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

I rise today to support the motion moved by Senator Sherry, which states:

That the Senate notes the 2007-08 Budget:(a) fails to:

(i)

tackle Australia’s poor productivity performance,

(ii)

meet the challenges of climate change,

(iii)

deliver practical solutions to the water crisis, and

(v)

ensure long-term investment in broadband infrastructure; and

(b) focuses on a short-term election fix rather than long-term nation building.

I want to focus on a couple of things in particular, but I would like to start with climate change. Before Senator Bernardi leaves the chamber, I want to point out to him that the ‘60 below 1990 by 2050’ is not plucked out of the air and it is not plucked out of the European Union; it is based on the notion that we need to constrain the increase in global temperature to less than two degrees. I note that earlier today Senator Bernardi voted against constraining global temperature to two degrees or below. He obviously thinks that a temperature increase of two degrees is okay. The Prime Minister said, famously, earlier this year that a four- to six-degree temperature rise would be ‘less comfortable for some’. Of course, that means ‘dead’ for many—which I suppose in the Prime Minister’s terms might be less comfortable. We have also heard the Minister for the Environment and Water Resources, Malcolm Turnbull, say that eastern Australia could easily absorb a one-metre sea level rise. Perhaps if he were standing on the cliffs in Sydney he might think that would be the case. But it is a ludicrous assertion when you consider estuaries and wetlands and coastal infrastructure around this country. A one-metre sea level rise would be an utter and absolute disaster. If we had an appropriate budget which looked at the real risks associated with climate change, we would have already done coastal vulnerability mapping in the last 10 years and released it to the public, and they would be able to see for themselves the enormous risk to coastal infrastructure and property. In fact, there would be panic in property prices around the country, which is why I suspect many governments are refusing to do the vulnerability analysis as a result of sea level rise.

I particularly want to talk through the ramifications for a country that has not made a determination about what level of global temperature rise is deemed to be appropriate. The Prime Minister and the Treasurer say that they are waiting for the emissions trading task force. But they are approaching this from the point of view of what they think they can achieve in terms of economic measures; they are not thinking about what they actually have to achieve to get an ecological outcome. All the evidence is now showing that, the earlier you act to reduce global greenhouse gas emissions and the earlier you bring in supportive measures, such as energy efficiency measures and other measures that will advance renewable energy, the better it is for everybody, the less cost and the greater the outcome. The case for late action demonstrates that the cost of leaving it and doing nothing—as is currently the case—will result in the economic cost and the dislocation being very much higher. So the sooner we act on and have an emissions trading scheme, an increased mandatory renewable energy target, feed-in laws to encourage renewable energy and a national energy efficiency target, the better.

The problem that the government have in suggesting appropriate targets that they have plucked out of the air is that they will have to face the scientists at some point. As we speak, this week in Bonn the SBSTA group are talking about the post-2012 Kyoto period—the second commitment period. The European Union is working on the basis that the world cannot tolerate the idea of global temperatures rising more than two degrees. The economists, however, are only modelling for a two-degree to 2.4-degree rise. So they have a long way to go to catch up with the world scientists. The latest IPCC report says that we have to stabilise greenhouse gas emissions by 2015; yet the project infrastructure that the government talk about in terms of clean coal or nuclear will not be on stream by 2015. The Howard government are leaving Australia extremely vulnerable to much higher costs and greater dislocation by failing to address climate change right now.

The Treasurer talked about the instability in our region and the global shocks which can threaten our economy as being real risks. Yes, they are—and many of those are risks associated with climate change. In the last 12 months there have been several reports pointing out that, in the Pacific region, many Pacific island nations are now identifying small islands within their countries for evacuation. Those people will have to go somewhere. Often, they will not be able to be housed in the bigger or higher islands. They are going to reach a point where there will be incredible pressure on land and water resources. People will have to go somewhere. Australia’s refusal to deal with mitigation and to reduce its own greenhouse gas emissions is a source of irritation in the region. And there will be conflict, because people will need somewhere to go. Tuvalu has approached the Australian government previously asking about who will take its people and Australia has said no. Kiribati has said that it would not even bother approaching Australia because it knows what the answer will be.

There is a discussion in the United Nations system about expanding the definition of refugee to include ‘environmental refugee’, because we know that there are going to be millions displaced as a result of climate change, even with the degree of warming that is locked in now—let alone increased warming as a result of increased emissions over time. What will happen, for example, to people in Bangladesh? They have nowhere to go but across the border. As climate change bites, we will see the kinds of resource conflicts being fought over food and water resources that we are currently seeing being fought over oil. When I was in Nairobi last year, some women spent three days getting down to the city, riding on the top of freight trucks, to come down and talk about the extent of damage that water depletion is doing in their villages, where they have run out of food and where wild animals have also run out of water and have started to trample villages in pursuit of water and food.

