The Late DebateHow will the world remember the late former US president Jimmy Carter? The Victorian Labor Party attacks Peter Dutton in an ugly smear campaign, and hand sanitiser being drunk as alcohol?
Lately the gentleman. Welcome to the Late Debate.
Good evening, Welcome to the Late Debate time, Kel Richards joining me on the panel. Will Kingston and Evelyn Ray. Thanks for joining us. It is lovely to have your company. Later on in the program, and we're going to talk about what happens if you have the wrong sort of electricity meter and the fact that they can suddenly decide to turn off your air conditioning, and you'll have a chance to join us in fulminating about those dreadful things they are doing to crocodile Dundee. But first, how will the world remember Jimmy put Carter, an affable, likable george and peanut farmer. He was a one term president. According to my sort of estimates are only nine I think one term presidents in the United States. He won in nineteen seventy one from the hapless Gerald Ford. Then he defeated it was defeated by the great communicator Ronald Reagan, and he left after four years in presidency. It was after his presidency that Carter became really famous for his work with Habitat for Humanity, personally working with teams picking up a hammer and a saw, and working on those building sites and with the Carter Center. So will how will Jimmy Carter be remembered as a president?
I know we're meant to say nice things after someone passes away, so I'll get that out of the way in about fifteen seconds. He did a lot of good stuff after he finished presidency, and he gave us Ronald Reagan because he was so rubbish.
Now, I hate to.
Say it, but he has been remembered in his life as one of the most destructive US presidents, and I don't think that's going to change just now that he's passed away.
He unfortunately, after Joe Biden still say that.
Yeah, this is you know, this is a really kind of pedantic debate. But he led to rampant inflation in that country. He let the Soviets run wild. He was a weak leader in his time in office, and I think he will be remembered unfortunately, very dimly, notwithstanding his work after he left.
He strikes me a little as being, in a sense, the opposite of Trump. Carter a likable man. Everyone liked him. He was a lovely, warm, friendly man, and everyone approved of him and morally thought he was wonderful.
But he was a very.
Weak president, whereas Trump, on the other hand, is one of those. One of a couple of days ago, someone said to me, oh, he's an appalling character, dreadful human being, but he proved to be a good president in his first term and may well do the same thing in his second term.
So is he Is he the opposite of Trump?
I think so.
I think a big difference between the two of them is one gets things done and one doesn't. And you know, it's funny how during you know, the death, and I guess people remembering his life and all of his work, everybody always begins with, you know, and qualifies their condolences to the family, which is the right and respectful thing to do. You know, his family are obviously mourning his death and things, and that's a very sad thing.
To go through.
But everybody then notes that he wasn't the greatest president.
And it has to come.
With that caveat, because I think that even Democrats, even leftists, who were very happy with him when he was elected and things like that, and then his life afterwards, even they are more than happy to criticize him. But I think a really good telltale sign if someone really is a good politician. Usually if it's very loud that he's not liked like Trump, it's usually a good sign. He's probably doing a good job, I think somewhat exactly, which is a good thing in this day and Asian and perhaps was then that there are a lot of excuses I think that I'm seeing being aired post you know, Carter's death, and a lot of people are saying, oh, you know, it was the time, or it was this, or you know this and that. But you know, if you look at just objectively the things as president that he did, you know, minus the emotion, minus trying to tread carefully around, you know, mourning.
His death, it was his own policy that led him down.
And look at Iran with the Islamist look at what you mentioned Will with the Soviet Union aggression that sort of came under there. He also elected a lot of really progressive, like extreme progressive.
Into the court, which then obviously.
Saw the degradation of the legal system, the constitution, the human rights.
And you know, he also I think one of the last things.
That he said before he passed away was he staying alive long enough to vote for Kamela. So I think that says enough about it.
I think we all know that it wasn't him who actually he said that.
He was a very old man, and there was, as you say, a spokesman who said.
It for him.
I always remember him as being involved in the around hostage crisis. Fifty two American diplomats were held for four hundred and forty four days.
That's about one undred quarter years. Again in three months something like that, a terribly long time.
And right at the beginning will he actually announced he would put no boots on the ground, there would be no military action.
He was going to talk this out. Now. Is it possible for a good guy to be a good president? Or isn't it? Is it not possible?
It's a really interesting question, and it's a question I've probably changed my mind on. I once thought that to be a great leader you needed to have a firm moral compass. I'm now not so sure about that. There are just too many examples throughout human history, from Lloyd George through to Nixon through to Trump, where bad, well potentially men with questionable morals have proven to be effective leaders. And too many people on the other side of the ledger, like Jimmy Carter, who have been fundamentally good men who have proven to be weak leaders. I think the key ingredient is strength. I don't necessarily think it is having a strong moral compass.
I think that.
Strong moral compass leads to strength. I would push back with you.
On that one.
I think that we are so used to not having good options. It was always the lesser of two evils. Particularly now like in Australian politics. It's like I probably wouldn't vote for any or either people in you know, the parties. But it's just in my mind and in my logical system, I'm thinking, well, what's the lesser of two evils? And I think for too long we've kind of, you know, made lead ways with this. But I think in an ideal world as actually it's good morals that leads to strength.
