Carbon pollution
I’m calling it the “carbon pricing package” because that’s what Julia Gillard called it in parliament yesterday. It doesn’t yet have a sexy name like the CPRS, one of the details still to be settled.
We know now that the final details are to be released on Sunday, there is talk of an address to the nation by Gillard on Sunday night, and she is going to wear out her shoe leather to answer questions and explain the package. There is also talk of information packages to spell out the impact on individual electorates.
Gillard has warned that it will take time to turn public opinion around.
It seems that the usual suspects and more are lobbying for last-minute changes. Power plants apparently think they need emergency assistance. On the face of it significant changes seem unlikely. The Greens have reached a settlement, Windsor and Oakeshott are happy.
Lenore Taylor reports that the coal industry is planning a massive assault on the tax and that there may be special concessions for steel.
It’s make or break say Michelle Grattan and Tom Arup. They also say the the ABC will run her address to the nation, but Seven and Nine will not.
This post may serve a s a roundtable to take us through to Sunday night, absent major developments.
This is going to be so fascinating to watch, though undoubtedly in a car crash sort of way at times.
Joyce says he’s disgusted with what Windsor and Oakeshott has done to “them”. Who does he think he is?
Can Abbott keep up his frothing hysteria for two years or will he just deflate eventually? How will the politics play out in terms of the ALP/Greens stand-off? They have to be friends, whilst remaining enemies in many ways. Will the compromises, whatever they are, piss some Green supporters? Will it be a package which is actually effective? This final question is probably be the one which will be lost amidst the media fuss and bother.
Prediction: Very modest targets, no petrol, $20/tonne C tax etc., but enough ‘ramping up’ review mechanisms to placate the Greens and a quick changeover to an ETS.
This is going to be fun.
I just want the PM to explain in degrees centrigrade the impact the policies will have on Australian and Global temperature change and why it is worth it.
the underlying politics hasn’t really changed since 2007 – if anything, it’s gone backwards if annual Lowy polling since then is to be believed. As with the CPRS this will be a two track process: those who pay the carbon price and those who will secure exemptions (EITEs and coal)
I just want the blunt razor to STFU with its incessant negativity.
I see OBR is already rehearsing a right-wing talking point.
I wonder if this will be for the Greens what the GST was for the Democrats?
Yep, it could be lots of fun, but it could get tedious responding to all the dumb questions like at 3. tho that will all be forgiven if i win the sweep on when Barnaby’s forehead vein bursts.
It is a good thing shoe leather is a renewable resource.
The underlying politics changes, I suppose, when the damn thing goes into effect and the world doesn’t end.
sg, I don’t think it will be the Greens’ GST moment. Don’t forget that Meg Lees supported the GST in spite of what the majority of Dems members had indicated they wanted. Most Greens (well, most of the ones I know) are adult enough to realise that any acceptable compromise is better than nothing. (The original CPRS that our senators voted against was not, of course, an acceptable compromise as it was worse than nothing.)
I’ve had a crack at pre-writing the media coverage. See The Failed Estate
http://thefailedestate.blogspot.com/2011/07/precooked-carbon-tax-coverage.html
I suspect that most Greens will hold our noses and support the deal if:
a) polluter compensation consumes only a modest part of the revenue
b) the poor are protected
c) there’s significant direct provision for renewables
d) the price ramp post-inflation takes us to $40 by 2020
e) there is scope for more aggressive action on the pre-2030 timeline
Agree with DI that more Greens will accept a compromise this time. If they threw out this scheme, that would be the end of Gillard and we would get Abbott. So better now to accept a scheme that won’t achieve much, because at least when it becomes apparent that it’s not achieving much the mechanism will be there to adjust.
“The underlying politics changes, I suppose, when the damn thing goes into effect and the world doesn’t end”
But Robert, every ongoing price rise of everything is going to be due to the ‘carbon tax’.
Eureka Street has a nice little cartoon
If Barnaby really thinks the carbon tax will be a disaster he can only thank himself and Tony for it. They may have weakened the case for a carbon tax if they had put together a credible alternative and spent more arguing the case for this alternative instead of just saying noooo.
Damn posting by Android! I meant pre-2020 timeline, as this bar was probably the single biggest reason for objecting to the 2009 CPRS amongst Greens along with the rubbish targets, the offsets CC&S etc.
Pablo: The question that should be asked is what the proposed price is actually going to achieve.? The prices that have been bandied around so far will be too low to achieve much at all. The promise to ramp up prices later will do little to encourage investment given the real risk of Abbott becoming the next prime minister.
