Adam Bandt (Melbourne, Australian Greens) Share this | Hansard source

Before I get onto my substantive contribution to the debate, I'd just like to raise two matters. The first point is that I'll be moving a second reading amendment to add some words to the amendment moved by the member for Hunter. I raise that at the start because I understand that things are moving very quickly here, and I'm not sure whether copies have been made available yet.

The second point I want to make before I get onto the substance of my contribution is about the process tonight. I would have liked a chance to read this Future Drought Fund Bill before being asked to debate it and, potentially, vote on it. This is a bill talking about spending billions of dollars. For people talking about transparency to require us to now debate it and, potentially, vote on it tonight is appalling. And this bill was introduced into this House incorporating, we're told, some very important amendments. Those amendments, as the member for Mayo has set out, were negotiated by the former member for Indi, and, in general, we think those amendments are pretty good. We want the chance to work out whether or not those amendments are faithfully incorporated in this bill. I want the chance, as a member of parliament who is being asked to authorise the spending of several billion dollars, to go and test this bill—get people to have a look at it, get some input on it and then decide what my contribution is going to be. In that context, even as little as 24 hours would have been helpful. We could have done what usually is done, which is introduce a bill, give people 24 hours to reflect on it and then come back and vote on it if it is that urgent. But we don't have that.

The government and—I must say, with a heavy heart—some members of the crossbench have denied me and other members of the parliament the chance to fully read this bill and understand it. Instead, we're being forced to state a position on spending several billion dollars right here, right now, and that is not the way this place should be run. People who have waved the banner for transparency need to remember what has happened tonight and need to remember the process that has led us here, because now people who I didn't think would force me to have to vote on $5 billion have just joined with the government to force me to do that. I say that with a heavy heart because we should not be here in this situation. The government should not be doing that, and they're the ones who bear the main responsibility.

The way this place works is that conversations take place between people, including on the floor of parliament. Sometimes those conversations are free and frank, and it's good that they take place in a way that allows things to progress, because otherwise this place could get ground down. I haven't betrayed any confidences in my time here and I am not going to start now. But I do think it is important that this place knows that we on the crossbench were all told that this debate was going to finish at 7.30 pm. We were told that we would pull up stumps at 7.30 pm so that everyone could go through the usual processes and have a chance to consider their position on it so that we could come back tomorrow. No sooner were we told that by a very senior member of the government than the opposite happened, and that person knows who they are. That person knows who they are and that they came and told us we were going to pull up stumps at 7.30 pm, at the usual time, with the adjournment, and that's not what's happening. The debate is being pushed on.

There's a lesson in that for everyone here. There's a lesson in that for the crossbench. There's a lesson in that for the opposition. And that is that, when the government tell you that they're going to be fair on process, don't believe them for a second. The government had the opportunity to do that and they blew it. You might think, 'Oh, it doesn't matter; it's just the Greens.' Well, there's another place, called the Senate. Usually in this place, we can have discussions across the aisle, amongst each other, and agree to disagree. When someone tells you a process is going to happen and you're going to get the chance to consider a bill, you can usually take people at their word. Well, in week 2 of this parliament, I have learnt something very, very quickly. Don't take this government at their word when they tell you they are going to give you a chance to look at bills—because this is forcing the parliament to vote on spending $5 billion without the chance for any proper scrutiny at all. That in and of itself is reason for us all to be very, very concerned about what the next three years are going to look like. We should all be very concerned, after this afternoon, about the next three years, because what we have learned is that the government will say and do anything to win support for a particular vote and then renege on it within an hour—renege on it within an hour—to suit their purposes.

Okay, you've won your vote. We're having the debate tonight. But we've learnt the lesson; we've learnt how you're going to operate. And in all the time that I've been here, even under former Prime Minister Tony Abbott, I've not seen practice this sharp. This is the sharpest practice I have seen from a government. It is disappointing that others have got caught up in the wake, but they probably had the right to take the government at its word as well. And I think everyone here has learnt a lesson tonight: that you do not take this government and its senior people at their word when they tell you how things are going to run. This is the sharpest practice I have seen in all my time in this place, and on a bill that is so significant, when you're introducing amendments. This isn't the same bill that we saw before. When you're bringing up an amendment bill, give us the chance to look at it. Give us 24 hours. Give people the chance to go and look at it and work out whether it does what you say it does. Who knows—people might want to vote in favour of it.

For the sake of buying yourself a couple of hours, when we could have had this debate and the vote tomorrow, you have just trashed any goodwill or any standing you had on how this place is going to run. You might have got your little victory tonight, but what you've done is send a very clear message to me, to my party and to everyone who sits on the cross bench that you'll come here and say one thing and then something else will happen an hour later. Noted. I'm not going to say who it was who said that, but they know who they are. Noted.

Onto the substance of the bill and the amendment that I will move—if the government were serious about tackling drought, you would imagine that they would be saying the words 'climate change' over and over again. If this government were serious about making sure, as the member from Mayo said, that what we're seeing now doesn't become the new normal, or even the new baseline good, they would be falling over themselves to stop global warming. We were told very, very clearly at the end of last year that, unless we want to set ourselves on a path where we're going to see a 92 per cent decline in agricultural productivity in the Murray-Darling Basin, we are going to have to get the world two-thirds out of coal-fired power within the next 10 years. The best gift that could be given to farmers is to tackle global warming so that the droughts we're seeing now don't become a regular way of life, all the time—not just things that happen every now and then, as nature changes, but a regular way of life.