But Luther once famously said he would be governed by the devil if he was a good governor. In other words, it's the power to govern well and make good decisions and good judgments.
That's what matters.
Got it well, I think that And I'm like that you quote Luther. I quite appreciate.
Some of the things that he's done, particularly the Reformation, but that's another topic. Joe's not on the show, so you won't get into that. But I honestly think that, you know, like everybody has a moral.
Compass, which is what guides them. And I think that.
Strength that isn't restrained by good morals is quite dangerous.
Just like a man or a woman.
Without purpose is quite dangerous. The same logic I believe applies with politicians. I think that sure. I mean, I'm not saying that every politician needs to be perfect, like we're all imperfect, but I think we should be striving, particularly with people who have that much power to have authority over us, we should be striving.
And for people who have that, decent and strong can happen. Churchill gave us decent and strong and won the Second World War. Reagan gave us decent and strong and won the Cold War.
It can happen.
I don't think they're mutually exclusive, but I think we're right in saying that strength is the keyword here. And I think the one thing which I'm excited about with an incoming Trump presidency is the concept of peace through strength. I think ultimately, when you'll have a strong leader in the White House, which I think Trump will be you'll ultimately see a greater level of global security and that's something we didn't unfortunately have under Jimmy Carter.
Let's see if this applies to our local politics, because this coming year, twenty twenty five is an election year, and the polls are coming out and they're saying things are bad for the Labor Party. Both in New South Wales and Victoria. Labor has dropped in the latest opinion polls swung strongly against Labor and the battleground state of Western Australia. The trend has cut the government's primary vote from thirty three percent to twenty nine percent in both New South Wales and Victoria since the last election, putting a Labor on course for a feet in key electorates unless its stages a dramatic turnaround next year. Victorian voters have lifted the coalition's primary vote from thirty three to thirty eight percent, and New South Wales voters have increased their coalitions have bought thirty seven to thirty eight percent.
And it seems to me that this.
Business of having someone strong in government what we've been talking about to do with Ronald Reagan and Donald Trump and Jimmy Carter could apply here.
I mean, is Australia.
Are Australians looking at Anthony Albanesi and saying we want a stronger leader.
I don't think so.
I no, shocker, can you believe it? But I mean I look at some of the statistics like Victoria, for example, and I think have people not learnt?
I mean, like it honestly shocks me.
I you know, I'm not one that would you know, run with a conspiracy and believe it to be true. But like, I mean, I can't believe that these votes, I mean the last election, like they voted Dan Andrews back in back after what he did during COVID, and I thought, how does this happen?
The party in Victoria was a mess, There was not an electable opposition.
Yeah, but look, honestly, I honestly think that.
The Liberal Party in Victoria have done themselves no favors unfortunately, especially with what they've done with Moira, and I wonder whether perhaps that's why Victoria is different to the other states, because, to be honest, like what they did to her was truly.
Deplorable.
And yeah, so maybe that's why that state stands differently to other states who are perhaps swinging more towards Liberal.
Let's come back to Victoria in just a moment, because they've got a new state leader. But I'm thinking in terms of whether we need strong leaders and I had a Liberal Party your executive member say to me the other day. He said, kel what we need is a Liberal Party campaign that says what Australian needs is leadership. What Australian needs is done. Is that the way the country is flowing.
I think there's a couple of points.
I think the first thing is it is absolutely without question that the quality of political leadership across the Western world is not where it was in the time of Jimmy Carter and Ronald Reagan. I think we've seen a shift, and it's been a shift for the worst. Dutton incoming is certainly no Ronald Reagan. He's stronger and he's a better option and a two party in a two party system then Alberonizi is. But I don't think he's necessarily the long term answer for Australia. The other thing that I would say is, unfortunately, because there isn't a very strong alternative, we are fracing minority government in this country and that will be an absolutely mitigated disaster after seeing the lack of results the last time we had a minority government.
The thing is, sorry, we have good options here in Australia. The problem is they're not in the positions where they can take power. Like I think alec Antick would be an incredible prime minister. I think he's I think, well, he's not in the right he'd have to change the positions.
Yeah, I know that, But why aren't the best people rising from.
Well that's the good question, because like you said, I don't you know, out of Albanesi and Dunton. Absolutely I'm going to be I would vote Dutton.
You know before alban easy.
But that being said, like there are better options, and I think we need to start having conversations about shifting things for the better and having a real change. I mean, I look at America and I'm inspired, and I'm like, oh, thank goodness that there's you know, chumps back in and I don't you know, I honestly hope Jade Vance's VP gets elected after him. I think he would be great. He's a young strong man. Yeah who I think people would like to follow. And I look at that and think, gosh, I wish We had something like that in Australia and new just new blood.
And politics is the art of the possible. So bring it back home.
Real well, Antiic is possible.
That's a great twenty thirty five. He can't become prime minister. We are to work out where we're going now.
The polls are.
Telling us, and you were saying, and most commentators are saying the same thing. The poll numbers that I read out a moment ago indicate there'll be a minority government and that might mean a labor government.
Supported by Greens and Teals.
And you turn it up a sort of show of pale what I mean, and that sort of possibility it's not attractive. I wonder if those poles are right. The American poles got it wrong. They said it was on a knife edge, razor sharp, and no one could pick the winner. And in fact Trump came in in a landslide. And my guess is there are a lot of people out there the poles are not measuring, the people who were saying no, I won't take part of the pole, and they're people who might actually give Dutton government comfortably.
