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The Forum > Article Comments > Can the LNP overcome the Newman factor? > Comments

Can the LNP overcome the Newman factor? : Comments

By Graham Young, published 12/1/2015

Newman is one problem. He's a short aggressive man with the reputation of being often charming, frequently distant, and a bit of a martinet.

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Have I got it wrong. Does not Cando want to privatise?
Posted by Flo, Monday, 12 January 2015 8:24:05 AM
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Graham, you seem to see the Qld LNP government through 'rose coloured glasses'. You've listed (but not substantiated) some good points but conveniently omitted others.

For example what about the LNP's (not only Newman's) intention to not only support huge development of coal with all its degradation of the atmosphere and the iconic Reef, but to actually make huge investments of taxpayers' money in it to make it happen?

Don't you think this may loom large in the eyes of many voters?
Posted by Roses1, Monday, 12 January 2015 9:32:17 AM
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Roses 1,

This may interest you.

http://www.theaustralian.com.au/national-affairs/state-politics/donors-get-mine-approval-on-quiet/story-fnr8rfrw-1227181486790

"A FINAL act of the Newman government before calling the Queensland state election was ­approval for a controversial coalmine development by a company that had donated $650,000 to the Liberal National Party."

Last year, SBCT released Australian Electoral Commission documents that showed the Acland mine’s parent company, Soul Pattinson, had donated $650,000 to the LNP over three years.

These were marked as being on behalf of Acland mine owner New Hope.

The donations were made in three instalments, two of $200,000 and one of $250,000, in the lead-up to the company’s submission of an environmental impact statement.

“The donations are not illegal but they fail the pub test on any measure,” Mr Gordon said."

One would assume that the Newman govt will suffer a significant drop in support...but from my vantage point, Annastacia Palaszczuk comes across as quite wishy-washy and lacking the required dynamic to carry her party to victory.
Posted by Poirot, Monday, 12 January 2015 10:48:34 AM
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Yup, but particularly if he loses his own seat to Mz Jones.
Which then begs the next question.
Can the LNP survive the Newman Factor?
Rhrosty.
Posted by Rhrosty, Monday, 12 January 2015 11:06:12 AM
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Where Graham writes "...the latest Newspoll has the parties on 50% each of the vote...they need around 52% of the vote to win enough seats to govern."

The (or one of the) latest surveys seems to answer LNP electoral prayers by predicting they'll get 53% of the vote.

See The Australian, Jan 12, 2015 http://www.theaustralian.com.au/national-affairs/state-politics/lnp-holds-ace-cards-but-hand-has-slipped/story-fnr8rfrw-1227181571969 :

"The most recent survey, conducted last week and revealed in The Weekend Australian, also showed the LNP had crept ahead of the ALP, leading them by 53 per cent to 47 per cent on a two-party-preferred basis after the two were locked on 50 per cent support."

So Newman may return.

Pete
Posted by plantagenet, Monday, 12 January 2015 11:26:53 AM
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Well lets hope so plantagenet. Beattie & Bligh were both catastrophes, going somewhere to happen. Unfortunately they happened in Queensland. As I recall it was 6 billion on the pipelines & another 2 billion on the desalination plant, neither of which have ever been used. Then of course the healthcare department payroll debacle. Talk about incompetence!

Today's Labor doesn't have anyone anywhere near as smart as either of them, probably as they made sure to get rid of any one with talent to avoid challengers. Is there another party anywhere so reduced in talent that Annastacia Palaszczuk could become leader?

So a return of Labor with it's recycled dropkicks would be even more catastrophic than Bligh. We need at least another couple of terms of decent management, before we could afford another spending spree.

Yes Newman is a bit abrasive, but in a cabinet of capable people the Cheshire Cat goofy grin of a Beattie wouldn't hack the load.
Posted by Hasbeen, Monday, 12 January 2015 1:01:45 PM
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G'day Hasbeen

Tanya Plibersek maybe - but I would neither pronounce nor willingly root for Annastacia Romanov-Palaszczuk-Itszybitszy-Rimsky-Tchaikovsky.

Pete de Wheelbarrow
Posted by plantagenet, Monday, 12 January 2015 3:55:32 PM
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Poirot, I am sure the ALP has a list of every LNP donor and will be trying to smear all of them when it can by association. They'll ignore instances where donations are given and the donor gets an adverse decision (Clive Palmer) and focus on situations where the donor got something they wanted. If I were the LNP I would have knocked those donations back. But both sides are in an electoral arms race that requires a lot of money so they take everything they get.

