A Victory for Common Sense

The decision today from the Coalition to push for a delay on consideration of Labor’s ETS legislation is a sensible one.

I (and a number of others) have long argued that introducing an ETS into Australia in the absence of an international agreement was economic suicide and would harm Australian industry.

I recall that this position was first publicly advocated on behalf of the Coalition by former leader Brendan Nelson who, whilst a strong advocate for sustainable environmental causes, was prepared to confront the stark reality and peril of Australia going it alone.

Whilst he paid a heavy price for pioneering this matter, today is vindication of the wisdom of that approach.

Labor’s ETS is a dog of a policy. While the Government automatons dutifully trot out their ‘lines’ referring to consultation, white papers, green papers and the need for certainty, one thing remains absolutely clear.

All the consultation and coloured paper shuffling did was create a scheme that would lift prices, increase unemployment and wouldn’t make a jot (or tittle) of difference to the climate.

Sometimes I wonder if it is only me that sees Labor’s consultation process as indicative of a broader failure. I mean, here we have a Government, boasting of its consultation process and how it ‘got the balance right’, only to then make radical changes to the scheme at the last minute.

Doesn’t that show that their original process was clearly flawed in the first place?

If you accept that premise, then one can only wonder at the credibility of the hundreds of reviews, committees and inquiries guiding the rest of Labor’s policy agenda.

Something about all this doesn’t sit right with me. If the Government makes such a mess of what it called ‘the great moral responsibility of our time’, what other policy disasters do they have in the making from their consultation process?

Clearly we can identify their mortgaging of Australia’s future as a case of monumental economic mismanagement, their attack on superannuation as ill-considered, their war on inflation as imaginary…I could go on and on.

Even worse, what about the policies developed on the proverbial ‘back of the envelope’ like the $43 billion broadband initiative? What credibility can be given to them?

These deficiencies in this Government are becoming more and more apparent. It is simply a question of whether Australia can afford to pay the price for their incompetence.