Anthony Byrne (Holt, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Hansard source

Paul Sheehan. He went on:

I’m sure the member for Flinders thinks so.

We have elected a prime minister, four times, who has led Australia through an era of unbroken and unprecedented prosperity, yet appeared obdurately impervious to the greatest issue of our times. He promised to reduce the size and intrusiveness of government but instead increased federal taxes, including the GST, to a peacetime record of 25.7 per cent of gross domestic product, but did not use this unprecedented flow of funds to mobilise the nation against the greatest threat to its survival.

Sheehan speaks about a particular project in Coombing Park. It is about a farmer who is trying to protect his property. He wrote about what this farmer said:

“We are going down to 20 per cent stocking rate, which is below our cost of production,” King told me on Friday. “Our business cannot trade for many more years if we erode our equity each year. Even the best farmers are suffering now. The bush is dying. The towns, the landscape, the rivers are being killed by this climate change.”

Note the term “climate change”. Not “drought”.

As this farmer says:

“I have no doubts this will all accelerate as time passes. Pretty soon we will be able to see the great deserts from the Great Dividing Range.”

That was written by Paul Sheehan—no friend of the Labor Party, I can assure you. Human induced global warming and its resultant changes in our climate system is no longer an intellectual issue discussed by Blundstone-wearing urban greenies—it is mainstream, it is empirical and it is now. The government must move to tackle global warming comprehensively, as is required in the national interest, and it certainly does not in this bill.

A report set for release in Britain today warns climate change could cost the world trillions of dollars. Labor’s Treasury spokesman, Wayne Swan, last week met the report’s author, respected World Bank economist Sir Nicholas Stern, after he briefed the British cabinet on the economics of climate change. Mr Swan today said of the report:

It says basically that the globe and individual nations have a window of opportunity only of 10 or 15 years to act …

Failure to act would lead to a worldwide recession, he said, and leave large sections of the globe underwater in 50 years time. We saw that graphically illustrated on the front page of the Sydney Morning Herald. Mr Swan also said that the Stern report said countries needed to introduce ambitious targets to reduce carbon emissions but that the government’s failure to ratify the Kyoto protocol on greenhouse gas emissions meant Australia was starting a long way behind. Labor’s environment spokesman, Anthony Albanese, has basically said the same thing.

It is not an issue that just concerns my electorate or those in this chamber. A recently released annual Lowy Institute poll reveals Australian concern over global warming to be the big sleeper of national affairs, a problem that worries Australians more than Islamic fundamentalism. Australian public convictions on climate change have crept up on the government and have now overtaken it. It is interesting that in the year 2000, amongst other timely commitments to addressing climate change, the Labor Party committed to ratifying the Kyoto protocol. Although only a small step in helping reduce greenhouse pollution globally, it remains a significant symbol of international diplomacy and one to which Labor remains committed, particularly as it sends a very powerful market signal to the world.

The government says that, if Australia ratifies the Kyoto protocol, Australian jobs will be lost to places without the same market conditions, such as India and China. From what I can see, Australian jobs are going to these countries largely because the government has failed to ratify the Kyoto protocol. Being locked out of the protocol’s mechanisms means Australians are unable to create worthwhile business opportunities from reducing greenhouse pollution. As an example, if Australia had ratified the Kyoto protocol, farmers would be able to claim large financial rewards for permanent revegetation projects. How? By selling to Kyoto countries and their companies the credits created by locking up carbon in trees and soil. But under the Howard government farmers miss out yet again.

In a similar way, any local business—even a school—that undertook an energy efficiency upgrade could sell its carbon credits in a carbon market and be financially rewarded for its efforts. In the first half of this year, the European carbon market was worth $15 billion. The government’s continued isolationist position for international action is stopping Australian businesses access global markets and it means that jobs in the new markets are being created offshore and not here, not in our country, not in our cities, our suburbs or our regions.

So if these opportunities are not arising here, where are they? What, for example, are our allies the Americans doing? Let me tell you what some of the Americans are doing. Whilst the Australian position has been aligned with that of President Bush and his anti-Kyoto stance—although we will see what happens after the midterm congressional elections—the Howard government has failed to see the substantial shift by various US national, state and city leaders taking prominent roles in the carbon constrained global market. Seven US states, 227 cities and a number of influential members of congress, both Republican and Democrat, are circumventing the Bush White House’s intransigent position. These congressmen and women, governors and mayors are committing their jurisdictions to emission reduction targets, carbon trading and renewable energy development. As the US moves forward on climate, it leaves Australia politically and economically isolated as the least prepared developed country in the world on this issue.

