Justin's Spot

Contradictory and confusing accounts of the Australia Day protest fiasco

2012-01-29T12:39:00.011+08:00

There are still a lot of unanswered questions about the events leading up to the ugly demonstrations outside The Lobby Restaurant on Australia Day, as the accounts given by Julia Gillard and UnionsACT secretary Kim Sattler don’t add up:

“I heard it from the crowd.” — Kim Sattler, The Canberra Times, January 28, 2012 2:24 PM

“Mr Hodges accurately conveyed to her [Kim Sattler] the statement made by Mr Abbott.” — Julia Gillard, The Australian, January 28, 2012 4:29 PM

“I spoke to Tony Hodges on the phone… He mentioned that Tony Abbott had made a statement about the embassy, that it shouldn’t exist at all.” — Kim Sattler, Sunday Herald Sun, January 29, 2012 12:00 AM

“ACT union official Kim Sattler says reports that her account of events on Australia Day contradicts Prime Minister Julia Gillard are ‘inaccurate’.” — The Sydney Morning Herald, January 29, 2012 1:37 PM

Swan's explanation for replacing Professor Warwick McKibbin doesn't add up

2011-03-31T17:36:00.017+08:00

Federal Treasurer Wayne Swan cited the length of time Professor Warwick McKibbin and Don McGauchie served on the Reserve Bank Board in the justification he gave to Ross Greenwood on 2GB for replacing these vocal critics of the Labor government’s fiscal policy.

Can I just make this point about the two departing members. They’ve been there for 10 years. I don’t think there’s ever been a situation where someone has been on the board longer than 10 years.

This is not true. Jillian Broadbent has been a member of the Reserve Bank Board since 1998. Swan didn’t have a problem reappointing her for a third five year term in May 2008.

Reality check: Facts about the threat posed by radiation from the Fukushima Daiichi plant

2011-03-18T22:59:00.009+08:00

People are exposed to an average of 3.0 mSv/year.
People have a normal radiation acceptance level of 20 mS/year.
On 17 March at 10am, helicopters measured 87.7 mSv/h at 90 m and 4.13 mSv/h at 300 m above the Daiichi plant.
Other measurements of radiation levels taken within ~60 km of the Daiichi plant ranged from 0.7 to 170 μSv/h on 17 March.

Sources:

Fairfax paints a grossly distorted picture of earthquake sizes

2011-03-06T20:28:00.001+08:00

An article by Fairfax on the magnitude 6.3 earthquake that devastated the city of Christchurch in New Zealand includes an interactive diagram of several earthquakes which are compared by the relative sizes of circles shown on a map.

Interactive diagram in a Fairfax article comparing the magnitudes of earthquakes.

The magnitude 7.9 earthquake that occurred in Sichuan, China on 12 May, 2008, appears nearly as large as the catastrophic magnitude 9.1 earthquake near northern Sumatra on 26 December, 2004. It is not a meaningful comparison, because earthquake magnitudes are measured on a logarithmic scale. An increase in magnitude by one unit represents a tenfold increase in the maximum amplitude of the seismic waves recorded by the seismograph and about 32 times the amount of energy released. Thus the magnitude 9.1 earthquake near northern Sumatra had an amplitude 10^{9.1 - 7.9} = 15.8 times larger than the magnitude 7.9 earthquake in Sichuan, China, and 10^{9.1 - 6.3} = 631 times larger than the magnitude 6.3 earthquake in Christchurch.

According to an empirical relationship developed by Beno Gutenberg and Charles Richter, log₁₀E is proportional to 1.5M, where E is the energy released by the earthquake and M is the magnitude. This means that in terms of energy released, the magnitude 9.1 earthquake was about 10^{1.5(9.1 - 7.9)} = 63.1 times stronger than the magnitude 7.9 earthquake, and about 10^{1.5(9.1 - 6.3)} ≈ 15800 times stronger than the magnitude 6.3 earthquake.

Sportsbet closes bet on Labor leader at the next federal election

2011-02-27T08:20:00.012+08:00

Sportsbet just closed the bet on the person to lead the ALP at the next federal election, but has kept open the bet on the Liberal leader. Bill Shorten was briefly favoured to lead Labor at $2.00 with Julia Gillard at $2.50 just after she announced her plans to introduce a price on carbon a couple of days ago. The bet was still available when Google captured a snapshot of the page on 26 February 14:14 AEDST.

Eric Ripper foolishly brings up Alannah MacTiernan in his attack on Troy Buswell

2011-02-20T20:21:00.006+08:00

Eric Ripper might recall that Alannah MacTiernan lost her licence twice for drink driving and a third time for speeding.

She stayed on in the transport portfolio despite misleading the public about her previous driving offences.When asked whether it was her first time, she said "No, I lost my licence in '94, I think it was, yeah, '94"—she lost her licence for drink driving in 1986 as well as 1994.

MacTiernan's conduct was debated in Parliament on 2/5/2001:

North Queensland has seceded, if you believe the Daily Mail

2011-01-02T22:09:00.046+08:00

Any Australian who has been through our primary school education system would have immediately been struck by the Daily Mail’s article about the disastrous flooding in Queensland that was published on their website on 30 December, 2010. Unfortunately, it wasn’t just the scale of the disaster that would have struck Australian readers, but the addition of a new breakaway state from Queensland displayed on their map of Australia.

Northern Queenslanders have long felt that they need a state of their own that focuses on the needs of the rural and regional communities living in this area. Outspoken independent Bob Katter recently said that Queensland needs to be split to save the region from economic ruin. While many Northern Queenslanders would welcome the splitting of the state across the 22^nd parallel south, they would have been just as unimpressed as the rest of Australia with this glaring geographical error.

Capricornia was the name for the proposed state dreamt up by Ian Johnston in his personal campaign for the creation of new states back in 2005.

How did they make such a blunder with a state seven times the size of the United Kingdom? Perhaps they ran a story on the North Queensland secessionist movement at some stage and accidentally used the map that includes the proposed state instead of the current map of Australia.

A little known truth about children detained behind razor wire

2010-10-23T20:19:00.011+08:00

When Prime Minister Julia Gillard announced the Labor government’s decision to release children and their families from immigration detention centres into the community, she evoked those well known emotive images of children detained behind razor wire:

I don’t think it’s the Australian way to have kids behind razor wire in the hope that will be a deterrent.

It was a misleading statement, because children seeking asylum in Australia are no longer being detained behind razor wire. Furthermore, contrary to what is widely believed, the previous Howard government actually abolished—not introduced—detention of children behind razor wire, and this was acknowledged by the Prime Minister in Question Time:

Mr FORREST (Mallee) (2:15 PM) —My question is addressed to the Prime Minister. I refer the Prime Minister to her statement: ‘I don’t think it’s the Australian way to have kids behind razor wire.’ Will the Prime Minister confirm that by 2005 the Howard government had overturned the Hawke and Keating governments’ policy of mandatory detention of children behind razor wire and that there have been no children held in these conditions since that time?

Ms GILLARD (Lalor) (Prime Minister) —I genuinely thank the member for his question. Can I say to him that I just referred to the 2005 reforms in my last answer to a question from the shadow minister and I respect the role that the member asking the question played in advocating those reforms from the back bench of the then Howard government.

…

Mr ABBOTT —Given the question that was asked by my colleague the member for Mallee, and given the Prime Minister’s answer, which referred to changes made by the Howard government in 2005, I ask her by way of supplementary question: why did she create the impression yesterday that there were still children behind razor wire?

…

Ms GILLARD —The question of children and razor wire is directly relevant to this reform, so I say again to the Leader of the Opposition: if he wants to say, ‘Good on the government, but the Howard government thought of this first,’ that is fine by me. …

Wyatt Roy entitled to his seat under the Commonwealth Electoral Act 1918

2010-09-19T13:08:00.009+08:00

Section 34 of the Constitution generated some excitement among Labor supporters because they believed that it meant that the new LNP Member for Longman, Wyatt Roy, who is just 20 years old, is not legally permitted to hold a seat in Federal Parliament:

COMMONWEALTH OF AUSTRALIA CONSTITUTION ACT - SECT 34

Qualifications of members

Until the Parliament otherwise provides, the qualifications of a member of the House of Representatives shall be as follows:

(i) he must be of the full age of twenty-one years, and must be an elector entitled to vote at the election of members of the House of Representatives, or a person qualified to become such elector, and must have been for three years at the least a resident within the limits of the Commonwealth as existing at the time when he is chosen;

(ii) he must be a subject of the Queen, either natural-born or for at least five years naturalized under a law of the United Kingdom, or of a Colony which has become or becomes a State, or of the Commonwealth, or of a State.

The first few words of Section 34 allow the minimum age for members and senators to be reduced by an Act of Parliament without amending the Constitution, and this was in fact done with the passage of the Commonwealth Electoral Act 1918, which reduced the minimum age for members and senators to 18:

COMMONWEALTH ELECTORAL ACT 1918 - SECT 163

Qualifications for nomination [see Note 6]

(1) A person who:

(a) has reached the age of 18 years;

(b) is an Australian citizen; and

(c) is either:

(i) an elector entitled to vote at a House of Representatives election; or

(ii) a person qualified to become such an elector; is qualified to be elected as a Senator or a member of the House of Representatives.

(2) A person is not entitled to be nominated for election as a Senator or a member of the House of Representatives unless the person is qualified under subsection (1).

Newspaper Editorials for 20 August, 2010

2010-08-20T07:14:00.010+08:00

The Australian:

One thing is abundantly clear, however: Kevin Rudd's big-government experiment was a disaster. Whichever party is returned, this ugly revival of old-style central planning must be buried and cremated. The Australian regrets taking Mr Rudd at his word in 2007 when he presented as an economic conservative who believed governments step in only when markets fail. The trouble was markets were deemed to have failed when Mr Rudd decided they had failed, and that was often. Long before the global financial crisis, the dead hand of government was touching the private sector in inappropriate places, and its behaviour grew steadily worse. GroceryWatch and FuelWatch were early signs of the hubris that resulted in the atrocity of a mining tax.

…

Our doubts towards Labor are about the party, not Ms Gillard, who has an abundance of courage and a talented frontbench team. Yet the financial crisis has revived a command economy culture we thought had been purged by Mr Hawke a quarter of a century ago. It was not big government that saved Australia from recession but the courage of leaders like Mr Hawke, Mr Howard and Paul Keating, who spent their own political capital on economic reform. The true test of a prime minister is not how he or she survives an external shock but how well they prepare us for the next one. It comes down to a question of trust in a contest between a leader who learned his trade under Mr Howard and one who served under Mr Rudd. On those grounds, we endorse Mr Abbott as our 28th prime minister.

The Australian Financial Review:

…By instinct, the Coalition would be less likely to waste taxpayers' money on risky projects than Labor, less inclined to sacrifice efficiency for "fairness" and protect weak industries, and more likely to embrace productivity-boosting reforms in welfare, tax and — hopefully by the 201 3 election — the workplace. Such reforms require real leadership. They are less likely to happen under Labor, which allows focus groups and unions to decide national policy and who should be prime minister.

We prefer the Coalition — which steered the economy through the 1997 Asian crisis and the fallout of the 2001 US recession. We hope, if elected, it learns better in office than Labor.

The Courier-Mail

This campaign has lacked detail on how to deal with those complex political and economic challenges, reducing the choice to a decision about what sort of country we want – one dominated by big government, or one where government gets out of the way to allow enterprise to thrive.

…The reason the Rudd/Gillard Government lost its way is that it believed fervently in the former and, in the process, squandered the trust and goodwill it received from Queensland voters in 2007, when it promised to confront contemporary issues more aggressively than the Howard government.

The past three years have been a story of government being presented as the solution to the nation's challenges, when in fact it only added to them…

…

This, in fact, is a strength and shows a commitment to the people he aspires to serve. We know well what Mr Abbott stands for because his positions are well chronicled. Like this newspaper, he stands for the strength of free enterprise empowered by less regulation and lower taxes. So does his party. The nation will be better for their return to government.

Tony Abbott is more honest than Julia Gillard, says former Labor leader

2010-07-22T21:55:00.017+08:00

In an interview on Sky News Australia, former leader of the federal ALP gave this blunt assessment of the honesty of the leaders of the two major parties:

Mark Latham: So every single slip, every wrong word, almost every misplaced syllable by a party leader it’s seized on. I’ve seen that already in this campaign. It’s seized on, as a story way out of proportion with its public interest value. So that encourages the politicians to narrow down, give them absolutely nothing and what we’ve seen so far in this campaign is that Gillard is really a changed person. She used to be fairly sort of free-wheeling and open about things. She has mastered the art of narrowness in public life whereas Abbott who, you know, really can’t sort of restrain himself from being a little bit honest is more likely to lead himself into an answer that, you know, is more honest than what Gillard’s giving people.

David Speers: But you’re saying Tony Abbott’s more honest in this campaign than Julia Gillard?

Mark Latham: Well he’s more inclined to speak his mind which you know should be a virtue, in a normal system it would be a virtue but in a system we’ve got now where the narrowness is absurd, there’s absolutely nothing in it for a politician to have an opinion that is outside the narrowly scripted message of the day on the campaign trail and this will be an ongoing problem for Abbott. Abbott who, for whatever reason, can’t sort of control himself in that regard is obviously going to find some …

Julia Gillard continues to mislead voters on the Australian Constitution

2010-07-05T19:58:00.030+08:00

Julia Gillard wants voters to forget that Australia is a federation of states with rights that are enshrined in the Australian Constitution, because they don’t sit well with Labor’s agenda to further centralise power in Canberra.

One of the central themes of the Rudd-Gillard Labor government’s campaign to win votes for its proposed Minerals Resource Rent Tax (MRRT) is that the nation’s minerals are owned by all Australians. As the government realises, this statement is misleading, as talkback radio host Alan Jones pointed out in his interview with the Prime Minister on 2GB last week:

JONES: -All company tax is profit-based, Julia. All company tax is profit based.

PM: Yes, but Alan, Alan, let’s just, absolutely right, I’m agreeing with you, we’re not having an argument about that. What’s different about mining? The key resource us a resource that is owned by everyone and we’ve got to work out what that’s worth. Historically-

JONES: -That’s not quite right, either. Constitutionally, what’s under the ground is owned by the States.

PM: Well, you know, Australians, Alan - whether they’re sitting in their States or sitting in their nation, it’s owned by Australians.

Australia’s minerals are owned by the Crown in the right of the states (excepting the territories), not in the right of the Commonwealth as the government is suggesting with its spin. It is clear from Section 114 in Chapter V of the Australian Constitution that while our minerals are owned by Australians, not all Australians own all our minerals:

114. A State shall not, without the consent of the Parliament of the Commonwealth, raise or maintain any naval or military force, or impose any tax on property of any kind belonging to the Commonwealth, nor shall the Commonwealth impose any tax on property of any kind belonging to a State.

Coming to your PC: the Rudd Desktop Assistant

2010-06-18T19:43:00.002+08:00

Remember Clippit, the animated paper clip that would appear and offer assistance when you started using a Microsoft Office application for the first time? It might have impressed some people with its animated stunts, but when it came to delivering the help you needed, all too often it responded with irrelevant answers to your questions. It looked very friendly, but when you wanted to get down to doing serious work it became an annoying, unwelcome intrusion. Now just imagine what it would be like to have a Kevin Rudd variant of this feature running in the background on your PC all the time, because this is in essence what might pop up after downloading and installing the application that the Rudd Labor government just announced would be available for parents seeking protection for their children online.

When Senator Conroy's desktop panic button was launched last week, it was derided by the online community as a waste of taxpayers' money because it was nothing more than a help button which connects the child to resources online—or so they thought. It would be naive to think that this button—reported to cost $73,000 to develop and includes the ability to update itself automatically—will do nothing more in future.

Perhaps the Rudd Labor government intends to quietly dump its unpopular plan for mandatory ISP-level filtering by sneaking in an update for PC-based filtering. However, this is a custom-built application and development is ongoing—not an existing commercial product available off the shelf—so we can only guess what the government plans to do next with its panic button.

The intentions of the Rudd Labor government's ideas for the Internet need close scrutiny, because a picture is emerging of a government obsessed with centralised monitoring and regulation of activity on the Internet. If the government is planning to make ISPs retain the browsing history of Internet users as some people in the industry claim, then it is more out of touch than it seemed at first with its plans for mandatory ISP-level filtering. Internet users can conceal their browsing history via the same methods as those used to circumvent ISP-level filters, such browsing via a Web proxy. It is obvious that they are not listening to expert advice in the development of their policies.

Sand and gravel included in the Rudd government's mining tax grab

2010-06-16T07:15:00.008+08:00

Despite being included in a list of resources that may merit exemption in the Henry Tax Review, lime, phosphates, sand and gravel will be subject to the Rudd Labor government’s proposed Resources Super Profits Tax (RSPT). Senator Wong couldn’t explain why the government chose to include these resources in the proposed tax on mining in yesterday's session of Question Time in the Senate.

Senator WILLIAMS (New South Wales) (2:28 PM) —My question is to the Minister representing the Minister for Resources and Energy, Senator Wong. I refer to the detailed analysis of the Henry tax review, table C1-1, headed ‘Resources that may merit exemption from the resource rent tax’. It lists more than 33 resources that may merit exemption. Why will these resources—including lime, phosphates, sand and gravel—still be subject to this massive new tax grab?

Senator WONG (South Australia) (Minister for Climate Change, Energy Efficiency and Water) —As I made clear in a previous answer, obviously the Henry tax review falls within the Treasurer’s portfolio, so if you have questions on the detail of that, Senator, I would suggest you put them to Senator Sherry, who represents the Treasurer. I can assist in relation to a number of the issues raised, however. For example, I would make the point that the move to a profits based regime will obviously, in general, be of greater assistance than a volumes based regime for more marginal operations. I make that as a general proposition.

The second point I would make is that a number of the commodities that you have discussed—not all, but some—are traded on world markets and obviously have their price set by world markets. For example, you mentioned phosphate. ABARE has advised that the price of phosphate is determined on world markets and by movements in the Australian exchange rates. I also make the point that, as I responded in response to an earlier question, the government’s modelling has indicated that the introduction of this reform, the replacement of royalties and the reduction in the company tax rate for all companies has, in fact, been independently modelled to bring down consumer prices by 1.1 per cent as well as to ensure that there is an increase in output as I have previously described. It may suit those opposite to run scare campaigns around a whole range of issues here; the fact is that this is about economic reform. It is about building a stronger economy and recognising that the benefits of the resources sector should be more fairly shared amongst all in Australia and should be utilised to make investments in other parts of our economy such as regional infrastructure, superannuation and reduction in the company tax rate. (Time expired)

Senator WILLIAMS (New South Wales) —Mr President, I ask a supplementary question. Given that the small quarries will face an effective tax rate of 57 per cent despite the Henry review advice, what modelling has the government done in relation to the effect of the obvious price increases in these infrastructure and fertiliser products?

Senator WONG (South Australia) (Minister for Climate Change, Energy Efficiency and Water) —Again, I do not know where you are quoting your figure from. I again remind you that this is a profits based regime which obviously only applies after a certain threshold which incorporates a rate of return. In relation to some of the fertiliser and fertiliser ingredients that you reference, I have indicated to you that a number of these commodities are in fact traded commodities and would have their prices set on world markets. The low-value commodities that are used as agricultural inputs are usually lower profit—

Honourable senators interjecting—

Senator Brandis —Mr President, a point of order: the question was limited to whether or not modelling had been done with relation to the effect on these commodities. Nothing that the minister has said has gone anywhere near the question of whether or not modelling was done. You should bring her directly to the question.

The PRESIDENT —I am listening to the answer that the minister is giving. It is a little bit difficult with the interjections that are taking place across the chamber. If they were not happening, it would be much easier to hear the comments that are being made.

Senator WONG —The modelling is the Econtech modelling which I have previously referred to. I was attempting to be of some assistance to the senator and to give him a specific answer in relation to the agricultural inputs he raised. The advice I have is that these are usually lower profit and, therefore, unlikely to face a higher tax burden under the RSPT, particularly given the replacement of royalties with an RSPT. I also indicate that the government is clearly consulting on this implementation. (Time expired)

Senator WILLIAMS (New South Wales) —Mr President, I ask a further supplementary question. Will the government pay financial compensation to state and local governments that will face obvious increased costs in road construction and community infrastructure because of this big new tax on all quarries that supply these resources?

Senator WONG (South Australia) (Minister for Climate Change, Energy Efficiency and Water) —What the government is doing, as the Prime Minister has announced, is implementing a $6 billion regional infrastructure fund. This demonstrates why tax reform is so critical to Australia. A fund means that we can begin to tackle our urgent infrastructure needs now and put something back into the mining communities that make our economy strong. The reality is that this is a tax that is about investment in infrastructure, investment in superannuation, investment in a reduction in the company tax rate for the other sectors of the economy, a fairer share and a stronger economy.

Media release from Shadow Treasurer Joe Hockey: A Shameless Con

2010-05-11T21:24:00.002+08:00

This Budget confirms that Kevin Rudd and Wayne Swan are addicted to spending and allergic to tough decisions.

This is another big taxing, big spending Labor Budget with no serious reform.

The Budget assumes less smoking with higher tobacco taxes, yet it assumes more investment with massively higher mining taxes.

Kevin Rudd and Wayne Swan are asking the Australian people to trust them to deliver a Budget outcome that is based on the most favourable terms of trade in 60 years, assumes a significant increase in investment in resources and assumes no new additional Government expenditure between now and 2014.

The Budget’s return to surplus relies upon a great big new tax on Australia’s resources sector, not tough decisions.

This great big new mining tax is a dagger to the heart of the Australian economy, putting major projects at risk and sending jobs offshore.

Mr Rudd and Mr Swan want to sacrifice Australia’s future economic prosperity to improve the numbers in this Budget’s bottom line.

Spending in this Budget will increase by $26 billion over the next three years relative to last year’s record spending forecast.

The Government will have to borrow over $700 million a week to fund its reckless and wasteful spending — putting upward pressure on interest rates and the cost of living for Australian families.

Interest on net government debt will be $4.6 billion in 2010/11.

By 2012/13 the Government will be spending $6.5 billion a year on interest payments.

The peak debt bill of $93.7 billion will be the amount owed by the Australian people to pay for Kevin Rudd’s spending spree.

The Government has not taken a single tough decision to rein in its reckless and wasteful spending. The improvement in the Budget’s fiscal position is a direct result of a growing economy and stronger terms of trade combined with tax hikes on miners and cigarettes and an attack on private health insurance.

The Budget also exposes the costs of the Government’s waste, mismanagement and policy failures, including a $1 billion blowout as a result of Kevin Rudd weakening Australia’s borders and $1 billion being spent to fix Labor’s tragic home insulation mess.

TAX:

The Government’s $9 billion a year mining tax will damage the sector of the Australian economy which did the most to see us through the Global Financial Crisis. Already this reckless decision has resulted in BHP casting doubt over the $20 billion expansion of Olympic Dam, Santos deferring a decision on a $15 billion LNG export-terminal in Gladstone, Xstrata suspending a $30 million regional exploration programme, and Origin Energy predicting increases in domestic energy and fuel prices.

Small business across Australia will be deeply concerned by the additional $445 million that Mr Rudd and Mr Swan will be giving to the Australian Taxation Office for increased compliance.

BILLION DOLLAR BOAT BLOWOUT:

Labor’s Budget reveals the economic cost of Kevin Rudd losing control of Australia’s borders.

Offshore asylum seeker management has blown-out by a massive $777 million since last year’s Budget. This blow-out in offshore management costs has occurred at the same time as Kevin Rudd has walked away from his commitment to universal offshore processing. Labor will spend an additional $202 million on accommodation for illegal arrivals both on Christmas Island and on the Australian mainland in Darwin, Sydney and Port Augusta.

HOME INSULATION PROGRAMME:

The Budget confirms that Kevin Rudd’s home insulation disaster will cost at least $1 billion to fix, with thousands of homes across Australia still not inspected in the aftermath of the scheme’s cancellation. The Home Insulation programme which has been linked to four deaths and resulted in 240,000 dangerous and dodgy insulation jobs, 1,000 electrified roofs, and 120 house fires, will now cost the Budget a further $1 billion. This programme is the most monumental failure of government policy in living memory.

LABOR SPIN ON SKILLS, EDUCATION AND EMPLOYMENT:

By setting a target for full employment at an unemployment rate of 4.75 per cent in 2012, the Government is effectively giving up on the employment prospects of 75,000 Australians.

The Government’s promise of a $661 million for skills investment re-badges $601 million of existing spending, including a $456 million cut in the Productivity Places Programme.

Further delays in the Julia Gillard school halls programme will mean that $500 million of stimulus funding will not be spent until 2011/12, at least three years after the Global Financial Crisis.

HEALTH:

The Budget confirms that Kevin Rudd’s health policies will be about more bureaucrats and not better services. The Government will spend around $500 million to establish new layers of Commonwealth bureaucracy. In less than a month, Kevin Rudd has broken his promise of no net increase in health bureaucrats.

Having broken his election promise and built just two of 36 GP super clinics, Kevin Rudd is now asking the Australian people to trust him to build 23 more. On this conversion rate, Australians can expect this latest promise from Kevin Rudd to deliver just 1.4 extra super clinics.

Furthermore, what the Government isn’t telling people is that only 9 of the additional 23 super clinics will be at full scale.

ENVIRONMENT:

Having shelved its response to what Kevin Rudd described as “the greatest moral challenge of our time”, the Budget demonstrates that the Government does not have a credible policy on climate change. The Coalition remains the only major party with a policy that will reduce carbon emissions by five per cent by 2020 while at the same time delivering good environmental outcomes.

But the Budget confirms that Kevin Rudd’s original great big new tax on everything — the ETS — will be coming back after the election.

MORE WASTE AND GOVERNMENT ADVERTISING:

In an undisguised election campaign strategy, the Government will spend $126 million on print, radio and television advertising.

Despite having no climate change policy, the Government will spend $30 million for another climate change advertising campaign.

The Government will also spend $38.5 million over two years to advertise the outcomes of the Henry Tax Review even though they only adopted a handful of the Review’s 138 recommendations.

Despite having not even introduced their Paid Parental Leave (PPL) legislation into the Parliament, for the second Budget year running, the Government has committed funding for PPL advertising to a new total of $12 million.

The Prime Minister’s daily PR spin on hospitals will continue with a new $29.5 million advertising campaign to sell their health package even though Western Australia has not signed on and all new beds won’t even be delivered until 2013-14.

With broadband services under the NBN still years away, the Rudd Government has committed $16 million over two years, including $7.6 million in the current financial year, on an NBN advertising campaign while at the same time, cutting $16.4 million from the previous Coalition Government’s ‘Australian Broadband Guarantee’ programme which ensured fast and affordable broadband.

It would appear that politically motivated government advertising is more important to Kevin Rudd than the $21.2 million programme to combat illicit drugs, from which he has cut $4 million.

DEFENCE

Wayne Swan’s Budget delivers Kevin Rudd’s priorities to Defence — more bureaucrats and less to the front line, increasing civilian numbers by 1,500 and cutting the number of uniform personnel by 500. The Budget will also place greater pressure on recruitment and retention in the ADF with further cuts to the successful defence gap year programme.

INFRASTRUCTURE:

The Budget does not invest a single additional dollar in Australia’s major road networks. There is no additional funding for the duplication of the Pacific Highway, making a farce of Kevin Rudd’s commitment to finish the duplication by 2016 — another broken promise.

11 May 2010

The sign says it all

2010-05-09T09:00:00.003+08:00

Photo taken in Redcliffe, Perth.

There was no "fat finger" 16 billion trade that led to Wall Street's largest intraday plunge

2010-05-07T17:20:00.009+08:00

The story that Wall Street's biggest intraday plunge in history was caused by a trader accidentally entering 16 billion rather than 16 million for the quantity of a sell order is nonsense. A check of the New York Stock Exchange's technical specifications reveals that the maximum quantity for trade orders is 6.5 million shares.

Issues of ISP-level filtering

2010-04-16T21:45:00.008+08:00

Simple illustration of the flaws with ISP-level filtering. Call me old-fashioned, but I believe it’s better to tackle the problem at the source. Internet users aren't the only victims of child pornography.

