Wow. Abbott as an unprincipled weathervane on climate change. It is an accurate description of Tony Abbott with one exception. Malcolm misrepresents by asserting that Abbott claims his policy will be zero cost. He doesn’t claim that but, by avoiding the use of market instruments, the Abbott policy will be high cost.
‘Tony himself has, in just 4 or 5 months, publicly advocated the blocking of the ETS, the passing of the ETS, the amending of the ETS and, if the amendments were satisfactory, passing it, and now the blocking of it’.
Update: Abbott loses the few scruples he had and promotes denialist Nick Minchin to replace Energy and Resources spokesperson MacFarlane. And he makes the mouth Barnaby Joyce Treasury spokesperson. The defeat of the CPRS and the successes of Abbott have fueled worldwide climate change denialism.
HT to DD
I print this attack in full below:
While a shadow minister, Tony Abbott was never afraid of speaking bluntly in a manner that was at odds with Coalition policy.
So as I am a humble backbencher I am sure he won’t complain if I tell a few home truths about the farce that the Coalition’s policy, or lack of policy, on climate change has descended into.
First, let’s get this straight. You cannot cut emissions without a cost. To replace dirty coal fired power stations with cleaner gas fired ones, or renewables like wind let alone nuclear power or even coal fired power with carbon capture and storage is all going to cost money.
To get farmers to change the way they manage their land, or plant trees and vegetation all costs money.
Somebody has to pay.
So any suggestion that you can dramatically cut emissions without any cost is, to use a favourite term of Mr Abbott, “bullshit.” Moreover he knows it.
The whole argument for an emissions trading scheme as opposed to cutting emissions via a carbon tax or simply by regulation is that it is cheaper – in other words, electricity prices will rise by less to achieve the same level of emission reductions.
The term you will see used for this is “least cost abatement”.
It is not possible to criticise the new Coalition policy on climate change because it does not exist. Mr Abbott apparently knows what he is against, but not what he is for.
Second, as we are being blunt, the fact is that Tony and the people who put him in his job do not want to do anything about climate change. They do not believe in human caused global warming. As Tony observed on one occasion “climate change is crap” or if you consider his mentor, Senator Minchin, the world is not warming, it’s cooling and the climate change issue is part of a vast left wing conspiracy to deindustrialise the world.
Now politics is about conviction and a commitment to carry out those convictions. The Liberal Party is currently led by people whose conviction on climate change is that it is “crap” and you don’t need to do anything about it. Any policy that is announced will simply be a con, an environmental figleaf to cover a determination to do nothing. After all, as Nick Minchin observed, in his view the majority of the Party Room do not believe in human caused global warming at all. I disagree with that assessment, but many people in the community will be excused for thinking the leadership ballot proved him right.
Remember Nick Minchin’s defense of the Howard Government’s ETS was that the Government was panicked by the polls and therefore didn’t really mean it.
Tony himself has, in just four or five months, publicly advocated the blocking of the ETS, the passing of the ETS, the amending of the ETS and, if the amendments were satisfactory, passing it, and now the blocking of it.
His only redeeming virtue in this remarkable lack of conviction is that every time he announced a new position to me he would preface it with “Mate, mate, I know I am a bit of a weather vane on this, but…..”
Third, there is a major issue of integrity at stake here and Liberals should reflect very deeply on it. We have an Opposition whose current leadership dismisses the Howard Government’s ETS policy as being just a political ploy. We have an Opposition Leader who has in the space of a few months held every possible position on the issue, each one contradicting the position he expressed earlier. And finally we have an Opposition which negotiated amendments to the Rudd Government’s ETS, then reached agreement on those amendments and then, a week later, reneged on the agreement.
Many Liberals are rightly dismayed that on this vital issue of climate change we are not simply without a policy, without any prospect of having a credible policy but we are now without integrity. We have given our opponents the irrefutable, undeniable evidence that we cannot be trusted.
Not that anyone would doubt it, but I will be voting for the ETS legislation when it returns in February and if my colleagues have any sense they will do so as well.
Well if Malcolm and Kevin believe so strongly in Jones, Mann, et al they have the total tax take at their disposal to raise via their preferred CO2E mechanism and indeed Kevin could have started doing that 2 years ago, or at least when a like minded malcolm took over the reins of the Opposition. I’m certain the Greens would have agreed wholeheartedly with them if they wanted to get a serious start on raising the private cost of carbon for us all. Naturally Bob Brown was never a big fan of their idea of handing out millions in free permits to their big union/big biz mates to fuel the trading profits of Morgan Sachs and Co.
