Labor Premier: carbon tax will "push up prices"

7 March, 2011 by

You've just made a LOT of new friends

Gong for the most blindingly obvious statement about the carbon [dioxide] tax goes to Lara Giddings, who tactlessly speaks the truth when Gillard, Combet et al are spinning their way up their own backsides. No Prime Ministerial Christmas card for you this year, Miss Giddings, methinks:

Tasmania’s Labor Premier Lara Giddings says a carbon tax will push up living costs and unfairly inflict economic pain on her state despite it already having more renewable energy than other states.

The federal government insists its compensation measures will help cushion households from steep price rises.

“You’d have your head in the sand to say there aren’t going to be cost of living increases,” Ms Giddings told ABC Radio on Monday.

“That’s not fair.”

It certainly isn’t, but delusional Combet isn’t having a bar of it:

Federal Climate Change Minister Greg Combet rejected the suggestion, arguing compensation measures for pensioners and low-income households would act as a cushion. [What about the rest of the population? – Ed]

“I don’t expect any significant impact on the overall cost of living out of our carbon price mechanism once we’ve done all our final work [please, my aching sides – Ed]. But, we will ensure that whatever that may be, we will assist households cope with that price impact,” he told reporters on Monday. (source)

Which I guess means they’ll be emitting the same amount of carbon dioxide, then? Total horse-shit, Greg. Sorry. Never thought I’d find myself agreeing with a Labor state premier, but in this case, Lara’s right on the money.

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Rio Tinto: carbon tax "disastrous"

7 March, 2011 by

Trucking awful tax…

Tell us something we didn’t know:

Mining giant Rio Tinto has warned the carbon tax is “potentially disastrous” for industry unless a far more generous compensation package is offered than under Kevin Rudd’s Carbon Pollution Reduction Scheme.

Rio’s managing director, David Peever, says the CPRS design would have resulted in a cost of $3 billion on Rio Tinto’s export business.

He said industry accepts changes must be made to cut carbon [dioxide] pollution [emissions]. [Really? Why? – Ed]

But Mr Peever – who is also a member of the Federal Government’s business roundtable on climate change – says cutting pollution [emissions] will be expensive and in some cases the technology to cut it has not even been developed yet.

“Businesses unable to pass a carbon price through to customers, which is most businesses competing in international markets, would simply have to absorb it,” he said.

“Depending on the magnitude of the carbon price, this may be manageable when market conditions are favourable and margins are healthy.

“But when the cycle turns down, it will inevitably be disastrous.” (source)

And already the Greens are circling the wagons to ensure that compensation to the evil mining industry is kept at rock bottom:

Greens leader Bob Brown said an independent arbiter should decide compensation.

“There’s no way we will back these big corporations being compensated when they don’t deserve compensation,” Senator Brown told Sky News.

“I’m just saying if trade-exposed industries, which include Rio Tinto … want to put in a claim after carbon pricing’s been brought in … let that claim be looked at independently and verified so we don’t have gouging by big industry at the expense of small business.” (source)

Remind me, who gives a flying fig what Bob Brown says again? Oh yes, we all must now. He’s the Prime Minister, after all…

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Swan: public "confused" by carbon tax

7 March, 2011 by

If it quacks like a duck… it's a tax

Ah, yes, the old excuses are the best. If anyone disagrees with your policy, just say the public are too ignorant to properly understand it, and that all that’s necessary is better “communication”. Such is the arrogance of Labor that is believes it is beyond criticism, so when the public go ape because their Prime Minister has lied to them about a carbon tax in order to get elected, they go into self-deluding rationalisation strategies – in other words, we’re right and the public are just a bunch of stupid bogans. Charming.

AUSTRALIANS are confused by the government’s carbon tax plan, Acting Prime Minister Wayne Swan admits.

Mr Swan has tried to downplay concerns about the proposal to cut pollution, saying the scheme would not operate like a “traditional tax”.

He said a “traditional tax” would take money from Australians’ pay packets, while the government’s scheme would take money from big businesses.

Opposition leader Tony Abbott was quick to match the Treasurer’s spin with his own, saying if it “acts like a tax … it is a tax”. (source)

Swan is desperately trying to spin the Labor government and himself out of trouble by claiming that this is a tax on “polluters” [what type of pollution is carbon dioxide again? – Ed], but carefully avoiding the fact that the “polluters” will pass on the tax to their consumers in the form of increased prices. Otherwise, why would there be a need for bewilderingly complex “compensation schemes” for individuals? Sorry Wayne, doesn’t wash.