Conroy spun the filter trial, and out came a report fluffier than a Himalayan cat that's been through a clothes drier

2010-04-14T14:27:00.013+08:00

Senator Conroy has had more than enough time to provide clarity, substance and certainty on his planned mandatory Internet censorship regime. With each day that passes that their calls for reason, common sense and clarity on this issue are ignored, Australians with legitimate concerns about this policy grow ever more cynical about the ability of their politicians to understand and represent their views on issues relevant to ordinary Australians. In this age many Australians consider the Internet to be fundamental to their every day personal communications, just like the analogue telephone which is being replaced by VOIP, where voice telephony is delivered via the Internet. Many Australians consider this a serious issue that warrants robust and informed debate involving all stakeholders, and for it to be based on fact.

The Enex TestLab report is misleading and has Senator Conroy’s fingerprints all over it. Take for example the feedback from customers on page 28:

Over-blocking
Participants were asked if access was blocked to sites that they thought they should have access to (e.g. to identify perceptions of over-blocking). Only a couple of respondents indicated that they were frequently blocked access to sites they should have had access to, while most respondents reported that they were blocked “possibly once or twice”. A number of users reported they were “unsure” as to whether they had been blocked unnecessarily and some customers commented on the benefit of seeing some “output” of the filters action.

Proponents of the government’s policy might think that this is just collateral damage in the war on child pornography because it appears in the section of the report titled Customer Feedback — Additional Content Filtering, which covers the impact of the optional “family” filter on customers’ experience. We don’t know whether reports of over-blocking and other negative feedback can be attributed to the mandatory filter which was used at the same time for customers who participated in the trial of the filter for optional additional categories. They did not seek feedback from customers who participated in the trial of the mandatory filter alone.

Conroy boasts that the AMCA filter is 100% accurate. It’s just like throwing a net into the ocean, pulling out a few fish and saying “See these fish I’ve caught? It’s 100% accurate at catching these fish.”

You don’t have to embrace libertarianism to see the insanity. The end does not justify the means, especially when evidence that the end will be achieved does not exist. Will it block 5% of child pornography on the Internet? Will it even block 1%? Nobody knows. It’s hard for experts to provide clear answers when they are not provided with clearly defined aims. Also, it’s hard to disprove something that was never proven in the first place. The government has failed to demonstrate that the technology it intends to impose on each and every Australian will be effective in protecting children from child pornography.

How does Senator Conroy plan to filter the web traffic of mobile phones?

2010-04-10T12:33:00.008+08:00

Below is the page that is displayed when I browse to www.iplocationtools.com from my BlackBerry in Australia. It displays the IP address and location of the host connecting to the website, which in this case is a proxy located in Canada, the country in which RIM, the maker of BlackBerry smart phones, is based. How does the Rudd Labor government intend to censor the Internet when it accessed through the BlackBerry web browser or any other application that uses a proxy located offshore?

Noble's amusing response to an unsolicited takeover bid for Macarthur Coal by American miner Peabody Energy

2010-04-06T20:57:00.003+08:00

NOBLE COMMENTS ON PEABODY'S LAST MINUTE OPPORTUNISTIC GRAB

5 April 2010, Hong Kong

The board of Directors of the Noble Group have noted with interest the recent developments regarding an unsolicited offer by the United States based Peabody Coal for Macarthur. The board of Macarthur reacted to their bid with the same enthusiasm as a lost and hungry hiker who stumbles across a road kill Roo that had been in the sun too long, and not surprisingly said "no thanks".

We at Noble noted that this unsolicited offer had, as one of its many conditions, a requirement that the merger between Gloucester and Macarthur not proceed. This merger had already been carefully considered over a substantial period of time by the boards of both companies and had been unanimously supported and recommended to Macarthur's shareholders at a vote to take place on April 12, 2010. Without putting too fine a point on it, everyone at board level thought it was a great deal for their respective shareholders.

The entire concept behind the Gloucester-Macarthur merger was to build a truly outstanding multi mine and port Australian-based coal group with unique access to key markets. It was also crafted to give all shareholders who had patiently held the various shares involved the right to ride along and enjoy any potential upside.

Life was great until a few days ago when, instead of jumping on their horses, the Americans charged into town on a Gulfstream jet for the afternoon and plunked a bid down that was a great deal for them, and not, in our view, anywhere near what was already on the table. Hats off to them for being opportunistic and crafty; it ruined our Easter weekend.

So, now, instead of looking for eggs with our kids, we have to draft this release and inform the market that the Noble Group will have to give long hard thought as to whether we will try to chase these chaps out of town by, among other things, exercising, if certain events occur, our option to increase our share of Middlemount mine to 50 percent, where we would have the right to sell 100 percent of the output for the life of the mine. It goes without saying the Middlemount mine would then have to be operated as a separate 50-50 joint-venture company. We will also have to give thought to other ways in which we would make the interlopers from St. Louis leave us alone. Our quiver is far from empty. What will they do if we also review our rights under the Monto project and act to protect our investment? For them, this transaction would make a Porcupine seem well-shaven.

What we would really like is for the Americans to go back home. We busted our tail to put together a good fair deal that will build a great company. All they are doing is trying to throw a wrench in a well though-out deal with a check book and try and turn people's heads with a short-term payoff.

All of this reminds us of the wonderful story about the late great Kerry Packer. The story goes that he was trying to play a little blackjack and an American kept bugging him to get into the game. Finally Kerry got exasperated, looked up at the hapless guy and said, "what are you worth?". Mr. Texas puffed up and said "One hundred million"; Kerry replied "flip you for it". We consider that we have earned our stripes by building well run, publicly held businesses over time ..... and by not underestimating the grit of the country. Even in the face of Americans with checkbooks.

ooOoo

About Noble Group

Noble Group (SGX: N21) is a market leader in managing the global supply chain of agricultural, energy, metals and mining resources. The Group operates from over 150 offices and plants in 38 countries, employing approximately 70 nationalities and serving more than 4000 customers. Noble manages a diversified portfolio of essential raw materials, integrating the sourcing, marketing, processing, financing and transportation. With 2009 annual revenues exceeding US$31 billion, Noble owns and manages an array of strategic assets, sourcing from low cost producers such as Brazil, Argentina, Australia and Indonesia and supplying to high growth demand markets including China, India and the Middle East. Today, Noble has interests in grain crushing facilities, coal and iron ore mines, fuel terminals and storage facilities, sugar and ethanol plants, vessels, ports and other infrastructure to ensure high quality products are delivered in the most efficient and timely manner to its customers.

In late 2009, Noble Group was honored at the DHL SCMP Hong Kong Business Awards by winning the coveted International Award. During the year, Noble ranked #218 on the Fortune Global 500 and achieved "Investment Grade" ratings (Baa3) from Moody's Investors Service and (BBB-) from Standard & Poor's, complementing its initial "Investment Grade" rating (BBB-) from Fitch the previous year. In addition, Noble appears on the Forbes Global 2000 and Forbes Fab 50 lists of leading companies. Noble Group is among the 30 securities listed on the Straits Times Index.

For further details please contact:

Mr. Stephen Brown
Noble Group Limited
Tel: +852 2250 2060
Fax: +852 2861 0018
Email: stephenbrown@thisisnoble.com

Mr. Brad Smolar
Smolar Limited
Tel: +852 6339 3396
Fax: +852 2573 2473
Email: reputation@smolar.com

Coverage of South Australian and Tasmanian state elections on Twitter

2010-03-20T15:47:00.004+08:00

URL: http://justins-spot.blogspot.com/2010/03/coverage-of-south-australian-and.html

Washington Times exposes Warmists' snow job

2010-03-06T08:23:00.011+08:00

The Competitive Enterprise Institute has published the contents of e-mail exchanges at the National Academies of Science that were first reported by the The Washington Times revealing plans for an "outlandishly aggressively partisan" campaign to attack climate change sceptics, including raising donations to publish an advertisement in the New York Times. Not surprisingly, they describe the efforts of Senator James Inhofe to hold climate scientists to account as "McCarthyism". It is clear that these scientists are not confident that the merits of their science will enable their alarmist and exaggerated claims to be sustained under scrutiny.

Media release from Senator the Hon. Eric Abetz

2010-02-17T20:23:00.009+08:00

15 February 2010

Senate Additional Estimates: In case you missed it

No amount of spin doctoring and Ministerial interference can hide Labor’s litany of broken promises, lies and clangers following a week of hard fought efforts by the Coalition, exposing Labor for what it is - all talk and no action, all spin and no substance.

Here are a just a few examples of Labor’s bungling and broken promises exposed during Senate Estimates:

Destruction of Border Protection

Last week in Senate Estimates, Immigration Minister Chris Evans, facing questions from Liberal Senator Gary Humphries, appeared to find it somewhat amusing to admit that boot-scooting lessons were provided to asylum seekers on Christmas Island, as part of more than a billion dollars of taxpayers money the Labor is spending annually to deal with immigration issues. As Senator Humphries, Shadow Parliamentary Secretary for Citizenship and representing the Shadow Minister for Immigration and Citizenship in the Senate, said later in an interview with 6PR’s Howard Sattler, “The people smugglers clearly use a number of sales pitches; I don’t know whether they describe the boot-scooting at Christmas Island as one of those things. But you’d have to wonder what they do say and it is a worry. It ought not to be the impression that is created of what Australia will do for people who illegally enter its territorial waters.”

Labor fails to invest in Education Fund

Following scrutiny of Education Department officials by Senator Brett Mason, Shadow Parliamentary Secretary for Education and School Curriculum Standards, the Department has revealed that Labor has not contributed one cent to the Education Investment fund despite promises by the Rudd Government that they would do so, with great fanfare, as the centrepiece to Labor’s so called “Nation Building Package”.

Resources and Energy sector specialist rejected by Henry Tax Review

Department of Resources and Energy officials revealed that inexplicably their offer to second an officer from the resources division to the Henry Tax Review secretariat to provide specialist input, following growing speculation that the Rudd Government is looking to slug the resources sector with a massive new rent tax, has been rejected. “Considering this review could have very, very serious implications for the resources sector and could result in a massive new rent tax being imposed on it, I find it absolutely extraordinary that the Department’s offer to have a representative seconded was rejected,” said Shadow Minister for Resources and Energy, Senator the Hon Nick Minchin.

ASIC probed on Liquidators

Questioned by Nationals Senator John Williams, the Australian Securities and Investments Commission revealed that liquidators complete their own annual return and that ASIC does not carry out a routine audit which Senator Williams describes as “a recipe for disaster” and justifies the upcoming Senate Inquiry into liquidators and administrators and the role played by ASIC before and after a company collapses.

Rudd looks after himself and leaves all others without Training

Government officials questioned by Senator Mathias Cormann, Shadow Minister for Employment Participation, Apprenticeships and Training, and Senator Michaelia Cash, Chair of the Education, Employment and Workplace Relations References Committee, revealed to Senate Estimates that only one single trades training centre out of the 2,650 promised by Labor before the last election is fully operational and that coincidently the only trades training centre that has been established so far is located in the Prime Minister’s home town of Brisbane. This is despite an assurance just three months ago by the same Government officials that fifteen trade training centres would be completed by the end of last month.

Labor Government failing Australia with its Great Big New Tax

Treasury officials, questioned by Nationals Senator Ron Boswell revealed that following the Copenhagen debacle, which failed to secure a binding global agreement on emission reduction, it has done no modelling of the current international situation. Senator Boswell said, “Treasury modelling stands and falls on whether a global emissions trading scheme is in place. All their analysis of the impact of the Emissions Trading Scheme on pensioners, jobs, income and price rises depended on Copenhagen being successful.” Senator Boswell said that “it was very strange that no one in the Government had directed that the modelling be updated to take into account the Copenhagen outcome.”

Labor fails to support Australian fruit and vegetable growers

It has been revealed that whilst a staggering 114 Australian officials attended the failed Copenhagen conference, not one Australian Government representative could make it to the Berlin Conference on the fruit and vegetable industry seven weeks later. Senator Ian Macdonald, Shadow Parliamentary Secretary for Northern and Remote Australia and representative of the Shadow Minister for Trade, Transport, Regional Development and Local Government, confirmed during Senate Estimates that the Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade were invited to the trade fair but showed little interest in supporting Australian fruit and vegetable growers.

Labor fails to deliver to Australian taxpayers

The Australian Tax office admitted that 700,000 Australians are facing delays in the processing of their tax returns because the Department’s computer system is undergoing a major overhaul and that the Department estimates it will take until at least March 2010 to catch up on the back log.

Laptops? What laptops? Kevin07 promise slower than Conroy’s broadband.

Education Department officials revealed that despite Labor’s promise to give every one of Australia’s one million secondary students their own computer connected to ultra fast fibre broadband, less than a quarter of the new computers have been delivered and none of them have been connected to fast internet. Kevin Rudd needs to deliver one million computers by the end of 2011. ‘At the rate he’s going now, it will take some time until the end of 2018 to deliver Kevin07’s election promise. The whole program has been over-hyped and under-delivered right from the start. It’s been grossly under-budgeted and is now way behind schedule. Sadly, it has now become a national joke’, said Senator Brett Mason.

Labor mocks Australians with the ironically named Fair Work Act

During questioning by Shadow Employment and Workplace Relations Minister, Senator Eric Abetz, Fair Work Australia President Justice Geoffrey Guidice was unable to commit himself either way when asked if no Australian workers would be worse off since the introduction of Labor’s new workplace laws. Fair Work Australia was asked to address the growing confusion over workers entitlements and conditions despite both Julia Gillard and Kevin Rudd giving Australian workers a guarantee that no Australian workers would be worse off under Labor’s so called Modern Award scheme.

Kevin07 Green Loan Scheme promise a monumental failure

More than seven months into this financial year and Peter Garrett and Rudd Labor have managed to deliver just 1,008 of the 20,000 budgeted ‘Green Loans’ they promised to deliver, let alone the 200,000 they originally promised voters in 2007. Liberal Senator Simon Birmingham, Shadow Parliamentary Secretary for Climate Action, says Labor’s ‘Green Loans’ scheme has been downsized from what the Rudd Government originally promised and describes Labor’s bungling of the scheme as a monumental case of mismanagement.

Labor fails our Defence Force

Defence Force chiefs revealed more pay bungles within the Australian Defence Force. When questioned by Shadow Defence Minister, Senator David Johnston, Defence revealed that 56 combat engineers based in Afghanistan have had to repay debts of $38,000. Sixty three soldiers, who had returned from Afghanistan, have been forced to repay $340,000 and hundreds of Reservists have been overpaid. Meanwhile 25 Reservists were underpaid. Senator Johnston says even the Chief of the Army, Lt Gen Ken Gillespie admitted he has been forced to repay $20,000 due to a superannuation glitch in the system.

Conroy recommended Labor mate for plum NBN job

In a stunning revelation Communications Minister Senator Stephen Conroy admitted under questioning by Chair of the Environment, Communication and Arts References Committee Senator Mary Jo Fisher that it was he who recommended disgraced former Queensland MP and Labor Party apparatchik Mike Kaiser for a plum $450,000 a year job with the Government’s NBN Co. Senator Conroy said he put forward Kaiser’s name to NBN Co CEO Mike Quigley “as a person of possible relevant experience” for the role of Principal of Government Relations and External Affairs. Mr Quigley advised that the position had not been advertised, nor was a short-list of possible candidates compiled prior to Mr Kaiser’s appointment. Senator Conroy dismissed Mr Kaiser’s involvement in an electoral rorts controversy in Queensland as a “youthful indiscretion”. Kaiser will be paid around $100,000 more a year than the Prime Minister. Conroy now becomes the ‘Minister for Mates’.

Lack of NBN transparency

Communications Minister, Senator Stephen Conroy refused to say whether he will publicly release Labor’s $25 million Implementation Study for his $43 billion NBN Mark II proposal. Senator Mary Jo Fisher, Chair of the Environment, Communication and Arts References Committee, asked the Minister if the report will ever be released and questioned him as to why he would not commit to releasing the information for public scrutiny if Labor had nothing to hide. So Much for Mr Rudd’s supposed commitment to openness and transparency.

Labor fails to deliver on its promise to Aboriginal families

Despite Labor’s promise to deliver comprehensive preschool education to Aboriginal children none of Mr Rudd’s promised children and family centres in remote communities are operational. Liberal Senator Brett Mason, Shadow Parliamentary Secretary for Education and School Curriculum standards, discovered that two years after Kevin Rudd delivered his ‘Sorry’ speech; none of the 35 promised centres are even close to being operational.

Labor fails accountability test on public housing

Having ploughed $5.638 billion into it’s investment into public housing, Labor has failed to secure any guarantees that the dwellings provided to the states won’t then be sold. Coalition Housing spokesman, Senator Gary Humphries said its sheer foolishness for the Rudd Government to trust the States with this windfall and Labor must move immediately to guarantee that State and Territory Governments will not rort the system.

Counsellor assigned to India in placation exercise over uranium ban?

The Department of Resources and Energy confirmed that as part of a “whole-of-government” decision, it would station a departmental counsellor to the High Commission in New Delhi to identify and promote resources and energy trade and investment opportunities at a cost of $2.7 million. It was revealed that no such position has been assigned to China, which is far and away the largest importer of Australian minerals, which includes uranium, accounting for around 26 per cent of our overall mineral exports. India accounts for just 8 per cent of mineral exports and 6 per cent of energy exports. Shadow Minister for Resources and Energy, Senator the Hon Nick Minchin said, “One would have to seriously question whether this decision is purely an attempt to placate the Indian Government, which is both bemused and displeased by the Rudd Government’s nonsensical refusal to sell it uranium for civil purposes, while at the same time selling it to China for the very same reasons.”

Strong Border Protection and ASIO compromised by Rudd’s Special Deals

Evidence suggests Labor put political expedience before national security in its ‘special deal’ for refugees aboard the Oceanic Viking. Evidence presented at Senate Estimates clearly shows that the only reason refugees, given adverse security assessment by ASIO, were transferred from Indonesia to Australia was because of Kevin Rudd’s ‘special deal’ for the Oceanic Viking.

Labor’s cash splash fails the educational outcome test and more Jobs for Australians test.

Labor is unable to say how many jobs were created under its $16.2 billion cash splash on its so called Building the Education Revolution scheme. Labor also failed to answer how building multi-purpose school halls will help Australian school children’s literacy and numeracy and improve their academic performance.

Labor beggars belief – failure to embrace all Australians

Labor has confirmed that Australians who are blind or vision impaired will not be guaranteed a secret ballot at the next Federal election. Under questioning by the Coalition’s spokesman for disabilities, Senator Mitch Fifield, Labor’s Special Minister of State, Joe Ludwig flat out refused to comment.

Missing in Action - Prime Minister’s grand plan for hospitals.

“Not even a back of the envelope plan for fixing hospitals could be produced by the Secretary of the Department of Health,” said Senator Concetta Fierravanti-Wells, Shadow Minister for Ageing.

Websites: www.liberal.org.au www.abetz.com.au

Media enquiries: Jane Kilmartin (02) 6277 3019 — 0400380925

An inconvenient truth about the IPCC

2010-02-08T22:35:00.015+08:00

It is one of the most critical and frequently cited findings of the IPCC and has been used to justify action to reduce greenhouse gas emissions by governments around the world:

Most of the observed increase in global average temperatures since the mid-20th century is very likely due to the observed increase in anthropogenic greenhouse gas concentrations.

In the IPCC Fourth Assessment Report, the words very likely specifically mean a probability greater than 90%.

While this figure has been treated as definitive in our understanding and response to global warming, it is not based on science as most people would believe. The figure was determined via a show of hands from representatives from each country. It was the result of a political process that did not involve climate scientists.

Is this what Kevin Rudd had in mind for Australia at Copenhagen?

2010-01-30T15:01:00.008+08:00

You would be amazed by all the things that you don't hear in the mainstream media, such as the draft text of the Copenhagen climate change treaty, which thankfully was never agreed to. Even though it is still online, hardly anybody has read it, which is probably the way it was intended.

The 181 page document is barely comprehensible, but Clause 38 that begins on page 18 raises your eyebrows:

38. The scheme for the new institutional arrangement under the Convention will be based on three basic pillars: government; facilitative mechanism; and financial mechanism, and the basic organization of which will include the following:

The government will be ruled by the COP with the support of a new subsidiary body on adaptation, and of an Executive Board responsible for the management of the new funds and the related facilitative processes and bodies. The current Convention secretariat will operate as such, as appropriate.

The Convention’s financial mechanism will include a multilateral climate change fund including five windows: (a) an Adaptation window, (b) a Compensation window, to address loss and damage from climate change impacts, including insurance, rehabilitation and compensatory components, (c) a Technology window; (d) a Mitigation window; and (e) a REDD window, to support a multi-phases process for positive forest incentives relating to REDD actions.

The Convention’s facilitative mechanism will include: (a) work programmes for adaptation and mitigation; (b) a long-term REDD process; (c) a short-term technology action plan; (d) an expert group on adaptation established by the subsidiary body on adaptation, and expert groups on mitigation, technologies and on monitoring, reporting and verification; and (e) an international registry for the monitoring, reporting and verification of compliance of emission reduction commitments, and the transfer of technical and financial resources from developed countries to developing countries. The secretariat will provide technical and administrative support, including a new centre for information exchange.

Columnist Janet Albrechtsen read the treaty draft before the UN climate change conference in Copenhagen and warned the public of the "fine print" in the climate change agreement that our governments were about to sign up to in The Australian and The Wall Street Journal.

Senator Fielding is just another twit on Twitter

2010-01-29T13:26:00.007+08:00

@senatorsteve: just been using a nice new apple mac inside the detention centre. Not bad at all!

@latikambourke: @senatorsteve good to see your priorities are in order, Senator.

@Pollytics: You really are a tool sometimes RT @senatorsteve: just been using a nice new apple mac inside the detention centre. Not bad at all!

@jamesmassola: @senatorsteve I'm a little unclear on what using an iMac has to do with a visit to Christmas island. Why is that noteworthy?

@Pollytics: @senatorsteve Did you feed the animals? You're treating the rest of your trip like you're at the zoo. Wake up to yourself, its detestable

Senator Brown's life in a parallel universe

2010-01-21T19:04:00.010+08:00

According to The Canberra Times, CSIRO hydrologist Dr David Post stated that there was "no evidence" linking the drought in eastern Australia to climate change. In response, leader of the Australian Greens, Senator Bob Brown, made an extraordinary claim:

We should ask why CSIRO is prepared to turn an unaccountable blind eye to recent climate trends in Tasmania. This undercurrent of scepticism would seem to suggest the report has been politicised.

While the Rudd Labor government has been ridiculing climate change sceptics opposed to its Carbon Pollution Reduction Scheme (CPRS), which will be re-introduced into Parliament for the third time after two failed attempts to have the legislation passed, Senator Brown believes the findings are a result of the CSIRO "caving in to political pressure".

If there is any political pressure that is influencing the work of the CSIRO, it is pressure to avoid publishing research that conflicts with the government's climate change policy, as was the case for Dr Clive Spash, whose research was suppressed because it was critical of the government's CPRS.

Dr Post does not actually rule out the possibility that the drought in the Murray-Darling Basin was caused by climate change:

At this stage, we'd prefer to say we're talking about natural variability. The science is not sufficiently advanced to say it's climate change, one way or the other. The jury is still out on that.

The report from the CSIRO Murray-Darling Basin Sustainable Yields Project puts the current drought into context:

Annual rainfall in the southern MDB for the ten-year period 1997 to 2006 was significantly lower than the long-term average but similar low-rainfall periods occurred in the 1890s and around 1940.

More 3D buildings for Australian cities in Google Earth

2010-01-17T09:36:00.008+08:00

I started playing around with Google Earth again after using it to look at the destruction wreaked by the earthquake in Haiti. More 3D models of buildings in Australian cities have been added since I last enabled the 3D Buildings layer and looked at our cities.

Melbourne

The University of Western Australia

Perth

America's Climategate: Allegations of climate data manipulation at NASA and NOAA

2010-01-16T20:05:00.015+08:00

Explosive allegations of data manipulation at US government climate data centres have been aired in a special report on the website of KUSI News, based in San Diego, United States. These claims are based on research by computer programmer E. Michael Smith and meteorologist Joseph D'Aleo, who say that world temperature observations have been substantially manipulated to support claims of global warming.

According Smith and D'Aleo, the US national temperature dataset has been manipulated in a number of ways. In about 1990, readings from thermometers around the world had been excluded, reducing the total number of thermometers used in the dataset from 6000 to 1500. Readings from thermometers in cold places were substituted with ones from elsewhere, as E. Michael Smith explains:

Smith: One of the more startling ones I ran into was Bolivia. There is a very wonderful baseline for Bolivia, a very high and mountainous country, right up until 1990 when the data ends, and if you look on the November 2009 anomaly map, you'll see a very red, rosy, hot Bolivia. How do you get a hot Bolivia when you haven't measured the temperature for 20 years?

Coleman: Well, how do you?

Smith: They take the temperature from places up to 1,200 kilometres away and copy it in, they fill in with what they've got. And what they've got is the beach in Peru and the Amazon jungle.

Also, adjustments were applied to the raw data to produce a warming trend where none existed, as in the case of Davis, California, which appears to be warming in the adjusted data but shows cooling in the non-adjusted data:

Port-au-Prince: Before and after

2010-01-16T11:33:00.002+08:00

Port-au-Prince, before January 12, 2010, when it was struck by a magnitude 7.0 earthquake:

Port-au-Prince after the earthquake:

Update: Rudd Labor government censors results from ISP filtering trial

2010-01-01T17:04:00.030+08:00

In an earlier post I briefly explained how key results were missing in the Enex TestLab report on the government's live pilot of its proposed ISP-level filtering scheme.

The results of the accuracy testing can be combined into a single table.

No results were published on the percentage of URLs that were blocked on the innocuous list of URLs, as was done for the participants blocking additional content. The results cannot be considered complete without figures providing an indication of the rate of over-blocking that occurred for filters blocking URLs on the ACMA blacklist only.

A filter blocking only those URLs listed on ACMA blacklist should in theory block fewer innocuous sites than a filter blocking additional categories of content as well as the ACMA blacklist. However, the results for filtering the ACMA blacklist only are crucial as ISPs will be required to block the content specified on this list for all Internet users under legislation the federal government intends to introduce into Parliament this year.

While the rate of over-blocking for filters blocking the ACMA blacklist alone is likely to be better, publishing just the results for trials of filters that block both the ACMA blacklist and additional categories of content puts the government in a convenient position when challenged by criticism of the filters' performance. Enex stated in the report that the percentages for the blocking of URLs on the innocuous list of URLs were high:

In terms of over-blocking the results of this trial show that, while an improvement on previous testing levels, this is still considered high.

The government might respond to criticism by stating that less over-blocking will occur with the proposed mandatory filter which will block URLs on the ACMA blacklist without providing any actual figures obtained from tests.

The case is similar with the feedback survey that was carried out for customers of the ISPs involved in the pilot. The customer feedback survey was not issued to customers of ISPs that filtered the ACMA blacklist only, as stated in the report.

Policy motion passed by the Liberal Party of Australia (WA Division) opposing Government censorship of the Internet

2009-12-21T19:34:00.010+08:00

The following policy motion (as printed in the Conference Handbook) moved by the Western Australian Union of Liberal Students was debated and passed at the 59^th Annual Western Australian State Conference held on 21 March 2009:

That the Liberal Party of Australia (WA Division), is opposed to all Government censorship of the internet.

Support was emphatic, with no more than 5–10% of conference delegates voting against the policy motion.

ALSF Media Release: Fight the filter!

2009-12-20T12:57:00.008+08:00

Published at http://www.alsf.org.au/news.php?n=54:

Wednesday, 16 December, 2009

Fight the filter!

The Australian Liberal Students’ Federation (ALSF) has today slammed the Rudd Labor Government for its proposed internet filter and called on the Coalition to fight the filter.

“There is a grass-roots movement against this policy, and the ALSF is a leading group in that movement,” ALSF President Alex Butterworth said today.

“The ALSF will continue to campaign hard against this oppressive policy, which will limit freedom of speech, slow down internet speeds substantially, and cause an estimated 20 million legitimate sites to be blocked,”

“Rudd promised broadband for all Australians and a computer for every child, and all he is doing is slowing down the internet, slowing down the economy and taking us backwards,”

“Importantly, we need to ask why the filter is even being considered when voluntary filtering packages are already available to those who want them?”

“The filter shows that the oppressive nanny state is alive and well under the Rudd Labor Government,” “Australia will join countries such as Iran, Syria, China and North Korea as one of the few nations where the internet is filtered,” said Mr Butterworth.

