It was one of the most cringe-worthy moments in Australian politics – and if anyone knows how to make complete dickheads of themselves, it’s Australian politicians. But Craig Emerson’s ‘Whyalla Wipeout’ stunt was cringe for the ages.
When Julia Gillard immediately broke the unequivocal promise she made the day before the election and introduced a carbon tax, then-opposition leader Tony Abbott rightly pointed out that it would be a disaster for heavy industry. “Whyalla risks becoming a ghost town, an economic wasteland, if this carbon tax goes ahead,” Abbott said at the time. The town, Abbott warned, would be “wiped off the map”.
Cue Emerson’s mortifying stunt.
It was not just embarrassing: it was obviously ludicrous. No one would seriously think that Abbott was arguing that Whyalla would simply vanish the day after the carbon tax was passed. What Abbott correctly argued was that emissions intensive industries, like steel making, would collapse under a carbon-tax regime and that towns whose single biggest employer was a steel mill would rapidly become ghost towns.
While Gillard and her carbon tax were soon dumped, the damage had already been done. A decade later, Anthony Albanese and his clueless ‘Minister for Climate Change and Energy’, Chris ‘Boofhead’ Bowen, are finishing the hit job.
Now they have the added cheek to blow billions of our taxes trying to paper over what they’ve wrecked.
The Albanese government will fund up to $500 million of green upgrades to the imperilled Whyalla steelworks if it is sold to new owners, after the South Australian government seized control of the debt-laden business and the federal opposition slammed Labor’s renewable energy goals.
A senior government source said the rescue package would be worth about $500 million in the short term as the company entered administration once more.
Over the longer term, a second part to the rescue plan would significantly increase the total outlay by state and federal governments to save the iconic steel works.
The total bill to the taxpayer comes to $2.4 billion.
Like UK coal mines in the ’70s, taxpayer money is being thrown at failing industries by desperate socialist governments. The difference is that the Whyalla steel industry isn’t in such dire straits by its own hand. Instead, the dead hand of Albo and Bowen’s demented ‘Net Zero’ policies have doomed them. Half a billion of our taxes is only staving off the inevitable until someone in government comes to their senses and dumps the policies at the root cause.
Deputy Opposition Leader Sussan Ley said on Wednesday that state and federal Labor’s renewable energy goals were “killing the competitiveness of Australian manufacturing”.
“Federal Labor was elected on a promise that they would ‘rebuild manufacturing’ and yet today the Whyalla steelworks joins the long list of Australian manufacturers who have gone insolvent since Labor took office,” Ley said.
The federal government has set a nationwide goal for 82 per cent renewable electricity in the grid by 2030 and the South Australian government is aiming for 100 per cent by 2027.
These people are complete idiots.
Complete idiots with their hands in all our pockets and a desperation to save their cushy jobs.
South Australian Premier Peter Malinauskas has engineered a massive political stunt to be seen to be doing something to rescue the aged Whyalla steel mill when its ultimate survival is at best uncertain.
Just a day after good news on interest rates, the last thing Anthony Albanese wants heading into an election is the collapse of a major company […]
It is unprecedented in Australia for a state to put a company under like this, but the politics is clear because the mill is the lifeblood for the 22,000 people in the town.
Australia’s luck is fast running out.
