LIBERAL LIES OVER LOOMING ENERGY CRISIS
I write to agree with Greg Bourne, Climate Councillor and former head of BP Australasia (Letters 17/2), that the Turnbull Government has no idea what to do about the looming energy crisis in Australia.
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Prime Minister Malcolm Turnbull’s attacks in Parliament this week have been a desperate diversion in a policy void.
His accusation that I, and the Member for Hunter Joel Fitzgibbon, want to close coal-fired power stations in the Hunter is untrue and absurd.
We know the value of coal to this region.
But we also know that our coal-fired power stations are nearing the end of their life, and that no one will invest in new ones. That is industry fact.
We also know that reliable energy is a must, especially for power-hungry industries such as Tomago Aluminium, which was forced to power down last week.
The Prime Minister was caught out lying when he blamed South Australia’s reliance on renewables for the blackouts.
And in NSW, he’s found no one to blame except Labor – as if talk of renewables is putting the lights out.
As Mr Bourne wrote yesterday, Australia’s electricity system is not yet broken, but it is ageing, unreliable and polluting.
I do not profess to be an energy expert, but I am asking questions on behalf of the people I represent, a good proportion of whom are coal miners, power station workers, and families who rely on manufacturers such as Tomago.
Labor does not want to close power stations.
The power stations will close because they are nearing their use-by date.
Labor, at least, has an energy plan, including an emissions intensity scheme and a target for renewables.
The Government has nothing but hot air.
Meryl Swanson
Member for Paterson
PUBLIC OR PRIVATE?
Education attracts many views about whether or not adequate funding is ever allocated to what is, alongside health, the most important element in producing a productive, well-structured society.
Should funding be public, or public and private as we have now?
At this point, a question comes to mind. The government uses taxpayers’ money to finance education – public and private.
How fair is that some people send their children to public schools while their taxes are subsidising somebody else's private education?
It's time that politicians stop arguing about which political party takes better care, and provides greater funding when in government.
Even though Labor have always addressed health and education more adequately than the Coalition, no Australian government has as yet been successful in bringing in a system that takes care of health and education needs, once and for all!
Not only has it earned the highest recognition on international rankings but 75 per cent of Finland's population regards it as the most important event that has ever happened in Finland’s history.
There is no degradation of any kind in adopting another country's system if it's proven to function and has been proven successful.
And it's a cop-out to say that it would not work here as well as it has in Finland because of country size differences.
People all over the world, regardless of culture, religion or size of territory, have the desire as well as the ability to learn. All they need is the tools and desire to learn. The government should provide the tools and the teachers should be up to the task of enticing the students to learn.
Foresight, progress and well-being require sensible planning into the future.
And what could be more sensible than giving future generations the tools needed to survive and progress?