A look back at Deputy-Prime Minister Barnaby Joyce

Now that Tony Windsor has announced he will stand at the 2016 federal election as an independent candidate in the New England electorate, it is perhaps time to briefly recap Nationals MP for New England and Deputy-Prime Minister Barnaby Joyce’s position on some of the issues which may be at play for voters in that seat or go to perceptions of his gravitas or otherwise.

Barnaby Thomas Gerard Joyce entered the Australian Parliament in 2005 as a senator for Queensland and resigned to contest the NSW seat of New England in 2013, a seat which was vacant due to retirement of its member Tony Windsor.

Until September 2013 he was a member of the Opposition.

A  former accountant, he is a man of property with a residence and commercial property in St. George, Queensland and two rural properties in Barradine on the Liverpool Plains, NSW.

In the first half of last year taxpayers spent $912,269.95 meeting his parliamentary entitlements claims, including family members travel totaling $12,818.80 over those six months.

SELECTED JOYCE:

MICHAEL BOWERS: It is fair to say that you need to be in politics for a fairly long time, generally speaking, before we have enough cartoons to do a Talking Pictures. You've been here less than a year, I think, and we've got a wealth of material. Did it stun you how much interest there was in you when you came to Parliament?

SENATOR BARNABY JOYCE: Probably disturbed me a little bit. It disturbed me that I was so ugly…..

SENATOR BARNABY JOYCE: In a funny way you are sort of happy with that. When you do cross the floor it is amazing the abuse you get from your own side and the things they scream at you. When I went to the hospital for that check-up and there was someone from my own side who screamed out, "I hope you do die, you so-and-so!"

MICHAEL BOWERS: Who did you sit next to when you crossed the floor.

SENATOR BARNABY JOYCE: You don't really look. The person I sat next to I remember they said, "This is so cool," and I went, "This is so dangerous!"

[ABC TV Insiders, “Talking Pictures” segment,19 February 2006]

The major reserves of coal in the world are located in the United States, China and India, and those countries are where the jobs will go when this Labor government’s ETS is introduced. The government will be exporting the jobs of Australian working families to the United States of America and to China. Mongolia will not have an ETS, and it will be a big exporter of coal. We will have direct attacks from Indonesia on Australian exports. Indonesia has become very capable in taking over Australia’s share of coal exports. South Africa has the ability to deliver metallurgical, coking and thermal coal. [Senate Hansard, 12 March 2009, 3.32pm]

BARNABY JOYCE, NATIONALS' SENATE LEADER: The Australian Government would never be allowed to buy a mine in China. So why would we allow the Chinese Government to buy and control a key strategic asset in our country? Stop the Rudd Labor Government from selling Australia. [ABC TV 7.30 Report, 17 March 2009]

The outspoken Queensland Senator Barnaby Joyce is now the oppositions finance spokesman and he's told AM he favours banning Chinese state-owned companies from investing in Australia's resources sector. And he likes the idea of breaking up the power of the big four banks in Australia by toughening divestiture laws in the banking sector. He has also raised the spectre of the United States not paying it's debts and causing a global economic meltdown. [ABC Radio AM, 11 December 2009]

The Opposition Leader Tony Abbott has bowed to pressure and booted the Senator from the critical role after months of gaffes by Barnaby Joyce.

But the Senator insists he did a good job and today he's condemning anonymous sources on his own side of politics for white-anting. [ABC The World Today, 26 March 2010]

This is part of where we are off to in this insane world. What will this world look like if they stay there? What on earth will Australia look like if this crowd stays there? Their own people cannot believe them. They have walked all over the left; to the right they look absolutely absurd. The NBN is another complete absurdity. The only thing we can do to fix it is get rid of them. [Senate Hansard, 11 September 2012, 4.29pm]

Hansard records show that Joyce mentioned the National Broadband Network approximately 69 times as an Opposition senator but never once on the floor of the House of Representatives to date.

