Australia’s energy debate exists in a bubble of outdated activist paranoia that never moved beyond Soviet-era reactors.
Progressive, eh?
When Chris Bowen and Anthony Albanese shake hands at global forums, we must assume other nations are whispering behind their backs.
Are those the guys who think nuclear is a fantasy? The three-eyed fish meme ones. Yeah. Are they really blowing up their coal-fired power stations? Gosh! See if you can some money out of them… They’re clearly mad. I don’t know. Say it’s for something green. They won’t ask for detail. Your nation is an island. Tell them the seas are rising. I hear you can get a couple of hundred million out of that…
If freshly re-instated Climate Change and Energy Minister Chris Bowen is genuinely interested in the viability of the renewable energy future he is spending taxpayer money on, he should look at the disaster unfolding in the UK.
Managing a Net Zero grid at least a decade ahead of Australia, Energy Secretary Ed Miliband tried to rebrand solar panels and wind turbines as a matter of ‘national security’ and then was forced to hold his tongue as people jeered back that it’s a matter of ‘national stupidity’.
Miliband and Starmer have said they are determined to ‘take on the blockers, the delayers, [and] the obstructionists’ holding up renewable energy projects.
Remember, these are not a military opposition. They are country folk who were minding their own business when city politicians showed up out of nowhere and decided to win elections on green credentials bought with public money and the ruin of farmland.
Unsurprisingly, those farmers have accused the government of ‘bullying’ after Labour lied to their faces, telling them their voices mattered, while speaking about them as nothing but an obstruction to be removed.
As reported in the Independent, one rural area is facing the construction of 520, 50-metre-high pylons. ‘We’re going to be surrounded. There’s not going to be anywhere in our parish that you won’t see these pylons … there were people in tears about how devastating it’s going to be.’
This is the ugly reality of a socialist greater good philosophy, where the lives of individuals are brutalised for the collective goals of the city.
To reach Net Zero by 2030 (or 2050, it keeps changing), Labour has secured a promise from energy providers to spend a collective £77 billion over the next five years. That is likely an understatement.
People aren’t thrilled about the cost, but they’re downright furious about what that money is being used to build. Pylons. Thousands and thousands of pylons.
Ed Miliband is trapped between the green promises he made during the election, public energy contracts approved by the state, ferocious backlash from farming communities, and the Reform Party.
Such is the political danger for Labour that the government has considered buying the support (or silence) of rural citizens with a £250 deduction per year from their energy bills. It’s also not clear if this deduction happens before or after the £30 per year expected green cost is added. Either way, it was deemed insulting.
Said the UK Housing and Communities Minister, ‘If you are making that sacrifice of having some of the infrastructure in your community, you should get some of the money back. So we’re making that commitment of £250 a year if you are near those pylons. We think that’s a fair balance between people who are making that commitment to the country themselves, and how they should be rewarded.’
What about the loss of property value? Emotional trauma? The day-to-day hell of living in a construction site as the towers go up?
The local council elections have given a good indication of what local people really think of the Net Zero future, with Nigel Farage’s Reform Party cleaning up Labor and Tory areas.
In an interesting turn of events, Keir Starmer has risked invoking Enoch Powell with his island of strangers speech in an attempt to re-frame British politics as a battle against mass migration. A risky choice for a Prime Minister who argued the reverse for his whole career, but that reveals how worried Labour is about Reform’s ability to conquer the regions in the Net Zero Rebellion.
Nigel Farage is laughing at Labour. Reform already won the mass migration debate and they are not being shy about challenging Net Zero. They can see the tide turning and, like mass migration, the watershed has been crossed. They have pledged an all-out war against green energy projects and whichever political party promotes them.
‘We will attack, we will hinder, we will delay, we will obstruct, we will put every hurdle in your way. It’s going to cost you a fortune, and you’re not going to win,’ said Richard Tice.
The public are falling in love with Reform as their hate for pylons and wind turbines grows.
Further, Reform wants to impose new taxes on the entire renewable energy sector, calling it a ‘massive con’ that is ripping the British people off. Why should the public pay in their energy bills when foreign billionaires and their shareholders can foot the bill?
‘The British people need to know there is a direct link between the cost of all these subsidies to the vested interests in the renewables industry and your bills,’ said Mr Tice.
Speaking in February, Nigel Farage said: ‘We view the Net Zero targets as being the primary reason for the de-industrialisation of Britain.’
In a later speech, Farage got a rise from the crowd when he said, ‘The media can go on and say we’re a protest party, and you could argue there’s a lot to protest about!’
Although he immediately clarified that Reform is not a protest party but a party ‘for all ages, all religions, all walks of life, and all British people and that’s what brings us together. Our belief in the country…’
Farage is harvesting the fruit of a steady, honest, and principled resistance to a ludicrous death cult that defrauded the public out of its wealth. Reform will profit from the collapse of Net Zero and neither Labour nor the Tories can do anything about it, even if they repent their sins.
The same problem faces the Liberal Party, and to a lesser extent, the Nationals.
Labor, the Greens, and Teals should be decimated by the inevitable collapse of renewable energy. (It is happening in every Western country so it is safe to assume Australia will follow.)
All the Net Zero chickens are on their way home to peck and claw at Albanese. Unfortunately, conservatives bought into the green nonsense after Tony Abbott was rolled, either through stupidity or electoral convenience, and now their punishment in the wilderness will continue.
There is a collapsing window in which new leader, Sussan Ley, could change direction, acknowledge what’s happening in Europe, and make the case against green politics. It seems unlikely though.
Maybe the Nationals, with One Nation on their wing, can be the Reform movement in this country, cleaning up politically as Net Zero fails ideologically…
Either way, the era of renewable energy is coming to an end.
Flat White is written by Alexandra Marshall. If you would like to support her work, shout her a coffee over at donor-box.