The ETS has been rejected, and the government has announced it will come back for a third try, adopting the failed deal with Malcolm Turnbull as its new policy. In short-run political terms, there are some obvious benefits here.
Clearly, a crucial consideration is that the government does not want to negotiate with the Greens and would much prefer a deal with the Liberals. But if they are looking at three or four terms in office (and they should be) they will have little choice but to make such deals.
I hope this bill is rejected once again, and that the government finally bites the bullet for a double dissolution.
John Quiggin 
Alice – what would Abbott do to women that has you trembling?
In terms of putting my money where my mouth is I don’t know what you are referring to. Where have I suggested that Abbott is likely to win the next election? I don’t think he will.
At a guess I’d say that the ALP currently has about an 70 – 80% chance of remaining in government at the next election.
@Alice
Hi Alice – actually I think global warming is the issue – the most significant issue people have ever faced as it cuts right to the heart of what it is to be a social body of the size we should become.
So you want $80 if you win and $50 if I win? let me get that striaght Terje?
@nanks
Im all for bringing women to the fore and workchoices Nanks. I dont think this should be an ETS DD. The opposition are going to blow any tax effect to kingdom come when people are more worried about their jobs. That gives them an argument. Nah – its a workchoices fight all over again. We dont want the bastards back and we dont want Abbott telling women what they can and cant do with their bodies (dark ages stuff).
Alice, Abbott is the Leader of the Opposition, not the Government, and has bugger-all chance of winning the next election. You should take a deep breath and calm down.
Your implication that men will vote for Abbott unless women deny them sex is misandrist garbage. Australian voters, of both sexes, will reject Abbott because they dislike him and his (or Minchin’s) policies, not because of threats in the boudoir.
BTW, how the hell d’you know how your other half votes anyway? It’s a secret ballot, FFS.
If the ALP wins the lower house I give you $15. If the ALP loses the lower house you give me $85. Deal?
FYI debaters of internet censorship, Reporters without Borders maintain 2 lists on internet freedom. There is Internet Enemies, 12 countries, and then there is Countries under Surveillance. There are 11 on that list, one western nation, Australia.
Ahhh, tactfully steering past any issues of price and quantity, or the “Cap In Hand” policy I think Alice is promoting, may I suggest moving back to the main topic of dealing with the Greens? And if anyone is asking for money, I gave at the office.
Now, I do hope Clive Hamilton wins in Higgins, simply because that knocks of one ex-Costello staffer. Oh, and it does send a fairly pointed reminder to Nick “The Knife” Minchins band of Merry Munchkins that environment is important. Flip side is if an ex-Costello staffer gets in, well, I don’t know – Abbott and Costello have traded verbal bazookas in the past few hours, so I guess Costello isn’t on the Abbott Xmas list.
After Copenhagen, to which I hope the Labor government invites Green representation (and stuff the freakshow on the speaker’s left side of the house), perhaps a compromise position may be reached with the Greens on a new CPRS II, or something simpler and better, if it comes up. Labor needs to get decent discussions going with them this time, even if some initial conditions are a bit tough to chew on.
If they don’t do that I might get religion and go over to the dark side, to the Intelligent Warming or Intelligent Cooling, or whatever gives the most amusing acronym.
For Feminine Sensibilities ?
@Ros
I realise the govt sees the internet as a mechanism through which to achieve greater control over the population. I think that is a seperate issue to internet filtering – sadly the two have become conflated
I think Abbott will do better than expected, and that the ALP may be scared of an ETS election.
The question is whether the ALP will want to go to an election before or after the next budget. If they think it will be a horror budget (as Turnbull was hoping) then they may trigger the DD for March or April… but if they think they can justify a few more handouts then they may wait for a budget bounce and go after July.
If you combine the possibility of a horror budget with rising interest rates, then you can see the ALP argument for an early election. But, as I said at the start, the hard heads in Labor are also probably aware of the dangers of an ETS election… where the ALP will increase their vote in dead red seats (like Sydney, Melbourne, Brisbane, Griffith etc) but potentially lose votes in marginal regional seats.
Interesting that the Government intends to send the bill back in for another go. It must be calculating that Abbott will not gain much in the polls, the divisions in the Libs will continue to fester, and that there is a better than even chance the moderates will have a go at knocking off Abbott, putting Joe Hockey or Mal Turnbull back in and backing the bill. Either that or it is hoping that a repeat of the bill will keep the CPRS pressure on the Libs all the way until election day. I can’t quite bring myself to believe it’s that cynical.