Tony and many in the Liberal and National Parties are still wondering if the science is settled of course, those thorny issues of contention being raised most succinctly here-
http://wattsupwiththat.com/2009/12/06/american-thinker-understanding-climategates-hidden-decline/#more-13783
Now after some concerned person managed to publicise some very worrying correspondence and fortran code from the inner circle of the commanding heights of AGW advocacy/science the word Climategate entered the lexicon very promptly. It seemed to confirm every complaint from anyone who had ever dared question the data and methodology of these AGW tzars and their very large caravan of enthusiasts. It also appeared that they had been deliberately obfuscating and avoiding mandated and reasonable FOIA requests for very questionable motives. Dr Jones has now stood down while EAU, with the blessing of an initially hesitant Pachauri, conduct an investigation into it all. As well Penn State are investigating Michael Mann and Co for the same reasons. Indeed one Mike Hume from EAU itself has come out and stated the stunning revelations call into question the whole IPCC process itself and it may have well have outlived its usefulness.
What is the layperson and his duly elected representative to make of all this? Particularly when many scientists are coming out and laying accusations of subverting the peer review process, fudging data and refusing to publicise the raw data and methodology? They are even accused of bullying and being criminals by one of their academic peers here- http://www.quadrant.org.au/blogs/doomed-planet/2009/12/skeptics-in-wonderland
certainly accusations that are not often heard among polite academics. Is he correct or just a disgruntled academic sore that some research piece didn’t make it past honorable peer review?
All this and it’s no wonder our elected representatives like Abbott are wavering somewhat. Not so some like Turnbull and Rudd it seems who are full steam ahead with Copenhagen based on all this. I must say it makes me marvel at their steadfastness and certainty with it all, whether or not you think their solution is one of feed Morgan Sachs and starve the world, etc. We shall see how all this steadfastness goes in Copenhagen while this new Climategate furore rages on at home I guess. Abbott too.
There was a word I was looking for, that Turnbull is often accused of and some say contributed greatly to his downfall. It was on the tip of my tongue. It somehow seemed relevant to all of this from scientists who believed they could capture the temperature of the ages to all sorts of things. But then I thought, nah observa, it’s all just Greek to you meboy you silly lay agnostic and would you believe it? Naturally an educated, true believer, in the know can come up with the answer straight away-
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/sciencetech/article-1233624/Copenhagen-climate-summit-Yes-climate-change-real-conference-wrong-way-tackling-argues-professor-Mike-Hulme-University-East-Anglia.html
He’s wrong observa. Countries reached an agreement to limit CFC emissions.
With a mix of hard line religion, anglo saxon morality and agricultural amorphism the updated shadow bench is more like “back to the future”
Fruit scones anyone?
They can agree all they like among all their limos and Groupthink kumbaya talkfests but they all have to come back home and walk that talk with a skeptical public now, who were already getting cold feet before Climategate broke. The polls all show that and the closer these high priests got to putting their magic pudding in the oven, the more the BS detectors began to kick in. Climategate is beginning to kick those detectors into overdrive now and many in the science community are jumping off. It remains to be seen how quickly and how many pollies follow suit. We’ll see.
Couldn’t help chuckling about this on the BBC-
“Gordon Brown has warned the UK faces a “catastrophe” of floods, droughts and killer heatwaves if world leaders fail to agree a deal on climate change.
He addressed the Major Economies Forum in London, which brings together 17 of the world’s biggest greenhouse gas-emitting countries where he said there was “no plan B” if agreement was not reached at December’s UN summit in Copenhagen.
Negotiators have 50 days to save the world from global warming, he added.”
What NO Plan B? GULP!!!!
Let’s have a decko at walking the talk shall we? Rudd basically kicks it off with- ‘It won’t cost you anything folks, honest!’ Now check out the unusually high number of comments and which way the comments are running here-
http://www.news.com.au/national/kevin-rudd-pledges-to-repay-ets-rise/story-e6frfkvr-1225808012641
Get the picture? How long do you think it will be before the marginal punters that count, swing behind Climategate and the science isn’t settled? All Abbott and Co have to do is hammer the massive tax grab line, promise them a few windmills and solar panels and Rudd and Co will be oncers. They won’t be alone there around the world.
Malcolm might like to consider that Tony Abbott has not said that we don’t need to respond to the climate change argument; his argument is that tax is not a response we should be favouring. He did say that the argument about climate change is crap, not that climate change is crap. The phrase Climate Change is a tautology anyway and I am sure that Abbott would know that. But then Malcolm is not alone I guess in seeing no difference in meaning or intent between CC is crap and the argument about CC is crap.
I have just been listening to and reading Amory Lovins, am taken by his position, including that governments should steer not row. Has anyone the time or inclination to direct me to rebuttals of his views please.
Ros, leave off – Abbot is on record saying that `climate change is crap’ and that is his argument. Why bother dissembling Abbott?
