What a dire weekend for herpetology students, just before the full grimness of the dire holyday season unfolds ...
All the pond can offer this day is an extended tour of hell ... with some fresh hell ready to unfold on the morrow ...
Early Saturday morning the pond could see the nightmare beginning its unfolding ...
The pond had thought Petey boy had stumbled off into the twilight zone to bump into another gotcha journalist, but at least the pond was relieved of that burden by the sight of "Ned" just below him. What need of Petey boy when you have "Ned" to channel him?
At the very bottom of the main pile, there was the Ughmann doing his bog standard renewables walrus impersonation.
Over on the far right there was a tribute to a cartoonist who long ago lost his way, a story of trouble in Tykeland, an early prattling Polonius sighting, and some blather about think tanks.
In the usual way, the reptiles hastily revised this listing later in the morning, promoting Ben, disappearing Polonius, giving Tom a break and dropping Leunig and trouble in Tykeland down the list ...
Relax, Polonius will make his appearance tomorrow and so will trouble in Tykeland.
For the moment the pond must deal with the Ughmann and nattering "Ned", and that's more than enough ...
Here's the problem. The reptiles clocked in the Ughmann as a nine minute read, and yet for the pond it stretched to the horizon and beyond, what with there not being a single original thought or new angle to be found, just the usual dumping on renewables and nuking the country to save the planet rising as an Ughmann vision.
The title said it all, Nuclear to rise on the rubble of flawed policy, The sun will inevitably set on Labor’s low-cost, renewables-only fantasy.
This time the reptiles decided to credit the collage author that started off the torture, Labor’s plan uses flawed modelling that shuns a proven energy source. Collage: Emilia Tortorella.
Oh Emilia, Emilia, you would have been better off dodging the credit and blaming AI ...
Then the Ughmann cranked into gear ...
It’s odds-on the Albanese government will deliver billions more in electricity subsidies some time after the Reserve Bank board meets next February.
Because, if not for the Ponzi scheme of state and federal governments laundering taxpayer dollars back through power bills, electricity prices would be 66 per cent higher today than they were just 18 months ago.
In the parallel universe of politics the arsonists expect praise when they return with a fire extinguisher. In this world Labor and a long parade of Luddites also furiously attack a remote nuclear future in the hope people won’t focus on the disastrous energy present.
The here and now is where the focus should be sharp because the system under construction will be ruinously expensive and unreliable. The case for nuclear inevitably will rise on the rubble of bad policy, but not before enormous damage is done.
Economist Chris Richardson has calculated the difference between the subsidised and real cost of power from figures hiding in plain sight in the latest Australian Bureau of Statistics consumer price index.
Because, if not for the Ponzi scheme of state and federal governments laundering taxpayer dollars back through power bills, electricity prices would be 66 per cent higher today than they were just 18 months ago.
In the parallel universe of politics the arsonists expect praise when they return with a fire extinguisher. In this world Labor and a long parade of Luddites also furiously attack a remote nuclear future in the hope people won’t focus on the disastrous energy present.
The here and now is where the focus should be sharp because the system under construction will be ruinously expensive and unreliable. The case for nuclear inevitably will rise on the rubble of bad policy, but not before enormous damage is done.
Economist Chris Richardson has calculated the difference between the subsidised and real cost of power from figures hiding in plain sight in the latest Australian Bureau of Statistics consumer price index.
Now the pond doesn't intend to argue, there's nothing that hasn't already been said about starting up a ruinously expensive and dubious set of SMRs from scratch that needs repeating here.
Instead the pond is content to note the interrupting illustrations, Economist Chris Richardson. Picture: AAP
Does this Richo variant ever worry about the company he keeps? Does he think that X is the best forum for sustained economic analysis? Apparently ...
Richardson wrote on X that the politics of surging electricity prices were dire, so the federal government would almost certainly return to the taxpayer till to mask the bill shock. “But that’s another $3.5bn into the economy for the RBA to juggle,” he wrote. “So they may well keep the RBA guessing … because that’s what makes sense in a game of chicken.”
Flagging that it intends to pour more cash into the economy before the Reserve Bank board meets would imperil the chance of a pre-election interest rate cut the government so desperately covets. So expect it to delay and deny until the bank rules on the cash rate.
Given that Treasury secretary Steven Kennedy sits on the RBA board, one wonders if its other members will quiz him on the government’s intentions come February 17 or if he will volunteer the information. As David Pearl has written in these pages, a man serving two masters leaves you wondering where his loyalties lie. But there is no need to wonder whether the government’s plans for a weather-dependent grid will deliver cheap power.
Flagging that it intends to pour more cash into the economy before the Reserve Bank board meets would imperil the chance of a pre-election interest rate cut the government so desperately covets. So expect it to delay and deny until the bank rules on the cash rate.
Given that Treasury secretary Steven Kennedy sits on the RBA board, one wonders if its other members will quiz him on the government’s intentions come February 17 or if he will volunteer the information. As David Pearl has written in these pages, a man serving two masters leaves you wondering where his loyalties lie. But there is no need to wonder whether the government’s plans for a weather-dependent grid will deliver cheap power.
Then came another snap, another Ughmann victim, Treasury secretary Steven Kennedy. Picture: NewsWire/Martin Ollman
By this point the pond was yearning for a 'toon, something to break up the endless ranting, the ad nauseam talk of doom and gloom ... but the pond stayed strong, it's best just to swallow a huge chunk ...
It is a lie, and the truth is written in your electricity bill. Another round of energy subsidies would be an admission of abject policy failure from a government that was elected on the promise of cutting power costs. Labor’s pre-election pledge was based on modelling by Melbourne-based firm RepuTex, which forecast wholesale and retail electricity prices would be driven down by “access to an abundant supply of low-cost renewable electricity”.
The company went so far as to put a number on it, which Labor repeated ad nauseam. “It will see electricity prices fall from the current level by $275 for households by 2025, at the end of our first term,” Anthony Albanese said when he released the modelling in December 2021.