Yeah, I think that may be right, and I'll break the fourth wall here, ladies and gentlemen, I know after speaking off camera that you said that being having a minority government may not necessarily be a bad thinkel and I just think that is absolutely bonkers. It leads to fragmentation, it leads to nothing getting done, it leads to squabbling. I can't understand how you could possibly think that minority government could be in any way a good thing for this country.
I don't think I said.
That, actually, so I don't think I said that. No, no, no, I just joined under the I've remained convinced that Dutton is going to win comfort winter. I shouldn't be saying things like this. Should putting my kidneys on the line, isn't it here? But I think it's looking at these numbers. If that's what the polsters are finding, I think there's a margin the pulsters are not finding who could give Dutton a comfortable win, mind you. Alberizi says he's not thrown by the Boles. As far as he's concerned, they're perfectly okay. Here's what he had to say to the Australian people.
What I'm worried about is helping fellow Australians. I've been underestimated my whole political life, and I'm focused on making a difference for costs of living. I'm making a difference for plans that we have going forward.
I'm assuming that raised in a housing commission came up to staffter that and we didn't have quite time to extend out.
He says, will that he is being underestimated, is he?
I think I ran in the Herald the other day that Albanezi is the master tactician and I just haven't seen much evidence of it in this first turn. With the voice being the obvious example of an incredible political catastrophe, he may be able to pull something out. And look, he's been in politics first since what ninety six and it does take a fair bit to be able to keep your seat over that time. But I haven't seen much evidence of the master tactician.
No, No, In fact, he looks much more like someone who just can't read the room. And where most Australians are.
I think, you know, evidence shows, particularly with his voice, you know referendum, that he can't read the room. He's out of touch with the Australian people. But yeah, I honestly think at this point in time it's Dutton's election to lose. I believe that, and like you said, well, I don't think that Albanese has given us a single reason to think that we are and underestimating him. You know, I think that the only problem we'll have is if liberal don't step up, because at the moment we really need a proper alternative to labor and not labor light.
Yeah. I agree.
I think if we're talking about anyone being underestimated, I still think in quiet corners of Marrickville and Green areas that they're underestimating Peter Dutton. I'm fascinated by the myth of the socially conservative liberal leader in this country. They said Howard was unelectable, they said Morrison's unelectable, they said Abbott was unelectable. They keep making the same mistake, and Darton is in the same mold.
I just sense they may.
Still be making the same mistake today because they can't get their head around someone like that being in a position of power.
You're right, I mean, right at the beginning of the Albanesi period, they enjoyed portraying Dutton as being unelectable, but they've had to pull back from that hearing it leads of the disastrous loss in the Voice and the fact that Dutton keeps scoring points. Yeah, and when he proposes nuclear power, people keep saying, oh, that's interesting, that's worth thinking about.
Talk about that some more.
Yeah, I think you are still in their heart of hearts. I just can't don't think they could possibly get the head around a Christian Conservative being in that position.
But look, we will see.
Okay, well let's see what the Treasurer has to say. Because Jim Chalmers is going to be front center trying to sell the economic performance of the Albanesi government.
That's not going to be easy.
So what is telling Australians is, in fact, we've never had it so good as Australians.
It's gone. We've had a tough We're.
Really pleased the twenty twenty four is over, but that's behind us now and good times are just around the corner, are they ever?
One?
Oh, it's easy for people who have their salary paid by the tax.
You know.
Of course politicians like this can make bold statements like this because they are essentially no consequences, you know, to losing this salary so to speak. You know, But I think Australians are very much tired of lip service. I think, you know, leading into the election and all of these promises and everything, people just don't really care what politicians have to say anymore. They all want to see tangible action. People want to be able to pay for their electricity bill. People want to be able to put food on the table. People would like to you know, their kids to be educated in school and not indoctrinated.
It's very simple. And so I think lip service.
Isn't going to do them any favors again. You know, they've got four years essentially of the same thing if we vote for them again. And I'd think the last four years have been incredibly difficult for most of Australians. And I like to ask a question, if we can have better days, and they can promise this better days, then why haven't they already because they're in power now.
So what's different?
Well, it was overseas. I mean it was the Ukraine War. It was things that were happening.
Ills for something that was overseas, it shouldn't have affected our country the way.
That it did.
Yeah, that didn't work for it, She soon out. It didn't work for Joe bid Kamala Harris and Joe Biden.
Because voters don't have memories of goldfish.
They still remember the inflation that five seven, six, seven, eight percent, and just because it may be going down a bit, they remember the hurt for me.
And I can't take credit for this.
I was speaking with Joe Hockey the other day and he basically said, this election is two opposing trends hitting each other's. On one side, Australians generally give first term governments a second go. We haven't elected, we haven't booted out a first term government since nineteen thirty two.
It's a long We're also a nation is very scared of change.
We are are, so you put that on one side and on the other side, fourteen out of the fifteen largest elections in the Western world in recent history have all gone to the challenger over the incumbent. There is a global mood of resentment for the ruling political power and there is a mood for change. So it really comes down to which one of those trends is going to be busted.
