CPRS Bills 2010: Turnbull trumps Abbott in climate change debate (transcript)

Malcolm Turnbull speaking today in Parliament on anthropomorphic global warming and an emissions trading scheme, in direct opposition to his leader's new policy position:

The White Paper estimates the CPRS will result in a one off increase in the CPI by 1.1% – compared to the 2.8% one-off increase in the CPI caused by the introduction of the GST. Most households are compensated for this increase in costs either in whole or in part.

I should note that the largest component of increases in electricity prices in NSW over the next five years is, in fact, additional network charges to recognise the increased investment in the security and reliability of electricity infrastructure. Those increases, unlike the CPRS element, are not the subject of any compensation.

But given we have an apparent bi-partisan agreement that emissions should be reduced by 5% of 2000 levels, is an Emissions Trading Scheme, at a general level, the best policy to achieve the desired reduction in emissions?

Believing as I do, as a liberal, that market forces deliver the lowest-cost and most effective solution to economic challenges, the answer must be yes.

Because more emissions intensive industries and generators need to buy more permits than less intensive ones, lower emission activities, whether they are cleaner fuels or energy efficient buildings, are made more competitive.

A brown coal fired power station, for example, pumps out four times as much CO2 as an efficient gas fired one. But gas is expensive and clean and brown coal is cheap and dirty.

If there is no cost charged for emitting carbon there is simply no incentive to move to the cleaner fuel.

Until 1 December last year there was a bi-partisan commitment in Australia that this carbon price, this exercise in reducing emissions should be imposed by means of an emissions trading scheme.

At their core these bills are as much the work of John Howard as of Kevin Rudd. The policy I am supporting today as an Opposition backbencher is the same policy I supported as John Howard’s Environment Minister.

And why did we, in the Howard Government, believe an emissions trading scheme was the best approach?

It was because we, as Liberals, believed in the superior efficiency of the free market to set a price on carbon......

The ETS allows Australian businesses to make their own decisions as to how to reduce their emissions – Government sets the rules and in part sets the cap on total emission and then lets the market work out the most efficient and effective result.

Schemes where bureaucrats and politicians pick technologies and winners, doling out billions of taxpayers’ dollars is neither good policy is neither economically efficient and nor will it be environmentally effective.

For these reasons, Mr Speaker, I will be voting in favour of these Bills.

Rather cleverly Turnbull has released his full speech here ahead of the Hansard transcript.

Shafting Abbott in this way must have given him much pleasure, with the added advantage that he appears steadfast in his views when compared to Abbott's recent volte face.

A little aromatic? No, Tony - you said cr@p and you meant cr@p

ABC TV The Insiders Sunday 7th February 2010:

"BARRIE CASSIDY: You see the credibility problem for you is that you're a conviction politician. You call it as you see it. And yet you seem to be slightly half hearted about it. And then of course you have to live with the comment that you made, that you think climate change is crap.

TONY ABBOTT: I think what I actually said was that the so-called settled science was a little aromatic. Now you don't have to accept the totality of the science to still think that there is a reasonable argument for taking sensible precautions against possible risk and that's what we're doing."

A little aromatic? No, Tony - you said "absolute cr@p" and you meant "absolute cr@p".

Your blunt opinion was very well documented, you didn't deny the words when directly questioned in December 2009 and trying to fib now only shines a spotlight on your slippery political nature.

Now I know you have all but admitted that when you said that the science around climate change was "absolute cr@p" you were fronting what you thought was a hostile Liberal Party audience in Beaufort Victoria, but (unless you always tell people what they want to hear to save yourself a lynching) you were actually voicing your own opinion.

In fact the Pyrenees Advocate editor who attended that party function got the distinct impression that you were quite serious and reported; "In a wide ranging speech, Mr Abbott talked about climate change, the Liberal political fortunes and Kevin Rudd. Quote - the argument on climate change is absolute crap," he said."

The editor was interviewed by ABC Melbourne's Steve Martin and it's online for posterity here.

