The only bad thing is the state government not rapidly increasing train frequencies for off-peak, when we have the rolling stock to do so (and also removing the VLine booking system, like, that is really stupid).

Whether we have enough drivers, I dunno

It’s absurd that a private school receives a single cent of public funding.

Go be private if you’re going to be private…

All funding destined for private schools should be redirected to public schools (and more) at rapid pace.

For clarity, I’m not saying everyone can not own a car, but most people definitely don’t need a yank wank truck, or a car that drives 1000 km in a single go, for the vast, vast, vast majority of their trips.

I think there’s a case to be made that if one must have a car, and they have the option of choosing an electric car, they should do that, and in the rare cases they need a car that runs on fuel for range or lack of charging options, just rent one.

I hope you get some more transport options near you soon to tick you over to the car-free life!

As someone who doesn’t own a car, it’s wild to me that people will buy something for the extremely rare times they’ll use that feature.

Renting a car for the weekend is a thing, folks…

When is our government going to have some moral courage?

Sadly, Labor’s notionally socialist past is long, long, in the rearview mirror.

Upsetting the gambling industry is liable to get your house firebombed, so it’s unsurprising the status-quo “Labor” party isn’t gonna do shit to really reign it in.

We’re the worst in the world on gambling…

Seems pretty clear cut that QR is at fault.

Hopefully the public knows this. Drives me up the wall how many comments I hear from the community against striking workers.

I really think they’re all slapping a band-aid on the problem. Our bus routes are such low hanging fruit to actually be good, but all around the country, they’re kinda meh (especially here in Victoria).

We could pretty quickly rationalise the paths the take, and hire many new drivers to increase frequency.

We need to give the people who can get out of their cars the option, and currently many people simply don’t have a choice because of the stupid ways we’ve allowed our cities to grow, and be car-dependent.

Mark my words, fuel corporations are going to be laughing all the way to the bank for the rest of this crisis. All these tax cuts are going to do is leave us with less revenue and more of the money going to them.

Sure, putting a “discount” on minimum wage seems dubious to me though.

You can in Victoria: https://www.vic.gov.au/if-your-child-wants-leave-school-early

Someone who’s 30 could conceivably be working at the same position at Coles, as you say, as a 17* year old . (This is the law in Victoria, there may well be 16 year-olds who can leave school in other states).

It’s stupid though, because this is MINIMUM WAGE, that they reduce even further just because of your age.

I think it’s dumb and they should at the very least remove this minimum wage “discount” (notice how it’s in the employers point of view, love the FWC…) for 16-17 year-olds also, as they may be working full time.

“Junior rates will remain in place for those aged under 18.”

Apparently fuck everyone who leaves school at 16.

It’s stupid that same work, same pay doesn’t apply to children

It’s because Labor is now a centre right, tax cutting government, sadly.

I think they’re so worried about the optics of rationing they’re trying literally everything else.

And painting themselves into a corner because it’s not like they can increase the excise again until the war is over now…

??? Are you seriously suggesting bringing back wage slavery?

The solution to having more manufacturing in Australia is not eliminating the minimum wage.

Wtf are you on? Here I was thinking: Hmmm I disagree with this person on many things, but they’re just concerned about the cost of living and people’s ability to afford a home.

Nope, turns out your attitude is anarco-capitalism; The least free society you can imagine and the most popular sci-fi dystopia genre…

I would have instead thought it’s mostly the higher wages, no?

Regulations are written in blood, so I’m personally very sceptical about weakening them.

Practically the only forces I hear asking for weaker regulations are the companies who want to cut corners, and many people have died from that.

The community cost ends up being much higher.

And oil have to stay anyway, but more as material than source of energy.

100% with you here. Hence why we need to preserve it and move to stop burning it ASAP.

batteries are not a answer

Also agree with you on this. Batteries habe their place, but not for long duration storage, they aren’t practical for that. There a number of promising technologies (beyond pumped hydro which is probably the best, but requires certain terrain) while have poor round trip efficiency, are still worth it in my opinion - compressed/liquid air energy storage, vanadium flow batteries, other thermal solutions like sand.

It also bears noting that a lot of our thermal energy needs (both heating and cooling) could be built our as district heating/cooling.

There’s a bunch of stuff that can be done, we have literally no choice but to try.

nuclear never get promoted by so called “green”

Nuclear, while vaguely better than oil and gas, is a stupid long-term solution, because there still is almost no permanent storage of waste, and to get the most out of it, you need to do recycling which the US and other nuclear powers don’t want you to do because you can enrich plutonium.

I could maybe live with building it provided no alternative in the short-term, but just doesn’t seem like the smart play to me. Everyone just conveniently forgets about the waste which will last for 10,000s of years.

Thorium seems interesting though.

we just do not have time for something which take 30 years to materialise

Almost everything listed above could be built right now. It wouldn’t be the absolute most efficient thing possible, not profitable, but we could start right now - and are, but usually drips and drabs and banks don’t want to fund them at the scales we need.

At this moment, but oil exploration and re-expanding our oil refining capacity doesn’t exactly happen overnight either.

I agree with you that our energy system is dependent on oil, and we’re continually kicking the can down the road on this one.

The best time to invest in a green energy future was decades ago, the second best is now.

We just have to stop waiting for the free market to do it, because it won’t do it, and if it does, it’ll be way too late.

Storage needs to be built like yesterday, even if it’s terribly unprofitable at first. Until we have that, no for-profit company will want to invest further in renewables (assuming we continue capitalism).

In any case, we need to build it (via the government), because the private market hasn’t, and won’t.

The final thing is, we won’t have a choice, oil is finite, and climate change is gonna fuck us. Moving back to rail freight except the last-km, electrifying as much of our transport as possible, building and incentivising public transport for 95%+ of personal trips, the list goes on.

It’s not impossible, it’s just not easy.

Interested for you to elaborate on why you think that is. Personally, I think it’s because we’re a high-income country and companies would prefer to do it in lower income countries so they can make more money.

Part of this had also come from globalisation and the removal of many tarrifs that once existed.

The tarrif question is tricky though, because in the short-term, it makes everything more expensive if they’re just applied immediately all at once, and in the long-term, other countries will apply retaliatory tarrifs, making our exports less competitive.

I’m not claiming to have all the answers, but it seems clear that the “free market” isn’t gonna solve this problem, some government intervention seems necessary (tarrifs, for example, are imposed by governments).

Investment into high tech manufacturing could also be an option, but again, it’s sure as hell not going to come from the private sector who won’t see immediate and excess profits from that endeavour.

Anyway, keen to hear why you think “government” is the reason we’re no longer manufacturing much here.

America sends to be the only country that got the memo.

Press X to doubt this will occur in any meaningful way, or otherwise it will be coupled with an active further suppression of wages vs productivity (wage increases have already decoupled with productivity increases long ago).

America is controlled by moneyed interests even more than us, so I doubt whatever happens there with reshoring won’t be mostly positive for the working class. As most Australians will agree, the USA is not a country to be emulated.

In our case, government intervention is necessary, because market forces (where profit is the only incentive) makes rebuilding our manufacturing base impossible. No company will invest it they can’t make the highest profit possible.

I know you’re just being hyperbolic for effect, but 25% is already extremely high.

It’s not surprising we’ve gotten to this point though. Seeing as we’ve offshored all our manufacturing jobs in search of higher profits for shareholders…

We don’t make shit in Australia anymore. We’re a country of holes in the ground and houses as the only economic output 😅