The latest local government elections in Queensland … may point to a fundamental shift in popular mood back in favour of growth and development. After many years of anti-growth policy paranoia, it’s a refreshing wind if it lasts. >>

Whaaat??

Hells bells, what planet have you been on Ross?

At what point was growth and development not a maximised government objective in Queensland??

What a non-sensical start to your article. And yes, the rest of it, being based on this absurd premise, is completely off the rails.

You wrote:

<< In Cairns, another region fast developing a reputation for an economy strangled in anti-development red and green tape and excessive planning controls… >>

Crikey! When Cairns took off in the 80s with a massive growth rate and poor regulation, it had all sorts of problems – increased unemployment, crime, rents, rates and other expenses for established citizens, etc, etc. It needs to be carefully managed. There is just about no unnecessary green or red tape up here.

<< The point of all this is that the new political mandate for growth shouldn’t be dismissed as some isolated reaction to the past government’s failings. >>

I think you’re inventing this notion of a new political mandate for growth. People in southeast Queensland in particular are very concerned about continuous population growth in a region where it has obvious enormous downsides.

What the people really want is a better personal deal, which means a better average per-capita rate of economic growth amongst other things. One essential prerequisite is a big reduction in population growth.

So now we’ve got Can-do Cram-em-in Campbell Newman running Queensland, who shows no signs of mitigation the population part of growth so that the economic part of growth can actually possibly start to win some results for the community. Wonderful!

"The pro growth and pro business candidate Mark Jamieson (33%) scored more than double his nearest two rivals, each on 17%."

Gosh Ross did you do maths at school, 33% if more than double would require his nearest two rivals to have only scored a maximum of 16%, while you go back to school, perhaps you could do a subject like physics so that you can get informed about growth, the laws of thermodynamics and while you are at it, do some geography, you will realise we live on a finite planet, with finite resources.

Your "The community seem to be making their views clear: bring back growth, bring back economic prosperity, restore the state’s balance sheet and with it, restore some health to personal balance sheets"

Sorry but the only reason we had growth over the last 30 years was the result of a credit (read debt) bubble that has now burst globally.

Obviously the utopian cloud you live on is different from the rest of us.

Usually when a political party is on the nose it get's tossed out, QLD is no different. Your spin on the ‘why’ is absolute rubbish.

Get out and smell the roses, or better still some home grown organic vegetables.......what a clown.

A better question would be 'Hells bells, what planet have you been on, Ludwig?

The entire population of Australia has had it with the constant increase in growth-strangling green & red tape - except for an increasingly out-of-touch residual of atavistic bitter-enders, much like yourself no doubt.

Take population growth as an example: in the not-too-distant future, this county will easily support a population of 50 million, perhaps 10 million of whom will live in Qld. This will occur, whether you like it or not, because economics and market forces - not no-growth greenies, nor I-got-there-first NIMBYs - will determine the labour force, which will determine the population. Nothing you can do about it mate.

Yes, governments will have to furnish roads, schools, hospitals and other infrastructure; but on balance it's easier to do so with growth than without it.

Look at Tasmania - a now-mendicant state that has basically stood still for 30 years, partly because it has said 'no' to growth-sustaining policies. It has become a fly in amber and no sensible person wants that for the rest of the nation.

Ham

Part 1: The first thing that must be understood in Australia's electoral process is that it is cyclical – the Australian electorate gets disenchanted very easily so it votes for the other side. So in Qld, Labor was ousted primarily because it was time to look at someone else on the tele - Bligh was on the nose because the electorate had become cynical of her double standards – she talked about managing development but behind the scene was pushing a ‘development at all cost’ mentality to make Brisbane and the south east bigger than Sydney and Melbourne, best witnessed by her development push along the western corridor and north to Gympie. The very astute and personally ambitious ‘Can-do’ Campbell saw the opportunity to cash in on her deceit and realise a change in leadership so he jumped, boots and all, into the fray.
Despite this authors claim, local Australian politics does not have the clout to go against global economic trends as Australia is a minnow in the overall scheme of things. The political change we are currently experiencing is not driven by the need to see a revitalised growth process but more about the need for a change in who is the heading up our governments. Local politics is powerless against the will of the global economic processes and new leaders at state and local level will not get the growth process happening – well not until the global economy is ready for it to happen and then the results will trickle down to us. Local politics can soften the hit but they will not stop it. The author is deluded if he thinks this is not the reality reinforced by the fact that every incentive that can be thought of to get the Australian population to spend money on housing or in retail is not working! But as with politics, such economic surges are cyclical and development will come back but not until the northern hemisphere says it is ok to do so.

