Hockey: Wind power “utterly offensive”

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Our Treasurer has tendency towards bluster and today he’d done himself no favours. From the ABC:

Federal Treasurer Joe Hockey says he finds wind turbines “utterly offensive”, but is powerless to close down the ones operating outside Canberra.

Speaking to Macquarie Radio, Mr Hockey was being asked about whether the Government would target clean energy programs in its quest for massive spending cuts.

“Well, they say get rid of the clean energy regulator, and we are,” he said.

He then mounted an attack on wind farms, specifically the wind turbines operating outside the national capital.

“If I can be a little indulgent please, I drive to Canberra to go to Parliament, I drive myself and I must say I find those wind turbines around Lake George to be utterly offensive,” he said.

“I think they’re just a blight on the landscape.”

Asked if he would cut Government subsidies to wind farms, in line with the Government’s stance on corporate welfare, Mr Hockey said he could not stop the Bungendore wind turbines from spinning.

“We can’t knock those ones off because they’re into locked-in schemes and there is a certain contractual obligation I’m told associated with those things,” he said.

But Mr Hockey hinted new climate and green energy schemes could be on the chopping block come budget night.

“You will see in the budget that we have addressed the massive duplication that you have just talked about and the vast number of agencies that are involved doing the same thing,” he said.

“We are addressing that in the budget, [and] we are considering that very carefully.”

Addressing climate change is hardly “offensive” and this is pretty out of school stuff given the Government’s renewable target review is already struggling for credibility. I mean, jeez, does the Treasurer think the vista of Lake George would be improved by a belching coal-fired power station?

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Then again, maybe it’s just consistent!

About the author
David Llewellyn-Smith is Chief Strategist at the MB Fund and MB Super. David is the founding publisher and editor of MacroBusiness and was the founding publisher and global economy editor of The Diplomat, the Asia Pacific’s leading geo-politics and economics portal. He is also a former gold trader and economic commentator at The Sydney Morning Herald, The Age, the ABC and Business Spectator. He is the co-author of The Great Crash of 2008 with Ross Garnaut and was the editor of the second Garnaut Climate Change Review.