Senator Faulkner says that I deny climate change. I do not deny climate change at all. I just deny that they have the capacity to change it back. I was watching the weather intently over the Christmas break and since the carbon tax it seems to be around about where we left it last time. I thought that it was all going to be better now that the carbon tax is in. I thought that we had climate nirvana, but it is about where we left it. I want my money back. What happened to the weather? It was supposed to be fixed up by now after the carbon tax! [Senate Hansard, 11 February 2013, 4.23pm]

Hansard records Joyce mentioning climate change approximately 56 times as an Opposition senator but only once in passing as a government MP and Minister for Agriculture in the House of Representatives. He has never mentioned the Coalition Government’s “Direct Action” policy which replaced Labor’s carbon reduction scheme

Yes. If there is nothing that needs to be answered, that is fair enough. We just need to clear the air; that is all. We just need to clear the air and get it off the cards. It is now very important that this piece of legislation goes through and that the people around Kiruna, the people around Breeza, the people around Nea, the people around Werris Creek and the people around Quirindi clearly understand that we support this legislation—because they will be reading this; you can bet your life on it—and that Xavier Martin, John Lyall and even Tim Duddy understand that we are in support of this legislation. They can communicate to the people of the area that we support this legislation and, in supporting this legislation, that we clearly show that the coalition in New England are trying to work to resolve issues. Hopefully, they will have a strong hand in a future coalition government to continue the work that needs to be done to make sure that we get the proper balance right. [Senate Hansard, 16 May 2013, 3.50pm]

BARNABY JOYCE: The other one is about apparently the sexiest man alive, and that's not me. Not that I needed to tell you that.

WILL OCKENDEN: A quick look through some old sexiest politician polls does confirm the Minister's comments.

So when Barnaby Joyce was talking sexy, he had someone else in mind.

BARNABY JOYCE: Which is a gentleman by the name of John Christopher Depp, 51 years old otherwise aka Jack Sparrow and he has decided to bring into our nation two dogs without actually getting the proper certification and the proper permits required. Basically it looks like he snuck them in.

WILL OCKENDEN: The two Yorkshire terriers Boo and Pistol are believed to have arrived in Australia last month, and weren't declared to customs and didn't pass quarantine.

BARNABY JOYCE: We found out he snuck them in because we saw them taking it to a poodle groomer.

WILL OCKENDEN: Now the dogs have discovered, Barnaby Joyce has given Johnny Depp 50 hours to remove them from the country, or else.

BARNABY JOYCE: Mr Depp has to either take his dogs back to California or we're going to have to euthanise them. [ABC Radio The World Today, 14 May 2015]

MARK COLVIN: The Federal Agriculture Minister Barnaby Joyce's decision to oppose a Chinese backed coal mine has reignited debate about the leadership of the National Party.

Mr Joyce has been widely assumed to be a likely successor should Warren Truss retire.

Mr Joyce has argued strongly against the Environment Minister Greg Hunt's conditional approval the Shenhua Watermark project.

He's specified that his concerns stem from his position as Agriculture Minister, not because the project's in his electorate.

PM has spoken to a number of Nationals MPs who believe the question has damaged his standing internally, and to Liberals who say it's further evidence he shouldn't succeed as the Nationals' leader. [ABC Radio PM, 14 July 2015]

Hansard records Joyce only mentioned the Shenhua mining site once in the Senate Chamber and never to date on his feet in the House of Representatives.

NEW England MP Barnaby Joyce says the Coalition's "not ruling anything in or out" when it comes to matching Labor's promise on the multibillion-dollar Gonski funding agreements, but maintains money isn't the only factor in a successful education system.

Labor has put education on the front lines of the upcoming federal election battle by promising to honour the final two and most lucrative years of the six-year Gonski funding arrangements with the states, something the Coalition has declined to do.

But Mr Joyce denies the pressure's back on his government, arguing Labor hasn't said precisely how they'll pay for the full six years of Gonski.