Media Enquiries:

Alex Butterworth
+61 418 264 020
abutterworth@alsf.org.au
www.alsf.org.au

Censorship: it's already happening under Kevin Rudd

2009-12-19T14:24:00.010+08:00

Actions that the government has already taken to suppress politically unfavourable views raise doubts about Kevin Rudd's motives for implementing mandatory ISP-level filtering. It is unfortunate that these outrageous violations of freedom of speech have received little attention in the media.

When an MP instructed his supporters to contact him to obtain copies of a speech because new regulations issued by the Department of Finance and Deregulation prevented him from distributing material critical of the government, I thought it was only a joke. Unfortunately, it wasn't—so much for deregulation. Luke Simpkins, Federal Member for the Western Australian seat of Cowan, raised this issue in a speech given under Parliamentary privilege on 27 October 2009:

Mr SIMPKINS (Cowan) (8:49 PM) —It is a great honour to be able to stand in this parliament as an elected representative of the people of Cowan. It is great to be able to stand here and speak with the protection of parliamentary privilege to ensure that I am not restricted in saying what needs to be said. I can talk, and have done so, about the things that matter to my constituents without my right to freedom of speech being restricted. This is a cornerstone of the great democratic tradition. That being said, I do not use parliamentary privilege to tell lies; I use it to tell the truth. If we did not have parliamentary privilege then our ability to tell the truth and convey information would effectively be restricted. The other great advantage of parliamentary privilege is that we cannot be told what we can and cannot say. If we were, that would be censorship and the argument would very clearly be that such censorship would exist to deny us the ability to communicate alternative viewpoints for the benefit of our nation or to deny us the opportunity to be critical of the government in a constructive manner.

Censorship does not exist in the parliament, but in conveying information about what happens here censorship does apply. When I convey information to my constituents, what I need to tell them is censored. The government’s appointed censors in the Department of Finance and Deregulation can tell me that I cannot print certain statements. They tell us that freedom of speech is not allowed. I cannot send my constituents copies of Hansard, the official recording of what is said in this place, if that Hansard record states or implies any words that are critical of the Labor government. The text of this speech, once in Hansard, would be predominantly blacked out by a thick black marker—a marker that serves to eliminate the ability of anyone to engage constructively in a critical debate about government policies and actions.

If I were to say that the Prime Minister was very good at finalising the delivery of quality Howard government projects and programs, and taking credit for them, but hopeless in terms of his own policy performance, that would be censored. I cannot report that in writing. If I were to say that the Deputy Prime Minister’s bungled, over-budget, behind schedule, hopelessly mismanaged—and now under investigation by the Auditor-General—memorial school halls debacle was a fiasco, that would be censored as well. If I were to say that the Minister for Health and Ageing has failed to fix public hospitals by the promised mid-2009 deadline then that would be censored.

If I were to talk about the failure by serial bungler the Minister for Broadband, Communications and the Digital Economy to achieve the original broadband tender at over $4 billion—he is now risking $43 billion of funds borrowed from taxpayers on a broadband plan that has no business plan, which is a very expensive plan without a plan to make sure that taxpayers’ money is spent properly—that would be censored. If I were to say that the Minister for Infrastructure, Transport, Regional Development and Local Government claimed responsibility for infrastructure projects most of which were initiated by, and many of which were completed by, the previous coalition government then that would be censored. In fact, I do not think that you can even report anything about unauthorised boats arriving in Australian waters, as the mere mention of such an event would be critical of the government and that would be censored.

All these comments would be blacked out. Criticism of the Labor government is not allowed in our letters and newsletters. Bringing the people’s attention to mistakes of the government is no longer allowed in this country. The outlawing of legitimate criticism is occurring now in the printed format by the design of the Labor government, but who knows what the future holds.

I wonder what will be next. Perhaps we will have a list of unparliamentary words expanded so that we can no longer say—in reference to ministers, the Labor Party, State Labor governments, former members of the Labor Party, unions or any other association to do with the Labor Party—words such as ‘bad’, ‘mismanagement’, ‘bungled’, ‘incompetent’, ‘hasty’, ‘knee-jerk’, ‘putting Australia at risk’, or even ‘debt’ or ‘deficit’ et cetera . It is very hard to accurately describe the government without those words.

Perhaps the next step will be that Hansard can be edited to take out any criticisms of the Labor government. Perhaps what is being planned is that standing orders can be modified so that questions or criticisms of the Labor government will, in the future, result in exclusion from the chamber. At least then the Labor government would be able to say that there has not been a bad word said about them in parliament.

This censorship has resulted in the Labor government censors stopping criticism of the government by the opposition in letters or newsletters. The censors are not elected, just directed by the Labor government. These restrictions do not apply to the Prime Minister and ministers in the Labor government, who can continue to use ministerial budgets to criticise the opposition—double standards of the worst kind. This is, without doubt, censorship and an attack on the basic principle of democracy—freedom of speech.

Recently, Dr Clive Spash, a scientist at the CSIRO, was prevented from publishing a paper critical of the Rudd Labor government's emissions trading scheme (ETS). The political interference in research conducted at the CSIRO was raised in Parliament by Eric Abetz, Senator for Tasmania, on 25 November 2009:

It is often in matters of contention and sharp debate that the knowledge and expertise of the scientific community is most valuable. This is why it is so important to protect the right of scientists to speak out about their research and discoveries.’

Going back to that topic of—what was it?—matters of contention, guess what? We have a Carbon Pollution Reduction Scheme being considered by the parliament as we speak—somewhat contentious—and guess what Dr Spash was writing about? The Carbon Pollution Reduction Scheme. So by the very test that Senator Carr puts down, he nevertheless puts the censor’s pen through and says, ‘No, we don’t want to hear in any unfettered way what Dr Spash might have to offer not only the government but also the Australian people to help inform them in their debate.’ We do not get the full and detailed treasury modelling on matters to do with the government’s legislation in recent times; we do not get the whole story out of this government.

When you have an institution as proud as the CSIRO being muzzled in this way in the face of a minister who claims that he has been an advocate his whole public life for ‘vigorous and transparent public debate unfettered by political interference’, when you have a minister who says that but then does the exact opposite, you know why he is a cabinet minister in the Rudd government. He fits the mould. That is what the Labor cabinet ministers do: they say one thing, promise one thing and then do another.

Open letter to Australia's Prime Minister from Reporters Sans Frontières

2009-12-19T13:41:00.001+08:00

Published at http://www.rsf.org/Open-letter-to-Australia-s-Prime.html:

The Hon Kevin Michael Rudd Prime Minister Parliament House Canberra ACT 2600 Australia

Paris, 18 December 2009

Dear Prime Minister,

Reporters Without Borders, an organisation that defends free expression worldwide, would like to share with you its concern about your government's plan to introduce a mandatory Internet filtering system. While it is essential to combat child sex abuse, pursuing this draconian filtering project is not the solution. If Australia were to introduce systematic online content filtering, with a relatively broad definition of the content targeted, it would be joining an Internet censors club that includes such countries as China, Iran and Saudi Arabia.

Communications minister Stephen Conroy announced on 15 December that, after a year of testing in partnership with Australian Internet service providers (ISPs), your government intended to introduce legislation imposing mandatory filtering of websites with pornographic, paedophile or particularly violent content.

Reporters Without Borders would like to draw your attention to the risks that this plan entails for freedom of expression.

Firstly, the decision to block access to an "inappropriate" website would be taken not by a judge but by a government agency, the Australian Communications and Media Authority (ACMA). Such a procedure, without a court decision, does not satisfy the requirements of the rule of law. The ACMA classifies content secretly, compiling a website blacklist by means of unilateral and arbitrary administrative decision-making. Other procedures are being considered but none of them would involve a judge.

Secondly, the criteria that the proposed law would use are too vague. Filtering would be applied to all content considered "inappropriate," a very slippery term that could be interpreted very differently by different people. In all probability, filtering would target "refused classification" (RC) sites, a category that is extremely controversial as it is being applied to content that is completely unrelated to efforts to combat child sex abuse and sexual violence, representing a dangerous censorship option. Subjects such as abortion, anorexia, aborigines and legislation on the sale of marijuana would all risk being filtered, as would media reports on these subjects.

The choice of filtering techniques has not been clearly defined. Would it be filtering by key-words, URL text or something else? And what about the ISPs that are supposed to carry out the filtering at the government's request? Will they be blamed, will they be accused of complicity in child sex abuse if the filtering proves to be ineffective, as it almost certainly will?

Your government claims that the filtering will be 100 per cent effective but this is clearly impossible. Experts all over the world agree that no filtering system is effective at combating this kind of content. On the one hand, such a system filters sites that should not be affected (such as sites about the psychology of child sexuality or paedophile crime news). And on the other, it fails to filter targeted sites because their URLs contain key-words that are completely unrelated to their content, or because their content (photo and text) is registered under completely neutral terms. Furthermore, people who are determined to visit such sites will know how to avoid the filtering by, for example, using proxy servers or censorship circumvention software or both.

The Wikileaks website highlighted the limitations of such as system when it revealed that the ACMA blacklist of already banned websites contained many with nothing reprehensible in their content. According to Wikileaks, the blacklist included the Abortion TV website, some of the pages of Wikileaks itself, online poker sites, gay networks, sites dealing with euthanasia, Christian sites, a tour operator's site and even a Queensland dentist's site.

The US company Google has also voiced strong reservations. Google Australia's head of policy, Iarla Flynn, said yesterday: "Moving to a mandatory ISP filtering regime with a scope that goes well beyond such material is heavy handed and can raise genuine questions about restrictions on access to information."

As regards paedophilia, the most dangerous places on the Internet are websites offering chat and email services. So if this project were taken to its logical conclusion, access to sites such as Gmail, Yahoo and Skype would also have to be blocked, which would of course be impossible.

There are more effective ways to combat child pornography, including tracking cyber-criminals online (by means of cookies, IP address comparison, and so on), combined with police investigation into suspects and their online habits. Why did your government end the programme launched by the previous government, which made free filtering systems available to Australian families? This procedure had the merit of being adapted to individual needs and gave each home the possibility of shielding its children from porn.

A real national debate is needed on this subject but your communications minister, Stephen Conroy, made such a debate very difficult by branding his critics as supporters of child pornography. An opportunity was lost for stimulating a constructive exchange of ideas.

We also regret the lack of transparency displayed by your government as regards the tests carried out in recent months using procedures that have been kept secret. Your government paid some 300,000 Australian dollars to ISPs to finance the tests. Australian taxpayers have a right to be given detailed information about the results.

Finally, you must be aware that this initiative is a source of a concern for your compatriots. In a recent Fairfax Media poll of 20,000 people, 96 per cent were strongly opposed to such a mandatory Internet filtering system, while around 120,000 Australians have signed a petition against Internet censorship launched by the online activist group GetUp. The withdrawal of this proposal would therefore satisfy public opinion as well as prevent a democratic country from introducing a system that threatens freedom of expression.

I thank you in advance for the consideration you give to our recommendations.

Sincerely,

Jean-François Julliard
Secretary-General

Liberal MPs and senators who have spoken against mandatory ISP-level filtering

2009-12-19T08:30:00.018+08:00

Cory Bernardi, Senator for South Australia and Shadow Parliamentary Secretary Assisting the Leader of the Opposition, for The Australian, 6 February 2009:

I identify myself as a social and fiscal conservative and most people who know me would agree with that assessment. As such, one could reasonably expect me to support ISP filtering as a means of ensuring inappropriate content remains unavailable via the internet.

Yet I have grave reservations about the Labor Party proposal on mandatory ISP filtering which is described as a ‘clean feed’ – words that just sugar-coat compulsory censorship of whatever the government deems you are not allowed to see.

Dr Dennis Jensen, Member for Tangney, in the House of Representatives, 14 September 2009:

Computer users, particularly the more tech-savvy—and a special mention must go to the Whirlpool website forums for fostering real debate of the issue—hold the minister as an object of contempt and ridicule, particularly for his bumbling attempt to impose controls over the medium which is ultimately setting the world free. The internet delivers power to the world’s people. It is an ally of all who cherish freedom, individual liberty and true democracy. That is why it is the enemy of authoritarian rulers in countries such as China, Burma and Iran—and, it seems, of the Australian Labor Party.

Members should recall that under the last coalition government we had a very simple, very cost-effective and very popular program under which families could get free copies of an internet filter program for their homes to protect their children from unsavoury internet content. The Rudd government scrapped that, and two years after taking office the minister is still unable to offer an alternative. Delay after delay has very fortunately put this censorship plan on hold, and for this some thanks must go to internet service providers who refused to take part in sham trials.

By now, the members opposite must also have realised how deeply flawed is the internet filter pursued by the minister, and we can only hope that they will quietly abandon it at some stage. What grew from the idea of protecting children using the internet rapidly became billed as a weapon against child pornography, and these are surely two very different issues. From there, the minister has broadened it to propose blocking Australians from viewing any material which a select group of faceless bureaucrats deem inappropriate. And to top it off, the list of banned material would itself be banned from public scrutiny, effectively making the censors unaccountable. IT experts say such a system will slow the network and that it will not work, regardless. This is particularly the case in combating traffic in child pornography, which reportedly is usually distributed through peer-to-peer networks rather than via websites, and so could continue unhindered by the filter.

And so we have a government pledging to spend tens of billions of dollars on a national broadband network of dubious worth which will supposedly offer higher speed data links to all. At the same time, the government is planning a censorship scheme which will have the opposite effect, reducing data speeds and hindering access. And, most crucially, it would stop the free flow of information which we have come to expect from the internet, a strategy more akin to foreign dictatorships, for which Labor feigns distaste, a strategy wholly not in keeping with our country’s proud history of free speech and open debate. The internet promised to take us all into the future, but this government appears intent on applying the policies of the past in its selfish pursuit of power and control, not only in this building but over the lives of all Australians.

Jamie Briggs, Member for Mayo, for The Punch, 27 August 2009:

Proponents of ISP filtering claim it will make it safer. Rubbish. Indeed the ISP filter systems work by closing down access to web addresses after they have been launched. Some claim that this will be as little as 24 hours after the website is launched. Even in the best case scenario it is going to be the old dog chasing its tail.

The ISP filters fail to address online chat rooms, peer to peer connections and emails.

What we have to ask ourselves here is how much are we sacrificing for additional ‘protections’?

The internet surely has dangers but they are so far outweighed by the enormous educational, economic and social benefits that we should be very wary of allowing our Government to attempt to regulate it.

If parents want to protect their children from the nasties, they should. We should be telling parents, like not talking to strangers, that the Government cannot protect you from every danger in the world and that you must take responsibility for your children’s safety.

There is a massive risk with this false promise that we will start to walk down a very dangerous path of censorship that can’t end well.

Simon Birmingham, Senator for South Australia, for The Punch, 10 November 2009:

Somehow, when promising to clean up the internet, they forgot to say what exactly it was they were going to protect kids from. Cyber bullying? Information about drugs, suicide or cults? Pornography perhaps? Surely kids shouldn’t be seeing any of these things online. Lucky for mum and dad Uncle Kev is on the case cleaning up the net.

Or is he? Ever since Labor announced its policy I’ve been trying to find out exactly what would be blocked. The story appears to have changed month by month – sometimes it’s all pornography, sometimes X rated material, sometimes inappropriate content. But now it seems to be stuff that’s already illegal – content that has been Refused Classification.

So while mum and dad are busy cooking dinner and Uncle Kev is meant to be looking after the kids on the internet, they will still be able to access pornography, information about drugs and unsuspectingly chat away with goodness knows who in chat rooms – hardly being kept safe from inappropriate content!

Originally the government proposed a very broad filter that would provide a ‘clean feed’ to each and every internet user, whether you wanted it or not. The notion of a ‘clean feed’ that protects children from “harmful and inappropriate online material” would have been a compulsory ISP level filter of such scale that China and Iran might have felt a little filter envy.

However, many experts believe a compulsory ISP level filter would result in the decimation of internet speeds and force serious restrictions on free speech. The more you filter, the greater the impact on speeds. And, the more you try to filter, the more likely you are to block access to material that law-abiding adults would legitimately want to access.

Michael Johnson, Member for Ryan and Opposition Whip, in a media release, 17 December 2009:

The frightening question is where will Rudd’s state censorship and government intrusion into the privacy of our lives end? We have seen Mr Rudd try to make homebirths illegal and take away the right of women to choose the place of giving birth and recently attempted reprehensible muzzling of Opposition Members of Parliament from criticizing the Federal Government.

The arguments against Labor’s ISP filtering censorship plan are compelling. I believe there are many arguments to support my position:

The ISP filter will provide a false sense of security. Antivirus is a prime example – as much protection as we load onto our computers and networks we access, there are always new viruses, worms and trojans gaining access and creating havoc.

The Australian Communications and Media Authority (ACMA) already has the responsibility for issuing take-down notices for black-listed content hosted in Australia. This Service Provider Responsibility List can be accessed at: http://www.acma.gov.au/WEB/STANDARD/pc=PC_90157

There are already tools available for parents in commercial form which are just as foolproof as this ISP filtering plan, but don’t equate to censorship. These come in the forms of personal internet filters, parental control software and remote monitoring.

Parents should be providing their children with the educational resources and know how to support the disciplinary responsibilities not only they, but their children, must be aware of when using the internet.

Even with the ISP filtering plan in action, it will not protect your child from online chat rooms, peer to peer connections or emails.

Alex Hawke, Member for Mitchell, to ZDNet Australia, 18 December 2009:

I'm inherently against this concept, it's a very bad way to do governance.

I'm a Christian and I have spoken to the Christian lobby and told them that this policy will not be effective. It could even potentially lead to some of their views being added to a government filter.

I don't think they're open to the danger of this policy mechanism. It will go beyond [child pornography] and that's where it could run into trouble. I'm going to be arguing strongly inside the liberal party that we should oppose this policy.

Rudd Labor government censors results from ISP filtering trial

2009-12-18T11:11:00.012+08:00

Crucial information on the Rudd Labor government's trial of ISP-level content filtering is conspicuously absent in the Enex TestLab report. Senator Stephen Conroy, Minister for Broadband, Communications and the Digital Economy, has failed to disclose the rate of over-blocking that occurs when the filter is configured with the ACMA blacklist. While the report includes results on the degree of over-blocking and under-blocking for a list of URLs provided by Enex, the figures for over-blocking for the ACMA blacklist are more important as this is the list that ISPs will be required to block when mandatory ISP-level filtering is in force.

The reality of Internet content filtering is that as the success rate for blocking of prescribed prohibited content increases, so too does the over-blocking of legitimate content, as Enex makes clear in its own report:

Enex considers it unlikely that any filter vendor would achieve 100 percent blocking of the URLs inappropriate for children without significant over-blocking of the innocuous URLs because the content on different commercial lists varies and there is a high rate at which new content is created on the internet. Enex has also noted, through previous testing, that the higher the accuracy the higher the over-blocking.

Enex reported that they were successful in blocking 100% of the pages listed on the ACMA blacklist, but what was the price paid in blocking of legitimate content? Even though the Minister has not released this information, he is proceeding with the implementation of ISP-level content filtering without consulting the Australian people on whether they are prepared to accept the negative impact it will have on the accessibility of the vast majority of sites on the Internet that do not pose a threat to children.

Mandatory ISP-level filtering: issue of feasibility or freedom of speech?

2009-12-17T11:35:00.019+08:00

Most disagreements I've had on the issue of mandatory ISP-level filtering are not on whether it is bad policy, but the reasons why it is bad policy. The community's concerns fall into two categories:

Social: objections to government regulation of access to online content.
Technical: foreseen technical challenges that ISP-level filtering creates, such as preventing circumvention and a reduction in network performance.

Engineers will tell you that ISP-level filtering simply doesn't work, which might appear to contradict the fears that people have about the government being able to block access to content to further its own political interests. The social and technical arguments at first may appear to disagree with each other, but they are closely related and can be even seen as one and the same issue being debated from different angles.

The success of the Internet has been built on its open, decentralised and robust design that has enabled its rapid expansion and information to quickly and reliably flow from one host on the network to any other host located anywhere on the globe. Attempting to regulate communications requires intervention in the fundamental underlying workings of the Internet and inevitably leads to undesirable results. Whether you view this from a social or technical perspective, the policy undermines the strengths of the Internet that have allowed it to transform the way we communicate.

Proponents of Internet censorship sometimes compare the Internet to TV in the censorship debate—programs are censored on free-to-air television, so why should the Internet be treated any differently? The difference is that free-to-air programs are delivered over a broadcast medium and communication occurs in only one direction between the station and the public. When programs are censored, the content is removed at the source. Censorship on the Internet via ISP-level filtering is achieved by blocking communication between hosts connected to the Internet, not removing the content at the source, and has an adverse impact on all communication that takes place between Internet users.

WAIA President's two opposing positions on ISP-level filtering

2009-12-15T19:59:00.005+08:00

Richard Bone, President of the WA Internet Association, appears to have a good understanding of the inherent flaws of using ISP-level filtering to regulate content on the Internet, as he wrote in an article for the Australian Strategic Policy Institute:

It is not an effective way to block or stop the content that it is designed to prevent.

Filters can be bypassed. This would be particularly relevant in radicalisation networks where the participants form a relationship with each other which could involve sharing of techniques to bypass filters.

The introduction of (arguably ineffective) filters will increase the costs to ISPs and impede their ability to provide superior performance. This will ultimately lead to higher costs and lower performance for consumers.

Legislative change is far too slow to be effective. For example, the time to introduce filtering legislation, or revisions to such legislation is months or years whereas technology to bypass and/or avoid filters would occur in days or even hours.

The introduction of filtering legislation would be an impediment to investment and innovation in the Australian internet industry. It is already the case that the lack of safe harbour legislation for hosts within Australia drives Australian content to be hosted offshore. If filtering is introduced this will worsen.

He clearly understands that ISP-level filtering won't work and law enforcement is a better policy alternative:

In forming counter-radicalisation policy it should be remembered that the internet provides a tool to help humans communicate better and more easily. It is a facility that underpins a human activity system. As part of a human activity system, the internet evolves often very rapidly to trends driven by human behaviour. The internet is resistant to impediment—where changes are introduced they are often quickly circumvented.

From an industry perspective, the best way to fight radicalisation is to use human law enforcement, equipped with state-of-the-art technology, assisted by the Australian internet industry.

Despite writing the above for the strategic policy think tank, he publicly stated his support for the government's plan for mandatory ISP-level filtering:

This initiative will help reduce access to significant amounts of harmful content.

It is difficult to see how he was giving an open, honest opinion on this ill-conceived policy after making the earlier remarks for the ASPI.

Rudd's Copenhagen entourage

2009-12-13T01:54:00.013+08:00

Below is the provisional list of 114 participants that Australia has sent to the United Nations Climate Change Conference in Copenhagen. According to the statistics provided on the provisional list of participants, 194 nations have sent a total of 8053 participants, so the average number of participants in each party sent to the conference is 42.

The party includes 28 people from the Department of Foreign Affairs, but surprisingly the Foreign Minister's name Stephen Smith doesn't appear on this list.

H.E. Mr. Kevin Michael Rudd

Prime Minister

H.E. Ms. Penelope Wong

Minister, Climate Change and Water

Office of the Minister for Climate Change and Water

H.E. Ms. Louise Helen Hand

Ambassador for Climate Change

Department of Climate Change

Mr. David Fredericks

Deputy Chief of Staff

Department of the Prime Minister and Cabinet

Mr. Philip Green Oam

Senior Policy Adviser, Foreign Affairs

Department of the Prime Minister and Cabinet

Mr. Andrew Charlton

Senior Adviser

Department of the Prime Minister and Cabinet

Mr. Lachlan Harris

Senior Press Secretary

Prime Minister's Office

Office of Prime Minister

Mr. Scott Dewar

Senior Adviser

Office of Prime Minister

Ms. Clare Penrose

Adviser

Office of Prime Minister

Ms. Fiona Sugden

Media Adviser

Office of Prime Minister

Ms. Lisa French

Office of the Prime Minister

Office of Prime Minister

Mr. Jeremy Hilman

Adviser

Office of Prime Minister

Ms. Tarah Barzanji

Adviser

Office of Prime Minister

Mr. Kate Shaw

Executive Secretary

Office of Prime Minister

Ms. Gaile Barnes

Executive Assistant

Office of Prime Minister

Ms. Gordon de Brouwer

Deputy Secretary

Prime Minister and Cabinet

Mr. Patrick Suckling

First Assistant Secretary, International Division

Prime Minister and Cabinet

Ms. Rebecca Christie

Prime Minister's Office

Mr. Michael Jones

Official Photographer

Prime Minister and Cabinet

Mr. Stephan Rudzki

Mr. David Bell

Federal Agent

Australian Federal Police

Ms. Kym Baillie

Australian Federal Police

Mr. David Champion

Australian Federal Police

Mr. Matt Jebb

Federal Agent

Australian Federal Police

Mr. Craig Kendall

Federal Agent

Australian Federal Police

Mr. Ian Lane

Squadron Leader Staff, Officer VIP Operations

Mr. John Olenich

Media Adviser / Adviser to Minister Wong

Office of the Minister for Climate Change and Water

Ms. Kristina Hickey

Adviser to Minister Wong

Office of the Minister for Climate Change and Water

Mr. Martin Parkinson

Secretary

Department of Climate Change

Mr. Howard Bamsey

Special Envoy for Climate Change

Department of Climate Change

Mr. Robert Owen-Jones

Assistant Secretary, International Division

Department of Climate Change

Ms. Clare Walsh

Assistant Secretary, International Division

Department of Climate Change

Ms. Jenny Elizabeth Wilkinson

Policy Advisor

Department of Climate Change

Ms. Elizabeth Mary Peak

Principal Legal Adviser, International Climate Law

Department of Climate Change

Ms. Kristin Tilley

Director, Multilateral Negotiations

International Division

Department of Climate Change

Mr. Andrew Ure

Acting Director, Multilateral Negotiations

International Division

Department of Climate Change

Ms. Annemarie Watt

Director, Land Sector Negotiations

International Division

Department of Climate Change

Ms. Kushla Munro

Director, International Forest Carbon Section

International Division

Department of Climate Change

Ms. Kathleen Annette Rowley

Director, Strategic and Technical Analysis

Department of Climate Change

Ms. Anitra Cowan

Assistant Director, Multilateral Negotiations

Department of Climate Change

Ms. Sally Truong

Assisting Director, Multilateral Negotiations

International Division

Department of Climate Change

Ms. Jane Wilkinson

Assistant Director

Department of Climate Change

Ms. Tracey Mackay

Assistant Director

International Division

Department of Climate Change

Ms. Laura Brown

Assistant Director, Multilateral Negotiations

International Division

Department of Climate Change

Ms. Tracey-Anne Leahey

Delegation Manager

Department of Climate Change

Ms. Nicola Loffler

Senior Legal Adviser, International Climate Law

Department of Climate Change

Ms. Tamara Curll

Legal Adviser, International Climate Law

Department of Climate Change

Ms. Jessica Allen

Legal Support Officer

Department of Climate Change

Mr. Sanjiva de Silva

Legal Adviser, International Climate Law

Department of Climate Change

Ms. Gaia Puleston

Political Adviser

Department of Climate Change

Ms. Penelope Jane Morton

Policy Adviser, Multilateral Negotiations (UNFCCC)

International Division

Department of Climate Change

Ms. Claire Elizabeth Watt

Policy Advisor

Department of Climate Change

Ms. Amanda Walker

Policy Officer, Multilateral Negotiations

Department of Climate Change

Mr. Alan David Lee

Policy Adviser, Land Sector Negotiations

Department of Climate Change

Ms. Erika Kate Oord

Australian Stakeholder Manager

Department of Climate Change

Mr. Jahda Kirian Swanborough

Communications Manager

Ministerial Communication

Department of Climate Change

H.E. Mr. Sharyn Minahan

Ambassador

DFAT

Diplomatic Mission of Australia to Denmark

Ms. Julia Feeney

Director, Climate Change and Environment

Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade

Mr. Chester Geoffrey Cunningham

Second Secretary

DFAT

Diplomatic Mission of Australia to Germany

Ms. Rachael Virginia Cooper

Executive Officer, Climate Change and Environment

Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade

Ms. Rachael Grivas

Executive Officer, Environment Branch

Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade

Moya Elyn Collett

Desk officer, Climate Change and Environment Section

Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade

Mr. Rob Law

Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade

Mr. Robin Davies

Assistant Director General, Sustainable Development Group

Australian Agency for International Development

Ms. Deborah Fulton

Director, Policy and Global Environment

Australian Agency for International Development

Ms. Katherine Renee Ann Vaughn

Policy Advisor, Policy and Global Environment

Australian Agency for International Development

Mr. Brian Dawson

Policy Adviser

Australian Agency for International Development

Mr. Andrew Leigh Clarke

Deputy Secretary

Department of Resources Development, Western Australia

Mr. Bruce Wilson

General Manager, Environment Energy and Environment Division

Department of Resources Development, Western Australia

Ms. Jill McCarthy

Policy Adviser

Department of Resources, Energy and Tourism

Mr. Simon French

Policy Adviser

Department of Agriculture, Fisheries and Forestry

Mr. Ian Michael Ruscoe

Policy Adviser

Department of Agriculture, Fisheries and Forestry

Mr. David Walland

Acting Superintendent, National Climate Centre

Bureau of Meteorology

Mr. Damien Dunn

Senior Policy Adviser

The Australian Treasury

Ms. Helen Hawka Fuhrman

Policy Officer, Renewable Energy Policy and Partnerships

Mr. Scott Vivian Davenport

Chief Economics

NSW Department of Industry and Investment

Mr. Graham Julian Levitt

Policy Manager, Climate Change

NSW Department of Industry and Investment

Ms. Kate Jennifer Jones

Minister, Climate Change and Sustainability

Queensland Government

Mr. Michael William Dart

Principal Policy Advisor

Office of the Hon. Kate Jones MP

Queensland Government

Mr. Matthew Anthony Jamie Skoien

Senior Director, Office of Climate Change

Queensland Government

Mr. Michael David Rann

Premier, South Australia

Department of Premier and Cabinet, Southern Australia

Ms. Suzanne Kay Harter

Adviser

Department of Premier and Cabinet, Southern Australia

Mr. Paul David Flanagan

Manager, Communications

Government of South Australia

Mr. Timothy William O'Loughlin

Deputy Chief Executive, Sustainability and Workforce Management

Department of Premier and Cabinet

South Australian Government

Ms. Nyla Sarwar

M.Sc student

Linacre College

University of Oxford

Mr. Gavin Jennings

Minister, Environment and Climate Change and Innovation, Victorian Government

Ms. Sarah Broadbent

Sustainability Adviser

Ms. Rebecca Falkingham

Senior Adviser

Victoria Government/Office of Climate Change

Mr. Simon Camroux

Policy Adviser

Energy Supply Association of Australia Limited

Mr. Geoff Lake

Adviser

Australian Local Government Association

Sridhar Ayyalaraju

Post Visit Controller

DFAT

Diplomatic Mission of Australia to Denmark

Mr. Tegan Brink

Deputy Visit Controller and Security Liaison Officer

DFAT

Diplomatic Mission of Australia to Denmark

Ms. Melissa Eu Suan Goh

Transport Liaison Officer and Consul

DFAT

Diplomatic Mission of Australia to Denmark

Ms. Lauren Henschke

Support Staff

DFAT

Diplomatic Mission of Australia to Denmark

Ms. Maree Fay

Accommodation Liaison Officer

DFAT

Diplomatic Mission of Australia to Denmark

Ms. Patricia McKinnon

Communications Officer

DFAT

Diplomatic Mission of Australia to Denmark

Eugene Olim

Paasport / Baggage Liaison Officer

DFAT

Diplomatic Mission of Australia to Denmark

Ms. Belinda Lee Adams

Ms. Jacqui Ashworth

Media Liaison Officer

DFAT

Diplomatic Mission of Australia to Denmark

Ms. Patricia Smith

Media Liaison Officer

DFAT

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PMO

Chameleon loses its camouflage

2009-10-30T23:08:00.000+08:00

Kevin Rudd's major immigration bungle—the so-called "Indonesian Solution", which really should be called the Indonesian Fiasco—exposes his phoniness. Such is his mastery of delivering spin over the 24-hour media cycle and contempt for the average voter that he masquerades as an economic conservative, environmentalist, humanitarian and Christian socialist, depending on which voters he wants to con in the message that he is conveying. He makes extraordinary and incoherent ideological shifts not just between press releases, but between sentences within the same speech.

