As I have mentioned before, this is my blog and I can basically write pretty much whatever I want. You can choose whether or not you read it.
Tonight I want to let you know about my despair at a couple of policy decisions from our State and Federal governments. There are many things that cause me angst but here are 2 that have come to my attention in the past day or so.
This is the text of an email is received from the Australian Conservation Foundation (ACF) today. We have a Prime Minister who wants to revoke the UNESCO World Heritage listing of Tasmanian forests.
“We have quite enough National Parks, we have quite enough locked up forests already. In fact, in an important respect, we have too much locked up forest.
“One of the first acts of the incoming Government was to begin the process to try to get out of World Heritage listing 74,000 hectares of country in Tasmania, because [it’s] not pristine forest. It’s forest which has been logged, it’s forest which has been degraded…”
“Why should we lock up, as some kind of world heritage sanctuary, country which has been logged, degraded or planted for timber? Why should we do that?”
Does this look degraded to you?
Prime Minister Abbott also said: “Man and the environment are meant for each other,” and that Greg Hunt is “an Environment Minister who appreciates that the environment is meant for man and not just the other way around.”
He supports those who “love what Mother Nature gives us and who want to husband it for the long-term best interests of humanity.”
“The last thing we should want, if we want to genuinely improve our environment, is to want to ban men and women from enjoying it… from making the most of it.”
By “making the most of it”, Prime Minister Abbott means logging the World Heritage forests, destroying the historic agreement reached by the timber industry, workers and environment groups, and ignoring the wishes of a majority of Tasmanians.
A poll published in Launceston’s Examiner on Saturday shows more than 90 per cent of Tasmanians are sick of the conflict over native forestry and support an agreement to end it.
Tasmania’s World Heritage forests are already open for enjoyment. The only way that will change is if the Prime Minister locks them up for logging.
Our petition to UNESCO to stand by their decision to protect Tassie’s forests is ACF’s fastest growing petition.
Next, is the Queensland Premier, Campbell Newman and his Energy Minister, Mark McArdle who have the solar rebate firmly in their sights. They have announced the scrapping of the 8c/kWh feed-in tariff from July this year, leaving consumers to negotiate directly with the power companies. This is an online news report.
Queensland Government to axe 8c-per-kWh solar feed-in tariff to cut electricity costs
THOUSANDS of southeast Queensland solar households will lose their guaranteed 8c feed-in tariff and will have to negotiate directly with retailers over a price for the energy they produce. Energy Minister Mark McArdle will today unveil a significant overhaul of feed-in tariffs, saving other energy users millions of dollars on power bills.Mr McArdle said removing the cost of purchasing the high-priced energy produced by these solar households would put downward pressure on all electricity bills.Solar advocates have today slammed the decision to scrap the 8c feed-in tariff.Lindsay Soutar, the national director of Solar Citizens, said it would be difficult for households with solar to negotiate fair deals with retailers.“There are 40,000 homes that are about to lose the already too small financial return they receive from providing clean energy back into the grid,” she said“And there are thousands of families in Queensland who want to make the move to solar who will now be forced to negotiate directly with retailers for any sort of financial return.“This is incredibly unfair. It is obvious that it will be difficult for individual households to get a good deal from their power company.
The state government has been accused of ignoring warnings about the legal risks associated with cutting the solar power scheme.“They simply don’t have the negotiating power. When retailers set the rules, solar owners lose.”The 284,090 households that receive the 44c tariff will not be affected, with the State Government keeping its commitment to continue paying the more generous amount to those who adopted solar before the scheme was closed.The move will switch the responsibility for paying for rooftop solar power from government-owned distributors to retailers.It will affect almost 40,000 households throughout southeast Queensland that currently receive 8c per kilowatt hour for the energy produced by their rooftop solar panels.Mr McArdle last night told The Courier-Mail that the 8c tariff would have added an extra $110 million to all power bills over six years, had it continued.
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Retailers currently get this power for free from distributors and pay solar customers up to 10c per kilowatt hour extra for their power — meaning some customers get up to 18c.“At the moment what happens is that … the feed-in tariff that is paid under the 8c is recovered by the networks and then passed through to Queenslanders in their power bills,” Mr McArdle said.“Placing it on to the retailers will mean there is no pass-through back to consumers who are not using solar.”From July 1, solar households in the Energex distribution network will not get a regulated rate for their energy and must negotiate with retailers. A new regulated rate will be set for the 10,000 solar households on the 8c feed-in tariff in the Ergon Energy area, where there is currently no competition.Mr McArdle said removing the 8c feed-in tariff in the southeast would foster competition ahead of the removal of regulated prices in July 2015.“I don’t think (retailers) will abandon solar customers, because paying the feed-in tariff is part of their market strategy to attract customers to their contracts,” he said.“Customers can then start to play retailers off against each other to get a better deal, and we may well find that the feed-in tariff increases with competition.’’
Tomorrow’s post will be a little less controversial.
I have had the benefit of a renovated bathroom which has an inherently streamlined design. I love the fact that there is no plug lying around on the side of the sink. There are only 2 items on the bench – a ceramic shell dish which holds a small bar of soap and a repurposed vase (The Duke drilled a hole in the base of it) which holds our toothbrushes. It is a quick and easy task to keep this area clean and tidy.
As this is quite a compact area we chose not to have a bath – just an easy to access shower area. I had seen this type of recessed shelf in motel bathrooms and asked the builder to create one when we remodelled the room. I love the idea because it is simple and streamlined to the eye, nothing to rust or gather soap scum and there is no encroachment to bump into when you are showering. From left to right there is shower gel, shampoo, conditioner, facewash and a nail brush – everything required when showering.
The floor is another place where clutter can gather. I found these fittings which attach to the wall – a holder for extra rolls of toilet paper and the toilet brush holder are both clear of the floor and do not need to be moved when sweeping or mopping the floor.
The only 2 things on the floor of the bathroom are a set of scales and the waste paper basket.
