Pauline Hanson, Closing the Gap is complete rubbish

Senator Pauline Hanson

Sam

27/02/2020

Pauline Hanson, Closing the Gap is complete rubbish

Senator Pauline Hanson Closing the Gap Senate Speech: When I speak here today I hope that I am going to get across the voice of many Australians. I’ve never been a pretender, and the people of Australia are relying on me to speak openly and honestly about this issue of closing the gap. Closing the Gap is complete rubbish, and my thoughts are echoed by many Aboriginals who take the time to meet with me. As far as I’m concerned, it’s a joke. The call for recognition is just a feel-good smokescreen that hides the true problems. The biggest problem facing Aboriginal Australians today is their own lack of commitment and responsibility to helping themselves.

Closing the Gap is the marketing term used by politicians and bureaucrats so they can feel good about themselves and get in front of TV cameras and pretend they’re doing something to lift remote First Nations people out of their self-perpetuating hell holes. Most Australians know that tens of billions of dollars are spent each year to help alter the standard of living between those in remote Aboriginal communities and even those living in our developed parts of Australia. When you spend billions of dollars a year on any group of people you expect outcomes. Sadly, those billions have gone to the non-productive, unrepentant Aboriginal industry, not to where it should go, the grassroots Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people. It is an industry that has achieved no notable benefits in pulling our First Nations people out of squalor, domestic violence and poverty.

When I speak here today I represent the quiet Australians, those Australians who have had a gutful of the billion-dollar handouts with very little to show for them. Far too many Aboriginal kids in remote communities at this very moment are starving. They’re that hungry they’re breaking in to homes not to steal DVD players but to steal food. Far too many Aboriginal kids are fearful of their alcoholic parents and family members, who prey on their vulnerability. Those Aboriginal children in my home state of Queensland, in towns like Doomadgee, Woorabinda, Aurukun and Yarrabah, remain vulnerable to sexual assault and a life of petrol and paint sniffing under the current weak plans by our federal and state governments.

On the other hand, I need to commend the hard work of the NPA Regional Council, led by Mayor Eddie Newman and by Councillor Michael Bond from New Mapoon, who took the time to meet with me last year to genuinely speak about bridging the gap. Together with their council colleagues in Umagico, Seisia, Bamaga and Injinoo, they have demonstrated that we can close the gap with work programs and opportunities for our Queensland Indigenous people—and so too with the mayor of the Torres Strait Islander Council, Fred Gela, and the Torres Shire Council mayor, Vonda Malone. What people need to understand about me and One Nation is that we will always give credit to those Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander groups who are actively striving to better outcomes for their people, but I’ll also call out those dysfunctional communities.

I spoke about this issue 24 years ago when I was first elected to the House of Representatives. It wasn’t called Closing the Gap back then, but again we threw countless billions at the very same problems we’re talking about today. What’s changed since I first raised those issues? Nothing. We still have Aboriginal kids not going to school. The wonderful air-conditioned school in Doomadgee has around 400 students enrolled, but they’re barely able to roll-call 50 per cent of students on any given day. They’ve got just one child in the whole school with a 100 per cent attendance record. Whose fault is that? Lazy parents. You can’t blame the whites when it’s your own negligence. We can throw all the money in the world at building these schools, with three meals a day for $2 to make sure Aboriginal kids are given a wholesome meal while they’re at school, but, if they don’t turn up, how do they get ahead in life? We’re also bribing parents with payments to send their kids to school, but even that’s not working.

Never before have Aboriginal people been given greater opportunity to get a job. I see it frequently advertised: ‘Only Aboriginals need apply.’ I had a letter sent to my office last year that confessed to applying for one of these jobs, even though the writer knew he wasn’t Aboriginal and in fact he wasn’t even Australian; he was a Pacific islander. When he was quizzed about his heritage, he made up a story, saying he was a part of the stolen generation and had no proper knowledge of his background. What type of mockery does this create?

