ABOLITION or reduction of Victoria’s 50 per cent stamp duty concessions for first home buyers would be a “kick in the guts for young people”, according to shadow treasurer Michael O’Brien.
Mr O’Brien told The Spectator that he believed the Labor State Government intends to scrap the concession, which can deliver savings of up to $15,500 on the tax bill for buying a house.
“We introduced the 50 per cent stamp duty concession as we knew that young people needed a bit of help to get into the housing market,” he said.
“For first home construction we also introduced a $10,000 grant. Both policies make a big difference towards getting a deposit together.
“If (stamp duty concessions) were rolled back or scrapped it would be a kick in the guts for young people.”
The concessions cost Victoria about $170 million a year, which could increase as the price of housing in Melbourne continues to rise.
Details of a potential policy shift by State Treasury were leaked to Fairfax Media this month and Treasurer Tim Pallas responded by saying the Government had “no plans” for change.
Mr O’Brien called for the State Government to go further than its previous statements on the issue and give a guarantee that it would not change the concessions.
When asked by The Spectator to give a guarantee that concessions would not change, Western Victoria Labor MP Gayle Tierney said there were “no plans” to do so.
“Victorians can be assured that support for first homebuyers is not at risk,” she said in a statement.
“The Government has no plans to change arrangements for first home buyers.”
“The Andrews Labor Government is fully aware of the concerns and obstacles facing first home buyers and will continue to take action to ensure they are supported.”
Mr O’Brien said any downward changes to housing incentives would have an impact in regional Victoria.
“The median house price in Hamilton was about $260,000 last time I checked,” he said.
“(Premier) Daniel Andrews wants to double the stamp
duty bill for first home buyers and keep their homes out
of reach.”
An RAAF F/A-18F Super Hornet F/A-18A Hornet in the skies over Iraq. Photo: Department of Defence
September 10, 2015
WANNON MP Dan Tehan has refused to comment directly on a United States Military Central Command report that suggested the Royal Australian Air Force may have bombed a civilian area in Iraq last year.
Mr Tehan did say that avoiding civilian casualties would be “a key consideration” if Australia decided to expand its campaign of airstrikes against terrorist group ISIS from Iraq into Syria.
Last week the website Airwars.org, in conjunction with the ABC, published a US CENTCOM report into suspected civilian causalities in Iraq and Syria caused by nations participating in the US-led bombing of ISIS.
The report revealed that the US and its allies had internally investigated dozens of events involving at least 325 possible civilian deaths from airstrikes.
The report covered the period from August 2014 to May 2015, during which 16,193 sorties were flown and bombs, cannons or missiles were used on 3837 of those missions.
According to the report, on December 21 last year “two unknown individuals may have been wounded as a result of a deliberate strike conducted by the Australians on a suspected weapons factory in Fallujah”.
“Approximately 10 minutes after the last weapon impact, a probable female and probable child were observed on FMV (Full Motion Video, likely filmed by drone or fighter jet) to walk through the target area.
“A probable male arrived and carried the child to a motorcycle and transported him to the Fallujah hospital.
“The female walked to the median strip on the road and lay down, and was not observed any further.”
The “allegation” was listed as “cleared” in the report and the findings were passed on to an Australian liaison officer.
“Assessed to be insufficient information to determine CIVCAS (civilian casualties),” the report stated.
“The lack of urgency and the fact that the child walked normally suggest his injuries were not life threatening.
“There was no Iraqi allegation of CIVCAS and CAOC (Combined Air and Space Operations Center, US Air Force base, Qatar) recommends that there is insufficient information to warrant further inquiry”
The report also noted that the Australian Defence Force had also investigated the incident and “reached a similar conclusion”.
During a press conference on Friday, Mr Tehan said he was “not aware of that report”.
“It would be better if that question was directed to the Defence Minister,” he said.
Mr Tehan was asked if the Australian Government would consider the risk of civilian casualties if the RAAF started airstrikes in Syria.
“That is always a key consideration that any government considers when it makes decision as to whether it should join military action in
any country,” he said.
“That aspect, the rules of engagement, is always something that is taken into consideration.”
Mr Tehan has been at the forefront of a recent push for Australia to expand its anti-ISIS air campaign to Syria on the grounds that the international border was providing a safe haven for terrorists.
Australia is already bombing ISIS in Iraq at the request of that nation’s government, and bombing Syria would present additional legal issues.
Mr Tehan was asked if there should be more transparency in regard to civilian casualties caused by the US-led Coalition’s bombing of Iraq and Syria.
“I think there is transparency,” Mr Tehan said.
“Those that we are fighting are the ones who do not like transparency; they do not like democratic principles. They are the ones that are acting in ways that, frankly, beggar belief.
“The current situation in Syria, where you have nine million people internally displaced, is the greatest humanitarian crises we have seen in the word, and in my personal view, it is a very strong reason as to why we need to act in Syria and why we need the international community to be doing more.”
The US report into suspected civilian causalities was originally designated ‘SECRET’ and was on restricted release to governments of ‘Five Eyes’ nations, which includes Australia.
The report was subsequently declassified and released to a US journalist under Freedom of Information laws.
