Today is a great day not only in Australian history, but also in world history. It marks the day when people of character and sensibility pushed back against an overwrought and pointless green agenda, and pushed back in a big way. They’ve had enough, and they’ve scraped the Krudd off their shoes and are moving forward.
Tony Abbott has won the Australian election in a landslide, and vows to abolish the carbon tax as a first order of business. Abbott has declared Australia is “once more open for business” in claiming victory in Saturday’s election.
It is a huge blow to the Rudd-Gillard labor party and their green goals, which were built on a lie foisted on the Australian people. In 2010 when Gillard said “no carbon tax” in a videotaped speech that has been seen as the key moment Australians lost trust:
Then, shortly after she was elected prime minister, she acted as if those words were never spoken, and implemented a carbon tax anyway. There’s nothing worse than a liar who is oblivious to their own lies, and in my opinion, this was the catalyst that set the stage for the end of labor’s green dream as well as their dominance in government.
Abott says he will abolish the carbon tax. In an August 5th Herald Sun article:
If elected, the coalition on day one would suspend the CEFC (Clean Energy Finance Corporation) and prepare legislation to shut it down permanently. It’s vowed to introduce legislation within a fortnight designed to abolish the carbon tax, and all government climate agencies associated with Labor’s clean energy laws.
From the Herald Sun today:
“Today the people of Australia have declared that the right to govern this country does not belong to Mr Rudd or to me or to his party or to ours but it belongs to you, the people of Australia,” Abbott said.
“And you will punish anyone who takes you for granted.”
Andrew Bolt wrote on his blog: “Finally, a man worthy of the office of Prime Minister – and humble enough to hope it.”
Congratulations to my friends in Australia, the Krudd is kaput and the carbon tax is going away, and almost certainly Flim Flam Flannery too. What a great day!
Cook, Ove, and Sou, this Krudd’s for you!
Meanwhile, back in the USA, the Washington Post seems oblivious to this loud message from down under (h/t to Steve Milloy):
The first thing to do is to build the cost of pollution into the price of energy through a simple carbon tax or other market-based mechanism. Though the tax revenue could be rebated right back to people, higher sticker prices for fossil fuel-derived energy would still give them reason to change behaviors and demand more energy-efficient appliances.
It’s like deju vu all over again, because Australia’s carbon tax was setup just like that, and it was flatly rejected by the people of Australia today. Let’s hope we don’t have to deal with the same madness here in the States.
UPDATE: Australian Eric Worrall writes in a short story submitted to WUWT just moments after this was published says:
Tony Abbott, the man who once described climate change as crap http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tony_Abbott#Climate_change , has won a landslide victory in the Australian election, an election which has seen substantial swings against Labor and the Greens.
While we Australians have been disappointed by Abbott’s genuflection towards green dogma, with his promise to replace the hated carbon tax with a watered down form of carbon pricing, we live in hope that it is simply window dressing, to appease greens within his party. Abbott has given us grounds for such hope, with statements to the effect that his budget to mitigate climate change will be capped, regardless of whether the allocated funding achieves its stated goals, and a promise to tighten up the allocation of the national science budget. http://www.dailytelegraph.com.au/news/nsw/abbott-vows-to-cut-futile-research/story-fni0cx12-1226710934260
Abbott has also spoken out against Tim Flannery http://joannenova.com.au/2013/04/jobs-and-junkets-are-on-the-line-abbott-could-axe-flannery-and-the-climate-commission/ , the government doommonger general, who did more than anyone to deliver Australia’s white elephant desalination plants, with his strident support for predictions of permanent drought (end of snow, anybody?).
So its exciting times for climate skeptics down under – and potentially, a global warning for the ambitions of politicians and political parties which are getting too cosy with the greens.
Apropos landslide, the polling a week ago showed the distinct possibility of KRudd and Swann, among other prominent Labor members, losing their seats. That would have been a landslide! And very amusing…
Ken B, Dave Sivyeer and ‘climateace’ have pretty well got it right. Just a few additions on the history in the Liberal Party.
After losing the 2007 election, we had a temporary Leader of the Opposition (Brendan Nelson), then Malcolm Turnbull took over. He supported the Climate Scam fully, and made an agreement with Kevin Rudd that the Liberal Party would support Rudd’s Emission Trading Scheme (ETS), without consulting the Liberal Party Room. Tony, as did many others, objected, and they forced Turnbull into a leadership ballot, which Tony won by one vote, and he became Leader of the Opposition. This meant the end of agreement on the ETS, and, being doubtful of being able to get it past the Senate (the Liberals opposed it, as did the Greens, Rudd dropped the proposal. The Greens opposed it on the ground that it was insufficient, they wanted a far more stringent scheme. From this time on, Rudd’s approval ratings began to decrease, till eventually Miss Gillard and her Union Mates managed to depose him and she became Prime Minister.