I think history also shows as a tendency with governments to go from very progressive to very conservative. It's like this big, you know, rollercoaster that goes around and you know, you get a really super conservative government and then you know, generations go through.
That and they rebels.
Conservatism is where the swing is going at the moment on a global basis in America, not not in Britain, but for distinctive local rule.
Niger Faraj falled it.
Apart basically what happened in Britain. So yes, it could be that.
I think the other problem that Jim Chalmers has got as a treasure up is he doesn't sound like a treasure up. He sounds like an economic commentator on the sidelines. So when he says people in Australia are doing it tough, he's making a comment. He's not doing anything about people doing it tough. He's telling us, as a commentator on the sidelines, what's going on. When he says, well, it's been tough so far, but it'll be good around the corner. Things are going to get better, he sounds again like an economic commentator, not like a treasurer who actually has his hands on the leavers will.
Yeah, well, this is the tragedy of monern Australia and it's not just the Labor Party. We can't do reform anymore. When was the last big economic reform? Maybe the GST was that twenty years ago, now twenty five years ago. We can't do economic reform and we've got an economy which is stagnating. We have tried to cheat economic growth by getting more and more immigrants in because we haven't bothered to think about productivity, Labour can't do it. To be honest, I haven't heard much from the Liberal Party about economic reform. Whe's Angus Taylot, what's he doing these days? But we need to get serious about this in this country and at the moment I'm not hearing anything about it.
Now.
We talked a little while ago about Victoria. Let's go back to Victoria because Victoria has a new label, a new Liberal leader, a job pursued having made a series of bad judgments, has lost the position. The new Liberal leader in Victoria, Brad Baton, has come out strongly in support Peter Dutton. Now Brad Baton, like Duttner the former police officers, as are you evalent police.
And hold it against me? Yes and no? Okay. So it's a double edged sword.
So there is a time and a place for somebody like Dutton and Baton for example, Victoria at the moment is having.
A huge surge in crime.
So perhaps somebody with his mentality, his experience, the way that he would fight these sorts of things could be a good thing in cleaning up the crime that we're seeing in Victoria. But unfortunately, what happens with politicians who have a law enforcement background, there's a tendency that they go from policing criminals to policing civilians. That's a good point and what I saw with Dutton. Now, like I said, I'm not here to rag on Dutton, but I was very disappointed in his response to social media for kids. He wanted to use digital identification as a means to police children accessing these things.
Now, that to me is.
A typical cop and a typical cops mentality, you know. So we basically sacrifice our basic human rights, our freedoms, our liberty is things that our ancestors fought and died and bled for and we just throw that for I guess, ease of policing things, you know. And so I think we have to be really careful when we elect politicians like this to keep them in check and remind them that they work for civilians. Now, and to not police civilians. And so I think, you know, something like this could be good, but it needs to be really kept accountable and in check, and the voters and the people and the people around these men will play a really important role in making sure that they do that well.
Will You've got two people who both have a similar background, and we don't know a lot about Bread and yet he still remains a bit of a mystery to us to a large extent. But if he's on the same page as Peter Dutton, if he's going to be pushing the Liberal Party in Victoria in that direction, the labor in Victoria, we know he's on the nose.
I mean, is that a.
Good thing for the twenty twenty five election as far as the Liberal Party is concerned. Does that mean there are really seats in Victoria that are vulnerable that could be picked up by the federal Liberal Party.
I'm not sure, to be honest.
Most people in state politics are lightweights, so it's not exactly like we're picking, you know, from the cream of the crop. But what I really want to get back to what Evelyn said, because the question.
I have is whether Australia as.
A nation really is that uncomfortable with authoritarianism today? Are we uncomfortable with having the cop who will take away our freedoms bit by bit in the position of premier or the position of Prime Minister. Because I think from what we see saw during COVID and what we've seen during the response to the Misinformation and Disinformation Bill, I don't see a lot of freedom fighters out there. We saw a crocodile and d at the end of Danika's show there we may see it if we're lucky at the end of our show. And I think that version of Australia, the irreverent, laid back, anti authoritarian, lucky country, may not be there. So you know what, maybe the authoritarian is what the people want.
Well, let me give you a thought on that, because we've got a We've got a convict background, and I think two things flow out of the convict background. The first is that convicts would not give the boss.
A hard time.
They're not going to argue with the bloke who's got the whip in his hand or who's holding the gun. They don't do that. But underneath they are never in agreement. They are often rebellious. I know we're told we were really we just gave in over COVID. We just did whatever we were told. But I suspect there was a lot of quiet rebellion going on. We were told, for example, here in Sydney there was a limited number of killing it as you were allowed to drive now at the risk of some sort of post hoc arrest. I need to admit that my wife and I lived slightly beyond that from.
Our daughter, and we just ignored it. We just went there.
We didn't tell anyone, We didn't complain, we didn't didn't write letters to the newspaper, didn't bring up the talkback shows. We just did what we wanted to do if we thought we could get away with it. That's the convict mentality. Well, if you could get away with it, you'd do it. And so you appear to be complied on the surface, But underneath the old convict mentality says we'll get away with what we can get away with, and I suspect a lot of that actually happened.
