Australian Politics

Timing huh, left it until just after the Tas. election :)

Alex Vickery-Howe tracks the disturbing trend of dishonest politicians falsely equating peaceful protest with acts of terror.

A West Australian councillor has endorsed and congratulated Vladimir Putin on his election win during a bizarre appearance on Russian state television.

In a video published on Russian state media, Port Hedland man Adrian McRae congratulated Mr Putin on his "transparent and comprehensive" victory.

See also: ABC: Extraordinary powers to deport non-citizens may never be used, despite rush to legislate

• In short: The immigration minister is set to gain new powers with the Senate poised to pass laws that will make it easier to deport non-citizens.
• It relates to a cohort of non-citizens who have exhausted all legal avenues for remaining in Australia.
• Members of that group are either in immigration detention or on bridging visas.

Laborel party letting foreign companies dictate policy.

"So much promise"?!

Are Greens appeasing Labor in a secret deal? This support is out of character with their stance on privacy.

For instance, Greens were the only ones to push against the "Identify and Disrupt Bill" (which newspapers ignored in favour of "Freedom" March dramas).

• In short: Tasmanian Labor leader Rebecca White says it will be up to the Liberal Party to try to negotiate with the new crossbench and form a government.
• The Liberals need 18 votes in the lower house to govern but will finish with between 14 and 16 seats — meaning they will likely need the help of the Jacqui Lambie Network and the independents.
• What's next? Rebecca White's leadership position will automatically become vacant but she has not indicated if she will put her hand up for it again.

Despite calling an early election to regain majority government, the Tasmanian Liberals have fallen short. But so too has Labor. Here's what will happen next.

• In short: Australia's former high commissioner to the United Kingdom, George Brandis, cautioned politicians against criticising diplomatic appointments.
• On Wednesday, former US president Donald Trump said he had heard Kevin Rudd "was a little bit nasty".
• What's next? The Coalition has questioned Dr Rudd’s tenure, suggesting he will not be able to work with Mr Trump if he is returned to the White House later this year.

#BrisPol

Nice to see some sensible policy for a change. Alas they have no hope of getting in :(

That's right Cronulla, your likely next local member isn't actually local. But, he promises he will be real soon!

Good luck with that!

Having lived in super safe-seats and marginal seats, I promise it's far better to live in a seat that flips every election!

He could have made a decent prime minister—too bad it never really panned out.

Anyway, here's Malcolm discussing Trump on MSNBC.

https://youtu.be/aGvzfOkdFMg?si=14WksVCbGTTQvR4M

@australianpolitics #auspol

Peter Dutton's nuclear plan is just terrible public policy.

The truth is that, in an Australian context, with nuclear power more expensive per kilowatt hour than either grid scale solar & storage or coal, nuclear just doesn't make economic sense.

The UK has a mature nuclear industry. Its new Hinkley Point C plant, started in 2016, is now expected to not be complete until 2031, and costs £35bn.

https://www.theguardian.com/business/2024/jan/23/hinkley-point-c-could-be-delayed-to-2031-and-cost-up-to-35bn-says-edf

So how much would it cost to replace all of Australia's coal power plants with nuclear ones?

We'll, at current exchange rates, £35bn — that's the cost of just one Hinkley Point C sized reactors — works out to A$67.6 billion.

So building just 10 nuclear reactors the size of Hinkley Point C costs $A676bn, making the AUKUS subs look like Home Brand corn flakes in comparison.

(Just for comparison, ScoMo's AUKUS subs cost $368bn, and Daniel Andrew's Suburban Rail loop is estimated at around $100bn.)

That's assuming Australia, starting from scratch, could build nuclear plants as quickly and cheaply as the UK, which was one of the first nations on Earth to split the atom.

So is it debt & deficit to fund this? Big new taxes? Even by the LNP's own measuring sticks, it's a crap policy!

The Australian Federal Government has previously examined the prospect of building nuclear power plants in the Switkowski report: https://webarchive.nla.gov.au/awa/20080117214749/http://pandora.nla.gov.au/pan/79623/20080117-2207/dpmc.gov.au/umpner/docs/nuclear_report.pdf

The big thing that's changed since it was published is that grid solar + storage is now cheaper than coal or nuclear power.

So would you support holding up the closure of coal plants for 15 years until nuclear plants are completed, then paying substantially more on your power bills, while the federal government pays hundreds of billions of dollars in government subsidies, while also hiring thousands of additional public servants to regulate it all?

#auspol #nuclear #ClimateChange #australia @australianpolitics

oh this is gonna be good! (there's video)

What a winner.