The Australian Defence Force said in a statement to the ABC that a routine ‘battle damage assessment’ was conducted following the airstrike.
“The assessment was consistent with the reports detailed in the Iraq/Syria CIVCAS Allegation tracker released by US Central Command under FOI legislation,” the statement read.
“As there were no reports or claims of any casualties from Australian airstrikes, no further action was undertaken.”
AUSTRALIAN Wool Innovation, which funds research and marketing
on behalf of woolgrowers, has recommended that members vote in ‘WoolPoll’ for a two per cent levy for the next
three years.
However, some Western District woolgrowers want the AWI to reduce its funding for marketing activities or change its approach to promoting Australian wool around the
world.
A two per cent levy brought in about $43 million to AWI from woolgrowers in 2013/2014, which was combined with $8.7m from brand licensing and $13m in government contributions.
AWI has previously spent 40 per cent of its funding on research and development (R&D), which has occurred both on and off farms, and 60 per cent on marketing.
AWI chief executive Stuart McCullough confirmed last week that this spending ratio will continue.
Woolgrowers who have paid a levy will be given the chance over the next six weeks to vote on how much of their sales go towards AWI, with options ranging from zero to three per cent.
Hensley Park Jigsaw Farms principal and manager Mark Wootton said he would vote to cut AWI’s funding and he believed many other local growers would do the same.
“I’m a zero (levy) man now,” he said.
“South-west Victorian growers aren’t getting much from AWI; it’s a very NSW-centric organisation.
“I’m convinced about the
R&D, but I’m not sure if
the marketing has been
successful.”
Report
Mr McCullough said the two per cent level was put forward because that was the maximum level the Government would match, and there were also concerns about the global economy.
AWI has commissioned Deloitte to produce an independent report into “all aspects” of its organisation and had found the levy offered “excellent return on investment”.
“What they found is that the company in the last three years improved productivity, we also created some demand for wool and increased wool prices, and we delivered cost savings as well,” Mr McCullough said.
“What they also said is for every $1 spent, $2.90 was
returned to woolgrowers.”
AWI had been “very successful” in promoting wool as a ‘technical’ fibre for the ‘sports and outdoor’ market, as well as re-establishing the luxury market in China.
“The recommendation is two per cent (for the levy). The rationale for that is, firstly, the cost/benefit analysis that has been done by Deloitte indicated that we are doing OK, we are doing well,” Mr McCullough said.
“(At the time of assessment) Greece looked like defaulting on loans, America was still emerging, and China looked a little bumpy. And it has proved to be really bumpy with growth there, although promised at seven per cent, it’s going to be half that.
“We are of the view that consumer confidence is not going to be great over the next three years and now is the time to ratchet up.”
Call for changes
Despite the results presented by Mr McCullough, a number of Western District woolgrowers have called for changes to be made to AWI’s approach to marketing, as well as its transparency with the results of WoolPoll and feedback from its brand campaigns.
Mr McCullough was asked during the WoolPoll launch event in Melbourne last week about the lack of WoolPoll ‘roadshow events’ in the Western District.
“Are you afraid of what
some of the farmers might
say to you?” a woolgrower
asked.
Mr McCullough dismissed that suggestion, but it appears some local woolgrowers have concerns and want better communication with AWI.
“There’s a lack of transparency, I’ve asked them about their marketing campaigns and they’ve said it can’t be judged easily; I wouldn’t be able to run my business like that,” Mr Wootton said.
“I’m sure a lot of SW Vic growers would have voted for zero last time. AWI must have that voting data but they won’t release it.
“There’s a lot of frustration as the wool industry has changed, but I’m not sure AWI has.”
Concerns
Nareeb Nareeb Station property manager and stud principal Richard Beggs said “overall I’m pretty happy with AWI” but he had concerns.
“I support the two per cent levy. I wish that AWI would offer growers a way to vote on how the levy was spent,” he said.
“I would like to see a higher percentage spent on research and on farm innovation rather than marketing
“A lot of growers feel that the spending has shifted too far towards marketing.
I’m a little disappointed in the WoolPoll committee that they didn’t give us that option.”
As AWI has recognised, many woolgrowers are looking at their returns and being tempted to switch to producing crops or other livestock.
‘Glenholme’ woolgrower Matthew Linke said he was questioning the two per cent levy recommendation.
“We’re not seeing the return with auction prices. There’s a fair value for 21 microns but with 16-17 microns it’s getting hard to meet costs,” he said.
“We want to go with a contract rather than go to auction.
“I can’t see the benefits of AWI flowing through to growers if they are producing super fine.”
Mr Linke also said that he found AWI’s approach to marketing “concerning” and he had spoken to wool buyers who shared the same opinion.
Money was also a big concern for Mr Wootton.
“Two per cent is a lot of money … I’m not going to say how much but it’s a fair motza,” he said.
“This is a real life decision and we have got other options.
“Cattle is an option for us, or prime lamb. Right now, protein is king.”
THE Mandatory Data Retention scheme that was passed by both houses of Australia’s Parliament last week represents the unholy trinity of bad legislation: rushed debate, unclear costs and no real solutions.