Assuming Abbott can come up with a policy that cuts carbon emissions I doubt there will be any split within Liberal ranks. Perhaps he will go the nuclear option. The senators that did cross the floor to vote with the government on the ETS spoke in favour of nuclear.
Labour have said that there’s not going to be a DD, and they’re probably not lying about that.
It’s obvious that the coalition will be wiped out at an election next year.
There are two possibilities:
a) the govt thinks that it will win an outright majority in both houses, and doesn’t need to consider the greens, or,
b) the govt thinks that the greens will hold the balance of power, and are offering the Libs a chance to re-think their position and vote for the existing CPRS in February, prior to the election, thus preserving the rip-off from households to big business that Turnbull negotiated.
I think that the govt is neglecting to consider some other possibilities, e.g. that the public won’t tolerate the proposed rip-off at all, and will vote against both the Libs and the govt.
It looks to me that Alice doesn’t understand the concept of betting odds. Nothing wrong with that. Lots of people are confused about lots of issues. That’s why people generally shouldn’t try to impose their life preferences on other people.
Tim — I imagine it is that cynical, though I’m not sure it’s going to work. If they can encourage continued instability (and Turnbull may help) then it will be a good strategy. But if the Liberals fall in behind Abbott then it will simply give the Liberals more time to attack the ETS. The other point is that they can’t really call a DD now (christmas time) so having another sitting in early February gives them an obvious point in time to call the DD.
What Labor need are a bunch of retired scientists still on the public teat to travel around the rural Australia I know and love, and to explain how the evidence stacks up to make AGW the best supported theory so far, and the least successfully argued against (in the sense of rational argument using observational evidence and other factors like “It’s the Communists!”). So far the IPA-ers have had their crack geologist unit criss-crossing the rural townships and leaving a (steaming pile of) mess-age full of a mish-mash of sciency bits and bulldust. If Labor cannot or will not deal directly with defeating the mess-age left by these rockcrackers then Labor are going to lose valuable voters – not the farmers themselves for they see only drought, a bloody long drought – namely the rural industries and services that depend upon agriculture. Small businesses have everything to lose in the bush if the hardliners spit on the dirt in front of them and call it rain.
ALP have showed their hand here. Their interest in CC is primarily as a political wedge at the moment.
Primary vote poling for the greens is up to around 13%. Obviously a few percentage points coming from the lib vote over to greens – at least in terms of polling. But one has to figure some will now come over from ALP as well.
If you are fair dinkum about CC then obviously a conservative vote is out of the question – but it is hard to see how you could actually vote ALP, especially after their disgraceful (water it down and wedge it) treatment on this issue.
@rog
I’ve given up on Intelligent Warming.
God told me that he doesn’t exist and neither does ‘the intelligient being’ and even ‘The Flying Spaghetti Monster’ is a myth. He explained that, therefore, IW is not correct.
I am taking him at his word on this. He’s never lied to me before.
That said, I still think that IW should get equal time in teaching at school – after all, it is a scientific theory.
Maybe banning death would be as effective as denying AGW? This could be a new Liberal party policy. I hear Tony is groping around for policies at the moment.
Maybe Abbott and the Liberal Party should have insisted that the world is flat and that the moon landing was a fraud. At least those claims will not rapidly become untenable through direct experience!
Worth a look:-
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nuclear_power_in_Australia#Opinion_polls
@John Humphreys
I doubt Labor can do better than let Abbott flap in the wind for a time. The longer they leave him before they cut him down, the larger the electoral victory. They don’t need to do the DD immediately. Let them fight and bicker amongst themselves. Already there are signs that the realists are finding a party lead by surrealists difficult to stomach. Leave Tony, Minchin and friends to do more damage to the Liberal party than Labor could even wish for. Hell even if they come back to their senses, more flip-flopping will simply lose even more votes. Since 2007 they have held every conceivable position on every conceivable issue. Even the most die hard Lib, still willing to vote for them, must be suffering from vertigo by now. No need for hanging chads, in that state, they’ll invalidate their votes themselves.
It is actually worth a look, Terje. Some idiot who calls himself KAPITALIST88 falsified the data on the page. Was that you, by any chance?
I think the ALP should let the Libs bicker amongst themselves a while. The divisions won’t go away. If there’s more head cracking, all the more reason for Turnbull to go start his own party (you can be assured he’ll be talking long and hard to his business mates in the next week about funding the venture, as well he should). That would be a win-win for labour since a moderates party let by Turnbull would be ideal for Labour to negotiate with. The Greens are gambling on a DD to really break through (compare 1984 for the Democrats) and get some serious numbers into the Senate, and they’ll play pretty hard on that.
