Energy privatisation

Chris Minns (left) and Dominic Perrottet superimposed over a failed report card

Labor’s small target strategy offers little to people and further shrinks the already thin political differences between the major parties, argues Peter Boyle.

Home in Puerto Rico destroyed by Hurricane Maria in 2017

The blackout that engulfed Puerto Rico when Hurricane Fiona laid bare the impacts of austerity and privatisation carried under United States fiscal control, reports Barry Sheppard.

private wind farms

While wind farms are touted as climate solutions, profit-hungry companies are actually causing widespread damage, reports Tamara Pearson.

Hurricane Fiona

Hurricane Maria devastated Puerto Rico in 2017. Then the power grid was privatised in 2020. Now this, reports Jon Queally.

While the energy sector remains in private hands, it will resist any transition away from fossil fuels. Greens MLC Abigail Boyd discusses the urgent need to take it back into public hands.

The energy crisis we didn’t need to have has put the question of a publicly-owned energy industry on the table again. Sue Bull argues that is the only way to keep good jobs and energy prices down. 

The suspension of the national electricity market points to the need to learn from the past. The whole idea of having an energy market for a commodity that everyone needs is a scam, argues Pip Hinman.

As if to dispel any doubts that her privatisation spree was ending, Jim McIlroy writes that the NSW Premier has moved to reassure private corporations that it is not.

Throughout the intense wildfires that gripped California since July, the media barely mentioned their underlying cause — climate change and energy company profiteering, writes Barry Sheppard.

In Australia, the National Electricity Market is rapidly becoming dysfunctional, with power shortages, blackouts and soaring prices making headlines.

Private companies are refusing to invest in new fossil fuel generators to replace those that have closed. This “investment strike” is due partly to uncertainty about carbon pricing and partly to increasingly volatile spot prices received by generators.

Up to 1000 people gathered outside state Parliament on November 15 to protest against plans by the Western Australian Coalition government to sell the state’s main electricity provider, Western Power.

The protest was organised by the Use your Power Group, headed by the Australian Services Union (ASU) and Electrical Trades Union. There was also strong support from the Maritime Union of Australia, Construction, Forestry, Mining and Energy Union, United Voice, Australian Manufacturing Workers Union and State School Teachers Union.

Privatisation continues to be touted as a quick fix, so the mantra goes “public sector bad, private sector good”. That is, using community funds and resources to build up a vital service or piece of infrastructure, usually over a period of many years, then when there is a “budget crisis” selling it off to yield a quick cash injection and the removal of an expense from the ledger — regardless of whether it is generating income or not — while giving sweetheart deals to the new owners to ensure monopoly-like conditions to maximise their profits.