Tag Archives: Queensland election 2017

Palaszczuk powers on to a new term

Adrian Beaumont at The Conversation has a good summary of the election:

    At the Queensland election, held on November 25, the size of parliament was increased from 89 seats to 93. Comparing this result with 2015, Labor officially won 48 of the 93 seats (up four), the Liberal National Party 39 (down three), Katter’s Australian Party (KAP) three (up one), and One Nation, the Greens and an independent won one seat each.

    With 45 seats held by parties other than Labor, Labor has won a three-seat majority. Continue reading Palaszczuk powers on to a new term

Climate clippings 118

1. South Australia going for broke

Malcolm Turnbull would call it a ‘reckless, irresponsible, ideological frolic’, but South Austria has been running 63% on wind and solar during the last few months, and is going for broke.

Giles Parkinson says SA must, and will, lead world on renewables.

    The Weatherill and Koutsantonis strategy is to embrace new technologies, cheap wind and solar and storage, smart software and smarter management, and put into practice the sort of scenarios envisaged by the CSIRO, Energy Networks Australia and more recently by the storage review commissioned by chief scientist Alan Finkel.

All that can stop Weatherill and Koutsantonis is Nick Xenophon at the next election putting the LNP into office. Continue reading Climate clippings 118

The best kept secret: ALP electricity policy for Queensland

I came across it via Facebook around midnight on Saturday night. Not sure when it was released but there’s been nothing in the media yet about it. Surely there will be, because it is more than a little stunning. It’s called Powering Queensland’s Future: Affordable, Stable and Balanced.

From a standing start after the LNP under Campbell Newman had ‘cleansed’ the state of renewable energy projects, since February 2015 the Palaszczuk Labor government has enough runs on the board to be dubbed “a leader in Australia’s renewable energy boom” in a report by The Climate Council – Billion dollar boom: Queensland’s bright renewables future. I’ll summarise what they said, but the Palaszczuk government is running even faster and further than you would be led to believe in that report. Continue reading The best kept secret: ALP electricity policy for Queensland

LNP pledges cheap electricity for Queensland – vision splendid or hoax?

Here is the vision splendid. The promise is to save a typical Queensland family an average of $160 a year over the next two years, and then a further $300 per year from 2020. LNP leader Tim Nicholls said on TV that the average family would save about 10% on their bills.

I don’t know why that is supposed to be so stunning. Labor is promising $50 pa immediately, plus $146 pa in 2017-18 and $216 pa in 2018-19 from actions taken to put downward pressure on prices since the Queensland Competition Authority struck a new standard price for 2017-18 in early June. Here it is:

Continue reading LNP pledges cheap electricity for Queensland – vision splendid or hoax?

The Adani Project: – is it good for Australia?

This is a guest post by blog commenter Geoff Henderson. It is particularly strong on the structure and standing of Adani as a company, and on the truly pathetic contribution the project would make to both jobs and the coffers of the state government in royalties. I’ve added some links of other recent material at the end. Enjoy!

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A Four Corners program[1a] made serious claims about the Adani Conglomerate corporate profile in India. Credible allegations of bribery, corruption, money laundering, environmental destruction, tax/royalty avoidance and more were leveled at Adani.[1b] Continue reading The Adani Project: – is it good for Australia?

Saturday salon 28/10

1. China has arrived

The biggest story of the week was probably the Chinese Communist party congress. Leader Xi Jinping is looking to stay for at least another 10 years and putting his “socialist thought” into the party constitution, places him alongside Mao Zedong and Deng Xiaoping in the pantheon of revolutionary leaders. But Richard McGregor says the real star is the party itself, and the West should wake up: Continue reading Saturday salon 28/10