Well, let me wrap a bow around this by saying, or quoting the great Clive James, who said, the problem with Australia isn't so much that we had descended from convicts, so that we're sended from Jaylor's and I see the Jaler mentality as Clive James saw at thirty or forty years ago.
While we're on the Victorian Labor Party, the Victorian alp has been accused of getting into gutter politics after launching a highly personal social media attack on Coalition Opposition leader Peter Dutton and his wife. Opposition Home Affairs spokesman James Patterson, a Liberal senator from Victoria, Is, called on Prime Minister Anthony Albanezi to take this grubby.
Meme down immediately. Evelyn.
They've used his wife's comment that Peter Dutton there's not a monster to give them to use against him.
What do you think about this?
Look?
I honestly think if you're in the spotlight, you've probably come to expect this sort of tactic from the opposition.
Should you expect it?
You know, I think we live in a I think we should have a lot more freedom to express things.
I don't think anybody should really be above jokes.
I mean, it seems desperate, it seems distasteful, it doesn't seem very classy. But you know, hypothetically speaking.
You know, and I'm not saying Dutton is a monster at all.
But I don't think anybody in a political spectrum should be above us looking in their personal life. Like I said, if I have somebody who's telling me how to live my everyday life, I want to make sure that they're you know, a decent person. That being said, like I said, it just seems really lacking tact and desperate.
And also there's no history of this kind of thing really in Australian politics. We've tended not to do that. Let's go overseas now, because this year marks the eightieth anniversary of the liberation of Auschwitz by the Allies in the form of the Soviet Army when they marched into the camp in January of nineteen forty five. Soviet troops entered Aschwitz on January the twenty seventh, nineteen forty five, a date which is now marked as International Holocaust Remembrance Day. Now, this year is an important ceremony because it's the eightieth anniversary and special solemn ceremonies will be held at Auschwitz in Poland. But will the leaders of Israel be.
Allowed to attend?
The Polish government has announced that if Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netnyahu sets foot on Polish soil, he will be arrested. That is using the ICC's arrest warrant for supposed war crimes.
Will your reaction.
It's a face.
It's an absolute disgrace for a democratically elected leader who has been fighting a just war. But I think this makes a even greater or. This tells an even greater story around Australia's involvement in the ICC, which is no longer tenable. In my opinion, this is the final straw Australia should be rethinking it's obition. We had Alexander Downer come out the other day with Tony Abbott and said if they could have considered what the ICC would have become today, yes.
They wouldn't have got they wouldn't have.
Gone into it.
This was meant to be effectively for dodgy countries that didn't have proper judicial systems and to sort out bad people there. It wasn't to target democratically elected leaders in the middle of fighting just wars against Barbarrack votes.
Should should let ya who simply defy the Polish government and turn up on Polish soil and say if you dare arrest me.
I'm not sure, to be honest, that something like that would benefit the war in the Middle East at all. I mean, I guess the question is, how doesn't any yahoo move forward from this?
How do you?
Because I mean, it's not going to run away, it's not going to escape, it's not going to be a race. So how does a democratically elected, you know, politician deal with.
Matters like this?
I wouldn't even know to tell you the truth. But does he fight it? Does he get it removed? Would that be a way that a democratic politician could prove it?
Certainly, certainly limits the holiday options if nothing else, basically Florida or nothing.
But it looks dodgy.
I mean, the warrants they have issued look extremely doubtful and extremely dubious and based on very poor evidence and very poor investigation.
And it should be easy for him, I guess, to go and defend that and get it. I mean, I don't believe that these courts are objective or impartial. I think we've seen historically speaking that they are very subjective. They've been influenced by outside sources. And one of the things that you need to remember with justice is that there are very strong pillars that.
Hold up the courts of justice. Some of those things are being objective.
And impartial, not having outside influence. And once that those pillars get cracked and fractured, the entire.
Justice system comes down.
So I fully believe that these courts are not those things and it's not just. But that being said, I also don't think we should be a part of it at all. I think it's just another arm of globalism. It's just like the UN, just like the WHO.
I think that democratic nations like you mentioned as well.
Should it cause it so bad to themselves? Do need to be challenged? I mean, how would this be for an idea?
Net Yaho flies to the United States, where they've said they will not arrest him, and then he joins a President Trump's party and flies with President Trump's party and all of his team to Poland. I mean, in the middle of the Americans, with the most powerful man on earth present by his side, with the Poles. Dare arrest Net and Yahoo. Just an idea, maybe they could give it a go. Coming up after the break. If you've got an air conditioning system, but you're plugged into the wrong sort of a meter, a digital meter, your econ could be turned off.
On a very hot day.
Back more than eight thousand Queensland householders had the cooling function on their air conditioner turned off, not by them, but remotely by their electricity supply energets. And it happened on a sweltering Sunday earlier this month. And this was the fifth time this big brother style of divention that happened this year. Once you allow your energy supplier to fit a digital meter to your electricity box, they are in control. What was it the ball used to say resistance is futile. They can remotely turn off part or all of the electricity being fed into your house. Look will how sinister is this? I mean what they do is they come along and say, we've got this better electricity meter. It will save you money and we'll give you a special disc out of four hundred dollars.
Can we install it? I think we should say no.
I think you're looking at the wrong source of evil. I don't think this is the fault of the energy company. The fact is there's not enough energy to go around in Queensland, and there's not enough to go around in Australia.
