because their Government had signed a very dodgy deal with the Russians to build six nuclear powers plants on top of a major earthquake fault line. That faultline right where a cabal of corrupt senior Indian politicians and senior bureaucrats had signed the contract with the Russians had seen 1,000 villagers swept to their deaths when the 2004 Boxing Day tsunami hit.
He told me on camera how the humble fisherfolk of Idinthakarai
whose ancestors had ploughed the ocean for millennia;
How the Delhi Govt refused to have any community consultation and refused repeated requests by the people of Indinthakarai to be given access to environmental assessment reports.
Dr Udayakamur is an earnest practitioner of Gandhi’s non violent protest actions to effect Change.
The locals under Dr Uday staged sit-down protests where they buried their bodies in the sand up to their necks on the foreshore where the nuclear plants were being built. Thousands of people marched into the sea out front of the power plants defying police orders.
In the end their actions were in vain. The police used riot tactics and baton charges, mace and teargas to bludgeon the good people of Indinthakarai into submission. Which is the situation today. They are too scared to come out of their homes in mass protest. The Government of India, of Prime Minister Modi has become a terrorising state of its own people.
Dr Uday faces 58 criminal charges which includes ’Sedition’. He faces many years in gaol and long years before that in drawn out court proceedings. It has taken its toll on his health and his family.
All this happening out of sight of reporter’s notebooks and cameras in the world’s largest ‘Democracy’.
Australian nuclear news headlines 9 – 16 September
Headlines as they come in:
- David Noonan confronts Australia’s politicians with critical unanswered questions on the AUKUS agreement – will they pretend not to hear this?
- The Public Interest and Indigenous Rights in South Australia must not be compromised by an untenable Defence imposition of AUKUS military High-Level nuclear waste & nuclear weapons usable fissile material on the Woomera Area
- Labor claims Aukus nuclear waste dumping issue just a Greens scare campaign.
- Barnaby Joyce — nuclear energy not as cheap as he thinks it is
- Record weeks for renewables blow up Dutton’s nuclear con
- Albanese has a second chance with AUKUS.
- Award-winning Australian film-maker David Bradbury detained in India (he exposed India’s repression of its peaceful anti-nuclear activists).
- The lucrative charity, yes CHARITY, running the Land Forces weapons expo
- Why Aged Care Funding Scrutinised, but Military Spending Not
- Submission -James Lechte – re new agreement on Naval Nuclear Propulsion it’s not too late to walk back this AUKUS commitment .
- Submission – Stephen Clendinnen – re new agreement on Naval Nuclear Propulsion – oppose this costly, dangerous, AUKUS mistake.
- Submission -Terry Barridge – re new agreement on Naval Nuclear Propulsion – it’s dangerous, the public should vote on it.
The lucrative charity, yes CHARITY, running the Land Forces weapons expo
by Michael West | Sep 14, 2024, https://michaelwest.com.au/the-lucrative-charity-yes-charity-running-the-land-forces-weapons-fair/
The promoters behind the Land Forces weapons expo are registered as a charity. This charity, AMDA, pays no tax but does pay high salaries and just tripled its income to $35m. Michael West
It was rubber bullets and tear gas for peace protestors but special police mollycoddling and a Victorian Government sponsorship for the merchants of death.
What do we know about the promoters of the Land Forces weapons fair which the Victorian government so avidly protected from anti-war protestors this week with a $15m police presence, stun grenades, pepper spray and batons?
We know from regulatory filings the promoter behind Land Forces is a charity called AMDA Foundation. We know from AMDA’s financial disclosures that this charity is highly profitable. Its income shot up from $13m in 2022 to $34.6m last year
That was for the year to June; at which point it was sitting on a financial investment portfolio of $43m in cash, stocks and bonds. AMDA even gets government grants – grant revenue is booked at $6.6m over the past 2 years. The principal sponsor for Land Forces expo this year was none other than the Victorian Government, which went to extraordinary lengths to protect and promote its investment.
The mainstream media was bizarrely strident in its anti-protest coverage, running the story (not disavowed by the government and Victoria Police) that protestors sprayed police with acid. That was later downgraded to ‘irritants’ and ‘low-level acid’ bringing speculation it might have been orange juice (citric acid) or maybe the chemicals in the bubble liquid from the bubble machine with which the outnumbered protestors entertained the police blockade at one point.