And to those principals and teachers who say they're already seeing improved results just two years into the funding reforms, the MP says increased funding alone doesn't guarantee better student results. [The Northern Daily Leader, 6 February 2016, p.3]

Hansard records show Joyce has never mentioned “Gonski” funding on the floor of the Senate or during his time as either an MP, minister and Deputy-Prime Minister in the House of Representatives.

Australian Federal Election 2016: we'll all be rooned!

Ever since Labor released the outline of its negative gearing and capital gains tax reform policy, both the Prime Minister and the Treasurer have been thundering on about the catastrophic consequences which would result.

Apparently if implemented this policy will be like one of the seven plagues of Egypt sent to decimate the wealth of the chosen ones.

Malcolm Turnbull telling voters that “every homeowner in Australia has a lot to fear from Bill Shorten” and that removing negative gearing will “smash the residential housing market”. While Scott Morrison informed us that "It's bad news if you own a home, it's bad news if you're an investor in a home, and bad news if you're renting a home…That's three strikes and you're out."

Then the authors of the report Turnbull and Morrison relied on, BIS Shrapnel, came clean……

Financial Review, 3 March 2016:

The government's assault on Labor's negative gearing tax has suffered an embarrassing setback with the authors of a damning report saying it was written late last year and had nothing to do with Labor's policy released just a month ago.

Just hours after Treasurer Scott Morrison used the findings to slam Labor's policy for driving up rents and dragging the economy backwards, BIS Shrapnel associate director Kim Hawtrey made an urgent clarification.

"The assumptions were set several months ago, and the analysis done late last year, well before Labor announced its policy. Therefore the assumptions do not align with Labor's policy," he told The Australian Financial Review.

"The report makes no recommendations and does not purport to be an assessment of any particular policy."…..

This was followed a few days later by further embarrassment for Turnbull & Co…...

Peter Martin: Economics Editor, The Age, 7 March 2016:

Negative gearing encourages excessive use of debt, lifts overseas borrowings and raises real interest rates, according to the economist whose work on the subject has been lauded by the Treasurer Scott Morrison.

Kim Hawtrey, now with consultancy firm BIS Shrapnel, wrote the words more than 20 years ago when he was an academic at Macquarie University in an article in the journal Australian Tax Forum.

"Deductibility of interest payments on debt creates a tax advantage for debt over equity," he wrote. "Negative gearing ensues by way of combining debt interest deductibility with concessional tax treatment of capital gains, encouraging over-investment in property and related asset inflation sectors."

More than two decades on, Dr Hawtrey says he won't divulge his personal position on negative gearing, saying the work his firm released last week was "technical" and "dispassionate".

"I have not commented on my views and I am not going to comment on my personal views, from a policy point of view, or as a voter or whatever," he told Fairfax Media.

"We were simply given a task and we carried out that task, and no attribution or nothing should be read into that as to any policy preference."….

Then matters became a little worse for Liberal and Nationals MPs who were hoping to use the BIS Shrapnel report as strong talking points in their respective electorates – another report surfaced…..

ABC News, 7 March 2016:

A new report on the housing affordability crisis in Sydney and Melbourne calls for the Federal Government to urgently rethink its support of negative gearing.

The report, Sydney and Melbourne's Housing Affordability Crisis – No End in Sight, was written by Dr Bob Birrell and David McCloskey from Monash University's Centre for Population and Urban Research.

Dr Birrell said the report highlighted the seriousness of the problem.

"These governments have abandoned the current generation to a lifetime of rental properties," Dr Birrelll said.

"The situation is much worse than it was a couple of years ago. It is a social catastrophe."

He said governments have created the conditions for major concessions for investors.

"The result has been an enormous increase in investment but it has been primarily in established houses and that has caused these prices to reach levels in Sydney that are among the highest in the western world," Dr Birrell said.

The report revealed the record-high housing prices in Sydney and Melbourne would lead to social problems.

