So, News Limited have decided to put up on their election website a “Vote-a-matic” feature designed to tell people which party to vote for at the upcoming election based on the way they answer a series of questions.

A great idea. Damn good. Pity about the way they’ve done it.Continue Reading »

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ANZ customers and employees responded well to our action at the ANZ Bank’s Sydney headquarters today. Kerry Nettle was joined by the Greens’ candidate for Wentworth,Susan Jarnason andSue Mahony who is taking on Peter Garett in Kingsford Smith. They handed out anOpen letter to ANZ Customers asking them to let the ANZ bank know their views on the giant Tasmanian pulp mill.

ANZ has said they will do their own social, economic and environmental assessment of the cost of the pulp mill before deciding on financing the mill.

You can let ANZ know your views by going to theTell Mr Smith website.

Another week, another ALP me-too policy change. It’s becoming increasingly difficult to remember the differences between the ALP and the Coalition in this campaign. In so many of the key policy areas differences are more about style than substance, inviting voters to change the colour of the car but keep the same model.

In schools education the difference repeated ad nauseam by ALP spokespeople for years now has been ‘needs based funding’. This set of magic words never came with a concrete explanation but nevertheless did some work in differentiating the ALP from the coalition. Now that differentiation has been dropped.

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I’m feeling pretty gutted this afternoon. Having woken up to the news that Labor foreign affairs spokesperson, Robert McClelland, had stood up for aprincipled position on abolishing the death penalty, I was filled with a sudden feeling that maybe a Rudd Government would actually stand for something. Maybe they would make a real change from the current mob.

What a disappointment, then, this afternoon, when McClelland waspulled into line by his fearless leader, afraid of a few shadows and anasty headline in the Australian.Continue Reading »

If the Prime Minister doesn’t call the election this weekend, I will introduce a private members’ bill when Parliament resumes next week requiring the total amount of taxpayers’ money spent on government advertising to be included in every advertisement.
 
The aim of the bill is to name and shame governments who use taxpayers’ money on blatantly political advertising. It will allow taxpayers to see exactly how much of their money is being spent by self-serving governments.
 
The bill will amend theCommonwealth Electoral Act 1918and theFinancial Management and Accountability Act 1997to require the total cost of a government advertising campaign to be displayed in all the advertisements in that campaign, alongside the authorisation.
 
The ‘Climate Clever’, ‘Better Super’ and ‘Net Alert’ ad campaigns will cost taxpayers $52 million, $69 million and $21.5 million respectively. The Greens bill would ensure each advertisement displayed the total cost of the campaign to taxpayers.Of course, some government advertising is necessary to impart information to the public. But by displaying the cost of these advertisements governments will think twice before abusing taxpayers’ money.

Bob Brown

A couple of really big stories in recent days help to debunk the ludicrous myth that renewables would have any trouble meeting our energy needs pretty fast, as long as we get cranking with energy efficiency as well.

You might have seen this piece on aproposed 500 turbine wind farmout near Broken Hill which could provide 4.5% of NSW’s electricity demand by the end of 2009. A huge amount of clean power there, with a very fast energy payback. That means, if it gets priority access to the grid through some kind of feed-in law, it’d reduce emissions fast by replacing coal. Excellent news also that the company involved appears to have sensibly started the conversation with the locals before even putting in their DA, which always makes for a smooth process.Continue Reading »

Fiona Katauskas, who is one of my favorite political cartoonists, has agreed to do a cartoon a week for me through the whole crazy election period.

I like the way she thinks as well as loving the way she draws…

Fiona has done a number of cartoons in the past for some of our campaign postcards - which you can [soon] find on my website.

Fiona’sown websitehas a whole pile more great cartoons, and makes a regular appearance onThe Chaser’s site.

Another friend of mine has promised to do me a couple of animations as well, so keep an eye out for these in coming weeks.

Today the Australian Council of Social Services ACOSS released its Federal Election statement “Towards a Fairer Australia”.

The question it poses is simple – if Australia as a nation can’t find it in its heart to help out the disadvantaged and ensure a fair go for all Australians during the economic ‘good times’, then can we really continue to think of this country as the land of the fair go?

The Australian Greens support the call by ACOSS for a national action plan to address the needs of low income Australians. It fits in with my previous calls in the Senate for aNational Anti-Poverty strategy. A good example of the success of such a strategy is given byIreland.

I thought it might be helpful to list some of the commitments we’ve already made in the Senate to address the issues raised by ACOSS today in their call for a fair go for all.Continue Reading »

Malcolm Turnbull has done what Gunns and the Prime Minister required and approved the pulp mill. But he hasn’t taken it off the election agenda – this is far from over.

Mr Turnbull is saying that the conditions he’s put on the marine effluent, and saving 400ha of forest, make this a world’s best practice mill. But how can a mill which will destroy 200,000ha of magnificent forest, 500 times what’s being protected, be world’s best practice? How can a mill that pumps effluent, albeit less than it might, into a pristine environment be world’s best practice? How can a mill that adds 10 million tonnes of greenhouse gases to the atmosphere every year be world’s best practice?

Mr Turnbull didn’t answer those questions, because he decided he didn’t have to.Continue Reading »