PM's climate change proven to be hot air

By Piers Ackerman

No single issue better illustrates the Rudd Government's gross incompetence than its blindly ideological approach to the question of climate change. Fortunately, and perhaps accidentally, Prime Minister Kevin Rudd's own hand-picked climate change guru, Professor Ross Garnaut, has now driven a truck through its principal argument.

In the 10 months since Rudd, Treasurer Wayne Swan, Climate Change Minister Penny Wong and Environment Minister Peter Garrett have held office, the Government has constantly decried and denigrated as "irresponsible climate-change deniers" all who question their views. The snide use of the word "denier" to link sceptics with those who deny the actuality of the Holocaust is so obvious it hardly deserves mention. But its repeated usage is indicative of the gutter nature of the massive propaganda campaign waged by Rudd and his colleagues as they attempt to capitalise on their symbolic signing of the politically correct Kyoto Protocol.

Fixated with the flawed reports prepared by the totally partisan Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change and falsely claiming there is a "consensus" among climate scientists that human activity is responsible for global warming, Rudd has pushed a warped agenda based on extraordinarily dubious modelling. And such an agenda can, in all reality, have no effect on the planet, let alone the behaviour of other nations.

For the whole of their period in office, federal Labor's mantra has been simple: the cost of doing nothing about climate change will be greater than the cost of doing something. Now, however, former foreign affairs mentor Professor Garnaut has revealed that mantra is false. First, though, let's look at Labor's determination to repeat that chorus, as captured by Hansard:

"All are familiar with the fact that the economic cost of inaction on climate change is far greater than the economic cost of action on climate change" (Rudd, June 26).

"This government does understand that the cost of inaction on climate change is far greater than the cost of action" (Swan, June 26).

"It is the case that the economic costs of inaction are greater than the costs of action" (Swan, June 24).

"Those of us on this side of the chamber understand that the economic costs of inaction are far greater than the costs of responsible action now" (Wong, June 24).

"On the question of emissions trading, we on this side of the House know a simple fact and it is this: the economic cost of inaction on climate change is far greater than the economic cost of action on climate change" (Rudd, June 23).

"Australians recognise that tackling climate change will not be painless, but I think the Australian people have a very clear understanding that, as I said, the cost of inaction would be greater than the cost of responsible action now" (Wong, March 18).

"The fact of the matter is that it is the costs of inaction that outweigh the costs of action" (Garrett, March 17).

"And overall our view has long been, put in simple terms, that the costs of inaction on climate change are much greater than the costs of action" (Rudd, February 21).

"We on this side of the House recognise the costs of climate change and that the costs of inaction are far greater than the costs of action" (Swan, February 14).

But a comparison of tables taken from Professor Garnaut's July report and the paper he released on Friday shows that this is not so. In his July 4 draft, he stated that the cost of no mitigation - that is, if no action were taken on so-called greenhouse gases - would be minus 0.7 per cent of GDP in 2020. In his new paper he presents three scenarios for carbon-emission reductions by 2020.

At an "as-soon-as-possible" level of 450 ppm (parts per million) he says the cost would be minus 1.6 per cent of GDP.

At the "first best" conditional offer of 550 ppm the cost would be minus 1.1 per cent of GDP.

If a second-best "Copenhagen compromise" was followed, the cost would be minus 1.3 per cent of GDP.

It is highly revealing that in presenting his first specific trajectories and estimated costs of emissions reduction, Professor Garnaut has found that the cost of reducing emissions is greater than the cost of doing nothing - although that is not how he sold his paper. It is Rudd who is the denialist on the economics of climate change, if Professor Garnaut is to be believed. The costs of action outweigh the costs of inaction.

Rudd and Swan have already warned Australians they face increasing unemployment. To that must be added the costs of Labor's as-yet unspecific plans to deal with its over-hyped catastrophic view of climate change. Professor Garnaut's report indicates Labor's mantra on climate change to be false. Why does the ALP want to sacrifice the economy for a lie?

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Elderly man dies after waiting 8 hours for a public hospital bed

An elderly man has died while waiting for a ward bed at the overcrowded Townsville Hospital after being left in a corridor for more than eight hours. The man, believed to have had cancer, was monitored by medical and nursing staff during the delay to transfer him to a ward at the troubled hospital.

Health Minister Stephen Robertson yesterday said he had referred the case to the Health Quality and Complaints Commission for independent review. "I view this matter very seriously and that's why I'll be referring this incident to the independent health watchdog," Mr Robertson said. "It's my responsibility to ensure that when events such as this occur that we don't sweep it under the carpet and we get full disclosure in terms of the facts of what actually occurred and learn from them, if there are in fact lessons to be learned."

Several doctors and nurses contacted The Sunday Mail late last week expressing concern at the over-crowding in the hospital. One staff member said it used to be unacceptable practice to have more than eight patients waiting to be admitted to a ward. But, he said, the hospital now had to deal with the tragedy and shame of a patient dying on a trolley in a corridor. "He was very sick, but he waited a very long time for a bed - and didn't get one," said an emergency department nurse, who asked not to be identified, about the man's death last Tuesday. "He was in the corridor with patients on trolleys in front of him and behind him ... he was rushed into the resuscitation room, but he wasn't revived. It's just terrible."

