The Australian gives a cool-headed assessment of the current manoeuvrings around the passage of the ETS throught the Senate next month. Whilst The Australian’s leader writers appear to be still broadly in support of some kind of emissions trading scheme (which given the unproven science ACM considers is just plain wrong) at least they are demanding that Kevin Rudd address the concerns with the proposed scheme, rather than merely scoring cheap political points:

The Opposition Leader, having decided to deal with the government rather than be trapped into a green election the Coalition would be hard-pressed to win, must now offer effective ideas on the legislation. For its part, the government (after months of rhetoric) must be more precise about the impact of its scheme. While the opposition may be out of wriggle room on this issue (it must ultimately pass the legislation or risk a double-dissolution election), the government must make sure it does not bestow a costly and risky scheme on future generations.

And the first place where the Prime Minister must convince people of the ETS’s economic feasibility is at this week’s federal Labor conference. The ETS is not universally popular with cabinet ministers, and backbencher Jennie George spoke for other MPs with energy-intensive industries in their electorates when she said she was “mindful” of the scheme’s impact. Mr Rudd has been adept at exploiting conservative divisions over the ETS, but the time for politics is past: he must now show a willingness to explain and justify the detail of an ambitious and unproven scheme.

Read it here.

But strangely couldn’t find time to meet an elected Senator of the Australian parliament. Tim Mahar [who he? – Ed], who hails from the middle of nowhere, was granted an audience with Saint Al at the Asia Pacific Climate Change Conference in Melbourne a couple of weeks ago, whilst Steve Fielding was snubbed. Do you think it might be because Mr Mahar has swallowed Gore’s misrepresentations whole, and is a fully paid up member of the church of Global Warming Alarmism [surely “Climate Change Alarmism” – Ed], whereas Steve Fielding might ask a few tricky questions?

Here’s a sample of Mr Mahar’s arguments:

“Imagine your child had a heart problem and nine out of 10 specialist said she needs surgery immediately or she will be severely disabled and may die. [And there is the glaring flaw in your mawkish argument – the earth is not heading for severe disability or death thanks to a gentle warming from the Little Ice Age, which has, since about 2001, ceased – Ed]

“However one said: ‘Let’s wait a while and see what happens’.”

“What would you do?”

“In fact, it is our children and grandchildren who are most at risk,” Mr Mahar said.

Much of the three-day conference involved working with Al Gore on the most recent developments in the science of climate change. [Al doesn’t give a fig about the science, he only cares about making big bucks out of carbon credits – Ed]

“It was disturbing to hear just how quickly the climate is changing,” he said.

“Extreme events here are droughts and fires, but other totally unprecedented events are happening all over the world [like thousands of records for cold being broken all over the northern hemisphere summer? – Ed].

“We can turn things around but it will require a huge change and urgent action.”

No wonder Al was happy to meet this guy.

Read it here.

Nothing is going right for Malcolm Turnbull. It now seems that his decision on the ETS will be timed perfectly to meet an opposing tide of public opinion:

Just as Malcolm Turnbull has turned the Liberal Party towards accepting an ETS before the global climate change conference in Copenhagen in December, there has been a turnaround in public support for delaying finalisation of a carbon emissions trading scheme.

And while most people are still prepared to pay higher costs for petrol, electricity and gas to cut greenhouse gas emissions, support drops away rapidly as the expectations rise of higher costs.

According to the latest Newspoll survey, 45 per cent of voters want the Rudd government to delay finalising its Carbon Pollution Reduction Scheme until after the Copenhagen conference compared with 41 per cent who said Australia should not wait to see what other nations were doing.

Eight per cent of respondents to the survey, taken exclusively for The Australian last weekend, oppose an ETS outright, taking the total who oppose the scheme or want it delayed to 53 per cent.

In September last year, 61 per cent wanted Australia to act as soon as possible, no matter what other countries were doing, and only 33 per cent wanted to delay or opposed the scheme outright.