Labor has never walked away from this pledge, no matter how far it vanishes down the sinkhole of reality. The government position seems to be that wishing will make it so, or that economic models trump real-world experience.
The RepuTex analysis is wrong because it treats wind and solar energy gatherers as equivalent to coal, gas and nuclear generators. To borrow from philosophy, lumping gatherers in the same basket as generators is a category error, like asking “what colour is the number five?”.
The CSIRO’s GenCost report does include some of the additional costs of integrating weather-dependent generation on to the grid. But it doesn’t include them all and makes fundamental errors in writing off future expenditures as sunk costs, underestimating the price of backing up the system and using costs that seem extreme outliers.
The company went so far as to put a number on it, which Labor repeated ad nauseam. “It will see electricity prices fall from the current level by $275 for households by 2025, at the end of our first term,” Anthony Albanese said when he released the modelling in December 2021.
Labor has never walked away from this pledge, no matter how far it vanishes down the sinkhole of reality. The government position seems to be that wishing will make it so, or that economic models trump real-world experience.
The RepuTex analysis is wrong because it treats wind and solar energy gatherers as equivalent to coal, gas and nuclear generators. To borrow from philosophy, lumping gatherers in the same basket as generators is a category error, like asking “what colour is the number five?”.
The CSIRO’s GenCost report does include some of the additional costs of integrating weather-dependent generation on to the grid. But it doesn’t include them all and makes fundamental errors in writing off future expenditures as sunk costs, underestimating the price of backing up the system and using costs that seem extreme outliers.
As to why you should prefer the opinion of a former failed seminarian to actual scientists, think of that as a mystery up there with trinitarianism and transubstantiation.
As anyone knows, a thought bubble on X is infinitely preferable to extensive analysis ...
And it can’t claim to be an analysis of the best energy policy for the country because changing the electricity grid changes everything. The grid is the system that runs all systems. Choosing the best mix of generators for it isn’t the same as comparing over-the-counter prices for microwave ovens.
Energy is not part of the economy, it is the economy. System-wide changes need to be analysed at this level. This point has been underlined by economist Alex Coram. In a recent post on X he wrote: “The problem is that the energy debate in Australia is carried out in accounting costs pretending to be economic costs and none of it is serious.” Coram tells this column: “I think the lack of a proper economic analysis of what amounts to the transformation of our entire economy is the big story in all this.”
He says to deal with the “energy is the economy” problem a serious analysis should begin by identifying the mix of goals Australia wants to achieve, then consider the full costs of all feasible technological options and trajectories to get there. Then develop a transition plan that maximises the mix.
Energy is not part of the economy, it is the economy. System-wide changes need to be analysed at this level. This point has been underlined by economist Alex Coram. In a recent post on X he wrote: “The problem is that the energy debate in Australia is carried out in accounting costs pretending to be economic costs and none of it is serious.” Coram tells this column: “I think the lack of a proper economic analysis of what amounts to the transformation of our entire economy is the big story in all this.”
He says to deal with the “energy is the economy” problem a serious analysis should begin by identifying the mix of goals Australia wants to achieve, then consider the full costs of all feasible technological options and trajectories to get there. Then develop a transition plan that maximises the mix.
A proper inquiry would need to go beyond using the usual tools of supply-and-demand side economics. This demands some innovative analysis and mathematics “that are not likely to be well handled with the sort of DIY approaches we have used so far”, Coram says.
And electricity is a market like no other. Here, keeping supply in perfect harmony with demand is essential in maintaining the system’s frequency and keeping the lights on. The random supply of wind and solar disrupts both the economics and the physics of an electricity market. On-and-off energy toggles the marginal cost of producing another unit of power between zero and infinity, as wind and solar dump their surplus or deficit costs on the entire system.
This is difficult to deal with in a theory of supply that holds that suppliers respond to demand; price rises are a signal to produce more goods. Or, in an electricity system with predictable generators, more power.
“If you think about it, it is pretty frightening that we are prepared to bet our economic future on what is nothing more than some DIY accounting by an organisation with no serious capacity in economic theory and analysis,” Coram says.
Australia is conducting a proof of concept experiment on our civilisation’s life support system.
And the evidence from South Australia and countries running grid-scale experiments with weather-dependent generation puts accounting orthodoxy to the sword.
In the real world, when wind and solar rise to become a dominant power source, electricity is expensive and grids unreliable.
Germany’s capricious grid is proving to be the most reliable predictor of Australia’s energy future. That nation’s energy transition has cost it $1 trillion since 2000, as it began closing coal-fired and nuclear generation and replacing it with wind and solar energy harvesting.
Its wind and solar droughts are now so routine they have a name: dunkelflaute, or the dark doldrums. Germany is lucky because it can import power from other parts of Europe through its web of interconnections. And its neighbours are unlucky because Germany’s random generators are exporting inflation.
The Financial Times reported this week that a lack of wind in Germany and the North Sea pushed up electricity prices in southern Norway to their highest point since 2009 and almost 20 times their level of just a week earlier.
Norway’s Energy Minister Terje Aasland was blunt: “It’s an absolutely shit situation.”
The ruling centre-left Labour party now says it will campaign in September’s parliamentary election to turn off electricity interconnectors to Denmark when they come up for renewal in 2026.
Sweden’s Energy Minister Ebba Busch also attacked Germany for shutting its nuclear power plants.
And electricity is a market like no other. Here, keeping supply in perfect harmony with demand is essential in maintaining the system’s frequency and keeping the lights on. The random supply of wind and solar disrupts both the economics and the physics of an electricity market. On-and-off energy toggles the marginal cost of producing another unit of power between zero and infinity, as wind and solar dump their surplus or deficit costs on the entire system.
This is difficult to deal with in a theory of supply that holds that suppliers respond to demand; price rises are a signal to produce more goods. Or, in an electricity system with predictable generators, more power.
