Penny Wong (SA, Australian Labor Party, Shadow Minister for Corporate Governance and Responsibility) Share this | Hansard source

I move:

That the Senate—

(a)

notes:

(i)

the continued scepticism of the Prime Minister (Mr Howard) over the link between human activity and climate change,

(ii)

that the Howard Government has dragged the chain on climate change for more than 10 years, and

(iii)

the environmental and economic cost of past inaction and any future delays in tackling this challenge; and

(b)

calls on the Government to recognise the link between human activity and climate change and join in the efforts of the international community by ratifying the Kyoto Protocol.

I rise to speak on this motion put forward in my name on behalf of the Labor Party in relation to this Prime Minister’s continued scepticism over the link between human activity and climate change and the fact that this government has dragged the chain on climate change for over a decade. I also want to talk about the economic and environmental cost of this government’s inaction and of any future delays in tackling the challenge. We are calling on the government to finally recognise the link between human activity and climate change and to join the efforts of other members of the international community in ratifying the Kyoto protocol.

We have seen this week in parliament the government trying to show its credentials, it says, on climate change. In fact, the government has had the opportunity, if it wanted to, to show the Australian people whether or not it has finally understood the implications of climate change. What have we seen? We have seen ministers running different lines. We have seen ministers changing positions. In question time in the Senate we saw Senator Minchin again running the hard line that Australia should not go it alone in terms of emissions trading and, frankly, contradicting the softening of his Prime Minister’s position and directly contradicting the position of Minister Macfarlane, who seems, for political or whatever reasons, to have had a conversion in relation to the issue of emissions trading.

We have had much fanfare around the Prime Ministerial Task Group on Emissions Trading. This was their big strategy to try and show that the Howard government actually knew something about what was happening in terms of climate change and was actually working on a plan. We have seen a lot of media about the government doing this work on emissions, and yesterday we had the release of the task group’s much heralded paper. And I have it here. This is it—it is nine pages long. There are nine pages from the much heralded task group on emissions trading, delivered eight years after the Prime Minister rejected four reports on the same issue.

On Tuesday in this place, we had the release of the government’s response to the Senate Rural and Regional Affairs and Transport Committee’s report on rural water resource usage which showed yet again that the much trumpeted $10 billion water package was hastily put together, poorly costed and that as at December of last year the government was still saying ‘business as usual’—and it wants us to believe that it has really thought through the water policy and costed it properly?

As people know, we recently had the release of the fourth Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change report, and we have seen the Prime Minister commenting on it. In his comments the Prime Minister demonstrated his complete lack of understanding of the issues. He described the possible outcomes and scenarios outlined in the report as being ‘uncomfortable for some’. That is his analysis of the enormous threat and challenge that climate change presents to Australia and to the globe.

The nine-page emissions trading discussion paper was released yesterday. It does make for some interesting reading because it represents a shift in position by the government. I suggest that the shift in position is not about conviction, not about an understanding of the scale of the threat and not about a willingness to address the long-term challenge to Australia’s economic prosperity and our environmental security; it is about a desire to demonstrate to the Australian public that the government are actually taking the issue seriously. It is all about political positioning; it is not about conviction or an understanding of the issues.

The report makes some interesting points. It states that the early adoption of emissions trading ahead of most of the rest of the world could promote investment and the development of a future comparative advantage for Australia. Frankly, the Prime Minister is unlikely to act unless he is pushed, and he does not want to act because, it appears, he is really not convinced climate change is real. He is still hiding behind his argument that if we act on climate change we will destroy the economy. We know it is a false choice, and his own report says as much.

When will the government come clean that its concerns about carbon trading and climate change are not a knee-jerk reaction but are really because it does not want any reaction at all? It does not understand the seriousness of this issue. It does not understand the implications for our future. What it does understand is political positioning—and, as I have previously said, the Prime Minister is a very clever politician. Climate change is simply too important an issue to be left in the hands of a government which does not understand the significance of the threat. In the last eight years, the government has ignored three reports on carbon emissions trading. Frankly, the Prime Minister did not need this subsequent report to tell him that urgent action on climate change was needed now.

Eight years after the Prime Minister rejected past reports, it is in black and white in his own prime ministerial task group report, which states:

Given the scale of the challenge faced there is no room for complacency.

Yet we know that back in March, June, October and December of 1999 similar reports were all ignored by this government. Frankly, the government failed Australians on climate change then and it is failing them now. We also know that the water package previously announced was cobbled together late. It is really an example of the government’s Johnny-come-lately—pardon the pun—approach to many significant environmental issues facing Australia.

I want to talk briefly about the fourth Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change report. This report was produced by 600 authors from 40 countries, including 42 scientists from Australia and 620 expert reviewers, and 113 governments were involved. This report sets out in great detail some of the potential scenarios to be faced by Australia and the globe. This is the report about which the Prime Minister was asked on Lateline:

… what do you think living in Australia would be like by the end of this century for your own grandchildren … if … the average mean temperatures, around the world do rise by somewhere between four and possibly even more than six degrees celsius?

What did the Prime Minister say? He answered:

… it would be less comfortable … than it is now…

That is hardly a statement you should hear from a Prime Minister who should understand the scale, complexity and potential threat that climate change poses to this nation. The fact is that this potential increase in temperature carries a burden for future generations. It carries a burden in terms of highly stressed ecosystems, with many of our natural icons under siege. It also carries significant social and economic threats. The health, security and social implications of this sort of change are substantial. The Prime Minister went on to challenge the accuracy of the IPCC report in his interview. He stated:

… I think it’s very, very hard for us, in 2007, to try, with that kind of mathematical accuracy ... to sort of extrapolate what things might be.