So that’s a 20% increase in those opposing the ETS or wanting it delayed, and Turnbull does precisely the opposite. Not surprisingly, his popularity is at rock bottom, and the writing is on the wall for his leadership…

The Opposition Leader’s about-face over passing the ETS before Copenhagen and commitments from the big carbon emitters — the US, China and India — came as he slipped to his lowest standing against the Prime Minister, a worse position than former leader Brendan Nelson when he was replaced.

Read it here.

The point I made about an emissions trading scheme is that I don’t like it one little bit. I think it’s economically suspect and I think the science behind the policy is contentious to say the least.

Read it here (h/t Andrew Bolt)

Hands up who can guess why Kevin Rudd wants to reduce the voting age to 16 or 17? Could it be because the “yoof” of today are all brainwashed by their schools into thinking we have to “tackle climate change”? Or because the “yoof” of today think that pointless gestures such as Earth Hour, heavily supported by the educational establishment, actually makes some discernable difference to the climate? Or because the “yoof” of today are too naïve and inexperienced to see the damage an ETS would do to Australia’s economy? Or maybe because the “yoof” of today would therefore all vote Labor?

Read it here.

In an excellent article in Quadrant, Richard Lindzen, the Alfred P. Sloan Professor of Atmospheric Sciences at Massachusetts Institute of Technology, discusses climate alarmism, and possible reasons behind it.

The notion of a static, unchanging climate is foreign to the history of the earth or any other planet with a fluid envelope. The fact that the developed world went into hysterics over changes in global mean temperature anomaly of a few tenths of a degree will astound future generations. Such hysteria simply represents the scientific illiteracy of much of the public, the susceptibility of the public to the substitution of repetition for truth, and the exploitation of these weaknesses by politicians, environmental promoters, and, after 20 years of media drum beating, many others as well.
…
Before disintegrating in a pyrotechnic display of unscrupulous manipulation, ENRON had been one of the most intense lobbyists for Kyoto. It had hoped to become a trading firm dealing in carbon emission rights. This was no small hope. These rights are likely to amount to over a trillion dollars, and the commissions will run into many billions.
…
With all this at stake, one can readily suspect that there might be a sense of urgency provoked by the possibility that warming may have ceased and that the case for such warming as was seen being due in significant measure to man, disintegrating. For those committed to the more venal agendas, the need to act soon, before the public appreciates the situation, is real indeed.

Read it all here.

Kevin Rudd and his band of cronies are a bunch of small minded politicians with gutter standards and even less dignity, always on the lookout to score cheap points against the opposition. So the ETS, and the undoubted mess the opposition has got itself into, is the perfect stage for Rudd to perform his tawdry brand of politics:

Opposition emissions trading spokesman Andrew Robb said last night that the Prime Minister was insincere after the government launched a series of attacks on the Opposition Leader despite his offer of a compromise.

His comments came as Labor backbencher Jennie George echoed one of Mr Turnbull’s “log of claims” by insisting Australian workers had the same protection as American workers in the scheme before the US congress.

On Friday, Mr Turnbull said the opposition was prepared to consider supporting ETS legislation to go to parliament next month, reversing the shadow cabinet’s position that the Coalition would not vote for the legislation before the UN climate conference in Copenhagen in December.

But yesterday Finance Minister Lindsay Tanner scoffed at the offer of talks, telling the Ten Network’s Meet the Press that Mr Turnbull should propose legislative amendments rather than vague talking points. And he questioned whether Mr Turnbull could guarantee he spoke for his colleagues after encountering opposition to the ETS from Coalition conservatives. Last night, Mr Robb said Mr Tanner’s comments, and a similar attack on Mr Turnbull’s “platitudes” by Climate Change Minister Penny Wong on Saturday, showed the government was not interested in genuine progress on its plan to begin emissions trading in 2011.

“This is just a smokescreen,” Mr Robb said. “They have been playing politics all along on this.

“Kevin Rudd should say, for example, whether he agrees that the jobs of Australian workers should get as much protection under our scheme as American workers would get under the proposed American scheme.

“It’s not a difficult question.”

Read it here.