After the 2010 election, there was a hung parliament, the Liberal National Party Coalition having 73 seats and the ALP 72 out of 150, with one Green and four Independents. Miss Gillard persuaded the independents to support her by various means, and she formed government. Before the election she had said there would be “No Carbon Tax under the Government that I lead” (see clip shown above), but she persuaded the Greens in the Senate to agree to one, which we unfortunately now have.
It is true that Tony Abbott and the Liberal Party are still in favour of reducing carbon dioxide emissions by 5% in 2020 and in favour of the renewable energy targets. However, they argue that the ETS was a bad scheme – although in terms of economics the best, in practice the easiest to become completely fraudulent and corrupt (see Europe) – and therefore BAD for the country. The “Carbon Tax” is the most efficient, but it is economically bad, as it is levied in such a way as to penalize industry that cannot pass on the tax – ie, all export industries, while the industries that can pass on the tax do so, hurting all consumers, especially those who have to rely on electricity. Also bad in that it was not at first applied to road freight transport, but does to rail fuels, while not applied at all to passenger car fuels, but to the coal that produces electricity for our railways and tramways. A totally bad tax. The “Direct Reduction Scheme” was expected (by those in favour of the ETS) to be the most costly of gaining the desired reduction, but is now to be capped, so it is not an open ended drain on the economy. In addition, the DRS is one which will be used to support various projects which means it will be possible to turn the spending off easily via the Budget if desired (we do!) and can be used to support projects which would otherwise be desirable.
All indications are that Tony is honest, and will be a good Prime Minister.
The efforts must be to further demolish the CAGW scam, and persuade the pollies that it is wrong. Eventually (asap!) the pollies will get around to agreeing, and will drop the bad policies.
Ironic, considering your substance-free reply. I guess it can be daunting to click on a link to check source material, making rhetorical statements and typing “nonsense” a much more appealing prospect.
The sample size was 1 million, and it was national. The questionnaire covered a range of issues – it wasn’t designed to attract a particular demographic, other than those who think about policy and politics.
In another poll, 40% of Australians responding agreed that steps should be taken to address global warming even if costs were significant, slightly more said that steps should be taken but not too costly, and only 15% said no steps should be taken that have economic costs at the present time.
http://lowyinstitute.org/publications/lowy-institute-poll-2013
Or how about getting some wisdom from the man of the hour?
Tony Abbott (2009) – “The argument is absolute crap. However, the politics of this are tough for us. Eighty per cent of people believe climate change is a real and present danger.”
He since recanted on the “absolute crap” statement, clearly stating his acknowledgement of AGW, and the Coalition has a CO2 mitigation strategy it would like to supplant cureent legislation.
Like it or not, a majority of Australians think the government should take steps now to deal with global warming. So does Tony Abbott, for example with the Carbon Purchasing Fund. The Coalition definitely wants to scrap the Carbon Tax (and the ETS, which is legislated to replace it in the next few years). Perversely, it will allow most of the offsets that the tax pays for to stand. That’s a deficit-angled decision, but the full detail of their economic costings has not been released yet. We’ll have to wait to see for ourselves how they will do it – should they successfully repeal the carbon tax.
@ur momisugly David Horscroft September 8, 2013 at 12:50 am.
Nice summary 🙂
But for how long?
Dudley and Pompous
‘All indications are that Tony is honest, and will be a good Prime Minister.
But for how long?’
It is not looking all that good, actually.
Abbott has broken three undertakings on day 1.
The first was to go somewhere or otherwhere unimportant.
The second was that he failed to turn back a boat today.
The third was Abbott’s repeated promise that under an Abbott Government there would be ‘no suprises’.
Abbott has made numerous public undertakings to turn back the boats. So counts as a ‘sutprise’ that he was peddling off on his bicycle somewhere when a boat was not turned back.
So far he is sticking to his repeated promise that there would be ‘no excuses’.
Dudley
One of the very interesting things about Abbott is the degree to which he will continue to be able to reconcile (or paper over) two fundamentally-opposed factions in his Party and Coalition Partner – the National Party. It is simply not possible for there to be a sensible policy and programmatic compromise between the opposing worldviews of AGW deniers and an AGW supporters.
