Last week, the former NSW Treasurer and Minister for the Hunter Michael Costa attacked current Opposition Leader John Robertson for his comments suggesting the Labor Party was planning to phase out coal mining. Mr Costa labeled the move a betrayal of the party’s traditional voters. Michael Costa’s concern for the jobs of devout Labor voters

Last week, Greenpeace released a report calling for a halt to Australia’s burgeoning coal exports and pointing to the catastrophic climate impacts they would cause. In response, Mitch Hooke, chief executive of the Minerals Council of Australia, took a standard industry line: “the proposal to stop Australian coal exports won’t stop global coal use –

The Australian government will begin imposing a tax on carbon emissions in mid-2012. But large giveaways to industry mean Australia’s scheme doesn’t go nearly far enough in reducing the nation’s CO2 emissions or providing economic stimulus. Another global climate conference has come and gone with little action to reduce carbon dioxide emissions, which makes efforts

Climate change and food security are among the biggest problems facing the world today, and the fact that an increase in the former means a lot less of the latter simply makes both problems even more urgent. While the overlap in the consequences of these two problems might be obvious, what is less clear is

Between the lines is the Institute’s selective analysis of the policies and politics affecting the wellbeing of Australians. This edition looks at the Resource Super Profits Tax, government advertising and missing out on government assistance.

NOBODY could have predicted that the might of Rio Tinto would be challenged by Bulga, a tiny NSW town of 300. Certainly, nobody could have predicted that Bulga would win. But when the Land and Environment Court overturned the NSW government’s approval for the expansion of Rio Tinto’s Warkworth coal mine, citing that the project’s

QUEENSLAND Premier Campbell Newman has stared down former federal treasurer Peter Costello and he deserves some credit for that. A stocktake of Australia’s electricity now, compared with two decades ago, confirms that the privatisation and corporatisation of the sector has been a massive failure. An analysis of the sector since Victoria privatised power in the

Electricity privatisation has failed to deliver cheaper power to consumers and has not improved the sector’s efficiency, a new analysis by The Australia Institute has found. The analysis shows that since Victoria privatised power in the 1990s, electricity prices have outpaced inflation, increasing by 170 per cent compared with an increase of 60 per cent

What is the corporate equivalent of a dole bludger? For all the talk about class warfare in Australia it is interesting that the conservatives have a pejorative name for individuals who need support from the state but progressives don’t even have a term for the foreign companies that make huge profits but still have their

Tony Abbott’s Direct Action Plan has been ridiculed by many as expensive and unworkable. One of the primary objections has been that the centrepiece of the policy, the Emissions Reduction Fund, is a baseline-and-credit scheme that will require counterfactual baselines to be set for every participating polluter. The baseline for a given polluter will be

A cabinet reshuffle provides the perfect opportunity for a prime minister to clarify the role of incoming ministers. From his deeds, it’s pretty clear Martin Ferguson interpreted his job as representing the interests of those who profit from extracting our resources rather than the citizens who own those resources. And given their praise on his

Although the new water trigger law, recently introduced by the Government was cheered by the rural independents, Greens and environmental groups, the proposal is illogical, runs counter to existing policy structures and is unlikely to improve environmental outcomes. The government has unilaterally introduced this water trigger in breach of the 1997 Council of Australian Governments

This presentation provides a summary of key findings from research by The Australia Institute into the economic impacts of the mining boom. It gives an overview of the Australian mining sector, including levels of employment, foreign ownership and subsidies, and looks at the consequences of the boom for non-mining industries like agriculture, tourism, manufacturing and

Australian farmers have lost $61.5 billion in export income since the mining boom pushed the Australian dollar to historic highs, a new analysis by The Australia Institute reveals. Still beating around the bush: The continuing impacts of the mining boom on rural exports examines the rural sector’s export income from the beginning of the mining

The government’s obsession with speeding up the mining boom has delivered an exchange rate and a shortage of skilled labour that is devastating the manufacturing industry. Rather than take its foot off the mining boom accelerator or admit that the miners’ boom means a bust for manufacturers, the government is trying to buy itself some

The Australia Institute (TAI) has been researching the economic impacts of mining activity in Australia. This document provides a brief summary of key facts and links to TAI research papers, policy briefs and submissions currently available online. Key facts Mining ‘crowds out’ other industries: The expansion of mining causes a contraction in non-mining industries, particularly

The rapid expansion in the mining industry over the past decade has done more harm than good to Geelong’s economy. Mining has created virtually no jobs in Geelong and has induced a high exchange rate that is crippling Geelong’s manufacturing industry with more than 1 in 8 manufacturing jobs lost over the past six years.

