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nichy
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Monday, February 14, 2011 at 03:35pm
If you’re trying to sell a new tax that even its paid supporters admit will hurt ordinary families, should your number one salesman be someone who is already rich – and who will receive $720,000 in taxes to spread a pro-tax message?
A couple of months ago, author and dinosaur bone specialist Tim Flannery told a Sydney audience that “within this century the concept of the strong Gaia will actually become physically manifest … this planet, this Gaia, will have acquired a brain and a nervous system. That will make it act as a living animal, as a living organism.”
Evidently this declaration of faith pleased the great earth spirit, for last week Flannery was rewarded by being named as the head of Prime Minister Julia Gillard’s climate change commission.
The commission – its full title is an anagram of “A Climactic Immense Hogs-On”, which seems about right, seeing as it will chew through $5.6 million of your taxes over the next four years – aims to convince a dubious public that we’ll all be better off with a carbon tax.
To that end, Flannery and his team of Gillardian carboneers will travel Australia like old-timey evangelists, preaching of climate terrors to come unless we sacrifice our economy. All male members of this tax-funded hogs-on are bearded academics, by the way, which gives you some idea of the sheer electrifying charisma we can expect to light up town halls across the nation.
“I’m delighted to take up this challenge. I think it’s a very timely one,” Flannery, a paleontologist, said at the announcement of Gillard’s Gaiathon. “I will be trying to lead discussion on what climate science has to offer us.”
Let’s start with a discussion on what climate science offers Flannery. Plenty, as it turns out. Flannery will pull down a $180,000 annual salary (paid by you) over four years for his leadership of the climate change commission; not bad considering that his main task is to tell people that they should pay more taxes. Thanks for the advice, rich guy.
The really cute part is that Flannery will only work three days per week for his $180,000, allowing him to continue his roles with Macquarie University, the Siemens Sustainability Advisory Board and the Prince of Monaco’s Foundation. And he’ll probably write another book or two. His $1153 per working day in Labor carbon cash comes on top of that.
(Incidentally, during the launch Flannery had this to say about the government’s Queensland flood tax: “From a personal perspective could I just say I’m happy to pay my levy.” Right decent of him. Let’s hope he can afford it.)
Flannery interrupted the filming of his third publicly-funded ABC documentary series (Two Men Spend Your Money, I think it’s called) to attend last week’s announcement. That’s yet more of Australia’s collective earnings headed Flannery’s way. No wonder this bloke likes taxes. He’s received so much of them.
The Tweed Daily News happened upon Flannery and his documentary partner John Doyle earlier this month during filming at Point Danger on the Gold Coast. For a pair of dedicated anti-carbonists, they’re leaving a decent-sized carbon footprint. “They have been drag racing [and] ridden in a helicopter over the Snowy Mountains,” said assistant producer James West.
Then the whole crew flew out for further tax-funded antics. The series airs in September and will be worth watching for those Flannery drag-racing scenes alone. Presumably Flannery competed in a hybrid Toyota Prius, such as the shiny new one given to him by the car company two years ago in return for some public speaking engagements and the world’s most embarrassing YouTube ad: “I’m always in and out of airports and in and out of planes. It’s just one of the things you have to do these days if you want to be effective in the environmental movement.”
It’s also something that the environmental movement wants to stop you and I doing, because air travel is so bad for the environment (but not for environmentalists). Anyway, Toyota got a good deal. Flannery previously boasted of charging American corporations $US50,000 for a single speech, back in the days when US corporations had that kind of dough to toss about.
So this is the guy Labor is sending around the country to tell people who don’t earn $50,000 in a whole year that they should happily cop a carbon tax. The millionaire appeared on the ABC’s Lateline last Thursday – where he was billed as “chief climate commissioner” – to open his tax sales pitch.
There was a bunch of cuddly $180,000-per-year hog talk about “greater understanding in the community” and “socially beneficial action”, but this exchange is all most people needed to hear:
TIM FLANNERY: “Any price on carbon will come with a cost.”
TONY JONES: “The cost being increased electricity prices for ordinary folk.”
TIM FLANNERY: “That’s right.”
Remember Julia Gillard’s words during the election campaign: “There will be no carbon tax under the government I lead.” Not only is a carbon tax now imminent, but she’s handing over millions to Team Flannery so they can flog it. Still, at least it’s only going to hurt “ordinary folk”. Meanwhile, rich Labor luvvies like Flannery will become vastly wealthier.
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