Penny Wong (who has made a good start as foreign minister) needs to intervene quickly to ensure Australia keeps a strategic piece of real estate only 950km from Cairns from becoming a Chinese People’s Liberation Army naval/air base; a dagger pointed to the heart of Australia. Twenty-one beautiful little islands off the east coast of PNG are owned by an Australian who wants $36 million for them and the only buyer at this stage is a Communist Chinese company.
The owner wants to sell them to Australia, but no one seems interested. They are also home to millions of nesting sea turtles and would make an ideal sea turtle sanctuary. If the federal government buys them in a joint venture with, say, the World Wildlife Fund, who could run them as a sea turtle nesting sanctuary, it would be a win-win for conservation and Australia’s security. You need to get in quick, Penny.
Closer to home, Albo’s jobs and skills summit starts this week. Whilst it’s better for the opposition to go to anything the government is hosting, I can understand Peter Dutton not going but am pleased the National Party is.
In politics, it’s good common sense to back good policy from the other side. Within 10 minutes of Jon Stanhope as Chief Minister announcing a new Cotter dam in 2007, as opposition leader I backed him. When asked If I had any criticism, all I said was “what took you so long, Jon?” Conversely, when Jon was opposition leader and shadow Attorney-General in 2001, he backed my tightening of the bail laws to ensure criminals who committed crimes whilst on bail were remanded in custody.
So, if sensible outcomes arise from the summit, the Nationals and Liberals should back them. I would urge the Nationals to back the sensible announcements of new coal, gas and oil explorations announced by that most sensible Labor resources minister, Madeleine King.
The dangers of the summit are unreasonable demands for excessive wage rises that industry and Australia can’t afford, and excessive wage rises for public servants who have already benefited by being cosseted during the lockdowns, unlike struggling small family businesses that have been decimated.
I am a strong believer in unions to protect workers and fight for their legitimate rights, but not to place an unbearable strain on the Australian economy by making unrealistic wage claims and taking destructive strike action if they don’t get their own way.
It would be good if the resource unions also pushed hard for a bit of realism in the government’s unrealistic and hurried push to get rid of coal and gas before we can actually store solar and wind power. Whilst some groups that should have been included were not, handled properly, a lot of good can come out of the summit. Handled poorly, many workers, businesses and ordinary Australians will be the losers.
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