Australian
There is currently 1 person viewing this thread.
These 5453 comments are related to the topic:
THE CLIMATE CHANGE MYTH that Julia wants us all to pay for
THE CLIMATE CHANGE MYTH that Julia wants us all to pay for
sort by:
Show
per page
Replies: 5,453
|
By:
Finally some genuine and logical thinking.
Very well said thebas, agree with you. My issue is with the current proposed Gillard Labor carbon tax - which serves no purpose, other than helping the comrades achieve a surplus in 2013. |
|
By:
the tax hasn't even been designed yet and you're all bagging it - maybe we should just go back to the ETS we'd have now if Howard won in 2007 (thank God?) he didn't!!! or the one the Libs and Labor had agreed on before Abbott came along
|
|
By:
pxb
Joined: 07 Jun 10 Replies: 577 09 Dec 10 01:56 I think you'll find it's the balance of CO 2 pxb...picture a locked car filling up with Co 2 ....everything dies... Picture a second car filling up with oxygen at the same rate (starting from current atmospheric levels), everything dies in the oxygen car first. This is because increasing levels of oxygen are more toxic to both plants and animals than increasing levels of CO2. I'm a scientist and am well aware that the CO2/climate circus is the price we pay for a society where 90% of the population is ignorant of basic science. Good on you pxb: Obviously the reverse is true with oxygen as you say.Again ...it would be good to see some knowledge and balance from the pollies....but they have costed the amount of revenue from the tax no doubt. |
|
By:
Looks like the world's environment ministers don't read the Betfair forum and think it's something worth worrying about - sure it would've been nice to see them go further but it's good they got an agreement.
From the Herald Sun website THE Federal Government needs to "get cracking" on establishing a price on pollution following the UN climate deal in Cancun, campaigners say. More than 190 countries represented at the United Nations-led talks today agreed to seek "deep cuts" in carbon emissions, which science links with global warming. "Just before dawn overnight in Mexico the UN got its mojo back in terms of taking action on pollution and climate change," John Connor of The Climate Institute said in Sydney. "Australia is coming into 2011, the year the prime minister said would be the year of action on pollution and climate change. "We need now to not only meet international commitments, but to remain competitive, to put a price on pollution and to have a flexible mechanism to increase that ambition as years come." The challenge before the Federal Government was to get legislation through that could "actually establish a price on pollution but also have the flexibility to meet ambitious pollution reduction efforts," Mr Connor said. Australia's target to reach a five per cent emissions cut by 2020 on 2000 levels was not enough, Mr Connor said. "What's important for us is that we get action that enables us to do the full range of our commitments to at least 25 per cent reductions on 2000 levels by 2020 and that investors in the market can see that's potentially going to happen," he said. "It's really time Australia got cracking with some action here and that's the challenge for the Australian parliament so we can match international efforts." While the Cancun agreement wasn't binding, Climate Change Minister Greg Combet suggested it would lead to major polluters like the US and China taking steps to cut their emissions. "Australia's main objective in international climate change talks is to achieve a comprehensive international agreement covering all major emitters," he said. "The outcome achieved at Cancun is an important step towards this goal and in line with our stated objectives leading into this conference." The UN Framework Convention on Climate Change also agreed to start a new fund to manage billions of dollars in aid to poor nations. It anchors pledges made by developed and developing nations at the 2009 Copenhagen conference, which led to the non-binding Copenhagen Accord. "This is important because it provides an agreed pathway to achieve major emissions cuts," Mr Combet said. "This is the first time that all major emitters have agreed to report to the world community their commitments and efforts to reduce carbon pollution in their own economies." |
|
By:
Won't Get Fooled Again - The Who
We'll be fighting in the streets With our children at our feet And the morals when they worship will be gone And the men who spurred us on Sit in judgement of all wrong They decide and the shotgun sings the song I'll tip my hat to the new constitution Take a bow for the new revolution Smile and grin at the change all around Pick up my guitar and play Just like yesterday Then I'll get on my knees and pray We don't get fooled again The change, it had to come We knew it all along We were liberated from the foe, that's all And the world looks just the same And history ain't changed 'Cause the banners, they'd all flown in the last war I'll tip my hat to the new constitution Take a bow for the new revolution Smile and grin at the change all around Pick up my guitar and play Just like yesterday Then I'll get on my knees and pray We don't get fooled again No, no! I'll move myself and my family aside If we happen to be left half alive I'll get all my papers and smile at the sky For I know that the hypnotized never lie Do ya? Yeaaaaaaaaaaaaaa! There's nothing in the street Looks any different to me And the slogans are out-phased, by-the-bye And the parting on the left Is now parting on the right And their beards have all grown longer overnight I'll tip my hat to the new constitution Take a bow for the new revolution Smile and grin at the change all around Pick up my guitar and play Just like yesterday Then I'll get on my knees and pray We don't get fooled again Don't get fooled again No, no! Yeaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaah! Meet the new boss Same as the old boss |
|
By:
Can somebody please explain that by Gillard saying " without surety ...electricity prices will continue going up" ...does this mean with a carbon tax they will not continue to go up...fk me
Fkn blatant lies...fkn embarssment to be called a primeminister |
|
By:
Very well said AP.
