My Daily Advertiser Op Ed column for Tuesday 27 July 2020

Penalties for dodgy recycling not enough

As I hope we are all good recyclers it is disappointing that the Coalition federal government sets such a bad example.

I’m referring to new recycling exports legislation, coming into effect next January.

In what at first appears to be good news, recycling will be subject to sweeping national powers in an imminent federal law that threatens companies with levies, product recalls and other penalties if they breach targets to reduce waste.

The draft law imposes criminal penalties including jail terms for those who defy the Morrison government’s bid to halt waste exports in a staged plan that starts within six months.

However, as Greens Senator Sarah Hanson-Young said, though the government had “finally” chosen to act it really should back the tougher measures in a Greens bill already before Parliament.

And of course, as ever with this environmentally lacklustre government, compliance is voluntary, not mandatory.

The controls are a response to a policy shift in China to turn away shipments of our waste product.

The government has opened talks with industry to back the bill so it can be put to Parliament in the first week of August, but the Greens are attacking the plan for doing too little to stop waste exports.

The draft bill, seen by The Sydney Morning Herald, is the first commonwealth power to control recycling and is being watched closely by companies that will have to submit to new licenses, duties and fees.

“A person may be subject to a criminal offence and civil penalty if export operations that are covered by the suspension are carried out after the suspension took effect,” says a confidential guide to the draft bill.

The jail terms could be for up to three or five years, depending on the provision breached.

As well as imposing export bans, the Recycling and Waste Reduction Bill will update “product stewardship” rules that expand existing rules to recycle products such as televisions and computers.

But a fight is looming in Parliament when the bill is introduced, with the Greens arguing for mandatory recycling targets and stronger powers to force companies to take responsibility for their products and packaging.

Labor recycling spokesman Josh Wilson has accused the government of “repackaging” money from previous measures in its $167 million Recycling Investment Package in March, suggesting more spending is needed.

“The government has a valuable opportunity to do right by our oceans and our environment in putting forward strong legislation that will properly tackle Australia’s waste crisis. The Greens will make sure they do,” Senator Sarah Hanson-Young said.

Sadly, but predictably, the Assistant Minister for Waste Reduction, Trevor Evans, said Australians would not accept the intervention being sought by the Greens.

“This is the first time a federal government has stepped so heavily into the waste and recycling sectors,” Mr Evans said.

“Some alternative proposals rely on an ethos of heavy intervention and regulation which, to be frank, Australian businesses and households just won’t bear in the current circumstances.”

Also, and disappointingly the government does not support the Greens’ call for a national container deposit scheme, arguing states are doing this already, and does not want to impose a national ban on plastic bags.

While environmental groups want a mandatory ban on plastic micro-beads used as thickener in cosmetics, the government argues a voluntary code is enough because 94 per cent of products no longer use the beads.

Mr Evans and Environment Minister Sussan Ley announced a $20 million Product Stewardship Investment Fund last week to pay for schemes that return old products.

The National Waste and Recycling Industry Council said the export bans appeared “straightforward” and should include strict measures to prevent illegal operators trying to by-pass the controls,” said the council’s chief executive, Rose Read.

However, “The unknowns are still what are the costs for the industry in complying, but the intent is that this will be kept to a minimum,” she added

Consumers can use existing schemes such as “Mobile Muster” to recycle mobile phones but Ms Read said the government had to make sure this was extended to all products with electrical cords and batteries.

She backed the Greens’ call for mandatory rather than voluntary schemes.

“That will give us more confidence that companies would hit their targets,” she said.

My Daily Advertiser Op Ed column for Tuesday 21 July 2020

The Queen did intervene in the dismissal

Last week the hitherto embargoed correspondence between then Governor-General John Kerr and Buckingham Palace were finally released. In the words of political historian and Whitlam biographer Jenny Hocking “The Palace letters are every bit the bombshell they promised to be” (SMH/The Age).

Given that much of the mainstream media, such as the ABC and The Australian vigorously downplayed any suggestion of collusion between Yarralumla and the Palace it is important to take a close look at the correspondence, for other commentators have seen that, as Cikey.com noted “Yes, the Queen did have a hand in the Dismissal. If you can’t see the palace played politics you’re fooling yourself”.

The letters begin with Kerr’s appointment after the 1974 election, starting with trivial issues such as asking the Queen’s Private Secretary, Baron Martin Charteris, whether the curtsy should still be employed.

But by autumn he had turned to the emerging political crisis. The Liberal government of New South Wales and the Nationals government of Queensland broke convention by appointing replacements for departing Labor senators not from Labor, thus giving the Coalition a Senate majority.

Federal Opposition leader Billy Snedden, seen as ineffectual, was replaced by Malcolm Fraser, who makes clear he will not be bound by the convention that the Senate does not block money bills. He publicly argued that an extreme and reprehensible circumstance could justify a denial of supply, forcing an election.