This is Penny Wong’s and her arrogant government’s idea of negotiation. Malcolm Turnbull’s suggested amendments to the ETS have already been rejected by the government. Clearly they considered them in detail before reaching that decision…

The plan was alive for less than half a day before Climate Change Minister Penny Wong dismissed it as a shopping list of “vague and inconsistent demands”.

Senator Wong said the Government would listen to Mr Turnbull only if he had a coherent set of instructions from the joint Coalition party room.

Prime Minister Kevin Rudd similarly gave it the thumbs-down, taunting Mr Turnbull to unify the warring Coalition before putting anything before the Government again.‘

Rudd cannot resist cheap political point-scoring, even when we are talking about the most complex piece of legislation since the GST. But at least the Nationals have some principles:

Senator John “Wacca” Williams said he would rather walk away from Canberra with a clear conscience than vote for the legislation in its present form. “Permits could cost the agricultural sector $7 billion. Under that scenario there’d be no farmers and no food.”

Senator Williams said the Government was only interested in getting a double dissolution trigger for an early election.

“Politics is what’s behind it all, and we shouldn’t be playing politics with Australia’s future,” he said. [Absolutely right – Ed]

The Nationals Senate leader Barnaby Joyce reiterated that he would not support the scheme, and other senior Nationals said they would never vote “for anything that looks remotely like the existing bill”.

Read it here.

Finally, at least the Opposition are focusing pressure on the government by proposing a number of significant changes to the ETS. If the government rejects them all out of hand, we will know what we suspected all along, that they are not interested in the effect it will have on the climate, or the economy. Their response will be interesting, as The Australian writes in an opinion piece:

There are members in the opposition partyroom who would be happy fighting an election on the ETS. But in agreeing to talk, Mr Turnbull has placed the pressure where it should be — on the government. At long last we are about to have the conversation that should have been running for months, a discussion on the detail of the ETS.

This will be a difficult discussion indeed for the government because the ETS is immensely complex and the risk is that there are many unidentified devils in the detail.
…
There is no case for rushing the ETS through parliament because Mr Turnbull does not want to be unfairly accused of opposing the cap-and-trade approach to carbon emissions or because the government would prefer to avoid being bogged down in debates over the detail. It is up to Mr Rudd to justify the legislation, not as a symbol to satisfy voters who want action on global warming. Rather, he must convince us it will work, without costing jobs and exports. The political manoeuvring this week will not be remembered for long but we will all endure the consequences of a flawed ETS.

Unfortunately, given the Opposition’s weak position, they have no choice but to try and negotiate the ETS, rather than do the right thing which is to reject it outright. Remember, the ETS will do nothing, repeat nothing, to alter the climate, local or global. Australia contributes just 1.5% to global emissions and even reducing that to zero overnight (i.e. a 100% reduction) would make no perceptible difference to global temperatures, even if CO2 were the main driver of temperature, which is by no means proven.

What we do know, however, is that the ETS will damage the economy, raise energy prices for consumers, lower standards of living, cut thousands of jobs and make Australia less competitive against economies that have chosen not to hamstring themselves with pointless emissions reductions.

Read it here.

Senior Coalition figures are at odds about the proper response to the ETS vote next month. Tony Abbott has urged coalition MPs to pass the ETS to avoid a double dissolution:

The one-time leadership opponent to Mr Turnbull has turned into his staunchest public defender and has appealed to Liberal MPs to “allow” the Opposition Leader to exercise his assessment on emissions trading and to save the Coalition “from a fight it can’t win”.
…
Although Mr Abbott believes an emissions trading scheme won’t cut global carbon emissions and that it will cost jobs, the conservative Liberal frontbencher and Howard government minister has called for Liberals to pass the ETS in the Senate and avoid a double-dissolution election.

But at the same time, Nick Minchin has said that the Coalition will block the ETS:

“We don’t think parliament should be presented with legislation on this subject until after we know the outcome of Copenhagen,” Mr Minchin said.

“We will vote against this legislation in August, as will every other non-government senator.”

Interesting times.

Read it here.