To make things clear, I am not a libertarian or anarchistic extremist who is calling for the end of all government surveillance.
Targeted surveillance has saved lives and will continue to save lives; it should be available to police and intelligence agencies though a system that is fast and flexible, but has appropriate safeguards and accountability.
On the other hand, retaining communications metadata on 23 million Australians is a form of mass surveillance that is unreasonable, expensive and ineffective.
The Government says it only wants access to the ‘envelope’ not the ‘letter’ inside, to use a 19th century analogy that has been widely employed by MPs.
Political strategy
The thin, artificial line between digital ‘envelopes’ and ‘letters’, applied to almost every form of modern communication, is a political strategy to make this mass surveillance more palatable to the general public.
As US intelligence service whistleblower Edward Snowden has stated, metadata is the most valuable part of mass surveillance because it cannot lie, it can be processed automatically by a computer and it does not need language translation.
Under Mandatory Data Retention, the government can tell that you called a doctor’s office and a sexual health clinic in the last two years but it doesn’t know what you talked about.
It can tell you called your accountant, your financial adviser and a ‘money lender of last resort’ all in one day but it can’t tell what the issue was.
It can tell that you called a marriage counsellor and a removalist, received an email from a last-minute hotel booking service and started using your phone on the other side of town, but it can’t tell the health of your relationship.
Minute-by-minute
It will record which towns and suburbs you have visited with your mobile phone over the last two years, sometimes at a minute-by- minute level of detail, but this isn’t ‘real-time tracking’ according to Wannon MP Dan Tehan.
It make use of all these powers without a warrant using legislation that predates the sale of home computers, and will have the amplified power of two years’ worth of records.
A lengthy record of whom you communicate with, who communicates with you, and when and where this all happens, is hugely revealing even if you aren’t a journalist or whistleblower.
The Associated Press reported on Tuesday that the US Government is considering an end to mass phone metadata retention as an internal review had found it “not central to unravelling terrorist plots”.
American civil liberties groups claimed that the only identifiable conviction that has come to light from phone metadata alone was for a taxi driver who sent $15,000 to a terrorist group in Somalia.
If Mandatory Data Retention offered even a faint hope of combating terrorism it would be much easier to support, but the international experience is that it has only increased crime clearance rates by 0.006 per cent.
Considerable damage
That tiny increase, about 100 times less than what might be considered statistically significant, will be achieved at the cost of the presumption of innocence and considerable damage to Australia’s tech sector.
Under the most generous estimate, about half the costs will be passed directly on to consumers; it is a new tax of at least $120 per year for the privilege of being spied on.
It is another broken promise from Prime Minister Tony Abbott.
The Labor Party deserves equal blame, both for supporting the legislation and for letting the concept gain significant ground under former Prime Minister Julia Gillard in 2012.
The rise of the so-called Islamic State and its brainwashed young followers in the suburbs of Australia were used to justify the latest reincarnation of mandatory data retention.
However, Islamic State has already distributed an easy-to- follow internet security guide to its members and sympathisers that renders Data Retention completely useless.
The horror of the Charlie Hebdo magazine killings in Paris was also invoked by Mr Tehan despite France already having a robust mandatory data retention scheme, which manifestly failed to prevent the attack.
Even the Chinese Communist Party, which has both metadata and content surveillance built into China’s internet and pays about 100,000 people to monitor online conversations, has failed to prevent all terrorist attacks.
More arrests
When those aims failed to cut through to voters, the list of claimed benefits was expanded to include more arrests of drug traffickers and paedophiles.
The Australian Federal Police had already let slip that the system would help civil lawsuits against those who share Hollywood films on the internet, a trivial offence in comparison.
When you look past the spin, there is no real urgency to this law as it has been languishing around Canberra for at least seven years and will not be implemented for at least two years.
Listening to the rhetoric from the Coalition and Labor, it was as if passing the Bill would force Internet Service Providers (ISPs) and telcos to simply hit a switch and instantly retain records.
Prior to the widespread adoption of the internet it was only feasible to protect your electronic communications if you had been trained by a spy agency or worked for a major corporation.
One of the first free military-grade encryption applications was released in 1991, and since 2002 it has been possible to mask your identity online using relatively simple software.
For any kind of criminal, let alone a terrorist, avoiding Data Retention will be even easier than installing a software package.
“Smart criminals”
Attorney General George Brandis has conceded that “smart criminals” may be able to get round his new surveillance system.
If you can figure out how to sign up for popular email services such as Yahoo or Gmail, or a social network like Facebook, then congratulations: Senator Brandis now considers you “smart”.
The Australian Government has no power to force overseas communications providers to store useless data, and so it hasn’t even tried.
According to internationally- respected magazine, The Economist, mobile messaging apps will be technology’s latest battleground.
However, in this new technology race Australia has already started to slash its own Achilles tendons with Data Retention.
The massive cost of creating and storing data that is useless for commercial purposes will scare off any group considering launching messaging apps, or even local offshoots, in Australia.
Almost all the jobs, investment and tax revenue from mobile messaging boom will flow to countries that have never instigated mandatory data retention, or have wisely decided to abolish it.