"The PM's stance reveals a monumental insensitivity to the social catastrophe flowing from record-high housing prices for the next generation of home seekers in Sydney and Melbourne," the report stated……

It comes as no surprise that the latest Newspoll reveals that the Coalition and Labor are still neck and neck on a two-party preferred basis, with Turnbull’s net satisfaction rating shrinking to three points. The Australian pointing out on 8 March 2016 that “It was 10 points a fortnight ago and 22 points in January. If it continues to slide on this trajectory, he will sink below zero.”

Nor is it any surprise that the Essential Research opinion poll released that same day also has Labor and the Coalition tied on a two-party preferred basis, with primary votes for Turnbull & Co down 2.6% since the September 2013 federal election and primary votes for Labor up 3.6% in the corresponding period and approval of Malcolm Turnbull's performance as prime minister standing at 45% - down 6% since its February 2016 poll.

In which Australian Attorney-General George Brandis pushes the point that Macolm Turnbull is just like Tony Abbott and Mungo agrees

Image of Tony Abbott (left) & Malcolm Turnbull  (right) found at ABC The Drum

Federal Attorney-General George Brandis being interviewed on Australian Agenda, 6 March 2016:  

Well I wouldn’t adopt that metaphor and I must confess I haven’t read Mr Abbott’s Quadrant article but the point I want to emphasise to you and to your viewers Peter is that Mr Abbott speaks from within the heartland of the Liberal Party, as does Mr Turnbull. They both want the same thing. They both have fundamentally the same approach to public policy.

Mungo MacCallum at The Drum, 29 February 2016:

And so it has come to pass. Malcolm Turnbull as we knew him has all but vanished; in a political sense, it could be said that he has been destroyed. Instead, we have a sort of Abbott avatar - smoother, more articulate, even more plausible, but still undeniably the essence of the previous prime minister. Not only have just about all the old Abbott policies been retained, but new ones - the sort that might have sprung, fully formed, from the head of the precursor - have emerged.

What Nationals MP for Page Kevin Hogan did not tell the Grafton Chamber of Commerce's February breakfast meeting when he was asked about foreign ownership of land and overseas workers

This was the incumbent Nationals MP for Page Kevin Hogan as reported in The Daily Examiner on 22 February 2016:

A member of the chamber executive, Mark Butler, asked Mr Hogan what the government was doing to combat countries like China buying up large tracts of Australian land and the prospect of those owners employing Australian workers……

Mr Hogan said the government, led by the Nationals, was fighting foreign ownership.

This included setting a minimum property sale of $15 million before the sale was brought to the Foreign Investment Review Board.

Mr Hogan said the limit in 2013 had been $250 million.

"Even then I think that's ($15 million) too high, but at least it's cumulative so, if they buy an $8 million and a $7 million property, they appear on the board's radar," he said.

What he didn’t tell this collection of potential voters in the forthcoming federal election is that investors from free trade agreement countries such as Chilean, Chinese (once the trade agreement comes into effect), Japanese, New Zealand, South Korean and United States investors are not automatically held to that $15 million threshold.

Yes, the $15 million threshold for purchase of agricultural land is cumulative for investors from China, Japan, Korea, but the agribusiness threshold for China, Japan, and Korea is $55 million, based on the value of the consideration for the acquisition and the total value of other interests held by the foreign person [with associates] in the entity. While the agribusiness threshold for Chile, New Zealand and United States is $1,094 million.

Other foreign investors can purchase agribusinesses up to a $55 million threshold, based on the value of the consideration for the acquisition and the total value of other interests held by the foreign person [with associates] in the entity.

For investors from non-free trade agreement countries Singapore and Thailand, where agricultural land is to be used wholly and exclusively for a primary production business the threshold is $50 million (otherwise the land is not agricultural land).

In addition, Foreign persons (including foreign government investors) are able to apply for an exemption certificate to cover a program of acquisitions of interests in agricultural land.