Paradoxically, the promise of future price increases may spook investment in gas fired power because of the risk that the price will reach a point where it makes commercial sense to replace gas with renewables well before the investment in gas has paid for itself.
In terms of power it will be interesting to see if the MRET emissions trading scheme is retained. If it is not, we could go into the next election with investment in clean power stalled.
Yep, I agree Fran – the long game is:
a) phasing out of compensation to polluters over time. However, I would urge Greens supporters to hold their nose over the initial bribery to polluters. Bribes now may be undeserved, but they are cheap at the price if the result is an effective scheme over time.
b) phasing out of exemptions, where possible over time.
c) ramping up of price over time.
d) scope to tighten the scheme without handing over billions in compensation.
e) good “complementary measures”, eg renewables promotion.
The head of the Australian Coal Association was on ABC News Radio this morning saying that the modelling they’ve commissioned which shows 3000 jobs lost if the carbon price is implemented is “very difficult to refute” because the consultants actually went to particular mines and asked which ones would become unprofitable with a carbon price. However he then stuffed up later in the interview by saying that the information which the consultants gathered on which the modelling predictions are based can’t be made public for reasons of commercial confidentiality. The ACA might as well be making it up as far as any meaningful public debate is concerned.
He also didn’t say how many new jobs might be created elsewhere because of the change.
Plainly $14bn in polluter bribrs plus no onshore reductions in emissions before 2031 and all of these based on CC&S working out pus virtually zip on renewables, transport, forestry, agriculture, mining, manugacture out – and all locked in tight until 2020 – that was nevet going to be acceptable andwould have made us look as bad as Meg Lees.
Please excuse Android typos.
Mr.Denmore@10 – Not only are the newspaper headlines already written, but the P.M. is to be censored by at least two of the television stations. Apparently Channels 7 and 9 have already announced they will not broadcast a Prime Minister’s Address to the Nation, Channel 10 is “still considering”, and the ABC “may” broadcast it but proposes giving equal time to the Opposition. Gutless media up to it’s usual tricks.
Meanwhile, apparently Sean Carney thinks that Bob Brown saying that, in effect, a compromise is a compromise is somehow poisoning democracy.
I’m not sure outside an election campaign why Tony Abbott should be given equal time on a direct telecast. As for the rest of the media, they’ve spent months leading with this story (and devoting hundreds of thousand more words than they would to the federal budget) and now want to tell us it doesn’t deserve a live speech???
mediatracker – seriously how many channels is it necessary to broadcast the *same* content on? People have a remote control if they do want to watch it and for those that don’t will resort to DVDs or previously recorded programs anyway.
Just out of interest I’m hoping someone will do a bit of analysis comparing Rudd’s original CPRS and the one that finally got agreement from the Greens to see how different it is.
As for what it really achieves – surely the fundamental aim of the program is to show to rest of the world that we are willing to do something about climate change and to encourage others to do something as well. So in a way the most important measure will be what the rest of the world thinks of our scheme. In the bigger picture what it actually does is a bit irrelevant.
In place of the obligatory graphic of smokestacks billowing steam, could I suggest one of the following images as more apropos?
OBR@3, the PM was intending to do just that on Sunday night for the likes of you but unfortunately the right wing favoring media princes have refused her a time slot (possibly because at the end of her speech some may well be better informed on the facts rather than the scare campaign).
Perhaps just this once you can go to the ABC, and then come back with an informed comment.
Very few mines have carbon dioxide coming out of them so the report is a crock.
Once the ETS is in place it will be seen, like the GST, that most fears were groundless.
However I am very doubtful if this Government could even sell a cold beer on a stinking hot day.
They do not seem to understand their take on politics is all wrong and has been since Rudd was gotten rid of. Do they all suffer from Aspergers?
I am wondering that when the next election is called and the fears of the ETS prove groundless, the budget is clearly in surplus ( assuming the European debt fiasco does not affect World growth) and the economy is humming along how both sides of politics wil react.
Such prescience, Mr Denmore!
I mean your Failed Estate piece.
Labouring the point: As a rough approximation one tonne of coal @ 10% ash will release 3.3 tonnes of CO2 into the atmosphere when it is used. Additional CO2 will result from the oxidation of carbonaceous material in waste dumps. The potent greenhouse gas methane is also released during mining. Then there is the CO2 generated as a result of the use of fuel and electricity used for mining, processing and transporting of coal.
