Relax, truth has surfaced -- in the Garnaut climate report

Kevin Rudd's global warming guru has finally - and reluctantly - exposed the con. Ignore everything the Government has told you. The truth, conceded Professor Ross Garnaut last week, is that it really is cheaper for Australians to do nothing about global warming. And, no, it's not immoral to figure there's no point spending big money to "stop" this warming when it won't make a blind bit of difference.

No wonder the Rudd Government refuses to comment on Garnaut's latest report, released on Friday. Much of the argument for its grand plan to make us slash emissions from 2010 has just been destroyed. I guess it's just hoping no journalists, most of whom are warming believers, will care to notice what Garnaut has just admitted through gritted teeth. As far as I can tell, only the Daily Telegraph's Piers Akerman has drawn the unmistakable conclusions.

Let's assume just for now that man's carbon dioxide emissions really are heating the world. Let's also assume that heating would be bad, and wouldn't actually help crops grow. Let's also ignore that the world has in fact cooled since 2002. Even given all that, it's bizarre to think Australia should lead the world in slashing emissions, losing billions of dollars and thousands of jobs. What difference to the world could Australia make, when we pump out less than 1.5 per cent of all man's greenhouse gases? Why make such sacrifices when giants such as China and India are stamping on the growth pedal, getting gassier by the week, and have vowed not to stop until they're rich? It's brainless, of course.

And to that argument, Prime Minister Kevin Rudd has had one glib response: panic now or pay later. Or as he put it on June 23, and again on June 26: "The economic cost of inaction on climate change is far greater than the economic cost of action." One government minister, from Treasurer Wayne Swan to Environment Minister Peter Garrett, after another repeated the mantra -- that we must pay now or pay more later. Here, for instance, is Climate Change Minister Penny Wong on June 24: "The economic costs of inaction are far greater than the costs of responsible action now."

But is all this actually true? As Akerman has pointed out, Garnaut in his draft report in July calculated the cost if we did nothing about "climate change" and just adapted to whatever turned up. The cost by 2020, he estimated then, would be a cut of 0.7 per cent in the GDP we'd normally expect. Now compare that claimed cost with what we'd pay if we actually tried to stop global warming. In his report last week, Garnaut says if we cut our emissions by 25 per cent by 2020, and the rest of the world somehow agreed to do likewise, our GDP would fall 1.6 per cent. If we cut emissions by 10 per cent, we'd lose 1.1 per cent. And if we simply adopted the weakest version of the Government's planned emissions trading scheme, even without actually cutting gases, we'd still lose 0.9 per cent.

That is: doing nothing about global warming turns out to be cheaper than "doing something" every single time. So Rudd is exactly wrong: the economic costs of action are far greater than the economic costs of inaction. That's according to Garnaut's own reports, which, incidentally, point out that whatever happens, we're still likely to be seven times richer in 2100 than we are today. That's assuming that any reliance can be placed on his models, which haven't been checked by anyone outside the loop.

Now before you dismiss Garnaut as just another evil sceptic, consider this. He's actually the deepest believer in the theory that man is heating the world to hell. In fact, he even asked the City of Yarra Council for permission to build a steel roof on his home on the grounds that global warming would cause "severe and more frequent hailstorms". And, like so many devout believers in global warming, Garnaut skips over inconvenient truths -- such as the fact that even the alarmist Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change's four assessment reports admit that "decreases in hail frequency are simulated for Melbourne".

So Garnaut is a believer and confirmed catastrophist, but even he is now wondering how sane it is to slash our emissions when we're so irrelevant on our own. He now recommends that the Rudd Government promise only to cut our emissions by 10 per cent by 2020, a target that has horrified the green movement and warming scientists. Greens leader Bob Brown in particular is apoplectic, saying cuts of at least 40 per cent are needed to save us from Armageddon. Labor itself was thought to be toying with promising cuts of 20 per cent.

But now Garnaut says just 10 per cent is the most we can realistically hope to cut without sending jobs overseas for no real gain to the climate. Yet even that (relatively) modest target comes with a catch. Garnaut says that if the rest of the world doesn't promise at next year's Copenhagen Conference to make some cuts of their own -- even ones much less than ours -- we shouldn't even bother to cut our emissions by 10 per cent. Just half that would do, and even that would be just to set an inspiring example to the rest of the world that would "keep hopes alive of an international agreement, at reasonable cost".

