Australian Politics
Monday, September 02, 2024
Greens plan to drive most landlords out of business
The Greens have their eyes firmly focused on winning over renters at the next election, with a new policy aimed at giving tenants more power in resolving disputes with their landlords.
The Greens have announced plans to establish a National Renters Protection Authority (NRPA) which would only deal with tenancy disputes, including enforcing national minimum standards the party has put forward, covering ventilation, heating, cooling and insulation.
Costed at $200m a year by the parliamentary budget office, based on the Greens rental policies, the NRPA is proposed to have 1,000 staff across the nation “allowing them to investigate rental breaches as well as offering advocacy, advice and education to renters all around the country”.
The Greens say investigators with the proposed body would be able to issue fines of up to $18,780 to real estate agencies found to have breached the rules, as well as on-the-spot fines of up to $3,756. The fines would increase for “serial offenders”.
The agency would take the place of state and territory administrative tribunals, which are often overwhelmed with rental disputes, particularly over bond payments.
With polling showing that a hung parliament will be a likely outcome at the next election, the Greens are looking to hold the balance of power and see one of Australia’s forgotten demographics – its 7 million tenants – as one of the pathways.
The proposed agency would sit as the centrepiece of the Greens’ array of rental policies, which include a two-year rental freeze and ongoing caps of 2% for increases, measures the government is not entertaining as part of its own suite of housing policies.
The minor party also wants the right to guaranteed lease renewals and access to five-year leases, arguing tenants deserve better security when it comes to their rental properties.
The government responded to growing anger from tenants earlier in the year by convening the state and territory leaders for a national cabinet to discuss rental reforms. The result was an agreement to work towards national minimal standards for properties, consistency on reasonable grounds for eviction and limiting rental increases to once a year.
But little has changed and with growing anger, the Greens see an electoral advantage.
The party’s leader, Adam Bandt, said both major parties had abandoned renters, treating them as “second class citizens”.
“Unlimited rent increases should be illegal. Unliveable rentals should be illegal. That’s what a National Renters Protection Authority would achieve,” he said.
“Labor and the Liberals think they can tinker around the edges with a fundamentally broken housing system but renters will punish them at the ballot box.”
The party’s housing spokesperson, Max Chandler-Mather said the nation needed an agency dedicated to renters.
“What’s the point of minimum standards for renters if there’s nobody to call when the landlord or real estate breaks the rules?” he said.
“There will be no more pleading with the landlord to send a plumber, fix the heater or send an electrician – it’s your right to have a livable rental home, and the Greens will make that a reality.”
The housing minister, Clare O’Neil, has said she is “intensely concerned” about Australia’s rental crisis and promised “profound and transformative” investment from the government to increase housing supply.
But the government has not changed its policy positions. Labor, after fierce negotiation with the Greens, which included more immediate funding for social and affordable housing, passed its housing future fund that is touted to build an additional 30,000 homes a year.
Its shared equity plan, help to buy, and the development incentive build-to-rent remain stalled in the Senate, with Labor and the Greens locked in a negotiation impasse.
The Coalition has also withheld support, unless the government agrees to its super for housing policy, another measure Labor has previously ruled out.
On Sunday, Liberal senator Andrew Bragg raised the possibility of withholding GST from the states unless they accelerated domestic housebuilding, which has not previously been raised as one of the Coalition’s policies. Bragg said “everything was under consideration”.
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The one question in Victoria's rainbow libraries toolkit now being asked that has infuriated parents and experts
Librarians in one Australian state have been encouraged to ask children as young as five about their gender pronouns, sparking outrage from parents and experts.
The Victorian Government on Friday unveiled a 'rainbow libraries toolkit' which has since been issued to more than 290 public libraries across the state.
Launched by the Jacinta Allan's government, the toolkit comes with a new set of guidelines that aim to help libraries become more inclusive spaces to LGBTQIA+ communities and families.
Some of the advice for inclusivity provided in the toolkit includes adding books on gender diversity to library collections, promote drag queen story-time and avoid using 'gendered language', Sky News reported.
A section titled 'Non-Gendered Interactions' urges librarians to not assume primary school children's pronouns.
'It is also important to recognise that, especially for young people, gender identity and sexuality can shift or evolve over time,' the toolkit states.
'Children in particular may want to experiment with different gender expressions through dressing up, and we can support them by avoiding mapping our expectations of gender onto them.'
The toolkit also urges library staff that even if they know a child who visits their library, it's best to 'leave room for them to express a change in their identity'.
This includes finding out if the child still continues to use the same pronouns they did in the past.
'Checking in casually about their pronouns ('Do you still prefer he/him pronouns?'; 'Do you still go by Sam, or is there something else you'd like me to use?') can let a young person in particular know that you are safe, accepting and flexible and that, by extension, so is the library,' the toolkit suggests.
'(This) can let a young person in particular know that you are safe, accepting and flexible and that, by extension, so is the library.'
Local government minister Melissa Horne said the library toolkit will make sure 'all Victorians' would belong in libraries 'regardless of identity'.