The Bureau of Meteorology has said that the drought in the Murray-Darling Basin is now the most severe in 120 years of records. Last week the climatologist at the Bureau of Meteorology, Dr David Jones, said that, while the Federation drought and the World War II drought were similar to this one, this is worse. While the north of the basin is doing it harder than the south, he said: from the general picture across the Murray-Darling Basin for droughts lasting two to three years, this is the most severe we've seen in terms of the rainfall totals and probably also in terms of the general run-off into dams. And this drought is hotter, with temperatures across the Murray-Darling about one degree hotter than during the Federation drought. Australia has warmed by about a degree. The world has warmed by about a degree as a result of global warming. This is what global warming looks like! And that's going to mean more evaporation and more transpiration when it rains, and it's going to mean that plants and animals are going to require more water when it comes.

The bureau and others have identified three key drivers of the severity of the drought, two of which are directly related to climate change: underlying reduction in southern wet season rainfall driven by climate change; underlying temperature increases driven by climate change; and the warm conditions in the far Indian and Pacific oceans resulting in reduced rainfall—the so-called Indian Ocean Dipole and El-Nino-like conditions in the Pacific. But it's also worth noting that, on that third factor, there are predictions from some scientists that El Ninos could become more frequent in a warming world. The picture of the millions of fish killed in the Menindee Lakes is the most graphic example of a complete crisis across the rivers and wetlands and agricultural communities of the Murray-Darling Basin—a crisis that was predictable a decade ago.

As I flagged at the start, Professor Ross Garnaut's climate review warned of the collapse of agriculture in the Murray-Darling because of global warming. It seems we are now well into the beginning of that collapse. Without emergency action to limit global warming, Professor Garnaut's prediction of a 92 per cent loss in irrigated agricultural production by the end of the century will come to pass because there will be an ecological collapse, as predicted. It is happening as they told us it would happen.

What do you do? You come in here and pretend that it doesn't exist. Members from the back bench give their climate-denying speeches. Then you try to take public money away from schools and hospitals to keep open coal-fired power stations. You are not serious about protecting farmers from the drought. You're not serious about looking after regions that are undergoing drought, because if you were you would not wish more droughts on them. But that's what you're doing. As pollution goes up and up, as you pretend that climate change doesn't exist and as you chuck around lumps of coal in parliament, you are wishing more droughts on Australia.

The digging, exporting and burning of coal, oil and gas are the major causes of climate change and, therefore, key drivers of the drought we are experiencing and the worsening droughts that we will face in the future. Every tonne of coal that this government allows to be exported is another farm facing extinction. Whilst the funds in these bills may ameliorate in some way the impacts on farmers for a short amount of time, the reality is that this government is doing much more to cause this crisis than this fund will ever cancel out. You have been put on notice. What it means for farmers and regions if we do not get global warming under control has been put on notice. And what do you do? You come in here and propose to make it worse.

Last year's State of the climate report by the Bureau of Meteorology and CSIRO states:

Australia's weather and climate continues to change in response to a warming global climate. Australia has warmed by just over 1°C since 1910, with most warming since 1950. This warming has seen an increase in the frequency of extreme heat events and increased the severity of drought conditions during periods of below-average rainfall. Eight of Australia's top ten warmest years on record have occurred since 2005.

…   …   …

The drying in recent decades across southern Australia is the most sustained large-scale change in rainfall since national records began in 1900.

The drying trend has been most evident in the southwestern and southeastern corners of the country. The drying trend is particularly strong between May to July over southwest Western Australia …

You would think that the Minister for the Environment or the Leader of the Nationals would be screaming about climate change from the rooftops, given that their electorates are at the epicentre of this crisis, but instead from them we get denial, we get obfuscation and we get delay.

I move as an amendment to the amendment moved by the member for Hunter:

That all words after "very same" be omitted with a view to substituting the following words:

"communities;

(3) notes that the Bureau of Meteorology has said:

  (a) the current drought in the Murray Darling Basin is the most severe in 120 years of records; and

  (b) that climate change is a significant cause of the severity of the drought; and

(4) calls on the Government to recognise that we are in the middle of a climate crisis, which has implications for droughts in this country".

This amendment does not say that second reading of the bill should be declined. It says that the parliament has an opportunity to send the very clear message. While the government may not want to acknowledge the reality of climate change and drought, this parliament does not need to continue with that delusion.

I say to the government: do not come in here and talk about the hardship of farmers while you are making climate change worse; do not come in here and tell us how tough people are doing it while you are making climate change worse; and do not come in here and tell us about the threats to people's livelihoods while you are making climate change worse. You point the finger at everyone else and you say it's the fault of the few brave people who are standing up and trying to draw attention to it, but this government has the blood of rural and regional Australia on its hands because it is making global warming worse, and that will make droughts like this happen more often, more frequently. This will become the new norm under this government.

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