Many Australians feel we have widened the gap as a result of Federal Court and High Court decisions. Only yesterday, we undermined our border security and immigration laws with the decision by our High Court. We widen the gap by dropping Australia’s national anthem at football games but are expected to stand and conduct a welcome to country.

You will never close the gap while this parliament continues to hand native title land claims back to land councils. The tensions this creates among tribes or mobs is feeding the division in many of these remote communities. I hear frequently from Aboriginals who have serious concerns with the behaviour of Noel Pearson and Jason Yanner, alias Little Boy Murrandoo Yanner. These people aren’t helping close the gap; they’re simply riding the gravy train.

Incarceration rates of Aboriginals remain alarmingly high, even with the reluctance from the courts to jail them. The simple truth is: if you do the crime, you do the time. We expect it of every other Australian or person who comes to this country. If you want to close the gap, start taking some responsibility for your own people. As the old saying goes, you can lead a horse to water but you can’t make it drink. We’ve provided the schools, it’s now up to you to send your own kids to school. We’ve provided the jobs, but it’s up to you to turn up when you’re rostered on, not when it suits. It’s up to the Aboriginals to stay off the grog and the drugs.

I will leave you with my final thoughts. Closing the gap should be about treating all Australians equally and on an individual needs basis, not one based on race. These government policies that are based on race are themselves discriminatory and racist. Stop feeding the resentment in this country and you’ll naturally close the gap. And stop playing the victim if we are to move forward as a united country. Resentment, hatred and blaming have to stop. We owe this to all future generations, regardless of race or colour.

Pauline Hanson Closing the Gap Speech Senate 12 Feb 2020

Parliament of Australia Website provided under Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivs 3.0 Australia licence.

The Greens Climate Emergency Backfires in the Senate

Australian News

Sam

26/02/2020

The Greens Climate Emergency Backfires in the Senate

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We are in a Climate Emergency, No more Coal Mines LOL

Senator WHISH-WILSON (Tasmania): I move:

That the Senate agrees that, given we are in a climate emergency, no new thermal coal mines should be opened.

Senator ROBERTS (Queensland): I seek leave to make a short statement.

The PRESIDENT: Leave is granted for one minute.

Senator ROBERTS: One Nation opposes this motion. According to the 5 November 1982 edition of the journal Science, termites alone emits 10 times more carbon dioxide than all the factories and automobiles in the world. When will we see the socialist Greens motion condemning termites? Considering that China produces over 27 per cent of the world’s carbon dioxide output and is currently planning to build hundreds of new coal-fired power stations, when can we expect to see Senator Whish-Wilson and the socialist Greens putting forward daily motions condemning the Chinese Communist Party? Not only does China produce over a quarter of the world’s human carbon outside output; their commitment to the so-called Paris agreement allows them to continue to increase their carbon dioxide output until 2030 and only then slow the increase—not stop the increase in output or decrease output but slow the increase—coinciding with the end of their building phase. That is business as usual as 1.4 billion people seek to continue to make progress from hydrocarbon fuels.

Senator GALLAGHER: Labor will not be supporting this motion. I am again going to call out the Greens for continuing to bring motions into this place that seek to divide those in this chamber who want to see genuine action on climate change and work together to deliver it. This is another variation of the many motions you bring into this chamber every week for the sole purpose of dividing the progressive vote, showing that you are ‘holier than thou’ and making sure we are in a position where we are forced to vote against it. We put our hand out to you and say: why don’t we, for a change, work together on issues of climate change and try to get things through this parliament that will make a difference?

Continue

Senator Hanson-Young Senate Speech on Climate Change:

Senator Sarah Hanson Young

Sam

26/02/2020

Senator Hanson-Young Senate Speech on Climate Change:

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Hanson Young: I move: That the Senate take note of the answer given by the Minister for Agriculture (Senator McKenzie) to a question without notice asked by Senator Hanson-Young today relating to climate change and drought.