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Ackerman and Devine on the carbon tax woes

6 March, 2011 by

Backroom deals

Two great reads for a Sunday morning. Firstly, Piers Ackerman in the Telegraph:

IT would be easy to dismiss New England independent Tony Windsor as a whining, whinging wimp and a rat, but he has now assumed national importance in the carbon tax debate.

He has had undeserved relevance thrust upon him.

Last week, Windsor earned the opprobrium of all sensible MPs and public figures around the nation when he connived with Channel 7’s Mark Riley to publicise a purported threat he claimed to have received.

In what was one of the more disgraceful media moments in a year already marred just two months in by Riley’s attempt to smear Opposition leader Tony Abbott with a false and innuendo-laden report on the death of a young Australian soldier, Windsor said on Tuesday he had received his first-ever death threat.

It didn’t help that Riley’s report added false claims about the shooting of a US congresswoman, dishonestly implying that the accused in that horror had been influenced by so-called shock-jocks and right-wing political commentators.

“You’re a f****** liar, a dog, a rat … I hope you die, you bastard,” a caller said, apparently in relation to Windsor’s role in assisting the Gillard Government develop its global-warming strategy as a member of its Multi Party Climate Change Committee. (source)

And then Miranda Devine in the Herald Sun:

YOU have to feel for Julia Gillard, the grand negotiator.

Saddled with a minority Government, she has to appease the Greens and accommodate the silky Bob Brown, while throwing a few bones to Nick Xenophon and Andrew Wilkie and buttering up the turncoat independents Tony Windsor and Rob Oakeshott, mopping their brows when the heat gets too much.

All the while she has to make sure she doesn’t venture so far into Left-loony land that her own MPs revolt.

Can you imagine what a nightmare for the Prime Minister those daily cups of tea with the Greens and independents have become? She must just feel like picking up the Earl Grey and smashing it against a wall.

No wonder Bob Brown looks pleased with himself, striding around Canberra like the Deadly Mantis, dispensing his wisdom to all and sundry. He can’t believe his luck, as Gillard cedes her power and authority. He smells total capitulation to his world view, with the shadowy shock troops of GetUp at his disposal.

It was his carbon tax that opened up the fault line Gillard is struggling to straddle now, as angry voters bombard Labor MPs’ offices with emails complaining about the Green colonisation of Labor’s soul.

They’re the people who really count — Labor’s authentic base, the working families in suburban seats, the aspirational classes for whom soaring electricity and fuel costs aren’t some theoretical exercise but a painful daily reality. Working people employed by BlueScope Steel are Labor’s base, not inner-city greenies with protected salaries.

And nothing will alienate them quicker than Green demands that petrol be included in the carbon tax, no matter how Brown tries to sugarcoat it. As Graham Richardson told Gillard: include petrol and you’re dead (memo to Tony Windsor: that’s not a death threat). (source)

 

 

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Is coal safe? Labor say yes, Greens say no

5 March, 2011 by

Milne: dangerous eco-fascist

So that would be a “no”, then. The Greens are in charge, so we cannot trust anything Labor or Gillard or Combet says. The Australian leads with the story that Greg Combet has stated that “coal is safe” under Labor’s carbon pricing scheme, but unfortunately it isn’t up to Combet to decide:

Speaking to The Weekend Australian, Mr Combet seized on Greens leader Bob Brown’s signal last week that his party was “open to looking at the impact on trade-exposed industries” as evidence it was prepared to negotiate on transitional assistance for sectors such as coal and aluminium.

But Senator Brown’s deputy, Christine Milne, yesterday renewed her attack on the coal industry, writing on The Punch website that “to prevent the climate crisis, we need to transform our economy away from the dead end of coal to the exciting opportunities of baseload solar and other renewable energy and energy efficiency technologies”.

The idiocy of this statement beggars belief… no it doesn’t, actually, it is after all the Greens talking…

“We need to redesign our cities around people instead of cars,” she wrote.

“We need to protect our magnificent forest carbon stores. All that activity will stimulate our economy. It will create jobs and investment in new industries, many of which need the same skills that people in the coal sector already have.”