He gets it when it’s revealed that Whitlam’s resources minister Rex Connor has misled parliament by using a shadowy agent Tirath Khemlani to find a huge billion dollar loan from oil rich states, which was initially denied in Parliament. By mid-October Australia was in political crisis.

Kerr then began a process of reporting and thinking out loud to Charteris.

On October 17, 1975, Kerr tells the palace “the crisis has broken”, with the misleading of parliament now out in the open. On October 20 he notes that Whitlam has said that he would never give way to the Senate.

He also muses on the possibility that the G-G could use the governor-general’s “reserve powers”, i.e. to act without prime ministerial advice.

Let’s follow this through, for it’s the crux of the matter. By convention, the reserve powers had been supposed to no longer hold. A governor-general was meant to do exactly as a prime minister advised. But in that week the shadow attorney-general Bob Ellicott had issued a paper claiming that the reserve powers still existed in full force.

Then a suspicion by Kerr that Whitlam would ask the Queen to dismiss him came into play.

Kerr was thus left in no doubt that Whitlam would use the direct route to the palace if he had to. The letters show that Kerr is seriously worried he may lose his plum job. But, given that in the 70s Australia still had a powerful left-wing movement with elected communists holding office he was also worried that things were about to get out of control.

In the final week it became really complicated, far too much for the word limit on this article to recount. So to cut to the chase, Charteris wrote to Kerr saying that “It is often argued that such reserve powers no longer exist. I do not believe this to be true. I think those powers do exist”.

This is clearly a political intervention by the Crown in Australian politics. There is no other way to see it. Charteris had the option of saying to Kerr: “It is for your judgement alone, and Her Majesty has complete confidence in you etc.” But he didn’t. He affirmed that the highly contentious idea that reserve powers are still active.

This advice is, as Guy Rundle wrote, the “smoking gun” of the Palace Letters”.

The Whitlam dismissal showed that the monarchy, through the ‘reserve powers’ of the G-G still has a dominant role in what we thought was an independent sovereign state.

The letters show that the old argument against us becoming a republic, i.e. that “if it’s not broke don’t fix it” doesn’t apply, as our system of government certainly is broken.

As the Greens commented after reading the letters, it is high time for Australia to become a republic.

My Daily Advertiser Op Ed column for 14 July 2020

Save theatre courses at CSU

Today my column will be devoted to a very specific local issue, the need to preserve the creative industry courses, specifically the theatre ones, at Charles Sturt University’s Wagga Wagga campus.

The column is word for word also a letter I have just written to CSU’s Acting Vice-Chancellor and its Council members, and so takes the form of an ‘Open Letter’.

I am referring to media stories reporting the closure of the Bachelor of Creative Industries (Acting and Performance Design) at CSU’s Wagga Wagga campus, and their reported relocation to the Bathurst campus. The Daily Advertiser has been most diligent in its reporting of this issue.

In arguing so I will acknowledge a personal concern, though it does not in any way form a conflict of interest, as I have had no involvement with CSU since my retirement fourteen years ago. Prior to that I was a Senior Lecturer in Theatre and Course Coordinator for three decades. For several years before my retirement I was also Course Coordinator of the School of Visual and Performing Arts post-graduate programs.

The Wagga Wagga campus has been home to very successful theatre and creative industry courses since the establishment of its predecessor, the Riverina College of Advanced Education. Drama was initially taught as service subjects before becoming a discrete degree level course. For many years separate Bachelor of Arts courses were offered in Acting for Screen and Stage, and also in Theatre Production and Design. Honours years were subsequently added.

Wagga Wagga is ideally suited as a home for the Bachelor of Creative Industries (Acting and Performance Design) because of its more than a century old history of hosting performing arts companies, making for a hospitable, congenial and productive environment. The School of Arts was formed in 1859, and continues to provide high standard theatre today. The Civic Theatre opened in 1963. The Riverina Theatre Company, nee Riverina Trucking Company, the state’s longest running regional professional theatre company, was formed in 1976.

The CSU’s (Riverina) Playhouse, recently refurbished by the university at a reported cost of $3.5 million, opened in 1986. The Playhouse’s prime central city location on its own makes a compelling reason for retaining these courses at the Wagga Wagga campus. The university’s own publications note that the Playhouse is a “vital part of the Wagga Wagga creative community and a vital teaching resource for the University.” It beggars belief that the university would squander such a vital resource and community connection by relocating the courses to Bathurst.

Wagga Wagga is also home to a splendid civic Art Gallery and a flourishing visual arts community. The Wagga campus is also the location of the Booranga Writers’ Centre, established in 1994. It serves local, national and international communities through Writers-in-Residences and the publication of its annual anthology fourW. All these institutions have strong links with the Wagga campus’ creative industry courses.

In short, Wagga Wagga’s long history as a community that gives such prominence to the creative arts make it a much more appropriate location for the Bachelor of Creative Industries (Acting and Performance Design) than Bathurst.