The PM has been incredibly lazy in her language in recent weeks. Needs to pull up her socks - the rumours are already awash with Labor heavyweights re-posturing themselves and factions whispering away. I've said it before and I'll say it again - Labor have missed the boat on climate change - if Labor, led blindly by by Bob Brown and the watermelons think they'll pull this nonsense over the publics eyes - they are dreaming. This ship, Labor, will sink faster than the Titanic in late 2011 on the back of a carbon tax and on the back of continued hopelessness, that is, the Gillard leadership. Footnote to wombleoz: we've seen and read all this nonsense before wombleoz, remember the COPENHAGEN get together - what a great fkn success that was...ffs  |
|
By:
mcrann hits the mark again
SUNDAY December 12 2010 is a date which will live on in stupidity. In Canberra we had the Treasurer Wayne Swan unveil his 'McBank package.' It takes a very special kind of stupid to craft something that is both pointless and destructive. A package which if it actually 'achieved' what it 'thought' it set out to do, would do very little to actually help customers of financial institutions. But would damage our financial system, impose real costs on the taxpayer, encourage 'moral hazard', and so hurt the very individual Australians it purports to want to help. In Cancun we had the Climate Change Minister Greg Combet sign Australia up to a climate change framework which was even more pointless and yet at the same time even more destructive than his cabinet colleague's effort. What was 'agreed' at - the now even more appropriately tagged - Cantcun, will make four-fifths of five-eighths of very little difference to global greenhouse gas emissions and so to the globe's temperature that they are purported to raise. Yet it will mount a direct attack on YOU. All of you. Both continuing to unnecessarily raise the price of your electricity and attacking the foundation of our economy more broadly. In sum, we didn't just have two cabinet ministers embrace stupidity on the same day. But embrace it on a truly breathtaking scale. Further, what each proposes is in its way a direct assault on the nation. Swan and Combet individually, and the Gillard Government collectively, stand accused of betraying the national interest and every single Australian. Now I was half-wrong when I wrote last week that Cantcun would be as complete a failure as the previous year's Copenfloppen. That it wouldn't even get the previous gas-fest's 'agreement to do nothing.' It did just enough to ensure that the caravan of 15,000-plus true believers, main-chancers, freeloaders and assorted green lunatics could straggle on to South Africa next year. That is, after all, the primary purpose of these climate change conferences - to justify the one next year. Which's main purpose will be to ensure they all straggle to another free lunch in Rio de Janeiro in 2012. More accurately, gorge themselves at an unending free feast. Combet described the Cantcun outcome as an "historic step forward." I half expect him to step proudly off the plane, waving a piece of paper, declaiming "cold in our time." Stupid is as stupid does. He doesn't seem to understand that his gushing over a non-existent advance, could still have very real consequences. The government - both Rudd-Gillard and Gillard-Goose, sorry Swan - has committed to a unilateral 5 per cent cut in our greenhouse gas emissions by 2020. The Greens in their monumental indifference to reality want it to be 25 per cent or more - not knowing or not caring just how devastatingly punishing that would actually be. It would effectively close Australia down. As 5 per cent overall is around 30 per cent per person, because of our strong population growth. To go to 25 per cent or more would require per person cuts approaching 50 per cent. Not in some distant period, but in 10 years. The trap for Combet et al is that they have 'committed' to a bigger cut if the rest of the world actually did something substantive. So his gushing that it has, when it hasn't - there is no way that China or the US are going to even commit to seriously cutting emissions, far less deliver on any such commitments - could force a bigger Australia target. Indeed, the Greens deputy leader Christine Milne made exactly that demand on Sunday. The new 'agreement' meant Labor had "no choice" but to increase the target. Now Reserve Bank governor Glenn Stevens was put in the 'interesting' position of fronting the Senate Committee the day after the day of stupidity. He was somewhat more diplomatic than my observations. But crystal clear. In short: there's plenty of competition and one way or another "various players" want the public purse to subsidise the operation of the financial system. The Treasurer keeps going back to the state of play in the years immediately before the world caved in, arguing that's the 'normal' he wants to force us back to. Stevens politely, indirectly, put him to rights. It is widely held, he said, that "risk was underpriced for some years before then (2007)." So financial institutions of all types could "get ample funding cheaply, and this was passed on to borrowers." And so the way this filtered through the system, it had the effect of unnaturally and unsustainably forcing down bank margins - my words, not Stevens'. That world though was swept away by the meltdown. And yes, it impacted on competition - my words, because that competition was artificial. That said, and this is Stevens, the market remains "a good deal more competitive than it was in the mid-1990s and borrowers have access to a much larger range of products." And so in a few carefully chosen words, Stevens sliced and gutted the Goose and the whole sorry pack of excuses for his package and the package itself. That's a Treasurer just being stupid. But where he is inclined to head is the real worry - making the taxpayer the increasing guarantor of risk in the system. Where that can lead has been on graphic display in both the US and Ireland. |