Yesterday I was in this place and I asked the Leader of the Government in the Senate, Senator Cormann, about the impact of drought on farming communities and the fact that building dams were not a policy that would help the struggling farmers today or, indeed, help the river system in the months and years to come.

Today I asked the Minister representing the Minister for water and drought, Senator McKenzie, whether this government will finally accept the link between climate change and drought. Yet we did not get a straight answer. What we have seen is that this government continues to have its head buried in the sand when it comes to climate change, when it comes to drought and when it comes to the emergency that we are in. The only thing this government wants to do is tell people, ‘Pray for rain, and we’ll build some dams so that next time there’s a drought we might be okay.’ It is not a plan for the future and it is not a plan for struggling farmers and our struggling river system today.

The reason we are in a crisis in the Murray-Darling Basin is threefold: corporate greed, people taking too much water out of the system and leaving none for anybody else; cotton, because we shouldn’t be spending all of our water making cotton seasons happen all year round, every year, in the middle of a drying climate; and, of course, climate change. What is making climate change worse is coal—coal, coal, coal. So if you want to know why the Murray-Darling Basin is so stuffed, it’s climate change, it’s coal and it’s corporate greed. These are the reasons our farmers are struggling, and this government has its head in the sand. They’ve got no idea what to do because they have no plan for dealing with climate change. And if you don’t have a plan for climate change, you don’t have a plan for managing the drought. That’s the truth.

It’s just unthinkable that this government continues to pretend to farming communities and the Australian community more broadly that there is nothing they can do. They are turning a blind eye to the obvious. The science is telling us very clearly that we have to get serious about reducing carbon pollution—get out of coal—if we are to do anything about reducing the impact of dangerous global warming. That means if we want to stop future droughts, not just building dams but actually stopping climate change; that is what will help.

Chamber: Senate on Oct 2019. Item: QUESTIONS WITHOUT NOTICE: TAKE NOTE OF ANSWERS – Drought. Speaker: Hanson-Young, Sen Sarah. Source: Parliament of Australia Website provided under Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivs 3.0 Australia licence.

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Hanson-Young, Building dams does not make it rain or create more water

Senator Sarah Hanson Young
The Greens

Sam

26/02/2020

Hanson-Young, Building dams does not make it rain or create more water

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Hanson Young: I was asking in relation to this government’s proposal to spend more taxpayers’ money building more dams in places such as New South Wales. And while I’m standing here on my feet, we know, of course, that the New South Wales state government have just announced that they are going to move ahead with watering down—excuse the pun—and slashing environmental protections and assessments to build new dams and new pipelines, all in a big rush to look as though they’re doing something in relation to the crippling drought, which we’re experiencing throughout the Murray-Darling Basin.

Of course, the big problem here is that simply building dams doesn’t make it rain. Building dams does not create more water. In fact, we are going to see this government spending hundreds of millions of dollars of taxpayers’ money building dams that will further destroy the Murray-Darling Basin river system and further destroy the farming communities throughout the basin, because it won’t be the community and it won’t be the river that get access to this water that is harvested and stored. We know that because the rules in New South Wales around allocation are an absolute joke. They give priority to big corporate irrigation over the needs of the community and the environment. So we’re going to see buckets of taxpayers’ money spent on dams that are not going to be assessed for their environmental impact. There’s no cost-benefit analysis. The water is going to be harvested and then in three or four years time we will be back to where we were. This is an absolute disaster.

We are facing a continually drying climate. We are in the midst of a climate emergency, and all we get from this government is ‘pray for rain’. That’s the only plan they have. Building dams won’t make it rain and having a drought plan with no plan for climate change means you’ve got nothing at all. This government is up ‘crap creek’ without a paddle right now. There’s no water in the river and they can’t get themselves out of it, so they’re willing to just splash around money and pretend, hoping that the community—the farmers and the taxpayers—won’t notice. It is an absolute disgrace on the part of this government, despite all of the heartaches that is going on in river communities. We have towns that don’t have clean water. You can’t turn on the tap and take a glass of water to drink. We’ve got farmers, small-family farmers, who don’t have enough water for their stock or their crops. Meanwhile, big corporate irrigators continue to store water and irrigate at the expense of everybody else.