Exemption certificates for agricultural land would generally be considered where:

* the total proposed value of acquisitions over a three year period does not exceed $100 million (or if acquiring for use for an activity other than agriculture, $30 million). This includes acquisitions made individually or under an exemption certificate;

* the regions or localities where the agricultural land in which interests are to be acquired are defined clearly.

[Australian Government, Foreign Investment Review Board, Monetary thresholds, 2016]

Potentially this means a private investor from China or a Chinese corporation can buy farm lands valued at up to a cumulative $100 million over three years before appearing on the Turnbull Government's own political radar. 

All of the aforementioned provisions leaving plenty of wriggle room for investment in agricultural land and businesses and definitely not what Kevin Hogan was spinning the good folk of Grafton last month.

UPDATE

Kevin Hogan continues to demonstrate that he either doesn’t understand his government’s own rules concerning foreign ownership or he is deliberately misleading his electorate.

ABC News, 9 March 2016:

A National Party MP is hoping local jobs will not be lost as a result of a Chinese buy-out of north coast NSW macadamia farms.

Four properties covering 380 hectares at Dunoon near Lismore, and formerly run by US-based Hancock Farms, have been bought by a Chinese group known as "Discovery".

The member for Page Kevin Hogan said he was aware of rumours of a sale.

Mr Hogan said a Free Trade Agreement with China did not mean the door was now open to foreign workers.

"It's a well-known fact within the free trade agreements that we do with any country, not just China, because let's not just make this a China thing, that any company and there's been companies that have owned Australian assets for 200 years and with every free trade agreement the work has to be offered to Australians first," Mr Hogan said.

Kevin Hogan said any foreign investment greater than $15 million had to be approved by the Foreign Investment Review Board, and he was waiting on information on whether the macadamia sale was vetted.

"We made an election commitment to lower it from the ridiculous amount of $ 250 million when it used to be triggered to look at a purchase if it was in the national interest, we have lowered that from 250 to 15 [million dollars] so if this entity has triggered over $15 million it would have absolutely gone before the Foreign Investment Review Board," Mr Hogan said.

Are we witnessing the beginning of the end for the global coal industry?

While the Australian Coalition Government keep its head deeply buried in the sand on climate change policy and the future of fossil fuels the world has quietly begun to by-pass coal, one of this country’s biggest exports.

Senate Bill 1547 (ELIMINATION OF COAL FROM ELECTRICITY SUPPLY) passed the Oregon House of Representatives on a 39-20 bipartisan vote on 16 February 2016 and re-passed the Senate on 2 March 2016:

BILL SUMMARY

“Requires each electric company providing electricity to retail electricity consumers located in this state to eliminate coal-fired resources from electric company's electricity supply. 

Clarifies that term "public utility" does not include people's utility district or electric cooperative for purpose of being regulated by Public Utility Commission. Allows Public Utility Commission to consider net gain or loss of sale of coal-fired resources for certain allocations to retail electricity consumers. Modifies qualifying electricity for purposes of renewable portfolio standards. Changes compliance requirements for renewable portfolio standards. Makes other changes to provisions setting forth renewable portfolio standards. Permits carry forward of certain renewable energy certificates for specified periods. Provides rules on application of renewable portfolio standards when electric utilities acquire service territory. Permits commission to approve cost recovery for costs related to renewable energy storage. Provides process to address conflicts between requirements for electric company to comply with renewable portfolio standards and reliability standards of North American Electric Reliability Corporation. Changes goal to acquire electricity from community-based renewable energy projects to requirement to acquire such electricity. Expands sources that qualify for community-based renewable energy projects to include facilities that generate electricity using biomass and that also generate thermal energy for secondary purpose. Directs commission to establish stranded cost obligation associated with condemnation of or transaction related to service territory or property of electric company. Requires public utilities to annually forecast projected state and federal production tax credits received due to variable renewable electricity production. Clarifies that term "public utility" does not include people's utility district or electric cooperative for purposes of being regulated by Public Utility Commission. Requires each electric company to file applications with commission for programs to accelerate transportation electrification. Allows return of and return on investment made by electric company for purposes of program. Directs commission to establish program for creation of community solar projects. Repeals minimum solar energy capacity standard for electric companies. Declares emergency, effective on passage.”