|
By:
UN climate talks get some Mexican mojo
by Erwin Jackson, deputy CEO of The Climate Institute, from Cancun, Mexico Just before the Mexican dawn on Saturday, the UN got its mojo back in guiding global action on pollution and climate change. While more needs to be done, particularly at the national level, the Cancun Climate Summit concluded with Copenhagen’s political pollution reduction commitments formally recognised under the UN Convention and critical financing and accountability mechanisms agreed. The percentage of global pollution subject to formal commitments under the UN zoomed from Kyoto’s 27% to Cancun’s 80%. At 3pm on Friday the meeting hung in the balance. The new text to capture discussions over the previous two weeks had been due for release at 8am. A silent hush and tension had fallen over the conference as the Mexican presidency worked behind the scenes with senior negotiators to finalise an agreement that could be the basis of a decision in Cancun. At three the text was released and at 6pm the chair of the meeting, Mexican foreign minister Patricia Espinosa, entered the plenary hall and was greeted by thunderous applause and a three-minute standing ovation. This moment defined the outcome in Cancun. Similar scenes continued through the night and the applause from the room gave Espinosa a mandate to stare down Bolivia, the only country to not support the agreement. At 3am the Mexican chair drove home the Cancun Climate Agreements by bluntly saying she could not allow one nation to stand in the way and veto the wishes of 192 others. While some aspects of the commitments require further work, the Cancun summit delivered important progress in several key areas. Significantly, the Cancun talks produced formal UN decision anchoring pollution limitation and reduction targets covering more than 80% of global emissions. Collectively, these targets are not strong enough but now the world has a formal negotiating basis to strengthen them over time. This is the first time we’ve seen the US, China and all other major emitters collectively anchor their national pollution targets in a formal UN agreement. While not a treaty, a decision under the Climate Convention does carry legal weight even if in the strictest terms it is not legally binding. This is why countries spend millions of dollars sending delegates to UN meetings and take two exhausting weeks negotiating detailed texts line by line. (See The Climate Institute’s briefing on the different implications of alternative legal forms of international agreements.) A few concrete examples of how seriously countries take decisions under the UN can be seen in the implementation of the Kyoto Protocol. The rules that define the operation of the multibillion dollar international market and accounting frameworks used by countries are defined by decisions. This illustrates that decisions are taken very seriously by countries, and governments generally work to implement these commitments. While the UN climate talks have got their mojo back, ultimately the UN won’t reduce global emissions. This is the role of national governments. International agreements give countries the confidence to go further than they will do by themselves as they feel others are moving with them. Unlike the 1997 Kyoto summit, where environment ministers agreed an environment treaty, the modern geopolitics of climate change are dominated by economics and trade considerations. This is part why achieving consensus through UN processes is difficult. In Cancun, it was clear that global momentum will continue to be built through actions at the national and subnational level. Important new initiatives announced in Cancun included Norway and Indonesia’s US$1 billion deal to protect tropical forests, beginning with a two-year ban on new permits to clear forests. South Africa also demonstrated progress at the national level with a draft policy to introduce a national carbon tax to complement their existing pollution price for vehicles. While Cancun will build confidence, in the short-term, governments’ competitive instincts continue to dominate and drive multibillion-dollar investments in clean energy and low pollution technologies as they jostle for poll position in the global clean-energy race. Countries — in particular China and the EU — are driving multibillion-dollar investments in clean energy and low-pollution technologies in order to dominate the global clean energy economy. The UK and China already have direct and indirect pollution prices higher than Australia. China saw over $US35 billion dollars in clean energy last year and dominated the global market. The UK, with a population only about three times the size of Australia, saw $US11 billion invested, while Australia attracted less than $US1 billion. This is why the implementation of a limit and price on pollution remains central to Australia’s economic prosperity and national interest. Without a domestic pollution limit and price Australia will not be in a position to fulfill the commitments made in Cancun. Without a domestic pollution price Australia will continues to be out-competed by countries dominating the emerging low pollution economy. *Erwin Jackson is deputy CEO of The Climate Institute from Cancun, Mexico. |
|
By:
*Erwin Jackson is deputy CEO of The Climate Institute from Cancun, Mexico.