There you go again rog, wanting to irrefutably conflate global ETS opponents with AGW theory skeptics and outright deniers. I’m an agnostic on AGW (albeit getting less agnostic by the day given the stench emitting from East Anglia and the number of scientists that are increasingly smelling it) but I’m at one with Abbott that there’s also something rotten in Denmark- http://www.news.com.au/world/copenhagen-conference-in-disarray/story-e6frfkyi-1225808437312?from=public_rss
Surprise, surprise! Didn’t you wise folk realise that carbon credit creation and the new world order would require ‘Your World Bank’, not to mention the usual given the GFC (or particularly unusual)- http://www.theaustralian.com.au/news/proposed-carbon-trading-scheme-is-rife-for-fraud/story-0-1225750093424
So their Danish Text was ‘leaked’ was it? You sure it wasn’t one of those evil professional hackers chaps?
From news website-
“THE UN says the theft of emails from climate researchers was a professional job, with hackers probably paid by people wanting to sabotage the Copenhagen summit.
Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change vice-chairman Jean-Pascal van Ypersele said the theft from the University of East Anglia’s Climatic Research Unit was not the work of amateur climate sceptics, The Times newspaper reported yesterday.
He said it was a sophisticated and well-funded attempt to destroy public confidence in the science of man-made climate change.”
And in the US their left are blaming these evil hackers as Russians too. Oh the irony. Haven’t you heard about the Wall yet chaps? It’s like this rog. I’m a market green man and can see lots of problems with the current constitution of our marketplace, as can so many of my peers, but we’ll be damned if we’re going to let these new world order hijacking agendists make it worse with this stinking pile of crap and all who sail with it, for whatever their reasons. I’m with Ros and Lovins and trust Abbott is too until he proves otherwise. Steer not row? Sounds a damn sight better than some beating the drum while the galley slaves are chained to the oars. You work it out for yourself rog, after you’ve worked out the delicate and subtle nuances between leaker, hacker and whistle-blower.
“Has anyone the time or inclination to direct me to rebuttals of his views please.”
Not an expert on Lovins Ros but let me have a go here. Perhaps we can identify two main threads to him. His ‘steer not row’ argument and some specific, pressing and practical policies that flow from that and his overall experience(negawatts perhaps). Who should steer, how and where to becomes the immediate question and I’d answer that it should always be the invisible hand guiding us all. The moment you deviate from that, if not exactly the road to serfdom in mature democracies, it’s the road to rent seeking, special treatment, subsidies and eggsperts picking winners, not to mention capture by self-serving elites(the Graduarts Class). The notion that all of us were created equal and as such should face a level playing field on price is a powerful one the founding fathers missed badly, I’d suggest most strongly. All power to the individual dollar voters here.
However it seems clear that the environment and environmental ‘goods’ appear to suffer badly under that regime. Greenies have an obvious point. Lovins Negawatts and say John Wamsleys Earth Sanctuaries don’t seem to get a look-in and they should get a much greater hearing. My answer to that is simply because of the design of our current constitutional marketplace and I can easily conceive of one that doesn’t. There is a third way through the mire here folks if you’ll just stop tripping out trying to change the world when the answer is all about you in the Lovins and Walmesleys, etc. Basically have faith in the undying ingenuity, entrepreneurship and industry of your fellow citizens in your small patch of mankind. If not them, who then? Just you?
Now you may say that’s impossible or someone would have thought of it before and besides I’m a true left greenie and it’s blindingly obvious there’s clear market failure with Gaia and Marx was right all along and the EAU CRU can prove it. Alright suppose we accept that premise and your hubris, then you explain to me just how you’ll allocate your omniscient public resources between what Lovins and Walmesley are both advocating? In my market green constitutional marketplace I can leave it all up to the marketplace to decide and they’ll both get a very good hearing from all your individual dollar votes. That’s the third way chums.
Thanks Observa. I will chuck in another observation of Lovin’s, that we have fallen for the line that “protection must be costly or we would already have done it” Gells well with your have faith in the ingenuity etc, as he lists the organisations that have made billions just by improving their energy efficiencies, because efficiency is cheaper than fuel.
It was a good question Ros. It was like imagining the ultimate Gaia superbug had wrought its final vengeance on them all. All the Bolts, Blairs, Abbotts and Minchins are gone and there’s only the true Gaias left. It was touch and go for the agnostic O there for a while but he pulled out of the coma to be left with all the true Gaias. The Flannerys, Lovins, Walmesleys, Hansens, Bellamys, Gores, etc, etc. Now I think you can see clearly what sort of world the agnostic O finds himself in. Some Bellamy type whistleblower has released those EAU emails and the Hansens, Bellamys and Walmesleys are on the warpath against the Flannerys, Lovins and Gores with their new world order and CO2 is THE great evil and we need a global ETS above all else. The science isn’t settled say the skeptics and ETS doubters and the O is in a bit of a quandary. How does he choose?