NSW Greens MP Cate Faehrmann, who is also the party’s mining spokeswoman, yesterday praised a decision to refuse the Wallarah 2 coalmine expansion on the NSW central coast, but said “unfortunately” the refusal was an exception to the rule in the state and there were 17 major proposals for new mines or expansions being assessed. (source)

How many utterly ludicrous statements can one have in just three paragraphs? “People instead of cars”, “create fake subsidised Green jobs at the expense of real jobs”? The reality is the Greens hate coal with a passion and will do anything to see it completely wiped off the face of the earth. The fact that there’s nothing to replace it except useless fart power and equally useless sunbeams doesn’t bother the anti-human eco-fascists who don’t care that people will go without heat and light.

And don’t even bother to mention the only viable alternative to fossil fuel generation – nuclear. Despite the fact that we have the largest reserves of uranium on the planet, the Greens would rather punish humanity than take the best alternative option.

And these shit-for-brains Greens are now running the country? GOD HELP US.

Getting very angry… must stop and cool off…

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Grab the popcorn: Labor meltdown approaches

4 March, 2011 by

Enjoy the show!

This would be the best result of all – Labor tears itself apart down the Left/Right factional axis, and by all accounts, it’s on the cards. So pull up a chair, grab the popcorn, put your feet up, and enjoy the show!

THE Labor Left has accused the Right of “political bastardry”, saying it is undermining Julia Gillard’s climate change plan by opening up a debate on gay marriage and the influence of the Greens.

Three senior Left figures urged the Prime Minister last night to take a stand against the Right, saying it was undermining a caucus decision to back the Greens’ territories’ rights bill, which has been linked to a push for same-sex unions and euthanasia.

The Left said the growing factional brawl was damaging the party and should not have been inflamed by the Right.

“People are worried this could develop into a problem for the government,” a Left source said.

“There is concern this could open up sensitive areas that are not needed to be debated at this point in time because there are other more pressing issues.”

The Labor caucus this week backed the Greens’ territories’ bill, which would prevent the commonwealth from rescinding territories’ laws without the approval of both houses of parliament. (source)

Nothing like a good internecine punch-up to cause chaos in the Labor ranks. Bring it on!

 

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Australia is run by the Greens #2

4 March, 2011 by

Worth a thousand words, Julia

I predict this will be a recurring theme. A few days ago, I wrote that the Greens were running the country. Now it seems that this suspicion is spreading through government, industry and the public, and the consequences for the Gillard government will be disastrous.

The photo opportunity at the launch of the carbon price policy, with Gillard and Combet outnumbered and outflanked by eco-Nazis Brown and Milne, hapless “independents” Whining Windsor and weirdy-beardy Oaf-shott, and Gillard literally looking up to Brown with a look of admiration (see image), was a classic PR disaster. It was also the perfect illustration of who is really in charge – and for the avoidance of doubt, it ain’t Julia…

Dennis Shanahan in The Australian:

THE perception that Julia Gillard is giving too much to the Greens, that she’s ceding her authority to Bob Brown and giving precedence to briefing independent and Greens MPs ahead of her ALP colleagues, is taking hold among her vital constituencies: the public, business and her own parliamentary party.

From specific issues to broader concepts and fundamental policy, Labor’s pact with the Greens for their support in a minority government is having an increasingly corrosive effect on the Prime Minister’s authority and confidence that the government can deliver its own agenda.

There is evidence the public’s general confidence is being shaken by sudden policy shifts and uncertainty about a minority government; there is growing disquiet, even dismay, among business leaders that dealing with the government on the basis of compromise with a commercially viable outcome is being overtaken by ideological demands. Labor MPs are concerned they are being treated as second-rate representatives and the government is being outsmarted by Brown as the Australian Greens’ leader. (source)

The possibility of a split in the Labor government isn’t insignificant, with the right wing faction, sick of kowtowing to Bob Brown and his environmental Marxists, finally decides enough is enough. And that’s before we’ve even reached the substantive policy issues associated with the carbon tax: Labor wants 5% emissions reductions, Greens want 25%; Greens want petrol included, Labor doesn’t etc etc…

When those thorny issues are on the table, it will only get worse. And it’s not just climate policy, either:

JULIA Gillard has restated her absolute rejection of gay marriage and hotly disputed opposition claims the Australian Greens have hijacked Labor’s political agenda.

But her comments come amid division within Labor’s powerful Right faction, with Australian Workers Union national secretary Paul Howes yesterday backing gay marriage, putting himself at odds with other key right-wing powerbrokers.

