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ETS: emissions trading scheme or energy tax swindle?

By David Flint - posted Wednesday, 6 August 2008


“This is extravagance, Sir, this is madness.” This was the reaction of Lord Chancellor Somers when King William III showed him his proposed abdication speech.

William was exasperated with myopic politicians who wanted to run down England’s defences against France. William relented.

But as he feared, the politicians were wrong. France was intent on European domination; war broke out and lasted 13 years.

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Now we have foolish politicians, having inherited a rolled gold economy, intent on running it down and burdening future generations with an ideologically based Emissions Trading Scheme (ETS).

And just as a frog put into a cooking pot of cold water is said not to notice if the temperature is increased ever so slowly, the ETS will be designed to be gradually imposed in the hope that the electors will not notice.

That’s why any ETS - in 2010 or 2012 - ought to be opposed.

The only way an ETS can achieve what the taxpayer funded advertisements allege is if the answer to each of the following five questions is “Yes”.

If only one produces a negative response, the ETS is exposed as just another energy tax. The ETS will be nothing more than an Energy Tax Swindle.

The five questions are:

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  1. Is the world’s climate warming, or still warming?
  2. Do man made carbon dioxide emissions significantly affect the weather?
  3. Do no other factors beyond human control significantly affect the weather?
  4. Will the advent of an Australian ETS persuade China, India and the US to enter into a similar world wide ETS almost immediately?
  5. Will an Australian ETS by itself have any significant effect on the weather in Australia?

The answer to most, perhaps all of these is likely to be no.

There is now a serious debate as to whether the world is warming or is still warming. And if it is, there are a large number of disinterested scientists (those without any conflict of interest) who doubt the impact of man-made emissions on the climate.

Climate change has been with us for millions of years. But anthropogenic global warming could only have existed from some time in the 20th century. If we assume the theory is correct, and a worldwide ETS actually neutralises it, what guarantee is there that other factors will not affect the weather?

There is of course, no guarantee at all. So even an effective world wide ETS could all be in vain.

In any event no serious foreign affairs commentator expects China or India to enter a genuine ETS. Even if Senator Obama was elected President and proposed this, Congress would never agree.

And everyone knows an Australian ETS will not have even the slightest effect on the weather, the Murray River or the Great Barrier Reef.

So there is no reason to proceed with an ETS. But the government is intent on this. And once in place the ETS will be ramped up - after the next election.

The ideological commitment to an ETS and to anthropogenic global warming (AGW) indicates rational argument will not prevail. All an ETS will do is enable the government to take even more money from taxpayers and waste and redistribute it, at the same time enriching the usual carpet baggers.

This commitment to AGW has taken on a sinister theological character. Those who question it are called doubters, or deniers. How long will it be before they are labelled heretics? The reason for this commitment is best explained by the observation famously attributed to G.K.Chesterton.

This is that when men stop believing in God it is not that they believe in nothing: they then believe in anything.

Kevin Rudd’s party has a long tradition of passionate attachment to ideology - the socialist objective the terms of which used to be inscribed on every member’s ticket. Communism was a human disaster, but widespread socialism in those democracies who went down that path seriously damaged their economies and impoverished generations. The massive nationalisations in Britain doomed that country to slow rates of economic growth and decline for decades until the advent of a truly reformist government under Margaret Thatcher.

Almost everyone thinks socialism was a mistake. For a generation keen on apologies for past wrongs, who has apologised to a whole generation of Britons?

So what is the point of the ETS, this tax on energy if it is not to satisfy a new ideology? An editorial in The Wall St Journal (July 14, 2008) is more cynical. It suggests a result consistent with socialist ideology. They say the resulting massive tax windfall will be used to accelerate the move to emasculate a once free people and make us even more dependent on government.

Everyone knows the Liberal Party kowtowed to the AGW believers over an ETS in 2007 because electoral defeat was staring it in the face. That’s in the past, like the ALP’s opposition on the GST. Instead of clinging to it, the opposition should just renounce it. So should the sensible people in the Labor Party, as Michael Costa clearly does.

When Labor turned its back on socialism in the 80s it rushed to endorse free market economics. Hawke and Keating - with Liberal support - unilaterally opened up our markets without requiring reciprocity. As a result most of our manufacturing industry moved off shore. And our agriculture remained seriously damaged by the EU, US and Japan who refused to follow our example. Just as every other power will if we are foolish enough to adopt an ETS.

All we have left is mining and the talents of people in the private sector. A unilateral and increasingly burdensome ETS will run down our mining industries and impose costs on all.

Rather than imposing a new energy tax, or modifying excise to pay for it for an initial period, so like frogs we can be boiled without noticing, we should take advantage of our comparative advantages. That is what both government and opposition have been telling us to do for decades.

We could begin not by fiddling with the excise, but getting rid of this burdensome and unfair tax altogether. That would reduce fuel costs by almost half and vastly stimulate the economy.

And for ministers who whinge about any resulting increased global carbon imprint, just what was the carbon footprint of the various jets, and air-conditioned hotels for the legion of ministers and advisers sent to Bali for something which could have been done via the Internet? Once again, the message to the people is do what we say, not do what we do.

To those who say government revenue would be threatened without an excise, the answer is twofold. The growing surpluses are the peoples’ not the government.

Governments typically are wastrels - how else can we possibly explain the generous gift funded by working families to the surprised executives of that most profitable firm, Toyota?

Governments need discipline, and reducing taxes would bring them into the real world in which ordinary Australians live.

So what should happen to an Australian ETS when the government eventually reveals the details? The Senate should ensure the fullest public debate through a public inquiry before a Senate Committee.

It will be in that inquiry that the truth can emerge, provided of course the media plays its role in providing balanced reporting.

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About the Author

David Flint is a former chairman of the Australian Press Council and the Australian Broadcasting Authority, is author of The Twilight of the Elites, and Malice in Media Land, published by Freedom Publishing. His latest monograph is Her Majesty at 80: Impeccable Service in an Indispensable Office, Australians for Constitutional Monarchy, Sydney, 2006

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