If you want to know why Labor wants to go easy on the bikies, then on the same basis perhaps you should look at the CFMEU who has given over a million dollars to the ALP and hires the bikies as enforcers of its corrupt industrial tactics.

Roses, Labor planned those coalmines originally and also the ports. The ports have been scaled back. The "risk" to the GBR is a Greenie hallucination. Ships sail on the water and don't effect coral at all.
Posted by GrahamY, Tuesday, 13 January 2015 7:28:47 AM
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Graham, ships are fine until one runs aground or spills bunker oil. I counted 22 huge ore carriers waiting off Hay point several years ago, and there are plans to expand it.

So you think the risk of ships running aground is a 'Greenie' hallucination? Ships don't run aground these days? Ever heard of the Sanko Harvest off Esperance, 1991 or the Rena off Tauronga NZ, 2011? These are just two shipwreck pollution incidents that spring to mind near cargo ports where I have lived, and of course I could go on.... They were less than a fifth the size of the coal bulk carriers and those ports are small in terms of traffic volume in comparison to Hay Point.

OK so I say the Qld LNP Govt and corporations expanding the polluting coal industry despite the high risks of having stranded assets due to climate imperatives and also damage to the Reef are 'Brownie radicals'!

Yes both Lib and Lab Governments have supported coal expansion; maybe that's one reason the Greens have been increasing their vote.

On the LNP's performance, I don't dispute your other measures but please post some links to substantiate your claims. I also agree with you that successive governments'(particularly Bligh's) lies about privatization are absolutely appalling.

However, the Newman Govt's performance in relation to incomes trails the rest of Australia, contrary to their spun claims.
https://theconversation.com/the-true-state-of-queenslands-economy-without-the-spin-35959?utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=Latest+from+The+Conversation+for+13+January+2015+-+2295&utm_content=Latest+from+The+Conversation+for+13+January+2015+-+2295+CID_2b6704f9fe76056a4b129b1713bc7b14&utm_source=campaign_monitor&utm_term=The%20true%20state%20of%20Queenslands%20economy%20without%20the%20spin
Posted by Roses1, Tuesday, 13 January 2015 11:24:53 AM
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Hi Roses, how many ships have been wrecked on the GBR, and what damage was done? Just citing a couple of ships being wrecked somewhere in the world doesn't represent any sort of a coherent argument. Next you'll be arguing that car accidents are a risk to our land based natural heritage because they happen.

The Greens are trying to shut down modernity, so they use sentimental pitches about highly unlikely catastrophic consequences of modernity to picturesque assets to scare the unthinking into coming on side.

I read the article by the professor and it is devoid of analysis. He also cherry picks the measures that he uses, choosing GDI, because it supports his case, and downplaying GDP because it doesn't. And he makes no effort to look at the underlying issues to see why the stats say what they do. If he did he would see Labor borrowing to give the economy a sugar hit, and he would see Campbell Newman wrestling with the consequences.

You don't turn the Queen Mary on a sixpence, which is why you are worried about the reef. Neither do you turn an economy on a sixpence. What you are seeing now is the legacy of Labor. Newman needs another term to prove his solutions up.
Posted by GrahamY, Tuesday, 13 January 2015 9:10:00 PM
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Graham, this is a clear case of your conservative idealistic lense versus my progressive one.

I say Australia's problem is a legacy of handouts to the rich - mainly by Costello for example superannuation tax breaks worth many billions.

As for QLD, Bligh's borrowings and privatizations were done against the wishes of the electorate. But is Newman a saint in this regard? He intends to massively increase taxpayer debt by borrowing huge amounts to bankroll the infrastructure needed to get the doomed Gallillee Coal extraction up and running.

That's one reason I don't vote for either Libs or Labs.

Re the Greens 'trying to shut down modernity', I'll give you another perspective from the progressive lense. The Greens (world wide) are promoting a third industrial age - replacing most fossil fueled infrastructure with renewable energy. It's the conservatives who don't believe this is possible who are the Luddites. In WA and Qld we see clean economical renewable energy has stalled thanks to Luddite Liberal-National party governments. In South Australia we see the opposite - 30% renewable energy - well on the way to a secure energy future - thanks to >15 years of progressive state governments.
Posted by Roses1, Wednesday, 14 January 2015 1:29:50 AM
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I'm sorry Roses, but you aren't progressive in any meaningful sense of the word, and I am definitely not conservative. When renewable energies are cost competitive with existing energies I will happily use them. I have no problem with renewable energy. I've even invested in them a couple of times. However I do have a problem with taxing the poor and the needy to subsidise the Greens illusions about renewables. Let the renewables stand on their own feet, as you apparently think the rest of the country should. The Greens want to tell the rest of us what we should support - that is not progress, that is regress.

