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loods, fires, cyclones and droughts are ever presents of the Australian landscape and have been here far longer than cars, cattle, coal miners and timber workers.

Yet every time we have a natural disaster, we find government infrastructure washed away, burnt down, blown apart or lacking water. Meanwhile, billions of dollars of community savings are wasted on vain attempts to cool the climate.

This surely is the year to stop wasting money on climate change follies in order to allow more spending on real, present day problems like disaster-proofing government-controlled infrastructure and land.

Two policy changes are needed.

First, stop all federal, state and local government spending or legislative support for climate commissions and bureaucracies, United Nations-Kyoto junkets, carbon sequestration, green energy, biofuels, carbon taxing and accounting, global warming research and climate change foreign aid. In short, abolish every department, position or budget with “climate”, “warming” or “carbon” in its name or description.

Second, rebuild government infrastructure and manage government land to standards that can better withstand the inevitable floods, fires, cyclones and droughts.