If all this CO2 and methane were taxed @ $30/tonne CO2 equivalent the take would be in excess of $100/tonne. Probably not enough to put coal mines out of business at today’s prices but certainly enough to hurt if export coal is included. Coal miners might have been smarter to support the original MRRT in return for coal being excluded from any future carbon tax.
The first question is:0″ what effect the proposed tax have on coal production related emissions?” In most cases the answer is probably bugger all. For most mines a $30/tonne tax is unlikely to lead to a change in practices. Which begs the logical question: “Why stuff around imposing a tax that will achieve absolutely nothing?”
to quote Harry Clarke
“Effects on coal will be negligible since it is only the emissions in recovering coal that are taxed and local electricity use. Most coal is exported so that reduced demand for coal locally will be replaced by foreign demand. The effect on coal prices will be small because Australian coal is only a small part of the world’s total.”
Me thinks he knows a wee bit more than you
Labouring the Point: Do they all suffer from Aspergers?
Labouring the Point, could you take your ableist slurs somewhere else?
ltp: So why are we bothering to tax the coal industry? Or the steel industry? Or…..
What I really want to know is whether the tax is going to make any difference before the next election. I suspect that bugger all difference applies across the board.
Before it begins the left are in panic. Given the recent history of the ALP and their current standing why would anyone give the prime minister a leg up. she damages herself by announcing plans without any thought. The greens invariably do her in. We live in a scary circus on amphetamines. Or so it apears.
Tony “GUTLESS” Abbott is finished come Sunday!
Let’s hope so, Keithy. The pantomine in Parliament today was embarassing. There is no way back from this disfunctional situation without the elimination of Abbott and his sicophantic core. Looking at the faces during sessions I see a party ready for another style. It is mostly Abbott and his little cluster still engaged in maintaining the “big deecption”.
ALSO, Tony Abbott now has to tangle with the fact that the Gemasolar plant has just done it’s first 24hour stint!
THE WORLD TURNS…
@36.
Yep, what a bargain
http://theenergycollective.com/nathan-wilson/58791/20mw-gemasolar-plant-elegant-pricey
at only $33/W delivered, lets buy a dozen!
Duncan @ 37, if we bought a dozen, the price per watt would be way lower. The Spanish plant is not much more than a proof-of-concept, after all.
Your argument, btw, resembles the ones I’ve heard advanced against every technological advance.
DI(NR) – most major technological advnces don’t rely on specific taxpayer funded subsidies and anti-competition legislation.
Duncan: We tend to forget that the market price for power is much much higher during the day than it is at night. A solar thermal plant with enough storage to handle the shoulder periods will sell its power for multiples of the average price for both wind and base load coal power. You have to think about price as well as cost when comparing power sources.
DINR is right. The price will come down over time and for larger plants.
In the long term, solar thermal with storage looks like the best chance of reliable clean power if hot rocks aren’t the answer to everything and nuclear remains too scary.
The government puts a lot of money into R&D, even for cashed up industries like the minerals industry.
This doesn’t mean of course that it made sense for the government to subsidize the Mooree solar PV plant or for it to subsidize a duplication of a Spanish solar thermal demonstration plant.
If you guys actually bothered to read the link, you’d see that large scale and volumes may bring the price down to $25/W.
Does $25/W mean that if I were to power a 60w light bulb for an hour it would cost me $1500? Sounds kinda expensive.
Razor @ 39, you are about as wrong as it’s possible to be.
Tell me (and this is a trick question), what do the Internet, digital computers, Teflon, GPS, and satellite communications have in common? These are just the examples that popped into mind in 10 seconds, btw. I’m sure a few minutes’ reflection could produce dozens, if not hundreds, more examples of technical advances that only happened because of taxpayer subsidies and monopolistic behaviour.
Paul,
I have someone in the family with Aspergers so I am quite familiar with it.
It wasn’t a slur at all.
Try to be careful with inaccurate descriptions please.
Given that this Government continues without any change to its methods pursue political events that have been shown to be a complete failure then Aspergers is the only rational answer.
Sam asked:
$25/W is clearly an installed cost (e.g a 2GW system costs $25 * $1,000,000 to install — still very expensive especially for about 25%CF) rather than an operating cost which would be expressed in $/Wh retail. Your 60W lightbulb running for an hour would demand 60W/h at whatever retail price you are being charged.
What makes you say that?
