From today’s Crikey:
I could never quite figure out why the Libs thought that “wedging” the ALP on nuclear power was a smart move. Howard should have seen the “nuclear reactor in your backyard” coming from a country mile.
It hasn’t escaped anyone’s notice that Turnbull has been backing away from any prospect of nuclear power at a rate of knots this week. Presumably all the members and candidates in the marginals are similarly on message. Certainly Herbert MP Peter Lindsay has been – emphatically denying to ABC Townsville radio that he’d been recently spruiking nuclear power as North Queensland’s future.
It isn’t quite a “Macaca moment” as no eager YouTubers were there to capture Lindsay saying otherwise, but he might have stopped to consider that you can run but you can’t hide from Google cache. Google regularly takes snapshots of pages it indexes, and archives them in its cache. They’re fully searchable, as Jason Wilson from citizen journalism website YouDecide2007 knows well.
Wilson reports:
Mr. Lindsay’s website did carry a very detailed argument for the merits of nuclear power generation as recently as the 7th of July.
Crikey readers can view the screenshots here.
As Wilson argues in conclusion:
The point here is that Lindsay made a clear and unambiguous defence of nuclear power as an option only a few short months ago, and has now made that defence “disappear” on his official website.
If Australia is considering the introduction of nuclear power – and it may well be that it’s a reasonable option – it should be on the table as an issue for debate in this election campaign. Moves like Lindsay’s might reinforce the impression that the Government has expediently swept nuclear power under the carpet for the campaign season.
If we were being uncharitable, we might even wonder what light this information casts on his denials about that conversation in which Colbran alleges that he supported the adoption of nuclear power in the region.
Indeed. Lindsay has a long history of being rather loose with his lips. Though he holds Herbert with what is ostensibly a comfortable margin of 6.2%, he’s had some close scrapes in the past. Much of his margin comes to him courtesy of a solid swing at the 2004 election, where the Latham stance on Iraq wouldn’t have gone down a treat with the defence heavy electorate.
Lindsay is in a tight race again, running against a Labor candidate, self-made millionaire George Colbran, who couldn’t be further from the “union boss” stereotype and who has a background in small business many Libs would envy.
Lindsay is presumably doing a bit of tidying up of loose negative ends on his website, but his excitable advocacy of nuclear power might be harder than he thinks to wipe away.
Not Ted Lindsay its Peter. Ted was a stalwart ALP candidate (& member??) in the ’80s
Peter Lindsay is a political and intellectual lightweight. Perennial backbencher to whom Howard recently gave a gig in Defence to try and shore up his standing with the local ADF people. As most are under 30 it was probably a waste. George Colbran, “Mr Maccas”, was an interesting choice for the ALP and is as far away from the union boss stereotype as you can get. A poll in the local Murdoch rag had George well up but his campaigning to date hasn’t exactly set the place on fire. However, the local ALP are quietly confident. At one stage Peter was doing alot of whinging about Georges money and how he would try and buy votes, which seemed a bit ironic coming from a Liberal. Peter’s nuclear gaffe may have an impact, but at the moment the main focus of the campaign is on the local Labour council threatening legal action against Peter for parking containers on empty land and hanging signs on them! Really in depth stuff but par for Townsville. I think national issues will impact most on the vote in Herbert.
What Malcolm Turnbull has been saying about nuclear power, in actual policy terms, is not news. Even if you started right now, and had a fast-track approval process, you couldn’t get a nuclear power plant built in Australia for a decade. And, if you’re a private investor, you’d be crazy brave to plan to have one up and running that soon. The Americans look set to build a number of new-generation plants around 2013-2016; any sane investor would want to see those up and running before putting in the big bucks to actually build one.
But the fact that he’s emphasising that it’s a long, long way away speaks volumes for the politics of nuclear power. It’s a massive loser, and it’s going to be one for a while yet until it becomes clear whether or not renewables and geosequestration can deliver.