Yeah, right. Like China and India are just waiting for a cue from Australia.

Why is Garnaut's concession so devastating to the Government? Because he's admitting that nothing we do on our own makes the slightest difference to the climate. Whether we cut our emissions by 5 per cent or 100, if the rest of the world, China and India in particular, keep gassing on, then the Great Barrier Reef will still die, polar bears still drown and St Kilda Beach will move to Fitzroy.

So much for Rudd's deceitful claim that, "if we do not begin reducing the nation's levels of carbon pollution, Australia's economy will face more frequent and severe droughts, less water, reduced food production and devastation of areas such as the Great Barrier Reef and Kakadu wetlands". Rudd's own climate guru doesn't agree. And rightly so. (Oh, and relax: all that doom will only happen if man's gases are indeed frying the world, and even Garnaut admits "there is a large uncertainty" about that. He's not wrong.)

And here's the other damaging thing about Garnaut's report. He's suggesting it's not immoral to balance gain against pain, and to work out whether cutting emissions is a price worth paying for what little it achieves. Why, Garnaut is asking, must we add to our climate woes by cutting our economic throats as well? A good question. And I'd go still further than Garnaut yet dares, even though his own figures say he should: Why try to stop global warming, when doing nothing is cheaper? Indeed, why spend billions to stop a warming that in fact seems to have stopped already?

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Far-Left school curriculum coming up under Rudd

The latest chapter in the history wars returns one of its chief protagonists, Stuart Macintyre, to the front line, with his appointment by the National Curriculum Board to draft the course for schools from the first year of school through to Year 12. Professor Macintyre, the Ernest Scott professor of history at Melbourne University and chairman of Australian Studies at Harvard, was sidelined by the Howard government in its pursuit of a national curriculum for Australian history. But Professor Macintyre is one of four educators appointed to draft "framing documents" setting out a broad direction for the curriculum in four subjects.

The board has made another controversial appointment in its adviser on the English curriculum, selecting Sydney University literacy researcher Peter Freebody, who is identified with the critical literacy side of the so-called reading wars. The adviser on science is University of Canberra professor Denis Goodrum, and Monash University professor Peter Sullivan will draft the mathematics curriculum.

Professors Macintyre and Freebody were understood to be overseas yesterday and unavailable for comment, but NCB chairman Barry McGaw defended the appointment of both academics, saying they were leaders in their fields. Professor McGaw said Professor Macintyre - a former communist - was a "very sane historian" and the politics of Australian history was less of an issue with the board developing a broader history curriculum. He described Professor Freebody as a "fine scholar" and while his background was not in literature, the board would convene a panel of experts to work with him on that aspect of the curriculum.

"Almost anyone is controversial in literacy," he said. "If anyone doesn't have enemies, they probably haven't been engaged in the debate." Professor McGaw said the framing documents were intended as a starting point for public consultation. The final decision on the curriculum would rest with the board.

A spokeswoman for Education Minister Julia Gillard said she was confident in the judgment of the NCB, which is independent. But Wollongong University associate professor in history and politics Greg Melleuish said Professor Macintyre's appointment was akin to the Howard government appointing Keith Windschuttle, noted for his questioning of the Aboriginal genocide. "They seem to have selected the person who is most likely to raise the hackles on the other side," he said. "I would have thought it incumbent on whatever government it was, particularly in history, to try to depoliticise the process and Professor Macintyre's appointment won't do that."

Professor Macintyre is often described as a left-leaning historian and co-authored a book about the history wars, which debates the interpretation of European colonisation and its effect on indigenous people. The debate became heavily politicised after John Howard championed an alternate to the black-armband view of history.

Professor Freebody was a developer of a widely used model in the teaching of reading called the four pillars of literacy, which sees it as "not a 'scientific' decision, but rather as a moral, political and cultural decision". Literary academics say Professor Freebody has since moved away from that model, and now has a strong commitment to the need to teach phonics or the letter-sound relationships.