It’s all a rort on the public, on the very taxpayers and citizens the Victorian government had its police assaulting this week, because weapons companies – the likes of AMDA’s exhibitors BAE, Lockheed Martin, Thales and Boeing – are funded by governments globally.
In Australia, the Defence budget is soaring amid rising weapons sales; so it is a fair bet that the income of AMDA will be higher in 2024.
AMDA’s $30m in expenses last year included $8m in pay for its 31 employees (FTE equivalent), which averages out at almost $260k per employee. The 5 KMP – the crew at the top of the charity – shared $1.5m or almost $300k apiece in ‘charity pay’.
The fake charity AMDA Foundation is exposed by Michael West Media’s Michelle Fahy.
Landforces’ brothers in arms: how a weapons peddler qualified for charitable status . https://www.michaelwest.com.au/landforces-brothers-in-arms-how-a-weapons-peddler-qualified-for-charitable-status/
by Michelle Fahy | Jun 4, 2021 The Coalition is cracking down on charitable organisations. However, the Australian charity promoting arms deals on behalf of weapons makers that profit from humanitarian catastrophes is unlikely to be in the government’s sights. With the weapons expo LandForces wrapping up in Brisbane this week, Michelle Fahy delves into the charity behind LandForces.
The Morrison government has charitable organisations in its sights. It proposes to amend the legislation covering charities so that minor legal misdemeanours by staff or supporters of a charity could be used as a prompt by the regulator for a review of a charity’s privileged status.
St Vincent de Paul told The Saturday Paper that if an activist wearing a Vinnies T-shirt refused to move along when asked by police, Vinnies could risk having its charitable status removed.
Hands Off Our Charities, an alliance of Australian charities, said in a submission to government: “The proposal is a major overreach and the need for further regulation has not been (and in our view cannot be) properly explained.”
Yet consider the activities of a not-for-profit organisation that many Australians will be astounded to discover has gained privileged charitable status – AMDA Foundation Limited (AMDA).
AMDA is the organiser of Land Forces, a biennial military and weapons exhibition running in Brisbane this week showcasing organisations “operating across the full spectrum of land warfare”.
The 600 exhibitors at Land Forces include local and multinational weapons manufacturers and other suppliers to military forces. Event sponsors include global arms corporations such as Boeing, BAE Systems, Lockheed Martin, Rheinmetall, General Dynamics, Saab and Hanwha, along with local companies Electro Optic Systems (EOS), CEA, and NIOA. Representatives from foreign governments and militaries are among the attendees.
Several of AMDA’s arms-maker sponsors have supplied their weaponry to the two countries leading the coalition fighting the war in Yemen – Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates. The UN has been pleading for years for countries to cease supplying weaponry to these countries.
In late 2018, the New York Times published distressing photographs of emaciated children in Yemen dying as a result of aid blockades during the war. The mass starvation continues. UNICEF has said more than 400,000 Yemeni children under five could die preventable deaths this year.
Promoting arms deals on behalf of corporations that have profited from this unspeakable humanitarian catastrophe is the antithesis of what an Australian registered charity should be doing.
But the political posturing evident in the government’s proposed changes is unlikely to result in any repercussions for the AMDA Foundation. Instead, it is ‘activist’ environmental charities that are being targeted by the changes. Which is precisely the problem with such sweeping broad powers. They can be implemented selectively to silence voices the government does not want heard.
“It is the principle that underpins the change that is wrong, regardless of who it is used to target,” said Matt Rose, Economy & Democracy Program Manager at the Australian Conservation Foundation.
Arms trade promotion a “charitable activity”?
AMDA runs numerous major military and weapons-related trade exhibitions around Australia. Its roster of events includes Avalon, a biennial aerospace military and weapons expo in Victoria, next slated for early December 2021. The Indo Pacific Expo, a maritime warfare exhibition, is scheduled for May 2022 in Sydney.
These and other industry trade shows bring together sellers and buyers of weaponry and other military and security-related equipment. “Doing business is easy at Land Forces,” says its website, noting that Land Forces serves as a “powerful promotional and industry engagement forum”.
