"Time to Erase the Emissions Trading Nightmare."

A statement by Viv Forbes, Chairman of the Carbon Sense Coalition.

The Carbon Sense Coalition today called on the Premier of Queensland and all elected members to bring pressure to bear on the Federal Government to immediately abandon plans for Emissions Trading. The Chairman of "Carbon Sense", Mr Viv Forbes, said that at a time of world economic crisis, the last thing productive Queensland industries need is the threat of this destructive policy hanging over them. "Emissions Trading and its carbon taxes must harm Australian industry, and Queensland will suffer most.

We are assured there are real environmental or climate benefits from all this sacrifice and warned of dire consequences if we do not act immediately. Prophecies of climate doom issue weekly from the pulpit of CSIRO. However, there is growing scientific evidence and opinion that carbon dioxide in the atmosphere does not control the climate. Thus all the resources spent on attempting to limit or remove it will be totally wasted.

Australia is totally dependent on carbon-based fuels and farm animals dependent on the natural carbon cycle. To allow scaremongers from the Canberra hot-house to demonise the use of these harmless natural products on which we all depend is economic suicide.

Moreover, there is no proven technology and insufficient capital and time to significantly replace carbon-based fuels without the nuclear option being chosen by many countries. And the kangaroo grazing option is too silly for words.

The targets demanded by Garnaut and the Greens can only be reached if we engineer or have thrust upon us a major depression of economic activity. It is time some grass roots politicians from the provinces demanded two things: Firstly, an independent scientific assessment of the role of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere. Secondly, an independent cost-benefit analysis of this attempt to control the climate.

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More Australians want migrant intake cut

Dissatisfaction with immigration is rising across the country, and NSW is the state most set on reducing migrant numbers. Between 2004 and 2007 the proportion of voters who wanted the migrant intake cut rose from 34 per cent to 46 per cent, a study by a Swinburne University of Technology academic, Katharine Betts, shows.

The paper, which appears in the journal People And Place today, found that NSW had the highest support for a pared back intake, half of the respondents saying migrant numbers should be "reduced a little or a lot".

In 2006-07 a third of all new migrants to Australia chose to live in NSW. "The effects of population change are more noticeable," said Dr Betts, an associate professor in sociology. "People are aware of the extra traffic on the road, and everyone knows someone that can't find a place to rent."

Voters' mutterings come as the Federal Government faces questions over its immigration program which, this year, swelled to record levels while the country teetered on the brink of a recession. The Prime Minister, Kevin Rudd, has said next year's intake will take into account financial conditions before the federal budget next May..

Dr Betts said attitudes to immigration were influenced markedly by the economic climate and political rhetoric of the day. For instance, over the past 18 years of comparable statistics, taken from the Australian Election Studies, opposition to immigration policy was strongest in 1993. About this time, the Labor government, under Bob Hawke and then Paul Keating, was speaking enthusiastically about multiculturalism, the nation was emerging from recession and high unemployment was souring sentiment to new immigrants' easy access to welfare. "In such a setting, some voters could have believed that immigration was bringing in competitors for scarce jobs," Dr Betts said.

Conversely, support for increased immigration was highest in 2004. Under the Howard government the word multiculturalism all but disappeared from use, economic conditions had improved and changes to immigration policy reduced total numbers, limited family reunions and restricted new migrants' access to welfare. This, combined with tough border control, worked to calm the electorate, Dr Betts said. "Many voters may have come to believe the program was not only small, well-targeted and . in the national interest, but that it was also under close control. The idea that people are just streaming in gets people really upset."

And it is unlikely to surprise politicians that when they talk tough on immigration, voters feel more favourably disposed toward migrants. Immigration policies that appeared to benefit the people already in Australia were best received, Dr Betts said.

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HISTORY TEACHING REFORM

Three current articles below

Greater serve of history in national curriculum

History lessons will be soon be compulsory for every Australian student until the end of Year 10 under radical national curriculum proposals. The Rudd Government is pushing for extended and compulsory history subjects across Australia as educators survey a generation of students with "gaps in their history". The National Curriculum Board will this week unveil its proposals to transform history, science, maths and English subjects in our classrooms from 2011.

Arguably the most controversial of these reforms is the content and structure of history taught to students from Cape York to Perth. The NCB proposes the subject become compulsory and stand alone with about 100 lessons a year from Years 7 to 10, and a "distinctive branch of learning" constituting 10 per cent of all primary class time. The NCB also suggests what and when matters of ancient, modern, Australian and world histories should be learned by students.

