Anthony Albanese (Grayndler, Australian Labor Party, Deputy Manager of Opposition Business in the House) Share this | Hansard source

I rise to speak on the appropriation bills. Climate change is the greatest environmental challenge facing the world. There is overwhelming scientific evidence that climate change caused by carbon pollution is making Australia hotter, the oceans warmer and the cities and towns drier. The year 2005 was the hottest on record, and the five hottest years on record have been in the last seven years. Climate change directly threatens every city’s and town’s water supply, the Great Barrier Reef and Kakadu. Science says that climate change increases the intensity of cyclones and hurricanes. Climate change means we will have more category 4 and category 5 cyclones. We have seen that just this year.

If climate change is unchecked, it will severely damage Australia’s agriculture and tourism industries while also affecting many Australians through severe weather events and further water restrictions. The Bureau of Meteorology says that this is because carbon pollution is changing our climate. There is no doubt that recent steep rises in temperature are due to human activity. To paraphrase respected naturalist Sir David Attenborough, humans have become a force of nature; we are changing the climate, and what happens next really is up to us.

However, there is still no national climate change strategy in Australia. In this budget the one department which will suffer staff cuts is the Department of the Environment and Heritage. Included as part of that are cuts to the Bureau of Meteorology—long-term climate forecasters. One would have thought that was the last area you would cut in the current circumstances. Because of the Howard government’s complacency, Australia is on track to increase its greenhouse pollution by 23 per cent. The Howard government’s complacency and politicking over climate change is placing our environment, economy and vital infrastructure at risk.

The Prime Minister is now playing catch-up politics. He is desperately promoting nuclear power for Australia to pretend he is doing something about climate change, an issue he has ignored for a decade. But the issue of climate change is catching up to John Howard. It is real and the scientific evidence is overwhelming, but, because John Howard is so far behind the game, so in denial and such a mean and tricky politician, his instinct is always to play politics and ignore the national interest. It is always the political interest that is put first by this Prime Minister, never the national interest. Time and time again, confronted with a political problem, the Prime Minister chooses division over leadership. By pushing nuclear energy, the Prime Minister is trying once again to divide Australia not unite it. A climate change strategy focused on clean energy and energy efficiency would unite Australia. Clean energy and energy efficiency are good for everyone—the community, business and, most importantly, our children’s future. Everyone is a winner with clean energy.

Quite frankly, I do not think the Prime Minister is serious about debating nuclear energy. The Prime Minister says he wants a debate but he just walks straight away from that debate and engages simply in insults and vindictiveness. If we are going to have a real nuclear debate in Australia, let us have a debate about climate change. Let us have a debate about why the government is failing to support its own renewable energy industry. Today the government’s environment minister said it was not a problem that Australian renewable energy companies had to move offshore to China in order to commercialise their products rather than produce them here. The company Roaring 40s recently announced they will not proceed with half a billion dollars worth of projects in Tasmania and South Australia. They—not Labor—say that it is because of the failure to increase the mandatory renewable energy target.

Just last month the same company, Roaring 40s, announced a $300 million deal to provide three wind farms to China. It got nowhere near the publicity that the uranium deal did. It was a $300 million deal that can be repeated over and over again, because we are talking about a sustainable renewable energy industry. It was a great achievement for Australia. Roaring 40s are welcome in China but they are not welcome in John Howard’s Australia. That is an absolute disgrace.

If you thought that the Howard government was somehow not to blame for that, over the last two months the minister for the environment has blocked a wind farm in Victoria because one parrot every 667 years would be threatened. Think about this: the same government that is promoting dangerous nuclear energy for Australia says it will block a wind farm because one parrot may be affected every 667 years. Then again, the minister tried to stymie a Western Australian wind farm which his own department has given the green light to. Instead of blocking clean energy projects, the Howard government should seize the economic opportunities of the worldwide push towards clean, renewable energy. Sadly, the approach is all about politics and not about Australian jobs, the Australian economy or the Australian environment. We had the potential for a stronger renewable energy industry, yet the government’s inaction has instead seen our jobs go overseas and our market isolated.

The latest Business Review Weekly Rich 200 list, published each year, has a new debutant. That debutant is the Chinese-Australian dual citizen Dr Zhengrong Shi. He debuted at fourth. He is now the fourth richest Australian, with a wealth of some $3 billion. How does this come about? How does someone go from being not on the list to being the fourth richest Australian at their first appearance? I will tell you how. Mr Zhengrong Shi did his postgraduate and his PhD work in solar energy at the University of New South Wales and at the Australian National University. His wealth comes from developing Australian solar energy technology in China—invented in Australia; made in China. Here we have Mr Zhengrong Shi worth $3 billion. It is an extraordinary achievement, which shows what Australia is missing out on. He is the personification of the government’s failure to invest in the future of Australia.

Less than two years ago the Howard government’s energy white paper stated:

The Australian Government is not contemplating the use of nuclear energy in Australia.

But the Prime Minister now says that it is inevitable. He says he has changed his view because of the increased price of oil. What an absurd argument. You do not put petrol in your light switch to turn on the lights or put yellow cake in your car to make it go. The truth is that oil plays no role in electricity generation in Australia. What an absurd proposition, a dishonest proposition; it is an attempt to distort the debate. There are no nuclear cars but there are nuclear reactors, and, when it comes to the nuclear debate, you cannot have a nuclear debate without stating where you think the nuclear reactors should go and where the nuclear waste should be sited. Will there be a nuclear reactor in Port Stephens, in the member for Paterson’s electorate?

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