AMDA says it exists to help the “general community in Australia”. But the general community is not permitted to attend Land Forces nor AMDA’s other arms exhibitions. (The public can attend the Avalon Air Show, a separate public event run at the same time as the Avalon arms expo.)
AMDA is part of a group of companies registered with ACNC which operates around the country. It had 24 full-time-equivalent employees and a gross income in 2020 of $11.7 million – 32% of which came from government grants and 61% from operating revenue. Its income in 2019 was $26.2 million, mostly from operating revenue.
Revolving doors and conflicted interests
The AMDA board is an all-male affair. Its chair is former chief of the Royal Australian Navy, Christopher Ritchie, who joined the board in May 2017 while concurrently sitting on the boards of Lockheed Martin Australia (until 2020) and German naval shipbuilder Luerssen Australia, both multibillion dollar contractors to the Defence Department.
Former chief of army Kenneth Gillespie sits on the AMDA board while also sitting on the board of Naval Group, the French multinational building Australia’s controversial new submarines. Gillespie is also chair of the Australian Strategic Policy Institute (ASPI) Council, the highly influential and supposedly “independent” think tank tasked with providing strategic advice to the government.
ASPI is sponsored by Naval Group as well as other global arms manufacturers including Lockheed Martin, Thales, Saab and Northrop Grumman. ASPI has been vocal in its anti-China ‘war drums’ rhetoric, stoking regional tensions, along with the Asia Pacific arms race.
Why Aged Care Funding Scrutinised, but Military Spending Not
Double Standards in Public Discourse
The double standard in how we view social versus military spending is stark. While aged care is framed as a financial burden that requires higher contributions from individuals, military spending is accepted without the same level of scrutiny. Why is it that investments in the well-being of citizens are questioned while investments in military equipment go ahead without question?
Australia’s government has the financial ability to distribute more resources toward aged care without compromising national defence. By reallocating just, a fraction of the $368 billion earmarked for submarines, the aged care system could receive the necessary funding to address worker shortages, improve infrastructure, and ensure that no senior is left without quality care.
September 13, 2024 by By Denis Hay, The AIM Network
Introduction
Australia is grappling with rising demands for aged care services as its population grows older, leading to a $5.6 billion reform package to improve the sector. Yet, every dollar given to aged care is met with scrutiny, with questions about sustainability and affordability. In stark contrast, military spending – including the $368 billion given for the AUKUS submarine deal – goes ahead with far less financial scrutiny.
Why do we ask, “At what cost?” for aged care, yet overlook the same question for military projects? This article explores these double standards and how Australia’s currency sovereignty means the government has the financial capacity to fund both without compromising one for the other.
Disparities in Spending Scrutiny
I. Aged Care Reforms: Why “At What Cost” is Constantly Asked
A. Key Changes in Aged Care
The Australian government’s $5.6 billion aged care reform package aims to improve services for more than 1.4 million older Australians, helping them stay at home longer before entering institutional care. However, the reforms include higher means-tested contributions from seniors, raising concerns about affordability for lower-income individuals.
B. Challenges in Aged Care Funding
Australia’s aged care sector is facing significant challenges, even with the new reforms:
1. Workforce shortages – More than 300,000 workers are needed to meet the demand for aged care services, but underfunding is making recruitment and retention difficult.
2. Underfunding – The sector is still underfunded despite the reforms, with many care facilities still struggling to provide adequate services.
3. Increased demand – With Australia’s aging population expected to double by 2050, more funds will be needed to provide quality care.
Despite these growing challenges, aged care funding is constantly questioned. The $5.6 billion reform package was seen as necessary, but it came with a public narrative focused on budget concerns and intergenerational equity, suggesting the government is walking a financial tightrope when funding such social services.
C. Public and Political Scrutiny
Aged care spending is consistently subjected to public and political debate, with media coverage often emphasising the “cost to the taxpayer“ and generational fairness. Yet this intense scrutiny stands in stark contrast to how military spending is viewed, where multibillion-dollar defence projects move forward with little financial questioning.
II. Military Spending: An Unquestioned Cost
A. Overview of Military Expenditures
In 2023, Australia committed $368 billion over the next 30 years to the AUKUS submarine program, making it one of the largest military spending commitments in the country’s history. The overall defence budget for 2023-2024 alone reached $50 billion, marking a significant increase compared to previous years.