We have governments that are going all in on.
Renewables without the large scale battery storage to be able to actually do it, and there is not enough energy for energy X to go around, So say that that or large wide scale blackouts. I don't see what else they can possibly do here. The issue is government policy, the issues. It's still suicidal zero and unfortunately the private sector has been compromised as a result.
But we're still giving people outside our house the power to control our house. And even though you're right the rest of the background, everything that you said is perfectly correct, We're not going to have enough power in the system and it's not going to come up the right times because we're.
Not getting dispetchable power. Despite all of that, we can't give into this kind of control.
And my understanding is they signed up for an energy rebate and I think you get about four hundred bucks off.
He chose to put this in.
So that's the sale.
But as long as they know what they're signing up for, and I don't know how well this was communicated, it could have been very dodgy on the energy company's part. I'm not sure if they knew what they were signing up for, then I say, you know, Bybyware.
I think this is a really good lesson in why precedent is so important.
And I harp on about this all.
The time, but I look back at COVID for example. I'm not going to really press on that, but some of the legislation that was used to enact these draconian measures and arbitrary laws was enacted in Australian legislation.
In there was some in nineteen fifty six.
In New South Wales it was twenty ten, and it was only being used in you know, like decade later. And so this is such an important lesson in why precedent matters.
Because you might.
Think, you know, it's you know, the difference between analogue and digital, like who cares, But you're right, Kel, there is a precedent that we act unfortunately, because of what history shows, particularly with big government, is that they take far easier than they give back, and big governments continue to grow until there's a revolution against them. You know, you can vote you way into tyranny, unfortunately, but you have.
To fight your way out of it.
So precedent is so important when and I hate that we have to look at these things, but when you are signing over these things. We should be using a lot of discernment and a lot of wisdom and go how could this be used against me and my family in the future. And it's sad that we live in a first world nation and we have to think this way, but I think that we do. And I think the first thing Australians also need to stop saying is that we're a first world nation.
I mean, what may the first world country? A first world You.
Have power, you have electricity, you have comforts. You don't just have necessities.
You have going in the wrong direction because we're not going to have dispatchable power under this wind plus sola plus backward.
That's exactly my point when.
Time, I don't want to sign a deal in which someone sitting in an office somewhere else says, oh, tonight will turn off the fridge.
Then don't sign tonight.
We'll turn off the TV and don't sign it. Well, I'm not going to. I'm wondering whether to. Too many of the difficult details are in small print at the bottom of the post. I think we've all signed insurance policies.
We know that, and I think that that may be fair. That may be fair.
I think that the bigger point here is there is a political opportunity for the conservative governments of Australia to say this sort of thing isn't about greedy corporates, which is what labor is doing at the moment.
It is about energy policy.
And at the moment I haven't heard the response from the state government there to say that this is an energy policy issue, not a greedy corporate issue. But we need to start having that conversation to start winning hearts and minds to say that net zero suicide and this stuff that's going to happen more and more unless we change course on policy.
Well, let's talk about the size of your power bill, because if you're a bit worried about the size of your power bills, then Australia's Competition and Consumer Commission say, welcome to the club, Welcome on board. Nice to have you as one of the members. Who's got a problem. The power price shock. The ACC warns that households are paying too much. Most of us are doing that kind of thing. We are missing out, They're saying, most of us are in the wrong sort of deals. So there were reductions in the wholesale price of electricity in twenty twenty four. Many of us didn't get them because we're stuck in deals where we don't get the best prices.
Everyone tell us about your power.
Yeah, I know, it was shocking.
I nearly had to take out a mortgage just to pay for the last one. Yes, you know, I live, you know, on a working farm, like we perhaps have more expenses than you know, your average residential home in suburbia. But that being said, it was well in excess of over two thousand dollars for a quarter. And I was literally walking around my property looking for a leaking hot water that could potentially be doing it. We have to pump water to our house. We don't have we are off tank, so I was thinking maybe the pump was broken and got frozen. This is how I had to think, and it was just crazy. I was calling people asking them to come and check my meter because it seemed so unbelievable to me that just me and my small family, like there are larger families out there, could be spending so much money. And I was looking for discrepancies. But unfortunately, if you look around, so many people are in my position where they're in such shock with this. But I think this goes down to what you were saying, will I think so many of these problems are because of our poor policies that.
Our government are putting in around power.
Unless something changes, businesses are going to go broke because businesses are spending tens of thousands of dollars for their electricity, like that's unsustainable.
Well, and this will sound callous, but Australian can seems need to feel the pain of high energy to recognize that this is the cost of net zero. So when we've seen the polls in the last ten years, do you want to do something about climate change? Ninety percent of people go yeah, sure, But then we haven't put consciously said this is going to.
Be the cost.
I think people knew the practical ramifications of what that meant.
It sounds nice, surely that's happening now now people build. Now people are saying, ah, this is what net zero costs me.
This is the tipping point. And we've seen something interesting in the UK as well, where there's been a story over the last three or four months where the winter fuel allowance for pensioners has been taken away because they're basically trying to fund the net zero scam. And as a result of that, there's been this very successful and very fair campaign to say that the Labor government in the UK is letting pensioners freeze to death over winter. These are the types of stories that, unfortunately, as sad and tragic as it is, we need to hear if we're going to say, look, we need to stop this nonsense. We need to have cheap, reliable power and we're not going to get that through net zero.