“If you think about it, it is pretty frightening that we are prepared to bet our economic future on what is nothing more than some DIY accounting by an organisation with no serious capacity in economic theory and analysis,” Coram says.
Australia is conducting a proof of concept experiment on our civilisation’s life support system.
And the evidence from South Australia and countries running grid-scale experiments with weather-dependent generation puts accounting orthodoxy to the sword.
In the real world, when wind and solar rise to become a dominant power source, electricity is expensive and grids unreliable.
Germany’s capricious grid is proving to be the most reliable predictor of Australia’s energy future. That nation’s energy transition has cost it $1 trillion since 2000, as it began closing coal-fired and nuclear generation and replacing it with wind and solar energy harvesting.
Its wind and solar droughts are now so routine they have a name: dunkelflaute, or the dark doldrums. Germany is lucky because it can import power from other parts of Europe through its web of interconnections. And its neighbours are unlucky because Germany’s random generators are exporting inflation.
The Financial Times reported this week that a lack of wind in Germany and the North Sea pushed up electricity prices in southern Norway to their highest point since 2009 and almost 20 times their level of just a week earlier.
Norway’s Energy Minister Terje Aasland was blunt: “It’s an absolutely shit situation.”
The ruling centre-left Labour party now says it will campaign in September’s parliamentary election to turn off electricity interconnectors to Denmark when they come up for renewal in 2026.
Sweden’s Energy Minister Ebba Busch also attacked Germany for shutting its nuclear power plants.
What does any of this have to do with starting a nuclear industry from scratch, government owned and presumably run, and with costs certain to blow out, that being the Australian way?
Well it allows snaps of irrelevant Europeans, including Sweden’s Energy Minister Ebba Busch. Picture: AFP
Evidently the reptiles decided this sort of interruption was a useful way of relieving the ennui and tedium, because shortly after this ...
“I’m furious with the Germans,” Busch told Swedish broadcaster SVT.
“They have made a decision for their country, which they have the right to make. But it has had very serious consequences.”
Busch said when German wind production was low, Swedish electricity was exported to fill the gap, reducing supply to Swedish consumers and driving up prices.
Sweden’s Prime Minister, Ulf Kristersson, also took aim at his own country’s energy choices.
“I realise that nobody is happy when I say that if we hadn’t shut down half of nuclear power we wouldn’t have these problems. But it’s true and it needs to be said,” Kristersson complained, referring to the previous Social Democrat-Greens coalition closing several nuclear reactors as part of a policy shift towards greater reliance on wind and solar.
“They have made a decision for their country, which they have the right to make. But it has had very serious consequences.”
Busch said when German wind production was low, Swedish electricity was exported to fill the gap, reducing supply to Swedish consumers and driving up prices.
Sweden’s Prime Minister, Ulf Kristersson, also took aim at his own country’s energy choices.
“I realise that nobody is happy when I say that if we hadn’t shut down half of nuclear power we wouldn’t have these problems. But it’s true and it needs to be said,” Kristersson complained, referring to the previous Social Democrat-Greens coalition closing several nuclear reactors as part of a policy shift towards greater reliance on wind and solar.
... the reptiles inserted another snap, Swedish Prime Minister Ulf Kristersson. Picture: AFP
Then it was back to the ranting, a final extended burst ...
The green dream sold to Germans was the same as that sold everywhere, that wind and solar would deliver cheap, abundant, reliable power. In 2015 The New York Times columnist Thomas L. Friedman bore witness to the promise of Germany’s energy transition.
“Here’s my prediction,” Friedman wrote. “Germany will be Europe’s first green, solar-powered superpower.”
“Here’s my prediction,” Friedman wrote. “Germany will be Europe’s first green, solar-powered superpower.”
This prediction has not aged well. Nearly a decade on, Germany is depowering and deindustrialising, its businesses and people crushed by the highest power prices in Europe.
The most reliable source of electricity in the EU comes from the country that generates 64 per cent of its energy from nuclear power. Reuters reports France is by far the largest electricity exporter in Europe, “accounting for roughly 60 per cent of net electricity exports so far in 2024”.
“Record French electricity exports this year have provided neighbours with critical supplies of cheap and clean power while the region remains hobbled by high energy costs, weak economic growth and political disarray,” the news agency reports.
But now France also is in political disarray and it seems nothing can save Europe from itself.
The International Energy Agency reports: “Electricity prices for energy-intensive industries in the European Union in 2023 were almost double those in the United States and China. As a result, the competitiveness of EU energy-intensive industries is expected to remain under pressure.”
Given Europe, and especially Germany, is not the energy example to follow, a sensible government might ask: What are the US and China getting right?
Here it is best, as ever, to look at what those countries are doing rather than listen to what they are saying, because both talk a great green game while burning lots of fossil fuel.
We have all heard China’s sales pitch, that it installed more wind and solar than the rest of the world combined in 2023. In the US the Biden administration’s Inflation Reduction Act is touted as “the largest investment in clean energy and climate action ever”. There is truth in both these claims but, to see how they actually run their economies, you need to lift the hood and have a closer look.
The most reliable source of electricity in the EU comes from the country that generates 64 per cent of its energy from nuclear power. Reuters reports France is by far the largest electricity exporter in Europe, “accounting for roughly 60 per cent of net electricity exports so far in 2024”.
“Record French electricity exports this year have provided neighbours with critical supplies of cheap and clean power while the region remains hobbled by high energy costs, weak economic growth and political disarray,” the news agency reports.
But now France also is in political disarray and it seems nothing can save Europe from itself.
The International Energy Agency reports: “Electricity prices for energy-intensive industries in the European Union in 2023 were almost double those in the United States and China. As a result, the competitiveness of EU energy-intensive industries is expected to remain under pressure.”
Given Europe, and especially Germany, is not the energy example to follow, a sensible government might ask: What are the US and China getting right?
