Nets on the outlets of drainage pipes save waterways from pollution

Yes, that was one of the big distortions of the whole campaign. The mine looks like possibly being an environmental disaster, which isn't great given it's proximity to the Great Barrier Reef - possibility of more coal run-off going into the reef (keeps happening whenever it floods already from the existing coal port), and pollution and physical damage from the extra shipping that will go through the reef area to the port. Then there's the massive amount of water they're going to be allowed to draw from the Great Artesian Basin (which is already depleting at a worrying pace). And all that's before even thinking about climate change.

But the conservative side of politics managed to make it all about jobs, even though the mine, being highly automated, will deliver very little. I believe the most the company expects is about 1600 (even though for years they were claiming 10,000 which still isn't that many). I believe more people have already been employed installing and maintaining renewable energy this year than will ever be employed by this mine, if it ever gets funded (a lot of banks have said they wouldn't fund it because of the environmental problems, as well as the fact that it doesn't seem like it will stack up economically, because the extra supply will likely push down prices making it, as well as other mines in the state less profitable - possibly to the point of unviability).

So it turned into this culture war over coal based on a mine that probably won't go ahead and even if it does won't actually give the community the jobs it needs...

There's one literally fifty meters from my house in Perth, but ok

Yup. I had to explain this to my visiting friends, who wanted to go to Coney Island after a storm.

IIRC, there are physical limitations on the city's ability to filter sewage and stormwater -- it all runs through the same pipes, and it would be a momentous undertaking to split the systems (some of those pipes are 200+ years old, and aren't accurately mapped). Wastewater treatment capacity is slowly increasing, however.

Please don't make assumptions over my particular leanings, it's a fairly high-level observation I was making. If you'd like to dispute that the last few governments in the last decade have been increasingly blatant with misleading the public, I'm all ears.

You're being directly obtuse, but to humour you:

> So what if people were lied to?

This is fairly serious when you consider that this is the entity which takes a portion of your working income as tax to provide services based on the needs of the community. If the policies which are decided on are based on a misinformed public opinion, then the services which are actually required (as opposed to being perceived as being required) are not delivered.

> Is the government the citizenry's only source of information?

Obviously not, but to claim that there is not a significant perception of truth in a lot of people's eyes when it comes to what a sitting government says is naive.

> Do they even trust the government?

See above, many do.

> Are there not competing sources of information?

This is a discussion in itself. The Murdoch groups own over two-thirds of the media outlets in this country (something like 64% according to a quick glance at wikipedia [1]). It is no small secret that this organisation has a lot of influence in Australia and has swayed public opinions previously on various topics, and there's a plethora of articles discussing this [2].

> What basis do you have for concluding that the Australian government has any significant ability to sway the opinion of its citizens?

I'd put the onus of proof on you for this one, what makes you think that they do not? Governments spend tens of millions of dollars in prime-time advertising with the sole intention of sway opinions of citizens. This seems beyond ridiculous to me that you would want to make that point.

1. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Media_of_Australia

2. https://www.theguardian.com/media/2018/sep/20/very-australia...