Bear the brunt
Even humble email services are likely to depart these shores, with only the biggest of Australia’s hundreds of ISPs likely to bear the brunt of data retention.
Google’s Gmail is standing by to offer cheap, encrypted, overseas- based and data retention-exempt email for businesses.
The lion’s share of economic benefits will flood to Silicon Valley in California, not Australia’s ‘Silicon Beach’.
Data Retention will create jobs, but mostly they will be in other nations with cheaper power and labour costs for warehousing hard drives.
Detailed information on your everyday life will be kept overseas by the lowest bidder, except for Telstra, which has pledged to store it locally.
If you or your children are planning to study for an IT course, it might be worth asking Mr Tehan why the Australian Government has opted to make it much harder to get a tech job in this country.
It is such as shame that the Coalition chose this path, having gotten off to a great start last year by announcing tax reforms that aim to encourage local entrepreneurs and investors to launch new tech ‘startups’.
Mandatory Data Retention represents an incredible back flip for a party that claims to stand for the ideals of more freedom and jobs, with less regulation.
Note: About four months after this piece was published, ABC reporter Will Ockenden requested his own smartphone metadata from a telecommunications provider. He published the results and then asked ABC viewers to analyse the raw metadata to see what they could learn about him. A week later they provided a “scarily accurate” profile of his physical movements during a 12-month time period.
Rising unemployment and declining manufacturing will collide with farmer-driven campaign against unconventional gas, but international markets will play the role of umpire.
The Victorian Liberal National Coalition has announced it will support an “extension of Victoria’s (current) onshore gas moratorium until 30 June 2020”.
It should be noted that the next Victorian state election is scheduled for November 2018, resulting in the policy’s effective length being 19 months (if the Coalition was returned to power).
Victoria has a moratorium on most aspects of onshore gas exploration and development, which was originally put in place by the previous Coalition Government and later expanded.
The current moratorium is so broad that it has even halted gas exploration projects that are unlikely to use hydraulic fracturing, such as Otway Basin works proposed by Lakes Oil.
Global oil prices are less than half of what they were 18 months ago, which has placed huge pressure on the US shale oil industry following its fracking-powered boom times.
Many shale projects were given the green light with an expectation that investors would be paid back from oil prices of between $USD80 to $60 per barrel.
Oil prices have spent most of this year between $USD40 and $50 per barrel.
West Texas crude oil price index – 18 months to September 30, 2015. Source: nasdaq.com
Liquified Natural Gas (LNG) prices were a little slower to follow oil prices but their recent fall has been considerable.
Japanese market regulators even skipped the monthly issue of LNG spot prices in June this year due to “a lack of trades”, a move that was widely interpreted as a sign of “tepid” demand.
US domestic and Japanese prices for Liquified Natural Gas (LNG) and crude oil imports to August 2015. Source: US Energy Information Administration.
The impact of low fossil fuel prices has been felt locally as well, with Adelaide-based oil and gas exploration company Beach Energy cutting $55 million from its capital expenditure budget in January this year.
Beach Energy was also hit by the departure of US energy giant Chevron, which had been a partner for Beach’s joint shale venture in remote South Australia.
The collapse of prices has become its own market-enforced moratorium on new unconventional gas projects, though recent sharp falls in the Australian dollar may help the fledgeling industry.
Meanwhile, an 18-month campaign against unconventional gas in rural areas in the southern half of Victoria, particularly in the rich farmlands of south-west Victoria and Gippsland, culminated in a 1000-strong protest in Melbourne this month.
Wool and red meat prices are rising and so are agribusiness wages, increasing the political clout of farmers and their representative bodies.
The upcoming state by-elections in South-West Coast and Polwarth, combined with over 1700 mostly anti-gas submissions to an ongoing parliamentary inquiry, undoubtedly had a influence in the Coalition’s new gas policy.
The Coalition’s policy appears largely based on the Victorian Farmers Federation policy, which was itself recently strengthened by a conference motion brought by farmers from south-west Victoria.
However, it must not be forgotten that agricultural exports also have floating prices and are influenced by the same global economic slowdown that has helped dragged down gas prices.
If China’s slowing economy results in anxious parents in Beijing and Shanghai no longer paying $AUD60 to $100 for Australian powdered infant formula, then an entire local industry is placed at risk.
If Japan reduces its appetite for premium Australian beef, or executives in Hong Kong take the scissors to business wear budgets, then the effects will be felt locally as well.
Fossil fuels may again dominate the economic stakes thanks to their high price inelasticity, causing large swings from relatively small changes to supply or demand.
The instant economic sugar hit that gas and oil fracking can provide could also be a future godsend for state and federal governments under pressure from rising unemployment and stagnating wages.
The estimates for how long a fracking operation can produce oil or gas varies from between three years and thirty years, but for any government under siege and facing an election that represents a lifetime.
Suffering from an impeding departure of local vehicle manufacturing and uncertainty over where new submarines are to be built, South Australia appears to be hitching its wagon to unconventional gas.