Here it is best, as ever, to look at what those countries are doing rather than listen to what they are saying, because both talk a great green game while burning lots of fossil fuel.
We have all heard China’s sales pitch, that it installed more wind and solar than the rest of the world combined in 2023. In the US the Biden administration’s Inflation Reduction Act is touted as “the largest investment in clean energy and climate action ever”. There is truth in both these claims but, to see how they actually run their economies, you need to lift the hood and have a closer look.
China did install a record amount of weather-dependent generation in 2023, at the same time as it was permitting the construction of two coal-fired power stations a week. Sixty per cent of China’s electricity comes from coal and it produces 35 per cent of the world’s carbon emissions.
Australia has abundant coal and gas resources and one-third of the world’s uranium. Our energy ministers have condemned all three power sources because they are way smarter than the Yanks and the Chinese and it’s sunny here.
These ministers, and the uncountable legions of advisers, agencies and advocates responsible for the grid under construction, are inflicting the greatest act of self-harm in our nation’s history. They have set us on a pathway to poverty. When the sun sets on this idiocy we will, too late, have to use nuclear energy or continue to burn coal and gas.
Surely the reptiles could have found another way to interrupt the ranting with an image of another distinguished Swede offering ideas with enormous appeal to the Ughmann?
That chef might have had a good idea, but all the good ideas escaped from the Ughmann:
While the nameplate capacity of wind and solar is an impressive 36 per cent of total generation, those sources delivered 13 per cent of the country’s electricity in 2023. This is always the case with weather-dependent generation – the headline and the story don’t match. In contrast, nuclear power is under 2 per cent of installed capacity but produces 4.7 per cent of the nation’s electricity.
China has 55 nuclear reactors, with 26 under construction, and is aiming to hit 150 of the units by 2035. This will lift the power they provide to the grid from under 5 per cent to 10 per cent. So, Beijing believes nuclear energy is compatible with building wind and solar. In fact, it’s essential to make the grid work while cutting carbon emissions.
Thanks to the shale revolution the US has risen to become the world’s largest producer of oil and natural gas, surpassing Saudi Arabia in oil production and Qatar in natural gas production. Abundant cheap gas has displaced coal in electricity generation and is the major driver of the US reduction in carbon emissions.
The US has 93 commercial nuclear reactors at 54 nuclear power plants across 28 states. The Biden administration’s green plan includes the pledge to triple nuclear power generation capacity by 2050. This goal has rare bipartisan support.
Nah, not really. What climate science denying planet did the Ughmann escape from?
Does he really think the US is the right sort of model going forward?
Wow indeed, and at least the tangerine tyrant is honest in his denialism and doesn't waste a lot of hot air heating up the pages of the lizard Oz, Ughmann style ...
The artificial intelligence revolution will drive demand for staggering amounts of electricity, which is why Microsoft has signed a deal to secure the power from a reopened Three Mile Island nuclear generating station. In October, 15 of the world’s biggest banks signed a joint declaration to increase support for nuclear power construction and 31 countries have now agreed to triple global nuclear energy capacity by 2050. All this is before Donald Trump returns to the White House, elected on a pledge to “drill, baby, drill” for oil and gas and to walk away from America’s international climate commitments.
So, in both China and the US, the cheap fuel that actually powers their economies comes from coal and gas. Both understand the limits of wind and solar. Both have decided there is no road to net zero and stable grids that does not run through nuclear power.
Yet again the pond has to ask why the Ughmann is so exercised about getting on the road to net zero.
Hasn't he been reading the lizard Oz, which has spent decades establishing that climate science is fake news and fake science?
Was all this simply so the reptiles could promote even more Ughmann detritus?
Chris Uhlmann’s documentary The Real Cost of Net Zero can be viewed on Sky News and YouTube.
The pond is so tired at having to wonder constantly why climate science denialists are so obsessed with promoting a road to net zero, but only by nuking the country. To what avail, to what point? Be honest, you really don't give a flying fig. You know it's just a caper.
At least if you joined the Canavan caravan you'd be honest liars...
Here have a relieving cartoon, it'll fix what ails ya ...
Oh yes, better than a THC gummy or an edible ... some weed candy for the brain.
And you'll need it, because after doing 9 minutes with the Ughmannm, the reptiles clocked in this weekend's nattering "Ned" Everest climb at a staggering 11 minutes.
11 lost minutes, never to be recovered, and "Ned" in a deep gloom, a trough of despond, 2024: the year Australia lost its way, The outlook is uninspiring, neither as bad as the Coalition insists nor as good as Labor pretends. But the risk is a nation heading into a trajectory of despond – without a robust course correction.
Again there was a credit for the opening artwork, Do Anthony Albanese and Jim Chalmers have a suitably ambitious agenda to break the cycle of third-best policy limiting the nation’s fortunes? Artwork: Frank Ling.
Oh Frank, Frank, frankly you should do an Emilia and let AI take the credit.
As for the "Ned" Everest, the pond can at least offer the consolation that it didn't bother with Petey boy, because there'd be enough Petey boy on hand in "Ned's" standard Chicken Little routine ...
Australia in 2024 is a country that has lost its way in a fractured world. The nation continues to underperform in a malaise that stretches back more than 15 years, the essential problem being the decoupling between political outcomes and the national interest.
At the close of 2024 the rail tracks pointing to our future seem entrenched – Australia is heading towards more public spending, bigger government to drive the economy, higher personal income taxes, historically lower unemployment, weak productivity, high energy prices, prolonged budget deficits and modest gains in living standards.
The outlook is uninspiring, neither as bad as the Coalition insists nor as good as Labor pretends. But the risk is a nation heading into a trajectory of despond – without a robust course correction.
Elections are chances for renewal yet the danger is that election 2025 will offer scant fresh policy while revealing a country split down the middle.
