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Australian Senate: New Select Committee on Fuel and Energy
Posted by Big Gav on July 9, 2008 - 7:06am in The Oil Drum: Australia/New Zealand
This is a guest post from Tasman
The Senate has set up a Select Committee on Fuel and Energy. The terms of reference are set out below or you can find them here: http://www.aph.gov.au/Senate/committee/fuelenergy_ctte/tor.htm .
Any citizen can make a written submission to the Committee: you don’t have to be an official representative of any organization. Details on how to make a submission can be found here: http://www.aph.gov.au/Senate/committee/wit_sub/bro_one.htm
Those not familiar with Senate inquiries can get an idea of the range of submissions that are typically received by a committee by looking at the following site which contains the text of submissions received by the Rural and Regional Affairs and Transport Committee (RRAT) during its inquiry into Australia's future oil supply and alternative transport fuels: http://www.aph.gov.au/Senate/committee/rrat_ctte/completed_inquiries/200... The final report of the committee is also available at that site.
This new Select Committee is quite separate from the earlier RRAT one (different membership and a different secretariat). Rather than repeat basic arguments about oil depletion scenarios and Peak Oil, which were covered quite well in the submissions to the RRAT inquiry, those making submissions to this new committee may wish to save themselves some time by referring to arguments or evidence provided to the previous committee, or contained in its final report (with updates and supplementary material as necessary).
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Having looked at the terms of reference, to be honest, this committee is simply the opposition trying to embarass the governments Fuelwatch program. It is a committe stacked with opposition memebers and Steve Fielding who's position is well known on cutting excise. You can tell by the terms of reference that they have already drafted their report which will amazingly endorse Coalition policy. Same old, same old I'm afraid.
Hi Termoil
I understand and appreciate your concern about the party-political nature of this inquiry. But let me assure you, as someone with practical experience of the dynamics of Senate committees, that the outcome is not quite as certain as you predict. Senate Committees have a habit of taking on a life of their own, mainly as a consequence of the quality and quantity of evidence they receive. Senators may start out with a particular intention but then may change their minds when confronted with solid evidence and arguments.
You may not like what you perceive as the intentions of this committee. And in response you can either lie down passively, sighing “same old, same old”, or, as I hope, you can use the forum that they provide to argue alternative views. Virtually all submissions sent to a committee are published on the web (thus affording you free publicity for your opinions) and are acknowledged (and often summarized) in the Committee’s report.
We are, thank God, still a liberal democracy where you are entitled to make your views known to your elected representatives. I have no doubt that you have useful things to say to this Committee, so I suggest that you put aside your personal notions about the intentions of the sponsors of this inquiry, and take this opportunity to get your views and ideas on the public record. What have you got to lose?
Yes my cynicism button was running hot this morning and I do intend to make a submission, just like I did for the 2020 Summit.
I also appreciated aeldrics post today which I think put into context the politicians mindset.
I'm not sure that I really have a good grasp yet of how to present something that impacts on the pollies rather than just tell the numbers. I am leaning towards somehting that memmel wrote a few weeks back where he did an analysis of the oil price tipping point at which for a big chunk of avergaae US citizens, work (as we know it) became a zero sum game. Memmels price was I think $175 BBL which we are on a close trajectory to achieve pretty soon.
I agree with Tasman - regardless of who set up the enquiry and how they are trying to spin the outcome, it never hurts to put the facts in front of them. They may ignore them but the message will slowly sink in (one virtue of constantly rising oil prices is that they constantly reinforce the idea - even die-hard skeptics must ask "what if" sometimes).