B. Justifications for Military Spending
Proponents of military spending often argue that defence investments are critical for national security, particularly with the growing military presence of China in the Indo-Pacific region. The AUKUS deal, which promises to deliver nuclear-powered submarines to Australia, has been framed as necessary for safeguarding Australia’s interests in the future.
However, this narrative ignores the question of cost. While $368 billion has been committed for submarines over the next three decades, far less attention is given to the financial opportunity costs – what else could be funded with such vast sums?
C. Limited Scrutiny on Defence Budgets
In contrast to aged care, military expenditures are rarely subject to serious financial scrutiny. Public debate around defence spending typically focuses on national security threats rather than the financial burden of these projects. Even when media coverage addresses military budgets, it rarely compares them to the costs of social services, leaving aged care and defence spending to occupy entirely different public conversations.
Australia’s Currency Sovereignty and the Real Limits…………………………………………………………………………..
Double Standards in Public Discourse
The double standard in how we view social versus military spending is stark. While aged care is framed as a financial burden that requires higher contributions from individuals, military spending is accepted without the same level of scrutiny. Why is it that investments in the well-being of citizens are questioned while investments in military equipment go ahead without question?
…………………………………………………………… Rebalancing Australia’s Budget Priorities
…………………..Australia’s government has the financial ability to distribute more resources toward aged care without compromising national defence. By reallocating just, a fraction of the $368 billion earmarked for submarines, the aged care system could receive the necessary funding to address worker shortages, improve infrastructure, and ensure that no senior is left without quality care. ……………..more https://theaimn.com/why-aged-care-funding-scrutinised-but-military-spending-not/
The tangled nuclear web of lies and half-truths – can we believe that Australia will refuse to take USA toxic wastes?
How is the Australian government going to twist their way around THIS ONE!
I’d really like to believe Prime Minister Anthony Albanese, who once was a noble opponent of the military-industrial-nuclear complex.
But – now – I fear that he is as gutless as most Australian politicians when it comes to sucking up to the USA.
https://theaimn.com/can-we-believe-that-the-australian-government-will-really-refuse-to-take-usa-uk-nuclear-submarine-waste/ 12 Sept 24, Today comes one of those amazing bits of news that a national government, in this case, it seems, Australia, has actually listened and responded to the many voices of peace and environment activists who are shocked at the proposed Naval Nuclear Propulsion Treaty which benefits the USA, but not Australia, and which makes Australia responsible for high level nuclear wastes from U.S/UK nuclear submarines.
If we can believe the Labor government – they are going to stand up to the USA and the UK, and refuse to accept high level toxic radioactive trash from USA – ‘Relief’ Australia won’t take high-level nuclear waste under AUKUS.
The latest information on Australia getting nuclear submarines is that as early as 2027, the United States will begin rotational presence in the Western Australia facility. Ultimately, there will be up to four U.S. Virginia-class submarines and one United Kingdom Astute-class submarine at HMAS Stirling. https://www.defenseone.com/business/2024/01/race-prepare-australia-nuclear-subs/393601/
So these nuclear submarines will be stationed in Australia , but owned by the USA and UK, not by Australia.
Well- here are a couple of clauses from this jargon-filled proposed Treaty:
ARTICLE IV – D
Australia shall be responsible for the management, disposition, storage, and disposal of any
spent nuclear fuel and radioactive waste resulting from the operation of Naval Nuclear
Propulsion Plants transferred pursuant to this Article, including radioactive waste generated
through submarine operations, maintenance, decommissioning, and disposal.
ANNEX B: SECTION I – SPECIAL NUCLEAR MATERIAL
Such Power Units shall contain highly enriched uranium and, only with respect to irradiated fuel, may contain plutonium.
Friends of the Earth are among the many who have sounded the warning:
Minister for Defence Richard Marles has stated that Australia would not accept radioactive waste from overseas, but this has not been explicitly ruled out in the Australian Naval Nuclear Power Safety Bill 2023 currently before Parliament. The words of an under-pressure defence minister in 2024 are unlikely to count for much decades hence if Australian legislation and the Agreement between Australia, the UK and
the US do not prohibit the acceptance of foreign spent nuclear fuel.