Media reports have advised us that CSU’s Wagga Wagga campus will henceforth be devoted to agricultural courses. This is a retrograde move that reverts it to the role of one of the two founding institutions of Riverina Collage of Advanced Education, namely the Wagga Wagga Agricultural College. As CSU consists of several regional campuses there is no logic behind making the Wagga Wagga one the exclusive home of agriculture.

Furthermore, in the case of the Wagga Wagga’s rich cultural history demonstrates, it needs to be pointed out that ‘regional’ does not equate solely with agriculture.

A campus devoted solely to agriculture would be a very barren institution, with none of the myriad interests and activities that make university campuses such vibrant places to pursue a university level education.

Though I cannot agree with the federal government’s claim that the purpose of universities is to ‘train’ job ready graduates, it needs to be pointed out that graduates of the theatre courses at the Wagga Wagga campus of CSU have very successful careers, locally, nationally and internationally in their chosen field.

In a similar vein of thought, it almost seems that a focus on job ready candidates falls into the same category as current federal government’s anti-intellectual/arts approach, as demonstrated by its recent course funding announcement.

In conclusion I must reiterate that the abandonment of the Bachelor of Creative Industries (Acting and Performance Design) at the Wagga Wagga campus of Charles Sturt University should not proceed. It is hardly an economically, pedagogically, or culturally appropriate step.

My Daily Advertiser Op Ed column for Tuesday 7 July 2020

We only have six months to avert climate crisis, but there are solutions

Though our attention has been appropriately focused on COVID-19, the climate change problem has not gone away.

Indeed, the world has six months to avert a climate crisis, said the International Energy Agency (IEA) chief, who warned of the need to prevent post-lockdown surge in emissions. That’s the bad news of today’s column, though there is some good news towards the end of today’s piece, if the Morrison/McCormack government wakes up and takes notice, that is.

“This year is the last time we have, if we are not to see a carbon rebound,” said Fatih Birol, executive director of the IEA.

Governments are planning to spend $9tn (£7.2tn) globally in the next few months on rescuing their economies from the coronavirus crisis, the IEA has calculated. The stimulus packages created this year will determine the shape of the global economy for the next three years, according to Birol, and within that time emissions must start to fall sharply and permanently, or climate targets will be out of reach.

“The next three years will determine the course of the next 30 years and beyond,” Birol told the Guardian. “If we do not take action we will surely see a rebound in emissions. If emissions rebound, it is very difficult to see how they will be brought down in future. This is why we are urging governments to have sustainable recovery packages.”

Carbon dioxide emissions plunged by a global average of 17% in April, compared with last year, but have since surged again to within about 5% of last year’s levels.

In its report, the IEA set out the first global blueprint for a green recovery, focusing on reforms to energy generation and consumption. Wind and solar power should be a top focus, the report advised, alongside energy efficiency improvements to buildings and industries, and the modernisation of electricity grids.

Sam Fankhauser, executive director of the Grantham Research Institute on climate change at the London School of Economics, warned that governments must not try to “preserve existing jobs in formaldehyde” through furlough schemes and other efforts to keep people in employment, but provide retraining and other opportunities for people to “move into the jobs of the future”.

Indeed, the money spent world-wide so far has tended to prop up the high carbon economy. At least $33bn has been directed towards airlines, with few or no green strings attached, according to the campaigning group Transport and Environment. According to analyst company Bloomberg New Energy Finance, more than half a trillion dollars worldwide,$509bn, is to be poured into high-carbon industries, with no conditions to ensure they reduce their carbon output.

Birol warned that IEA research shows that by the end of May the amount invested in coal-fired power plants in Asia had accelerated compared with last year. “There are already signs of a rebound in emissions,” he said.

Putting the IEA’s recommendations into action would boost the economy, added Rosie Rogers, head of green recovery at Greenpeace UK. “Government putting money behind sustainable solutions really is an economic no-brainer. It can see us build a recovery that both tackles the climate emergency and improves people’s lives through cleaner air and lower bills.”

Here in Australia the good news is that hundreds of thousands of jobs could be created by hurrying the shift to zero greenhouse gas emissions, a study backed by business and investment leaders has found.

Though the Australian Bureau of Statistics estimates 835,000 jobs have been lost since the coronavirus pandemic shutdown began in March a report by Beyond Zero Emissions, an energy and climate change thinktank, says practical projects to decarbonise the economy could create 1.78m “job years” over the next five years – on average, 355,000 people in work each year – while modernising Australian industry.

Called the “million jobs plan”, it says further stimulus measures needed to fight the Covid-19 recession are “a unique opportunity to lay the foundations for a globally competitive Australian economy fit for 21st century challenges”.

If the Liberal/Nationals coalition government we are currently saddled with could stir itself to action we could act immediately against climate change and create hundreds of thousands of new ‘green’ jobs at the same time.