South Australian Treasurer Tom Koutsantonis, a member of a minority Labor Government, tweeted after the Victorian Coalition’s policy announcement that SA was “now the only welcoming jurisdiction for oil and gas investment supplying the Australian east coast markets”.
South Australia now the only welcoming jurisdiction for Oil & Gas investment supplying the Australian east coast markets @APPEALtd
Should warnings from petroleum lobbyists come true, and a lack of domestic production does significantly increase local gas prices, then that could also become an election-defining issue for Victoria’s mainly urban population.
Providing that oil and gas companies have sufficient capital and shareholder goodwill, they could ride out the slowdown and return to their non-perishable oil deposits once global prices trend upwards again.
Bargain hunters have also been snapping up shares in oil and gas companies, hoping that their ‘buy in gloom, sell in boom’ strategy will pay off when the oil price rises.
For example, Kerry Stokes bought considerable Beach Energy holdings for as low as 62 cents on the dollar compared to boom times.
WANNON MP Dan Tehan has called for the Royal Australian Air Force to expand its current bombing campaign against ISIS terrorists in Iraq to include Syria.
Mr Tehan made the call in an opinion piecepublished by the Herald Sun on Thursday, arguing that Australia had an obligation to act in Syria to prevent terrorism at home and stop atrocities overseas.
“We are acting in Iraq against Daesh (ISIS) with our Hornets launching air strikes on a regular basis. We should be doing the same in Syria,” Mr Tehan wrote.
“It is in our interests to end the suffering of its civilians and to degrade the Daesh ‘caliphate’, which continues to shine as a beacon for global terrorism.”
Australia currently has F/A-18 Hornet jets stationed in the Middle East to attack terrorist targets in Iraq at the request of that nation’s government.
Launching military action might involve a different legal process despite Australia not recognising the legitimacy of Syria’s government, which as been attacking its own people as part of a brutal civil war.
Mr Tehan is chair of the Parliament’s Joint Committee on Intelligence and Security, which is mandated with reviewing spying and counter-terror laws.
The PJCIS does not have an explicit mandate to recommend military action but Mr Tehan invoked his recent meetings with security agencies in France, the UK and USA as part of his argument for bombing Syria.
The Spectator asked Mr Tehan if Parliament should vote on the proposal.
“Like our contribution to the effort in Iraq, any contribution to the effort in Syria would need to be decided by the National Security Committee in consultation with our allies,” Mr Tehan said.
“After doing this with regard to Iraq, the Prime Minister made a statement in Parliament.”
Prime Minister Tony Abbott said he supported Mr Tehan’s suggestion, but no formal process had begun to expand Australian airstrikes to Syria.
When asked if Australia should also take military action against the Syrian Government, whose campaign of mass murder, torture and rape mirrors that of ISIS, Mr Tehan said an end to that conflict should come through the United Nations.
“Australia must do its part now to assist the fight against Daesh,” he said.
“On the broader question of the civil war in Syria, the international community needs to come together at the UN and bring about a resolution to the conflict, with leadership from the UN Security Council.”
Lowy Institute research fellow and former Army officer, Associate Professor Rodger Shanahan, has labelled Mr Tehan’s Syria call “bizarre” and argued it would stretch Australia’s military resources.
Deputy Labor leader Tanya Plibersek told ABC radio that she agreed Syria was a humanitarian disaster but criticised how the push to expand RAAF bombing was announced.
“I think it’s extraordinary, frankly, that the Government sent out a backbencher to start floating ideas without any clear proposal, without any explanation to the Australian people of what the legal basis would be, what the mission would be, what success would look like,” she said.
FORMER Casterton man Lachlan Beaton, who has become a prominent figure in the debate over same-sex marriage, has called for people on both sides of the issue to abandon “hate”.
“As the weeks drew closer to (Tuesday’s Coalition party room vote), the debates become quite vitriolic on both sides,” Mr Beaton said.
“I went to a marriage equality rally (in Sydney) on Sunday and there was a lot of hate towards the other side, and I suspect the same is happening on the ‘anti’ side.
“I hope that over the next 12 months the debate doesn’t bring out the deepest darkest issues.”
Mr Beaton urged other same-sex marriage supporters to concentrate on the “important issues”, such as the impact of inequality on rural youth, rather than denigrating opponents.
He has been featured in news reports worldwide after he uploaded an emotional YouTube video that discussed his 12-year struggle to come to terms with his homosexuality.
Mr Beaton realised he was gay at about age 15 but hid the fact from everyone in his life, including his identical twin brother.
Queensland LNP MP Warren Entsch saw Mr Beaton’s video and used it to support his campaign for a bi-partisan private member’s bill to legalise same-sex marriage.
Despite the campaign, federal Liberal and National MPs and Senators voted two-to-one to block a ‘free’ vote on same-sex marriage during a six-hour party room meeting on Tuesday.
Backbench Coalition MPs can still cross the floor of Parliament and vote for same-sex marriage and not be punished, but any cabinet members that do so will be sacked from their ministerial positions.
Prime Minister Tony Abbott’s party room strategy has made it almost certain that any bill to legalise same-sex marriage will be defeated if put to Parliament before the next election.