protecting ones own interests would be another way of describing the press release? |
|
By:
McCrann is a Liberal Party mouthpiece.
Same rules apply. IMO. |
|
By:
along with Bolt, Jones, Devine,The Australian, Murdoch....the list goes on...
|
|
By:
he can write about anything and still get a pay cheque pity same cant be said about erwin
|
|
By:
Nice post AFL - highlighting a couple of the keys points
While some aspects of the commitments require further work, the Cancun summit delivered important progress in several key areas. Significantly, the Cancun talks produced formal UN decision anchoring pollution limitation and reduction targets covering more than 80% of global emissions. Collectively, these targets are not strong enough but now the world has a formal negotiating basis to strengthen them over time. This is the first time we’ve seen the US, China and all other major emitters collectively anchor their national pollution targets in a formal UN agreement. AND Countries — in particular China and the EU — are driving multibillion-dollar investments in clean energy and low-pollution technologies in order to dominate the global clean energy economy. The UK and China already have direct and indirect pollution prices higher than Australia. China saw over $US35 billion dollars in clean energy last year and dominated the global market. The UK, with a population only about three times the size of Australia, saw $US11 billion invested, while Australia attracted less than $US1 billion. This is why the implementation of a limit and price on pollution remains central to Australia’s economic prosperity and national interest. People can keep burying their heads in the sand if they want but we need to get aboard or miss out. Which is exactly why Julia talks about certainty, business knows - as do most - that a price on carbon is inevitable, they just need to know what it's gong to be so they can unleash the investment we're all waiting for Bring on 2011 and bring on the carbon tax  |
|
By:
joolyas lost her way afl cant you see that ffs she more worried about oprah
do we put you down as a looney greenie? |
|
By:
btw the temp around the world has not risen for 12 years
|
|
By:
hence why global warming is no longer used to con us. climate change is the go to extract the $$$
|
|
By:
so the leaders of 192 countries think we should do something but I think we should side with half dozen or so doubters here on Betfair
|
|
By:
the leaders representing the people who have not been asked......
and you will find most on this thread are doubters against the half doz or so believers.... why has the temp not gone up for 12 years womble? facts are facts |
|
By:
i expect no answer from you as usual when posed with a direct question.......
|
|
By:
From the SMH
AAP Australian scientists are examining the latest global weather data that reveals the decade will close as the hottest 10-year period on record. The United Nations weather agency says 2010 is "almost certain" to rank as one of the hottest three years ever while the past decade is already the warmest period since climate data began in 1850. Australia's weather bureau and several climate scientists are set to speak on the new figures later on Friday to explain what it means for the country's coral reefs and if long-term drought is still a possibility despite this year's record rainfall. Advertisement: Story continues below The World Meteorological Organisation released the new global figures during UN climate talks in Cancun, Mexico at 4am (AEDT) on Friday after compiling records from across the globe. The agency said the past 12 months have been marked by dramatic weather events: the worst flooding in Pakistan's history, drought in the Amazon, extreme heat across Russia and continued decreases in Arctic sea ice. "Large parts of Indonesia and Australia experienced heavy rains in 2010 as a La Nina event developed, with particularly unusual rains from May onwards," the agency reported in a statement on Friday. The top weather agency said that sea and land surface air temperatures for 2010 are currently estimated at 0.55C above the 1961-1990 annual average. Final yearly temperature data from the months of November and December will be examined in early 2011 to determine if 2010 will remain as one of the top-three hottest years. |
|
By:
Carbon tax = Federal Coalition Government
Your right wombleoz.....BRING IT ON |
|
By:
we'll see JEZ, we'll see - has to be in by the end of the year though so that people have time to get used to it, and the Libs scare campaign, a good way before the election
|
|
By:
How can people get used to a great big new tax on everything which is flawed and its outcome will be............
Ummmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmm ??????????????????????? Errrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrr........ The climate change boat has sailed my friend. The argument is weakening day by day. Remember Copenhagen? Remember the Labor PM who said "The Greatest Moral Challenge of Our Time" Goodluck |
|
By:
Womble: And Gillards words ...electricity is going to continually go up without surety...
Another .5 to 1% move on Interest rates and continual price rises on utilities , say 10% .... will break many households...the cliff is near imo And another thing... Water bills being in QLD ...IT IS REPORTED that some consumers had a cost of $30 water usage ... to supply that $300 or so... Those pipes have been well and truly paid for years ago... FK me ...being fleeced fkn everywhere |
|
By:
it won't be so bad come the next election, Henry reforms will be ready to roll - budget will be back in surplus, tax cuts will flow
|
|
By:
lets hope so Womble
 |
|
By:
I love this, it's like Rudd all over again. We're gunna do this....we're gunna do that We're gunna do this....we're gunna do that ffs The Rudd-Gillard Government continues to cruise along, directionless, agendaless and without leadership. All these promises. All this spin. Yet delivery and substance seems to bring it all undone - surprisingly enough. I mean look at the Labor record over the past few years? |
|
By:
wombleoz has been dribbling this nonsense for months.
But it's just that - DRIBBLE. The results speak for themselves. The Henry Review - been out for months, still no action. Health Reform - promises, promises, promises - STILL, nothing. Climate change - Gillard says no tax before election, now she says a great big tax on everything without environmental outcomes. Water Reform - since Howard got the ball rolling, all we've got from Labor is talk, talk and spin, spin - no ACTION! Add onto that, the waste, the debt and the litany of disasters and you've the complete kit and kaboodle. This government couldn't successfully organise a r00t in a brothel with a fist full of fifties - little lone govern the country. |
|
By:
2011 will be a VERY big year Jez, just wait and see
first BIG policy of the year rolls out 1 Jan - Paid Parental Leave, a genuine one funded by the government, not a GREAT BIG NEW TAX like Abbott was promising It's only the beginning |
|
By:
Wombleoz.
Too late pal. You think Australian's are fools? Rudd Labor said 2007 was going to be a big year. Then 2008....2009 and 2010. Julia Gillard continues to waffle on with the same content she used in her maiden speech to the Australian people after she'd stabbed Kevin Rudd to death, politically. I mean, it's just hopeless. You think its cool and thats fine - but the bottom line is, this government is hanging on by a thread. This government has been talking about a lot over the past 3 years - but you know what they've achieved........................................ |
|
By:
ummmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmm
|
|
By:
Thats right.
The Rudd-Gillard Labor years will be reflected upon in history as the wasted years of hopeless, hapless and spin-laden government. |
|
By:
The beginning of the end wombleoz.
Again, you think its cool - but its pathetic. But hey, you watermelons are suckers for mediocrity. |
|
By:
did you hear about the GFC Jez, was a pretty major sort of thing - the government did a great job keeping us out if trouble i'd suggest
|
|
By:
You'd suggest a lot of things wombleoz
One government saved us from the GFC. The Howard Government. FACT! Rudd and Labor didn't know what to do when the GFC hit, so they panicked and wasted billions and unleashed the most incompetent set of government programs in a generation. |
|
By:
They saved tens of thousands, if not hundreds of thousands, of jobs - they stepped in and supported the banks (they aren't exactly repaying that favour) and kept the economy bubbling along nicely - yes coming off a good base of money hoarded by Howard, but surely the deserve some credit Jez - where would we be without the spending???
|
|
By:
The Rudd-Gillard Government (first term government) lost its majority for good reason wombleoz - I'd suggest your alone in your praise of this hopeless and hapless government.
|
|
By:
FLASHBACK...........................
Gillard rules out imposing carbon tax Sydney Morning Herald - August 17, 2010 Julia Gillard has said there will be no tax on carbon while she leads the federal government. The Deputy Prime Minister, Wayne Swan, said last week that if Labor won the election there would be no carbon tax during its three-year term. Ms Gillard seemed to go a step further yesterday. ''There will be no carbon tax under the government I lead,'' she told Network Ten. ''What we will do is we will tackle the challenge of climate change.'' Advertisement: Story continues below The Prime Minister boasted that Labor had invested ''record amounts'' in solar and renewable technologies. ''Now I want to build the transmission lines that will bring that clean, green energy into the national electricity grid,'' she said. |
|
By:
You can't trust Labor.
|