Re Tony Abbott on Hazelwood

Alex Anderson writes: Re. “Abbott’s Hazelwood intervention defies reality” (Friday)

Before reading this I heard the man interviewed by Fran Kelly on ABC where he revealed again that he is either ignorant or dishonest for the purpose of political point scoring. What flashed through my mind was a line paraphrased from The Lion in Winter spoken by Henry II, ”will no one rid us of this meddlesome Pom”? Is it not time that he made an exit to Brexit? His wrecking ball activities have wreaked enough havoc on our nation.

 John Richardson writes: Re. “Abbott’s Hazelwood intervention defies reality” (Friday)

I don’t care whether it’s Tony Abbott, Malcolm Turnbull, Bill Shorten, Jay Wetherill, Josh Frydenberg, the gas producers, the power station operators, the electricity grid gougers or the purveyors of mushroom clouds … they are all dishonest spin merchants & all equally & deliberately intent on putting their own interests (political or commercial) ahead of the wellbeing of Australians & our nation.

While the knuckle-draggers of all persuasions argue about which of their phoney proposals represents the best way to increase electricity output & energy security, not one displays the wit or insight to examine the obvious alternate solution to the problem which trumps all of their proposals – simply reduce demand.

And what action would reduce demand overnight, provide instant energy security while a genuine future strategy is developed, drive a significant reduction in electricity pricing for both business & consumers, avoid the necessity for immediate, major, unaffordable capital investment, while generating significant taxpayer savings?

As Dr Norm Sanders suggests, simply shut-down the hugely costly & dangerous, foreign-owned aluminium smelters that consume 14% of Australia’s electricity, account for 16% of the greenhouse gas emissions from electrical generation, in addition to the significant quantities of greenhouse gases emitted during the smelting process itself, suck millions from the public teat (Alcoa has just been handed a $210m subsidy by the Victorian Government & a $30m interest-free loan by the Federal Government), not to forget the super cheap rates they pay for the huge amounts of electricity they use in their smelting process (estimated to be half the rates of other industrial customers & about a tenth of rates for residential users). 

Long live the pub test.

John Gleeson writes:  Re: “Campaign on 18C based in fantasy” (Friday)

Yes, I agree, it is all an illusion and a pathetic fantasy, simply because our politicians cannot bring themselves to stand up to Murdoch.  18C and the Murdoch driven martyrdom of Bill Leak may or may not be the high water mark of the way Murdoch operates-it does expose that fact that Murdoch has nowhere to go after a campaign of vilification that produced nothing for him.

However, suppose Murdoch decided that the refugee policy was wrong, and onshore processing plus the closure of hell-holes such as Manaus was the correct way to go?

How long before the government changed policy?  Very quickly, I would think, and therein lies the immorality at the heart of Murdoch and his News Corp-he can influence the public in a positive way, but prefers to vilify anyone who disagrees with him.