Rudd has spun a web of deception extending from the political left to the political right, and it has inevitably left him entangled. Julie Bishop, Deputy Opposition Leader and Shadow Minister for Foreign Affairs, asked Rudd about a newspaper report that he is offering millions of dollars to Indonesia to intercept the growing wave of asylum seekers in Indonesia:

Ms JULIE BISHOP (Curtin) (2:21 PM) —My question is to the Prime Minister. I refer the Prime Minister to the report in today's West Australian newspaper that 'Indonesia will be offered millions of dollars to intercept and house asylum seekers who attempt to make the journey to Australia', which could be paid 'as a bounty for every boat intercepted'. Will the Prime Minister inform the House whether such arrangements are under consideration and the estimated cost to Australian taxpayers?

Mr RUDD (Griffith) (Prime Minister) —I thank the Deputy Leader of the Opposition for her question, which goes to the fabric of our cooperation with Indonesia in dealing with the global challenge of people smuggling. I note that that question follows the previous question from the leader of the National Party, which pointed to the push factors which are at work, one of which is from Afghanistan and another of which is from Sri Lanka, given the recent civil war. This government has been absolutely consistent in saying that in dealing with this problem, which is a global problem, we must maximise our global cooperation with the UNHCR and resettlement countries. That is the first part of it.

The second part of it, of course, is to employ the cooperative arrangements with Indonesia and other regional countries through the Bali process and also under the provisions which are provided for under the Lombok treaty—which I seem to recall was negotiated by those opposite, though it was ratified and concluded after this government took office. That treaty, in one of its provisions, deals with cooperation between Australia and Indonesia on people-smuggling. The President of Indonesia and I have made no secret of the fact that we intend to continue to develop a framework for further cooperation on people-smuggling. That is what we intend to do. That will mean providing additional assistance to our friends in Indonesia to help with the resettlement task and to help with all the associated functions which they might undertake in the future to assist Australia and other countries in dealing with this regional problem. There is nothing remarkable in that; it is the right thing for Australia to do. This government makes no apology whatsoever for the fact that we have a tough line on asylum seekers when it comes to dealing with the challenges of people smugglers around the world—tough but humane.

Rudd's attempt to politically escape from this policy debacle by outsourcing border protection to Indonesia is anything but tough and humane. Opposition Leader Malcolm Turnbull summed up Rudd's epic policy failure in his address to Federal Parliament:

Well, it’s time for this Prime Minister to face up to the facts; he cannot escape responsibility for the people aboard that Australian Customs vessel. He cannot refuse to answer for how his policies have led to this outcome. He says his policies are tough and humane. Tough but humane – it’s just another of the phoney formulas dreamed up by the Winston Smith wannabes in his office to create an impression with the Government’s border protection policies are something they are not.

In fact, this Government’s policies are neither tough nor humane. They are dysfunctional. They do not work. They fail to achieve the object of the policy, which is to stop the people smuggling. They have failed and they will continue to fail. And Australians know that, because they see with their own eyes how these policies are unravelling as each and every day passes.

The Bilateral Solution

2009-10-30T12:34:00.002+08:00

Kevin Rudd must end the farce that has unfolded in Indonesia over the past 11 days as soon as possible before it does further damage to our international image. The vacuum in our border protection policy is clearly evident and it will only add to Australia's appeal as the ideal destination for the operations of people smugglers.

This policy debacle was entirely preventable and of the Prime Minister's own making because in trying to please the left and right at the same time using deceptive spin, he has created a situation that is bad for the asylum seekers, bad for Australia's diplomatic relationship with Indonesia, bad for our international reputation and undermines our border protection policy objectives.

Rudd should consider offering the 78 asylum seekers on board the Oceanic Viking currently anchored in Indonesia a compromise: allow women and children to be processed via Australian facilities if they disembark at once.

Cut the spin and bureaucracy and fix our phone companies, Senator Conroy

2009-10-25T17:16:00.006+08:00

While Senator Conroy seems to now be aware that mistreatment of customers in the telecommunications industry is rife, it remains to be seen whether he will show some leadership on this matter and deliver reform that working Mums and Dads will see on their phone bills. Conroy did not sound particularly proactive in the comments he made on Network Ten:

What we need to do is put pressure directly onto the telecommunications companies

If we do not start seeing a significant improvement in these sorts of reports ... we will legislate.

Even though phone companies have been ripping customers off for years by withholding details of charges from customers, he fails to commit himself to reform that is necessary to ensure that the rights of the customer are protected from dishonest business practices. The problems will not be fixed with bureaucracy, spin as a substitute for progress or endless process in the form of reviews, inquiries, commissions, committees and task forces that characterise the leadership style of Labor governments.

Twitter popular among the well-paid and educated: research

2009-10-25T14:44:00.008+08:00

The results of research carried out by Nielsen on the people who use Twitter would surprise some people, especially those who have tried out the social network for a short while and deride it after finding the experience rather underwhelming.

The results of the research published in the Australian Financial Review on 1.6 million Twitter users in Australia show that 61% of users earn more than $75,000 and 40% earn more than $100,000. 421,000 users have a Bachelor's degree, while 202,000 users acquired a postgraduate degree, with these two groups together comprising 39% of the Twitter users studied. The professionals using Twitter tend to work in sales, administration, technical areas, executive management or be self-employed.

Deirdre Macken, the journalist who wrote the article, explains the power of Twitter:

Because of the endless linkages between Twitter users, it is the ultimate expression of the idea that there are at most six degrees of separation between any two people in the world. Information jumps through wildly different networks, rapidly forming opinions or spreading news.

Much of the power of the network is a reflection of the people who use it. Worldwide, users tend to be adults established in their own professions who have a lot of opinions, even though they might lack outlets to express them.

Crocodile tears from gang not welcome in Western Australia

2009-10-25T12:10:00.011+08:00

Despite the complaints made by members of the Finks and their attempts to portray themselves as victims of police bullying in the media, it would be naive to think that they came to Western Australia just to go on a picnic. The Western Australian community has every reason to be concerned about the arrival of a group that was declared a criminal organisation just across the border in neighbouring South Australia. The South Australian Supreme Court ruled that Section 14.1 of the Serious and Organised Crime (Control) Act 2008 was invalid, although the South Australian Government is seeking to overturn the ruling in the High Court.

A Finks nominee from the Perth suburb of Belmont was recently charged for a range of offences, including a shooting incident in Landsdale.

One Finks member pleaded guilty in a Brisbane court on Friday for his involvement in a savage spree of bashings and sexual assaults carried out by gang members on the Gold Coast in January.

WA Attorney-General Christian Porter said that under legislation to be introduced into WA Parliament next year, it would be easier to declare the Finks a criminal organisation than other groups such as the Mafia, Chinese Triads or Sword Boys.

The Finks do not appear to have any support from the WA Opposition, either. Shadow Minister for Police, Margaret Quirk, said that an increase in their presence within WA "is certainly not welcome". She also said that they are "keen to set up somewhere else" because they are being pushed out of South Australia.

Adam Shand from The Sunday Times joins in Finks PR campaign

2009-10-24T21:59:00.007+08:00

A report by Adam Shand from The Sunday Times was just published attacking the efforts of our police to ensure the safety of the Western Australian community with the influx of members of the Finks motorbike gang from South Australia. He picks up a couple of Finks members from the airport and drives them to their clubhouse where they were holding a party and gets a first-hand glimpse at life inside the motorbike gang. The report begins with SPECIAL REPORT: Adam Shand, Inside Finks clubhouse—they must think they've gotten a real scoop to be given opportunity to enter their clubhouse and inform the outside world about how well behaved they are.

The report is titled 400 WA officers target Finks bikies . . . but no arrests and he appears to regard the operation as somewhat of a waste of taxpayers' money. After the impressions he gained from his visit to the clubhouse, he is convinced that the poor gang members are just misunderstood:

Not to everyone's taste, but not a threat to law and order.

...

At the time of writing, the weekend had been virtually incident-free.

The point he seeks to make in the story is then made in the final paragraph:

It's said there were nearly 400 officers statewide involved in the visit by the Finks. WA Police is facing a huge overtime bill with precious little to show for it.

We must remember that Adam Shand is a journalist, so perhaps he was disappointed that he didn't have a more exciting story to tell because the police did their job in maintaining the peace.

Reform needed to protect customers in the telecommunications industry

2009-10-24T14:10:00.003+08:00

Date: Sat, 24 Oct 2009 14:07:43 +0800
Subject: Reform needed to protect customers in the telecommunications industry
From: Justin Lee
To: Nick Minchin
Cc: Malcolm Turnbull, Julie Bishop, Mathias Cormann, Dennis Jensen

Hi Nick,

If Senator Conroy wants to reform the telecommunications industry, he should begin by introducing legislation that compels carriers to meet their basic service obligations, rather than leaving it to working Mums and Dads to ensure that they are not being robbed by stealth.

As we all know, the quality of the customer service (or lack thereof) provided by our telecommunications carriers is appalling, and this is due to the inadequate protection available to ordinary customers who do not have any practical recourse when the carrier fails to meet its basic service obligations. Carriers do not have any incentive to provide customer service at a level of quality that any customer would consider fair and reasonable.

My experience with the Telecommunications Industry Ombudsman (TIO) has been that it is slow, bureaucratic and places an unfair burden on the customer when the carrier has clearly failed to meet its basic service obligations. No customer should have to go through a lengthy dispute arbitration process every time they are incorrectly billed. I was continually billed with hefty, unexplained charges by Optus and each time I raised a complaint, the billing errors became worse. To make matters worse, they refused to disclose details of the services that were incurring data charges for reasons of "privacy". They refused to even confirm that none of the data charges on a bill were for services that I was not using. I was informed that there was no process I could go through to access details of my data charges.

We should have no illusions about the current regime under which our telecommunications carriers operate. Signing up to a phone service when the carrier is allowed to withhold billing information is like handing them a blank cheque.

Cheers,
Justin.

COALITION PLAN TO SAVE JOBS AND REDUCE COSTS

2009-10-18T17:50:00.004+08:00

Press release issued by the Hon. Malcom Turnbull MP following party room discussions on amendments to the Rudd Labor government's emissions trading scheme (ETS).

The Coalition has unveiled a plan to save thousands of Australian jobs and limit increases in electricity prices for small business through common sense amendments to Labor's flawed and rushed emissions trading scheme.

The Shadow Cabinet and Joint Party Room today agreed to a package of amendments that will form the basis for good faith negotiations with the Rudd Labor Government. The package demonstrates Labor's CPRS can be made cheaper and smarter, protecting jobs.

Key export industries, including coal mining, food processing, natural gas and aluminium will be better protected, saving thousands of Australian jobs under threat from Labor's scheme.

The package also protects farmers from the scheme by exempting agriculture altogether. By allowing agricultural offsets which include carbon sequestration in soils and vegetation, there is the opportunity for financial and land management benefits in the rural sector. This is a win/win for farmers and the environment.

By including voluntary measures, the environment will also benefit from individuals, businesses and community groups who develop their own initiatives to reduce greenhouse gas emissions.

The Coalition will continue to advocate an intensity-based cap and trade approach to the electricity sector, as this more than halves the initial increase in electricity prices, reducing the economic costs of achieving emissions cuts.

If the Government refuses to consider the intensity-based approach, it must clearly explain why, and work with the Coalition to provide an alternative strategy for cushioning the initial impact of higher electricity prices on small businesses.

The key amendments to Labor's flawed CPRS and the commitments required from the Government that will be sought by the Coalition are outlined below.

Trade Exposed Industries

Amend the CPRS to provide a single level of assistance for emissions intensive trade exposed (EITE) industries at 94.5 per cent until 2015 and 90 per cent thereafter.
Lower the threshold for assistance from the CPRS proposal of 1000 tonnes of CO₂ per $1 million of revenue to 850 tonnes of CO₂ per $1 million.
Continue to provide assistance to Australian EITE industries at 90 per cent until 80 per cent of their international competitors have also implemented carbon abatement measures.
Include primary food processing such as dairy and meat in the EITE scheme.
Allow industries that include a series of sequential or parallel production processes to have these assessed as a single activity in determining assistance.

Agriculture

Permanently exclude agricultural emissions from the CPRS.
Obtain Government agreement to introduction of an agricultural offset scheme in line with similar offset schemes to be introduced in comparable economies such as the US and EU.

Coal Mine Emissions

Exclude coal mine fugitive emissions from the CPRS.
Provide the Minister with authority to use regulation to control fugitive emissions with the objective of achieving a 30 per cent reduction by 2025 as technology and international best practice allow.

Lower Electricity Prices

Coalition will continue to advocate an intensity-based cap-and-trade model for generators. This delivers the same emissions cuts as the CPRS but with a much smaller increase in electricity prices.
This would greatly reduce the burden on small and mid-sized businesses, which receive no compensation for higher power bills under Labor's proposals.
Under the CPRS retail electricity prices will rise by close to 20 per cent in the first two years. Under an intensity approach, retail electricity prices would rise by less than 5 per cent in the first two years.
If the Government continues to refuse to consider the intensity model, the Coalition will negotiate for an alternative approach to cushion near-term electricity price increases for small businesses.

Compensation for Electricity Generators

Coal-fired generators must be better compensated for loss of value they experience from the CPRS, to ensure security of electricity supply and enable them to transition to lower emission energy sources.
The CPRS offers coal-fired generators 130 million permits over five years worth $3.6 billion. Yet three respected private sector analysts estimate their losses at $9–$11 billion.
Assistance should be increased to 390 million permits over 15 years (or about $10 billion). Assistance should be allocated to all generators in proportion to the losses they suffer.
In the absence of access to the Government's secret Morgan Stanley report, this represents the Coalition's best estimate of appropriate generator compensation given the available data.

Energy Efficiency and Voluntary Action

The Coalition will negotiate for a national "white certificate" energy efficiency scheme so households and businesses earn credits for efficiency measures, and contribute to reducing national emissions.
Likewise, the Coalition supports creation of a voluntary offset market in advance of the introduction of the CPRS, and amending the CPRS to ensure voluntary abatement leads to a lower national level of emissions.

The Coalition will negotiate the above matters with the Government in good faith, and in the expectation that the proposed emissions trading scheme can be improved to deliver the same environmental benefits with less severe economic costs.

The ball is now in Mr Rudd's court. If he wants to fix the flaws in his proposed emissions trading scheme, he needs to give Senator Wong the green light to engage with the Coalition and embrace our plan to save Australian jobs and reduce costs.

18 October 2009

They can "get away with higher prices" - IGA distributor

2009-10-18T05:38:00.010+08:00

WA IGA President John Cummings claims that locally owned supermarkets are "highly competitive" according to a survey he "personally conducted", where a basket of products sold at his IGA store in Glengarry were compared with products purchased from Coles and Woolworths stores in the Sydney suburb of Warringah. In his findings, Cummings stated:

The only conclusions to be drawn from this survey is that Perth shoppers are either well served by the independent sector and that the independents continue to put downward pressure on day-to-day grocery prices, or both Coles and Woolworths are engaging in blatant price gouging of consumers in Sydney.

Cummings' personal research is not as definitive as he would like to believe, especially when one looks at one of the slides from a presentation that was given by Reitzer, CEO of Metcash, to US investors:

Reitzer tells investors that one of the reasons that Metcash's "independent" grocers have been successful is that "their location or format allows them to get away with higher prices." Far from having the downward pressure claimed by Cummings, Reitzer boasted that IGA is able to defy market forces and rip off consumers.

The 800-pound gorilla standing in the way of extended trading hours

2009-10-17T18:22:00.028+08:00

We keep hearing the same arguments against deregulation of retail trading hours in Western Australia: small shops will be put out of business by Coles and Woolworths and the results of the referendum held in 2005 on this issue show that the public do not want reform. Unfortunately, we would be naive to assume that the opponents of deregulation who give these flawed arguments have the general community's interests at heart and not their own.

The ACT and Northern Territory both have completely unregulated trading hours. Tasmania's trading hours are unregulated on all but two and half days of the year. Notwithstanding the claims made by the independent grocers' lobby, liberalisation of trading hours in other states and territories has not had an adverse impact on the performance of independent grocers.

The people were not asked in the 2005 referendum whether they wanted extended trading hours, but whether they thought it was good public policy. Furthermore, IGA led a fear campaign in the lead up to the referendum with claims such as extending trading hours threatens 15,000 jobs, which is totally absurd.

All the economic debate that has surrounded this policy issue is just a distraction from the grubby rent seeking and politics that are driving the resistance to reform. Metcash, the distributor for IGA and Foodworks that benefits from the current regulatory regime, donated a total of $26,000 to the WA Nationals for the financial year of 2007/2008, as reported on the Australian Electoral Commission's website.

The disclosed donations for the financial year of 2008/2009 are yet to be published, but they will be interesting indeed. The Barnett Liberal government introduced legislation to extend retail trading hours, but this was blocked by the Nationals and Labor opposition. The Liberal government then explored an alternative approach to extending trading hours without passing legislation through the Western Australian Parliament: extending the boundaries of the Perth tourism precinct, which the Nationals said they would block via a disallowance motion—they even blocked changes that didn't affect the constituents of any of the seats they hold.

Finance Minister takes swipe at Hockey over Twitter use

2009-09-10T08:16:00.008+08:00

Lindsay Tanner, Minister for Finance and Deregulation, took a swipe at his counterpart in the opposition yesterday over his use of Twitter within the chamber:

Mr TANNER —I am delighted that the member for North Sydney has dragged himself away from his twittering for a few moments. We know he has got an attention span problem, but it would be good if he actually paid attention to the parliament rather than sitting there twittering all day.

It is clear from a quick glance at his Twitter profile that he has his Twitter use very much under control. Given that the majority of the government's responses to questions are irrelevant and leave us none the wiser on how it intends to deliver on its policy commitments, it is fair to say that he is not necessarily making less productive use of his time communicating with his supporters and the wider public via social networking sites.

Joe Francis to Eric Ripper on retail liberalisation: bring it on

2009-08-23T12:59:00.006+08:00

Transcript of the speech delivered by Joe Francis MLA, Liberal member for Jandakot, to the Western Australian Legislative Assembly on 18 August 2009.

MR J.M. FRANCIS (Jandakot) [4.14 pm]: I understand that this is a fairly passionate issue for many sectors of the community. Sometimes there is no black and white answer to some of the questions that are posed. I honestly appreciate the input that members opposite have made to this debate. However, I do not come here and lightly make a decision that will hopefully in some way affect the lives of my constituents, without giving it very serious consideration and certainly without talking to them first. We will obviously agree to disagree on many matters.

I did go through some of the history of this matter, and I will touch on it briefly. When the retail trading hours laws were first introduced into Western Australia 20-odd years ago, there were three main reasons for it. They confirmed the regulations that were already in existence; they were intended to give a limited protection for the lifestyle at the time; and they also preserved the idea, to some extent, that Sundays were family days and that retail workers, where possible, could ensure they would have a shorter working week.

Mr W.J. Johnston interjected.

Mr J.M. FRANCIS: I am talking about the original act that enshrined rules that were already in place. It has also been 21 years since Australia celebrated its bicentenary.

Mr W.J. Johnston interjected.

Mr J.M. FRANCIS: The member will get his chance to make a contribution. Australia in 2009 is a very different place from what it was 21 years ago, and that includes Western Australia. Our lifestyle, population, work ethic, standard of living, spending habits, working hours and society have changed dramatically in that time. Metropolitan Perth is really no exception. Changing lifestyles mean that more people have been undertaking tertiary education, vocational training and shift work. More people are involved in fly in, fly out work, and there is more casual and part-time work. The whole gamut of employment and lifestyle issues has changed the shape of metropolitan Perth. As well as the demand for this kind of work there has also been a demand for flexibility in shopping hours. That is obviously mainly around the retail sector. Unfortunately, although so much has changed, the one sector that has not changed is the retail sector, apart from in 1994 when shopping hours were increased from 12 o'clock on Saturdays until later. I would hate to see the response if any member threatened to wind back the clock on that one. I remember going to shops when they shut at 12 o'clock, and it was not a pleasant experience.

One of the things that have surprised me in this debate is that the Labor Party members have said that they consulted with small businesses. Some have said that they consulted their constituents.

Point of Order

Mr C.J. BARNETT: There are some standards in Parliament, and one of them is that people do not drink out of bottles; indeed, members should not consume liquids in the house. Members should not consume liquids or food, and they should not drink out of a bottle in the house. If the member for West Swan wants a drink, she should use a glass, be civilised and be courteous.

Ms R. SAFFIOTI: When I talked to the Speaker about my pregnancy, I asked whether I could bring bottled water into the house because I do not drink water that has been left around for a while. He said that it was okay.

Several members interjected.

The ACTING SPEAKER: There is no point of order.

Debate Resumed

Mr J.M. FRANCIS: The point I wanted to make—I hate to talk about obvious observations—is that one of the issues that has not been raised is that the current retail trading regime in Perth —

Several members interjected.

The ACTING SPEAKER: Order! The member for Mandurah is on two strikes. I do not want to formally warn him for a third time. I have given the call to the member for Jandakot, and the member for Jandakot is the person whom I would like to listen to at this moment.

Mr J.M. FRANCIS: Thank you, Madam Acting Speaker. I am trying to do this in a non-confronting way. The issue that has not been raised is that the current regime really benefits the rich. Let me explain why to the member for Wanneroo, because I know he will be fascinated by this. The bill deals with trading until 9.00 pm on Monday to Friday, but if people live closer to a tourism precinct, and the main one is the city, they are probably more likely to own more expensive real estate. If they want to go shopping outside normal trading hours, they do not have far to travel. People who live at Jandakot or Armadale have a bit of a hike to get into the city. There are so many inconsistencies with retail trading laws that I would be absolutely surprised if members did not realise that the current regime benefits those people who live closer to the city and tourism precincts as opposed to those people who live in the suburbs in the south east and must make the extra effort to go somewhere to make a considered purchase.

Ms A.J.G. MacTiernan: Have you analysed how people voted in the referendum?

Mr J.M. FRANCIS: I have.

Ms A.J.G. MacTiernan: Had you done that, you would see that, contrary to your speculation, the further people are from Perth the less inclined they are to support it.

Mr J.M. FRANCIS: The member for Armadale makes a good point. I do not write off the referendum lightly, but I will make this point: if a referendum were held now, it would be very hard to say what the outcome would be in my electorate because in the referendum held in 2005 only 11 000 people were on the roll in Jandakot; since then, 10 000 people have moved into the area. I see what happens in my electorate. I see the absolute nightmare that people go through when shopping on a Thursday night and a Saturday. I am thoroughly disappointed with the member for Cockburn, because generally the majority of my constituents shop at the same shopping centre, Cockburn Gateway Shopping City, and it is not easy to move about there—shoppers cannot get a car park. Extending trading hours on Mondays to Fridays would alleviate the Thursday night and Saturday rush for the soccer mums and the mums and dads with other sporting commitments who force the issue of grocery shopping into their weekend regime. For working mums and dads—I hate that phrase—extending trading hours would give them the option to do their grocery shopping on a Monday night, a Tuesday night or a Friday night. Effectively, whatever we may say, we are really talking only about food and groceries. It is matter of choice for consumers and it is also a matter of choice for business owners—that is, whether they open.

That brings me to another issue—namely, the results of the referendum. I appreciate that a large percentage of people did not vote for extended hours at the recent referendum. However, it was a fairly loaded question. When talking about loaded questions, it is well worth noting the consultation done by members opposite in their electorates. I refer to the letter sent to small businesses by the member for Victoria Park in which he stated —

I am surveying all businesses in my electorate of Victoria Park to seek your views in relation to extended weeknight trading.

I have to say that other members opposite used the same loaded questions asked by the member for Victoria Park. These are pretty loaded questions. For example, the member for Victoria Park asked —

2. Do you support the State Government overturning the results of the 2005 referendum?

He should have asked whether people thought that business owners —

Several members interjected.

Mr J.M. FRANCIS: If members opposite want me to go through it, I will. They loaded the questions. If members opposite had sent out a survey that asked whether business owners thought that they should be able to determine when they can and cannot open their businesses, it might have been —

Mr P. Papalia: Which line do you reckon we will run at the election?

Mr J.M. FRANCIS: Be it a big business or a small business, shareholders—the member for Warnbro's constituents own shares in big businesses—are denied the opportunity at the moment.

Mr P.B. Watson: Not too many of mine do!

Mr J.M. FRANCIS: They do, in their super funds.