The elements of the currently promised $3 billion CO2 reduction spend looks very awkward at best and bad policy at worst for precisely this reason. While they were in Opposition both factions could comfort themselves that it did not really matter.
Now when it all turns real because they have power – it does matter.
Watch this space.
I don’t know where you live, Mike, but the Oz MSM have mostly slanted their commentary to the right. Amazingly, News LTD paper The Telegraph took out what were virtually front page ads for the Coalition. You won’t believe these front-page pictures.
http://www.macrobusiness.com.au/wp-content/uploads/2013/08/ScreenHunter_23-Aug.-08-09.18.gif
http://www.macrobusiness.com.au/wp-content/uploads/2013/09/ScreenHunter_27-Sep.-02-14.40.gif
Yes, they’re real. No, the MSM in Australia is not left-wing. Can’t believe I’ve lived to see the day when a major newspaper stumps for a political party in full-page, front-page spreads. There are no examples of this sort of campaigning for Labor. Are there examples in other parts of the world? Apart from the New York Post (News LTD again) endorsing Mitt Romey on the front page.
“climateace says:
September 8, 2013 at 1:58 am”
The Govn’t is in “caretaker mode” and Abbott, and none of his cabinet, isn’t sworn in as PM yet. So less than one day into being “PM”, what do you expect him to do?
Dudley
Nice post about the niceties. Given the likely senate composition come July 2014 it is unlikely that Labor would see much point in opposing Abbott’s climate initiatives between then and now.
The public servants can be sacked these days so no real need to finesse anything there. If they get in the way in the interim it is quite easy to change their duty statements.
I doubt whether the High Court, unpredictable though it may be, would countenance a regulation the sole purpose of which is to circumvent the powers of the Senate to disallow (or not) a regulation. No doubt the lawyers would make hay out of it, nevertheless.
While the DD is a threat, it is IMHO more implied than real. Lots of newbies would hate having the possibility of having their lollies snatched from their grasp. Another election campaign would cost the parties money they do not have. And, given the increasingly strange outcomes being generated by swarms of candidates and lots of microparties in the Senate any outcome is possible. The risks are disproportionate to the rewards.
Still, the basic principle applies: no current government is bound by the actions of its predecessors.
IMHO, the major difficulties will not be apparent until Abbott&Co examine the small print in various government CO2 contracts with the large corporation energy suppliers.
Breaking many, many very big contracts would certainly cost hundreds of millions and may well cost billions. Who knows? Not the public and not Abbott.
We could be reasonably sure that both the corporations involved and the Gillard Government had a vested interested in locking the stuff down contractually as far and as hard as possible.
Patrick
He announced that he was on the job today being briefed by departmental secretaries.
Dudley,
yep, you’ve pointed out the hurdles in abolishing the Carbon Tax. Basically the point I was trying to make against suggestions above that the Carbon Tax repeal is a done deal.
Labor will likely oppose, along with the Greens and Abbott will most likely have to call a double dissolution if he wants to move forward. He has promised exactly that. Remains to be seen if he has the ticker to do it, as the opportunity to do so will arrive no sooner than 2015 (Carbon Tax to be supplanted by the ETS July 1 of that year), and could cost him the Prime Ministership if the move fails. Most likely outcome is some tinkering with legislation as is, and blaming Labor and the Greens for not fully making good the promise (if anyone actually holds him to it). In the meantime, Australian households will probably be less opposed to the scheme if each tax period rolls by and their overall nett income has changed little. I think that is the likeliest scenario, but the Coalition are quite good at calmly selling negative stories, so who knows?
“tonyM says:
September 8, 2013 at 12:29 am”
Took me a while to find something on the claim however, it seems a small town paper was “making stuff up” or simply wasn’t paying attention?
http://blogs.abc.net.au/victoria/2009/12/climate-change-is-crap-tony-abbot-said-to-the-pyrenees-advocate.html
The MSM here in Aus seem to relish every opportunity to “beat up” Abbott.
“climateace says:
September 8, 2013 at 2:30 am”
You are suggesting he can actually do anything without first being sworn in by the Governor General?
Patrick
‘The MSM here in Aus seem to relish every opportunity to “beat up” Abbott.’
You obviously do not subscribe to The Australian, the Sun Herald or the Daily Telegraph.
