Australia Rejects Climate Cap-and-Trade Bill — Senators voted 42 to 30 against it: “It is a dog of a plan”
Aug. 13 (Bloomberg) — Australia’s Senate rejected the government’s climate-change legislation, forcing Prime Minister Kevin Rudd to amend the bill or call an early election.
Senators voted 42 to 30 against the law, which included plans for a carbon trading system similar to one used in Europe. Australia, the world’s biggest coal exporter, was proposing to reduce greenhouse gases by between 5 percent and 15 percent of 2000 levels in the next decade.
Rudd, who needs support from seven senators outside the government to pass laws through the upper house, can resubmit the bill after making amendments. A second rejection after a three-month span would give him a trigger to call an election.
…
“We may lose this fight, but this issue will not go away,” Climate Change Minister Penny Wong told the Senate in Canberra. “Australia cannot afford for climate change to be unfinished business.”
Five members from the Australian Greens party sought bigger cuts to emissions while the opposition coalition and independent Senator Nick Xenophon wanted to wait for further studies on the plan’s impact on the economy.
…
“Australia going it alone before Copenhagen will not make a jot of difference,” Liberal Senator Eric Abetz said. “It is a dog of a plan and we will not support it in its current form.”
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Mondo,
You’re kidding aren’t you? Fielding talking common sense? The guy doesn’t even understand the scientific method and this allows him to be led around in ignorance by the Bob Carters and the Ian Plimers of this country. He doesn’t have a shred of credibility left and that’s without touching on the fact that he is one of those all too common political leaders who talks to the sky…..
I sure hope we can one day clean up our education system so that the nonsense and half-truths espoused by such pseudo-intellects can be discerned by most for what it is. Seems it’s still pretty easy to confuse a Senator.
This page shows the results of a recent, rather limited, poll regarding AGW and the proposed CPRS (‘Carbon Pollution [sic] Reduction Scheme’).
http://blogs.crikey.com.au/pollytics/2009/08/13/global-warming-and-cprs-polling/
No recent polls on the topic, to my knowledge, have canvassed opinion regarding the estimated cost (about $4000 p.a. per family) or other negative consequences (unemployment, power brownouts etc.) which must be clearly exposed during any future election on the issue.
The best thing that will happen is that over the next three months the Australian general public will get better exposure to both sides of the argument.
If the legislation is voted down in November the earliest they can have an election is in March (Have to allow time to close the parliament, set the date etc.etc)
The last time Aust. went to a double dissolution election it was over another superficially popular topic a national ID card. At the end of that election the Hawke Labor Govt just squeaked home and the topic that the election was called over was subsumed by a run for Federal Parliament by the Queensland Premier Joh Bjelke-Peterson (why is it the closer you get to the equator the more colorful the politicians are?).
We never did get a national ID card as the voters were exposed to both sides of the argument and glaring holes were found in the legislation during the wait for the election.
This means that the Rudd Govt. re-election is now dependant on what happens in Copenhagen in December.
If the big emitters walk away from an international agreement then why was the Rudd Govt getting its knickers into a knot to get a ETS passed.
If it is just a token agreement at Copenhagen, ditto.
So Rudd’s future is in the hands of China and India.
Extra time for the public to reflect on the increase or not of global temperature vs the increase in CO2 will not help the alarmists cause.
And if you guy’s and gals in the Northern Hemisphere could organise a really big deep winter during the Olympics in Vancouver it would be much appreciated.
Good on yer mate!
mondo,
Thanks for that link. Senator Fielding states the facts good and plain.
We can only hope that logic will prevail.
Hopefully other politicians will realise that these unscientific attempts to bludgeon western nations into cutting productivity and reduce our standards of living back to mudhuts benefit no one. But I’m not holding my breath!
No one has won an election on global warming taxes; the Australian Labour will not win one on that either. Rudd got elected last time because he wasn’t John Howard.
This is not the good news it seems.
The “opposition” leader in Australia is a left wing wannabee conservative. He`s a thorough believer in AGW and has even proposed his own Cap and Trade scheme. Kevin Rudd’s popularity is higher than ever, so if this gets rejected again, and we have an election, he will win in a landslide.
I still find it depressing that AGW ever got this far in the first place. Since when did so many people become altruistic planet savers? People are essentially selfish (which is fine) and I worry what these schemes like C&T are really about. A lot of people must be looking to gain money and power through it. (BTW, I’m selfish too, it is just that my goals are very small.)
Big push on public awareness of uncertainty needed before the next vote.
Time to woo some meeja celebs with big mouths.
Paul (23.50.58)
You state ‘If the opposition were even vaguely competent they wouldn’t have stood in the way of this. We don’t put up with parties going back on promises here. Check out the story of the Australian Democrats if you want to see what I mean”
Do you recall Rudd went to the polls promising 15-20% cuts but now is asking for 5% so surely this is going back on a promise. Looking at what is happening in Australia shows the real game of global warming-money amd political popularity. The Kyoto Protocol is largely discredited so now Copenhagen is the prize. The real reason for the Australian ETS is that it gives the prime minister political glamour at Copenhagen. As for the access available from the mainstream media to information questioning AGW, it is very limited. One of the best descriptionss of the debate on AGW I’ve ever read was from a woman writing to the national newspaper in Australia today. Her comment was
“…a debate now dominated by a toxic mix of quasi-religious dogma, feel-good faddism, extreme green ratbaggery, existential anxiety and base politics to a stubborn assertion of ideological purity by right wingers. Rationality apparently now only resides with policymakers in the thrall of an unprecedented example of group-think on a global scale”. Love it!