When it comes to the last referendum, regardless of what anybody says in the house, I would have to say that any person who seriously voted on this issue—I am asking for the member for Warnbro's indulgence and for him to put on his political strategist's hat—did not log onto the Liberal Party's website and read the policy document. People made up their minds reading the front page of The West Australian just before the election. Before the last election, people who really cared where the Liberal Party or the Labor Party, or any party, stood on the retail trading hours made up their minds after reading the front page of the paper and the quotes from the Premier. Robert Taylor wrote —

A Liberal Government would extend weekday shopping hours in its first term and fix some anomalies limiting weekend trading but would retain the ban on major grocery chains opening on Sundays, Opposition Leader Colin Barnett said yesterday.

A little later, the article continues —

He would seek to reach a consensus on extended Monday to Friday trading with the major grocery chains, Coles and Woolworths, industry and employee groups after he was elected.

The article goes on to quote the then Leader of the Opposition —

"On general trading hours I would sit down with Coles and Woolworths and the independents, consumer groups, representatives of the employees and industry," he said.

"The agreement I'd be seeking would be to extend weekday shopping as the next step in deregulation. Any staged deregulation needs to have time and I would want this to settle down before any further step in deregulation, so for the coming term of government if we can reach agreement what would be on the agenda would be an extension of weekday trading."

Mr Barnett insisted his move to extend weekday shopping hours honoured the spirit of the referendum, which rejected further deregulation.

He said —

"I respect the referendum result that was held. Labor failed to govern, they deserted the issue, they asked the people and now they're ignoring the people. I will not do that no matter what might be my views about deregulation,"

The point is, as I have said, people who voted on the issue of extended trading hours really did not make up their minds on the basis of what was on a website hosted by the Liberal Party or the Labor Party, but by reading what was in the mainstream media. It is pretty black and white. The heading on the front page of The West Australian states —

Libs promise late shopping on week nights

Mr P. Papalia: Did the Premier canvass it with the Nationals when he formed government?

Mr C.J. Barnett: No.

Mr J.M. FRANCIS: We were not a coalition going into the election. The National Party had —

Several members interjected.

Mr J.M. FRANCIS: I will tell members what the member for Warnbro's problem is with the debate about the National Party: the National's position, going into the election, was black and white.

Mr W.J. Johnston: Ours was black and white and yours was.

Mr J.M. FRANCIS: According to the Weekend Courier, the member for Rockingham —

...said he welcomed Labor's plan to extend trading hours, which would allow Sunday trading in Rockingham and continued trading on public holidays.

Mr P. Papalia: You are in government. You cannot get three of your own cabinet ministers to agree to your own legislation. You are a joke! The government is a joke.

Mr J.M. FRANCIS: Members opposite were far more divided on this issue than we ever were.

Several members interjected.

The ACTING SPEAKER: Order, members! I am sure Hansard has no hope whatsoever of recording any of this debate, which may in fact be in the wider interests of the general public. I call on the member for Jandakot to continue. Member for Warnbro, you are on two strikes.

Mr J.M. FRANCIS: Members opposite know as well as I do that the Labor Party has flipped and flopped on this issue for a long time. We know that in her heart the member for Armadale wants Sunday trading—I note her comments on 18 November of last year. The member for Willagee wants it, although he has changed his mind a number of times on this issue. There are a lot of facts and there are a lot of myths.

The retail sector in Western Australia is worth about $25 billion annually and we know that it employs about 74 000 people. Extending trading hours would give us the potential to grow that sector ever larger. In every state across this country that has slowly deregulated its trading hours, the figures and the facts prove that the retail sector has slowly grown greater than what could have been expected had that deregulation not happened.

As I have said, this is really a groceries issue. It comes down to the fact that at the moment some operators, through fairly convoluted and undisclosed franchise agreements, get away with not having the required minimum number of staff on their payroll. They are, therefore, exempt from the act and can open under certain provisions. My challenge to the people who run those stores and who essentially have a monopoly on extended trading hours, including late nights and Sundays, is that, if they really want to play fair and in the sprit of the game, they should publish their franchise agreements. Let us know what they say. Let us see that they are truly independent operators. Companies such as IGA are generally influenced by Metcash, a fairly large South African company, and I would hate for people to wrongly assume that they are not as independent as they make out to be. It comes down to a choice for consumers. At the moment, companies such as Aldi, a fairly large and popular discount retailer of grocery items in the eastern states, will not come to Western Australia. Aldi will not come to Western Australia because it does not think that the market is big enough for it to compete in. It is not the population size—in fact, there is an Aldi store where my parents live in Moss Vale in New South Wales. Certainly, towns such as Bowral and Moss Vale do not have anywhere near the population of my electorate alone. It is important to get a few other matters right as well. It is important to point out that this legislation does not force people to open; it just gives people the option to open.

I want to mention one of my experiences. In 2003 I was on a navy ship, HMAS Tobruk, when it berthed in Ho Chi Minh City in Vietnam. When we pulled in there, I thought, "Well, we are in a communist country; it is going to be fairly backwards here." However, what stuck out more than anything else was that retail shop owners in Ho Chi Minh City, in a communist country, were not told by their government when they could or could not open their shops. But we do it in Western Australia. It is absolutely ludicrous.

Anyone who believes in the spirit of competitive capitalism, as I do and hopefully everyone does, will realise that increased competition will only benefit the consumer. I can use the example of my little local independent store. To be honest, it rips me off every single time I walk in. I pay 15 bucks for a jar of coffee that I can buy for seven bucks elsewhere. The tomatoes are green, the cheese is mouldy, the milk is at use-by date, the ham is sweaty—yet I am forced to pay the price. I do not have the option to go, after hours, to Coles or Woolies because they are not open. If Coles and Woolies could open —

Mr P.B. Watson: You don't support your local business if you go to Coles and Woolies.

Mr J.M. FRANCIS: There are two little businesses. One is in my electorate and the other is in the member for Cockburn's electorate, which I will come to, and they are poles apart. The extra amount of time that it takes to drive to the other shop is so great that people only go there to buy the minimum number of consumables. If I had to choose whether to go to Coles or Woolies tonight rather than the local guy around the corner, I would go to Coles or Woolies. I would do that to send my so-called local independent retailer a very clear message; that is, stop ripping me off or I will go somewhere else. These little guys can compete with the big businesses.

There is a little retailer in the member for Cockburn's electorate called Tony Ale and Co. I would encourage anyone to go there when they are in that part of South Lake. Tony Ale walks into Canning Vale markets, the fresh food markets, not the flea markets, at 4.00 am every day when they first open. This place is the thriving hub of capitalism in Western Australia. It is brilliant to watch in action. He goes in there and says, "I will take the best of everything you've got and I don't care how much it costs." He buys it and puts it on his shelf. People queue to get into his shop most days. Why? Because his tomatoes last longer and his lettuces do not go soggy after two days. He does such a better job at retailing food and groceries than anyone. He really does not care if Coles and Woolies open 24/7.

My point is that IGA and other independents can compete with the big guys. This bill will not make those retailers less competitive; it will force them to compete and to stop ripping people off. Not all IGAs are like that.

Mr P.B. Watson: You're saying that one of the businesses in your electorate rips you off.

Mr J.M. FRANCIS: Absolutely, especially when I have to pay $15 for a jar of coffee.

Mr P.B. Watson interjected.

Mr J.M. FRANCIS: I am happy for it to go into Hansard because 99 per cent of the consumers in my electorate who are forced to go to that retailer and pay $15 for a jar of coffee that they can buy for $7 in Coles will agree with me.

I challenge the independents such as IGA that are so beholden to Metcash, its parent company, to publicise their franchise agreements. Let us see how many people are really on the roll and how independent they are with their state-wide buying power.

Mr P.B. Watson: You are a member of Parliament on $150 000 a year criticising small business.

Mr J.M. FRANCIS: I am not criticising all small businesses; most small businesses do an absolutely outstanding job. The member should not put words in my mouth.

I am disappointed today because the Labor Party had the chance to come into this place and support this legislation. It would have been supporting the consumers. At the end of the day, 99 per cent of the people we are talking about who will be affected by this legislation are the consumers who will benefit from increased competition and increased choice. I gain my philosophical belief from that notion. In a perfect world I would like to think that some time in the future we will not have a Retail Trading Hours Act. I am realistic enough to know that we have to take small steps. We are aiming for a nine o'clock closing time. Even eight o'clock Monday to Friday is no great step—it is just a small step that will allow people to slowly come into line so that some time in the future we can bring Western Australia into the twenty-first century.

I want to make two points in my last two minutes. In all honesty, I say to the Leader of the Opposition that I think he has failed in his political judgement. He was going to make this an election issue at the next election. If he wants to make this an election issue in my electorate or any other marginal electorate at the next election, he should bring it on. He has got it wrong. He has read the mood of the people wrong. He asked loaded questions in his survey. He has not consulted with the consumers enough. I walked into the Leeming Bowling Club last Friday. Quite a few people were there. Before I even gave the members a spiel on deregulation —

Mr P.B. Watson: Did they rip you off there?

Mr J.M. FRANCIS: They made me the patron. I asked them an unloaded question. I said, "Before I speak about the issue, who here supports the deregulation of trading hours?" I got a standing ovation from the old people. If members think that the demographics are a bit tougher with old people, they are even greater on our side with young people. For the Leader of the Opposition's own political survival, he should go back and rethink this one. If he wants to make it an election issue, he should bring it on.

I will conclude by making one last point. I want to quote someone who passed on many centuries ago. He was one of the people that I have always admired. He was a navigator, a sailor, an explorer and a discoverer. Christopher Columbus famously said something that I think applies to this debate more than anything else that any member here can contribute. He said that nothing that results from human progress is achieved with unanimous consent, and those who are enlightened before the others are condemned to pursue that light in spite of others. Those words are very noteworthy and I ask the Leader of the Opposition to take them on board.

Labor's branch stacking shame

2009-08-08T20:27:00.007+08:00

Even though they claim to represent the interests of blue-collar workers, it costs more to join the ALP than the Liberal Party unless you are earning $450 a week or less, in which case the fee is $22 for one year. Membership with the Liberal Party for a year is $25 regardless of income, while joining the ALP will set you back $44 to $110 per year depending on how much you earn.

The reason membership is higher than expected is because branch stacking is rampant within the ALP. Democratic processes are no obstacle to winning preselection within the ALP — just sign up members en masse who have only a vague idea, if any, of the candidate they are supporting, paying their membership fees in bulk on their behalf.

Increasing membership fees might discourage branch stacking, but it doesn't stop those who have enough money to buy the stacks needed to win ALP endorsement.

Conman Kevin

2009-08-05T15:30:00.004+08:00

Kevin Rudd is a phoney who has duped voters hook, line and sinker with his mastery of spin that has created an illusion not matched by the outcomes of his policies.

He conned the Right in presenting himself as an economic conservative, but has mismanaged our economy with poorly designed stimulus packages and other policies such as FuelWatch and GroceryWatch where it was clear from the outset that they were not going to deliver. Very little of his stimulus packages went into roads, railways, bridges and other economic infrastructure. Schools are being forced to tear down their assembly halls and build the Julia Gillard Memorial Hall in their place - a poor use of taxpayers' money.

He conned the Left in presenting himself as an environmentalist, yet he is committed to implementing an ETS that far from reducing global emissions, may actually increase them.

People have been so far conned that they immediately dismiss reports about his abusive treatment of staff and vile temper, but they are consistent with what I've learnt via sources close to the PM. His office required some repair work because of his tantrums.

We've learnt little since the 1930's

2009-07-29T20:22:00.010+08:00

The common argument used to reassure us that the current global downturn won't be as severe as the Great Depression is that the actions taken by governments around the world will change the current course of the global economy. The present thinking appears to be that financial systems and our understanding of them have significantly progressed since the 1930's. While they have certainly changed and are more complex than ever before, one can only conclude from a quick look back at recent history that it is wishful thinking to suggest that we're any better equipped to tackle the fundamental problems that financial markets have always faced.

The inescapable reality that lawmakers are less than keen to explain to the general public is that this financial disaster came about because of a debt-fuelled asset bubble in the US housing market and while it was years in the making, they failed to see it coming or take any action to avert the market collapse.

The popular story that this all started with unscrupulous mortgage brokers who preyed on witless borrowers is baloney, just like most of the other rubbish that journalists write in our mainstream newspapers every day. They get rewarded for sales, not truth or accuracy. The cold hard truth is that America's debt binge began with the borrowing of money from China that was raised through its big trade surpluses. The US government, for political reasons, was all too keen for home buyers to live beyond their means with policies that encouraged irresponsible lending.

If our financial systems and management of them were that far superior to the 1930's, then the bubble and mountain of private debt—far greater as a percentage of GDP than it was back then—wouldn't have grown so large and burst. Once a bubble bursts, the damage has been done. It can't be reversed by re-inflating the values of assets that were purchased for more than they were truly worth.

Brett Mason on the golden rule of Australian politics

2009-05-16T17:46:00.026+08:00

Brett Mason has delivered a couple of excellent speeches recounting the Australian Labor Party's history with public finance. The Senator for Queensland is not well known outside politics but he is fairly compelling to listen to with the conviction that he displays in his speeches.

Speech 1
Speech 2

Speech 1

Title:
APPROPRIATION (NATION BUILDING AND JOBS) BILL (NO. 1) 2008-2009
APPROPRIATION (NATION BUILDING AND JOBS) BILL (NO. 2) 2008-2009
HOUSEHOLD STIMULUS PACKAGE BILL 2009
TAX BONUS FOR WORKING AUSTRALIANS BILL 2009
TAX BONUS FOR WORKING AUSTRALIANS (CONSEQUENTIAL AMENDMENTS) BILL 2009
COMMONWEALTH INSCRIBED STOCK AMENDMENT BILL 2009
Second Reading

Date:
Thursday, 5 February 2009

Senator MASON (Queensland) (5:37 PM) —I rise to speak on the Appropriation (Nation Building and Jobs) Bill (No. 1) 2008-2009 and cognate bills. The blinding obscenity about this package is not that it will not actually work. That is obscene but that is not the blinding obscenity. It is not even the fact that future generations will be placed in debt for who knows how long. That is obscene but that is not the blinding obscenity. Even Labor’s financial incompetence is no longer obscene because that is part of Australia’s political folklore—we know the history of Labor governments, particularly federal Labor governments, and we are used to it. The blinding obscenity is that this government and Mr Rudd propose to push through the largest expenditure package, outside of budgets, in Australia’s history without parliamentary oversight. That is what he proposes to do and that is the blinding obscenity of this government.

If you want to know how significant that is—I am not very good with numbers but I did a quick calculation upstairs—we are talking about 42 thousand million dollars. There are, I think, 21 million Australians, so for every man, woman and child in this nation the debt immediately will be $2,000. And for every taxpayer—there are around 9,200,000 taxpayers—the contribution will be $4,565.22. The obscenity is that that debt was going to be placed on every man, woman and child and every taxpayer without proper parliamentary oversight. That is the blinding obscenity of this government. They have been in power for 15 months and already they are pushing through $42 billion without proper parliamentary oversight. That is a disgrace.

But politics is funny—it is an interesting profession. There are those who know the Labor Party well and know how they operate. Mr Latham, a former Labor leader, wrote today in the Australian Financial Review that Mr Rudd and Mr Swan:

… have jumped all over the financial crisis, not with a clear economic strategy in mind but with an urgent sense of the political opportunity it presents.

The stimulus package is about politics, much more than being about economics. Mr Latham knows that, the opposition knows that and Mr Rudd knows that, and that is a disgrace.

The problem—and my colleagues have touched on this eloquently throughout the day—is this: we now have a government that does not believe in anything. One of my favourite topics—and I will get onto this later—is this embarrassing essay from Mr Rudd. The problem is this: the Labor Party now no longer has any coherent ideology or framework.

Senator Boyce —They have Ruddbank.

Senator MASON —Yes, they have Ruddbank. They used to believe in socialism. That failed universally—it has been dropped. Then they developed the Third Way. Remember the Third Way? Mr Blair developed it—and Mr Hawke and Mr Keating. Mr Rudd has just dumped it. And what does he propose to replace it with? Nothing at all. I have read the essay twice. It is pathetic in its sparseness. It is funny when I think of it; in my lifetime the Labor Party used to be a grand party of ideas. I always opposed them. When the Maoists used to run around at university I opposed them. Now of course all they believe in is opportunism and ‘me-too-ism’. So in my lifetime they have gone from Maoism to ‘me-too-ism’. And what a pathetic downhill ride it has been.

I think it was Dostoyevsky who said that the problem is that someone who believes in nothing in the end will do anything. That is the problem with the stimulus package. It is all about politics and very little to do with economics.

My colleagues have all said eloquently that the cardinal rule of stimulus packages is this: make sure they are properly targeted and that you get bang for your buck. It is all about bang for your buck with stimulus packages. Unfortunately, this $42 billion extravaganza fails that test.

One of the centrepieces of the package is the handouts to many Australians. Sure, it is attractive superficially—we all accept that. Many people will think it is terrific. But will it actually make a difference on the ground? Every poll I have seen published says this: most of that money will be used to pay off mortgages and credit cards—to retire debt—and the other part of it will be used for savings and will not be used to spend and to stimulate. That is the problem. Again, there is no bang for your buck. In short, this is a package directed towards social infrastructure rather than economic infrastructure, and that at the nub is the failing of this package.

I accept that building libraries and sports halls might be laudable. Even if you put aside the fact, as my friend Senator Nash said, that that is of course a state responsibility—but I am a generous man so let’s put that aside—what sort of bang do you get for your buck and what return do you get from the stimulus package? The same could be asked of community housing, ceiling insulation or indeed all of the financial handouts to taxpayers: what sort of bang do you get for your buck? What return do you get on the money you spend?

It is estimated that parts of President Obama’s proposed stimulus package in the United States will generate a multiplier as high as about 1.7 to one—that is, every dollar that the US congress votes to spend will generate about $1.70 in the next 12 months. As my colleagues have said, eloquently, that is because the money is being spent on physical infrastructure projects like highways, railways and bridges, which generate jobs during construction and then produce benefits to the economy through reduced transportation costs. In other words, when the orgy is over something still remains. When the orgy is over, there is something for the morning after.

There were a couple of good articles today in the Australian Financial Review. Michael Knox, an analyst from ABN AMRO Morgans, analysed Kevin Rudd’s package. ‘What sort of return,’ he asked, ‘will this country get?’ What return will Australia get from Mr Rudd’s stimulus package? Michael Knox said:

The economic impact of the plan is that GDP growth is expected to be around half a per cent higher than in 2008-09 and about 0.75 to 1 per cent higher in 2009-10.

In 2008-09 we are spending 1.7 per cent of GDP in stimulus to get an increase in GDP of 0.5 per cent. This means we are spending $1 in stimulus to get only 30c in GDP. This is a multiplier of just 0.3—very low by international comparison.

He concluded by saying:

By emphasising social over economic infrastructure, the bang for the buck is so soft it might better be described as a dull thud.

So even within the terms of the government’s own reference this is a very poor package—no bang for the buck.

What about the other objectives? My friend Senator Boyce has raised the issue of jobs. Clearly, the opposition is all about jobs, jobs, jobs. Mr Turnbull has spoken about it relentlessly over the last few days.

Senator Boyce —And eloquently.

Senator MASON —And eloquently! After the debacle of last year’s $10 billion package, where it would seem very few of the promised 75,000 jobs have materialised, the government is now rather more modestly promising that the $42 billion will ‘support’ up to 90,000 jobs. We do not know what ‘support’ means. I am like Senator Boyce; I do not know what ‘support’ means, but presumably it does not mean to create or to maintain.

I go to a quick bit of arithmetic, Mr Acting Deputy President Hutchins, and I am not good at this so you may have to help me. That is 90,000 jobs at the cost of $42 billion, which comes out at $400,000 per job. And those are not new jobs, those are the supported jobs. At $400,000 a job, what a wonderful package! As Mr Costello said in the House yesterday about the government’s new policy to borrow and to splurge, we are reversing 10 years of hard work and we are doing it to support 90,000 jobs at more than $400,000 per job. What a fiasco! That is the Labor arithmetic, and it is not very pretty.

Rather than trying to remake capitalism, which Mr Rudd has tried to do with his sad little essay, he should perhaps do something to ameliorate the pain that ordinary Australians are feeling. I thought it was the job of governments in recessions to help those in pain, rather than to try to remake the economic system, which is Mr Rudd’s preoccupation.

Who are the principal people who should be benefiting from Mr Rudd’s concerns? The unemployed. They are the people at the bottom of the social heap. And what is Mr Rudd doing for the unemployed in this package? This is from a party that supposedly believes in social justice! The government is doing absolutely nothing for the unemployed. Do you know what? Within the next year there are going to be a lot more people who are unemployed. So perhaps the new social democracy that Mr Rudd talks about in this frightful little essay has nothing to do with social justice. The new social democracy is not about social justice at all. There is no concern for the unemployed at all. It is increasingly obscene.

Tim Colebatch wrote in today’s Age:

Those who need it are the poor people who bear the cost of the recession on behalf of the rest of us: workers who lose their jobs, apprentices laid off, youngsters who can’t even get into the labour market, and businesses and self-employed people who go broke. There is nothing in this package for them.

So much for new Labor! So much for a party trying to rediscover a new direction! So much for a sad, new social democrat who does not believe in social justice!

The worst thing, however—and my colleagues have spoken about this forcefully and with passion—is the tremendous cost to the economy for future generations. It is about sizing up debt for years and years to come, for our children and potentially our grandchildren. Others have spoken at length today about the government’s reckless policies that in just over a year have managed to turn a $22 billion surplus into a $20 billion budget deficit and have sent Australia back on the road to government debt. That is the problem. What is worse, judging by the legislation introduced by the government, is that we can expect it to get even worse.

What has the government done? It has given itself plenty of wriggle room. It is going to allow itself to borrow up to—

Senator Fierravanti-Wells —$200 billion.

Senator Fisher —$200 billion.

Senator MASON —‘$200 billion,’ is the chorus from the opposition. What worries me—what worries the opposition—is this: when we came into government in 1996 the budget deficit was about half that; it was about $96 billion. It took us about a decade to pay that off. I hate to think how long it will take to pay off if it is $200 billion. It could take an entire generation to pay off a debt like that. It would become in a sense systemic—as it has become in the United States and in western Europe. In fact, 10 per cent of the budget could be paying for budget deficits of previous years. Government debt can so overburden budgets that governments are crippled. And who pays the debt? Taxpayers in future generations. The worst thing that could happen to this country, sir, is this: like the United States and like western Europe we get used to living with—

Senator Brandis —Structural.

Senator MASON —structural debt that gets written into the budget each year and cripples us. That is the long-term problem.

You will recall that Mr Costello years ago commissioned the Intergenerational Report. You will recall his concern about intergenerational equity. This is another matter of social justice, I might add. The opposition is raising another matter of social justice. Who will bear the burden of today’s splurge? The point of intergenerational equity is, as Mr Costello pointed out, this: the changing demography of Australia means that with an ageing population there will be fewer taxpayers over the next generation to foot the bill. That is the problem. So the systemic, structural debt that Senator Brandis mentioned in his excellent address today is not just some sort of myth; it is highly likely. That is what petrifies the opposition.

Senator Brandis —And no Labor government will even start paying off.

Senator MASON —That is right. In the end, as always, it will be the coalition that has to pay the debt off. Some might think that I have a boring life. Perhaps I do. But I read with morbid curiosity Mr Rudd’s essay, ‘The global financial crisis’. To those people in the gallery: I suggest that you do not bother.

The ACTING DEPUTY PRESIDENT (Senator Forshaw)—Senator Mason, I suggest that you direct your remarks through the chair.

Senator MASON —Thank you. I suggest to you, Mr Acting Deputy President Forshaw, that you do not read it either. Let me point out the salient parts. Right towards the end of this embarrassing essay, Mr Rudd quotes President Sarkozy of France saying ‘laissez faire, c’est finis’; it is the end of laissez faire and the end of liberalism. For a start, as my colleagues know, France never adopted free market economics. That is why they have had 10 per cent unemployment for the last 20 years. Even worse, the irony is perhaps lost on Mr Rudd of something that I read in Monday’s edition of the International Herald Tribune. It was:

Prime Minister François Fillon on Monday rejected demands that the French government seek to stimulate consumer spending, rather than follow his plan to stimulate corporate and infrastructure investment, to lift France out of its economic slump.

He rejected demands; France rejected it. The article went on:

‘It would be irresponsible to chose another policy, which would increase our country’s indebtedness without having more infrastructure and increased competitiveness in the end,’ Fillon said in a speech in Lyon.

If the French can get it right, why can’t this government? Even Mr Rudd’s continental idols do not agree with him. Even the French are spending their money on roads, buildings, ports and railways and renovating infrastructure.

I suppose it comes down to this in the end with this embarrassing little essay: there are three policy prescriptions in this essay. They are: spend, spend and spend. There are no other ideas in it at all. And that is the problem with the Labor Party today, you see: they actually do not believe in anything except opportunism. That is at the heart of the problem in the debate in this parliament and the problem with Mr Rudd. Dostoyevsky was right: if you believe in nothing, you will do anything to survive politically, even if you have to mortgage the country in so doing and even if you have to mortgage future generations. That will be on Mr Rudd’s head and on the head of this government. (Time expired)

Speech 2

Title:
ADJOURNMENT
Australian Labor Party

Date:
Thursday, 19 March 2009

Senator MASON (Queensland) (5:52 PM) —Mr President, I seek leave to speak for up to 20 minutes on the adjournment.

Leave granted.

Senator MASON —I thank the Senate for its indulgence. There is a new dichotomy in Australian politics. We have today in the opposition economic conservatives. We have in the government former economic conservatives. But they are much happier today because no longer do people in the government have to live a lie. Friends like Senator Carr can tax, they can spend and they can send the nation into debt as much as they like, and they are much happier about that. Senator Carr’s old boss, former Premier Joan Kirner, said the other day that she was so happy that debt was no longer out of fashion. Debt in effect for Ms Kirner is the new black; debt is again fashionable.

The former economic conservatives, the government, have a very interesting solution to the current economic crisis. All of us in this chamber know this: the current economic crisis was caused by individuals and indeed by companies borrowing and spending far too much. In the United States, and indeed elsewhere, far too much money was borrowed and far too much money was spent by individuals and companies. What is the solution offered by the government? It is for governments to borrow and spend even more. That is the solution of the government. After companies and individuals have spent too much and borrowed too much, the nation, the government, should borrow and spend even more. That is the solution. It is a bit like drinking to cure a hangover. That is the analogy. That is the idea the government has: to keep on spending and borrowing even more and more and more.

There has been a lot of talk over the last two weeks about political DNA, about what makes political parties and political leaders tick. A quick look at history will tell us about every single Labor government since Federation. What does it tell us? It tells us this: every single federal Labor government puts our nation further into debt—every time. There have been 10 Labor prime ministers and they have put this nation into further debt every time. There is not one exception. Every time you have a Labor government they put the country further into debt. Debt is always higher when Labor governments leave than when they arrive—every single time. The farewell gift of Australia’s previous nine Labor prime ministers is more debt. That is the iron rule of Australian federal politics: every Labor government, more debt.

Go right back to the first one: Chris Watson. He was only there for a short time, but there was more debt. Andrew Fisher—he spent a lot; he created a lot more debt. Billy Hughes—again, he created a lot more debt. James Scullin—there was much, much more debt. John Curtin and Ben Chifley—again, they left far, far more debt than there was when they turned up as prime ministers. Then, of course, there was Mr Whitlam. We know what he did. What did he do? He borrowed and borrowed, and there was more debt. At least it is consistent. There is always more debt.

The one thing that is in Labor DNA is debt—every single time. Then, of course, there were Mr Hawke and Mr Keating. It is funny, you know. They did not start off so badly, but in the end the DNA came out. Mr Hawke and Mr Keating left this country in debt—$96 billion. Then, finally, there was Mr Rudd. Mr Rudd also, after six months, spent $50 billion and put the country into debt again. That is 10 Labor prime ministers: Watson, Fisher, Hughes, Scullin, Curtin, Chifley, Whitlam, Hawke, Keating and Rudd—10 out of 10, more debt. There is not one exception. Every Labor Prime Minister creates further debt for this country. It is a disgraceful record. In war and peace, in good times and bad, there is always debt. Debt is in the Labor Party’s DNA—not jobs; but debt. The excuses change, but it is always the same rationale—debt, debt, debt and debt, from every one of the last 10 Labor prime ministers.