The river is in crisis. We saw the millions of fish that were dead in the Menindee lake system over summer. Just in the last 48 hours another mass fish death has been sighted, and it’s not even December yet—we are in October. This summer is going to be hotter and drier. We know that. That’s what the scientists are telling us. That’s what the Bureau of Meteorology is telling us. It is going to be the summer of death—the summer of death for the Murray-Darling Basin and for the communities that are given no hope by this government, who are saying: ‘Just wait a few years. We’ll spend the taxpayers’ money and build some dams, and, fingers crossed, if we pray hard enough it will start raining.’ It is not a plan for drought. It is not a plan for climate action. Instead, we are just hanging our family farms and river communities out to dry, all the while doing the bidding of big corporate interests by slashing and burning environmental regulation and spending taxpayers’ money while we do it. I can guarantee that in three or four years time the river is going to be in a worse situation, not a better one, because this government did nothing about it.

Chamber: Senate on 15/10/2019 Item: QUESTIONS WITHOUT NOTICE: TAKE NOTE OF ANSWERS – Murray-Darling Basin Speaker: Hanson-Young, Sen Sarah. Source Parliament of Australia Website provided under Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivs 3.0 Australia licence.

Hanson: Without mining in Queensland, Labor zero paying off $90 billion debt

Senator Pauline Hanson

Sam

26/02/2020

Hanson: Without mining in Queensland, Labor zero paying off $90 billion debt

Senator Pauline Hanson Senate Speech (Coal Prohibition 24/02/20): This proposal by Greens Senator Larissa Waters to prohibit the mining of thermal coal in Queensland’s Galilee Basin will financially ruin my home state of Queensland. Some 36,000 Queensland coal mining jobs rely on this industry, and you can safely say tens of thousands of additional jobs also trade off the back of the Queensland coal industry. This bill, the Galilee Basin (Coal Prohibition) Bill 2018, not only reflects the Greens’ attitude towards coal and mine workers but it’s also a carbon copy of Jackie Trad’s and Labor’s Palaszczuk government’s approach to the industry.

The Labor Party in Queensland have established a ‘just transition’ group which is designed to make baristas out of coalminers and take their salaries of $100,000 or more to just $24.29 an hour. Without mining in Queensland, we have zero chance of paying off the $90-plus billion debt the state government—a Labor government—has racked up. This Greens bill to prohibit the mining of thermal coal in Queensland’s Galilee Basin will not only shut down 247,000 square kilometres of the Galilee Basin in Queensland but also kill many towns I have spent a lot of time in, like Rockhampton, Yeppoon, Cawarral, Sarina, Mackay, Moranbah, Nebo, Gleneden, Dysart, Proserpine, Bowen, Ayr, Townsville and Belyando Crossing. These are just a few of the towns the Greens have sentenced to a slow but sure death, and I won’t tolerate it.

In 2012, well before I was elected to the Senate, I watched property prices plummet by 62 per cent in Moranbah because there was a slump in mining. The downturn in coal mining sent countless hardworking families to the wall. These were families who were prepared to move out of the city and live in regional Queensland to make sure city slickers like Senator Waters and her Greens colleagues can live in their coal-powered cities. These little mining towns lost countless businesses too. They’ll never go back. The reality is the world is still embracing coal-fired power stations. Even The Australia Institute, who are no friends of coal, have conceded there are no fewer than 154 new coal-fired power stations under construction across the globe. Add to that more than 1,000 additional coal-fired power stations on the drawing boards of many other nations across the world. Some of these countries include Germany, Japan, Indonesia, India and the European Union. Most are signatories to the Paris Agreement.