Corroborating the remarks, right-wing national newspaper The Australian quoted a Liberal party (Abbott’s party) vice-president of the branch which hosted the event where Abbott made the remark in 2009.
http://www.theaustralian.com.au/politics/the-town-that-turned-up-the-temperature/story-e6frgczf-1225809567009
When later asked about the comment, Abbott said he was tired and the remark did not represent his considered opinion. It wasn’t made-up – unless Abbott was lying about his own words.
I think it is impossible to know his actual views on climate change. Although he now claims to ‘believe’ in AGW, and has endorsed Coalition policies to mitigate CO2 emissions, it’s more likely that his position reflects the political realities of the majority of Australians who think the government should deo so, which Tony himself has acknowledged (putting the figure at 80% in his own words).
We have had a great result here. I know a couple of the new minor conservative senators personally. They are not the loonies the media make them out to be. This could be an opportunity to turn back some of the politically correct crap of the last couple of decades. If Tony Abbott plays his cards right, he can get in the sort of stuff he would love to get through and claim it was at the behest of the minor parties. 🙂
“climateace says:
September 8, 2013 at 3:14 am”
I subscribe to none of them, least of all the two main propaganda branches of the Govn’t namely the ABC and SBS. However, the media that were rallying around in support of Rudd in 2007 and Gillard in 2010 are the very same media who dumped Rudd in favour of Abbott. Choosing winners? It’s wasn’t a difficult choice. The general opinion I have observed is that “Murdock media” put Rudd into power in 2007 and replaced him with Abbott in 2013.
Here’s me thinking we live in a free and democratic Constitutional Monarchy free from the influence of media “big money”. Clearly I have the nasty end of the stick.
It seems my posts continued to be left in the moderation cue and posted after much deay, despite doing nothing wrong. Mods, if your goal is to encourage me out of the discussion, it’s working. Pity – I try to be polite and on point, engaging the topics and not flaming. My experience with WUWT is that it stifles debate. I don’t get this treatment at any other blog on either side of the debate. Other than my remarks often being contrary to the party line, I’m mystified as to the reason, having been given none. What is the rationale behind this policy?
crosspatch says: September 7, 2013 at 8:48 pm
(Jon wrote about Norway already at 8:01 am.)
In Sweden we had our regime change seven years ago, but not much has changed regarding the (fake) climate issue. The economy is better though … We still have the carbon tax (as one of the first countries that introduced it). Media is still allowed to express false propaganda, without being able to come up with any kind of evidence. Next year, we have national selection again.
The left wing parties along with the media seems to do most things, in a desperate attempt to smear existing right wing government. They themselves (left wing) don’t care about their own obvious problems (factional, utopian campaign promises and other things that are rarely mentioned in media …). Also, they (Socialist Party) still have not dealt with their very dark period(s) during the 1900s (especially the ’30s-’40s). As I see it, the outcome of the next election will depend on whether voters are able to see through the smear campaign or not.
An obvious help for existing government to remain in power, is when anyone from the “Green” Party opens his/her (its) mouth … (ignorance has no limits …)
Labor is in denial. They are furiously pretending that the carbon tax lie had nothing to do with the result, even though it was a major tool to remove both Prime Ministers during the one term by their own Labor caucus.
The greens are pretending that things went very well despite losing 25% of their vote and more than likely 1 or 2 Senators in the Upper House ( the Senate). Labor is pretending things have gone very well because they have lost less seats than predicted. The truth is, that it is Labor’s worst loss since Federation of the States in 1901.
Such hypocrites. After the 2007 and 2010 elections they made much hullabaloo about having a mandate, even if they had to lie about the carbon tax. Now with a record win, they are saying the Abbot Government does not have a mandate.
And they wonder why they have been so thoroughly rejected.
Voters looked at their cost of living after the green madness has been inflicted on the so-called major polluters. The major polluters just passed the costs onto voters.
Then there are the green absurdities. A man in Sydney contacted his local council about removing a tree since greens do not recognize right to property. He was worried that it might fall on his house. The council refused permission by Heritage Listing the tree. Soon after, it blew over in a storm and crushed his house. The council refused any responsibility and the insurance company refused to pay saying the tree was not their problem.
Smug green bastards. I believe after making it public, he ended in winning his case. Greens thrive out of sight and in positions where they make themselves unaccountable.
In Queensland, they passed a Vegetation Management Plan that meant a person charged was guilty as soon as he was investigated. They altered the separation of powers so that the judges were part of the executive, not independent. In other words, anyone appearing in front of the judge was already guilty, it was just a matter of deciding the fine.