The story at present is an Australia more hostage to economic trends beyond its control and less able to shape its own future. There is now a widening chasm between much of the economic class worried about the lack of reform, creativity and productivity, on one hand, and the political class beset by a more distrusting public, thin parliamentary numbers and a more difficult governing environment on the other.
At the close of 2024 the rail tracks pointing to our future seem entrenched – Australia is heading towards more public spending, bigger government to drive the economy, higher personal income taxes, historically lower unemployment, weak productivity, high energy prices, prolonged budget deficits and modest gains in living standards.
The outlook is uninspiring, neither as bad as the Coalition insists nor as good as Labor pretends. But the risk is a nation heading into a trajectory of despond – without a robust course correction.
Elections are chances for renewal yet the danger is that election 2025 will offer scant fresh policy while revealing a country split down the middle.
The story at present is an Australia more hostage to economic trends beyond its control and less able to shape its own future. There is now a widening chasm between much of the economic class worried about the lack of reform, creativity and productivity, on one hand, and the political class beset by a more distrusting public, thin parliamentary numbers and a more difficult governing environment on the other.
Is it so bad "Ned"? Is it that dismal? Might not others have stronger reasons to be slumped in the trough of despond as they go for a drive with a couple of crash test dummies?
Yes, the pond snapped, snapped early and hard, the only way to endure "Ned"was to turn to the 'toons for salvation ...
The nation is far distant from that era of Australian exceptionalism, from Bob Hawke through Paul Keating to John Howard, that delivered a growth economy with budget surpluses, no debt, inflation within the 2-3 per cent band, real wage gains, universal superannuation, a sovereign wealth fund and substantial tax reform. Political credit for that reform agenda remains an issue of dispute among the principals – but there is no doubt that for a while Australia became a reform success that triggered global attention.
But the nation has allowed the keys to such success to slip away. With the 2025 election now looming, everyone talks up the Labor versus Coalition contest with Newspoll showing a voting split of 50-50. Yet there is a bigger issue – the concern that neither the Albanese government nor the Dutton-led Coalition has a sufficiently ambitious agenda to break the cycle of third-best policy limiting Australia’s fortunes.
Indeed, the prospect of a minority government only deepens the pessimism.
But the nation has allowed the keys to such success to slip away. With the 2025 election now looming, everyone talks up the Labor versus Coalition contest with Newspoll showing a voting split of 50-50. Yet there is a bigger issue – the concern that neither the Albanese government nor the Dutton-led Coalition has a sufficiently ambitious agenda to break the cycle of third-best policy limiting Australia’s fortunes.
Indeed, the prospect of a minority government only deepens the pessimism.
At this point the reptiles inserted a graphic which purported to be animated.
For those who couldn't read the fine print ...
This survey was conducted by Pyxis Polling & Insights between July 15 and July 19 with 1258 voters throughout Australia interviewed online. The theoretical margin of error is ± 3.0. It is compliant with the Australian Polling Council Code and a methodology statement will be available within two days at https://www.pyxispolling.com/apc/. Copyright at all times remains with The Australian.
The pond isn't going to do a tangerine tyrant and sue the pollster or the reptiles for running the poll, but surely the American experience showed that relying on a thousand or so people can lead to a few errors.
Including one massive error...
Hey, tell the pond it's not a pleasant distraction to have a sighting of where the wild things are ...
Our structural economic problems were apparent long before the Albanese government, with both side of politics needing to accept responsibility. The problems stretch back to the Rudd-Gillard era, encompass the nine years of Coalition rule and now a faltering Labor government. The malaise is structural. That’s why it’s hard to fix. There is no silver bullet.
Australia in 2024 was beset by cost-of-living pressures that undermined household incomes; a housing affordability crisis hurting a generation of young people; a fraud conducted by both sides of politics divided about the energy transition but pretending the nation could have both cheap and clean energy; a decade-long productivity slump threatening future living standards; and a big spending agenda consigning taxpayers to an ongoing high income tax burden.
Reflecting on the previous reform age, our longest serving treasurer, Peter Costello, tells Inquirer: “The era of Australian exceptionalism was seen in major structural reform, opening up markets – product markets, labour markets, financial markets – robust competition, the government getting out of business activity and exemplary fiscal policy. The high bar of fiscal policy was sustained surpluses that were sufficient to pay off commonwealth debt.
“In my time as treasurer, just under 12 years, Australia was seen among Western developed countries as the country that engaged in the deepest economic reform that had significant pay-offs for the community. Australian exceptionalism became a phrase used in the IMF. We were considered a model for other Western nations. This process began with Hawke and Keating but the fiscal high point – 10 budget surpluses and the retirement of all commonwealth debt – was considered to be Australian exceptionalism.
Australia in 2024 was beset by cost-of-living pressures that undermined household incomes; a housing affordability crisis hurting a generation of young people; a fraud conducted by both sides of politics divided about the energy transition but pretending the nation could have both cheap and clean energy; a decade-long productivity slump threatening future living standards; and a big spending agenda consigning taxpayers to an ongoing high income tax burden.
Reflecting on the previous reform age, our longest serving treasurer, Peter Costello, tells Inquirer: “The era of Australian exceptionalism was seen in major structural reform, opening up markets – product markets, labour markets, financial markets – robust competition, the government getting out of business activity and exemplary fiscal policy. The high bar of fiscal policy was sustained surpluses that were sufficient to pay off commonwealth debt.
“In my time as treasurer, just under 12 years, Australia was seen among Western developed countries as the country that engaged in the deepest economic reform that had significant pay-offs for the community. Australian exceptionalism became a phrase used in the IMF. We were considered a model for other Western nations. This process began with Hawke and Keating but the fiscal high point – 10 budget surpluses and the retirement of all commonwealth debt – was considered to be Australian exceptionalism.
And sure enough, after all that Petey boy blather came the man himself ... Australia’s longest serving treasurer, Peter Costello. Picture: Jane Dempster/The Australian.
As if longest serving was a badge of distinction, when in reality it just showed he lacked the ticker...
