Originally Posted by Vash the Stampede

With a minority government, Gillard has little choice. The Greens and independents have forced this on her. Every party leader makes campaign promises on the assumption of majority government. If the election delivers a hung parliament, all bets are off and campaign promises become negotiable.

Some party leaders don't even keep their promises even when they do end up with a majority government; just look at John "We will never, ever introduce a GST" Howard, for example.

Originally Posted by Amazulu

It's a crock of shit. If our government is serious about reducing carbon then they could do this:
Take half of the NBN cost, cut middle class welfare and cut government redtape. With the money saved, and some privte investment, they could build:
Nuclear power stations
Solar collectors
Geothermal plants
Wind Turbines (100's of them)
Wave-power systems
Close all coal-fired power plants
Mandate ever increasing efficiency targets for vehicles, buildings, factories
etc

What they are proposing is going to lead to ever increasing taxes and billion $ profits for bankers.

Originally Posted by Deancm_MKII

Australia will be the laughing stock of the world, especially when no other country will go down this route. Especially considering global warming is a hoax.

Originally Posted by gmralston

Agreed, the amount of renewable energy that this country let slip away horrific. I think you could do without the nuclear though, I am not against it just don't think it is needed here and the base load is too high. May as well sell the uranium to countries that do/will need it as the price is sure to go up in the future. Use natural gas power stations to meet demand when needed, they have a very low base load.

Originally Posted by Amazulu

GST is a good tax - in fact it should be much higher and income tax much lower
Carbon tax is a bad tax

Originally Posted by gmralston

But the amount of CO2 being pumped into the atmosphere is not a hoax.

Originally Posted by Deancm_MKII

Well there's no such thing as a good tax. GST should remain about the same and income tax should be scrapped.

Originally Posted by Deancm_MKII

Well there's no such thing as a good tax. GST should remain about the same and income tax should be scrapped.

Originally Posted by Amazulu

Nukes can be made smaller now for lower loads, but large ones would allow for future expansion. I think we should go all out for nuclear and do the whole lot - mining, processing, power, submarines, weapons. It's criminal that there is not one, decent solar collector here. Spain has just built a huge one and it's awesome. Wind power is not all it's cracked up to be but it is part of the solution - we could easily have 1000s of them. Why no wave power?

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/PS10_solar_power_tower
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Andasol..._power_station

Originally Posted by Wol

Solar isn't as efficient overall as sometimes it's made out to be

Originally Posted by Deancm_MKII

And yet CO2 doesn't warm the atmosphere and is not a pollutant.

Originally Posted by Deancm_MKII

Australia doing something is the equivalent of one person pissing into the worlds oceans.

Originally Posted by Deancm_MKII

Most of the CO2 (well about 50% from an article I read today) actually comes from livestock.

Originally Posted by Wol

>>For me, the ideal system would have no income tax but higher consumption/sales tax.<<

Then you'd have to give rebates to those on low incomes - think of the complications!

*My* ideal tax would be just the opposite - get rid of all taxes except income tax, have a lower limit below which you wouldn't pay anything and then a fixed rate above that.

The more you earn the more you pay and you automatically protect the low paid.

Originally Posted by Amazulu

None of the 'clean' energy sources, but together add up. If we are going to go down this road then lets do it properly and go for the whole range of solutions.

Originally Posted by freebo

Never gonna happen - how do you pay for healthcare, policing, defense, public utilities,welfare etc? You could argue that too much is spent right now but the current level of GST alone would not be enough to run the country.