Guys, guys, what are you all doing? We had one Great Amory Lovin going here and this skeptic/denier accusation stuff has split the Kumbaya down the middle. Garrett has split with Rudd and Wong and joined Bob Brown and we’re back to the bad old days before the Great Cleansing. We’re all concerned with saving the planet and I can see that but this stench out of EAU needs seriously looking into. Streuth even a 6th grader can see that- http://wattsupwiththat.com/2009/12/09/picking-out-the-uhi-in-global-temperature-records-so-easy-a-6th-grader-can-do-it/
What if you true believers are wrong on this and we all go down this path of carbon credit creation and trading, that hasn’t worked so far and already shows clear signs of rorting plus some very nasty externalities. Can I suggest you consider the obvious middle road solution and go with the Hansenites here? After all we have the total level of taxation to play with here with CO2E taxing and what’s your problem? Would you want to go to that extreme now folks?
Perhaps the reader can help the poor Observa out a bit here now that he’s cleared away all the nasty mire and clutter for you true believers. Can you see the path to the third way?
Turnbull as quoted:
We are indebted to HC for bringing Mr Turnbull’s defiant parting shots to our attention.
FWIW I thought Turnbull’s performance throughout the whole ETS episode was magnificent, the final words especially. He stood up for classical liberal principles against a faction who were clearly irrational and invidious.
The LP decided to ignore his sage advice and strong leadership and go for a politician whose idea of policy making is a flurry of blows. The elevation of Minchin and Joyce to senior ministerial positions is a joke. Although I have time for Andrews whose views on immigration are sound.
The LP will pay dearly for their mad minute, if they are already not having buyers regret. I predict that they will perform significantly worse in 2010 than their 2007 result (ALP 53 – L/NP 47). Most likely looking at a landslide loss (~ ALP 56 – L/NP 44 TPP).
Jack,
I thought Abbott might come to his senses as the responsibilities of his leadership set in. Instead he is shooting blind without policy or knowledge-cum-sense. His exaggerated claims of the costing of the ETS, his failure to acknowledge that the costs of his supply-driven policy will be higher, his disparagement of the Copenhagen process and his deception that an externality tax that is largely refunded to citizens is a massive tax grab make me see in Abbott everything that is contemptible in modern politics.
Joyce is a mouth without a brain and Minchin is a contemptible joke on the Australian public. I cannot express too strongly my disappointment and opposition to what is happening in Australian conservative politics.
Ah so that’s the way it is guys. Poor old Abbott can’t see the light of the true believers and pure theorists and it’s an absolute ‘travesty’ that he can’t eh? True, he mightn’t have all the answers, but he just might have the right doubts about the limited application of a theory by all these end is nigh doomsayers and their religious fervour blinding them to the obvious. But don’t take it from me, take it straight from the horses’ mouths- http://online.wsj.com/article/SB125011380094927137.html
observa, The WSJ article provides counterarguments to those proposing cap-and-trade solutions and the main alternative proposed is a carbon tax. That is certainly not something Abbott is suggesting. Either of these policies is a mile better than doing nothing which is what people like Minchin want. I continue to believe that cap-and-trade (without foolish exemptions) will have very similar effects to a tax set at the auctioned price of a cap-and-trade system (again without foolish tax exemptions).
These arguments constitute a debate economists have had but have nought to do with the case for controlling emissions.
“The WSJ article provides counterarguments to those proposing cap-and-trade solutions”
Actually I would say that under the circumstances of a Goriath religion that equates any criics of both the science behind AGW and/or their global ETS fix with heretics and blasphemers, the very mildly expressed ‘concerns’ of Cap and Trade originators are really a piercing alarm for all global ETS fans. These blokes aren’t stupid. It’s a bit like a central banker in Glenn Stevens admitting that they might have taken their eye off the ball with asset prices after the GFC. Read my lips here folks!
So Abbott could well be instinctively half right with an opposition to a global ETS and Turnbull the other half. Not that you’d know it from the deliberate conflation of the true believers but perhaps you have to be a half intelligent agnostic to see that. Basically I’m faced with eating a pudding that supposedly has all the right ingredients (EAU problems notwithstanding) but a stinker of a recipe as the two master chefs are telling me loud and clear, not that I or Abbott need any convincing that there’s too many amateur cooks and kitchenhands, lacking any past credibility, about to cook the lot. Meanwhile I’ll reserve judgement on the soundness of their main ingredient, whatever the expert food inspectors are in disagreement over.