We are told there will be a local vote before any nuclear power station is built but there have been few details of what area this vote would cover and how the question would be posed.
We are not even told if this is a core or non core promise.
I am not keen on having a nuclear power plant anywhere in the souther hemisphere not just in my backyard.
“Ted Lindsay”
Isn’t it Peter Lindsay (I think the former Labour member before P.Lindsay might have a Lindsay as well) so it is all rather confusing
Oops. Yes, you’re right. The former Labor member was Ted. He’s Peter. Will fix.
It is interesting indeed that the pro-nuclear party has gone very quiet on the idea. It seems like only weeks ago the rodent was espousing the need for a nuclear future, in fact he was spruiking like a strip club doorman.And now it is starting to look like the elephant in the room, with Turnbull being used to hose down the excesses of Howards glee at being once again the best friend of his pro-nuclear mates.
You don’t have to be a Rhodes scholar to work out what is going on here: Crosby Textor says nuclear is bad, so Howard stops selling it in the hope that it will go away, but only until after the election. Non-core promises about plebiscites and his need to repay the massive amounts of money being donated to the Liberal party will ensure that a nuclear power station in your backyard is a guarantee if you are foolish enough to vote this mob back in.
The wedge issue of nuke stations, is now only between the Labor Party and Greens and Democrats,and , historically the Democrats have been around much longer on that,followed by the once friendly to the ALP Movement Against Uranium Mining and the Rainbow Coalition. Friends of the Earth had a number of Democrat activist including one I knew who stood in W.A. and amassed a big phone Bill. And he was hard working enough at 24 years of age to at least prove to me,that people who are young,dedicated, and able to concentrate and seek endless matters of detail, should be given the title of MP. Still had some personal issues,which, are ,or were the problems of the time,and near poverty,whilst having to deal with the CES. The idea of living on Alexander Parade Fitzroy and have the traffic jam go past to three o clock in the morning was both desperation and dedication. The major parties have held so many back from fully potentialising..it makes me sick. I did hear tonight another voice from Curtin University making more claims about his objectivity than the failings of reason and fear of the opponents,when is the right of these people going to be limited to finding real evidences of that,rather than another effort in characterising.!? And Lucas Heights has extended its closure. Contempt dressed up as intellectual psychologisingabout matters to say something about self,is academic!? Crossing Alexander Parade daily, off to work of major national importance,unpaid work at that , doesnt equal a dedication based on fear alone,if, at all. If the truth can be heard and recognised.
Robert the Bruce – I’ve been following the local campaign signage issue too. Priceless.
The interesting thing for me at the moment is the question of whether or not Lindsay has been hung out to dry by the Libs. Colbran managed to organise a Rudd promise of $10m for a V8 supercar race (very many local people are keen on this). Lindsay has been working on it for months, and surely $10m is peanuts for hanging on to a marginal Qld. seat? He could be keeping his powder dry for a late announcement, but in that case he’s been pretty thoroughly outmanoeuvred. But I myself wonder whether (a) he’s seen as a liabilty (the “loose lips” factor), (b) they’ve decided that the money is better spent elsewhere in firewall seats.
The only polling in the seat has been based on small samples, but the stuff I’ve seen must be chilling for the Lindsay campaign. I know Mark’s aversion to betting markets as an indicator of the political future, but in recent weeks Colbran’s shortened from $3.30 to $2.00… Still worth a quiet hunge if you ask me.
Mark:
Quite apart from any n.i.m.b.y. influences, there are some other hefty influences on where nuclear powerplants will be built in what is currently Herbert electorate …. water supply, proximity to long-term customers, presence of rival elecricity suppliers, buffer zones in case of accident [okay, a repeat of the Chernobyl disaster is unlikely these days; try convincing thepublic of that].
Now, take a map of Herbert electorate and, taking those factors and more into account, think of where the boss-cocky of a nuclear power corporation might want to put nuclear power stations.
Oh dear, oh dear. They wouldn’t, would they!?? Oh dear, oh dear ….