Your criticism of Costello is unsupported. If you look at the benefits handed out by Howard and Costello they went mostly to families (think family benefits) and the retired and elderly (think concessional tax rates to self-funded retirees).

Your criticism of Newman is also unsupported. He is actually cutting debt by $25B or so, not increasing borrowings at all. While I have issues with the rail line in the Galilee Basin, I'm sure they will turn a profit out of it. I'm not sure that it will make a reasonable hurdle rate though. To make that calculation you would have to model it, and include royalties and taxes gained from the coal mining that couldn't be gained from other investment in infrastructure.

Governments do have a duty to provide infrastructure to industry as well as people. Extending a highway to an industrial area is no different in principle from the railway into the Galilee Basin.
Posted by GrahamY, Wednesday, 14 January 2015 4:29:52 AM
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Graham,

".....However I do have a problem with taxing the poor and the needy to subsidise the Greens illusions about renewables. Let the renewables stand on their own feet, as you apparently think the rest of the country should. The Greens want to tell the rest of us what we should support - that is not progress, that is regress."

In 2013 the world spent $550 billion on fossil fuel subsidies (four times that subsidising renewables) to keep the price below market rates and, therefore, discourage alternative measures in fuel efficiency.

What would happen if fossil fuel was required to "stand on its own feet"?
Posted by Poirot, Wednesday, 14 January 2015 8:36:29 AM
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Graham,

Good government does not invest in transport infrastructure for mines, except where the infrastructure is to be used by the community. Govt's job is to invest in PUBLIC infrastructure such as ports, electricity grids, public roads, public transport, schools and hospitals, NOT haul lines for mining companies

The Pilbara iron ore railways and ports were funded by the mining companies. Coal is another mineral extraction industry no different to iron ore but you say, on top of the subsidies it already receives, that Government should invest in its transport infrastructure. This is where governments come unstuck. They are neither qualified to make the call or entitled to invest huge taxpayer dollars in it, regardless of whether they (or you) think they'll make a profit.

The Newman Govt is only doing this because they are idealistically desperate for it to proceed and Adani corporation can't raise the capital, private investment being wary of coal, much of which will soon be stranded assets.

Another example that comes to mind is the WA govt constructing a road in the SW for BHP's $200m Beenup mineral sands mine that failed and was abandoned after 2 years, leaving a 'freeway to nowhere'.

Re Howard's superannuation handouts - yes they benefit the retired and elderly (I'm one of those). Low tax super contributions are a good thing for poor and middle income people and the superannuation co-contribution was great for the 'poor'; I used it myself, but now it's been axed by Abbott and Hockey.

I've no problem with this up to a middle income level, but the lion's share of these benefits (about 8 billion a year) go to the richest 10% - millionaires. They could stash away 150,000 a year (now 50,000) at 15% tax, while still working and pay no tax on withdrawal. Is that fair?

These mega-super concessions, negative gearing on established homes (OK that was Keating) and the partial tax exemptions on speculation profits are the tax concessions for the rich that I'm talking about and neither Libs or Labs have been willing to redress them.
Posted by Roses1, Wednesday, 14 January 2015 10:17:46 AM
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Wouldn't it be great if lefty, greenie people tried arguing with the truth.

Wouldn't it be even better if they would change their tune once their errors were pointed out to them.

Claiming that nor charging ROAD TAX on fuel used off road, in mining & farming is a subsidy is totally dishonest, & they know it. They should they have been told often enough, but like the famous dishonest hockey stick, they keep trotting out their lies, obviously hoping a few will be fooled.

I guess it must be hard admitting your whole belief system is based on lies, & has only an illogical emotional response to support it.
Posted by Hasbeen, Wednesday, 14 January 2015 12:13:30 PM
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Hi Roses, there are no subsidies to mining in Australia, above and beyond things like accelerated depreciation and R&D allowances available to every business. The Productivity Commission calculation is that they come to $300m per annum (from memory). Other countries might subsidise fossil fuels, but I think you'll find that the subsidies to renewable energy dwarf those subsidies. And that's without taking into account that fossil fuels run the world and renewable energy run a postage stamp proportion of it.