Fran: A gW is a billion watts. So $25/w = $25billion for a one gW installation. The other problem is working out what one gW solar means. It is often referring to peak rather than average output. $25/w works out at $8.56/kWh capital assuming that a one watt panel would produce 8 watt hrs per day. At a discount rate of 10%over 15 yrs you would need to charge over a dollar/kWh just to repay the capital.
John D said:
Just so — I left off three zeroes. $25m/gW would be very cheap, even for 25% CF. mea culpa I was thinking $25bn but implied $25m. So yes, the cost remains prohibitively high. On your figures, the abatement cost per tCO2 would be at least $1000 not counting operating cost.
@DI(NR) you can add the development of aircraft to that list of government subsidised investments …
Yeah, Fran, I thought of aircraft (WW2 and all), but wasn’t 100% sure of my ground on that.
Well, yes and no DI(nr), there’s some interesting history there.
The US government famously backed the wrong horse in the early 20th century, generously funding the Langley Aerodrome, which was a colossal flop while the Wright Brothers succeeded.
But, yes, the development of just about every feature of the modern airliner was the result of military funding in WWII.
However, we’ll never know how aircraft would have developed absent that stimulus; my guess is that we would have gotten jet airliners sooner or later.
I’ve got someone with Aspbergers as well. And that’s not a syndrome I would associate with the Gillard government.
Aspbergers is a high-functioning form of autism whose many positive characteristics include plain speaking, an ability to cut through cant to the nub of an issue, strong attention to detail, capacity for concentrating for long periods and a mighty sense of social justice.
I remind you of the Watson quote “the world needs, at most, six computers”. When first built thermoelectromechanical computers were insanely expensive (was it Bexley Park that had a staff of hundreds to get less than one FLOPS?) and only governments used them. I don’t know why they wasted our money on that junk.
The first televisions cost as much as a cheap car. But then, the first cars cost significantly more than a high-quality cab and pair but didn’t have anywhere near the performance. If you want really expensive first-generation technology I think it’s hard to go past the jet engine. Not only did a few production hitches cost them the war, just making the few they did cost them millions. And they could only fly for half an hour before they had to land. Talk about crap, those things were completely rubbish. You could build several piston-prop fighters for the cost of one, each of which would be more reliable, have more range and carrying capacity and be easier to operate, than the newfangled “jet fighter”.
Sorry, where was I? Oh, experimental technology is expensive, that’s right.
Duncan @ 37, economies-of-scale (..to basically repeat and/or pre-empt what every other thinking person is going to tell you!) change everything! This is why the silver spooners press the pause button!!
If change is not demanded then the status quo remains relevant: but the obvious and unquestionable reality remains that economies-of-scale change everything and I would go so far as to say that you know it!!!
John D @ 48, while we are looking at the hard-core relevant numbers why don’t we ask what ‘baseload’ actually means?
It’s give and take in this world innit!??!
FREE-MARKETS, the idea that exists in your head but silver spooners wish to make all labor/greens voters believe is infact infallible truth, depend on a free-flow of information i.e. facts!!
The ‘Liberal’ party doesn’t like it when too many facts are on the table: THAT IS THE PURE AND UNADULTERATED TRUTH!!!
Yes – a hell of a lot of technologies have resulted due to Government funding, especially military, and then become commercially succesful. However – the vast majority of that is trying to solve particular problems – superglue was invented in WWII as part of a project to laminate gun sights.
Sam @ 43, have you heard of dimensional analysis?!!?
Watts = Joules per second! Watts is a power rating, which is rate of energy per unit of time!! To find the amount of energy used, and therefore what can be charged for, you need to multiply out the relevant time period….
It makes sense when you try it but not until!!! …it’s like talking about km/h and asking how many kilometres you travelled in a said time period: you have to multiply it out!!!
@47 – I’m not talking about R&D taxbreaks etc used to encourage innovation that apply generically – I have a significant problem with Governments trying to pick winners.
@53
“When first built thermoelectromechanical computers were insanely expensive (was it Bexley Park that had a staff of hundreds to get less than one FLOPS?) and only governments used them. I don’t know why they wasted our money on that junk.”
I am assuming you are being sarcastic.
The story of the breaking of the Enigma Codes I find truely remarkable.
There is an Enigma Machine on dsiplay in the War Memorial in Canberra – it truely is the reason why we have the modern computer age and yet sits in a little glass case with little explanation of it’s importance in both the winning of WWII and the computer age.
Moz said:
Normally: I think there is a world market for maybe five computers. – Thomas J. Watson
This is regularly repeated but it’s not clear that it was ever said by Watson or anyone.