Let us talk about some of the leading US climate initiatives, which of course include the US banks. The Bank of New York has created a registry that it hopes will ease and increase trade in the growing global market for voluntary greenhouse gas credits, sources at the company recently said. I quote one of the sources:

“We saw an opportunity coming out of the Kyoto Protocol where companies … can buy varieties of gas emission reductions to offset their direct emissions or offset carbon products and services to customers,” a Bank of New York source based in London told Reuters in a phone interview.

The global voluntary carbon market has grown from three million to five million tonnes of CO² credits traded in 2004 to 20 million to 50 million tonnes in 2006, and is expected to reach 100 million tonnes or more next year, according to the Climate Group, a London based non-profit organisation. The voluntary trade the Bank of New York registry targets is separate from the mandatory trade under the UN’s Kyoto pact, such as the European Union’s emissions trading scheme. Many US companies such as Alcoa and DuPont have cut emissions voluntarily. Carbon credits on the EU market were selling for about $US19 a tonne recently and at about $US4 a tonne on the Chicago Climate Exchange some months ago.

Let us see what major US companies say on the particular regulations:

In April 2006, a US Senate Energy and Natural Resources Committee panel were surprised to hear the heads of high-powered energy, utility and retail companies including General Electric, Wal-Mart, Shell, Exelon and Duke Energy say they would welcome or accept mandatory caps on their greenhouse gas emissions.

Here is another one:

RETAIL GIANT TAKES A BIG STEP — In October 2005, the world’s largest retailer, Wal-Mart, announced a $500 million climate change commitment including initiatives to:

• Reduce greenhouse gas emissions by 20% in seven years.
• Increase truck fleet fuel efficiency by 25% in three years and double it in ten.
• Develop a store that is 25% more energy efficient within four years.
• Pressure its worldwide network of suppliers to follow its lead.
• Operate on 100% renewable energy.

With $312.4 billion in annual sales and more than 6,400 stores and facilities worldwide, Wal-Mart’s climate change commitment is of international business significance.

And another one:

IMAGINING ECO — In May 2005, General Electric, one of the world’s biggest companies with revenues of US $152 billion in 2004, announced “Ecomagination,” a major new business driver expected to double revenues from cleaner technologies to US$20 billion by 2010. This initiative will see GE double its research and development in eco-friendly technologies to US$1.5 billion by 2010, reduce company-wide emissions by 1% and improve energy efficiency by 30% by 2012. In May 2006, the company reported revenues of US$10.1 billion from its energy efficient and environmentally advanced products and services, up from US$6.2 billion in 2004, with orders nearly doubling to US$17 billion. In 2005, the company’s wind energy business was worth US$2 billion, estimated to rapidly reach US$4 billion. In five years, GE expects that alternative energies will comprise more than 25% of all energy equipment revenue.

We need to stay in the emissions trading game:

To prepare for an inevitable limit on greenhouse gas emissions, over 40 US and Canadian companies and organisations, including Baxter, Ford Motor Company, Interface, International Paper, Manitoba Hydro, Motorola and Tufts University, have joined the Chicago Climate Exchange, a voluntary but legally-binding program to reduce greenhouse gas emissions.

The scheme has been operating since 2003 to enable participants to prepare for an emissions trading future. By the end of 2006, participants are expected to have reduced emissions by 4%. In April 2006 over 1 million tonnes of CO2 permits were traded through the Chicago Exchange, and in the first two weeks of May 2006, over 2.4 million tonnes of CO2 permits were traded.

And if you looked at alternative fuels as well:

Microsoft magnate Bill Gates jumped into the bio-fuels market in April this year when he purchased US$84 million (AU$112 million), a 25.5% stake in common stock shares of Pacific Ethanol Inc., makers of corn-based fuel.

While not a major investment for Gates, it does indicate a market signal. Let us look at another one of our partners, China, and their efforts to reduce climate change. It was mentioned today by the Prime Minister that because China and India are not serious about global change that we should not be serious about signing the Kyoto protocol.

Contrary to popular opinion, China is leading world efforts to combat global climate change. It has ratified the Kyoto protocol. According to environmental sources, between 1997 and 2001, China reduced its carbon dioxide emissions by 17 per cent whilst its economy grew by 34 per cent. This was achieved by switching to cleaner energy sources, restructuring its economy and improving the efficiency of non-renewable energy sources such as coal. It has been calculated that China’s energy-saving measures have cut carbon dioxide emissions significantly

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