Of course this "cr@p" attitude to global warming means that you were telling the biggest of political lies when you told Kerry O'Brien on the 7.30 Report last October:

"Well, there may be one or two, but I think if the Government substantially accepts our amendments, that will make Malcolm, in effect, the co-author of this ETS. I think that would be a good position. It would be a rare ... it would be a great win for an Opposition. Let's face it, it's quite unusual for Oppositions to effectively be co-authors of major legislation, and if they were to accept our amendments, if they were to accept that their bill was, in important respects, very gravely flawed, I think that would be a good deal for the country, and obviously a political win for the Opposition."
I think we can all recognise the lie because as I write you are in the House of Reps getting ready to vote down the Rudd Government Carbon Pollution Reduction Scheme amended bills for the second time.

Download the audio file of Pyrenees Advocate interview.

Election 2010 - What's a lamb roast?

For days Tony Abbott's been popping up all over the evening tellie talking about the cost of food and shaking his head solemnly; calling lamb the "new lobster".
I couldn't afford to eat lamb chops in 2006 under Howard or in 2009 under Rudd - so why does 'Phoney Tony' Abbott expect me to believe that he will somehow make lamb affordable to poor people post-2010 if he's made Prime Minister.
Pull the other one, Abbott - those budgie smugglers are strangling your brain!

Lucky to afford mince
Maclean

The right-wing disinformation campaign is alive and well on the NSW North Coast

The political disinformation campaign is alive and well on the NSW North Coast in The Daily Examiner letters to the editor and what passes for the party faithfull are gearing up for the next federal election campaign:

Teaching, nursing students targeted

NOT so long ago when John Howard was PM and the state of our economy was actually 'state of the art', there were some anti-government voices in the Valley highly critical of Howard and the Coalition's policy on university funding through the Hecs scheme.

Where are those voices today, now that Julia Gillard, idol of their favoured political party, is forcing teaching and nursing students to pay up to 25 per cent more to gain a degree after dumping the subsidy put in place by the Howard government?

Why single out these two urgently necessary areas of university education to begin the clawback of some of the billions of dollars, mostly borrowed, that this Rudd government has squandered since 2007?

Billions tossed around like confetti at a wedding to feed not only Rudd's massive ego but the many rorts of the so-called Education Revolution. The myriad of enquiries, committees and no brainer 'Watch' programs that cost millions but amounted to absolutely nothing.

And then vital funding assistance for teaching and nursing students gets shafted.

Like the whales in the Southern Ocean, nursing and teaching students in this country have been cut adrift by this self-serving government.

FRED PERRING, Grafton

This is what the Federal Government actually put in place according to its Going to Uni website:

If you have a HELP debt, you start repaying your accumulated HELP debt when your HELP repayment income is above the minimum threshold, which is $41,594 in the 2008-09 income year and $43,151 for the 2009-10 income year.....

In the 2009 Budget, the Australian Government announced that students who graduate from an eligible education or nursing course of study from second semester 2009 onwards will be able to apply for a reduction in their compulsory HELP repayment if they work as a teacher or nurse.

From 1 January 2010 the maximum annual student contribution amount (previously called HECS) for commencing students undertaking education and nursing units of study will be increased from the 'national priority' rate to the band 1 rate [Rate 1 set at $5,310 p.a. maximum in 2010]......

Eligible education and nursing graduates (who graduate from second semester 2009 onwards) who take up employment in these professions will be able to apply for a HECS-HELP benefit which will reduce their Higher Education Loan Program (HELP) repayments. The benefit will be available for the 2009-10 income year. The maximum benefit for that year will be $1,558.50.

An education or nursing graduate is a person who has graduated from a course of study that is required for initial entry to teaching or nursing professions.

Further information will soon be available when guidelines for the benefit for teachers and nurses are finalised.....

The maximum HECS-HELP benefit you will receive as an early childhood education teacher [working in regional or remote areas, Indigenous communities or areas of high socio-economic disadvantage] is $1,600 for the 2008–09 income year, and $1,662.40 for the 2009-10 income year. This amount will be indexed in later years.