Currently most Queensland schools teach history to Year 10 as part of the studies of society and environment (SOSE) subject, which also integrates geography and social studies. Less than half of Australian students now learn history as a stand alone subject.

The radical reforms were formulated by a 10-strong advisory group containing Brisbane Girls Grammar School head of history Julie Hennessey, and led by University of Melbourne Professor Stuart Macintyre. Professor Macintyre said many high school leavers now had "gaps in their history" and were "not aware of major topics". "History should be taught as history because the skills of historical understanding and the importance of historical knowledge are not being given as important a place in the timetable," he said. The proposals draw heavily from Monash University's National Centre for History Education.

A NCB spokesman said the reforms could be modified at an educators' forum in Melbourne on Wednesday, before being placed on the NCB website for "public discussion" from November 2008 to February 2009. The changes to history, science, maths and English curricula - forming the first national curriculum - will then be trialled for two years before implementation in 2011. Future science students are set to learn about cloning, stem cell research and hybrid cars.

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Curriculum to scale back Australian history

The emphasis on teaching Australian history in recent years will be scaled down in the national curriculum, as its initial draft, to be released today, outlines a course that places the national story in the context of broader global events. The draft says restricting the study of history to Australian history is inappropriate, and while it retains an important place in the national curriculum, knowledge of world events is necessary to understand the nation's history.

The national curriculum stems the push to privilege Australian history, which culminated in the call by the Howard government to make the study of Australian history compulsory in Years 9 and 10. "If only to equip students to operate in the world in which they will live, they need to understand world history," the draft says. 'History should have a broad and comprehensive foundation from which its implications for Australia can be grasped."

The lead author of the draft, Melbourne University history professor Stuart Macintyre, said yesterday the push to cement Australian history in schools had left the position of world history unclear in curriculums. "To think one can study Australian history in isolation is a bit short-sighted," Professor Macintyre said. "There was a concern ... that it was solipsistic and not conducive to understanding Australia and its place in the world. "I think there is very broad agreement that, while all Australian students should learn Australian history, we don't really do our duty to them unless they study other history as well."

The draft curriculum proposes history be compulsory for all school students until the end of Year 10, and introduced as a distinct subject in primary school. Professor Macintyre said having trained history teachers was crucial to implementing the curriculum, and attention should be given to the history education given to student teachers.

The draft curriculum outlines a sequential study of world and Australian events based on factual knowledge and the skills to "think historically" or analyse events in a course that spans from the earliest human communities to the Industrial Revolution to the dismissal of the Whitlam government and the Iraq war. The draft, described as initial advice to the National Curriculum Board, was developed by a group of historians and history teachers led by the Left-aligned Professor Macintyre, whose appointment was criticised as being provocative by the conservative side in the history wars.

The broad aim of the curriculum is to introduce students to world history from the time of the earliest human communities, and to have an appreciation of the major civilisations that have existed in Europe, Asia, Africa, America and Australia.

In primary school, history should occupy at least 10 per cent of the teaching time, covering student family histories in the early years to allow students to make connections between their past and that of others. In middle and upper primary school, students would study the history of their local community and key national events such as the significance of Anzac Day, migration, "contact to 1788", and the early years of the colony. In Years 11 and 12, history would be optional and offer more in-depth study in ancient, modern and Australian history.

The draft proposes extension studies, such as those offered in NSW, that allow students to explore traditions of historical research and writing, including debates between historians through the ages. The draft curriculum emphasises the importance of factual knowledge in history, but says historical thinking and the skills of historical inquiry are just as important.

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Prominent conservative says Australian kids should learn about British history

OPPOSITION frontbencher Tony Abbott wants school students to study more British history, saying Britain has shaped the world and should get the credit for it. The National Curriculum Board today will release a draft curriculum which places a greater focus on world events in history classes.

Mr Abbott said he was in favour of world history but said the focus should be on Britain. "People have got to know where we came from, they've got to know about the ideas that shaped the modern world, and in a very significant sense, the modern world has been made in England," he said in Canberra. "I think (the curriculum) needs to be history that pays credit where it's due." "We are a product of western civilisation, in particular we are a product of English-speaking civilisation." History classes should start with the history of the Jews, then move on to the Greeks and Romans, then the history of Britain, Mr Abbott said.

Mr Abbott, the shadow indigenous affairs minister, did not mention Aboriginal or Asian history. When asked specifically about Aboriginal history, Mr Abbott said that could be studied too. "That's a part of it, sure, but if you want to understand modern Australia, you've got to understand world history," he said. When asked about Asian history, he said that was important, but it was important to know where we came from.

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