There are some who doubted Mr Rudd’s commitment when he first came into parliament. They doubted whether he would be a good Labor prime minister, because he did not come from a union background—he was a former diplomat. They were concerned that he might not know the Labor Party’s ways. But the Labor Party need not have worried, because he has the DNA. He has the debt gene. He has it; the Australian Labor Party need not have worried. Mr Rudd knows how to spend and he knows how to put the nation into debt. He has never forgotten that. Mr Rudd fits in perfectly with the other nine former Labor prime ministers in creating further and further debt. This country must never forget that when Labor left office they left this country and its people with $96 billion of debt—paying about $8 billion of interest each year to service that debt. That is what Mr Hawke and Mr Keating left this country, just like all the other Labor prime ministers did: debt. And they left it.

It has taken just six months for the Labor Party to spend over $50 billion and, of course, to extend a credit line of $200 billion. If it ever happens—and it will—that Labor spends the $200 billion, we will start to have the problem of structural debt. That is where, every year, the budget gets consumed by interest on debt—just like in western Europe. It becomes part of the political culture, the fabric and the way of life of, let us say, France. And 10 per cent of the budget is taken up on interest payments on debt. That is the problem. This credit line of $200 billion signifies the fact that the Labor Party will do it if they feel it is necessary.

Senator O’Brien interjecting—

Senator MASON —Well, it’s funny. What worries me is that Mr Rudd talks about turbocharging social democracy; what he has done is turbocharge debt. Perhaps that is the same thing. That is the problem. The debt has gone up $50 billion in six months. Only twice in this nation’s history—during the McMahon government and under the Howard-Costello government—has there been no net government debt. What did Mr Whitlam do as soon as he got in? He fixed that problem. He put the country back into debt. What happened when Mr Rudd got in? He put us back into debt, just like the other nine Labor prime ministers did. The one consistent fact of Australian political history, the one consistent political fact about Australian Labor governments, is debt—and there are no exceptions. What a coincidence! We know what is in Labor DNA. It is debt. There have been no exceptions. It is always the same. The Labor Party will bugger up the economy and they will expect the coalition to fix it up. It happens every time. With 10 Labor prime ministers, the coalition government to take over has been expected to fix and pay off the debt.

This is a moral question. What about the intergenerational equity? Mr Costello has spoken often about this. This is a moral issue. The Labor Party love to talk about equity, but they do not mind bankrupting our children or grandchildren to pay off the debt. It is all very well to spend on behalf of today’s voters, but who is going to pay off the debt? Our children and our grandchildren will be saddled with the debt that these people create, just like all the other Labor governments do. There are no exceptions. It is the one ironclad rule of Australian politics. They always say that the great dictators love children and hate their parents. You could never accuse Mr Rudd of that. He loves the parents; we are just not too sure if he loves the children who will be saddled with the debt that he is creating today, just as the other nine Labor prime ministers have created debt in the past. Every Labor Prime Minister puts this nation further into debt. It is the ironclad rule of Australian politics. It is absolutely disgraceful, if not scary.

Let us not forget how Labor spent their first year in office. How I remember Mr Swan, Mr Rudd and even Senator Conroy saying: ‘The economy’s overheated. The inflation genie is out of the bottle.’ They talked it down: the economy was overheated, interest rates were going up and the economy was out of control. We said, ‘Go for growth.’ They talked the economy down just at the time when it needed to be talked up, making the recession even worse. I will never forget how ‘the inflation genie was out of the bottle’—at four per cent—and things were so terrible, weren’t they! Now, a few months later, we know what economic terror is, their having talked down the economy. If they had gone for growth, they would not have had the problem. Instead, they kept talking down the economy and they failed to build up business and consumer confidence. So well done! Mr Rudd even got that wrong—first year in office: wrong.

What is the intellectual edifice behind this change from being an economic conservative? What is it based on? It is political opportunism, but this voodoo economics is based on the famous essay of Mr Rudd’s in the Monthly, which of course I have read. The philosophy, if you call it that, is unusual because it reflects an unusual state of mind. Mr Rudd’s political and economic philosophy changes at every opportunity. He was a Christian socialist. Dietrich Bonhoeffer, the great German pastor, was his spiritual, economic and social mentor, but he abandoned that and decided he was a neoliberal when he was after the shadow Treasurership before the 2004 election, under Mr Latham. He was trailing Mr Latham’s coat-tails through Labor caucus, saying he was a neoliberal. So he went from the German Dietrich Bonhoeffer to the Austrian Friedrich Hayek in a very short amount of time.

Then, upon becoming opposition leader, Mr Rudd called himself a self-styled economic conservative, and he was proud of it—very, very proud of it. Mr Rudd was so proud of styling himself as an economic conservative. He was out and proud about being an economic conservative. There was no difference between him and Mr Howard at all, really; he was ‘Howard lite’. He was an economic conservative and he loved every minute of it.

The first whiff of economic grapeshot, the first bit of real tension, the first downturn, and what happens? He drops all that. He drops Bonhoeffer, drops Hayek, drops economic conservatism and becomes a reborn social democrat all of a sudden. So he has changed four times in just a couple of years. Mr Rudd is, in a sense, Australia’s first post-modern Prime Minister, because he does not actually believe in anything. No-one I know has changes of hearts like that, except Mr Rudd—no-one at all. My old friend Senator Carr—I always have a go at him, I know—is wrong about everything, but at least he believes in something. Mr Rudd does not believe in anything. He changes his mind every second week. He is like a schizophrenic Harry Potter figure, baring his latest philosophy to some sort of focus group in Labor headquarters in Sussex Street over a Chinese meal, with dim sims. That is where he has got this philosophy from; it is pathetic. It is this sort of groupthink.

The essay in the Monthly is wrong. Not only is it based on hypocrisy; it is intellectually lazy, ignorant and wrong. Mr Rudd of course does not like talking about the fact that Mr Blair was one of the great neoliberals of the latter half of the 20th century; a Labour Prime Minister was one of the most significant neoliberals of the 20th century—as well as Mr Hawke and Mr Keating, of course, to their partial credit; I will give them that.

But perhaps even more disturbing than the shocking hypocrisy of the Labor Party adopting neoliberalism as well—even forgetting the hypocrisy—is the moral argument here. More people have been moved out of poverty in the last 20 years than were moved out of poverty in previous recorded history. More people have moved out of poverty in the last 20 years than ever before in human history. It is not because of communism or socialism or social democracy but because of free trade—yes, free trade. Free trade and neoliberalism created more wealth for the Chinese than for anyone else. The Chinese do not go on like Mr Rudd does. Mr Rudd takes advantage not only of the hypocrisy but of ignoring great moral arguments.

What the Labor Party does not seem to understand is that this is about good regulation. The fact is that the reason why Australian banks are among the best in the world is that the regulation is very good. This same system that Mr Rudd decries in Australia—the neoliberalism he criticises—is the same system that gave us the best banks in the world. So not only is this article in the Monthly pathetic, lazy and ignorant; it is just plain wrong.

And now it is worse. I understand that our high commissioners and our ambassadors are having to run around and hawk this line to world leaders. When Australia’s High Commissioner to the United Kingdom meets Her Majesty the Queen, I suppose he says, ‘Here, have a look at this article from the Australian Prime Minister.’ In Ulan Bator they probably take a translation of this article and give it to the local president, prime minister, doge or whoever it happens to be.

Our diplomats are expected to run around the world with this embarrassing little essay, which is ignorant and hypocritical. Our embassies have been changed into publishing houses these days. It is a pathetic, intellectually lazy and ignorant piece of work. To have the hide to have our diplomats running around with this! I wish they would peddle something I wrote, rather than this rubbish. Can you imagine asking our diplomats—our high commissioners and our ambassadors—to run around with this stuff? It is absolutely embarrassing. I feel sorry for them.

Who are the political legatees of this appalling ideology? Who are the people who love debt—debt being the new black to the Labor Party? Of course, in Queensland it is Ms Bligh, with $74 billion in debt. And she racked up that $74 billion of debt—guess what—in boom times. She has just had record mining receipts of billions of dollars. She has received billions of dollars in property taxes and hundreds of millions in GST. And do you know what she has done, Mr President? She has still racked up $74 billion of debt. I thought the $96 billion of debt federally in 1996 was bad. That was spread among about 20 million people. This is $74 billion spread among 4½ million people. Talk about structural debt. When will this debt ever be paid off, Mr President?

Of course, the Labor Party do not worry about that. They are not concerned about paying off the debt at all, because there is one golden rule of Australian politics: every Labor Prime Minister—from Chris Watson through to Kevin Rudd—spends more money than they raise. They leave this country with more debt. That is an iron rule of Australian politics. And this diseased DNA is now spreading to the Labor states. We have got Ms Bligh with $74 billion in debt and she does not seem to give a damn. It costs $10 million a day in interest alone to service that debt, and Ms Bligh does not care at all. (Time expired)

What should be done about the violence in Northbridge?

2009-05-10T09:12:00.014+08:00

The regular violence that we see in Perth's main entertainment precinct every weekend is clearly unacceptable to the community standards of most Western Australians.

After 3 or 4am on Sunday morning, the fights on the streets—in particular James St—follow one after another non-stop. Last night the police were attending to one fight while another man who was only metres down the road was out of his mind on some stimulant (and probably alcohol as well) and screaming at the bouncers threatening retribution by killing them and destroying the club. After a while the police did eventually casually walk over and intervene, but it should have been handled well before then. They were overstretched and you got the impression that the chaos was all rather normal to them.

The prime factor in all the violence is alcohol, but it is such a big part of our culture and lifestyle and consequently completely banning it is not a realistic option.

The only solution that I am reasonably confident will effectively address this problem is to close down all the licenced premises and clear the streets of all loiterers at some time between 3 and 4am. I am a regular patron of Northbridge's nightclubs and am reluctant to see this happen, but the physical safety of people in the area comes first.

I spoke to some nightclub security staff who offered their thoughts on curbing violence. The general message I received was that the people on the streets need to be dispersed, especially at the front of venues where people congregate. Closing off some roads such as James St would open up the area and reduce the opportunities for altercations between people who are intoxicated and just passing by each other.

Letter to the Liberal Party regarding the proposed Rio Tinto-Chinalco deal

2009-05-06T17:14:00.010+08:00

I recently wrote to senior members of the Liberal Party expressing my misgivings about the federal government approving the purchase of a $US19.5 billion stake in Rio Tinto by Chinalco, which is wholly owned by the Chinese government:

From: Justin Lee
To: Joe Hockey, Julie Bishop, Malcolm Turnbull, Mathias Cormann
Date: 1 May 2009 13:31
Subject: Disapprove of Chinalco-Rio deal

Libs,

I just want to let you know that I am a Rio share holder, and while the value of my shares have plummeted with the downturn (they've lost over 50% of their value), I disapprove of Chinalco owning such a substantial stake in the company. Chinalco is owned by a totalitarian state and the deal is not in the national interest.

Cheers,
Justin.

I received this reply from Julie Bishop:

From: Bishop, Julie (MP)
To: Justin Lee
Date: 6 May 2009 17:03
Subject: Chinalco-Rio deal

Dear Justin

Thank you for your recent email, receipt of which was acknowledged by my adviser Sue.

I have read the response from Malcolm Turnbull and as he pointed out, the decision of the Board of Rio Tinto in relation to Chinalco raises a number of significant issues of national interest.

The Coalition welcomes foreign investment in Australia and recognises the important role it plays in our economy. However large Chinese companies, unlike other sources of foreign investment are owned, either in part or full by the Chinese Government.

The Coalition does not believe it is in our national interest for the Chinese Government to be purchasing controlling stakes in Australian strategic assets and resources.

The final decision to approve the purchase of Australian companies, land and mineral rights rests with the Treasurer, however the Foreign Takeovers and Acquisitions Act 1975 and the Foreign Investment Review Board regulate, review and report on this process.

The Coalition is committed to ensuring the sale of any our strategic assets and resources is in the national interest.

Best wishes

Julie

Labor's runaway debt train raises the spectre of structural debt

2009-04-09T19:48:00.026+08:00

The ideological transformations that our Prime Minister has undergone would put the Shmoo to shame. He once described himself as an “an old-fashioned Christian socialist.” During his 2007 federal election campaign, eager to shake off their record of atrocious waste of taxpayers' money, the ALP then ran a television commercial in which he promoted himself as an economic conservative:

A number of people have described me as an economic conservative. When it comes to public finance, it's a badge I wear with pride.

The commercial can still be watched on Labor's YouTube channel.

The contrast with his current policies is extraordinary. This is the same man that just jacked up the nation's legal credit limit from $75 billion to $200 billion and burnt through $50 billion in just six months.

Rudd's out of control spending is far from unexpected. Without fail, every consecutive federal Labor government has left the nation in deeper debt than the previous one. Not once have they ever repaid the Commonwealth's debt.

What is Kevin Rudd's justification for his wild spending spree? Keynesian economic theory. The story he gives—wrongly—is that capitalism has failed, and to save the economy, the government must spend as much money as it can in a short time frame using borrowed money. Unfortunately, Keynesian economic theory is rather theoretical. The empirical results of studies into the effectiveness of deficit financed government spending are less impressive than the theoretical evidence.

At the heart of the economic problems that began in the US is a mountain of debt which led to a subsequent collapse in confidence. Kevin Rudd is trying to fix the problems with more debt. It's just like an alcoholic trying to cure himself by drinking spirits.

Alcopops tax grab added to Rudd's growing list of policy failures

2009-03-18T21:55:00.004+09:00

The ALP's gratuitous tax grab that was disguised as an initiative to curb binge drinking among teenagers has been defeated in the Senate by the socially conservative Senator Steve Fielding of Family First and the Coalition.

In spite of all their emotive rhetoric about how teenage girls cannot help themselves with these sweet tasting, colourfully presented alcoholic beverages, one year on from when the measure was first introduced they failed to provide any evidence that it had an impact on binge drinking.

To make matters worse, the ALP chose to give the tax revenue back to the liquor industry for purely political reasons, as Senator Mathias Cormann explains:

While we opposed this tax increase as a bad tax, we also took the view that the money collected by the government so far (without legal foundation as it turns out now) should not be returned to the liquor industry.

In fact the liquor industry did not want it back.

We bent over backwards, over the past two days, giving the government every opportunity to validate the $300 million collected so far and to invest all of it in genuine and effective measures to fight alcohol abuse in the community.

I moved three separate motions, (one together with Greens Senator Bob Brown) to give the Government the opportunity to validate the $300 million in revenue collected so far.

Recklessly, the Government voted against every single one of them. The reason? Political. They wanted to put maximum pressure on Senator Fielding to pass the tax.

Emissions Trading Scheme fundamentally flawed

2009-03-12T20:16:00.020+09:00

The government's proposed Emissions Trading Scheme (ETS) has become a major embarrassment for the Rudd Labor government. The government has been left in disarray because of internal divisions on the policy, and it is now the subject of three Senate inquiries. It has been very poorly designed and raises deep concerns from both the Coalition and Greens.

The ETS in its proposed form will have little or no impact on the nation's carbon emissions. Speaking of the Select Committee on Climate Change Policy, Andrew Robb, Shadow Minister for Infrastructure and COAG and Shadow Minister Assisting the Leader on Emissions Trading Design, said:

The Government's emissions trading scheme is deeply flawed – if implemented it would cost jobs, kill investment and not see any appreciable reduction in CO2 emissions.

This inquiry is an opportunity to look at additional complementary measures and alternatives to the Government's ETS.

This inquiry has been agreed to because everyone, including many in the Government's caucus think, that what the Government has come up with is so deeply flawed that we need to have an inquiry which will look more broadly at what can be done which won't cost thousands of jobs but can also do something significant about CO2 emissions.

The scheme has been slammed in a report commissioned by the Senate Select Committee on Fuel and Energy. Dr Fisher is critical of both what is known about the scheme and what remains unknown:

Although the public report on the Treasury modelling is voluminous there remain aspects of the modelling that are not transparent. To assist in this review the Chair of the Senate Select Committee wrote to the Treasurer requesting, ‘the government's complete documentation of the government's models together with the model codes and databases and any other model simulations undertaken relevant to the policy scenarios, but not publicly released’. To this reviewer’s knowledge no response was received. As a consequence, it has been necessary to undertake this review without access to a complete set of information about model documentation, databases, implementation and many of the underlying technical model parameters. Given the major long-term structural changes to the Australian economy implied by the introduction of an ETS and the fact that the development of the key model employed to determine the international effects on the Australian economy of the scheme was fully taxpayer funded, it seems reasonable that full model datasets, codes and comprehensive documentation be released.

...

As already stated this review regards the transparency surrounding the Treasury modelling process as unsatisfactory, notwithstanding the efforts of the Committee to gain access to models, documentation, codes and databases developed with public funding. This lack of transparency is regrettable given Treasury’s traditional advocacy of openness and competition when it comes to others.

The report also raises concerns about carbon leakage, where emission-intensive, trade-exposed industries relocate offshore. Carbon leakage not only threatens Australian jobs, but can potentially increase greenhouse gas emissions:

The most common description of carbon leakage concerns the relocation of energy intensive industries from countries with emissions constraints to countries with no such constraints. This could happen either via physical plant relocation or if firms in emission-constrained countries shrink while competitors in non-constrained countries expand. Global emissions might actually rise, compared to what otherwise would have occurred, if firms in the nonconstrained economy use more emission-intensive technologies.

Another channel by which leakage can occur is via global energy prices. Mitigation policies in carbon-constrained countries reduce demand for high carbon fossil fuels, leading to lower prices on world markets (other things equal). As a result, non-constrained countries would respond by increasing consumption above what it would otherwise be. Conversely, demand for cleaner fuels such as natural gas would increase in rich, participating countries, driving up the world price and reducing the reliance on such fuels in non-constrained countries.

Unfortunately, it appears that there was some political influence in the economic modelling that was carried out in the design of the scheme, as Senator Mathias Cormann, Chairman of the Senate Select Committee on Fuel and Energy, explained in a media release:

From evidence received late last year, the Committee already knew the Government had refused to ask Treasury to assess the most realistic scenarios when modelling the economic impact of its proposed CPRS.

Challenged about the scenarios chosen for modelling, a senior Treasury official told our Committee that “the scenarios that were modelled by Treasury were done at the direction of the government”.

That is code for don't blame us.

Lindsay Tanner's gutter politics

2009-03-09T09:50:00.008+09:00

Lindsay Tanner, Minister for Finance and Deregulation, in the House of Representatives on November 12, 2008:

Why is this happening? Why do we suddenly get this pattern—an orchestrated set of attacks on Australia’s regulator? Most Australians support our regulators. Most Australians think it is important to have a strict set of rules and fair dinkum, impartial, tough umpires. But there are, sadly, some people in the community who do not. There are some people in the community who do not like regulators and who do not like tough rules. The sharks and the shonks and the spivs that inevitably populate the nether regions of the financial world do not like regulators. Unfortunately they have taken over the Liberal Party. The sharks and the shonks and the spivs have taken over the Liberal Party. There has always been a factional tension in the Liberal Party—not between the wets and the dries but between old money and fast money. And fast money has taken over.

Even before Malcolm Turnbull became leader of the opposition, Labor worked furiously to find something in his past to tarnish his reputation. The thinking was that he was a merchant banker, surely he must have been up to no good. What have they found? Absolutely nothing.

Rudd should expect no less for his personal attacks in Parliament

2009-03-08T07:31:00.044+09:00

Kevin Rudd shouldn't shed any crocodile tears because of Malcolm Turnbull's article in The Australian slamming the Prime Minister's absurd ideological treatise on neoliberalism, given the number of denigratory remarks that Turnbull and the Liberal Party in general have tolerated from both him and Treasurer Wayne Swan in Parliament. Ever since Turnbull became Leader of the Opposition they have attacked him for his wealth and past career in the finance industry at every available opportunity.

The remarks play to voters' prejudices and not only were they totally uncalled for, they were simply wrong. The global financial crisis was not caused by greedy merchant bankers and neoliberalism. China ran up huge trade surpluses that were lent to the US and fuelled an asset bubble. Also, the US government intervened in the mortgage market, further inflating housing prices until the housing bubble burst.

Here is one appalling attack he made on February 5, 2009, in the House of Representatives, where he insults merchant bankers and outrageously suggests that Turnbull should apologise for the global financial crisis because of his profession:

Mr RUDD —I know those opposite do not wish to actually debate that which is real here, which is: how do you deal with providing the stimulus which the Australian economy needs because of the global economic crisis? We have a program put forward. It is costed. The assumptions have been backed by the Treasury, and we stand by those because they represent for us a credible strategy to see Australia through this crisis.

The alternative is not just sitting on the fence, not just carping from the sidelines, but an avalanche of politically opportunistic negativity from those opposite. But here is the ultimate irony for those opposite. There they are, representing the forces of neoliberalism around the world. There they are representing the forces of unrestrained greed. There they are, representing the forces of unrestrained markets, representing the forces also represented by unprincipled merchant bankers operating with under-regulated markets—their entire ideology, which has brought this crisis about—and yet they are unprepared to lift a political finger to support this government’s efforts to deal with the consequences of that crisis. This is the ultimate irony, the ultimate hypocrisy of those opposite: the unrestrained greed, unprincipled merchant bankers, under-regulated financial markets—at the absolute core of neoliberalism—causing this crisis worldwide, and there they stand back, smugly, seeking to take political advantage of this government’s attempts to deal with the consequences of that crisis for working people. Those opposite have contested whether in fact they are really neoliberals. Remember, as the Leader of the Liberal Party has said in response to this debate on unregulated financial markets: ‘Let us simply let the market run its course.’

Mr Hockey —Mr Speaker, I raise a point of order. I would just ask the Leader of the Labor Party to refer to the Leader of the Opposition by his proper title, please.

The SPEAKER —Order! Members should be referred to by their parliamentary titles.

Mr RUDD —The Leader of the Opposition has said on multiple occasions, ‘Let the market run its course.’ That is the very heart of the neoliberal agenda which has brought about this mayhem on markets worldwide, with impacts on working people, who now pay the price through the loss of jobs right across the world and in our country as well. The Leader of the Opposition reinforced that in the debate in the parliament on Tuesday when he began citing as his new authority on fiscal policy Professor Taylor from Stanford University in the United States, who is himself one of the archdeacons of neoliberalism. Remember what Professor Taylor said? He always asks himself each morning: ‘What would Milton do next?’—that is, what would Milton Friedman do next? And then you have not just these statements of ideology but also the action itself of ideology, which is to block this government’s efforts in the Senate to actually deal with the stimulus needs necessary to repair growth, growth which has been undermined by neoliberal wanton behaviour around the world which has brought this crisis about in the first place.

So there you have this extraordinary contradiction—their ideology wreaking havoc on the world economy and them refusing to support any course of action to deal with the consequences of their ideology’s spectacular failure. How about, I say to the Leader of the Opposition, you just stand up one day and say, ‘Maybe this neoliberalism, maybe this market fundamentalism—maybe we just got it wrong.’ How about a word of apology about all of those investment bankers around the world who creamed it, who scored tens and hundreds of millions of dollars out of this? How about just a word of apology which said you might have got it wrong? And how about a word of action to support a government’s efforts to clean up the wreckage after you? That is the moral challenge here, a moral challenge which has been failed by the Liberal Party corporately and by the Leader of the Opposition personally.

Wayne Swan is probably the worst in Parliament for playing the politics of envy:

Mr SWAN —I was making the point that the Liberal and National parties in this House are simply out of touch with the everyday lives of average Australians. The shadow Treasurer said only last week that Australians have never been richer. That is what he said only last week. Despite the fact that the stock market has halved in value in recent times, his view is that the champagne is still flowing. Of course, when you have the opposition led by a merchant banker and lawyer for merchant bankers, it is no wonder that they are so far out of touch.

More dumb policy from the Australian Laziness Party

2009-03-01T11:05:00.021+09:00

You wouldn't expect any less from the ALP. Federal Treasurer Wayne Swan just proposed that executives should have their salaries capped because Pacific Brands gave its executives pay rises after laying off workers in their Australian operations. Take a wild guess what will happen. That's right—these talented workers will just take better offers from overseas. For those that don't move offshore, local companies will just provide generous perks such as luxury cars or private jets in their employment packages. It is pure fantasy to expect that executives will apply their full potential in companies that don't attempt circumvent such regulation.

One might argue that companies will be able to hire more workers using the money that would have otherwise went into executives' pay packets—this is not necessarily so. The CEO will have less incentive to make the company competitive in the marketplace and sales could very well fall. Don't expect consumers to embrace slogans such as "Buy Aussie made"—they are unlikely to take any notice, especially when they have a mortgage to pay and family to feed.

US President Barack Obama recently introduced a cap on executive pay, but he wasn't so stupid as to apply it across the board—it is merely a condition that has to be accepted by companies receiving corporate welfare from the US government. Barack Obama said:

We don't disparage wealth. We don't begrudge anybody for achieving success. And we believe that success should be rewarded. But what gets people upset — and rightfully so — are executives being rewarded for failure, especially when those rewards are subsidised by U.S. taxpayers.

Automated layoff tracker

2009-02-28T16:55:00.023+09:00

Many layoff trackers have appeared on the Internet, but they all have the same shortcoming: people have to regularly update the page using information obtained through research or voluntarily submitted by those browsing their website. Here is a layoff tracker that is different.

With the aid of Google News, you can keep up to date with the mass layoffs occurring around the globe with a feed reader. News of the latest job cuts can be obtained by entering the following search criteria in Google News:

(cut OR layoff OR shed OR axe OR slash OR sack) AND job

This search can be accessed immediately at the following URL, which can be bookmarked for convenience:

http://www.google.com.au/news?pz=1&ned=au&hl=en-GB&q=%28cut+OR+layoff+OR+shed+OR+axe+OR+slash+OR+sack%29+AND+job

To receive a news feed of this search, enter the following URL into your RSS feed reader:

http://news.google.com.au/news?pz=1&ned=au&hl=en-GB&q=%28cut+OR+layoff+OR+shed+OR+axe+OR+slash+OR+sack%29+AND+job&output=rss

Was Andrew Bolt a lefty?

2009-02-21T13:45:00.016+09:00

Andrew Bolt is an opinion columnist for the Herald Sun, well known for his outspoken conservative views. He is no stranger to controversy and is noted for his scepticism of anthropomorphic climate change and the stolen generation of aboriginal children. He appears to write with great conviction as he expresses views held by only a minority of the population that inevitably generate a backlash from many readers.

Andrew Bolt's biography on the website of ICMI, a speakers and entertainers bureau, might surprise a few people. Apparently he was involved in a couple of election campaigns for the Hawke Labor government:

Outside journalism, he has worked for the Hawke Labor Government on two election campaigns, and for the State Opera of South Australia as its publicity director and acting general manager. He is married with three children.

Prime Minister gets a hard lesson on the house of review

2009-02-13T15:00:00.001+09:00

The initial defeat of the Rudd Labor government's massive economic stimulus package in the Senate would have taken many by surprise. The Prime Minister thought none of the crossbench senators would dare block the bill if he dangled a $950 cheque in front of millions of Australians. After the government refused to support Senator Nick Xenophon's amendments for economic and environmental assistance to the Murray-Darling Basin, he joined with the Coalition to block the bill. The bill was re-introduced into the House of Representatives and finally passed by both houses after the government negotiated a compromise with Xenophon.

As with other poor legislation that has been thrown out by the Senate, Rudd minimises the embarrassment by pinning the blame solely on the Coalition. The fact is that with the current composition of the Senate, the Coalition needs at least one other Senator to vote against a bill for it to be defeated.

Rudd's attitude, or at least the conception that he is trying to impart on voters, is that the passage of a bill through the Senate is just a formality, as is clearly evident by the figure of speech he used when he told Opposition Leader Malcolm Turnbull to "get out of the road" after he announced that he would not support the stimulus package. The reality is that when a bill is amended or rejected by the Senate, it is serving its intended purpose. It is a house of review and provides checks and balances that form a critical part of our democracy.

The role of the Senate in Australian democracy

The Australian Parliament is based on a British Westminster system, but the Senate was inspired by the Senate of Congress in the United States, which is a federation of colonies just like Australia. The US model of the upper chamber was chosen because it provides equal representation of all states regardless of population. Thus, it protects smaller states such as Tasmania and South Australia from dominance by New South Wales and Victoria. Presently, there are 12 senators for each state and 2 for the Australian Capital Territory and Northern Territory.