There’s a discussion here:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Thomas_J._Watson#Famous_quote
Richard Fidler interviewed Paul Gilding today.
http://www.abc.net.au/local/sites/conversations/
I think he’s correct that when the denial stops, the world will do amazing things to reduce carbon emissions and adapt to a sustainable economy in a short time.
What scares me is the incredible damage which will be done to the natural world and the misery of famine and wars which will be experienced in the few years before denial ends. He doesn’t say much about this in the interview.
One of my best pieces of work as an Economic Undergrad at UWA in the 1980′s was on the impact of WWII on Australian Economic Development – did you know that the US brought the forklift to Australia? Before then it was all sacks on backs etc.
Actually, Razor, I always thought the forklift was an Australian invention (being as we’re the laziest people on earth). Pity if that’s not true.
The thing is, though, Razor (and you’ve given us a few more examples yourself), at least since before WW2, the majority of technical advances have been down to government interference in the Magic of the Market (TM).
Oh, I forgot Operations Research. That’s another thing we got courtesy of government interference in industry.
OBR @15: I have problems with
It is just a lazy generalization misused by market tragics to encourage governments to winner pick “market based solutions” instead of doing the real homework.
There are many situations where what is good for an individual investor is not whats good for the country. This is where governments should be setting boundaries and supporting demonstration plants that use technologies that seem to be a logical part of the long term strategic plan.
SG@61.
I listened to parts of that interview today between interruptions.
Having listened to it in full, I got more of a ” adaption is going to be forced upon you” vibe, due to a number of issues and forces.
Thanks for posting the link, I’m richer for it.
Operations Research was also developed during WWII to cope with the massive logistics requirements – not because of desire to pick a market winner.
Razor, you’re missing the point. I know you’re not a fool, so it seems deliberate.
I know what Operations Research is, I learnt some of it at the School of Mil Survey and a shitload more at uni.
There was a thing on slavery before the american war today: it said that binary code, necessary for the computing revolution that we are still witnessing in the 21st century, came/was invented(not quite sure of the story!) from the machinery used to deal with the cotton!!!
They were probably talking about punched cards, Keithy – they were widely used to control Jacquard looms, and Babbage had a scheme to use them to program the Analytical Engine. They’re digital but not, I think, binary.
Yeh, looms and punch-cards… that was it! Ta for that! Um, they seemed to be saying that a simple yes/no system amounted to binary code! Maybe a precursor to I suppose then. Some Asian bloke once told me binary came from the idea of yin-yang: essentially I spose he’s right but he was a computer guy and it was probably just a story they made up as it would have to be as simple as yes/no programming!
The show was, AMERICA: The Story Of The US – Division, part 3 of 5!! It was on SBS 2 last night. They also reckoned Whale Oil was used in the Hubble Space Telescope but I didn’t catch why exactly!
Yeh, the analytical engine was probably what they were talking about aswell!! CHEERS!
Brian said:
And one might add that the spur to development in the US was the significant advantage the Europeans, who lacked US anxieties about state funding, had achieved in aircraft and poitential military deployment over the US.
[Fran, that was Robert- Brian]
OBR@59: well, yes. “that crap” saved a great many lives etc etc, despite being ridiculously slow and expensive. But my major point was that that push really kicked off the whole computer revolution without which this discussion we’re having wouldn’t be conceivable.
&Fran, thanks for the correction. I think the remark is one of those “if he didn’t say it, someone should have”. Broadly, at the time there weren’t many applications for billion-dollar computers so why would anyone want one. Today’s context is more “computers are essential, some people need bigger ones”, which gives you an exponential curve with a small number of insanely expensive computers at the top.
Not a worry Moz. I confess that years ago I used to repeat the claim for the amusement of my IT classes. I was mortified when I found out that it was of doubtful provenance. Constructively though, you’re right. It’s something someone should have said, which is why it is credible.
In related news, the great brain who gave us Senator Stephen Fielding now wants to see Labor preferences electing Liberal candidates (and thereby electing Liberal Lower House majorities in close elections) in inner-city seats where Labor will soon be in third place on primary votes if current trends continue.
DINR: Punched cards are essentially binary in the sense there is either a hole or no hole.
You’re absolutely correct, John D. I guess I was thinking of the underlying machine rather than the punched card itself.
Keithy, they would’ve used whale oil in Hubble for the same reason they used to use it in ships’ chronometers – its viscosity doesn’t change (much) no matter how cold it gets.
climate Spectator had this on what is known at this stage and potential impacts.
