Editor's Comment - Climate change
Interested in Climate Change and the Cost to Business? This may help (but not much!)
Over the last two weeks, we have emailed and phoned all major parties to get a simple answer to a simple question: what will be the cost to business and consumers of your proposed climate change proposal.
The response was ….nothing…not a word…complete silence.
We were not dissuaded by this lack of enthusiasm and went in search of the answers. For those who have a mind to do so, the following are the links to the key policy documents currently released to provide us, the business community and enrolled voters, with the information that we should have on this important issue:
ALP:
http://www.climatechange.gov.au/en/government/initiatives/cprs/who-affected/business.aspx
Liberal:
Greens:
http://greens.org.au/policies/climate-change-and-energy/climate-change-and-energy
Our Summary
For those of you who don’t want to go to the trouble of reading through all of these pages the following is a quick and dirty summary:
ALP: Implement a carbon tax – as approved by the Greens – collect the money from the major users of carbon who will then put prices up on all goods that require the use of energy in their production to pay the new tax. The ALP does not produce any modelling of what the consequent price rises will entail. They expect these price rises to be passed on to consumers who will receive some rebates via the taxation system to offset some of the cost. Once again, they have not released any modelling. The result of all of this must surely be the reduction in discretionary spending at the household level with a consequent impact on how much people can spend on goods and services provided by the Franchising Industry. How much and how long this will go on for is not stated.
Liberal: Implement a range of practices to reduce our current level of greenhouse emissions through the use of government funded incentives and ‘clean’ and ‘green’ programs. This all sounds very attractive: no tax, no immediate costs and a bit of smoke to mirrors to get the required reduction of 5% in our greenhouse emissions. As well, we will not be the leaders of the pack here, but wait until India and China get excited about Climate Change and then do something.
Greens: Impose a carbon tax and force people to adopt changes in their lifestyles. This could mean substantial changes to the way that people travel, eat, work and play. There are big implications for business and consumers. Make no bones about it – these guys are after transformational change of the Australian economy and the current way of life for most people in Australia. The only question is – how far will the ALP go in accommodating the Greens?
So – how will these policies affect you? Given that Franchising is a business model built on specifics, I am sure that we would all be much happier if he knew more precisely what the options outlined above really mean. One thing is for sure, no-one is really going to spell it out for us until after the 21st of August – and after that it may all be too late anyway!
The Editor.
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