Mr Beaton returned to Australia this week from his home in New York City in order to lobby MPs in Canberra and give a talk to students at his former school, Monivae College.
The Spectator asked Mr Beaton if the private member’s bill vote should still go ahead even if it created a damaging spectacle in Parliament.
“I think, from a political point of view at a sensible level, you should look at taking it off the table until there is a path through,” Mr Beaton said
“Having met with (Mr Entsch) on Monday, he’s really not worried about the politics of it and he’s said that to me directly.
“If there’s a prospect of MPs crossing the floor he would probably welcome it; he’s got a really strong conscience on this and he’s not going to let it go away.”
Mr Beaton met with Wannon MP Dan Tehan in Canberra on Monday, where there was agreement that youth mental health was a pressing issue.
However, Mr Tehan remained committed to his belief in the traditional definition of marriage and repeated his public pledge to support a free vote on same-sex marriage.
The next day Mr Tehan backflipped during the party room meeting and now supports the same-sex marriage decision being made by the people and not the Parliament.
The Coalition cabinet appears split on the issue of how to proceed now that Mr Abbott has made an open-ended pledge to have the issue decided “by the people”.
Some senior Liberals want a ‘plebiscite’ on same-sex marriage, which would require a simple vote by every eligible Australian to settle the matter outright.
Social conservatives want to hold a full referendum, which would require a majority of people in at least four of Australia’s six states to support same-sex marriage, a much higher hurdle to clear.
SINGLE-officer police stations are the “lifeblood” of smaller regional communities and must be retained, according to Victorian shadow police minister Edward O’Donohue.
Mr O’Donohue visited Macarthur police station last week with South West Coast MP Denis Napthine as part of a tour of local police operations.
“We, as a Coalition, strongly believe in the value of single-member stations,” Mr O’Donohue said.
“They are integral to the lifeblood of communities and we want to make sure that they are preserved, that they stay open and that they continue to be central to the life and heart of so many communities in Victoria.”
Mr O’Donohue accused the State Government of failing to match the Coalition’s police recruiting drive and creating a shortage of officers for regional Victoria.
“When we were in government we recruited 1900 additional police, the largest single additional recruitment of police in Victoria Police’s history,” he said.
“Labor has turned off the tap. The police academy is operating at half strength. Labor has made no commitment to additional police.”
Police Minister Wade Noonan in response accused Mr O’Donohue of running a scare campaign during his visit to the south-west and said police offer allocations were a matter for the Chief Commissioner.
Under the previous Coalition State Government, Victoria Police released a ‘blue paper’ policy discussion document that suggested smaller police stations would lose their full-time officers.
As a replacement, ‘super stations’ would be created to send roving officers to where they were needed.
The previous and current state governments have played down the ‘blue paper’ but The Spectator understands that Victoria Police has continued to survey officers for their thoughts on the ‘super station’ model.
Mr O’Donohue said police ‘hubs’ could help supplement single-officer stations, but should not replace them.
“A larger hub can always provide reinforcement, can always work with these sort of stations (Macarthur), but it can’t
replace, in our view, the work that these sort of places do,” he said.
Dr Napthine also said he was committed to keeping single-officer stations.
“The frontline of community safety, and community confidence, is the local police station and the local officer,” he said.
“That’s got to be maintained, protected and reinforced.”
Dr Napthine also welcomed amendments to a recent ‘two-up’ police safety policy that aimed to eliminate instances of police officers working alone.
The new policy was implemented in response to a heightened terror alert level and several terrorism-related incidents, but exemptions were added because of the burden placed on regional police stations.
“What we want is the opportunity for experienced single officer stations to operate with common sense; priority on safety for themselves but at the same time having the flexibility to respond as required in the community,” Dr Napthine said.
“Safety of officers must be the highest priority, but you can also achieve that with common sense.”
SOUTH-WEST Victoria is potentially sitting on a $6 billion oil and gas deposit with a production capacity of 100,000 barrels per day, according to Melbourne-based industrial engineering and mining company Mecrus Resources.
Mecrus has told Victorian Parliament’s inquiry into a potential onshore unconventional gas inquiry, via a written submission, that there is a ‘shale oil’ and natural gas deposit between Casterton and the South Australian border.
The company believes the commercial prospects for this deposit are “beyond doubt” after it “invested significant money to date in detailed exploration and investigation” and commissioned an independent study.
Representatives from Mecrus are due to give testimony to a Gas inquiry hearing in Hamilton’s Performing Arts Centre on Wednesday.
“The oil shale is quite deep and it is significantly separated from any utilised groundwater aquifers,” Mecrus managing director Barry Richards wrote in the submission.
“The identified resources in our primary target area are also extremely thick and of world class in nature”.
The primary target area is comprised of two mineral exploration licence areas held by Mecrus with a combined size of about 1500 square kilometres.
The two tenements, EL5298 and EL5297, incorporate land from around Ardno, Strathdownie and Wilkin to the south, to around Lake Mundi and Tullich in the north.
The eastern border of the two adjacent tenements begins about 10 kms west of Casterton and is hemmed in by the variety of state nature reserves and Crown land between Casterton and the SA border.