Equality minister Harriet Shing said the toolkit was evidence the government would always support the LGBTQIA+ communities, and they were trying to make the state a place where people can live 'wholly and freely'.
The development of the toolkit was based on the feedback of 156 surveyed LGBTQIA+ families in addition to 80 library staff, sparking outrage from critics
Conservative education experts are among those who have slammed the state government initiative.
Australian Catholic University senior fellow Dr Kevin Donnelly described the toolkit and its guidelines as a 'dangerous' example of allowing activists to take the place of parents and said it can 'destroy the innocence of childhood'.
Director of the Foundations of Western Civilisation Program at the Institute of Public Affairs Dr Bella d'Abrera told Daily Mail Australia that parents should also be 'very concerned'.
'The government both supports and funds the indoctrination of children with fringe theories about sex and gender, years before it is appropriate,' Ms d'Abrera said.
'There is no single circumstance in which it is appropriate for a librarian to be having discussions about gender and sexuality with other people's children.
'It is incredible that families can no longer even visit a public library without staff members attempting to recruit children into the radical gender cult.
'Children should be left alone to be children.'
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Renewables meet reality: Power grid emissions rise to threaten Australia’s climate goals
Rising greenhouse emissions from burning fossil fuels are offsetting gains made by Australia’s clean energy transition, after coal and gas plants were forced into greater use to meet spiking electricity demand.
Between January and March this year, the nation’s emissions rose 0.6 per cent, the National Greenhouse Gas Inventory said.
The preliminary figures released by the federal Energy Department on Friday underscore the significant challenges of Australia’s green transition amid revelations that carbon pollution cuts flatlined in the first half of the year.
Australia needs emissions to fall consistently between now and 2030 to meet its legislated emissions reduction target, with the deepest cuts to come from replacing polluting coal-fired power plants with clean renewable energy.
Emissions in the electricity sector rose 1.7 per cent in the March quarter. This increase was attributed to the huge demand for electricity as households switched on their air-conditioners to ride through heatwave conditions in NSW and Queensland, which required coal and gas plants to plug supply gaps after the sun went down.
The dirty secret of Australia’s green energy transition
In winter, between April and June, a prolonged stretch of cold weather collided with a rare wind power drought, limiting output from wind turbines and forcing gas-powered generators to meet peak demand.
Emissions in the electricity sector rose 1.3 per cent in the June quarter, the report said, due to an “increasing contribution of coal- and gas-fired generation to the total generation mix”.
Australia has achieved significant emissions reductions from its shift to cleaner power, which is considered one of the fastest of any country in the world.
Electricity sector emissions have declined over the long term, down nearly 29 per cent from their peak in 2009.
Renewables now account for 40 per cent of the mix, while the giant coal-fired generators that supply the bulk of the nation’s electricity are increasingly bringing forward their closure dates.
However, Australia’s flatlining emissions reduction exemplifies the size of the challenge for the Albanese government in meeting its climate targets.
To limit global warming as close as possible to 1.5 degrees – the level the Paris Agreement deems necessary to avert the worst effects of climate change – scientists say the world must reach a balance between the emissions it produces and those it removes from the atmosphere, known as “net zero” emissions.
Australia’s target of cutting emissions 43 per cent from 2005 levels by 2030 is legally binding, and is considered a critical stepping stone to reaching net zero by 2050.
The government is banking on the transformation of the nation’s coal-dominated electricity sector to deliver the bulk of emissions cuts.
It has hastened the rate of the rollout, with the share of renewables in the grid growing 25 per cent since it formed government in May 2022.
Climate Change and Energy Minister Chris Bowen said the figures showed Australia remained on track to meet its climate target, and accused the opposition of an “anti-renewables obsession”.
“Australia is lucky to be one of the sunniest places in the world, with some of the best solar and wind resources – harnessing them will ensure the clean, cheap, reliable and resilient energy system that Australians deserve,” Bowen said.
Opposition Leader Peter Dutton reignited the climate wars ahead of the next federal election, with a pledge to cancel Australia’s legally binding 2030 climate targets, and instead use taxpayers’ money to build seven nuclear plants, each potentially housing multiple reactors, between 2035 and 2050.
Dutton has said he supports the use of renewables in the energy mix, but has not specified what level of clean energy he would target for the grid.
The most recent projection from the Department of Climate Change, Energy and Water, released in November, showed emissions reductions are on track to comply with the 2030 climate target.
On top of renewable energy, the government has implemented policies to cut emissions by driving up electric vehicle uptake and to cut pollution from industrial users like processing plants, smelters and big miners.
The figures released on Friday showed emissions in the 12 months to June 2024 were 28 per cent below emissions in 2005, the baseline for the government’s climate target. Emissions fell 0.9 per cent compared with the previous 12 months in the year to June 2023.
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Jewish donors are pulling and redirecting their funds as they ‘despair’ at rise of anti-Semitism
Jewish philanthropists are in “despair” as they push back against the anti-Semitism that has exploded in the wake of the Israel-Gaza conflict and created an environment for prominent donors and Jewish artists that has been described as “toxic”, “destructive” and full of “vitriol’’.