It is important to acknowledge Australia’s poor history regarding radioactive waste disposal
facilities.
How is the Australian government going to twist their way around THIS ONE!
I’d really like to believe Prime Minister Anthony Albanese, who once was a noble opponent of the military-industrial-nuclear complex.
PM Albanese has been adroit at making himself a “small target” for both the Opposition nuclear enthusiasts, and for his own Labor Party members who deplore the AUKUS nuclear deal. No doubt he will rely on the mealy-mouthed USA-sycophant defence Minister Richard Marles to spin the story on this.
Submission -Terry Barridge – re new agreement on Naval Nuclear Propulsion – it’s dangerous, the public should vote on it.
Given the significant implications of such a security pact, it is only democratic that the Australian population has a direct say in this matter. I strongly advocate for this issue to be put to a vote, allowing the voices of Australian citizens to be heard and respected in a decision that will impact our nation’s future.
I am writing to express my concerns and opposition to the recent enhancement of the AUKUS agreement,
commonly referred to as AUKUS 2.0, between Australia, the United States, and the United Kingdom. As an
Australian citizen deeply invested in the long-term security and prosperity of our nation, I feel compelled to voice my apprehensions regarding the implications of this agreement
Firstly, I am troubled by the increased proximity of Australian military and security policies to those of the
United States. The United States, in its current geopolitical stance, appears to many as a waning power, facing significant domestic challenges and shifting international allegiances. By binding our security interests so closely with those of the United States through agreements like AUKUS 2.0, Australia risks inheriting the animosities and conflicts that are directed towards America. This alignment not only draws us into the sphere of influence of a nation facing considerable global scrutiny and criticism but also potentially makes Australia a target for those who view the United States unfavorably.
Secondly, the financial burden of AUKUS 2.0 on Australian taxpayers is a major concern. The investment
required to uphold the commitments within this agreement is substantial, and the returns – both in terms of security enhancements and economic benefits – are uncertain. In an era where economic stability is precarious, it is crucial that government expenditures are made with a clear and guaranteed return on investment. The lack of transparency regarding the financial implications and benefits of AUKUS 2.0 is worrying. Australian taxpayers deserve clarity on how their funds are being used and assurances that these expenditures will not only safeguard but also enhance our national interests.
Furthermore, in light of the current “cost of living” crisis, the financial commitment required for this deal
appears especially irresponsible. Many Australians are already struggling to manage everyday expenses, from utility bills to housing costs. Allocating substantial public funds to an uncertain and contentious military agreement further burdens the average citizen without offering immediate or transparent benefits.
Moreover, the United States has a long and contentious history of treating warfare as a business opportunity, enriching a select few at the expense of many. This perspective on military engagement should not be what we aspire to promote in our region. America’s track record in wars across the globe has often led to long-standing conflicts without clear successes, posing significant concerns about the wisdom of aligning our defense policies so closely with their strategies.
Given the significant implications of such a security pact, it is only democratic that the Australian population has a direct say in this matter. I strongly advocate for this issue to be put to a vote, allowing the voices of Australian citizens to be heard and respected in a decision that will impact our nation’s future.
I appreciate your attention to this matter and look forward to your response, outlining how you and your office will address these concerns. https://www.aph.gov.au/Parliamentary_Business/Committees/Joint/Treaties/NuclearPropulsion/Submissions
1 This month
7 April – WEBINAR – Australia and the Doomsday Clock – Preventing nuclear war through NoFirstUse and other policies
Online | Tuesday April 7, 4:00-5:30pm, Australian Eastern Time / 8:00-9:30am Central Europe Time
– Access the registration link
15 April – Zoom –Nuclear Power is Not the Solution
Apr 15, 2026 01:00 AM in Canberra, Melbourne, Sydney
Join the International Physicians for the Prevention of Nuclear War (IPPNW) on Tuesday, April 14th for a timely webinar exploring the risks associated with nuclear power and challenging the myth that it offers a simple, safe, carbon-free solution to the climate crisis
of the week – Australians for War Powers Reform (AWPR)
To see nuclear-related stories in greater depth and intensity
Antinuclear 