Professor Goodrum, who is working with the Australian Academy of Science in developing school curriculum, said the challenge was to reduce the amount covered in courses. "There's a tendency to succumb to breadth rather than depth of learning and that's one challenge to try to meet," he said.

Professor Sullivan said the challenge was to create a maths curriculum for the 21st century. "Children who start school at the same time as this new curriculum is implemented will enter the workforce in 2030 and they're not going to need the type of skills people needed in the 1950s," he said.

Opposition education spokesman Tony Smith said: "Stuart Macintyre brings a well-known, left-wing perspective to Australian history. We can only hope that Stuart Macintyre is able to suppress his views and develop a quality, non-biased, Australian history curriculum, but I'll guess we'll find that out when it's released."

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My worst fears have been realised. No educational balance under Rudd

By Kevin Donnelly

Leading up to the federal election, I welcomed the ALP's policy calling for a national curriculum based, as it was, on a conservative agenda very much like the Howard government's approach to reshaping the teaching of history and English. The fear was that the devil would be in the detail and, given the cultural-Left's control over the curriculum, that the agenda would be captured by those opposed to the more academic and balanced approach.

Stuart Macintyre's appointment as a so-called eminent educationalist to oversee history as a subject in the national curriculum - primary to Year 12 and mandated for all schools at the start of 2011 - shows such fears were well-founded. Macintyre, from the University of Melbourne and one-time member of the Communist Party, is a staunch advocate of what he terms "history from below" - one that dismisses a grand narrative celebrating what we have achieved as a nation. For historians like Macintyre, unlike Geoffrey Blainey, who called for an end to what he termed a black-armband view of history, the subject is about privileging victim-groups and interpreting the past in terms of power relationships.

In his book The History Wars, published in 2003 and launched by Paul Keating, Macintyre condemns so-called conservatives such as Keith Windschuttle, Janet Albrechtsen and me for suggesting history teaching is unfairly slanted towards a left-wing, blinkered view. Macintyre continued his attack on the more traditional view of history at a recent Australian Council for Educational Research conference where he defended "educational progressivism". One wonders what Macintyre has to say about Julia Gillard, the Minister for Education, who describes herself as an educational traditionalist and argues that Australia was settled, not invaded.

The second appointment proving that the national curriculum has been captured by the usual suspects is that of Professor Peter Freebody, from the University of Sydney, who will oversee English as a subject. One of the main criticisms of the way English is now taught in schools and teacher education is the impact of critical literacy - a view of reading that asks students to analyse and deconstruct texts in terms of power relationships and theory. Critical literacy draws on the work of the Brazilian Marxist Paulo Freire and, as noted by one overseas academic: "Where Freire's ideas have found the most fertile soil in recent years is in Australia. The Australians have led the world in a movement now called critical literacy."

Freebody advocates critical literacy on the basis that being literate is no longer defined as being able to read and write to the required level. Instead, in the jargon loved by advocates of theory, it involves "a moral, political and cultural decision about the kind of literate practices that are needed to enhance people's agency over their life trajectories and to enhance communities' intellectual, cultural and semiotic resources in print/multi-mediated economies". Freebody, like the Australian Association for the Teachers of English, argues that any talk about a literacy crisis is manufactured and that teachers need to be wary of approaches to literacy that lend themselves to "centralised political surveillance and technocratic control in education".

Given Kevin Rudd's belief in academic standards and a back-to-basics approach, one would have hoped the national curriculum would represent a break with the politically correct, ideological view so prevalent over the past 10 years. Such is not the case.

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PM flags major naval build-up in response to Asian arms race

Surprisingly hawkish for a Leftist

Kevin Rudd has foreshadowed a dramatic expansion of the Royal Australian Navy to counter a military build-up being bankrolled by Asia's growing economic prosperity. The Prime Minister last night warned that nations across Asia were modernising their military forces, particularly with more powerful jet fighters and submarines, and that Australia must respond with its own upgrade.

In a blunt warning to the national congress of the Returned and Services League, Mr Rudd also said he wanted to use Australia's status as "a middle power" to promote comprehensive diplomatic engagement within the region and through the UN as a buffer against regional rivalries. "We see a substantial arms build-up over time," Mr Rudd said in Townsville. "We need to be aware of the changes taking place. And we must make sure that we have the right mix of capabilities to deal with any contingencies that might arise in the future."

