The ACTU and ACF have joined forces to call for a half trillion dollar investment to decarbonise the Australian economy.

“That is extreme Green policy at its worst and would have massive implications for Australia’s rural industries,” Senator Boswell said.

The call is contained in a report titled Complementary Policies for Greenhouse Gas Emission Abatement and their National and Regional Employment Consequences for the Australian Conservation Foundation and Australian Council of Trade Unions, and prepared by the National Institute of Economic and Industry Research.

In order to pay the half trillion investment the report says that ‘investment can only be resourced from savings, which can only be increased by consuming less’”

This means ‘immediately-pleasing expenditures must be foregone: in the business case, profit distributions; in the government case, current services for the people; in the household case, current spending on consumption goods and service’.

“In the report, the ACTU advocates that ‘an incomes policy is agreed between the major stakeholder groups in the Australian economy via tax/wage, tax/superannuation or wage pause agreements to limit the inflationary consequences of the aggressive CO2 reduction strategy’.”

Senator Boswell said that Australian primary industry should be aware that the Greens have already offered the Gillard Government a deal to get a carbon reduction scheme through the Senate in the next Parliament.

“It is important that regional Australians direct their senate vote to the Coalition rather than be sprayed around independents and minor parties if we are to avoid these extreme green plans,” Senator Boswell said.

“The Coalition opposed the price on carbon in the last parliament because of the effect that it would have on primary and secondary industries.”

“Do union members know that the ACTU wants to freeze their wages to fund emissions reduction? I bet no one on the factory floor or in the mills knows anything about this deal on wage freezes to fund emissions reductions. Union leaders are treating their members like mushrooms.”
 
“The ACTU/ACF report concludes that ‘the ratio of household debt to gross disposable income will stabilise at around 200 per cent – a very high ratio by historic standards’.”

“The ACTU report says that ‘an important potential means of reducing emissions would be to switch production from the current mix of goods and services towards education and health services, both of which are low-emission’.”

“The union leadership of Australia have seriously promoted such a state of affairs. Why have they not been held accountable and asked to defend such an unsustainable position?”

Effectively, they are saying out with mining, farming and manufacturing. Then they want to increase public spending on top of all that: ‘To maintain the targeted GDP growth rate, public sector spending will have to increase. That is, the public sector will have to go into sustained deficit to offset the negative effects on the economy from a rise in the household savings ratio’.”

“The CFMEU says the super profit tax is a modest one. The tax is as far from modest as a scene from the Scores nightclub.”

“Cosy deals between the extreme environmental and Labor movements at the top levels of power have serious ramifications down the chain where the real people live and try to make a living.”

The Report can be found at
http://www.nieir.com.au/research_centre/reports/energy/Regional_Jobs_Technical_Report-FINAL_170510.pdf

ENDS