Find out if you're eligible

A bill to ban giving support to whaling fleets is before the Australian Senate

A private member's bill Environment Protection and Biodiversity Conservation Amendment (Prohibition of Support for Whaling) Bill 2010 was tabled in the Australian Senate and read for the first time on 4 February 2010.
The bill's aim is to create new offences and penalties related to providing service, support or resources to an organisation engaged in whaling.
Although no-one would doubt the motives of Greens Senator Rachael Siewert, her identified co-sponsor Eric Abetz raises the possibility that this bill might also be a long-shot attempt by the Liberal Party to embarrass the Rudd Government and increase any Australian-Japanese diplomatic tensions in the months before a federal election.
Since the 2007 election sent him to the Opposition benches I can't recall hearing all that much about whaling from Senator Abetz before this.

We're laughing now but......

We can laugh at the joke and say never happen or only in America, but.......

Murray Hill Incorporated is Running for Congress
Corporations are people too!

Until now, corporations only influenced politics with high-paid lobbyists and backroom deals. But today, thanks to an enlightened Supreme Court, corporations now have all the rights the founding fathers meant for us. It was their dream to build the best democracy money can buy.

That's why Murray Hill Incorporated is taking democracy's next step — running for Congress. Join us and build a vision for the future we can all be proud of. Vote Murray Hill Incorporated for Congress!
Vote Murray Hill Incorporated for Congress!

Get a load of the U.S. Supreme Court judgement which caused this tongue in cheek announcement that Murray Hill is fielding a candidate at the next American election.
Apparently the American courts have moved one step closer to according corporations full citizenship rights by giving companies the same First Amendment right of free speech as a person - therefore a right to unlimited spending on political advocacy during election campaigns.
Score in 'The Best Free Speech That Money Can Buy' Contest:
U.S. Government 0 Big Business 10

Snapshot : Murray Hill Inc video

Antarctic Whale Wars 2010: claim and counter claim in pictures

Institute of Cetacean Research photograph allegedly showing impact

Sea Shepherd Conservation Society photograph of the Bob Barker

An estimated 9,000 minke whales have been slaughtered as part of the Japanese annual Antarctic whale hunt since 1988 according to an Asahi Shimbun article on 23 January 2010.

In the latest war of words over interaction between the whaling fleet and the Sea Shepherd Conservation Society, the Institute for Cetacean Research which runs the Southern Ocean whale hunts under the guise of 'scientific research' has claimed that its vessel Yushin Maru No. 3 was rammed by the anti-whaling boat Bob Barker and supplied photographs allegedly showing this encounter.

Sea Shepherd has released a counter claim stating that it was the Bob Barker which was intentionally rammed and damaged above the waterline.

Damage allegedly done to the Bob Barker during the collision

Land use in Australia and the 2010 federal election campaign

Certain rural landholders are trying to make land tenure an issue in the 2010 federal election.
These landowners are upset at state restrictions on their ability to clear land of native vegetation and hold an erroneous belief that the Australian Government has 'stolen' their ability to take advantage of any carbon credits this land might produce.
This drive to roll back state law by making the Federal Government politically uncomfortable in an election year may not be as easily undertaken as it first appeared, when the initial reaction to their announcement of a lead-off campaign rally was rather underwhelming in a regional area which has an established rural component in direct competition with a growing residential sector for occupation and use of coastal lands.

On 2 February 2010 The Daily Examiner published this editorial:

Farmers and land use

THE notion that farmers should be allowed to do whatever they like with 'their' land needs to be debunked.

The issue was highlighted during the past two months by Peter Spencer, who went on a hunger strike trying to get a Royal Commission into government policies preventing him from clearing vegetation from his land.

Without going into the rights and wrongs of his case, there are broader issues at play.

Forget vegetation for a moment and look at water.

If a water course runs through a farmer's land, does that give him or her the right to take whatever they like and leave other landholders downstream with nothing? Of course not. Water is considered a community resource and does not belong to any individual.

If a farmer or landholder proposed a toxic industry on their land, should no-one have the right to question that industry? Again, of course not.

All landholders, urban and rural, have to abide by local, state and federal government decisions that affect what they can do on 'their' land because what they do on 'their' land has an impact on others.

