When it comes to telling half a story or ignoring the obvious if it doesn’t suit the particular story they want to tell, politicians excel like no one else. All sides of politics are equally guilty of attempting to sell the rainbow coloured unicorn to the more gullible members of society as a perfectly reasonable outcome. 

Opposition Leader Peter Dutton is attempting to convince Australians that nuclear power is renewable and worth far more of our attention than other renewable systems such as solar, wind power and pumped hydro. For a start, the claim of nuclear energy being renewable is dubious as there is a waste product that has to be safely stored for thousands of years. Dutton is also of the opinion that Australia could be producing nuclear power in a bit over a decade, which would be remarkable given the troubles the UK is having in the construction of the Hinkley Reactor C which is scheduled to commence generation five years late in 2030 after a construction period of 12 years and only if investors tip in another 4 Billion UK Pounds. 

There are several troubling issues here. The UK already has nuclear power so the regulatory environment is in place. Australia’s regulatory environment currently prohibits the construction of nuclear power plants, both Federally and in some states. Dutton’s plan to use the sites of existing coal fired power generation sites means that the current infrastructure would have to be decommissioned prior to the construction of the nuclear facility. Assuming the current landowners are interested (some of them have publicly stated they aren’t) and Dutton’s claim that we need large fuel consuming infrastructure to provide ‘baseload’ power rather than renewables to power the country is correct (it’s not) where does the power come from while the nuclear plants are being constructed and commissioned?

The new Northern Territory Country Liberal Government and the Queensland LNP are both promising to be tough on crime. Despite ‘crime’ generally reducing in Australia over recent years, the respective conservative parties are claiming children as young as 10 should be considered to be adults when being convicted of a crime. The rationale is that children will somehow develop the ability to determine that if they do the crime, they will always be caught and do a number of years in prison. While perceptions differ and it is possible that some children will consider the likelihood of being in jail for a long time prior to stealing the car, demonstrably a lot don’t. If jail time was a deterrent, why are our jail populations already over-capacity at a number of jails around the country? If jail time was a deterrent, arguably the First Fleet would never have arrived in Australia in 1788 – remembering that some on the First Fleet were transported against their will across the world for stealing a loaf of bread. If jail time was a deterrent, there would have been no need for Port Arthur in Tasmania (where the ‘incorrigible rogues’ who committed more crime after transportation to Australia were sent). The Netherlands is actually closing prisons and converting them for other uses. There are a number of reasons, but  

According to [Dutch Criminologist Frances Pakes, who is a professor at the University of Portsmouth] the Dutch are much more aware that a stay in prison does more harm than good. Society may be rid of a criminal for a while, but in many cases, criminals simply resume their activities when they leave prison. They may become more ruthless, due to the violent prison climate in which they have had to survive. And perhaps they have a wider criminal network that they built up behind bars.

“Tough on crime” isn’t a new mantra. Despite former Liberal Party Prime Minister Malcolm Fraser assisting hundreds of thousands of refugees from the Vietnam War (many who arrived in Australian by fishing boat) to settle here and become a part of a vibrant society, Dutton was a part of a Liberal/National Government that actively persecuted refugees from another war in the middle east for political purposes, calling them ‘illegal arrivals’, ‘boat people’ and implementing other discriminatory practices designed to de-humanise them. Trump is doing the same thing in the USA, with his claims of ‘illegal immigrants’ committing various (generally) fantastical ‘crimes’ being a reason to vote for his Republican Party, rather than the Democrats in their upcoming election. A number of conservative governments in Europe are also demonstrating their ‘tough on crime’ pretensions by actively attaching the human rights of people fleeing violence and suffering in their own countries. The former UK Tory Government was also proposing to forcibly send ‘illegal immigrants’ to Rwanda, a country in South Africa (sound familiar?).

The political fantasyland is not solely limited to the conservative parties. The Australian Greens have been campaigning for most of the current Federal Parliament for the Albanese Government to introduce rent caps and a number of other measures including relaxing town planning requirements that would, in the Greens view of the world, reduce the pressure and pricing of housing around around Australia. While they have produced some evidence to justify their position, the matters of regulation of real estate rents and town planning are the responsibilities of state and local governments – not the Federal Government. Albanese and his Ministers have as much say in these areas as most of the population. Should the Greens believe they have the ability to actually form a government, they need to understand what is legal and possible versus what makes good headlines. The Greens calls for negative gearing reform may also be popular and is a Federal responsibility – but does that mean the policy has economic creditability?  

Which brings us to the Albanese Government. The impression they gave throughout the last election campaign is they would be far more responsive to the environment and First Nations concerns than the previous ATM (Abbott/Turnbull/Morrison) Coalition Government. Arguably, allowing the construction of additional coal mines and delays to the introduction of measures such as efficiency standards for vehicles doesn’t support the environmental marketing prior to the 2022 election. The ‘voice’ referendum was also poorly prosecuted and a lot of the opposition to the proposal could have been foreseen and counter-measures taken before the nastiness and division were seeded into the community.

We elect politicians to manage future events based on past performance. Unlike advertising for industries that also market themselves on their past performance such as superannuation, there is no regulation or legislation in the majority of jurisdictions around Australia to require an element of truth in political advertising. Until there is, we can expect more political fantasyland because once they are elected we can’t do anything about it for a number of years. And if you were in their position, you too would probably promise your version of Utopia – and deliver far less as well.