Part 2: As for the regions, Ipswichs politically and socially savvy Paul Pissale has been working very hard for a long time on behalf of Ipswich so that it doesn’t disappear into the eclipse of Brisbane and the two coasts and their ruthless and relentless need for development. Ipswich has always been at risk of becoming 4th world since the demise of Australia's manufacturing base. Pissale has worked hard to promote alternatives for Ipswich so that it survives. I don’t believe his mantra is driven by property development but moreso the wellbeing of the community he represents informed by his ability to understand George Street. And full credit must go to him for that.
And then the Sunshine Coast – (you said) ‘another Council which became notorious for being difficult to deal with … ‘. What might have been more accurate to point out is that it was difficult for the developers and monied pro growth movement to deal with the council, just as it was for the deceitful Bligh government. There were powerful elements within the Sunshine Coast region and the first Sunshine Coast Council that were a thorn in the side of the pro-development camp so there was a need to bring in the big gun pro growth and pro business heavily monied and strategically backed candidate Mark Jamieson ‘to score more than double his nearest two rivals …’ and oust the physically and emotionally exhausted green element. Slick business hits town and the sad little wannabes want what he’s got. But the property developing real estate agent gets even more and the community loses the lifestyle that they moved to the coast for as the beach becomes even more distant on the horizon

Part 3: Tony Wellington, who ousted pro business Lew (who) Brennan to represent the northern end of the Sunshine Coast has his job cut out for him in the council process but at least he has the unrelenting support of the dedicated band of warriors who are not suffering but thriving ‘in their anti growth paranoia’ by fighting to preserve the lifestyle and responsible growth that they moved to the Sunshine Coast for.
I left the Sunshine Coast two years ago driven out by the growth in bogan mediocrity that the coast has become which meant it was no longer safe to walk around Maroochydore’s café precinct at night and because we couldn’t get to the beaches because of overcrowding.
Fortunately I have found a nice little green haven where I feel safe in a supportive and caring and respectful community, I can walk to the beach and have space and safety on that beach and I am not deafened by the drone of relentless traffic.
And I am not telling you where this place is!

Ham, you wrote:

<< The entire population of Australia has had it with the constant increase in growth-strangling green & red tape… >>

Really??

It would appear that you desperately wish we had open-slather growth, and that anything that stands in the way of it must be entirely bad and damn stupid government intervention! You are wont to assert gross untruths in order to convince yourself of it, and perhaps show your real-estate buddies that you are a no-nonsense (read; no-sense) advocate of ever more of everything at a very rapid rate forever regardless of the consequences!

<< Yes, governments will have to furnish roads, schools, hospitals and other infrastructure; but on balance it's easier to do so with growth than without it. >>

Now how on earth do you figure that?

Our economy has been growing like the clappers for decades. We would be battling to have had a higher economic growth rate over the last say twenty years … and we STILL can’t keep up a reasonable standard of basic infrastructure and services, let alone steadily improve them!!

It would be a WHOLE lot easier to do it without population growth or with a much lower rate of pop growth.

<< Look at Tasmania…>>

Yes, look at it! Looks pretty good to me. The average quality of life there is not any worse than for the rest of the country. Doesn’t have the population pressure problems that SEQ or Sydney or Perth have!

BTW, what happened to you on the recent ‘An Olympic Dream’ thread? We were just getting into a meaningful debate when you bombed out. It seems that you couldn’t explain your way out of your very confused comments about sustainability: http://forum.onlineopinion.com.au/thread.asp?article=13447#232892

...I go with you on that Z and R;

what amazes me is the insistence of people to persecute themselves by congregating in areas of the slum base such as the Gold Coast. If people were to act on instinct, allowing the deeper desires for peace to dominate their superficial desires for wealth and stature, the more would have the courage to act in accord, such as you did.

Is growth making a comeback? Not necessarily, as a commodity exporter, our growth is tied to other economies like China. We saw some of this hubris, when we experienced the first mining boom and a Howard Govt crowing about unprecedented economic growth.
However, I don't believe Howard was in any way responsible for the growth in the emerging economies. While the author makes some interesting points; there's already billions in approved development on the book!
I can't see can do Campbell taking very much credit for the very positive economic climate he inherited.
Bligh was rejected by former true believers because she privatised; and or, defied the will of the people. She was also rejected because she came across, except at election time, as an extremely arrogant recalcitrant autocrat.
Anybody else except a virtual tyrant, would have taken her medicine, and stayed on helping to rebuild the party and its prospects, the way LNP founder Lawrence Springborg did. The real problem for Labour is, they're chock full with former staffers, union officials and uni grads, few of who have any relevant business experience, and are far too dependant on empire building bureaucrats? Hence the back-flips and about-faces, which always seem to cost the taxpayer additional billions? Rhrosty.

Only the growth of ignorance is on the rise again. Talk about progressive regress.
Thanks to Education & PC.

As a coalition/LNP voter growth is not one of my reasons for voting for them nor do I think that the coalitions more likely to be promoting growth than Labor.