The Guardian, 4 March 2016:

Oregon has become the first US state to pass laws to rid itself of coal, committing to eliminate the use of coal-fired power by 2035 and to double the amount of renewable energy in the state by 2040.

Legislation passed by the state’s assembly, which will need to be signed into law by Governor Kate Brown, will transition Oregon away from coal, which currently provides around a third of the state’s electricity supply.

At the same time, the state will also require its two largest utilities to increase their share of clean energy, such as solar and wind, to 50% by 2040. Combined with Oregon’s current hydroelectric output, the state will be overwhelmingly powered by low-carbon alternatives to fossil fuels.

Climate campaigners said the legislation was a landmark moment and showed that the US was moving rapidly towards renewables, despite the temporary block placed by the supreme court on the Obama administration’s clean power plan…..

In December 2015 the Ontario Ministry of Energy in Canada announced The End Of Coal:

Coal went from 25% of Ontario’s supply mix in 2003 to zero in 2014, all while grid reliability and domestic supply improved. The elimination of coal stands as the single largest GHG emissions reduction action on the continent and was primarily responsible for Ontario achieving its ambitious 2014 emissions reduction target of 6% below 1990 levels.

The elimination of coal-fired electricity was a shared effort between the Ontario Ministry of Energy and two of its agencies:

* Ontario Power Generation (OPG), the largest generator of electricity in the province, primarily through hydroelectric and nuclear sites.

* The Independent Electricity System Operator (IESO), whose duties include both procuring electricity supply and planning the electricity system over the long-term…..

Today….Ontario has more than 14,800 MW of wind, solar, bioenergy, and hydroelectric energy online, and almost 3,000 MW of renewable energy projects contracted and under development. 20,000 MW of renewable energy will be online by 2025, representing about half of Ontario’s installed capacity…..

Federal Election 2016: Malcolm Bligh Turnbull's faux outrage

This was Coalition Prime Minister Malcolm Bligh Turnbull frothing at the mouth in March 2016:

"The 2013 Senate election was really an embarrassment for Australian democracy," he said at the Liberal State Council meeting on the Central Coast.

"People elected through back-room preference whispering deals, elected on a tiny percentage of votes, was a disgrace."

Now at the time writs were issued for the 2013 federal election there were 34 Liberal/Nationals senators, 31 Labor senators, 9 Greens senators and 1 independent.

After that election there were 33 Liberal/Nationals senators, 25 Labor senators, 10 Greens senators, 1 independent senators and 7 minor party senators.

With some senators resigning from minor parties in the first two years the mix is now 33 Liberal/Nationals senators, 25 Labor senators, 10 Greens senators, 4 independent senators and 4 minor party senators.

The Senate still functions - sitting days are per usual, estimate hearings go ahead as normal and committees function as well as they ever did.

So why all this faux outrage on the part of the Turnbull Government, which resulted in it introducing the Commonwealth Electoral Amendment Bill 2016 in the Lower House on 22 February and attempting to ram it through the Senate as I write?

Well it wasn’t because that very large Senate ballot paper led to a high informal vote – in fact 2013 saw the third lowest informal vote since 1977 when it came to casting votes for senators – and it wasn’t because the ballot result meant the Coalition had drastically fewer senators as they went from 37 senators in the 43^rd Parliament to 34 in the 44^th “hung” Parliament.

The real reason that Turnbull & Co are up in arms is because the Senate rejected the most punitive of its 2014-15 budget measures. You know, the ones that were blatant ideological attempts to begin the dismantling of universal healthcare, affordable university education and the welfare safety net.

The fact that the Senate was merely reflecting the outrage of much of the national electorate continues to be ignored, as Malcolm and his cronies blame those pesky minor parties and plot to comprehensively ‘own’ the Senate next time round.