John Humphreys has a good point about ALP trepidation on a ETS election. You can betcha bottom dollar there’s a swag of advertising companies pitching to the government right now for some lucrative public awareness work. Every state and federal government for the last 15 years has played that trick.
SJ – I don’t travel under any names other than my own. I don’t falsify data. I am not KAPITALIST88.
I hope you corrected the inaccuracies. Can you point out what they are?
@nanks
LOl Nanks – FFSS – For feminist superior sensibilities.
Here is what the Wikipedia source dated October 2009 said:-
http://news.smh.com.au/breaking-news-national/more-aussies-back-nuclear-power-poll-20091013-gu7r.html
@TerjeP (say tay-a)
Thats not very good Terje, only 49% want to consider it. If half of those who then proceed to consider it reject it you have three fifths of bugger all.
@TerjeP (say tay-a)
I thought it said…
Nuclear power may well be established in parts of the world but in Oz we have had such a long tradition of not doing it’s hard to see how this will be reversed with the support of an overwhelming majority of punters.
And where are we going to put it? It has to be near the grid so you have them near cities. Imagine the nimbyism
Nuclear power in Australia is dreamtime stuff.
Its irresponsible not to got with nuclear. Heliostats can help because they work in well with peak usage. Home solar and wind less-so. And here we ought be matching technologies. Ammonia and hydrogen can be made intermittently. A perfect match with wind and home solar.
Hydrogen is uneconomic and dangerous where compression is high and for central manufacture and distribution. But its so easy to make it can be made at home or by one fellow on your street. With only a small amount of compression you can make enough of it to get to work and back. We want hydrogen/diesel hybrids. But in practice it will be cheaper eventually to sort out hydrogen for commuting needs with diesel as backup.
There is no getting around diesel for heavy cargo transport if its efficiency that you want. But still having basic commuting hydrogen-based and oh so cheap. Well its a start.
We have got to start building more wharves. Nothing can beat the energy efficiency of water transport. You can even have computer-controlled sales to take the edge off the energy cost. That opens up the oceans for work in progress. Since manufacturing is really an extension of logistics. Logistics is about putting things in the right sequence. And cost-cutting is often about getting inventories down.
Putting this together it stands to reason that the most powerful economy to be spoken about with a human language, would be based around a multitude of factories with their own wharves as dispatch and incoming. And their inventories and work in progress on the water. Unmanned boats traveling slowly, with sales, hydrogen and diesel back up. And continually putting themselves in the correct order so that they arrive at the factory in the exact sequece in which they are needed. No economy could possibly be more effective or energy efficient then that.
In South Australia the obvious place for a nuclear power station (or four or five, to cope with the massive influx of our share of 15 million new immigrants) would have to be the Spencer Gulf. Nice clear waters with a brand new spanking desalination plant next door, and three towns full of unemployed and other welfare recipients. We could even put in some uranium enrichment plants nearby and use the rail infrastructure to transport it to the nearest port.
Fast forward five years in the hardliner Knifer’s Party (Nick “The Knife” Minchin’s legacy):
The rest of us live in Adelaide and the surrounds – except Minchin who had to move to Tassie shortly before the reactors were built, something to do with allergies – peaceful in our ignorant bliss, until the old generation nuclear power plant goes and does a III or IV. That’s when we all wish we had paid more attention to the prevailing winds in South Australia 😦
Luckily though, we kept all our old dirty coalfired power stations running – I mean hey, nuclear is sooo expensive compared with coal coal all you need is coal – and so no problemo. Pity ’bout the tuna zoo and prawns and abalone and other shit though. If only we’d waited until someone had figured out how to build a Gen IV reactor, but no, the hardliner Knifer’s Party insisted on exploiting the cheap existing technology (thanks Ukraine, great second hand reactor parts). Their intentions were good. Just helping their trillionaire friends to avoid financial ruin. Wonder why the insurance companies left SA all those years ago…
We all luv nuclear power and we all luvved James Hardie. Here’s a question: why must we be virtually dead last in coming up with legislation for an ETS and/or target commitments for GHG emissions reduction, yet we must race ahead to nuclear? Unless we know the objectives the rest is complete bollocks.
Here’s another one: why do we need nuclear if reducing emissions in Australia won’t make any difference to global GHG mass in the atmosphere? Just applying the Barnaby “Carbuncle” Joyce and Tony “Mad Monk” Abbott logic to the assessment.