There's more behind the lines ...
Do go on, wannabe wanker ...
“No other country had zero debt – not France, not Germany, not Britain, not Canada, Japan or America. Not only had we paid off all debt but, with the surplus, we set up a sovereign wealth fund (the Future Fund).
“No other developed country had a sovereign wealth fund – there are petro funds outside of the developed world and there’s Norway, but no other Western world country has built a sovereign wealth fund from surpluses.
“Australia wasn’t considered to be a middle-of-the-pack Western industrial economy; it was considered to be exceptional, with sustained economic reform over 20 years.
“Now Australia is no longer exceptional in any economic respect. Our budget is back in deficit, forecast to be there for a decade, our debt is heading towards $1 trillion, our productivity is falling, our per capita GDP has declined for seven quarters and structural reform is non-existent.
“What we have lost is our exceptionalism – the idea that we can be exceptional. The idea that Australia can lead the world has disappeared. I feel it is the end of an era, when Australia was exceptional but does not see itself as exceptional any more.”
As a qualification, it should be noted the Howard government at the end spent far too much and Kevin Rudd got under its radar pledging to be a fiscal conservative.
Yeah, yeah ... you're no chook ...
Meanwhile, the "Ned" malaise was still spreading ...
Australia’s potential today is not being realised. Short-term pressures operate against adverse long-term trends. A similar malaise extends across much of the Western democratic world and Australia, by comparison, performs better than most other countries on most indicators. But political leadership is faltering.
In May 2022 the people removed the Morrison government, not sure of Anthony Albanese but recognising it was time to change the government and hoping Labor would rise to the occasion. Initially, the omens were encouraging, but 2024 has seen another story – the mood today is disappointment, indifference, even anger.
Labor seems a prisoner of its history as a party focused on state power and redistribution while mesmerised by the contemporary transitions around energy, the care economy and social improvement. Nations rely on the quality of their governing parties – Australia’s need at this time is a Labor government, steeped in the Hawke-Keating-Hayden tradition, with the resolve to think big-picture change and reform.
It will be a tragedy if this Labor government fails to perform under the pressures.
Australia has been kidding itself in recent years. The two forces that have weakened our resolve have been the unprecedented income surge from the China boom – creating false impressions of our strength – and growing lethargy in our governance, cruelling the capacity for reform. The crisis of the West is writ large: it is a world defined by dramatic change yet political systems are struggling to respond, burdened by growing polarisation.
Much of the public believes Australia is heading in the wrong direction, yet Labor’s response is to offer more of the same. This week’s mid-year budget update presented by Jim Chalmers and Finance Minister Katy Gallagher offers a snapshot from our current location. There are some encouraging signs but the overall picture is ominous.
The reptiles turned to an AV distraction, what with that picture of overalls looking ominous ... (no, the pond won't run a snap of period overalls) ...
Treasurer Jim Chalmers has delivered the government’s Mid-Year Economic and Fiscal Outlook (MYEFO) for 2024-25. The Treasurer revealed the budget deficit, at $26.9 billion, is $1.3 billion smaller than previously expected. “We are on track for a soft landing in our economy,” Mr Chalmers said during a media conference on Wednesday.
Instead of a picture of overalls to illustrate the overall picture, the pond will stick with signs of hope ...
Back to "Ned" ... and here is the ongoing gloom ...
Here is the news: economic growth is forecast to pick up but average only 2 per cent across the next two years; underlying inflation is being reduced, falling to 3.5 per cent in the recent quarter, but the battle is not yet won; real wages and household incomes are showing modest growth; government spending, pandemic aside, is at record highs reaching 27.2 per cent of GDP in 2025-26 and staying two percentage points above pre-pandemic levels; the budget deficit has deteriorated after two years of commodity-boosted surpluses and the budget is estimated to remained in deficit for a decade until 2034-35; across the upcoming four years budget deficits will total $143.9bn, a $22bn deterioration from the May budget; net debt will reach $708bn at 2027-28; and while tax cuts for 13 million taxpayers arrived in mid-2024, the income tax take will keep rising and total budget revenue for the current year is a high 25.5 per cent of GDP.
This situation has serious consequences on election eve. There is no scope for new spending and any such spending needs to be offset. No space exists on these numbers for income tax cuts. Spending by federal and state governments has undermined the Reserve Bank’s quest to cut interest rates. The government sector is driving the economy and growth but that’s unsustainable and constitutes a misallocation of resources. The spending trajectory will be financed, on current trends, by budget deficits and higher income tax collections.
Yet the message from the mid-year review is that Labor obviously intends to engage in pre-election spending spearheaded by further cost-of-living relief and its childcare agenda. The government’s dream election scenario is an interest rate cut in February, giving it the opening to safely announce new spending and then call an election.
Economist and budget analyst Chris Richardson assesses Labor’s record: since coming to office its net spending decisions total $124bn and its decisions to increase taxes total $46bn “so they’ve worsened the budget bottom line across the forward estimates by $78bn”.
That is the result of Labor’s decisions. But there’s a related issue. Richardson calculates that since Labor came to office the total value of revenue write-ups (flowing mainly from China and high commodity prices, not decisions by politicians) now totals $384bn.
The federal Treasurer says the government has taken 78 per cent of the windfall to the bottom line. Richardson offers a contradictory judgment, saying the mistake has been “too many permanent spending decisions off temporary good luck”.
The spending was too easy. Australia has done better with its budget than many other nations, but it has wasted its opportunity.
“These write-ups were truly stunning dollars,” Richardson says. “This windfall is rare. Most nations never get to see it. On the test that history will apply – did we make hay while the sun was shining? – then transparently we did not. There’s been little to no structural reform of either the economy or the budget for two decades now. And what’s now happening for Australia is the luck is starting to run out.”