John D, there’s no link there. Is this the one you mean?
HeeHee…. Bye Bye Murdoch, Hello Renewable Energy Future!!! Tony Abbott loses crediibility here and a slip is all Gillard needs to drive home the substance of her argument: she has two years I think = SWEETNESS ITSELF!
The ABC has been giving disproportionate chunks of airtime to naysaying rentseekers. One after the other, it was intolerable in its obsequious anti-Labor bias. Switched off in disgust.
Mike Steketee has a neat summary of the science and how the carbon price package measures up, finishing:
Cuppa,
I fully agee with your observation. And it seems to be the female presenters who are delivering the most bias. Virginia Trioli has become embarrassig to watch, I’ve lost respect for Annabel Crab’s impartiality, and Jane Hutcheon delivered the most wasted interview opportunity with Tim Flannery on One+One through the week where her every question appeared structured to tear down Flannery’s credibility. Flannery defended convincingly but the damage was in that an interviewer would ask that many personal negative questions. It was like watching an episode of Law and Order.
The following Paul Kennedy interview of John Daley of the Gratten Institute, however, delivered by far the best expos’e of real understanding of Carbon Pricing, its impacts and deliverable outcomes so far in the entire “debate”. John Daley really has a complete grasp of every aspect of the global warming challenge and presents the information convincingly and comprehensively. A tour of the Gratten Institutes web site is well worth the time.
The ABC women really appear to have fallen for the charms of Tony Abbott, or perhaps it is that female competition thing that delivers male winners of Idol every time.
Through all of this ghastly, ghastly, ghastly episode of Australia’s political history the star performer for consistency, energy, depth of understanding of scientific content, and statesmanship, is Christine Milne. So of course she gets very the least ABC air time.
http://www.theage.com.au/national/personal-tax-cuts-to-sell-carbon-20110709-1h86d.html
“Treasury modelling also predicts the scheme will begin to drive dramatic changes in the electricity-generation sector – forecasting that it will not be commercially viable for any new coal-fired plants to be built in Australia.” This outcome alone vindicates the Greens decision not to support the CPRS. Anyone who imagiens their vote will collapse with this is drreaming.
Its a bit trickier for the ALP. But if the ALP had anyone who could explain and sell policies, I suspect they’d come back to win in 2013 from here. Unfortunately they dont. Except for Rudd himself, who, in retrospect, probably decided to keep cabinet on a short leash because he realised most of them were no good. I mean this cattle flip-flopping for example. Puhlease!
BilB, my impression is that Annabel Crabbe is mostly concerned about Annabel Crabbe and how many smart one-liners she can deliver.
LE, my hope and expectation is that lenders will not support new dirty coal, because they know that this is only the beginning and we will get more serious as we go.
And ABC’s dismal reporting performance continues with Joe Obrien’s interview of Adam Brandt. Obrien had only one question “how can Greens accept $23 per tonne when they had previously sought $40″ Regardless of the answers he pushed the question at least 4 times. Pathetic reporting. Brandt put across a good spectrum of the Green’s achievement, Obrien demonstrated that the ABC has no understanding of the subject matter and are only interested in creating controversy.
Epic ABC fail.
Agree Bilb. But Bandt handled it well. A new landscape is emerging – the GRNs have delivered here for their consitutents. The ALP, to some extent, has for theirs as well. The question is whether the latter can sell it all more broadly.
I really think that comes to to personnel deficiencies in the ALP front bench post-Rudd and Tanner. Prognosis not good – even though the policy outcome is quite saleable.
I find it too frustrating to watch much of the ABC these days, but I don’t think it’s a gender thing. As with News Ltd, any ambitious journo with half a brain knows that the way to get ahead is to toe the party line.
It’s why a talentless drone like Chris Ulhmann got the 7.30 gig – a virtual guarantee that the correct line will be pushed at all times.
I think the package is good – very saleable as tax reform in general. The rise in the tax-free threshold to $18,000 will stop BBQs, as they say.
today they arendoing what they should have done all along – explain and selling.
Its game on, Phoney. Watch the polls turn.
Totally agree, LeftyE.
Good policy. Very good delivery.
Well done Julia Gillard. Thankyou Greens. Thank you Independents.
And thank you Bob Katter, although you generally disagree, for your positive message on Ethanol and Biomass Electricity.
No thanks to Tony Abbott…for anything, simply because there is nothing there…Tony Abbott has nothing to offer for anyone. I hope that he is seething with rage.
