'Considering PEP-11 on balance' is not a commitment
Lucy Wicks is running full-page ads, saying that the Government is opposed to the PEP-11 project.
However, the responsible Minister is saying that he is "considering this on balance, in regards to the law, in regards to the national interest and ... tak(ing) into account the views of the community".
"Considering on balance" doesn't sound like a firm commitment in any meaningful interpretation of the words, and we all know what "taking into account the views of the community" means as a third-level factor, when it comes to the interests of the fossil-fuel lobby, so it is alarming that the lease-holders are proceeding full-steam ahead with drilling preparations, apparently on the basis of some knowledge denied to the community at large.
To be opening up gas fields indicates how seriously the Government takes its reluctant commitment to zero net emissions in 2050 (preferably, if possible, provided there is no loss of mining jobs, with full protection for the agricultural sector and preserving all National Party seats).
What about some protection for the rest of us, instead of pie-in-the-sky rhetoric about new, not-yet-invented technologies solving all our problems, without any need for regulation or for governmental action, except, of course, for "incentives" to the worst polluters to change their ways?
In this instance, incentives is the code word for splashing out our tax dollars to benefit big business on which the Morrison government relies for financial support, rather than requiring polluters to clean up their own mess through a trading scheme.
It is telling that a government that supposedly espouses the market as the best mechanism for dealing with national needs doesn't want to use the most obvious market mechanism (recommended by all economic experts) as the key to a workable emissions policy.
I don't care about SloMo being embarrassed in Glasgow, when he had to deliver this drivel to a sceptical audience, and I have no personal stake in the matter, as I'll be long gone by the time the impacts of emission increases hit home.
However, there is a "national interest" involved here, and it doesn't seem to be the one guiding Minister Pitt in his deliberations on the PEP.11.
SOURCE:
Email, 23 Nov 2021
Bruce Hyland, Woy Woy