The Galilee Basin will offer the whole of Australia and countries across the globe cheap, affordable base-load power, and there is no denying that. The Greens are completely reckless with their ill-conceived policies, and this bill should be sent to the shredder, never to be seen again. The Greens will stop at nothing to shut down coal. They continue to lie about the destruction of our Great Barrier Reef, using fake photos. They make out coal is killing our koalas and starting bushfires. The Greens are full of it, and the sooner Australians wake up to their rot the better. One Nation will not support the shutdown of the mining industry in Queensland and will, therefore, vote against the Greens bill to prohibit the mining of thermal coal in Queensland’s Galilee Basin. But One Nation is pushing for a coal-fired power station at Collinsville where there used to be one.

We actually are supplying power across Queensland, and, when they run out of power in the southern states, they rely on Queensland to supply that power. A known fact is that solar panels are not the answer to delivering the power that we need in Queensland. They have 2,000 acres outside Collinsville with 453,000 panels. Those panels are not delivering the power that they need to because the rats are chewing the wires. It is a constant problem that they have. At Kogan Creek, the state and federal governments invested $110 million into solar panels. Not one milliamp of power was delivered to the power station beside them, yet now they’re being dismantled. Look at South Australia and the $600 million invested in solar panels or the wind farms that are not even connected up because they can’t deliver reliable power. What does Australia do when, just like over the last couple of weeks, it is overcast and there is rain? There was no power coming from the solar panels. So we do need a diversity of power, but in shutting down the power stations in Australia or across the world—because that’s what you are doing by prohibiting coal—the fact is that we won’t have that reliable, dispatchable, cheap power.

I’ve travelled across my state quite extensively and spoken to business owners. Because they have to have a mix and because of the escalating power prices in Australia, we are seeing our industries and manufacturing shutting down to go overseas. We will see a further loss of jobs. And I’m fed up with hearing the Greens—and much of it is said on the floor of this parliament—absolutely telling our younger generation about the threat that coal poses to our Great Barrier Reef. Professor Peter Ridd, who has worked on the reef for 35 years, has said, ‘Coalmining has no effect on the reef.’ Actually he has said, ‘The reef is in great shape.’ There’s only about one per cent of it that has been subject to coral bleaching, and it’s not from coalmining. It has absolutely nothing to do with it. With all the fearmongering that goes on in this place, the Greens have never debated and put their argument forward. And that’s the problem within Australia: we have listened to the fearmongers and we have never had an actual debate and heard from the scientists about what global warming is about.

The IPCC, the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, in accordance with their charter, will actually only look at man-made climate change. They will not look at any other climate change whatsoever. It’s not in their charter. So we have not been told the truth. Here we are making policies for our country for the future generations and our businesses, and we are not being told the truth. We need to debate this. We need to know the truth. Our kids’ heads are being filled with rubbish by those who are pushing their own agenda. As I said last week about the indoctrination in the education system, climate change has definitely won. When Stewart Dimmock from the UK challenged the education system and his case was put before the courts, the judge was told by the IPCC that the Himalayas were actually melting. That wasn’t the case. That was a farce by the media and some group of people who were pushing their own agenda.

We all have a right to a place in this parliament to express our views and concerns, and I don’t deny anyone that. But when we are talking about the future generations and whether our pensioners can afford to turn on some heating or cool themselves down and when jobs are going to be lost, I think we need to know the truth. And, if we are wrong, then we admit to that, but we need to have a clear debate on this. The Greens’ whole attitude to this is ‘shut down coalmining’, but there has never been a real debate to understand why. Even the Australian scientists said, ‘If we shut down everything in Australia now, it would not make one bit of difference to the global temperature—not one bit.’

Our emissions are 1.3 per cent. Those are our emissions. And yet we seem to be intent on leading the world on shutting down to stop global warming when we have countries like China and India way above that percentage level—even Canada and New Zealand are. Like I said, this proposal, this bill, by Senator Larissa Waters needs to be shredded. It needs to be thrown into the bin. One Nation will definitely not be supporting it.

Source: Parliament of Australia Website provided under Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivs 3.0 Australia licence.

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