An extra payment to SINGLE INCOME families that earn leas then $150,000?! How is that consistent wit Labor values?? Why does it matter if it is single or dual income?
He’ll be sweating like a cornered pig right now Bilb. $18.000 tax free threshold is MAJOR economic reform.
Game on.
Just heard Niki Savva say that big biz will now bring intense pressure on Abbott not to pull the plug if he gains power. They can see a future laid out for the next 40 years and they don’t want it mucked around with on a short term basis.
Lefty E – I don’t think they are actually changing the tax free threshold but instead fiddling with the LITO. Otherwise everyone would be getting a tax cut and they have said that is not the case. Unless they are increasing other tax rates to compensate.
OK, start reading here!
Will wait until I’ve actually read the thing before making a substantive comment.
I look forward to your usual studious and well considered output, Robert.
@Chris, from the plan under “Household Assistance: Tax Reform”:
“The tax cuts will be delivered through major structural reform that increases the tax free threshold from $6,000 to $18,200. This means up to one million people will no longer need to fill in a tax return. When combined with the low income tax offset (LITO), people will not pay net tax until their income exceeds $20,542.”
Furious Balancing,
$20,542 would be an income of $400 per week. But remember anyone on that income level will certainly spend every cent of that income, which will mean that they are paying 10% baseline tax in the form of GST on expenditure.
BillB, I am simply posted a direct quote, straight from the plan, clarifying what the plan says regarding tax reform, as Chris was suggesting he didn’t think it was an increase in the tax free threshold.
So again, there is substantial increase in the tax free threshold, which is a significant reform. I have made no comment on the merits or impacts of that reform on low income earners or anyone else, so I’m not sure why I need to be instructed to remember anything.
I was doing some furious balancing myself, FB. You would understand the desire to do that.
Annabelle Crabbe just lost credibility further as a competent reporter. She failed to carry forward the Green’s principle objection to the CPRS as being that of locked in failure, and then failed to pick up the Abbotts failure to deliver detail with his “this will be released in some future budgetry statement” duckshove exactly what he has been falsely accusing the government of doing.
Adrian 89, I don’t seriously think that bias is gender based, it just seems to be that way at present.
Run your household through the” Estimator” if you dare.
https://www.cleanenergyfuture.gov.au/helping-households/household-assistance-estimator/
With access to all this information out out fingertips so that we can make out own dispassionate [or passionate, if you prefer] analysis of it, it amazes me how many people seem to enjoy the sport of picking out the deficiencies of the mainstream media.
It’s such a waste of an alternative space, if you ask me. LP used to offer some discourse that wasn’t just this highly reactive banter, where people infer imagined meaning from other peoples comments, and whinge about the mainstream media. These days, I pretty much just come here to read Brian’s excellent summaries of Climate science/politics, but even they seem to get hijacked by comments about how horrible the ABC is. I just text/write/email the ABC directly, it’s quicker, probably more cathartic, and doesn’t bore other people.
Anyway, I took a look at the biodiversity section of the plan because that’s about the only thing I know a little bit about. There is nothing outstandingly new, or revealing about it, I doubt it amounts to any new money in regard to biodiversity conservation, but I’d say it ticks all the right boxes and isn’t just some simplistic and costly “lets get a green army to plant a squillion trees” policy.
that should be “at our fingertips”. sorry
fb,
the fact there is a biodiversity plan is good. You’re probably right it’s largely existing commitments recycled. I’m in the position to know that a policy proposal of roughly $1 billion per year was put to them earlier this year. It’s a long way from that but better than nothing. It’s being administered by the Department of Environment and everything else with an independent advisory panel. That’s perhaps not so great either – I’d prefer to see a fund with independent investment guidelines.
Furious @103 re ABC
The way i see it, if LP commenters say it’s (insert expletive) biased and Cattalaxy commenters say it’s ( insert expletive)biased.
Then it’s probably balanced.
fb – interesting – so they must be increasing the tax rates at other levels to compensate so those on higher incomes don’t benefit from the raising of the tax free threshold.
My beloved has just deciphered the sinister logo on the Clean Energy Future website: it starts green, and ends red. Nick Minchin was right all along!
Prize to the first person who hears this suggested seriously.
I just had a look at the estimator, jumpnmcar. Apparently I’ll be about $500 pa worse off. That’s $10 per week. Big deal. I’m extremely well paid, and I won’t notice it.
Chris said:
That’s exactly what they are doing, following Garnaut.