This really is the nub of the problem—the Prime Minister’s own misconceptions about climate change and his refusal to take responsibility for a decade of inaction by his government. As I said previously, this is a report from hundreds of respected scientists from 40 countries around the globe. These scientists have given us their best advice, and politicians should not try and diminish or minimise the nature of the challenge that we face by simply pointing their finger at the science. This is an issue about managing risks and this is where the policy approach of the Howard government differs.

Of course, as we all know, this report comes on top of the Stern report released last year, which set out in great detail some of the economic issues associated with climate change—hard economic data on the effects of climate change on the global economy. Every day more and more evidence comes to light. I previously commented on the fact that the Great Barrier Reef Research Foundation have warned that climate change is the No. 1 threat to the reef and could have devastating effects if it is not brought under control.

These are not scenarios that are simply ‘uncomfortable for some’; the report from the intergovernmental panel and the Stern report—even the Great Barrier Reef foundation’s report and comments—do not paint a picture of a future which is simply uncomfortable for some. Climate change is a significant economic and environmental issue for this nation, and we have to deal with it. What is required is a long-term approach and a risk management approach.

I want to briefly refer to the Business Council of Australia president, Michael Chaney. As you know, the Business Council has had a range of views in relation to climate change and a range of views amongst its membership, but Mr Chaney made this point: ‘Regardless of one’s views on the science of climate change, the case is now such that business must ensure against the risk of it with an effective policy response.’ This is a very similar position to that which was adopted by the Business Roundtable on Climate Change last year, which went through some of the economic implications and laid out some policy options for the government to consider. Their basic thesis was this: we do have the opportunity to act now, and the approach that business and government should take is one of risk management. We may not know where this will end up but we have to manage the risk now. We have to take a long-term approach and try and deal with the issue. We have to also put in place market based mechanisms to drive more sustainable outcomes.

We have business calling for this. Those on the other side say that they are the party for business. Well, they are not listening to business on this. They are not taking a risk management approach, they are not taking a prudent approach, they are not taking an approach that recognises the economic threat that climate change poses long term. What this government is focused on is its political positioning. We have seen that this week where we suddenly have this pale green conversion by some members of the Howard government, including the Prime Minister, who are trying to demonstrate to the Australian people: ‘Look, we actually care about these issues, despite the fact we have done virtually nothing for the last 11 years. We do care about these issues and are trying to shift position.’ But they have not got their lines quite right. We see Senator Minchin in this chamber running a different line to the position of the Prime Minister, and Mr Macfarlane in the other place also running a different line.

Mr Macfarlane, actually, is quite an interesting case in point. This is the minister who previously described the film by Al Gore, An Inconvenient Truth, as being ‘good entertainment’. He described emissions trading as ‘folly’. He now says he has an open mind to it. One wonders what has changed. What has changed in terms of the Prime Minister’s language on this? The Prime Minister was previously incredibly hardline: ‘We’re not going to go down an emissions trading path unless the rest of the world do it first.’ That really is a do-nothing strategy. It is a line that justifies inaction. What has happened to the Prime Minister in relation to this issue? The Prime Minister is now softening his position because he actually understands—as I say, he is a clever politician—that the community is starting to shift beneath him. The community is starting to understand much more than its political leaders the potential threat of climate change for future generations, and it wants politicians to do something about it.

Apart from business leaders, we have had church leaders and community leaders speaking out on this. Bishop George Browning of Canberra has been quoted as saying in relation to climate change:

“This is first and last a moral issue … Refusing to do everything within our power to stop the world from heating is a moral responsibility.”

The reality is that the states, community leaders, consumers and business are all crying out for national leadership on this issue, but we have not had national leadership from this government.

This is an opportunity for the government today. Maybe Senator Eggleston, who I understand will follow me, will actually outline what the government is going to do. What is going to happen with this report? Is this just yet another piece of paper, another report that you put out there, pretending that you are going to do something about the most significant challenge facing this generation and this generation of political leaders and this parliament? Are you actually going to do something about this or is this yet another piece of political positioning to try to make people think that you are actually prepared to tackle the hard issues?

We saw earlier this week in parliament the Prime Minister again suggesting there was some doubt as to the link between human activity and climate change. Then the Prime Minister came in and corrected the record. As I said previously in this place, perhaps he had to do that because he was saying what he really thinks. That is possible. Perhaps he did not just mistake the question. Some might say he simply has mistaken the science and has mistaken the science for some time.

It is always an easy thing for a politician to say that a problem does not exist as the basis for justifying why you do not do anything about it. It is a very easy approach to deny that the problem exists. The Howard government have become very good at that. We saw that in question time today in relation to child care, with Senator Scullion denying that any problem exists—therefore, you do not have to fix it. That is the way the government have operated in relation to climate change for the last 10½ years. They have denied that the problem existed and they have continued to deny it. Only now, in the face of overwhelming international evidence and overwhelming community sentiment on this issue, do we see the government finally trying to pretend to do something about it. They will get up now and talk about all the money they are spending on this and that.

The reality is you have spent over a decade now denying that this problem exists, putting your heads in the sand, pointing your fingers at those who have said this is a problem, refusing to ratify the Kyoto protocol and having ministers out there saying, ‘We can’t go down an emissions trading scheme path—we can’t do this, we can’t do that—it’s bad for Australia,’ refusing to recognise there is a problem. The Australian people have woken up to that. They know there is a problem. Unfortunately, the government do not seem to understand there is a policy problem and a climate change problem. The only thing they understand is that they have a political problem.