On Wednesday, the Prime Minister said she could overturn an earlier Labor decision, to back a bill put forward by Greens leader Bob Brown that would remove the ability of ministers to overturn territories’ laws.

Her comments followed anger from the Labor Right after Greens MPs in the ACT said that if the Brown bill were passed they would renew a push to legalise same-sex marriage.

Tony Abbott yesterday cited the gay marriage push as evidence that the Greens were running her government. But Ms Gillard last night stood by her view that “marriage is between a man and a woman”. (source)

So what happens when Julia doesn’t play ball and give the Greens what they want? Answers on a postcard.

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Daily Bayonet GW Hoax Weekly Round-up

4 March, 2011 by

Skewering the clueless

As always, a great read!

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Stop whining, Windsor

3 March, 2011 by

Betrayed their electorates

Miranda Devine has little sympathy for Tony Windsor, and rightly so:

TONY Windsor and Rob Oakeshott are trying to play the victim now but the country independents are simply reaping the whirlwind of the betrayal of their deeply conservative electorates after the August election.

They sold out their constituents in return for flattery and back slapping in Canberra, and now they’re feigning shock when they get blowback. Give us a break.

Even though he tried to hide, everyone saw Windsor and his grinning, bearded mate Oakeshott standing there last week, with Julia Gillard, Bob Brown, Christine Milne and Greg Combet, at the press conference announcing the carbon tax that the Prime Minister expressly promised during the election campaign she would never impose.

And he’ll be hiding up the back of that sovereign sextet the next time they announce another of Brown’s pet policies – euthanasia, same-sex marriage and any number of wasteful crackpot green schemes that are anathema to conservatives.

Now Windsor is complaining about “shock jocks” and Coalition MPs and nefarious “others” who he claims are “involved in an orchestrated campaign” to inciting US-style violence against him. It’s just another smokescreen to hide from the consequences of his actions. (source)

In other carbon tax news, the Herald Sun reports that Labor heavies are telling Gillard to “put the bake on Greens”:

The right-wing delegation of Senator Farrell, and senior senators Steve Hutchins and John Hogg met the PM at 11.30am yesterday after the Greens claimed to have Government backing for a Bill to pave the way for gay marriage and legal euthanasia.

It is believed the PM said she had no knowledge of it and gave a commitment she would not back legal euthanasia.They had also confronted Treasurer Wayne Swan, who also claimed to be in the dark. [He usually is – Ed]

Senate Labor leader Chris Evans was later forced to apologise to a caucus of Labor senators at a 3pm meeting over what they claimed was a return to the Rudd-style lack of consultation and failure of government process.

…

Ms Gillard now faces a possible breakout of factional war with right-wing MPs accusing Labor left MPs – who support gay marriage and euthanasia – of conspiring with the Greens to deceive the Government. The issue was later resolved when the PM intervened to ensure Labor would vote with the Coalition in the Senate to delay the Bill by referring it to a committee.

MPs are also angry that the PM’s decision to introduce a carbon tax was not taken to the caucus.

Others told The Daily Telegraph they were receiving “virulent” emails complaining of a Labor “sell out” to the Greens, who combined with Ms Gillard to unveil the climate change pact. (source)

Paul Kelly in The Australian foreshadows an almighty crack down the middle of Labor, in a piece entitled “Brown leads ALP on a merry dance”:

The evidence, so far, is that Brown is outsmarting a divided Labor Party. Half the party is a willing conscript to the Green social agenda while the other half rejects this agenda on grounds of conviction and politics.

Brown sets the pace and Julia Gillard looks weak in responding to his social policy tactics.

Yet there is one impression Gillard cannot tolerate – and that is weakness. (source)

Interesting times ahead.

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Shut down Australia and save 0.01 degrees

2 March, 2011 by

Closed for business…

The Science and Public Policy Institute undertakes the cost/benefit analysis of Australian climate mitigation policies that the Gillard government strangely doesn’t want to do.

Gillard and Combet are always banging on about a carbon tax being in the “national interest”, but the reality is that a tax with no benefit couldn’t be less in the national interest.

So, ladies and gentlemen, if we shut down Australia’s economy completely tomorrow, then by 2100, we would have slowed any man-made warming by:

0.01 degrees

So Julia, please explain why we are bothering with any kind of carbon price?

Read it here (PDF).

Thanks to Jo Nova, who did the wonderful graphic!

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