Telling remark from TA — “there’s no such thing as a tax that doesn’t hurt people” — a clear concession from TA that this is not a tax. QED.
jumpnmcar said:
Or both are right although for different reasons — one has the bias going the wrong way. Don’t forget that possibility. Frankly, the notion of bias is dodgy anyway. Every news outlet adopts a perspective on what is salient, and how discussion ought to be framed. What #theirABC lacks is intellectual rigour. If it had that, I’d not care a jot about “bias”.
Back on topic — I rate this package as a 5/10. It’s certainly better than the Carbon Polluters’ Reward Scheme of 2009 — it has provision for winding back assistance to industry, adopting stiffer targets pre 2020 (which was the real dealbreaker last time IMO) less reliance on CC&S working, new money controlled at arms’ length from Mar’n Ferguson for renewables, a provision for a review of transport shielding, money for biodiversity, and a 2050 target of 80% reductions. There’s also a floor price.
So while it’s not a big step forward, it’s still a step forward rather than a step back in terms of locking in failure until 2031. There can be little doubt that this would not have been possible without The Greens who deserve a short round of applause for what little has been achieved.
Sidebar: the stuff on diesel for heavy transport is being done separately by the government, and may rely on the LNP to pass. Nice wedge.
A new – quick – post on the Clean Energy Future is up.
DI @ 108 – I’m in a similar position and agree with you. If anything I think they’ve over done the compensation and there should have been less money for the middle income earners or at least have it attached to them investing money energy efficiency gains.
I think this is going to be very hard for Abbott to wind back. I wonder how many election cycles its going to take for the libs to give up trying to wind it back before they realise it can’t be done.
Chris
could you explain why you think this?
Patrickm – the size of the tax cuts will make it difficult. I think it will be a very hard sell. He doesn’t have the revenue to keep all of the tax cuts if he loses the carbon tax I come and people will be wary of losing the tax cuts in exchange for price drops which *might* happen if the carbon tax is removed.
Also, if you have a look at the detail, there’s lots of things designed to make it very difficult to subvert merely by being in government. A future Abbott government will need to get legislation through both houses of Parliament to do so.
Robert Merkel; We know that JG ruled this tax out before the election, and just snuck over the line only with the support of independents from traditionally conservative rural electorates, thus the views of the majority of these electors have been disregarded by their ‘representatives’; nothing new or particularly wrong about this because we have no real democracy without PR. At least it is only a three year term and these people will have to face election again and if they are re-elected then their decisions are confirmed, or authorized in reverse as it were and the undemocratic problem is thus resolved, and the majority still sort of rule, even if it takes two electoral cycles to demonstrate such a miserable level of peoples power.
However, it would seem to me that there is an implicit appeal to the practices of fascism with the notion that it would be hard for the people to ‘subvert’ laws enacted with no mandate by electing a government with a mandate to remove the tax. Any mandate for the law’s removal will be obtained via a general election where the issue is front and centre. The election is for the ‘peoples’ house, the house of misrepresentatives. If those loosing the election attempt to keep their ‘laws’ with a scandalous blockage via the undemocratic States house, the senate, then a two party dictatorship like that in Australia might start to look very flaky.
An attempt to stop the people having any effective and timely say seems more likely to smash the major party that tries it rather than force the election of a better people – more deserving of our betters.
The dirtyness of this whole ALP/Green ploy is so clear that you have to be totally deluded to think that swingers won’t take the baseball bat to you once and then twice as hard if you don’t get the message. Time is not on the side of carbon taxing but on the side of people that want to have a say in how they are governed!
Patrick M
There’s so much wrong with what you’ve proposed it is not clear where to start.
Quickly: It’s not a carbon tax … (see previous, everone here knows the argument by now so I won’t reiterate). Equally, most people wanted a carbon price, which is why they voted an ALP/Green government in. Matters having little to do with this made the election much closer — QLD & NSW ALP were unpopular, Murdoch press, mining tax, dumping of Rudd, Gillard’s tactical ineptitude, asylum seekers etc .,.
On the democracy question … the senate has been operating to frustrate the lower house for much of the last 30 years. One can like that or hate it but it’s not new. Also, that a majority has a view about some matter ought to be of no pertinence to those who disagree. If Greens are elected to propose one opinion, they should keep proposing it regardless of what others say. To do otherwise would be to disenfranchise and silence their base and that really would be undemocratic. They’d deserve rejection if they did that.
Re the unobtrusive but valuable comment at #76, another example of the old dictum that, “conservatives never forget, and never learn”.
Sen. Faulkner must be turning in his figurative grave.