Gillard ploughs ahead despite poll | Top Stories | BigPond News

Despite the poll slump Ms Gillard says she is determined to push on with her government's agenda, including a carbon tax.

'This is a tough reform and it may get even tougher, before it gets easier,' she told ABC Television.
...Ms Gillard insists that once carbon pricing is in place, people will see how the system works and its benefits.

Crops News, Agriculture News | Agriculture.com

It is very cool right now in the Midwest (just 60s for highs in some areas yesterday; Minneapolis had a record-low maximum temperature of just 63 degrees)

VVD want thunderous changes in met office | Radio Netherlands Worldwide

The free-market Conservative VVD party, the largest party in the current coalition government, has accused the Royal Netherlands Meteorological Institute (KNMI) of being biased on the subject of climate change and is planning thunderous changes for the weather office - possibly slashing its 60-million-euro subsidy.

VVD MP René Leegte says the KNMI is influenced too much by the research conducted by the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC). Mr Leegte will put forward a motion in parliament today calling on Deputy Environment Minister Joop Astma to privatise the institute. The MP said the subject of privatisation had been broached before, but he would like to put the idea into action.

Mr Leegte called the IPCC “climate alarmists” and rebuked the Dutch met office for accepting their conclusions on carbon emissions and rising global temperatures so readily, while other research showed different findings. The Conservative MP said 20 percent of KNMI scientists were not objective when it came to research.