Cranky Queenslander

News out this week that our esteemed leaders in Canberra never really intended to scrap the Goodna Bypass should come as no surprise; Prime Minister Rudd has always been a man ready to say what needs to be said to get the votes, and worry about the doing later; But I think the important points have been missed completely or reported backwards by Channel 9;

First of all, there was NOT massive opposition to the bypass, and it was NOT the reason Shayne Neumann was elected; Polls conducted prior to the election in the area showed a majority supported the bypass, and anyone who has driven that corridor in the last 2 years will know why that is the case.

Even that’s not the big question in my mind; To me, the real question is, if you believe the bypass is going to be necessary, why on earth are you spending so much money massively upgrading a road that will later be bypassed?  It makes no sense at all, and you have to wonder what would motivate anyone to spend $2 BILLION upgrading a road you are going to replace.

Okay, $700 million of that is for the Wacol to Darra stretch, but still, it’s a lot of money for a road nobody will travel on when the bypass is put through.

It will be interesting to see how this plays out at the next federal election; Surely the folks who don’t want the bypass are going to be cranky, and the ones that did, equally so?

Listening to the continuing CPRS debate in federal parliament today, I am still baffled that so many people seem to be accepting the Labor party’s line on the subject. To me, it seems pretty obvious we need to do things that will reduce our carbon emissions.

So why is the Labor party hell bent on imposing a new tax, instead of reducing emissions? Take labor man John Quiggin for a great example of what I am talking about;

“More generally, since the opposition plan amounts to picking some winners, and throwing public money at them, it’s obvious from first principles that it must be more expensive than the government’s ETS.”

Not to me John; The governments proposed scheme levies a huge new tax, and also guarantees to give all the tax money back in compensation. It’s obvious to me that means a nett zero effect on the economy, and will mean a zero impact on emissions;

As I understand it, the opposition are suggesting we actually spend some money on projects and technologies that will actually reduce emissions. That seems like the way to go to me, lets see some government initiatives in Solar, Wind, Tidal, Nuclear and other low/non carbon emitting technologies. How about we do something about increasing the range of electric vehicles?

Seems simple enough to me, so get yourselves into the comments and tell me why I’m wrong. (or that I’m right, either way is good!)