Acting Townsville Health Service District CEO Mary Bonner said the first priority for the hospital was ensuring that the patient's family was informed and supported.

The death comes a week after Mr Robertson dismissed the concerns of Dr Sylvia Andrew-Starkey from the Australasian College for Emergency Medicine. Dr Andrew-Starkey said she had referred information to Queensland Health about people dying because of bed access problems in hospitals. But Mr Robertson challenged Dr Andrew-Starkey to provide evidence of a link between wait times and harm to patients.

Professor Drew Richardson, from the Australian National University, told The Sunday Mail he could direct the minister to two major studies carried out in Australia and two more from America which showed the link. "There are cases where coroners have handed down adverse findings in relation to the outcome of patients who have had to wait for extended periods to be admitted, Prof Richardson said. "There are cases where death has been a direct result of dysfunctional environments in emergency departments."

Townsville Hospital's emergency department was designed to cater for 38,000 patients each year. Last financial year almost 62,000 sought treatment there. The demand has led to up to 24 patients each day remaining in the emergency department, some of them for up to 48 hours, until beds can be found in overcrowded wards.

Doctors and nurses in the department said they no longer provide emergency care as much as determine which patients are most able to cope with a long wait in the corridor. "We do not treat patients anymore. We run around managing an out of control department - it's not because of sick patients. It's out of control because you don't know where to put a patient on a trolley," one doctor said.

Nursing staff said the were likely to lose colleagues if access block continues at the same level. "We've coped for long enough," one nurse said. "The straw to break the camel's back is out there blowing on the breeze and it will land soon. "I've had nurses that haven't been able to come to work just because they are so distressed ... they've had to take extended time off work because of work. "We're not just going to lose a nurse in the short term in ED - we are going to lose a nurse full stop ... they will never come back to a nursing role again."

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Paramedics as 'Babysitters' in hospital gridlock crisis

TAXPAYERS spend an average of $70,000 a month for off-duty paramedics to babysit critically ill patients who are unable to get a bed in gridlocked emergency departments. NSW Ambulance figures show the bill rose almost 30 per cent last financial year compared with the previous period as more patients languished in the back of ambulances lined up outside hospitals waiting for a bed. Chronic overcrowding in emergency departments has forced NSW Health to create Ambulance Response Teams, made up of off-duty paramedics paid overtime rates to sit with patients in emergency queues.

Figures obtained by The Sun-Herald show the bill rose to a record $118,218 in July and doctors say it's further proof the health system cannot cope with demand. A response team is called in when one ambulance has waited more than 60 minutes or two ambulances have waited more than 30 minutes outside an emergency department, allowing on-duty paramedics to get back on the road.

Sally McCarthy from the Australasian College for Emergency Medicine said the delays were a direct result of bed shortages. Once seen, one in four patients wait more than eight hours to get moved from emergency to a ward. Last financial year the bill for response teams was up almost 30 per cent, costing $831,769. Opposition Leader Barry O'Farrell said the money would be better spent on reducing waiting times, including through boosting doctor numbers.

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Leftist thugs allowed to win

"FERAL" rioters who wreaked havoc at 2006's G20 meeting have forced a Remembrance Day event to be cancelled. The three-day defence expo due to start on November 11 has been scrapped amid fears of violence by "low-life anarchists". Organisers of the Asia-Pacific Defence and Security Exhibition, to be held in Adelaide, took the dramatic step after reports hundreds of protesters from Melbourne and Sydney planned to disrupt it.

In recent weeks, police gave several confidential briefings on the scale of the planned protests and the cost of countering them. Police received intelligence on the protesters, including members of the ultra-militant group Mutiny. Mutiny and another group called Arterial Bloc were key protesters in the riots at the G20 meeting in Melbourne in 2006 and last year's APEC meeting in Sydney. Many other protest groups have been attempting to rally support for their cause in recent weeks.

Before the event was cancelled, OzPeace activist Jacob Grech said he anticipated "around 500" protesters would be at the event. He said plans were under way for several busloads of protesters from Melbourne and Sydney. Many would make their own way to Adelaide. "We have a policy of non-violent direct action," Mr Grech said. He confirmed members of the militant Mutiny group were planning to attend.

The Group of 20 nations summit at the Grand Hyatt Hotel in Melbourne in November 2006 descended into chaos when a mob outnumbered and attacked police. Protesters tried to break a police blockade at Collins St, pushing and hurled barricades at officers, and threw wheelie bins and milk crates. They vandalised a brawler van in a riot in which glass bottles were thrown at police.

Acting SA Premier Kevin Foley yesterday said the Government had full confidence in police to manage "these feral anarchists that would be descending on Adelaide" if the event had proceeded. "However, the organisers had to take into account a number of factors -- security issues as well as the level of support from the Defence Department," he said. "The decision was taken that the cost of security, the possible threats of violence, were risks that the organisers of the event and the Government agreed were not worth proceeding with."

Mr Foley said the decision should not be seen as a "victory" by the protest groups because the contacts with manufacturers made so far would be followed up. "These are feral, low-life people who want society to be in a state of near anarchy for their perverse pleasure," he said. "People who say they are anti-war, but who resort to violence and destruction to put their case are clearly dangerous."

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