The Senate also plays a crucial role in providing a more inclusive representation of a broad range of political views because members are elected via proportional representation. Under this system of voting, a candidate is elected if the number of votes they receive meets a minimum quota, which is calculated by dividing the number of formal votes by one more than the number of seats being contested and then adding one to this result. Candidates receiving a number of votes exceeding the quota have their surplus votes distributed to other candidates based on their electors' preferences. The process is repeated for the remaining candidates using the transferred votes. If unallocated seats remain after this process, then the candidate with the least number of votes is eliminated and their votes are transferred to the other candidates based on preferences. The number of seats won by a political party is proportional to their share of the vote and as a consequence small parties such as the Australian Greens and Family First are able to win seats in the Senate.

Government's filibustering makes a mockery out of the Senate

2009-02-11T21:19:00.012+09:00

If the government appreciated the gravity of the economic crisis and enormity of the stimulus package that will be put to a vote on Thursday night, it certainly didn't show with their lengthy and repetitious waffling on matters that were either irrelevant or weren't critical enough to justify the attention they received. Here is just one of the answers that Labor Senator Nick Sherry gave with $42 billion of taxpayers' money hanging in the balance:

Senator ABETZ (Tasmania) (6:10 PM) —At what time on Sunday did the Treasurer finally sign off on this document?

Senator SHERRY (Tasmania) (Minister for Superannuation and Corporate Law) (6:10 PM) —I am not really sure of that level of detail, but I will see if we can find out what time, where he was, what pen he signed off with, what colour it was—black or blue—and how much sleep he had the night before, which I suspect was not much. There may be some relevance to the level of detail we are getting to, but it has not become immediately apparent to me. It reminds me of when I asked the former Treasurer, Mr Costello, about the check-in and checkout times of the GST committee, when I was in opposition, in order to try and determine who was working on the GST package. It was a high-security zone down in Treasury and I wanted to know who was going in and out at what time. The records existed because of the security situation. There was an electronic check-in and checkout. I have to say that the former Treasurer, Mr Costello, was pretty blunt in his refusal to provide that level of information. I really think we are getting to that stage now. But I will put a request in to the Treasurer’s office about the approximate time, within a few minutes, that he signed off on it.

While the government denies it, they were deliberately stalling meaningful debate to delay a vote on the bill while they engaged in backroom negotiations with Independent Senator Nick Xenophon and the Greens.

Family First's Steve Fielding was the one crossbench senator who was not involved in the negotiations. The fate of the stimulus package will be decided by him if the Greens and Xenophon strike a deal. Senator Fielding was unable to engage the filibustering government senators, leading him close to tears in this emotional outburst:

A bit of economics here—I will go back to day one. What was happening on day 1? The Reserve Bank was going to make a significant announcement, but you guys wanted to hog the spotlight. The economy runs on confidence. You did not even allow the Reserve Bank’s downward adjustment of the interest rate to affect confidence in the marketplace. You wanted to hog it. You should have let that run its course and allowed confidence to build into the economy and then maybe come out with a plan. You did not allow the positive cycle of monetary policy to work itself out. No, no, no. You had to hog it. You had to beat your chests and say, ‘Hey, we’re in control of interest rates.’ Frankly, you should have let that run.

Then there was the second thing you did. You came into this place and basically told us, ‘Pass it, no questions asked.’ Don’t kid yourselves. Do not go to the Australian public and say you agreed to an inquiry. You were deadset against it. You have misread the Australian people. We know we need a stimulus package, but are you sure as all heck that your arrogance is 100 per cent right? That is what you said on day 1: ‘Don’t worry about it; just pass it.’ That was step 2—another mistake.

Step 3: these negotiations have been lip-service. You are tap-dancing around here this afternoon. You have put it off to some convenient time when there are no news stories. Stop playing politics. This concerns Australian people, their families and their lives. I am deadset serious about this. This is just a joke. I may not be the best negotiator. I am just a kid from Reservoir, but, sure as all heck, I know when someone is stuffing around. Get serious. Do not treat the Australian public like you treat the Senate.

US trashes global economy, then moves towards protectionism

2009-02-08T13:49:00.030+09:00

One has to wonder if US President Barack Obama is plotting the ruin of the global economy. The United States is the world's largest exporter of recessions, but that hasn't discouraged Barack Obama from pursuing policies that tip the playing field in favour of American goods. His economic stimulus package, which is yet to be passed by Congress, includes provisions that require public works projects funded under the package to only use American made steel and iron. In response to international protests, the Senate has added an amendment that allows for exceptions in cases where the provisions violate America's commitment to international trade agreements. The Senate rejected an amendment from Republican Senator John McCain to have the protectionist provisions removed from the package altogether.

Obama couldn't have chosen a worse time to move towards trade protectionism. The International Monetary Fund and World Trade Organisation have warned that the so-called "Buy American" provisions could ignite a trade war. Last year, Australia exported $484 million worth of steel to the US.

The development has Caterpillar, which just laid off 20,000 employees, very worried. Jim Dugan, spokesman for Caterpillar, said to Indianapolis Star:

Our position is that, while 'Buy American' may sound good, in fact we're very concerned that if this stimulus legislation contains the 'Buy American' provision, other nations and regions of the world would follow our lead and pass similar provisions.

Suddenly, we could find ourselves with an old-fashioned trade dispute similar to the 1930s, and soon global trade could grind to a halt. We are very, very concerned that this 'Buy American' provision could end up leading to a similar set of circumstances that would be detrimental to Caterpillar, and more importantly, to the U.S. economy and the global economy.

Why has Obama chosen to head down the path of protectionism, despite the risks it poses to the US economy as well as international trade? He owes a debt to the trade unions that invested millions in their campaign to have him elected. The American Federation of Labor and Congress of Industrial Organizations (AFL-CIO) budgeted US$53.4 million ($80 million) for their campaign efforts, while its affiliated unions spent US$150 million ($224 million). President of the AFL-CIO, John Sweeney, described Obama as "a champion for working families". It is about time that John Sweeney and Prime Minister Kevin Rudd replaced the words "working families" with "union members".

Senator Cormann on the Rudd Labor government's $42 Billion ‘Stimulus’ Package

2009-02-08T11:53:00.012+09:00

Below is an excellent speech delivered by Mathias Cormann, Senator for Western Australia, on February 5, 2009. Notice how sensitive Senator Kerry O’Brien was to some of his remarks.

Senator Cormann makes a critical but very simple point that successive Labor governments have failed to understand: governments cannot inject new money into an economy. He also mentions the disgraceful nonparticipation of government Senators in the debate on the stimulus package, and the challenges posed by President Obama's shift towards protectionism.

Senator CORMANN (Western Australia) (4:17 PM) —These are serious times, of course, and serious times require serious action, not just any action but serious action. I know that politicians in the face of a crisis want to do something, they want to be seen to be doing something, but just doing ‘something’, just to be seen to be doing ‘something’, is not enough. Serious times require serious consideration of what is the best way forward for Australia. It requires serious engagement between government and opposition, not a government that comes in here and says: ‘Take it or leave it. We want to spend $42 billion of taxpayers’ money. Just roll over and within 36 hours we want to sign off on it.’ That is sheer arrogance. It is reckless and irresponsible and for the government to even expect that we would go along with it is just breathtaking. We have the responsibility to give serious consideration to this legislation to ensure that what we do here in Canberra does not make things worse across Australia.

Yes, we are facing a serious and significant economic challenge, but this package is not the answer. This is a reckless package. It is a misguided, ill-thought-out package. It is a package put out by a government in panic mode. Faced with a global economic downturn, the government has pushed the panic button instead of coming up with some real solutions. Faced with a global economic downturn, Labor has reverted to type—spend, spend, spend; tax, tax, tax; borrow, borrow, borrow—like Senator Cash has just said. They are spending like drunken sailors. ‘Let’s throw some more money at the wall and see what happens.’

This latest Labor government continues, of course, in the bad tradition of previous Labor administrations. Labor has a history of mismanaging our economy. Under Paul Keating it was the ‘recession we had to have’ and a $96 billion deficit. Today under Prime Minister Rudd it is a deficit we have to have—and a $111 billion deficit at that. And let us not forget the socialism we had to have under Gough Whitlam, or the bank nationalisation we had to have under Ben Chifley. What else are we going to have? Are we going to put the economic potential of this great nation of ours at risk under future Labor administrations? At the end of the day, every time Labor has been in charge of the economy it has ended up in tears, with the Australian people having to foot the bill.

If the government happens to be successful in getting this package through, this will also end up in tears and it will be the Australian people yet again who will have to foot the bill. This $42 billion package does nothing to fix the problems we are facing. This package will actually make things worse. This package is reckless, it is ineffective and it is the wrong way to go. How did the government want the opposition to deal with this? They wanted us to rubber-stamp $42 billion in additional spending. They wanted this parliament, the parliament representing the people of Australia, to approve $42 billion in spending in less than 36 hours—more than one billion dollars per hour of scrutiny. To expect us to go along with this is just scandalous.

The Leader of the Government in the Senate was having a go at the opposition in question time yesterday—he did it again today and he did it this morning as he was introducing this legislation—because we were not prepared to give up our job of holding the government to account. I made the odd interjection yesterday in question time and on one interjection I was pulled up by the President for calling the Leader of the Government in the Senate, Senator Evans, a hypocrite, and I withdrew—

The ACTING DEPUTY PRESIDENT (Senator Forshaw)—Order! Senator Cormann, I do not think it is appropriate for you, under the guise of referring to a ruling that was made yesterday, to repeat that in the manner you have and I ask you to refrain from so doing.

Senator CORMANN —I would like to seek a formal ruling on that, because I have not actually reflected on Senator Evans in any way. What I want to do and what I intended to do is explain why I think the comments by the Leader of the Government in the Senate in question time yesterday and again this morning were hypocritical. I had a private conversation with the President of the Senate yesterday and he advised me very clearly on what I was able to do and not able to do, but if your ruling is different from what the President of the Senate advised me yesterday privately then I will take your guidance.

The ACTING DEPUTY PRESIDENT —I am happy to seek the guidance of the President. What I did was draw your attention to what I believe was where you were straying into unparliamentary remarks. It is not appropriate, nor is it in order—in fact, I understand it is a breach of the standing orders—to repeat, by way of quotation, remarks which have already been called unparliamentary. I would ask you to return to your speech on the matter before the chamber.

Senator CORMANN —Let me explain why I think the comments made by the Leader of the Government in the Senate in question time yesterday and again this morning after introducing these bills into the Senate, having a go at us for insisting on some appropriate levels of scrutiny, were hypocritical. In doing so I quote from a speech that Senator Evans gave to the Subiaco branch of the Australian Labor Party, at the Irish Club in Subiaco on 28 June 2007—less than two years ago—at 6.30 pm:

Labor recognises the role and value of an empowered Senate. Our support for the Senate has grown as it has developed into an effective political institution.

Now, listen to this:

Labor—in government or opposition—supports the Senate as a strong house of review, scrutiny and accountability. The fact is that the Australian parliament constructed better legislation when governments had to negotiate and argue their case in the Senate. We got better legislation when bills were thoroughly scrutinised by committees. The public had their input and governments were forced to listen and respond.

That is why I think that the comments that the leader of the government made in the Senate yesterday and again today are hypocritical.

We are talking about spending $42 billion of taxpayers’ money. We are talking about a package that the Australian has described as ‘Rudd goes for broke’. Let us reflect on that just for a moment. ‘Rudd goes for broke’, according to the Australian, refers to none other than the Prime Minister of the Commonwealth of Australia. When the Prime Minister goes for broke, the whole of Australia goes for broke. When the Prime Minister goes for broke, he forces Australians to go for broke. Australians have seen too many Labor prime ministers going for broke before. I put it to you that Australians do not want Australia to go for broke. Australians want a government that manages the economy carefully, skilfully and effectively. Australians want a government committed to sound and sensible economic management.

It is important to remember that governments cannot actually inject new money into the economy. Whatever the current government may believe, this is a very important reality. I do not think that this administration has quite understood it. Governments cannot inject new money into the economy. All that governments can do is redistribute money they have taken out of the economy by taxing individual Australians or businesses of today and tomorrow. They are forcing future generations of Australians to pay more in taxes to repay a significant borrowing of up to $111 billion or $200 billion, according to the package that this government is going to impose on future generations.

Would this $42 billion generate economic activity? Of course it would—$42 billion is a lot of money—but what sort of economic activity? All that the $42 billion package would do, by throwing more money at the wall, is create artificial demand—and, not only that, it will create artificial supply. You will have all those people out there with a ute in the back of their garage offering insulation. Whether they currently specialise in it or are responding to a genuine demand does not matter; the government is now creating artificial supply and artificial demand that does not correlate to genuine demand. What happens when the money runs out? Guess what—even $42 billion runs out one day. As soon as that $42 billion runs out, you will have all those people used to this government’s largesse coming through responding to a demand that is not real demand and responding to a demand that was created by government intervention.

What will happen to unemployment? The government will say, ‘All those people will be unemployed. Let’s put some more money out there, let’s create some more artificial demand and let’s create some more artificial supply,’ rather than let the market decide what it is that individual Australians want or need. Here we have a government who think: ‘We’ll take some money from these taxpayers over here and we’ll decide how you should spend it; we’ll decide how it is best allocated. Whether you need it or whether you want it, it doesn’t matter.’

Governments are not better at distributing resources in a more productive way than individuals. The arrogance of the government in the way they want to push this through the Senate is breathtaking. Labor wanted us to rubber-stamp this within 36 hours, without scrutiny, without asking too many questions. Have the government given us any reason to have confidence in their capacity to manage the economy? Have they given us any reason over the last 14 months to be prepared to sign a blank cheque?

Let us reflect on what has happened over the last 14 months. Before the last election we had the then Leader of the Opposition deceiving the Australian people into believing that he is an economic conservative, when now all he is is good old-fashioned Comrade Kevin. We had the inflation genie ‘being out of the bottle’. They were talking up inflation and talking up interest rates for political purposes, even though that was not in the best interests of the Australian people and even though that was not in the best interests of the Australian economy. What has happened to the inflation genie? Have we heard about the inflation genie in recent months? It has gone, hasn’t it? Yes, it has.

Then we have the budget. In the lead-up to the budget, all the rhetoric was we had to cut spending and it was going to be a tough budget. What happened? The government increased spending by $15 billion. They increased taxes by $20 billion. That was the only way that they were able to keep any sort of surplus at budget time: increasing taxes by $20 billion. When Labor came into government just over a year ago, they took over a $22 billion surplus. Now we are talking about temporary deficits. The reality is this: deficits under Labor are never temporary; they never are. Labor have got a plan to get us into deficit; they do not have a plan to get us out of deficit. We have the bank guarantee fiasco, and I do not even have to go into the detail of that as I am sure that the Senate well remembers the fiasco of the unlimited bank guarantee. Take the $10.4 billion cash splash. What has that done?

While all this has been going on, we have got the government telling us this is the worst economic crisis since the Great Depression. That is what has been said in this chamber again over the last couple of days and that is what I have heard Labor ministers, including the Prime Minister, say in recent weeks. If it is the greatest economic crisis since the Great Depression, why aren’t they having a more serious look at the impact of their proposed Carbon Pollution Reduction Scheme? Why don’t they even model the impact on the economy and the impact on jobs of the Carbon Pollution Reduction Scheme, an additional tax on carbon in the context of the global financial crisis? Treasury admitted that they have not done that. They have not done their job. From Paul Howse of the Australian Workers Union to Dr Brian Fisher, who has done some modelling for the Senate Select Committee on Fuel and Energy, a whole range of responsible and good people are calling on the government to do the responsible thing and conduct that modelling. But, no, they say, ‘Who cares? It’s not necessary. We’ve done modelling even though we haven’t looked at that.’ It cannot be so bad then if in the government’s view they do not think it is necessary to model the impact of the global financial crisis on their Carbon Pollution Reduction Scheme. It cannot be so bad in your mind, can it? I do not really understand where the government are coming from. While I am thinking of that, and while we are talking about the Carbon Pollution Reduction Scheme, I note that in the United States one of the things that President Obama—and Kevin Rudd is keen to be associated with the new momentum of President Obama—is doing is actually becoming more protectionist. Have you heard about this? President Obama is introducing some more protectionist policies in the United States of America to actually—

Senator O’Brien interjecting—

Senator CORMANN —Yes, I know; you spoke out against it.

The ACTING DEPUTY PRESIDENT (Senator Forshaw)—Order! Senators! Senator O’Brien, you will endeavour to refrain from interjecting. Senator Cormann, you will address your remarks through the chair. Senator Fierravanti-Wells, you will not speak while I am addressing the chamber.

Senator CORMANN —Thank you, Mr Acting Deputy President. This is actually a very important point. This is a quite critical point for jobs, particularly in the steel industry. President Obama is seeking to support the steel industry in the United States at the expense of the steel industry here in Australia by introducing protectionist policies in the United States. At the same time this government is looking at implementing a Carbon Pollution Reduction Scheme which is going to impose additional costs on our exporters and which is going to make it more attractive for importers and which is going to make it more difficult for Australian manufacturers to export overseas. How does all of that fit together? How can this government think that it is not economically responsible to do some proper, thorough Treasury modelling into the economic impact of its proposed CPRS, particularly in the context of a changed world environment and in the context of some of the things that are happening overseas, particularly in the United States of America?

We have got this $42 billion cash splash. What is this going to do? It is going to end up with us having $111 billion worth of debt, for starters, and even up to $200 billion of debt, with a $9,500 debt for every Australian. This is absolute panic stuff, in the great tradition of the Labor Party. There is absolutely no doubt that this is Whitlamesque. I read comments by some commentators in the Australian who were critical of coalition members of parliament making that association. But let us reflect on that. Gough Whitlam was Prime Minister at a time of international economic turmoil. Kevin Rudd is Prime Minister at a time of international economic turmoil. Gough Whitlam thought he could spend his way out of trouble. Kevin Rudd thinks he can spend his way out of trouble. Gough Whitlam went to great lengths to borrow more and more money when he was getting into trouble because he could not keep up with it all. Kevin Rudd wants to borrow more and more money. Kevin Rudd wants to increase our bankcard to $200 billion—a staggering $200 billion. It is mind-boggling. Senators opposite are going to go down in the history of Australia as having been complicit in taking Australia into the largest debt ever in the history of the Commonwealth. In 20 years time people will look back at this chamber’s members and they will say, ‘What did those senators do? Why didn’t they do their job? Why didn’t they hold the government to account? Why didn’t they stop this from happening?’ We have on the other side senators who are not even prepared to stand up and talk about it. Do you know why? The government has told the senators on the other side not to participate in the debate, so they just shut up.

Senator O’Brien interjecting—

Senator CORMANN —Are you allowed to speak in this debate?

Senator O’Brien interjecting—

The ACTING DEPUTY PRESIDENT —Order! Senator O’Brien, I have asked you previously to cease interjecting and I have asked Senator Cormann not to respond.

Senator O’Brien —But—

The ACTING DEPUTY PRESIDENT —Excuse me, Senator! I was about to ask Senator Cormann to address his remarks through the chair rather than debate across the chamber.

Senator O’Brien —Mr Acting Deputy President, I rise on a point of order. Is it in order for the senator to fabricate the position of a senator across the chamber? Is that a misrepresentation or a reflection?

The ACTING DEPUTY PRESIDENT —Senator O’Brien, that is not a point of order. And I might just, while I am speaking, remind Senator Cormann that it is appropriate, if you refer to a member of the other house or the Prime Minister, to address them in the appropriate manner—by their title or Mr or Mrs.

Senator CORMANN —Senators on the other side are very touchy, aren’t they? Very, very touchy, aren’t they, those senators on the other side? Through you, Mr Acting Deputy President, I would like to know whether one of those senators is actually going to participate in this debate, because I believe—and I am happy to stand corrected; I am happy for a senator on the other side to get up, ask for the call and correct my statement—that senators on the other side have been told by their government not to participate in this debate. I believe that senators on the other side have been told not to scrutinise, not to speak, not to in any way question or participate in the debate about this $42 billion package. In my view, they are just sitting there and not doing their job. The point I am making is that senators on the other side will go down in Australian history as not having done their job at a crucial time. At a time when we are facing significant economic challenges, the Labor side—in this Senate, at least—were not prepared to participate in this debate.

I will sum up by going back to where I started. These are serious times—of course they are. These are serious times which require serious action, not just any action. This package is not serious. The way the government have sought to rush this package of bills through the parliament is not serious. The way the government are treating this debate is not serious. If the government were serious about doing the right thing by the Australian people, if the government were serious about doing something that is going to help take the Australian economy forward, they would engage sincerely with the opposition. They would take up the offer of Malcolm Turnbull, the Leader of the Opposition, to engage constructively with the opposition and have a discussion about how we can come up with a more sensible package, a package that is actually going to make a difference.

Rudd seeks permission to go $200 billion into red

2009-02-04T10:51:00.030+09:00

If Rudd was an economic conservative as he claims to be, he wouldn't attempt to ram a $42 billion package through parliament within 48 hours of its announcement. That allows for little more than an hour of scrutiny for each billion of one of the largest spending packages in Australia's history. Worryingly, the government is already seeking approval from Parliament to increase its borrowing limit from $75 billion to $200 billion.

Let's not be naive: notwithstanding the urgency of the financial crisis, the motivation for seeking to have the Bill passed through Parliament by Thursday night was to avoid close scrutiny of the package. There is no justification for not giving the public adequate time to examine the stimulus package in detail.

Rudd miscalculated and displayed his arrogance in expecting that he could bully the Coalition into supporting the Bill because opposing it would not be politically popular. His plan has backfired; the events of today will now draw attention to a strength of economic conservatism, an ideology he has railed against: prudence with the use of taxpayer's money.

Here is the speech that Malcolm Turnbull gave today in Parliament:

Mr TURNBULL (Wentworth—Leader of the Opposition) (9.59 am)—Every time I meet a school group visiting this place I tell them that every member and senator is working hard to make Australia a better place for them to grow up in. I say that we often disagree but that everybody is focussed on them and I tell those children that this parliament belongs to them, that everyone is committed to a better future for them. I wonder today if I can say that to them again, because every billion dollars that we spend, every billion dollars of debt that we incur will have to be repaid by those children.

In government, we sought to take financial burdens off the next generation, and we did so. The Future Fund did just that, relieving those schoolchildren of the burden of over $100 billion of future payments for public sector pensions, and now a Labor government is piling those burdens on those children once again. In four years, net debt will be $70 billion, around $3,300 for every man, woman and child, and the government has asked for the right, just a moment ago, to borrow up to $200 billion—$9,500 for every man, woman and child in Australia.

The plan we were presented with by the Prime Minister yesterday reeks of nothing more than panic. Far from a steady hand at the tiller we have a government led by a man who lurches from one ill-considered, ill-thought-out economic decision to another. We have seen the catastrophic unlimited bank deposit guarantee develop without even speaking to the Reserve Bank. We have seen the enormous harm that it did through the community—the hundreds of thousands of Australians whose savings were frozen as a consequence, the finance companies who could not raise money and the motor dealers who could not get finance. All of that flowed from an ill- considered decision. But there have been so many others. We saw the cash splash just before Christmas. We have the incredible proposal of the Ruddbank to prop up commercial property values for the benefit of the big banks and their profits.

In the light of all of that, all of those errors—acknowledged errors, not in dispute; even the Prime Minister’s defenders acknowledge that he has made mistakes but hope that he will make fewer in the future— instead of carefully compiling a comprehensive response to this crisis over the summer, the Prime Minister spent his time writing a bizarre ideological treatise. It was as though he stepped into another world, a parallel summer fantasy dimension where Australia’s economy has been wrecked by lack of regulation by Liberal governments. Anybody reading his treatise could reach no other assumption and yet we see his own deputy, the Deputy Prime Minister, saying that Australia’s financial and prudential regulatory system was better than world-class and we see his small business minister writing in the Australian today ‘that Australia’s financial regulation is the envy of the rest of the world’. His own ministers are boasting of the stability of a financial system and its prudential and financial regulation that were put in place by the very men and women that their leader denounces as neoliberal extremists committed to letting the market rip and opposed to any form of regulation. It says a lot about the delusional nature of the Prime Minister at this time that not even his own ministers are prepared to sign up to his rantings.

We have said again and again that we are prepared to sit down and discuss with the Prime Minister the form of the responses to this economic situation. All of those offers have been rejected. Yesterday the government presented Australia with its package at 12 noon. We were briefed by a handful of bureaucrats who were not able to answer even basic questions about the details of the package. They are still coming back to us on some of those issues. At 2.30 pm the Prime Minister read his statement, which we had been given at 1 pm. The government then went on the attack. It was irresponsible of the opposition not to immediately endorse the $42 billion package. Moreover, it had to be passed through the House and the Senate by Thursday. In other words, the Parliament of Australia would be given about 48 hours to consider and approve the expenditure of $42 billion.

We support the Senate coming back next week, deferring estimates, to go through this plan in the greatest detail. It is vital that we do so. One can well imagine those schoolchildren of today who, as adults years hence, are paying high taxes to pay off the debt. When they complain about the high taxes they will be told by governments, by ministers, ‘Well, we’ve got this big debt. You’ve got to pay higher taxes to pay it off.’ They will ask us, ‘What were you thinking when you spent all that money? Why did you do that?’ We will have to answer, ‘Well, we didn’t have much time to think about it at all really.’

The opposition will vote against this package in the House and in the Senate. We know that this is not going to be a popular decision, but it is the right decision. The Prime Minister has made one easy decision after another. He has not made a hard decision since he took up that high office. But somebody has to stand up for what is right. Somebody has to stand up for fiscal discipline. Somebody has to stand up for the taxpayers of Australia and ensure that we do not impose staggering levels of debt on future generations. We will make that stand and we will make it knowing it is unpopular but recognising that the Australian people expect us to do what is right, and we will do that.

This stimulus represents about four per cent of GDP, almost all of which is spent over the next two years, following up on the one per cent of GDP cash splash in December last year. Despite the protests of the Treasurer, the fact that this stimulus follows so hard on the heels of the earlier one indicates that the December cash splash did not work. The general view among economists is that at least two-thirds of it was in fact saved. I am sure that most of the balance was well spent but not all of it was, as poker machine and hotel takings demonstrate. The fundamental problem, which the government refuses in its arrogance and in its blindness to acknowledge, is that, if you give people one-off windfall lump sums in uncertain times, they are more likely to save it than to spend it. That is a perfectly rational and prudent response. Indeed, the Prime Minister’s call at the end of last year on Australians to ‘spend, spend, spend’ is jarring. It was a jarring statement because most Australians—all of us, I am sure—know full well that at the core and instigation of this global recession was too much debt. In other words, whether governments like to hear it or not, a good old-fashioned conservative value of thrift and saving is going to come back into fashion, it is coming back into fashion and it ought to come back into fashion.

We do not reject the need for a stimulus at this time. The first question is: how big should the stimulus be today? Our judgement is that $42 billion is more than is appropriate right now. The government is looking increasingly like a frightened soldier who fires off all his ammunition in a panic in the first minutes of an engagement. This downturn may be very long lasting and we cannot possibly afford to spend larger and larger sums like this every quarter. Just think about it. If this package goes through, the government will have spent about one per cent of GDP in a cash splash in the December quarter and then there will be, just in the cash payments alone, another one per cent or somewhat more spent in the March quarter. It should not be overlooked by anybody that, just as the government times its announcements to coincide with Newspoll, so it is timing its handouts on a quarterly basis to avoid, no doubt, a quarter of negative growth. But where is that going to lead us? If we look at the cash handouts alone that the government is proposing to give away in March and that it gave away in December, what are we to expect in the budget and beyond? Are we going to rack up $40 billion or $50 billion a year in cash handouts alone?

We do not have access to any more financial information than that contained in the government’s Updated Economic and Fiscal Outlook which, as I said, we were given yesterday afternoon. But if the Prime Minister wants our support to a fiscal stimulus then he must be prepared to sit down and talk with us, he must be prepared to put the cards on the table and he must be prepared to negotiate. His current political hero, President Obama, probably the most popular political leader in the world, sits down with his political opponents. He is prepared to negotiate. He is prepared to engage the members of his legislature. This Prime Minister is so vain, so arrogant and so convinced that he and he alone is right that he is not prepared to do any more to his political opponents than hold a gun to their head and say, ‘Stand and deliver and you’ve got two days to do it’.