Resources and Energy Minister Chris Hartcher claims there will be “catastrophic consequences” if NSW does not develop more coal seam gas. He seems to believe that by doing so there will be more gas for local industry and that this will prevent soaring prices. This couldn’t be further from the truth. The reason that gas

‘Mums and dads’ seem to be replacing ‘working families’ as the focus of political concern in Australia. The biggest problem with last week’s hoax media release about Whitehaven Coal, many argued, was its impact on ”mum and dad investors”. The language of mum and dad investors is as widely used as it is meaningless. Gina

The Climate Change Authority’s final report on the renewable energy target, which was released yesterday, contains a number of controversial conclusions and recommendations. A standout amongst these is the recommendation that the federal government explore whether making native forest wood waste eligible to participate in the large-scale RET (LRET) would increase the rate of harvesting

This edition of The Australia Institute’s newsletter features: All I want for Christmas …. David Baker The clash between coal and conservation Paola Cassoni Beating around the bush Matt Grudnoff Income and wealth distribution in Australia David Richardson 10th Henry Parkes Oration Prof George Williams And homelessness marches on …. Alison Laird The one early

The NSW Minerals Council is out spruiking the benefits of the mining industry in the Hunter region in a new economic study. Using the same old tricks to inflate their numbers and ignoring any economic downside they manage to spin the result into a rosy picture that reaches the epic proportions of claiming that the

Imagine if we could increase the number of car parking spots in the Canberra CBD by 20 per cent. Now imagine we could do so at no cost to government, business or individuals and with no disruption. Would you support it? I imagine you would. So, what’s the catch? The catch is that most street-side

According to Rene Hidding, Tasmania’s Liberal spokesman for forestry, it is “insulting” to Tasmanians to inform them about the tiny contribution the forestry and logging industries make to that state’s employment. Presumably he thinks it would be better to deceive the people? For all of the analysis about what the collapse of the state’s forest

Australian farmers have lost $43.5 billion in export income since the mining boom pushed the Australian dollar to historic highs, a new analysis by The Australia Institute reveals. Beating around the bush: The impact of the mining boom on rural exports examines the rural sector’s export income from the beginning of the mining boom in

This edition of The Australia Institute’s newsletter features: Productivity – lazy workers or lazy analysis? David Richardson Gina’s call a bit rich Dr Richard Denniss Exposing the great sunscreen cover-up Dr Gregory Crocetti Measuring fugitive emissions Matt Grudnoff Could you live on $245 per week? Ben Irvine Infographics The economy and social justice Senator Doug

Listening to the mining industry complaining about the high exchange rate is like listening to a three-year-old complaining about the noise of their own tantrum. It simply adds insult to injury. The surge in world demand for our resources and the flood of foreign money into Australia to buy or build mining assets has been

The Nationals are worried about Chinese farm ownership yet it’s European mine ownership that’s harmed farmers Australians, it seems, don’t like selling off the farm. And the National Party really doesn’t seem to like selling them to the Chinese. But while the Nationals have a long, if not always proud, history in Australia it is

It’s obscene for someone with inherited wealth, whose business is subsidised by government, to criticise low-paid workers. Two numbers pretty much sum up all that is wrong with political debate in Australia: Gina Rinehart earns the annual full-time minimum wage every 53 seconds and, at the peak of the mining boom, the industry contributed only

The question perplexing many ActewAGL green power customers is a simple one: if my bill says I am responsible for no carbon emissions why did my bill go up when the carbon price came in? Unfortunately, the answer from ActewAGL has been anything but simple. Since my first article about this in The Canberra Times