The exploration licence areas EL5298 and EL5297 in south-west Victoria, held by Mecrus Resources and believed by the company to contain ‘world class’ shale oil deposits
“If the progression to the next stage from exploration to mining is successful, then it would be expected that many support companies would establish offices and service centres to support the development,” Mecrus’s submission stated.
Mecrus did not state how deep underground the oil deposit is meant to be, but other oil and gas companies have been exploring about four kilometres beneath the surface near Penola, SA.
The ‘Mecrus Group of Companies’ includes a variety of businesses focussed on groundwater management and desalination.
But its resources department is current focussed on mineral and petroleum exploration and not production.
The largest single project that Mecrus has worked on, according to public reports, is a $135 million contract to supply four giant coal-handling machines at the Abbot Point Coal Terminal in North Queensland.
Some of the company’s flagship contracts, listed as ‘case studies’ on its website, were worth between $2m and $10m.
The revelations in Mecrus’s submission could further agitate anti-gas activists and locals farmers who have joined their cause.
Landowners from south-west Victoria joined a protest rally in Melbourne on Sunday that called for the entire state to be declared “gasfield free” due to concerns that an onshore unconventional gas industry would damage agriculture.
Mecrus has also stated that, if an oil drilling project goes ahead, south-west Victoria could also be used for ‘carbon sequestration’ to held Australia meet its international emissions reduction targets by pumping greenhouse gas underground.
The Mecrus submission said the deposit as been “independently assessed” to likely contain 360 million barrels of oil as well as pockets of natural gas.
The deposit is believed to have a lifespan of 40 years and could produce more than $600 million in royalties for the Victorian Government during that time.
Given that oil royalty rates in Victoria are usually about 10 per cent of net production value, the economic value of the deposit could be as high as $6 billion.
If the project ever goes ahead it could, at peak production, create a yearly economic output larger than Iluka Resource’s Hamilton mineral sands separation plant or the Portland Aluminium Smelter,
Mecrus Resources notes that the “financial expenditure for such projects is extremely large” but says that it would bring “massive flow on effects for local communities”.
“If the progression to the next stage from exploration to mining is successful, then it would be expected that many support companies would establish offices and service centres to support the development,” Mecrus’s submission stated.
“This also will have a positive impact on the employment of local citizens through support functions to a new industry.”
The company says its exploration results indicate “there is a significant Oil Shale reserve and associated hydrocarbons contained within these Oil Shales” in the Otway Basin.
Mecrus has submitted ‘commercial in confidence’ documents to the parliamentary gas inquiry, including work and operation plans, an environmental management plan and groundwater contingency plan.
The managing director offered to give MPs a confidential briefing on request and stated in its submission that the aboveground impact from oil drilling in its exploration licence areas would be about one hectare in total.
Mecrus will probably have to use the controversial hydraulic fracturing, AKA ‘fracking’, technique to improve yields from any oil and gas deposits found in south-west Victoria.
Fracking involves pumping a mixture of water, sand and chemical underground to break up rock layers; the technology has been a major source of opposition to unconventional gas from farmers.
Mecrus has also proposed to fill the remaining underground void with carbon dioxide to cash in on the search for ‘carbon capture and storage’ facilities.
Brown coal power stations are a major contributor to Australia’s high per-capita carbon emissions.
A recent advertising campaign by the Mineral Council of Australia, promoting coal as “amazing”, has talked up the possibility of carbon capture to improve the economic and environmental virtues of the fossil fuel.
There is only one functional carbon capture operation in the world, located in Canada, but there are plans to use the technology to store emission from coal power stations in Victoria’s Latrobe Valley.
Mecrus has successfully completed a number of large construction and maintenance projects since the company was formed in 1999, but it has never started or delivered a mine or oil production site.
Mecrus established its mining and resource division in 2009 and was awarded its first exploration licence in 2010.
The collapse of oil and gas prices over the past 12 months has proven to be a challenge for Australia’s petroleum exploration and production companies.
South Australia’s Beach Energy, which holds a number of onshore gas exploration licences in south-west Victoria, was forced to slash capital expenditure after oil prices dropped and its share price plummeted.
Mecrus is a privately owned company with a much lower profile than its publicly traded competitors and it does not have to publish its annual reports.
The Victorian Parliamentary submission by Mecrus represents a rare insight into the company, as its latest press release was issued in August 2011 and its last four-page newsletter came out in late 2013.
Backing up what the company told Victorian MPs in 2011, the July 2015 submission states that “we do not believe there is any commercially viable Coal Seam Gas reserve” in the Otway basin.
The company wants any future oil activity to be governed under Victoria’s Mineral Resources Sustainable Development Act, rather than the Petroleum Act.
This could see oil and gas projects go ahead in Mecrus’s south-west Victorian exploration licence areas even if the Victorian Government decided to extend its current moratorium into onshore gas exploration and fracking.
Mecrus argued that treating south-west Victorian oil extraction under mining legislation would “strengthen regulatory safeguards and prevent delays to development of the industry”.