And the other side of this renewable energy story is what not just what we're experiencing, but what the people who are having the sources of this thrust on them. Another proposed wind farm development has been shelved. The partners behind a contextous plan in South Australia have quietly pulled out of the project. There have been proposals around Australia that this sort of thing should happen, and Albanizi government's advocacy for this sector's.
Been a reliance on wind power.
Now, is this evilent the big Chris Bowen project, the wind and solar plus batteries just steadily coming apart of the seams.
I think it's been coming apart at the seams for quite a while, and I mean This isn't the only wind farm in Oberon, New South Wales. They're planning on doing the largest wind farm in the state. I think that there's over two hundred and fifty of these wind tower things that are actually taller than the centerpoint tower. You've got farmers around the area who are getting paid up to eighty thousand dollars just because the shadows that hit over their house and they've got to live with it.
I mean, all of this is a joke.
I look back at you know, when we had the internet broadband. Do you remember when you used to have to dial it up and you'd sit there and it would dial. When they made the shift from broadband to Wi Fi, did any of us have any problems or did we go yep.
Let's quickly do that. Why because they had.
A reliable alternative. And unless they have a reliable alternative, they need to scrap this renewable energy and they need to just do coal. And I know that's a dirty word and all that to say that, but until we have reliable, affordable, renewable, clean energy, bad luck. Because people are struggling, people are in poverty. You've got grandparents who are freezing to death, they're telling us next year that what we have to do is start stocking up on firewood.
What the heck is that?
Well?
Will The problem is trying to sell what everyone's took you about coal fired power.
I think nuclear is the way to go receptible.
I mean, would the political climate wear that these days?
I think they will wear it if the cost of energy reaches a point where people are suffering badly enough.
And I think we are reaching that point.
We're very socialist country that I think people in their minds, especially in Australia, have been duped into thinking.
That the government will get them out of any problem. Well in that it's a big struggle.
We're going to have to get through that requires political persuasion, and probably a level of political persuasion that is beyond the political players in our system at the moment. Can I just make one other point which I think I think that the story here is that some environmental groups were saying that the whales would be affected or something like that, you know, coral or whatever. And I think it's a really interesting insight into how climate hysteria has replaced genuine environmentalism. I generally haven't really kind of had much a truck with Greenpeace, but in this instance fair play. If you're going to chuck big metal, spinny things, you know, the dark satanic mills of the modern age, as Tony Abbott called them, in the middle of natural environments, that is terrible.
I have a name for this will It's called right wing environmentalism, and I'm all for it, I think. And we can touch onto that right wing environmentalism, which is being a good steward of the land that we've been given and of our earth, being good steward at it.
Right Who wouldn't want to do that?
Who wouldn't want to have a better solution to trash and rubbish being in ocean?
Who wouldn't want to do that?
But you know what, wind farms out of the ocean is also not I never thought.
I'd say this on national television.
Noel happily chain myself to the trees where the next kind of bunch of these big metal turbines are being thrown in. We'll do it as a big Sky News initiative to say that we're not going to stand for climatista anymore if we're going to destroy our natural environment in the process.
Okay, and we will be the first one to be shaved up.
We will just be standing by applauding, shaying what a hero you are to us.
Will I never thought i'd say save the trees on national.
Really big issue that no one is actually facing is what we need in our system is what is called dispectable power. In other words, the demand has to week will the supply. If the supply is too high, that doesn't work. If the demand is too high, that doesn't work. You have to be able to match them. That means turning off the supply when you don't have high demand, turning it back on when demand increases. You cannot do that with windmills and solar panels. It doesn't work. You can do it with coal, you can deal with nuclear, you can deal with gas.
You can even do it.
With hydro by bringing another pump online. But with wind and solar, the electricity comes when it comes, when the wind blows, when the sun is shining.
So if you don't have.
Dispatchable power, you don't have a system whose engineering is controllable. So the whole fundamental business, it seems to me, is flawed, and no one is explaining that.
Yeah, I agree, I don't have anything more to add to that, because I don't think anyone is capable of explaining that, and that's both the political skill or the political courage to be able to do that in our current climate. Maybe someone like an alexanderik is that person, but there aren't many.
Perhaps you years.
Let's turn to a really serious and very worrying problem. Hand Sanitizer could soon be placed under lock and key in the Northern Territory after Police Commissioner Michael Murphy discovered that people are drinking and sanitizer evel the need for a band tell us about the social problems in the Northern Territory.
Well, this just shows that this is a symptom of a far greater problem.
As a nation.
I think Australia and a lot of nations in the West, we.
Are very sick. We are very spick, sick physically.
We are very sick emotionally, We're very sick mentally and spiritually.
And I think this is a second quicksit.
The people in the room, we're doing okay. There are problems in specific places. There's problems the big social problems, aren't they.
