Abbott
government gives $4m to help climate contrarian set up Australian
centre
Bjørn
Lomborg has been given money from the hard-pressed federal budget to
set up a ‘consensus centre’ at the University of Western
Australia
16
April, 2015
The
Abbott government found $4m for the climate contrarian Bjørn Lomborg
to establish his “consensus centre” at an Australian university,
even as it struggled to impose deep spending cuts on the higher
education sector.
A
spokesman for the education minister, Christopher Pyne, said the
government was contributing $4m over four years to “bring the
Copenhagen Consensus Center methodology to Australia” at a new
centre in the University of Western Australia’s business school.
The
spokesman said the “Australia Consensus Centre” was a proposal
put forward by the “university and Dr Lomborg’s organisation”.
Sources
have told Guardian Australia the establishment of the centre had come
as a surprise even to senior staff in the business school, who were
unaware that the centre was being established until shortly before it
was announced this month.
The
University of Western Australia vice-chancellor, Prof Paul Johnson,
confirmed the money had been offered specifically for the centre,
telling Guardian Australia it was “an opportunity that arose in
discussions with the department and the minister”.
“As
we all know it is difficult to get federal dollars to flow across the
Nullabor,” he said.
“Bjørn
Lomborg was in WA last year and called in at the university. He had
separate conversations with the minister … I have been having
conversations about this for six or seven months.”
As
Lomborg explained in a Freakonomics podcast last year, his consensus
centre was defunded by the centre-left Danish government in 2012 and
he was searching for a long-term funding solution. In the meantime
his centre had moved to the US and was relying on private donations
for a budget of about US$1m a year.
“We
used to be funded by the Danish government, from 2004 until 2012,”
he said. “One of the things that the Danish government did not like
was that we said, ‘Yes global warming is real, it is a challenge,
but the typical way that we solve it turns out to be a pretty poor
investment of resources.’ When there was a change of governments
here we went from a centre-right to a centre-left government, they
actually cut off our funding.
“We
moved to the US where we get funding from private individuals and
we’re trying to find a long-term solution for actually getting
funding. So we’re a … nonprofit in the US. We used to have a
budget of about $2m a year. Right now, we probably have a budget of a
little more than $1m a year. And we get it from private donations.”
Pyne’s
spokesman said the federal government’s $4m was “around a third
of the total cost” of the new Australia Consensus Centre, with the
university also contributing and “committed to raising external
funds.
Johnson
said the university’s contribution would be in kind, but that it
was seeking more funding from the state government or the private
sector.
The
centre would have three or four staff and be operational by June or
July. Lomborg had been appointed an adjunct professor, as well as
co-chairing the centre’s advisory board, with Johnson.
“I
anticipate he will contribute to the intellectual life of the
university when he is in Western Australia,” Johnson said.
Lomborg
uses cost-benefit analysis to advise governments what spending
produces the best social value for money spent, concluding that
climate change is not a top-priority problem. It says the seriousness
of the issue has been overstated, that subsidies for renewable energy
make no economic sense, that we should stop spending as much foreign
aid on climate projects and that poor countries need continued access
to cheap fossil fuels.
He
was also appointed to advise the Abbott government on foreign aid as
one of 14 people on an international reference group for the new
“Innovation Xchange” which aims to find ideas and encourage more
private sector involvement in delivering aid.
Labor’s
foreign affairs spokeswoman, Tanya Plibersek, questioned what kind of
message the appointment sent to Pacific countries who are deeply
concerned about the impact of climate change.
In
the Freakonomics podcast Lomborg described his policy on taking
private donations.
“There’s
no strings attached,” he said. “We’re very clear on saying we
take no money from fossil fuels, and we do not let anyone direct what
we’re going to do. So we have only taken money from private
individuals and foundations that have accepted that.
“With
that said, almost all of them have wanted to remain anonymous. There
are a few like the Kaufman Foundation, for instance, who have
accepted to say that they’ve given money to us. We’ve also got
money from New Ventures Foundation, from the Randolph Foundation and
from Rush Foundation.”
The
Rush Foundation looks for new policy on HIV Aids and the New Ventures
Fund is financed by the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation. Gates has
backed Lomborg’s views that wealthy countries should not try to
stop poor countries using fossil fuels to alleviate poverty.
