Christine Milne (Tasmania, Australian Greens) Share this | Hansard source

I rise this afternoon to note that the Minister for the Environment and Heritage, Senator Campbell, has shifted the government’s position on Australia’s capacity to meet its Kyoto target. For the last nine years the government has said that it will meet 108 per cent of 1990 levels in the first commitment period, and that has been the excuse that the government has used day in and day out to avoid pressure to introduce emissions trading, to introduce a carbon tax, to introduce a national energy efficiency system of regulations and so on. Now we find—we heard him this week—that a shift has started and he has started backing off, saying that it is unlikely, that we will struggle and that we hope.

It went backwards very fast, and the reason is this: Australia has to report to the Framework Convention on Climate Change in Nairobi in the second week of November on its greenhouse gas emissions and how it is tracking towards its target. Senator Campbell knows as well as I do that he is going to have to report the bad news to the world that the Australian government is not on track to meet its target, in spite of the fact that it got a megawindfall in terms of a one-off credit from land clearing. If you look at what has actually happened, we are finding that our electricity and heat emissions increased 43 per cent and our transport emissions increased 23 per cent from 1990 to 2004. That is what Australia is doing on greenhouse gas emissions.

As people out in the country are seeing the nation dry out, as the drought intensifies and as fires intensify and probably develop into megafires this summer, it is no good for Senator Campbell and the Prime Minister to put on their Akubra hats, visit these areas and pretend that drought relief and fire relief are going to be enough. People in Australia know that higher temperatures caused by global warming are leading to higher evaporation rates, less rainfall, more extreme drought, more extreme storms and fires, and terrible conditions—and, what is more, it is not going to get any better. In fact, it is likely to get much worse if the temperature goes higher by two degrees. We already have a temperature increase of 0.7 degrees. Imagine that doubling.

So the minister is actually culpable. People are going to look back at the Howard years as a decade of lost opportunity, as we only have 10 to 15 years to turn this around globally to avoid dangerous and utterly irreversible climate change, because the feedback loops in global ecosystems are such that you cannot, after a certain point, get the situation back. It is no use waking up in 10 years time; then it will be too late.

In May this year the government did not identify climate change as a risk to the budget. It is unbelievable when you look at what is happening out in rural Australia that that was not identified as a risk to the budget. In fact, Treasury said at the time that there may be a need for some more drought relief but that their analysis concludes this is unlikely to occur and that agricultural production forecasts are similar to previous years. How could Treasury say that? The CSIRO, the IPCC and practically every scientist in the country have been telling the government that this is happening and that these will be the impacts, but apparently Treasury do not have to listen.

I feel extremely angry about that on behalf of the Australian people, because on this very day there are fires burning all over the place out in the bush, including in Southern Tasmania, where they are experiencing 30 degrees and high winds in October. What is it going to be like around this country by the time we get to February? As Senator Webber said and no doubt Senator Campbell knows, south-west Western Australia is drying out faster than any other place in the world. This is not new information since May. This has been known by the world’s scientists, and this government has deliberately ignored that. It is studied ignorance, and it is deliberate. That is why it is culpably irresponsible—and the world will know that in Nairobi.

Senator Campbell has an obligation to tell Australians today what he already knows. He has got the report card that he is going to give in Nairobi. He knows what is going to have to say in Nairobi. Minister, you tell the Australian people before you leave the country what it is you are going to tell the rest of the world about the failure of government policy on climate change. This is the greatest issue facing the world, and we deserve to know how we are going.

Question agreed to.