Mr Rudd did not name any particular nation as posing a specific military threat. But Australian and US intelligence agencies are known to be wary of the growing economic might of China and India. And they have lately warned that China is building an underground naval base at Sanya, on Hainan Island, off its southern coast, with berths for up to 20 advanced nuclear submarines.

Earlier this year, the Chinese navy had at least 55 submarines, eight of which were nuclear-powered. Many were equipped with Yingji-8 anti-ship cruise missiles that can be launched from under water. It is believed there are a further 13 nuclear submarines in the planning stages. China announced in March it would lift its military budget this year by a record 19.4per cent to $63 billion, but Washington believes its actual spending is much higher.

Since taking power last November, Mr Rudd's Government guaranteed an annual 3 per cent real growth rate in defence spending until 2017-18 and has quarantined the department from budget cuts. He has been preparing a Defence white paper to be completed within months, as well as a national security statement expected to be delivered within weeks. And the Prime Minister has pursued frenetic regional diplomacy, defying Opposition criticism to visit China, Japan, South Korea, Indonesia, Malaysia and Singapore.

Last night, Mr Rudd told the RSL that the Asia-Pacific region was so dynamic and included so many "flashpoints" that Australia could not bank on never-ending regional co-operation. "The Asia-Pacific region will become more prosperous and its population will continue to grow," he said. "Militarily, however, as it has already become economically and politically, the Asia-Pacific will become a much more contested region."

By 2050, Australia's population would reach 35 million, while China's would peak at 1.5 billion by 2020 and India's would hit 1.8billion by the middle of the century. "The demographic changes in our region will mean that by 2020, when we look to our north, we will see a very different region to the one we see now - one where population, food, water and energy resources pressures will be great," he said. These pressures would add to those around pre-existing political fault lines, such as territorial disputes.

With North and South Korea still technically at war and China and Taiwan unable to resolve basic questions of sovereignty, increasing military spending was an issue of concern. "As a general observation, the modernisation of Asian military forces is being characterised by significant improvements in air combat capability, and naval forces, including greater numbers and more advanced submarines." Mr Rudd said Australia must therefore look to its own military resources and maintain a flexible land force able to contribute to "high-end military engagements". "We need an advanced naval capability that can protect our sea lanes of communication and support our land forces as they deploy," he said. "And we need an air force that can fill support and combat roles and can deter, defeat and provide assistance to land and maritime forces."

Mr Rudd said the power of the US would decline relative to that of other nations in coming decades but that it would remain the world's only superpower until the middle of the century and maintain its "global leadership role".

He also used his speech to bring context to his foreign policy moves since taking office, stressing that his proposal for the creation of an Asian Economic Community with a role on security, not just trade, was tied to his determination to use Australia's status as a middle power to encourage regional security. Likewise, he said, his proposed creation of an International Commission on Nuclear Non-Proliferation and Disarmament was part of an attempt to respond to the spread of nuclear weapons to more and more nations. "Australia has the credibility and the drive to lead initiatives like this, in part because they are in our interest, but also because they make a positive contribution to the international community," Mr Rudd said. "But diplomacy must always be reinforced by a credible national defence strategy. "We need to make sure that we have an Australian Defence Force that can answer the call if it is needed."

Earlier yesterday, Brendan Nelson told the RSL there should be a formal national apology to Vietnam veterans, acknowledging they were ill-treated when they returned to Australia in the 1960s and 1970s. The Opposition Leader said Vietnam veterans deserved an apology for being subject to abuse and mistreatment on their return from service.

Within hours, the proposal was rejected by the Vietnam Veterans Association. Vietnam Veterans Association national president Ron Coxon told The Australian last night Vietnam veterans felt they had already been honoured by the 1987 welcome home march, the construction of a national memorial in 1992 and the recognition of major battles such as Long Tan. "I don't think he would achieve anything by doing that," Mr Coxon said of Dr Nelson's proposal. "They would be better looking after veterans in the claims process rather than apologising for it."

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