There are specific niche problems everywhere, but the same problem is a lot of people are turning to things in our society to escape from reality because people haven't been given mechanisms to cope and etc. So that we could dissect that psychologically. But it is an incredibly sad situation. You know, when I was in law enforcement, I did some work with indigenous communities and very sadly I witnessed this firsthand. There were small children, like heart breaking, who would walk around with blisters in a circle shape from their nose to the bottom of their lips because they would have old milk bottles filled with glue and they would be smelling them. This is a problem that's been around for a long time. Perhaps hand sanitizer because of you know what we saw, it's more readily available. But sadly, these problems have been happening for a while. I think the big elephant in the room is how we deal with these problems. And unfortunately, white man like people you know, like us who come from British ancestry, who came here as convicts. Like we said before, our hands are kind of tied because if we were limited in what we're able to do to help these communities. And I think Jacinta Price has said this before and you mentioned it as well, Kel, that we need to be looking at welfare not by the color of your skin or what your DNA, your blood an ancestry says, but by what you know who's in need at the time, and get rid of that sort of racial lens.
And in doing so, we and Australians could.
Help these communities more. But if we, you know, we're seen as colonizers. If we dare step into an Indigenous community and say they're not living how they should be living. I mean, as a police officer, I would be saving babies from situations. I remember, you know there were drug addicts injecting their newborn babies because they were born with addictions, and I would go and take the baby from that situation. But I was the colonizer, and you know, how.
Dare I do this?
And so we've had this horrible social perception if we dare try and help these communities, and I think until we address that elephant in the room, and until we scrap this idea that we're doing it because we're racist, we're not going to deal with the big problem.
Can I suggest that it isn't really racist? I mean, I went on to the Message Albert Hospital, which is a home for homeless men in Sydney, to do a story with the film crew once and there was a chap there who introduced himself to me. He was a former ABC journalist, so I had I worked with him YEWS earlier and this is where he got to And while I was talking to him, he picked up a bottle of methylated spirits and began to drink from it.
It was chilling. I mean, how can anyone do that sort of thing?
But he had got into a position personally where he wasn't coping with life, and this is what he was doing.
Now, they've got to worry when.
There are people of any race, in any situation who get to that level of despair that all they can do is blot everything out.
Yeah, but those acts of despair are happening disproportionately and remote Indigenous communities. That are happening because of the lack of opportunities. They're happening because of terrible parenting. They're happening because shockingly high rates of abuse. And I think on the right we need to have the courage to call this out and say that these are problems.
They are backed by data, and we need to be able to address that.
I think evelyn K you're exactly right in saying that this is an issue of courage on the right. I think we saw during the Voice campaign increasingly more people get the confidence to say that. But unfortunately, and the great tragedy of the Voice campaign is it used up all of the political capital in the Indigenous affairs debate and now one of the last time you really started hearing serious policy and issuates about digitous affairs from Albanezi and Co. They've moved on despite it being the great moral challenge eight months ago.
May I make one other point, so Michelle, just about this.
Another thing that I think is really important for us to identify and recognize is that we've essentially set up generations of children in these communities that we're seeing, you know, these unprecedented numbers in.
These indigenous communities.
We've basically told them through the Voice referendum that unless you have this, and unless Australians vote yes to this, you've got no hope of ever having a voice in this country. Really, and that's a really big thing for those kids being raised with that in the back of their mind. Not only have we said that to them. We've also basically said to kids in those communities that we all hate you and that you've got no hope in no future.
It's an unwinnable game.
So of course they're going to step back and go, well, why would I bother if I try?
And it's not going to get me anywhere anyway.
I'm not sure that's the message we've said, But this is just the service is a very big, complicated issue and we can't deal with it all here. After the break, we will come back and we'll have a look at what damage WOKE can do a part of the fun in our lives now, we've talked about some fairly serious and even fairly grim topics on the program. I'm just looking at you. I think you hit cheering up now. So let's think for a moment about Crocodile under It. It's got to be a classic movie, the perfect holiday movie, or so you might think. But Channel five in the United Kingdom decided Crocodile Dundee is politically incorrect and they've chopped about ten percent out of the movie. The audience was terribly upset about this.
Will you live in London?
We will hold you personally responsible for Channel five days?
What are they up to?
The workmind virus is a very powerful thing.
Help and look, thankfully the work mind virus has not made its way into the Sky News studio quite yet.
We're going to do the extraordinarily courageous.
Thing in twenty twenty four of showing you a clip of crocodile Dundee, I think we've got three to go.
It's got a nice.
Nice that's a nice shock horror ladies and gentlemen.
I think I need to get counseling after that.
Yeah, I think, what's the violence is it?
I've got no idea why they thought that was outrageous, because all it is is one of the classic lines in the movie. Beautiful piece of writing, and the comic delivery is absolutely perfect. They pulled out other things in which I think Mick Dundee encountered a trans woman and when he just thought she was backed off. Well, of course that would horrify everyone these days, wouldn't it?
It would look Look.
The good thing is these sorts of stories are turning people against the woke mind virus very quickly. They are actually a very good thing to get this movement past us, which I think is getting past.
Us will be the death.
It is the death of satire, and we're seeing the fruits of that.
Can I say the good news is I think work is dying.
I think, well, Kell stupidity can't sustain itself.
Look, I think the worst of work is almost gone. Hopefully.
Okay, the news is good. We've ended on a cheerful note.
Next up on Sky to use the documentary Shandy Story The Search for Justice.