This situation has serious consequences on election eve. There is no scope for new spending and any such spending needs to be offset. No space exists on these numbers for income tax cuts. Spending by federal and state governments has undermined the Reserve Bank’s quest to cut interest rates. The government sector is driving the economy and growth but that’s unsustainable and constitutes a misallocation of resources. The spending trajectory will be financed, on current trends, by budget deficits and higher income tax collections.
Yet the message from the mid-year review is that Labor obviously intends to engage in pre-election spending spearheaded by further cost-of-living relief and its childcare agenda. The government’s dream election scenario is an interest rate cut in February, giving it the opening to safely announce new spending and then call an election.
Economist and budget analyst Chris Richardson assesses Labor’s record: since coming to office its net spending decisions total $124bn and its decisions to increase taxes total $46bn “so they’ve worsened the budget bottom line across the forward estimates by $78bn”.
That is the result of Labor’s decisions. But there’s a related issue. Richardson calculates that since Labor came to office the total value of revenue write-ups (flowing mainly from China and high commodity prices, not decisions by politicians) now totals $384bn.
The federal Treasurer says the government has taken 78 per cent of the windfall to the bottom line. Richardson offers a contradictory judgment, saying the mistake has been “too many permanent spending decisions off temporary good luck”.
The spending was too easy. Australia has done better with its budget than many other nations, but it has wasted its opportunity.
“These write-ups were truly stunning dollars,” Richardson says. “This windfall is rare. Most nations never get to see it. On the test that history will apply – did we make hay while the sun was shining? – then transparently we did not. There’s been little to no structural reform of either the economy or the budget for two decades now. And what’s now happening for Australia is the luck is starting to run out.”
But surely things are looking up ...
The pond simply needs a break every so often from "Ned" running the thoughts of others and then organising them into a litany of despair, and claiming the result for himself...
Putting further perspective on Australia’s dilemma, Deloitte Access Economics partner Stephen Smith tells Inquirer that bad economics will create bad politics.
Smith says: “Successive Australian governments have disappointed economists for many years with their lack of reform ambition. Part of the reason why reform has been put off is because the federal budget has been so lucky. Strong economic growth in China and high commodity prices have underpinned an enormous surge in company tax revenue, meaning governments have been able to fund promises like tax cuts and increased spending without doing hard work to improve the structural position of the budget.
“We may now be reaching a tipping point with slower growth in China and lower commodity prices. That means governments will not just disappoint economists in future but the voting public as well.
“The time will come for changes to tax. It must. Australia needs a more sustainable fiscal strategy. Almost half of all revenue raised by the federal government is sourced from taxes on individuals.
“At the same time, major tax expenditures such as the concessional taxation of superannuation contributions and earnings, and the capital gains tax discount, disproportionally benefit the wealthiest Australians.”
It is wrong to think Labor has not been ambitious. It has run aggressively on renewables, legislated a sweeping pro-trade union industrial relations agenda, supported the care economy with funds and wage subsidies, reformed the aged care system, committed to universal early childhood education, devised its Future Made in Australia project, largely restored the China trade and invested in social policy.
Yet the parts don’t fit together. They are all over the place, often good causes that fight each other – witness the tension between housing policy and high immigration, ploughing resources into the care economy knowing it will drain productivity improvements, let alone the macro-tension between fiscal and monetary policy. The public is confused about what Labor stands for and it senses the central policy problem – the absence of a clearly articulated co-ordinated strategy.
Chalmers and Gallagher pulled their best case together in the mid-year review. Chalmers said: “The economy is growing but slowly. Inflation is moderating. Real wages and real incomes are growing. Unemployment is low. A million jobs have been created. Participation is around record highs. The gender pay gap has a narrowed. Tax cuts and cost-of-living help is rolling out.
Smith says: “Successive Australian governments have disappointed economists for many years with their lack of reform ambition. Part of the reason why reform has been put off is because the federal budget has been so lucky. Strong economic growth in China and high commodity prices have underpinned an enormous surge in company tax revenue, meaning governments have been able to fund promises like tax cuts and increased spending without doing hard work to improve the structural position of the budget.
“We may now be reaching a tipping point with slower growth in China and lower commodity prices. That means governments will not just disappoint economists in future but the voting public as well.
“The time will come for changes to tax. It must. Australia needs a more sustainable fiscal strategy. Almost half of all revenue raised by the federal government is sourced from taxes on individuals.
“At the same time, major tax expenditures such as the concessional taxation of superannuation contributions and earnings, and the capital gains tax discount, disproportionally benefit the wealthiest Australians.”
It is wrong to think Labor has not been ambitious. It has run aggressively on renewables, legislated a sweeping pro-trade union industrial relations agenda, supported the care economy with funds and wage subsidies, reformed the aged care system, committed to universal early childhood education, devised its Future Made in Australia project, largely restored the China trade and invested in social policy.
Yet the parts don’t fit together. They are all over the place, often good causes that fight each other – witness the tension between housing policy and high immigration, ploughing resources into the care economy knowing it will drain productivity improvements, let alone the macro-tension between fiscal and monetary policy. The public is confused about what Labor stands for and it senses the central policy problem – the absence of a clearly articulated co-ordinated strategy.
Chalmers and Gallagher pulled their best case together in the mid-year review. Chalmers said: “The economy is growing but slowly. Inflation is moderating. Real wages and real incomes are growing. Unemployment is low. A million jobs have been created. Participation is around record highs. The gender pay gap has a narrowed. Tax cuts and cost-of-living help is rolling out.
As usual, the reptiles were on hand with a literal illustration ...
Chalmers and Gallagher pulled their best case together in the mid-year review. Picture: NewsWire/Martin Ollman
It did nothing to sort out the sort of problem the pond has been experiencing watching Wolf Hall, the very first attempt at a Brexit ...
The good news? Turns out you should doff the cap, bend the knee and kiss the ring, just to be safe ...
Okay, okay, it was just another distraction, but on the upside, even a hectoring, lecturing ancient mariner as tiresome and wearying as this one will run out of steam in the end ... it's just a matter of hanging in there ...
