Sinclair Davidson

Sinclair Davidson is the Dean of Research & Innovation at RMIT University in Melbourne, Australia. He is also a Senior Fellow at the Institute of Public Affairs, a corporate funded think tank based in Melbourne.

Background
A biographical note states that "he has written extensively on taxation policy in Australia and is a regular contributor to public debate. His opinion pieces have been published in The Age, The Australian, Australian Financial Review, Sydney Morning Herald, and Wall Street Journal Asia. Sinclair has also published in academic journals such as the European Journal of Political Economy, Review of Political Economy, Journal of Economic Behavior and Organization and the Cato Journal."

Activities
In April 2007 Davidson and Tim Wilson, a research fellow at the Institute of Public Affairs, lodged a complaint to the Australian Competition and Consumer Commission that Oxfam's support of fair trade coffee amounts to a breach of the Trade Practices Act provisions aginst misleading and deceptive conduct.

In May 2007 Davidson and Dr Alex Robson, a lecturer in economics at the Australian National University, challenged the view that the assessment of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change was sufficient to decide there was a need to make substantial cuts in greenhouse gas emissions. Claiming that there was a "lack of knowledge and understanding of climate change, it is not unreasonable for policy-makers to adopt a cautious approach to policy change. It is also not unreasonable for people to discount the hysterical commentary around climate change," they wrote.

In July 2011 Davidson and Ashton de Silva co-authored Costing of The Greens’ Economic Policies: Mining, a report for the Minerals Council of Australia, the peak mining industry lobby group, criticising the Australian Greens policy of a phase out of the coal industry in Australia.

Related SourceWatch articles

 * Climate change sceptics
 * Arguments used against a ban on new coal mines or a coal phase-out in Australia
 * Costing of The Greens’ Economic Policies: Mining (Report)

Archives of Davidson's articles

 * Sinclair Davidson, Sinclair Davidson, The Drum, archive of articles.
 * Sinclair Davidson, "Sinclair Davidson", Institute of Public Affairs, archive of articles.

Davidson's articles and reports on coal and global warming

 * Sinclair Davidson and Alex Robson, "Certainly clouds the IPCC", IPA Review, Institute of Public Affairs, March 2007.
 * Sinclair Davidson and Alex Robson, "IPCC pulls numbers out of thin air", Australian Financial Review, 2 April 2007, p.63.
 * Sinclair Davidson, "Tax on energy use is best way to fight pollution", The Age, August 1, 2008.
 * Sinclair Davidson, "Green jobs subtract value", Quadrant Online, August 8, 2009.
 * Sinclair Davidson, Federal government ads misleading on climate insurance cost", IPA Review, September 2008.
 * Sinclair Davidson, "The 'mining boom' myth", IPA Review, November 2008.
 * Sinclair Davidson, "The great CPRS green jobs con", Crikey, August 13, 2009.
 * Sinclair Davidson, "Science of Climate Change is only a Small Part of the Discussion", Crikey.com.au, November 17, 2009.
 * Sinclair Davidson, "CRU emails reveal a worrying pattern of bad behaviour", Crikey, November 23, 2009.
 * Chris Berg and Sinclair Davidson, "Climategate: What we've learned so far", IPA Review, December 2009.
 * Sinclair Davidson, "Mining tax risks spooking investors", The Drum, ABC, May 6, 2010.
 * Sinclair Davidson, "In response to Graham Readfearn", The Drum, ABC, November 2010.
 * Sinclair Davidson, "Why Garnaut's 'independent' committees aren't a good idea", The Drum, ABC, June 3, 2010.
 * Sicnlair Davidson, "Dirty little lie on carbon tax", The Australian, March 1, 2011.
 * Sinclair Davidson, "Carbon illusion we can't afford", The Australian, April 11, 2011.
 * Sinclair Davidson, "But Ross, who has an economy-wide carbon tax?", The Drum, June 17, 2011.
 * Sinclair Davidson, "Brown's economic Xenophobia will cost us dearly", The Australian, June 3oth, 2011.
 * Sinclair Davidson and Ashton de Silva, Costing of The Greens’ Economic Policies: Mining, Minerals Council of Australia, July 2011.

External articles

 * Graham Readeran, "On the origin of the sceptics". The Drum, ABC, November 19, 2010.