A fraud on the Australian people

JULIA Gillard’s carbon dioxide tax is the most brazen policy to be perpetrated by an Australian government.

Apart from the fact that 2 out of 3 families will be fully compensated for the tiny rise in household costs of $9.90 a week, and apart from the fact that the price signal will drive innovation and job growth, and apart from the fact that pensioners will be better off, and apart from the tax cuts, and apart from the fact that there will be no major effects on job creation or incomes, and apart from the fact that up to $110 extra per child will go to families under Family Tax Benefit A, and apart from the fact that up to $69 extra per year will go to families eligible under Family Tax Benefit B, and apart from the assistance to emissions intensive trade exposed industries, and apart from the money from the tax allocated to renewable energy projects and research, and apart from the move to a market based price on July 1, 2015, and apart from the targets to reduce emission by 5% by 2020 and 80% by 2050:


Apart from those tiny benefits, this must be a fraud on the Australian people, because I've haven't spent all this time being alarmist and scaremongering for nothing. I've been saying all along, even before the policy was announced, that this policy is a fraud. If we ignore the policy detail, I stand by my position.

Vent here while venting is still legal.

And if the tax comes in and industry limps on?

Probably OTT, and completely baseless, but I'll post it anyway:

Opposition Leader Tony Abbott has told a gathering of Australia’s manufacturers they must fight the carbon tax or their industry will die… 

"It can’t be fixed, it has to be fought, and if it’s not fought, the manufacturing sector in this country, I regret to say, is almost certain to die," he said. 

"I think this is as stark as that, the choice that you face - do you fight or do you die a horrible screaming death?" 

"Do you die or will you be given a nausea-inducing drug, strapped to a chair with your eyelids pinned open and forced to watch hours of films of extreme violence?"

 

Carbon Tax analysis

Economics writer Terry McCrann crunches the numbers:

Julia's tax will give you herpes. It'll be with you forever and on everything.

How long until the Left concedes that this tax will also give you gonorrhea?

Recipe for trouble

Dennis Atkins says Julia Gillard cannot afford to drop her carbon dioxide tax, even though it’s loathed by retired Liberal voters:

One veteran Liberal activist reports that the carbon tax is friendless among extremely old party members.

“I’ve been out door-knocking our people in one of the state electorates where we’ve got a pre-selection under way and anyone over 80 hates the idea,” said the party figure. “And the older they are, the more they hate it.”

Julia’s tax: rejected by Terry McCrann, and now big polluters say no

The Big Emitters Council of Australia declares war on Julia Gillard’s carbon dioxide tax in this letter to the Prime Minister:

First, our members believe in framing our carbon pricing policy Australia should act last, not in tandem with international action. We believe that a responsible policy would ensure that Australia avoids any proportional committment to action and the advantages of our high emissions per capita energy industry are not diminished because of environmental concerns.

Australia's policy should recognise that although we are one of the largest per capita emitters in the world a better way to frame this debate is that since we account for only 1.5% of global greenhouse emissions we should play no role in the international communities efforts to reduce greenhouse gases.

Terry has a more nuanced analysis:

This is a government and a Prime Minister in utter self-destruction mode. They are careering to disaster. 

It is pointlessly destructive. CO2 is plant food. This is a tax on our breathing. How much are you going to stop breathing at $20 dollars per tonne?  Why exactly is this government and this PM embarked on an attack on the nation’s prosperity? 

Why do humans need a planet with conditions that humans are able to live on? 

Online carbon tax polling

As this story Bolted from the blue, one columnist said, "Awkward. That poll quickly vanished from the CFMEU website"




Elsewhere, Julie Bishop had to pull the poll on her web page for technical reasons after it mistakenly showed over 80% of respondents Strongly support or Support a carbon tax ;