They also provided a permit system, where they could alter the maps after the event despite granting permission for someone to enjoy their own property, to make themselves right.
That would appear to break one of the major tenents of law, that you cannot be found guilty if the law is impossible to follow.
This reprehensible vegetation act was passed by the Labor party following instructions from the greens. The greens with 10% of the vote was dictating what the 90% should do.
“barry says:
September 8, 2013 at 3:17 am”
Well I am not convinced, “corroboration” in a two-bit media article, without any form of documentary evidence, just “hearsay”, what so ever, means nothing IMO. It’s falls in to the Gore quotes category where he is said, in the media, to have “invented the internet”. As I have found (I didn’t really bother while Abbott was in opposition), there is plenty of documentary evidence, audio and visual records, which supports what tonyM said at September 8, 2013 at 12:29 am. The word “science” has been left out of many of Abbotts quotes, even while we have SkS quoting the comment, it appears, correctly. Who knew SkS would get something right?
“barry says:
September 8, 2013 at 4:30 am”
I believe you are taking this way out of proportion. I am a long-time regular poster here, so are many others, sometimes a post pops into the moderation bin. It happens.
“Jack says:
September 8, 2013 at 6:13 am
The greens with 10% of the vote was dictating what the 90% should do.”
This is, apparently, democracy.
Well if that’s so, it’s just more of the same bull politicking we’ve seen from both sides this election season. Gillard’s apparent backflip on the Carbon Tax was one in a list of disappointments that broke trust with the public. It probably wasn’t a key factor – after all Howard survived backflipping on his pledge to “never ever” introduce a GST and went on to hold power for a record period. And Rudd was not associated (in the public mind) with the Carbon Tax, and bringing forward the
ETS was probably a vehicle for reinforcing that distance.
I think rather it was the combination of two leadership changes and a poor campaign full of policies that broke faith with different stripes of Labor supporters. Rudd’s reinastatement was greeted with a surge in the polls, which was squandered in the Labor campaign. The Coalition’s negative campaigning changed to something more positive in the last couple of weeks when his popularity slumped. The elction result was less about Coalition appeal and more about Labor failures. Abbott was never popular – he polled low up until the last week. Labor’s failures made him a more appealing candidate.
I personally don’t have high hopes for Abbott – he displays much less experience as a leader than he should considering his time in politics – but maybe he’ll grow into the office.
dbstealey says: September 7, 2013 at 9:06 pm
If you’re an US citizen, the only way you could have missed it, is through media censorship … but if you were just as active on the Internet back in 2004 as you are now, then you have few excuses. The issues with the US election back then (and later) was clearly observed & reviewed by media in Europe and in the rest of the world (is it time to demand independent/international electoral observers in the United States?).
These sites sums it up:
http://whatreallyhappened.com/WRHARTICLES/2004votefraud.html
http://www.yuricareport.com/ElectionAftermath04/ThreeResearchStudiesBushIsOut.htm
(Conspiratorial pages? Maybe, but they also mediate links … Also, Internet is a wonderful thing where it’s possible to search for and find information/things. In general (and regarding your other comments), anyone who’s capable to manage a computer and have an Internet connection …, but not everyone looks further then the few first search results, fewer beyond the first page … How many to get the hole picture? Even less. How many checks the results from different search engines? Extremely few!)
Regarding the “(sic)” (and you stating not to be a Republican),
this is a typical path of leftists, when trying to win arguments … (a cheap shot, as pointing at irrelevant details a.k.a. arm waving etc.)
Most important, you don’t know me, like you don’t know most of the commentators here on WUWT, but I’ll help you along with the most important things:
* I’m a non English native speaking person (Swedish).
* I’m dyslexic (Regardless, I read everything here on WUWT, except for looong (sic!) comments and I make my own conclusions, mostly based on what I did learn in school …).
* Due to my medication (terbutaline based), I have limitations in my fine motor skills and these minor tremors are unfortunately like the dyslexia, a permanent state that I have to deal with the rest of my life …
* Most of the time when I’m on the Internet, I’m using a smartphone (try imagine the size of the keyboard …). I think I’ll manage anyway through persistence. Expressed political and scientific ignorance by professionals bothers me actually a lot more …
About you,
* You neither misspell or make grammatical errors.
* I guess you have a keyboard that follows the QWERTY standard – take a look at the key that is positioned to the direct left of the “i” key …