PS: I’m kidding around in case noone noticed, just blowing off steam and a few carbon emissions from last night’s dinner. Go nukes go nukes ra ra RA.
What a fine day it is…I wake up to the news…..the right are kicking out Rees and we have a pic of Sartor looking like an advertisment for spray starch, and we have Abbott waving a cartoon pitchfork talking about bring back invidual work contracts (Workchoice V.2).
At least the weather is nice. Maybe I can forget about the madness for a while.
I hope Rees buries Sartor, Tripodi et al. Good luck to him.
@TerjeP (say tay-a)
while a poll may suggest that more people are in favour of nuclear power now than in the past, it is worth noting that this polling was undertaken in an environment without detailed public debate. So it reflects a gut feel response.
I would suspect that if the debate got serious a lot more information would be disseminated and hopefully a lot more people would make a more informed decision.
In my mind it isn’t a hard one. Not only do you get significant risk during operations of the facility and a really expensive and risky waste management problem, you also dont get the benefits that some protaginists envisage. The Olkiluoto-3 facility currently under construction in Finland was begun in 2005 and due to open earlier this year. It would generate 1600MW at a planned cost of E3.2bn. It is a couple of years late and well over budget. They hope to open it in 2012 at closer to E5bn (about A$8bn). The uranium will be mined in Namibia where they have had to build a 400MW coal fired power station to operate the mine. And no one wants to release information about the carbon emission generated from the construction of the facility, but I am guessing it is pretty significant. Depending on how you account for your long term waste costs (and discount rate) modern nuclear generates electricity that costs more than combined cycle natural gas.
What this all means is that nuclear is really expensive, takes a really long time to bring online even after you have committed to it and it doesn;t really deliver environmental benefit.
So why is it even being considered again?
@Alice
Crazy stuff Alice. You have to wonder about the sanity of people who are arguing about who gets to wear the captain’s hat on a ship that needs all hands focused on stopping it from sinking beneath the waves.
I agree with the DD PrQ … but not before July 1 2010. Were I Rudd, I’d dissolve the parliament on July 2 2010 and call the election for Saturday July 24, unless of course I could cut a deal in February with the Greens + 2 out of Xenophon, Troeth, Boyce and Humphreys to get legislation through.
Of course then I’d conjure another politically attractive trigger and do it on that basis.
Hi JQ – any reason why the comment I posted 10 o’clock last night is still awaiting moderation? Thanks.
Rudd has referred to Abbott’s magic pudding approach to climate chage policy.
I like to think of it as good old fashioned regulation based response, with more energy-efficient buildings, better land management and biosequestration programs. It sounds like Abbot will use regulatory powers and government programs to generate the carbon reductions. Sounds a bit lefty to me – i wonder if he has noticed yet?
If the Opposition is ruling out both a market based solution and a carbon tax there only alternative left is some form of regulation to direct people’s activity in the desired direction.
Regulation has the disadvantage of not being transparent, particularly on the allocation of costs, not comprehensive in scope and subject to severe distortion and unanticipated impacts.
Sounds slightly stalinist to me. Any libertarians on this thread would find any option based heavily on regulation highly undesirable, I would have thought.
On the issue of nuclear power, it has a very long time frame, substantial externalities that need to be properly costed in to get a fair comparison with other energy options and probably will require a substantial carbon tax to make it an attractive option for commercial power generators. an option that mr Abbott has ruled out.
A heavy regulatory hand by the government plus implicit subsidies by Government assuming responsibility for the cost of various risks is likely to be needed to make the nuclear option viable. We are aback here in the world of a centrally controlled economy.
@JJ
As the saying goes, Abbott is writing cheques his butt can’t keep. He can’t bring in nuclear without a substantial carbon price or a subsidy or a substantial increase in energy prices. he can’t regulate in areas of state sovereignty – which is pretty much all the areas he is talking about and business is not going to accept massive regulation unless there’s a market framework which means they have to do it anyway. The AIG is already concerned.
Expect Rudd to make these points.
Fran’s right JJ. Abbott’s pissing in the wind. He hasn’t even begun to think about how he can do it.
I see Abbott wants to increase soil carbon instead of cutting back on coal. I envisage Sturts Stony Desert being carpeting with potting mix.