“We need to remember in the international context that most of the OECD has had a negative quarter of growth. We have escaped a negative quarter of growth to date. Our gross debt position is a fraction of what we see in comparable countries. We’ve struck the right balance in our economic strategy and in the budget update today. We’ve maintained a primary focus on inflation and the cost of living without ignoring our broader responsibilities to people when it comes to Medicare and medicines and pensions and the like.”
But the demography and electoral politics driving the big spending items seem irresistible – the biggest is the National Disability Insurance Scheme, still estimated to grow a huge 8 per cent annually, followed by defence, hospitals, medical benefits, the childcare subsidy and aged care. Yet the situation is worse.
Labor is escalating the category of “off budget” spending – justified as investments that will return an income.
The big items here cover wiping student debts, the National Reconstruction Fund, Snowy Hydro 2.0, the Clean Energy Finance Corporation and Housing Australia, among others. These off-budget cashflows total a whopping $89.5bn across the forward estimates.
In his note sent to the media before the mid-year review Richardson warned the “off-budget” process was gaming the system and generating a loophole in accounting rules. He said a better measure was the headline budget balance and in the mid-year review this runs at a huge $233bn deficit across the forward estimates. It is highly relevant that the Coalition intends to locate its nuclear spending funds to this off-budget spending. Both sides are willing parties to the off-budget accounting method.
Independent economist Saul Eslake says: “Neither side of Australian politics has been willing to have an adult conversation with the Australian people about how all this additional spending should be paid for.”
Chalmers has signalled the way the election politics will be played. He says repeatedly that Labor’s spending has saved the country from a recession in 2024.
But the demography and electoral politics driving the big spending items seem irresistible – the biggest is the National Disability Insurance Scheme, still estimated to grow a huge 8 per cent annually, followed by defence, hospitals, medical benefits, the childcare subsidy and aged care. Yet the situation is worse.
Labor is escalating the category of “off budget” spending – justified as investments that will return an income.
The big items here cover wiping student debts, the National Reconstruction Fund, Snowy Hydro 2.0, the Clean Energy Finance Corporation and Housing Australia, among others. These off-budget cashflows total a whopping $89.5bn across the forward estimates.
In his note sent to the media before the mid-year review Richardson warned the “off-budget” process was gaming the system and generating a loophole in accounting rules. He said a better measure was the headline budget balance and in the mid-year review this runs at a huge $233bn deficit across the forward estimates. It is highly relevant that the Coalition intends to locate its nuclear spending funds to this off-budget spending. Both sides are willing parties to the off-budget accounting method.
Independent economist Saul Eslake says: “Neither side of Australian politics has been willing to have an adult conversation with the Australian people about how all this additional spending should be paid for.”
Chalmers has signalled the way the election politics will be played. He says repeatedly that Labor’s spending has saved the country from a recession in 2024.
Could it be worse?
Yeah, it probably could be worse, what with Uncle Leon sticking his arm up other sock puppets ...
Almost anything is more interesting than "Ned", even the rise of authoritarianism and a South African fascist revealing his taste for fascism ...
Somehow the realisation that things might be worse than groaning and sighing through an Ughmann and a "Ned" on a Saturday offered some consolation, all the more so as this was the last gobbet of "Ned" quoting others...
Opposition Treasury spokesman Angus Taylor has attacked Labor for record spending and out-of-control immigration – but Chalmers will argue against any Coalition cuts to spending on the grounds they will threaten a weak economy.
Eslake sketches the drivers behind the spending surge: the “very clear desire of the Australian public” for more spending on health, aged care, disability care and, more recently, childcare; the agreement that more needs to be spent on defence; and the rising interest rate bill on high debt. He says “it is not immediately obvious” how other areas of spending can be cut to offset the spending momentum in these areas.
Highlighting the spending addiction, Richardson says that in the past six months the tax take was revised upwards by $18.8bn and Labor spent $17.5bn.
“The problem is the revenue windfalls are getting smaller but the spending is not,” Richardson says. “Now they’re only saving 7 per cent of the windfalls.”
The future for Australia is going to be expensive wherever you look – NDIS, defence, energy. But the political system is in denial of the costs and how the nation will meet those costs. Politicians are dealing with the symptoms not the causes.
Take energy. Richardson says the latest Australian Bureau of Statistics numbers show that if we were actually charging people for the retail price of electricity rather than the subsidised price, people would be paying prices that were higher by 66 per cent. But politicians are dealing with the symptoms, not the causes. The future for Australia is going to be expensive wherever you look – NDIS, defence, energy. But the political system is in denial of the costs and how the nation will meet those costs.
Eslake sketches the drivers behind the spending surge: the “very clear desire of the Australian public” for more spending on health, aged care, disability care and, more recently, childcare; the agreement that more needs to be spent on defence; and the rising interest rate bill on high debt. He says “it is not immediately obvious” how other areas of spending can be cut to offset the spending momentum in these areas.
Highlighting the spending addiction, Richardson says that in the past six months the tax take was revised upwards by $18.8bn and Labor spent $17.5bn.
“The problem is the revenue windfalls are getting smaller but the spending is not,” Richardson says. “Now they’re only saving 7 per cent of the windfalls.”
The future for Australia is going to be expensive wherever you look – NDIS, defence, energy. But the political system is in denial of the costs and how the nation will meet those costs. Politicians are dealing with the symptoms not the causes.
Take energy. Richardson says the latest Australian Bureau of Statistics numbers show that if we were actually charging people for the retail price of electricity rather than the subsidised price, people would be paying prices that were higher by 66 per cent. But politicians are dealing with the symptoms, not the causes. The future for Australia is going to be expensive wherever you look – NDIS, defence, energy. But the political system is in denial of the costs and how the nation will meet those costs.
Yes, yes, we'll all be rooned, but things could be worse ...trust TT to explain ...