According
to Graham Readfearn’s Desmogblog, the Kaufman and Randolph
foundations have links to fossil fuel interests.
But
the communications manager for the Copenhagen Consensus, David
Lessmann, denied funding links with such interests.
”Kaufman
is America’s largest private economic foundation, funded with money
from pharmaceuticals, and Randolph is a charitable foundation funded
with money from Vicks chemical company,” he said.
He
pointed out the Copenhagen Consensus Center had recommended the
elimination of subsidies to the fossil fuel industry and increasing
investment in RD&D for green energy technologies.
UWA
said the Australia Consensus Centre would have “three main
projects” – advising on the “smartest” post-2015 UN
international development goals, advising on what policies would best
“keep Australia prosperous in a generation’s time” and “setting
global priorities for development aid and helping Dfat and
development agencies produce the most good for every development
dollar spent”.
“It
was a standard funding agreement with a series of deliverables,”
Johnson said.
He
said the centre would hold a major conference in 2016 or 17 on
Indo-Pacific development goals. It would also do cost benefit
analyses of investment in agriculture, which could inform the debate
about the development of northern Australia.
Last
year Lomborg spoke at an event on “energy poverty” in the leadup
to the G20 in Brisbane, sponsored by Peabody Coal.
Tony
Abbott quoted Lomborg in his 2009 book, Battlelines, writing: “It
doesn’t make sense, though, to impose certain and substantial costs
on the economy now in order to avoid unknown and perhaps even benign
changes in the future.
As Bjørn Lomborg has said: ‘Natural science
has undeniably shown us that global warming is manmade and real. But
just as undeniable is the economic science which makes it clear that
a narrow focus on reducing carbon emissions could leave future
generations with major costs, without major cuts to temperatures.’”
And
in a speech to the Grattan Institute in 2013, the then shadow
environment minister, Greg Hunt, used Copenhagen Consensus Center
findings to support his policy to abolish the carbon tax.
The
Institute of Public Affairs responded to Lomborg’s new Australian
operation by saying, “Bjørn, it’s great to have you!”
Lomborg
will be the co-chair of the Australia Consensus Centre Advisory Board
with Prof Johnson, the university’s vice-chancellor.
Australia
to authorize guards to 'beat asylum seekers to death' – report
An
inquiry by the Australian Supreme Court has proposed new powers to
officers at immigration centers, granting them right to resort to
violence, should they find it necessary, according to a former
Victoria supreme court judge.
16
April, 2015
Following
a Senate hearing of an amendment to the new migration bill Stephen
Charles SC, who was the Victoria court of appeal judge until
2006, told the
Guardian on Thursday that it would “inevitably
encourage violence by guards against asylum seekers” by
considerably expand their powers.
The
new powers, applying to immigration officers, would let them
use “reasonable
force against any person” to
maintain order and security, which in fact could lead to “beating
asylum seekers to death.”The
immunity from civil and criminal liability will include private
contractors – people, who are less trained than police officers.
“Time
and again police in the United States have been acquitted in
circumstances such as these,” Charles
said. “These
amendments to the Migration Act will in effect authorize guards to
beat asylum seekers to death on the basis they reasonably believe it
is necessary … to do so.”
Australia
keeps its asylum seekers at the Nauru refugee detention center, and
human rights violations including rape and physical abuse have been
going on since November 2013. Reports of harsh conditions at the
center, consisting of two fenced-off tent camps with up to 1,200
detainees, have been recently passed to the Australian government.
Legal
action against human rights violators in immigration centers could
only be possible if it is proven that a guard was “in
bad faith,” which
is quite difficult to demonstrate.
The
President of the Australian Human Rights Commission Gillian Triggs
said:“Senior
courts have ... explained the very high threshold that you must prove
to demonstrate bad faith. It’s very hard to show a subjective
intent of bad faith of a serving officer acting in the course of
their employment.”
On
Wednesday, Wickham Point Detention Centre in Darwin saw unrest, with
20 inmates reportedly harming themselves in order to avoid transfer
to Nauru Island. Police responded to the rioting, though authorities
denied any major “mayhem”.
This
February, Australians held candle light vigils to commemorate Iranian
man Reza Barati, 23, who was beaten to death while being held at the
Manus Island detention center in Papua New Guinea. He was allegedly
killed by the staff during three days of attacks by locals and
rioting he was not involved in.
