Jobs, jobs, and more jobs, that's the mantra by both the Liberal National Coalition Federal Government and the Queensland State Labor Government, and bugger the reef and the rising temperatures of climate change.
On Friday Westpac Bank released their climate change Position statement and 2020 action Plan. This effectively rules out any funding of Adani for the Carmichael coal project.
Matt Canavan, and Deputy PM Barnaby Joyce on Lateline, continue this mantra, to peddle the myth that 10,000 or more jobs will be generated, when in court Adani admitted only 1464 jobs would be created. In fact, Adani hope to fully automate much of the mining and transport, so jobs could be even less than stated in court.
If the Adani Carmichael coal mine proceeds, it is also likely to hurt existing coal jobs in Queensland and New South Wales.
Now the Port of Newcastle has slammed the subsidy plan for Adani coal mine which would destroy local jobs, according to the ABC. Port of Newcastle executive Jonathan van Rooyen invoked sovereign risk, that investments had been made in existing coal fields and the government wanting to subsidise a new coal basin development substantially alters the playing field in an already declining market.
“There is no avoiding the simple mathematics that if Turnbull succeeds in pushing between 25 million and 60 million tonnes of subsidised new coal into a flat world market the volume of coal mined and exported from the Hunter and Illawarra will decline. As will royalties collected by the NSW government and the number of coal jobs in the Hunter and Illawarra,” said Port of Newcastle executive Jonathan van Rooyen, as reported in the Newcastle Herald.
It is not the great jobs bonanza that the Queensland Premier and Federal Government Ministers have been spruiking.
ACIL Allen Consulting director Jerome Fahrer did a detailed economic assessment report (PDF) for the company which estimated that the region containing the mine would have an increase of just 483 full-time equivalent jobs while Queensland as a whole would have an extra 1206 full-time equivalent jobs. A far cry from the 10,000 jobs figure that everyone pushing the project loudly screams.
Time to pay attention to what Adani is really saying on jobs, not what the politicians are saying. It is not the great jobs bonanza that the Queensland Premier and Federal Government Ministers have been spruiking.
Also time to consider that India is rapidly ramping up renewables, increasing local coal production while imported coal trade is declining. Solar PV farms are now costing at the bottom of the range of new coal power stations. Development of any new coal power stations has been delayed at least a decade, and by then there will not be a market for polluting coal plants.
Image: Matt Canavan meeting with Gataum Adani via Matt Canavan/twitter
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