Re nuclear economics a couple of things need to be pointed out. Government indemnities are not unique to nuclear; both the WA and Federal govts have let Chevron off the hook if some of the 120 million tonnes of NG derived CO2 escapes from beneath Barrow Island. Gas fired electrical plant can never achieve more than 60% CO2 reductions compared to perhaps 98% for nuclear on average. The Finnish example is a cockup for which remedies are being implemented. Both gas and uranium will run short at some time but in relative terms nuclear fuel cost will be more affordable. It’s possible that future nuclear may need little if any new fuel. Even if not fuel will still be available at a price. Note for example Britain has used most of its North Sea gas reserves and will have to import gas from volatile Russia. Better to import uranium from the colonies but we’ve plenty to spare for at least a generation.
… adopting the failed deal with Malcolm Turnbull as its new policy …
… thereby driving a wedge between the minchkins and the coalition’s corporate constituency, who know they’ll never get a better deal.
I’d prefer a green-tinged bill to this blue-tinged one – a real one rather than this political artifact.
@Fran Barlow
Exactly Fran…we have the main headline today. Something about Abbott wants work contracts and we have Labor swinging madly right again at State level…I despair the country I live in is a fools paradise…or a paradise of fools. Here we go again. But it wont save state Labor and even less so now and who will we get in? State libs – even more right.
Ive had enough up to my back teeth of the blind mice in this country. They wouldnt know decent policy and decent politicians if both leapt up and bit them on the bum.
@TerjeP (say tay-a)
Abbott is a fake christian relic from the dark ages Terje. He would not approve that abortion pill….thats what he did to women. He would rather women who want an abortion to have a more difficult invasive procedure. This in the modern age when we have overpopulated the earth (perhaps with creeps like Abbott who would have been better terminated). I dont care where he is coming from but its plain outright misogynistic in my opinion.
He is an hideous. Capital H. Any woman in her right mind shouldnt vote for him. Its also a small matter that a lot of women work part time….the very people who get stuffed around by flexible work contracts. The women trying to raise children and get a bit extra to help their partners…there are so many of them and its them that gets clubbed by his wacko ideas on work contracts (workchoices V2).
Is there anything else you want to know Terje about why Abbott is a disaster for women??
“He would not approve that abortion pill….thats what he did to women. He would rather women who want an abortion to have a more difficult invasive procedure.”
That was definitely a mistake on his part. Even from an anti-abortion point of view which says the child has rights later in the pregnancy. Nobodies perfect. He’s not the bad guy you are making him out to be. I’d rather have a person who gets a few things wrong and is fair dinkum and not a triangulater. We are taught about the halo concept. But there is the opposite concept and we are not taught about it and so are probably too susceptible to it. The “anti-halo” concept. Where a dude really does get one thing very wrong. And so from there on in you figure he’s got cloven feet and horns hidden by hair. We all suffer from this. But you know we gotta look out for it.
“As the saying goes, Abbott is writing cheques his butt can’t keep. He can’t bring in nuclear without a substantial carbon price or a subsidy or a substantial increase in energy prices. ”
Thats the myth but no tax on coal is not the real problem for nuclear Fran.
Thats not why the nuclear is expensive. The main nuclear cost is financing the initial capital outlay. And if you know about discounting to present value, you will realise that there is going to be a big difference between the costs if you can put up a Westinghouse in 3 years or in 12.
Its not about taxing coal. Its about bringing down the commissioning time from 12 years to 3 years. The other thing is think about the fellow who owns the land. If he knows that these guys have had to go and get down on one knee to three layers of government, and schmooze and this is the one place they can put their nuclear setup then thats a sellers market for the land.
But if the Prime Minsiter uses just persuasion. And he goes around and persuades everyone to pre-approve more land than we could possibly use for energy factories and wharves and things….. that way you’ll have a buyers market.
The third thing is that all the workers are paying income tax, even though its years before the company can break even. So you do need that long-term tax exemption. Not a subsidy, just a tax-exemption.
You put that all together the mystery ends. Because the amount of power you can extract from the nucleus just dwarves anything coming out of some puny chemical reaction. If you have heard that mantra Fran, you haven’t heard it with all the relevant assumptions on the table.
Barry Brook would be your man for a second opinion on this matter I’d say. When Barry talks nuclear its time to get out the notebook.
@Fran Barlow
But wait Fran – it gets worse. Tripodi’s puppet is now premier of NSW and shes glad the people have such faith in her….and its such an honour to serve the people of NSW (and Tripodi and Obeid as per usual)…bla bla…yeah right Kristina – the people didnt get a say in you. The right faction voted but the people will vote you out soon. Enjoy it while it lasts.