Following
the rise in violence at the Australian detention centers, the UN
Special Rapporteur on Torture, Juan Mendez, examined Australia’s
asylum seeker policies. He reported various violations of the
convention against torture and other cruel, inhuman or degrading
treatment or punishment, signed 30 years ago at the UN Human Rights
Council.
“The
Government always assures the Australian people that it complies with
its international human rights obligations. But here we have the
United Nations once again, in very clear terms , telling the
Government that Australia’s asylum seeker policies are in breach of
international law,” said
Human Rights Law Centre Director of Legal Advocacy, Daniel Webb in
a press
release.
Proposed
powers allow guards 'to beat asylum seekers in detention to death',
former judge says (ABC)
Public
concern over the Trans-Pacific Partnership trade deal mounts
Aid
group Médecins Sans Frontières says a soon-to-be-sealed trade deal
will not only push up local medicine costs, but place life-saving
ones out of reach for millions of patients in developing countries.
Trade Minister Andrew Robb is negotiating the Trans-Pacific Partnership. Photo: Reuters
SMH,
16
April, 2015
At
a public forum organised by critics of the Trans-Pacific Partnership
on Thursday, Médecins Sans Frontières Australia's advocacy manager
Jon Edwards said leaked chapters showed it granted pharmaceutical
companies extended patents, allowing them to charge higher prices.
The
regional trade pact, which involves 12 countries covering 40 per cent
of the world's economy, has also come under fire for containing a
clause that allows multinationals to sue governments if new laws harm
their profits.
A
late-stage draft of the Investment chapter, leaked in March by
Wikileaks, showed some public health carve-outs, specifically the
Pharmaceutical Benefits Scheme, Medicare Benefits Scheme, Therapeutic
Goods Administration and the Office of the Gene Technology Regulator.
But
Mr Edwards told a crowd of more than a hundred at NSW Parliament
House that these exemptions were "seriously flawed".
"MSF
is not convinced that they will protect countries like Australia, let
alone Vietnam, Malaysia or Peru, from the threat of pharmaceutical
companies exercising legal threats or action to enforce monopolies
they are afforded in the TPP," he said.
Patricia
Ranald, co-ordinator of the Australian Fair Trade and Investment
Network (AFTINET), who organised the forum, said the carve-outs
showed the government's assurances about general safeguards embedded
in the TPP did not hold water.
"The
fact they've named those specific institutions means that the general
safeguards are not effective. If we have to name those institutions,
how about the other ones such as in food regulation, environmental
protections?"
Trade
Minister Andrew Robb refused to answer questions about the
exemptions, saying he would not engage in debates over "leaked,
outdated documents". He said the only text that mattered was the
final text.
On
Thursday, the Australian Council of Trade Unions joined counterparts
from the 12 negotiating countries in calling for trade talks to cease
unless they were conducted with "genuine, transparent, public
mandates that place people front and centre, not big corporations".
It
criticised the government for conducting the negotiations in secret.
Additionally
it raised concerns about indications in leaks that some countries are
attempting to reject protections of workers' rights and that the deal
will not cover the United Nations International Labour Organisation
conventions on rights at work.
"The
TPP makes corporate profits more important than protections for clean
air, clean water, climate stability and workers' rights," said
ACTU president Ged Kearney. "A fair trade deal needs to
recognise and protect workers' rights, environmental standards and
access to quality public services – this is not happening with the
TPP."
Mr
Robb described the call as the latest round of scaremongering by
anti-trade groups. He said the ACTU had taken part in 14 separate
consultations on labour issues.
"It
beggars belief the ACTU is opposing efforts to create jobs for
Australians. By criticising the approach to TPP labour chapter
negotiations, they are criticising themselves given they have been
actively involved in guiding this approach," he said.
Mr
Robb questioned whether Ms Ranald was being up front about her links
with trade unions.
At
the forum, Ms Ranald said AFTINET represented church, union, public
health, environmental, and women's groups, amongst many others.
"I
don't think being accused, being associated with unions is such a
crime. We're diverse," she said to loud applause.
Mr
Edwards said MSF was far from anti-trade.
"MSF
is not anti-trade, quite the opposite. MSF is pro-trade and
pro-competition in the pharmaceutical business, where it can reduce
prices and bring benefits to our patients and others in need of
essential medicines," he said.
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