WANNON MP Dan Tehan has missed out on a ministerial portfolio from Prime Minister Malcolm Turnbull’s post-leadership spill cabinet reshuffle.
Some of Mr Tehan’s fellow Victorian Liberals were big winners in the reshuffle, which saw a number of key Abbott-era ministers replaced but the Immigration, Finance, Environment and Trade portfolios left with their original holders.
Melbourne MPs Kelly O’Dwyer and Josh Frydenberg picked up key business portfolios as part of an effort to overturn Abbott’s ‘economic team’, who were strongly criticised by Mr Turnbull during a speech announcing his intention to challenge for leadership.
Victorian Senator Mitch Fifield has also moved up to the Communications and Arts portfolios.
Mr Tehan had backed Mr Abbott to remain as Liberal leader and Prime Minister, but said before the reshuffle that he would be happy to serve in any role under Mr Turnbull.
Mr Tehan will likely attend selected cabinet meetings in future as part of his work on the House of Representatives Standing Committee on Agriculture and Industry.
He is also chair of the high-profile Parliamentary Joint Committee on Intelligence and Security, which is primarily tasked with reviewing proposed counter-terror and intelligence gathering legislation.
The Committee recently released its report into legislation designed to allow the Australian Government to revoke the citizenship of dual nationals who engage in terrorist activity, or join or fight overseas for a terrorist group.
New ministry sworn in September 21, 2015:
TITLE
MINISTER
Prime Minister
The Hon Malcolm Turnbull MP
Minister for Indigenous Affairs
Minister for Women
Senator the Hon Nigel Scullion
Senator the Hon Michaelia Cash
Cabinet Secretary
Minister Assisting the Prime Minister for the Public Service
Minister Assisting the Prime Minister for Digital Government
Minister Assisting the Prime Minister for Counter Terrorism
Senator the Hon Arthur Sinodinos
Senator the Hon Michaelia Cash
Senator the Hon Mitch Fifield MP
The Hon Michael Keenan MP
Assistant Minister to the Prime Minister
Assistant Minister to the Prime Minister
Assistant Minister for Productivity
Assistant Cabinet Secretary
The Hon Alan Tudge MP
Senator James McGrath
Dr Peter Hendy MP
Senator the Hon Scott Ryan
Minister for Infrastructure and Regional Development
The Hon Warren Truss MP
(Deputy Prime Minister)
Minister for Resources, Energy and Northern Australia
Minister for Territories, Local Government and Major Projects
The Hon Josh Frydenberg MP
The Hon Paul Fletcher MP
Assistant Minister to the Deputy Prime Minister
The Hon Michael McCormack MP
Minister for Foreign Affairs
The Hon Julie Bishop MP
Minister for Trade and Investment
Minister for International Development and the Pacific
Minister for Tourism and International Education
Minister Assisting the Minister for Trade and Investment
The Hon Andrew Robb AO MP
The Hon Steven Ciobo MP
Senator the Hon Richard Colbeck
Senator the Hon Richard Colbeck
Attorney-General
Senator the Hon George Brandis QC
(Leader of the Government in the Senate)
Minister for Justice
Assistant Minister for Multicultural Affairs
The Hon Michael Keenan MP
Senator the Hon Concetta Fierravanti–Wells
Treasurer
The Hon Scott Morrison MP
Minister for Small Business
Assistant Treasurer
The Hon Kelly O’Dwyer MP
The Hon Kelly O’Dwyer MP
Assistant Minister to the Treasurer
Mr Alex Hawke MP
Minister for Finance
(Deputy Leader of Government in the Senate)
Senator the Hon Mathias Cormann
Special Minister of State
The Hon Mal Brough MP
Minister for Agriculture and Water Resources
The Hon Barnaby Joyce MP
Assistant Minister for Agriculture and Water Resources
Senator Anne Ruston
Minister for Industry, Innovation and Science
(Leader of the House)
The Hon Christopher Pyne MP
Minister for Resources, Energy and Northern Australia
The Hon Josh Frydenberg MP
Assistant Minister for Science
The Hon Karen Andrews MP
Assistant Minister for Innovation
Mr Wyatt Roy MP
Minister for Immigration and Border Protection
The Hon Peter Dutton MP
Assistant Minister for Multicultural Affairs
Senator the Hon Concetta Fierravanti–Wells
Minister for the Environment
Minister for Cities and the Built Environment
The Hon Greg Hunt MP
The Hon Jamie Briggs MP
Minister for Health
The Hon Sussan Ley MP
Minister for Sport
The Hon Sussan Ley MP
Minister for Rural Health
Assistant Minister for Health
Senator the Hon Fiona Nash
Mr Ken Wyatt AM MP
Minister for Defence
Senator the Hon Marise Payne
Minister for Veterans’ Affairs
Minister Assisting the Prime Minister for the Centenary of ANZAC
The Hon Stuart Robert MP
The Hon Stuart Robert MP
Minister for Defence Materiel and Science
The Hon Mal Brough MP
Assistant Minister for Defence
The Hon Darren Chester MP
Minister for Communications
Minister for the Arts
Senator the Hon Mitch Fifield Senator the Hon Mitch Fifield