I support the coalition/LNP because on balance they seem a little less addicted to some of my pet hates
- opposite day, when pretty much everything you say means the opposite
- constantly assuming that workers can afford to pay even more to support some cause that the party wants more money for
- large government
- gender discrimination
- large government debt with little of value to show for it

Subjective calls but no part of my voting intentions is around a love of even more development. If can-do starts to show to much of a passion for excessive development it may become a factor in my next vote but that won't be a positive for them.

R0bert

Quite a few of our now east flowing rivers used to flow west? When they last flowed west, Australia was a very different place, with a lot less desertification and coast to coat verdant forest. With every new record breaking flood event, billions of tons of suspended solids flow seaward to damage/destroy the natural marine habitat and all those that depend on it.
Can do Campbell could do worse than redirect some of these river flows, back into their original water courses. Many of these rivers have cut mile deep gorges! Those very gorges could be dammed, without increased evaporation outcomes or drowning productive land.
The fact that these same gorges are almost always sandstone; means, increasing fertility as vast areas absorb much of this water and then gradually release it back into the water course as future droughts bite, virtually drought and flood proofing much of Queensland.
Water is wealth and keeping it where it will do far less harm to the marine environment, but enhancing rural land/environment west of the great divide, will promote regional and rural development; and or, create a brand new import replacing export focused food bowl, much of which will support an increasingly hungry world?
Some of the New water can turn a few turbines, when diverted westward as controlled flows; and or, be injected into the great artesian basin; a finite resource, which stretches from northern Q'ld and into northern SA; and, could do with some topping up? Rhrosty

I hesitate to have faith in cando-Newman’s ability to improve Queensland society, economy, industry, and environment (or any one of them) until he demonstrates an ability, before breakfast or afterwards, to carry out a number of the impossible things expected of him.
There are are a fistful of these, but two will do for an indication of progress:
A) Overcome infrastructure (electricity, water, transport, etc.) funding (already deficient) for a population - by fostering an ever-increasing population needing ever-increasing infrastructure ?
B) Find many mile-deep gorges in Queensland. Just one will do - the crest of the highest mountain in Queensland just approximates a mile above sea level.

when diverted westward
Rhrosty,
A hundred years ago they talked about the Bradfield scheme. The ignoramuses of course knocked it on the head. Just as any proposal nowadays is knocked by the Greens.
There will always be people who can't comprehend that changing a river course is merely copying nature not going against it.

Hey, what's happening ? No-one heard of this ? Or does it make too much sense ?

The Bradfield Scheme

The Bradfield Scheme - the holy grail of the misinformed. How many more times does it need to be comprehensively debunked? Its misconceptions get cut limb from limb on a regular basis; yet it comes back every decade or so (and now more regularly) for another pruning - in the manner of a Monty Python re-run. The first comprehensive debunking on a scientific basis occurred in 1947, and this at no time has been overcome by the ever-wishful proponents of growth in their recurring visits to the idea.

ok collinset, debunk here, let us know what's no good with it.

This whole growth discussion is redundant.
You do not get a choice on whether to have growth or not.
It is not dependant on decisions by people or by application of money.

It is dependant on energy. If the energy surplus is not there then
there will be no growth.
So, as we are already at the peak of energy, therefore there will be
no growth.
End of discussion.

Bradfield made his assessments on poor data. Since his time much more detailed and accurate information has become available on topography, precipitation and streamflow in the source areas under consideration; and evaporation rates in areas targeted for reception of water. Even early post-war, engineer Nimmo took a serious consideration to this information and showed the scheme to be not feasible.
The upper Tully River has minimal annual flow for the purpose envisaged; the Herbert above its gorge has an intermittent flow of any real consequence. The Burdekin, at a lower elevation, has more water than the above; but depriving the cane growers on the Burdekin delta of groundwater replenishment might cause some angst.
Rather than asking for reasons why the Bradfield Scheme won’t work; it is more appropriate to ask for credible data to be provided by those supporting it. As it is to ask for the ultimate purpose of ending growth from proactive advocates of that

colinsett,
so, you're saying that getting water into the interior would not be beneficial ? If the Tully isn't sufficient then there are many other sources. Just because some engineers can't figure it out doesn't mean others can't. The question here is not just the Tully River but the concept.

No I. What Colinsett is saying is that the Bradfield Scheme is a bit like free energy machines: Plenty of believers, but no supporting science and no working model.

A shame to see people sucked in by such bunk, especially when there are so many promising technologies being developed.

Fester,
When lake Eyre filled recently there was great hoohah about it. I think it would enhance nature rather than going against it by making the lake permanent. Diverting some flows into the upper catchment would be a lot less complicated than many other irrigation projects.
You wouldn't actually not need diverting the rivers themselves but merely the excess flow from the wet. As for the developed technologies, where are they being implemented ? It's all well & good to have the technology when the mentality to use it wisely is lacking. Suppose it's much better to flood Brisbane every now & then. The benefits of such a scheme outweigh any opposition to it. It's a long-term scheme not something to please the five minute shareholders.