Greg Hunt (Flinders, Liberal Party, Minister for the Environment) Share this | Hansard source

Let me start by making a very clear statement. The government's policy is to commit to, work towards and be part of a global push to achieve the two-degree limit on global warming. The Cancun agreement sets that out. Australia was part of it, and we in opposition supported it and as a government we support it. That is both our policy and our objective. My understanding is that at this stage the French as they move towards the Paris post-2020 pledging conference are building a stack of bids. The extent to which they will achieve the two degrees is yet to be calculated. I am not aware of those outcomes, although, having met with the French minister in early April, her statement to me was that they were making significant progress. It is public that they do not believe they will get all the way this time but that they will get a significant proportion of the way, and that will set the world up for another pledging conference at some stage to be determined. I really welcome that.

The shadow minister asks about how this fits with the white paper, and the answer is 'very comfortably'. The energy white paper sets out, exactly as the shadow minister said, at page 44, amongst other pages, a four-degree scenario, but it was just that—a scenario. Our policy is to achieve a two-degree outcome for the world. What this was doing is what any good planner should do—hoping for the best but preparing for the worst. It was taking the realistic worst case. I am delighted and pleased to say that since that time what we have seen through a series of national pledges from other countries is significant progress towards the two-degree target. The energy white paper represented a scenario planning. It set out what it thought were the measures necessary to deal with what would be a worst-case scenario. Since then that worst-case scenario has, in our judgement, fallen by the wayside but, more than that, our policy is clear and categorical. I think that is extremely important to say.

I then want to move forward to the Climate Change Authority. I was in particular asked about the Climate Change Authority and the answer is fairly simple. We will respond to each of the three reports in due course. We are going through a process now of setting our post-2020 targets. That really involves contemplating and considering what was in the CCA report. We have received over 300 submissions—it could be higher now—to the task force being run as a whole-of-government coordinating task force by the Department of the Prime Minister and Cabinet. I have engaged in numerous roundtable or direct face-to-face meetings, as has Julie Bishop. We are going through a very detailed public consultation process.

We have always said that we will set our target in the middle of this year. Within the next month you can expect that Australia will lay down its target. Our goal—and I am perfectly public about this—is to have it in place before the major economies forum, which I believe is due on 20 July. That is our time frame. Against that, I am very confident that we will contribute in a constructive and ambitious manner that does not only the right thing by the planet but also the right thing for Australia's domestic future.

Having said that—and this is one of things where the white paper and energy comes in—it is extremely important to know that we have a series of elements that can help us achieve a very successful target. Remember this: we have already beaten our first round of Kyoto targets for 2008 to 2012. We will achieve and beat our second round of Kyoto targets from 2012 to 2020, and we will set a very constructive post-2020 target. We have the Emissions Reduction Fund; we have the safeguards mechanism. There is huge potential for vehicle emission standards in Australia, sadly following on from the loss of our domestic vehicle manufacturing industry. There is very significant potential for CO2 equivalent productions from the next round of the Montreal protocol and, in particular, the energy efficiency plan under the white paper.

See this speech in context