A quiet revolt against “bullying” and anti-Semitic rhetoric – used by some pro-Palestinian activists including publicly subsidised artists – has seen Jewish donors withdraw or redirect their funding deals with environmental, women’s or arts groups.
Lillian Kline, head of philanthropy for the Victor Smorgon group, said the fallout from the Israel-Gaza war “has had a massive impact on, not just Jewish philanthropy, but philanthropy across the board in Australia’’ and left some Jewish donor families in “despair’’.
“For Jewish people it has led to absolutely a re-examination of strategic priorities of funding, and there were many conversations in the wake of October 7 to strategically fund both Jewish and non-Jewish organisations in the wake of rising anti-Semitism,’’ she said.
Ms Kline advises other influential families on their giving strategies, and said “so many (donor) families were blindsided by the rapid rise in anti-Semitism’’. She said those donor families were “impacted negatively by how organisations that many of us had long-term relationships with either did not reach out or made statements that were, what the foundations found, to be completely lacking in sympathy, empathy, or acknowledgment of the pain and suffering of the Jewish community’’.
The Weekend Australian can reveal one Jewish philanthropist recently withdrew her financial support for the Biennale of Sydney and the government-funded Artspace visual art centre in inner Sydney because of social media posts she considered anti-Semitic. She said that within the visual arts, “the vitriol is beyond imagining”, partly because of peer “bullying” if artists weren’t aligned with an anti-Israel, pro-Palestinian cause.
As a long-time visual arts donor, she said: “I am absolutely shocked and betrayed and disturbed by the lack of thought by so many artists who rely on private collectors to support them and purchase their work … A lot of people (other Jewish donors) feel the same way.’’
Ms Kline revealed that “as we got together with the big families, we realised it’s so much bigger than the Jewish community. No one took any issue with pro-Palestinian sentiment, it was when it veered into pro-terror and anti-Zionist sentiment that it upset Jewish benefactors.
“The word to describe it is despair amongst Jewish philanthropists and foundations with longstanding relationships with these organisations, at either the silence or, worse, the absolute hatred that’s come from these organisations that a number (of families) have had relationships with.’’
Like universities, the arts have become a flashpoint for tensions over the Israel-Gaza conflict and industry insiders say the tensions have often escalated into bigotry, bullying and racism.
The bullying extends to the top of the arts world. Gideon Obarzanek is one of the nation’s most respected arts leaders – a four-time Helpmann Award winner, he founded the Chunky Move dance company and is now co-artistic director of Victoria’s flagship arts festival, Rising.
Yet the Melbourne-born choreographer said he, too, had been targeted by social media activists, who had questioned whether he should have his Rising role because of his background – he spent part of his childhood in Israel.
“I’ve certainly seen a level of anti-Semitism play out,’’ Obarzanek said. “I’ve copped personal criticism because of my cultural background … It’s difficult to deal with and I would add that my colleagues and team have been incredibly supportive.’’
Stressing how he believes art will always be political, Obarzanek added: “I have not spoken about my position towards Israel, so that limited criticism (of Obarzanek) has been purely because of my background and a questioning of whether I should be in my position, given my background as a Jewish artist and Australian cultural leader. So it’s not in reference to my position towards Israel, it’s just purely who I am.’’
He also revealed that “we have seen Jewish families, donors, who have been targeted directly. We’ve seen the Besen Family Foundation (targeted by activists).’’
Family targeted
Founded in 1978 by the late retail magnates Marc and Eva Besen, the Besen Family Foundation has given millions of dollars to arts, education, health and environmental projects, and helped establish Melbourne’s International Arts Festival, the precursor to the Rising festival.
In April, Rising’s website was updated to say it was ‘‘no longer in receipt of funding from the Besen Family Foundation’’. This extraordinary statement was made after some artists pulled out of the festival, citing the Besens’ support of projects in Israel.
The festival confirmed it had lost one other donor, an individual who was offended by Gaza-related comments made by a Rising curator outside of her official role.
Obarzanek said the bullying he referred to involved artists commissioned by Rising or working elsewhere being pressured to “boycott or divest or not perform’’. He said: “We haven’t seen organised groups but we have seen individuals band together.’’
Social media activist and children’s book illustrator Matt Jones Chun, who was allegedly involved in the leaking of personal details of 600 Jewish creatives, has targeted the Besen family’s support for the arts in Australia, including their Rising donations.
Chun, who hailed Hamas as “freedom fighters” the day after their October 7 massacre of 1200 Israelis, claimed the Besens had conducted projects in Israel that contributed to the “ongoing colonisation and genocide” of Palestine. The family denies this.
On his Substack website, Chun has named several high-profile Jewish donor families and claimed their support for Australian artists amounted to propaganda for Israel, even though most arts organisations are left-leaning.
Drawing on anti-Semitic tropes, he said “these wealthy propagandists are toxic and ubiquitous, intimately entwined with each other, and deeply connected to the Zionist occupation entity and its leadership’’.
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