I don't understand your point about railways. So if the state builds a railway to take mostly rural produce, that is OK, but if they build a railway to take coal it isn't? Somehow one is a "common good" but the other isn't? Same if they build a road which takes commercial vehicles? Sounds like a meaningless distinction.

It's also meaningless to compare with banks. Banks don't have the same sort of sunk costs that states do. They can lend anywhere in the globe, but the Queensland government has only got Queensland. And it will get money directly from the minerals that the banks won't get access to. So the maths aren't necessarily the same.
Posted by GrahamY, Wednesday, 14 January 2015 10:25:42 PM
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Graham,
I really recommend that you read this report on state govt ASSISTANCE to the mining sector. (OK let's not get into semantics about what constitutes direct subsidies; the Federal tax related allowances you mentioned can also be included under the term 'financial assistance' (FA), so let's stick with that term)

FA from state governments to industry is mainly in the form of rail, road and port infrastructure but includes other expenditure, most of which is primary or entirely for infrastructure used by the mining companies.
file:///C:/Users/XC8173/Downloads/Mining%20the%20age%20of%20entitlement%20(1).pdf

I quote (and this is but one of many gems you'll find in the report):
"Another way to consider the size of assistance to the minerals and fossil fuel industries is in comparison with the royalties that they pay to state governments. In 2013-14 the Queensland government is budgeting to spend $1,489 million on industry assistance. This is almost 60 per cent of the $2,604 they are anticipating receiving in royalties......
"The vast bulk of Queensland’s assistance to the minerals and fossil fuel industry relates to the transport of coal, by rail and at coal ports. Our analysis finds that $4.6 billion dollars was spent in the (6 year) period of analysis on wholly-devoted, new capital expenditure for coal transport – mainly railways and ports.

On top of this, Newman intends to spend a whole lot more of coal haulage rail for Adani's Gallilee mines.

Let us not forget that the coal companies are more than 50% foreign owned; for Adani and Glencore that figure would be over 80%. Is it fair that state governments give taxpayer funds to foreign investors?
Posted by Roses1, Thursday, 15 January 2015 8:58:55 AM
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(cont.)

I'd also like to know what you think about Poirot's post from an article in the Australian:

"A FINAL act of the Newman government before calling the Queensland state election was ­approval for a controversial coalmine development by a company that had donated $650,000 to the Liberal National Party." ?

I haven't read the article or researched the issue (refuse to pay to read the Australian which I consider to be too liberally laced with propaganda from Murdoch lackeys). But if it is true, then I reckon it's another heinous example of how corporations manipulate our state governments.
Posted by Roses1, Thursday, 15 January 2015 9:09:40 AM
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Roses, I can't read a file on your hard drive, or not unless you are going to give me remote access, but I'm guessing that is the Australian Institute analysis. Assuming that is the case, they count as assistance infrastructure that the state earns income from, and which isn't just used by mining companies. The infrastructure you refer to is also infrastructure being built now which will take minerals for decades. So comparing upfront capital costs with one year's worth of royalties is not valid. It would be like comparing the price of a house to one year of a home owner's income.

The other problem is that these rail assets will earn income when they are used which will give a return on the asset.

On this logic, when a developer builds a factory and rents it to a tenant he is subsidising a tenant to the value of the entire factory.

I've already commented on the Australian story above. Doesn't look good, but I don't think anything untoward has happened.

I don't have a problem with companies being foreign-owned. If you do, then perhaps you should think of restricting BHP to only mining in Australia, instead of all over the world, earning dividends for Australian pension funds from other people's backyards.
Posted by GrahamY, Thursday, 15 January 2015 4:56:21 PM
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Sorry Graham, here is the link:
http://www.tai.org.au/content/mining-age-entitlement

If you read this you will see that Qld Govt assistance to mining is not an isolated case as in a once- off investment; those $1-2 billion outlays for mining are happening every year.

Don't get your point about foreign owned companies; I have no problem with them per se.

I thought my point was clear: Australian taxpayers' money being paid out to boost profits of Australian shareholders would be less unfair than Australian taxpayer funds being paid to boost the profits of overseas shareholders. But still not fair or acceptable; it is not the job of Governments to boost any shareholder's profits.

I thought it was a core conservative principle that Governments don't get financially involved in industry. I seem to recall that a major reason Labor's Wilson in the UK got booted out in the late 70's was his disastrous 'quasi-nationalizing' of BMC among others.
Posted by Roses1, Friday, 16 January 2015 4:47:56 AM
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