Unlike the Prime Minister, we do not contend that the approaches we favour are the only way to go. There is an infinite range of policy options available at this time and all of them have detractors and supporters. None of them are certain of success. Let me give the House an indication of our views of the particular elements in this package and the elements that we believe would be more appropriate. This is a basis for negotiation with the government. First, as I said a moment ago, we believe the package is too big. We do not rule out supporting further stimuluses in the future depending on the economic circumstances and their composition. We need to keep a few shots in the locker. Our judgement is that a more appropriate level of stimulus is in the order of 1½ to two per cent of GDP, or between $15 billion and $20 billion dollars. That is a matter of judgement. There is no mathematical formula that gives you the right answer here, but our judgement is that that is the band within which the stimulus should be. If people believe that we are more prudent, more conservative in spending taxpayers’ money and we err on spending less than more then they are absolutely right. That is our philosophical approach to these issues. It is not a question of letting the market rip; it is a question of taking other people’s money seriously, guarding it, protecting it and ensuring that it is spent wisely and well. That is our commitment.

We do not support a further round of cash handouts. That is a very unpopular thing to say and I acknowledge that, but it is the right thing to say. I think most Australians will recognise in their hearts that it is the right thing to say. It is extraordinary that the government would embark on this when there is no basis for concluding that the cash splash of December was effective. At the very least, the impact of the December payments needs to be taken on board. We need to know precisely what it is. Bear in mind that these handouts were paid two weeks before Christmas, and I said at the time that this was an interesting economic experiment. If ever a one-off handout, a one-off cash payment, was going to be largely spent it would be this one because the timing, being just before Christmas, was perfect for those people who wanted that outcome. Nonetheless, it appears that it was largely not spent, and bear in mind, the recipients in December were, for the most part, on low incomes—pensioners and others.

The beneficiaries of the payments in the government’s package today will include many Australians at middle income levels. Furthermore, the economic climate is much more uncertain—or more uncertain, at least—than it was in December. The incentives to save rather than to spend are therefore a lot greater. So we would support as an alternative the bringing forward of the 1 July 2010 tax cuts to 1 January this year. This will have a budgetary cost. It is obviously spread over time and it is not as much as the cash payments in the Prime Minister’s plan, but it is temporary. It is a timing difference. It will benefit all taxpayers, but it will benefit most significantly those on low and middle incomes. It is therefore very well targeted. It does not put $950 in everybody’s pocket today, but that is the point. It increases permanent income and it therefore provides a greater incentive to work and to invest. And by the middle of next year, households will have more money in their pocket and the prospects of more money to come. They will have more money in their pocket immediately, of course.

The Prime Minister and the Treasurer have tried to portray anybody who doubts their analysis of quick cash handouts as some kind of economic quack. That just underlines both their lack of reading in this area and their incredible arrogance. There are many voices all around the world questioning whether the immense scale and scope of the fiscal measures being hastily implemented by many governments are the appropriate response. There are many reputable economists who wonder whether those measures will be effective and whether they represent the best use of taxpayers’ money. The Treasurer yesterday derided the views of the Stanford economist John Taylor as irrelevant and extreme. It is very interesting that the Treasurer of the Commonwealth of Australia would so personally and viciously attack one of the most distinguished economists in the world. Given the influence Taylor has had on central bank thinking around the world, this is simply outrageous. But, more importantly, there are plenty of other economists who are similarly sceptical over the headlong rush to huge deficits and heavy debt. They include Robert Lucas and Ed Prescott—both past winners of the Nobel Prize for Economics—Robert Barro, Eugene Fama and Gregory Mankiw among many others. These are not quacks. These are not extremists. These are not irrelevant. These are great economic thinkers who have a view that is respected around the world but not, apparently, by the all knowing Treasurer that we have on the other side of the House.

Nor is it right to portray as ignorant extremism the coalition’s stance that tax cuts often provide a larger boost to the economy than public spending. Indeed, one of the most powerful and persuasive empirical studies in the United States, which has been much quoted in the financial media, saying that tax cuts have a high multiplier—that is they provide a larger bang for the buck to the economy than outlays—comes from none other than Christina Romer, now a senior economic official in the Obama White House. Now, clearly these are very difficult times and there are a range of economic opinions and interpretations. Nobody has all the answers. So it is the height of arrogance and intolerance for the Prime Minister and the Treasurer to declare that the only way is their way. It just indicates a lack of willingness to engage in a constructive way both with the wider community and a wide range of views, not to speak of the views of other members of this parliament.

The next large element in the plan is an investment in schools. In government, we very heavily invested in schools. Indeed, one of our most successful and, I would say, popular programs was the Investing in Our Schools Program which the Rudd government has terminated. The $14 billion schools investment component of this package seems to have been selected largely because the government believes this building can be undertaken quickly. Experience suggests this will not be the case. The plan to work hand in glove with state governments reinforces everybody’s scepticism about that. We would welcome a renewal, indeed acceleration, of the Investing in Our Schools Program. However, we have to ask this question: is the most urgent infrastructure deficiency requirement in Australia primary school assembly halls and libraries? What about hospitals? What about nursing homes and aged care? What indeed about the National Broadband Network? What about water infrastructure, and what about expanding, and above all maintaining, our National Transmission Network? Labor’s response to this, of course, will be that there is more money to come for these measures, but there is the point. The finances of the Commonwealth are not a magic pudding. Everything has to be paid for at some time. Think of the faces and look into the eyes of those schoolchildren that come to parliament every day and remember that as these debts are piled up, billion upon billion, it is they who will have to pay them off.

In an indication of the specific responses we would bring to this plan, we would support a renewed Investing in Our Schools Program. Based on our experience, we believe that $3 billion over three years could be, and would be, well spent and, depending on demand, and of course on the economic conditions, consideration can always be given to allocating more funding. That is a very important point. The parliament is not going into perpetual recess. The parliament is always here. We can come back and if circumstances require a greater stimulus of a different kind and a different time, we can do that. The Prime Minister is in a panic. He is firing off all his ammunition at once. We need to keep more in reserve—prudence demands that.

The biggest gap in this package by far is jobs. The three top priorities this year must be jobs, jobs, jobs. Where is the assistance for small business in keeping employment high? The government will say that the insulators and the builders will be supported by these programs, and so they will. But most small businesses will not benefit from these spending measures. Fiscal stimulus should aim to invest in the Australian economy in a way that makes the whole economy more productive, efficient and competitive. Picking off one sector after another will always result in dislocations and discrimination against the sectors that are not privileged. That of course is why tax cuts are so effective, because every business and household benefits.

We believe an element of a stimulus package should that it lowers the cost of employing Australians. A key focus should be making it easier to keep Australians in their jobs, especially for small business. The accelerated investment allowance proposed has some merit, but a small- business which is struggling with declining revenues would be better off with additional cash flow that it can deploy as it sees fit. We want to discuss practical measures with the government that will put cash into the hands of small businesses. One proposal which we have seen and which has considerable merit would be for the Commonwealth to cover, for a period, a portion of the superannuation guarantee levy. Appropriately costed within the framework of a more prudent stimulus, this would provide support for small business, lower the cost of employment and provide an incentive across the board to every small business.

We welcome the government paying attention to the value of insulation. It is a great disappointment, as I noted in my speech a few weeks back, that the government’s election policy on insulation was left in complete abeyance. Nothing was done on it at all. Indeed, as of 20 January the government’s website dismally told anyone who was interested that the program details had not yet been developed—so much for efficiency. Insulation, however, is an energy efficiency measure that pays for itself, and government subsidies for insulation should recognise that. The $1,600 subsidy will, according to Mr Peter Ruz of Fletcher Insulation, who is quoted in the newspapers today, mean that over 90 per cent of jobs would be completed at no cost to the owner. The subsidy is not means tested. We would support an insulation subsidy of a lower amount and I would suggest for the government’s consideration one that is, for example, $500 for all houses, increasing to $1,000 subject to a means test. That would reduce the cost of the measure considerably but remain a very significant incentive to the insulation industry. A similar approach could be taken to solar hot water.

This stimulus has to provide the appropriate level of economic stimulus, so it has to be directed in a way that is effective. While the cash handouts will be popular, we do not believe they will be an effective economic stimulus. We believe that bringing forward the 2010 tax cuts would cost less and have much greater economic effect. They would benefit households and small businesses right across the board. We believe that the key issue for the government is the scale of this stimulus, the size of it. We believe it is too large and not composed of sufficiently effective measures. I have given some indication of ways in which the measures could be more effective. Above all, the government must ask itself as it looks at this and no doubt other measures it will bring forward: are they going to provide a benefit across the board? Are they going to make Australia’s economy more efficient, more productive and more competitive? If they do not do that, the money will not be well spent. The reality is that while these times call for governments to invest more than they normally would—and we recognise that—the investment and spending decisions must be of the highest quality. We should not be investing in measures or programs which do not stand on their own merits. They have to be measures that we would invest in in good times or bad. Otherwise, we are literally wasting taxpayers’ money at a time when, depending on the development of this global recession, we may find ourselves in greater need of those resources in the years to come.

I recognise that much of what I have said will not be popular, but it is right. We must stand up for prudent financial management. Every dollar that this parliament approves to be spent belongs to somebody else. We are dealing with other people’s money. More significantly than that, we are dealing with the future of the young Australians who come here to visit this parliament. I do not want to have to look into their eyes and say: ‘When you grow up you will be paying higher and higher taxes because of the debt your parents’ generation racked up today.’ We recognise these times call for investment and action by government. But it must be the right action, and governments must be prepared to take tough decisions, be prepared to take the right decisions and have the courage of discipline. The Prime Minister has shown none of that. He has wanted to be Santa Claus—everybody gets a prize. The problem with everybody getting a prize today is that the children of today will be carrying a very heavy penalty in the years to come. We are committed on our side of the House to ensure, insofar as we can, that every dollar that is spent this year and in the years to come is spent wisely and always remembering those children, because it is those children who will have to pay off Labor’s debt.

Rudd makes political mileage out of financial crisis

2009-01-31T18:43:00.046+09:00

Self-proclaimed economic conservative, Kevin Rudd, is economical with the truth in the explanation he gives for the global financial crisis. Rudd sanctimoniously gave his version of history in a speech last year:

Mortgage salespeople preyed on the aspirations of vulnerable families, soliciting them to take out home loans. Lenders confused working-class people, non-English-speaking families and first-time borrowers with hidden fees, ratchet interest rates and confusing repayment terms. Predatory financiers inflated borrowers' income and overstated their ability to pay back a loan.

These were the most obvious manifestations of the culture of greed and short-termism that pervaded large parts of the US financial sector. This culture was never challenged by a political and economic ideology of extreme capitalism. And this crisis bears the fingerprints of the extreme free-market ideologues who influence much of the neo-liberal economic elite, free-market ideologues who have a naive belief that unrestrained markets are always self-correcting and that markets left to themselves will always achieve optimum outcomes. Ideologues who believe that any regulation of private business is fundamentally wrong.

The truth is that it was misguided regulation rather than lack of regulation that was behind the lax lending standards which fuelled the housing bubble. The US government implemented a series of reforms that weakened lending standards with the aim of increasing home ownership among the poor and ethnic minorities. Lenders were compelled to give mortgages to borrowers on low incomes to satisfy regulations that were imposed by the Community Reinvestment Act (CRA). The government-sponsored enterprises (GSEs), namely Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac, had to meet "affordable housing goals" under the 1992 Federal Housing Enterprises Financial Safety and Soundness Act (FHEFSSA) by purchasing a certain percentage of mortgages for low and moderate income borrowers and those living in "underserved" areas.

Rudd's ideological posturing has not gone without criticism. Sinclair Davidson, Professor in the School of Economics, Finance and Marketing at RMIT and a Senior Fellow at the Institute of Public Affairs, gave his thoughts on Rudd's anti-capitalist remarks in an opinion piece that was published in The Advocate:

There really is nothing new under the sun. So too with the current financial crisis. But moralists are making hay while the sun shines. Prime Minister Kevin Rudd has blamed the financial crisis on 'extreme free market ideologues' who have 'resisted the regulation of financial markets.'

In contrast to what Kevin Rudd has argued it is a failure of regulatory capitalism. The causes of the current crisis are not 'greed and fear'; but rather the unintended consequences of do-gooders, bureaucratic intervention, and anti-capitalistic prejudice.

Rudd intends to continue with his campaign to ideologically indoctrinate Australians using the global financial crisis as an example of a failure of capitalism. While Australians are losing their jobs, Rudd has been writing a 7,000 word essay calling for greater government intervention in financial markets, even though he agrees that our financial system is among the most well regulated in the world.

IMF on the composition of stimulus packages

2009-01-31T10:49:00.018+09:00

Contrary to the claims being made by the Federal Treasurer, the IMF is not advising against the inclusion of tax cuts in fiscal stimulus packages. The following is stated in the executive summary of an IMF staff position note titled Fiscal Policy for the Crisis:

Looking at the content of the fiscal package, in the current circumstances, spending increases, and targeted tax cuts and transfers, are likely to have the highest multipliers.

Olivier Blanchard, Economic Counsellor and Director of the Research Department, and Carlo Cottarelli, Director of the Fiscal Affairs Department, gave their views on this issue in an article published in IMFSurvey Magazine. They recommend that tax cuts be targeted at consumers who are credit constrained. Blanchard states:

Consumers who are credit constrained are likely to spend any extra money derived from a lower tax bill.

Cottarelli also mentions the importance of diversity in the composition of stimulus packages:

Given the complexity of this crisis, policymakers have to recognize that there is an unusual degree of uncertainty about the impact of specific policies. Thus, they should not put all their fiscal eggs in just one basket, and the right package probably includes a mix of different policies.

Layoff trackers tally the carnage

2009-01-25T10:08:00.041+09:00

Corporate razor gangs have been working overtime as the global slowdown takes grip on the real economy. The gravity of the crisis became clear to the world in September and October of 2008 with the collapse of many major financial institutions and the crash of the stock market, and since then many companies have moved to downsize their workforce.

The mass layoffs we are witnessing are just the beginning of the global slowdown and we can expect them to continue for quite a while. Steve Ballmer, CEO of Microsoft, which just announced cuts of 5,000 to its workforce, offered his thoughts on what lies ahead:

We're certainly in the midst of a once-in-a-lifetime set of economic conditions. The perspective I would bring is not one of recession. Rather, the economy is resetting to lower level of business and consumer spending based largely on the reduced leverage in economy.

A few pages tracking the mounting layoffs have appeared on the Web:

Layoff Tracker — Forbes.com
Tech layoffs: The scorecard — CNET News
The Wired.Com Tech Layoff Tracker — Wired.Com
TechCrunch Layoff Tracker — TechCrunch
Vault Layoff Tracker — Vault

Forbes.com is also giving a weekly layoff report:

The Weekly Layoff Report: Jan. 23, 2009
The Weekly Layoff Report: Jan. 16, 2009
The Weekly Layoff Report: Jan. 9, 2009

Recently announced mass layoffs include:

Citigroup — 52,000
Bank of America — 35,000
Circuit City — 34,000 (bankrupt)
Woolworths Group — 27,000 (under administration)
Hon Hai — 20,000
Rio Tinto — 14,000
Alcoa — 13,500
AT&T — 12,000
BT Group — 10,000
Dell — 8,900
Sony Corporation — 8,000
TDK — 8,000
BHP Billiton — 6,000
Sun Microsystems — 6,000
Intel — 5,000-6,000
Credit Suisse — 5,300
Eaton Corp — 5,200
Dow Chemical — 5,000
Ericsson — 5,000
Laird — 5,000
Microsoft — 5,000
Stora Enso — 5,000

The cost for a simple meal in Zimbabwe

2009-01-24T20:39:00.004+09:00

If you find all the doom and gloom about the world economy a bit depressing, spare a thought for the people of Zimbabwe, where inflation now runs at %11.2 million per annum, according to the CIA World Fact Book. Below is a receipt for a simple meal at a hotel in Zimbabwe, which came to a total of Z$1.2 billion.

Zimbabwe's economy lays in ruins after farms owned by whites were seized in a brutal land reform program. It now has an unemployment rate of 80% and a GDP per capita of US$200, the lowest in the world. The GDP per capita of Australia for 2008 was US$39,300.

Fact sheet: biosequestration

2009-01-24T19:01:00.004+09:00

Fact sheet included in the Coalition's press release on its proposed Green Carbon Initiative.

What is it?

Biosequestration involves offsetting greenhouse gases by capturing and storing carbon in soil and plants. This includes restoring soil carbon through better land management; revegetation and reforestation; and biochar (converting biomass into charcoal, which can be fixed in soil).

Land Management

According to the Garnaut Review, 70% of Australia is arid and semi-arid rangeland degraded by marginal grazing. Garnaut estimates approximately 50% of Australia’s 2006 CO2e emissions (approximately 576 million tonnes, or Mt) could be absorbed each year for the next 20-50 years by improved practices on Australian cropping and grazing lands, and by revegetation¹.
According to scientist Dr Christine Jones an increase of 0.5% in soil carbon on 2% of Australia’s agricultural land would absorb a volume of CO2e exceeding Australia’s 2005 emissions².
Steps to improve land management include changed practices for animal management and husbandry, select breeding, grazing techniques, fodder quality, and animal shelter. Improvements would enhance animal live-weight gains and abate greenhouse gases.

Revegetation

CSIRO scientist Dr Phil Polglase estimates plantings to abate carbon emissions are profitable over 9.1M hectares of economically marginal low rainfall land at a carbon price of $20/tonne. Such plantings have potential to remove 143 Mt of CO2e each year – equal to approximately 25% of Australia’s 2006 emissions³.
Forestry and revegetation are already partly recognized as carbon offsets under Kyoto.

Biochar

Created by heating biomass in the absence of oxygen - a process called pyrolysis. Half the carbon is turned into biochar (charcoal) and fixed in soil. The other half is transformed into biofuels used to generate green energy.
Advocates such as 2007 Australian of the Year Tim Flannery contend its widespread adoption could, over 20 years, remove the 200-250 Gt of carbon added to the atmosphere since 1850⁴.
Resources firm Alumina estimates its existing pilot project⁵ can scale to offset 6 Mt of CO2e yearly. Alumina estimates total biochar potential of WA’s wheat belt at 25 Mt yearly, and total national potential at 100 Mt yearly – equal to approximately 17% of 2006 emissions.

¹http://www.garnautreview.org.au/pdf/Garnaut_Chapter22.pdf
²http://www.soilcarboncredits.blogspot.com/
³http://www.afg.asn.au/resources/pdfs/AFG08/Session_3_B3_1.pdf
⁴http://beyondzeroemissions.org/2008/03/19/tim-flannery-australian-of-the-year-2007-talks-bio-char-why-we-need-to-move-into-the-renewable-age
⁵http://www.aluminalimited.com/index.php?s=about&ss=sustainability&p=risk_management#regulatoryRisk

Fact sheet: energy efficiency

2009-01-24T18:16:00.006+09:00

Fact sheet included in the Coalition's press release on its proposed Green Carbon Initiative.

FACT SHEET: ENERGY EFFICIENCY

What is it?

Reducing energy use and greenhouse gas emissions from buildings by incorporating a variety of technologies and design features (such as passive heating/cooling) and retrofits (such as insulation).

According to the Green Building Council of Australia, 97% of existing Australian buildings are too old to have been built with energy efficient features¹.
Energy-efficient buildings have been cited as a major opportunity for low-cost (and often self-funding) carbon emissions abatement by respected climate change authorities and researchers including the United Nations IPCC, the Stern Report, the Garnaut Review², and McKinsey & Co³.
Globally, the IPCC found that by 2030 about 30% of global projected greenhouse gas emissions from energy use in buildings can be avoided at minimal or zero economic cost.
Locally, the Australian Sustainable Built Environment Council (ABSEC) estimates 27-31% of existing emissions from buildings can be abated at zero net cost - but the price signal contained in the Rudd Government’s CPRS will deliver less than one fifth this amount. ASBEC estimated by 2030 abatement of 60 Mt per year was achievable – about 11% of Australia’s 2006 emissions⁴.
McKinsey & Co estimates the Australian building sector can, by 2020, achieve emission reductions close to 50 Mt of CO2e – about 8% of 2006 emissions.
The Centre for International Economics estimates cuts of 39-45 Mt of CO2e can be achieved at a low cost (or net gain)⁵.
Many green retrofit options are financially self-funding over time. Estimates for the payoff horizon for retrofitting an average existing building are in the 8-11 year range.
Policy options to deliver gains from energy efficiency include:
- Education campaigns to overcome information inefficiencies and alert building owners to the net economic savings from retrofits.
- Accelerated depreciation for green retrofit expenditure.
- Increased capital expenditure investment allowance for green capex.
- Selective retrofit of existing government buildings.
- Constructing new government buildings to Green Star standard.
- Routine assessments of any regulatory burdens imposed on building owners, to ensure measures to encourage energy efficiency are not a drag on the economy.
The Rudd Government has failed to so far provide a $500 rebate for the installation of insulation in rental properties - 18 months after it was first promised.

¹ Green Building Council of Australia, the Dollars and Sense of Green Buildings 2008, found at http://www.aela.org.au/publications/Dollars_and_Sense.pdf
² The Garnaut Climate Change Review, found at http://www.garnautreview.org.au/index.htm
³ McKinsey & Co., An Australian Cost Curve for Greenhouse Gas Reduction, 2008 found at http://www.mckinsey.com/clientservice/ccsi/pdf/Australian_Cost_Curve_for_GHG_Reduction.pdf
⁴ http://www.asbec.asn.au/files/ASBEC%20CCTG%20Second%20Plank%20Report%202.0_0.pdf
⁵ “Building Energy Efficiency” CIE February 2008 at http://www.thecie.com.au/content/news/Final%20CIE_TPB_Perth%20(with%20animations).pdf

Coalition announces Green Carbon Initiative

2009-01-24T16:28:00.007+09:00

Today I received a copy of the Coalition's press release on its proposed Green Carbon Initiative from Senator Mathias Cormann. A transcript of the speech delivered by Malcolm Turnbull, Leader of the Opposition, has been published on his website at the following URL:

http://www.malcolmturnbull.com.au/Pages/Article.aspx?ID=97941

This is a significant announcement that will put pressure on the Rudd Labor government to deliver more in its environmental policy. Many environmentally minded voters who fell for Kevin Rudd's pre-election rhetoric have been left bitterly disappointed by the Rudd Labor government's emissions targets.

Because the Coalition has delivered a superior but practical alternate policy vision, the Rudd Labor government must now justify its actions—wasting question time with irrelevant blather or giving unacceptable responses such as “this information is not publicly available” will not be good enough.

LEADER OF THE OPPOSITION
THE HON. MALCOLM TURNBULL MP
FEDERAL MEMBER FOR WENTWORTH

GREEN CARBON INITIATIVE

The Coalition has today committed to a sweeping climate change strategy that unlocks vast and currently untapped opportunities to abate Australia's greenhouse gas emissions.

The strategy would greatly broaden Australia's response to climate change well beyond the Rudd Government's narrow, costly and overly complex Emissions Trading Scheme. It would also deliver large gains in agricultural productivity, environmental quality and energy security.

“It is a plan that will create new jobs and new enterprises – without exporting our industries and emissions overseas,” said the Leader of the Opposition, Malcolm Turnbull.

“Our Green Carbon Initiative will ensure Australia is able to achieve greater reductions in carbon dioxide than those proposed by Mr Rudd, at relatively low cost and with enormous additional benefits to our own country's environment and productivity,” Mr Turnbull said.

“We will aim to achieve additional annual reductions of at least 150 million tonnes of carbon dioxide equivalent by 2020.”

Drawing on the advice of climate change experts from around the world, the plan focuses on three directions for abatement that have been virtually ignored by the Rudd Government:

A Green Carbon Initiative to offset greenhouse gases by capturing and storing large quantities of carbon in soil and vegetation – ‘biosequestration’
Measures to encourage improved energy efficiency in buildings, where 23% of all greenhouse gas emissions originate
Increased investment in new technologies to address climate change – particularly clean coal, which is vitally important to the Australian economy

The Green Carbon Initiative includes commitments to restore soil carbon through better land management; to invest heavily in the revegetation and reforestation of the Australian landscape; and to pursue sequestration of large quantities of carbon via biochar (the conversion of biomass into charcoal, which can be fixed in soil).

Measures to encourage energy efficiency in the built environment are one of the lowest-cost opportunities for abatement – and often pay for themselves. But there are many obstacles to them being realised. The Rudd Government has ignored this area, making the cost to Australian families of cutting greenhouse gas emissions higher than it should be.

More broadly, the Rudd Government, in its haste to implement its poorly designed ETS, has neglected all alternative paths to a low carbon economy. Biochar, improved land management and much revegetation activity are all excluded from the proposed ETS.

“An ETS is not an end in itself,” said Mr Turnbull. “It is only part of the solution, one tool in the climate policy tool box, and, in fact, no solution at all without new energy sources and new low emission technologies.”

The Coalition will respond to the Rudd Government's proposed ETS at a subsequent date, after receiving its own economic modelling and reviewing the detailed legislation.

24 January 2009

Rumours about the future of Alcoa's Kwinana refinery

2009-01-23T21:43:00.021+09:00

An atmosphere of gloom hangs over Alcoa's Kwinana refinery as rumours spread about the future of its alumina operations. The refinery has been in operation since 1963 and employs about a thousand personnel. The Western Australian refinery, located about 22 km south of Perth, produces about 2 million tonnes of alumina annually.

Alcoa previously announced that it will shed 15,000 jobs globally but there will be no cuts to its workforce in WA.

Federal Liberal Party publishes Facebook profiles of parliamentary members

2009-01-21T20:31:00.016+09:00

The Federal Liberal Party has published details of the Facebook profiles of members within the Parliamentary wing, which are as follows:

The Hon Bob Baldwin

The Hon Chris Pearce

The Hon Christopher Pyne

Senator David Bushby

The Hon Joe Hockey

Senator The Hon Judith Troeth

The Hon Julie Bishop

The Hon Kevin Andrews

The Hon Malcolm Turnbull

Senator Mathias Cormann

Mr Stuart Robert

The politics of stupidity: Cyber Safety likely to go the way of FuelWatch

2009-01-20T15:52:00.024+09:00

The government requires the support of all 7 cross-benchers in the Senate to pass a bill opposed by the Coalition. A vote of no by any one of these senators can sink the government's bill, which puts them in a powerful position. This is how the FuelWatch scheme was killed off.

The cross-benchers are as follows:

Australian Greens

Family First Party

Steve Fielding - Senator for Victoria

Independent

Nick Xenophon - Senator for South Australia

The Greens, who have described the plan as "daft", will almost certainly vote against this legislation.

The positions of Senator Fielding and Senator Xenophon are unclear, but they support the idea of Internet censorship. Senator Fielding is the most likely to vote in favour of the filter because of his party's socially conservative values.

Links

The fastest way to drain your mobile battery

2009-01-17T21:36:00.015+09:00

I burned through two batteries with my HTC Touch Diamond within about 12 hours while I was at my friend's place. The second battery was a spare that I keep in my wallet. I browsed the Web a little but didn't make any calls.

There is one thing that can rapidly drain the battery of your mobile which you don't hear about: poor network coverage. To overcome the path loss due to factors such as distance or obstructions, the phone has to ramp up the transmitter power output to improve the strength of the signal that reaches the mobile station.

The three stooges: culprits behind WA's antiquated trading hours

2009-01-15T11:25:00.014+09:00

John Cummings
President of the WA Independent Grocers Association
Chairman of the National Association of Retail Grocers of Australia

Lead a misleading fear campaign in the lead up to the 2005 referendum on retail trading hours
Lobbies against deregulation

Joe Bullock
Head of the Shop Distributive and Allied Employees Association

Powerful right-wing powerbroker within the ALP who has lobbied against deregulation
Links with Brian Burke

Brian Burke
Former premier of Western Australia
Lobbyist

Orchestrated No campaign for small retailers

The chart that IGA doesn't want you to see

2009-01-14T20:02:00.016+09:00

Below is a chart that John Cummings, president of the WA Independent Grocers Association (WAIGA) and chairman of the National Association of Retail Grocers of Australia (NARGA), doesn't want you to see. He, along with disgraced former premier Brian Burke, campaigned against liberalisation in the lead up to the 2005 referendum on retail trading hours.

The No campaign was misleading to say the least. For example, IGA made the absurd claim that extending trading hours threatened 15,000 jobs. Data from the ABS, however, suggests otherwise. The chart shows that with the exception of South Australia, the average annual employment increased in all states and territories in the 12 months that followed liberalisation. South Australia was experiencing a slowdown in retail turnover before trading hours were liberalised in 2003.

Media

The West Australian

PerthNow

The Australian

Carpenter dumps deregulation plan

3rd Degree

WA's booming economy being left behind

Institute of Public Affairs

Case is overwhelming to extend shop hours