It is the same with land clearing.

No landholder should be able to clear swathes of vegetation from their land without first determining what effect that has on others around them.

That said, if a farmer buys land and the guidelines for the use of that land change, the community via its government should adequately compensate them for any commercial losses they suffer as a result of those changes.

But to suggest the community has no interest or right to determine what happens on private property is erroneous.

What farmers do on their land affects others.

And this letter to the editor in the same edition:

Giving credit to switched on farmers

A RECENT letter to the editor (January 23) asserted that Australian farmers don't receive any compensation for carbon credits sold here or overseas.

Now, I don't know what the writer had been told but this is not correct. Here is a simple explanation of the issue at hand.

"Carbon credits are a financial reward for activities that reduce the levels of carbon dioxide accumulating in the atmosphere. There are a large number of different carbon trading schemes in the world, some of which date back to as early as 1995. A carbon trade can simply be an agreement between two parties. For the term 'carbon credits' to be used, the emission reduction or biosequestration to which the credits apply must be subject to verification by an accredited certificate provider." [Dr Christine Jones, March 2007]

There are many registered Australian companies offering carbon credits for sale and some farmers on freehold land are participating in creating these credits and getting paid for their efforts. The farmers who are taking advantage of emerging markets in relation to national and international greenhouse gas abatement targets are those who have done their research and decided to involve themselves - not just sit back and whinge about how bad things are.

When it comes to any carbon sequestration total which is credited to the national ledger by the United Nations under the Kyoto Protocol, neither the Commonwealth nor Australian states receive any saleable credits from this at all because this particular total is a simple inventory accounting device to measure the nation's adherence to its international undertakings, however, government entities can buy existing carbon credits on the open market to offset their own activities.

As for the NSW Native Vegetation Act also mentioned in that same letter, a little diligent research will show that the matter is not as straightforward as any speakers at the Lismore Cooee Meeting might have suggested.

This year is an election year and it behoves us all to be careful of the political aims and aspirations of vested interests.

Judith M. Melville, Yamba

White Ibis stand up to be counted and you can help on Sunday 7 February 2010

There is a state-wide community survey of the Ibis underway today and NSW North Coast residents can help by keeping their eyes open.

National Parks & Wildlife information:

The Australian white ibis, Threskionis molucca, is a highly visible native water bird in New South Wales.

What do they look like?

• Like all ibises, the Australian white ibis has a large, curved beak designed for probing.
• Their heads and necks are featherless and black, except for horizontal lines on the back of the head that vary in colour from pale pink to red.
• Their bodies in contrast are mainly white, apart from black tips to the longest flight feathers, black lacelike wing feathers and highly visible bare patches under the wings and on the breast that also vary in colour from pale pink to red.
• The legs are reddish brown to black in colour.
• Prior to the 1970s, the Australian white ibis did not breed in the Sydney region but followed the non-permanent waters of inland lakes and rivers, due to the extensive droughts and changes in water regime they have sought refuge in the coastal wetlands. Ibises have adapted well to the constant water and food supply available in urban environments and they are now a common site in our parklands where they feed on invertebrates (beetles etc) and crustaceans (yabbies etc).

How many are there? Help us find out!

The National Parks and Wildlife Service is trying to get a better understanding of the distribution and abundance of Australian white ibis at a statewide level. This will help us to develop conservation practices for these birds. One of the questions we are attempting to answer is how many of these birds are actually in New South Wales?

Since 2003, we have been running community ibis surveys. The surveys have taken place on a single day in summer. We have asked members of the public to tell us about their ibis sightings in Sydney over the day. Information from community members will help us to understand and manage these distinctive birds.

The next survey is on Sunday 7 February 2010, and you're invited to participate! If you see any white ibis on this day, anywhere in NSW, please let us know.

We need to know how many birds you have seen, along with the location and time of day. Some birds may have coloured bands on their legs or coloured wing tags, as shown in the pictures. Please provide as many details as possible about the colour of the bands or tags and their location on the bird.

To send the information to us, you can:

• Use our online sighting form; or
• Phone the Environment Line: 1300 361 967 Mon-Fri only.