A recent street poll in Australia asked the question “What does ETS mean”.
Although the responses shown on TV were possibly biased towards the ridiculous responses for entertainment’s sake, they showed many people with no idea of even what the acronym stood for, never mind what the legislation would accomplish.
So much for Australians voting for and expecting an ETS.
I keep sending anti-AGW articles to my local Federal member of Parliament but he is toeing the party line and voting for an ETS; they just don’t want the one that the Labor party is pushing.
Re: H (23:57:03) :
I have to say he/she is pretty much on the money. Although the defeat in the Senate sounds like Australia has gotten some common sense, unfortunately, this is not so. It’s a big political game.
Although Rudd and Wong are crazy over this issue, the fact is that Rudd got elected 18 months ago after 12 years or so of Liberal Party government. It’s a bit like the USA, after a while you give the “other side a go”. The situation in Aus would be if Obama was able to call fresh elections to have a “new term”. Obama would still romp it in if that was the case. Unfortunately, in Aus, Rudd is still immensely popular for a variety of reasons.
If the Senate in Aus rejects the bill a second time within 3 months than Rudd (in the Aus Political system) has the grounds to dissolve both houses of parliament and there is a good chance that he will get a majority in the House of Representatives (the governing section) and the Senate (the house of Review).
A large number of the Liberal party (the group currently in opposition the Rudd) want or support an ETS but they have concerns about Rudd’s version of the ETS.
Unless there is some serious Climate Rationalist Debate over the next 3 months than Rudd will probably feel confident to call an early election if the Senate rejects the policy a second time. Unfortunately, I think it’s inevitable that the ETS may eventually get up but at least there is the opportunity for more debate.
The fat lady ain’t sung yet, unfortunately.
As I suspected, it is only in the UK the politicians are a bunch of self-agrandising, conceited, duplicitous, venal, mendacious, scientifically ignorant bone idle born out of wedlock half-wits with a smile on both faces, (have I missed something out?) who can’t be bothered to think things through properly! Well done Australia, you still have a sense of reality! (hard luck losing the Ashes tho’ (in forlorn hope)):-)
Bonzer show OZ!!! I’ll be cracking open some tinnies in your honour.
Alan the Brit, I couldn’t have said that better. Might we be related?
The Greens voted against it. There will be a newer, much more substantial bill in the near future.
You still have your fingers in your ears going la la la but the earth is warming and millions will die…
Bush was banging on about terrorists, and created a global mess.
Obama is banging on about the ecology, and is creating another global mess.
The only winners are ecoterrorists.
Good news down here, but probably not for long…!
The bill was also rejected by the greens for being too conservative, so if the greens ever control the balance of power in the future the final product could have vast reaching consequences for food production and export earnings.
The proposed ETS scheme has been appropriately re-named by senator Barnaby Joyce to stand for “Employment Termination Scheme”.
Thus, if this finally goes ahead we will have plenty of time sitting idly at home to contemplate where it all went wong.
“Time to woo some meeja celebs with big mouths.”
I suspect Jeremy Clarkson is unimpressed by the alarmists and he may be smart enough to read the graphs.
I’ve said it before…who is Penny Wong??? And why is she in charge of such an important issue. 99% of Australians would never have heard of her before Rudd formed his front bench and if her plan goes through 22million people are going to be significantly affected. I honestly would like to know what her scientific credentials are and life experience is that equips her to hold this portfolio?
Anyone fill me in?
Cheers
Michael
Great news. As a sceptical Brit I wish our politicians had as much sense as the Aussies. Well done.
Ian Middleton (23:38:25)
Thank you for getting the message out there. As you may have noticed skeptical protesters got a showing on the news. Please keep up the good work.
As an Australian I would advise other climate realists overseas that the problem in Australia is not yet over. Sadly I believe our opposition leader is a pompous buffoon with the brain of a stoat. He seems to believe that delay on ETS legislation is an appropriate response to the problem. In an energy dependant economy, the continuing threat of ETS legislation is as economically destructive as passing this totally unjustified tax grab. There are many good reasons to move away from fossil fuels, but the big lie of AGW is not one of them. The ends do not justify the means.
Alan the Brit (02:17:56)
Those aussies forgot to ‘reconstruct’ their upper house like us, and pull out all their unfortunate sharp teeth. I’d bet that our quiet exodus (below) is now set to become a torrent.
‘The British Foreign and Commonwealth Office has released statistics showing that with a British population of 798,800, Australia is now home to more British expatriates that France, Spain and Ireland combined.
Second only to China, the opportunities for work in a country with an exceptional quality of life is attracting thousands of British migrants to Australia every year, a number that shows no sign of slowing down in the near future.’
http://www.overseas-emigration.co.uk/content/view/570/392/
I went to one of Prof Ian Plimer’s book signings in Sydney. He noted he was trying to get interviews with the various Members of Parliament last year to talk about the issues but got hardly any response. However, his year they’re all calling him. (After having spoken with virtually every parliamentarian he says about 80% of the Liberal Party members are on side, and all of the Nationals). So things are moving quickly. This stall in the ETS can only be good news, as time is with us.