Craig Kelly (Hughes, Liberal Party) Share this | Hansard source

I'm pleased to rise to speak on the member for Clark's motion, and I do have a great deal of respect for the member for Clark and the work he has done in this parliament, but on this issue we disagree. It's not that we all don't want a clean environment and a greater future for our children. That is not in dispute. It's about how we go about it.

I note, as I rise to speak on this motion about the issues of global warming, that it's currently nine degrees Celsius outside here in Canberra. In Sydney, its current temperature is 14.4 degrees, and yesterday the hottest afternoon temperature we had was 14.8 degrees, which actually occurred at 10.30 pm at night. From what I can see, the 25 and 26 October were actually the coldest two days in October that we've ever had in Sydney's history going back to 1859. I think that's a rather apt fact that we should look at as we're doing this debate. Also, the other good news is that our dams, which we were told would never fill again—the good news is that Sydney's massive Warragamba Dam is currently at 96.3 per cent. That was actually said by, I think, one of the member for Warringah's advisers. They actually said the Warragamba Dam would never fill again. Well, I make the prediction that within the next few days the Warragamba Dam will, in fact, yet again fill up.

When we also look at the rainfall patterns over the last 120 years, it's often said, 'Oh, the country is drying out,' but the facts are we had more rain in the first 20 years of this century than we did in the first 20 years of the last century. So from 1900 to 1920, we had less rain than we had from the year 2000 to the year 2020. We're getting more rain, not less.

The other good news is, if we look at the Centre for Research on the Epidemiology of Disasters, a UN based organisation, they've shown over the last 20 years we're getting fewer climate disasters. Also the insurance data from Munich Re show the relative cost of disasters over the last 30 years is actually falling, not increasing. And, of course, there are deaths from climate disasters. There is an unprecedented 95 per cent decline in the number of deaths. In the first 20 years of this century compared to the last 20 years of last century, the number of deaths from climate related disasters has almost halved. On top of that, crop yields for almost every crop continue to increase and increase and increase.

I'm told that these wonderful renewables are so much cheaper than fossil fuels. If that's the case, I say, 'Absolutely fantastic.' The government just needs to step back and allow that cheaper product to get into the market as it would in any other market. But of course we know that is a complete and utter nonsense when you look at the data and you compare apples for apples, because, if you are comparing intermittent generation that is dependent on the weather to a form of generation that is actually baseload and you have a supply and demand, they are not the same like-for-like product.

The other interesting fact is when people talk about how we must set this target for net zero emissions. That's always very interesting, but, if the world was to get to net zero emissions, we'd have to freeze any further additions in energy. So there'd be no more energy for people in Africa and Southeast Asia—places where they are desperate for more energy. And what would we have to do? If we were able to build one over-1000 megawatt nuclear power station every single day until the year 2050 we still would not get down to zero emissions by the year 2050.

One thing in this debate we often hear is about the confusion about the subsidies renewables. There is confusion about not understanding how our road excise is an excise on road users. Finally, if we look at what's happening in the atmosphere today, if we look at how CO2 is measured, even with the shutdowns that we've had during the pandemic, CO2 emissions as measured in the atmosphere continue to decrease. You cannot even see what has happened because of the shutdown during the pandemic.

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