There is real dislocation happening around the world right now due to climate change—and, of course, in our own country we have the Murray-Darling. If ever there was an example of the economy being a wholly owned subsidiary of the environment, it is the collapse of the Murray-Darling system. I am amazed that the government would have the audacity to stand up in here and suggest that they have demonstrated some stewardship. In fact, it is the attitude that the economy operates separately from the environment that has led us to the disaster that is the Murray-Darling today—as has the assumption that you can keep on taking for granted the ecological services of river systems and expect to continue to make money out of them and overstretch the system to the point of collapse, which has occurred as a result of deepening drought, increased temperatures and higher levels of evaporation. In time to come, I think the world is going to see the Murray-Darling as the example of what happens with classical economic thinking that says that you can run the economy and pay for the environment later. The environment will not support that kind of exploitation. And I am appalled that the government’s plan for the Murray does not include buying out the overallocation of water permits for at least three years. The crisis is now. We need those water allocations bought out right now and water to go back into the river system. But that is not going to happen as a result of this budget. The government has come out with its big water plan but, when you get to the bottom of it, the water plan does not actually buy out those allocations in a time frame that is reasonable.

Another example is you have the Treasurer in here saying that the economy has never been better, but you have a mine that supports a lot of people in the Orange area having to close because it has run out of water. It has gone to the City of Orange and said that it wants to purchase drinking water from Orange to keep the mine going for two more months. Then what happens? The mine has to close and Orange has less water. What happens then if you do not have a replenishment of water supplies in that area? We have got to a point where that same mining company has been washed out in Western Australia as a result of cyclone activity and put out of operation in New South Wales because of drought.

Those are the kinds of ramifications of climate change on the mining sector. Yet everyone is expecting the minerals sector will continue to boom. The same applies to the Anvil Hill coalmine. I opposed that coalmine absolutely, but it has been shown that it may not be able to proceed anyway because of a lack of water. That is my point also about nuclear reactors. They need vast amounts of water. In Europe last summer they had to close down a whole lot of their nuclear reactors because they did not have enough water, as a result of drought, to put on the cooling towers. Far from being a solution to climate change, nuclear is as much a victim of climate change as many other forms of electricity generation, and we are going to see that into the future.

The time to deal with the real challenges of climate change is now, and we are not seeing it. Frankly, fiddling around the edges as the government is doing is an insult to the science, to future generations and to people who are desperately concerned and living at this very moment with the impacts of extreme weather events like much more extreme drought and much more extreme bushfires. We will see, no doubt, in time to come—as we have with cyclones—more extreme weather events, storm surges and coastal degradation. That is happening now. The adaptation centre is welcome, but it is 10 years too late. But adaptation is not enough on its own; we have to set credible targets for greenhouse gas reductions. We have to set interim targets for 2020, because otherwise how are we ever going to get to a 2050 target in the time frame?

Another issue really concerns me. Last year I talked about oil depletion, and we had a whole Senate inquiry into future oil supplies and the need to move to alternative transport fuels and invest in public transport—and still there is nothing. It seems that the government does not care that the balance of trade figures are going so far in the wrong direction. Doesn’t anybody care about the extent to which that imbalance is occurring, driven largely by oil imports? A decade ago we had 80 to 100 per cent self-reliance in oil. Now it is down to 55 per cent and going down fast. We are going to be importing and paying very high prices for oil in a global market where demand is outstripping supply—in my view faced with peak oil. Now was the opportunity to invest heavily in public transport. If there was one mega failure in the budget it was the fact that $22.3 billion was set aside in transport funding for new roads and nothing for mobility in our cities.

Everywhere else in the world can recognise that mobility is one of the biggest issues facing cities today. Look at what is happening overseas. You have California mandating reduced greenhouse gas emissions of 25 per cent by 2020; New York, 30 per cent by 2030; and the Mayor of London putting in place a huge investment in public transport. He has put in place congestion charges and used the money to invest in public transport to improve the amenity of the city. Investment in public transport does many things. First of all it improves air quality and health in the cities. Secondly, it reduces congestion and improves people’s lives, because they can get around a healthier city much more quickly. Congestion in Australian cities is costing business and the community dearly for the hours people are sitting in their cars stuck in traffic jams. It also deals with the issue of obesity, climate change and oil depletion.

Why will the government not spend the surplus looking at major infrastructure development in public transport in our cities which would benefit everybody and take care of a number of the big issues facing this country today? The Mayor of London has made public transport free for people under 16 and over 60. That recognises that those people need to move around the city and that they are in a position where they do not have as much cash as others. He has moved in and invested heavily in a new bus fleet, using the money from congestion charges to advance public transport. But in Australia it seems that the relationship with the private vehicle is such that the government is determined to maintain it by putting in new roads without any thinking about how we are going to keep those cars on the road in the face of oil depletion. Frankly, putting some money aside for alternative fuels at the same time as introducing an excise regime which effectively discriminates against them demonstrates that the government does not really understand oil depletion, alternative fuels, climate change—any of the issues that are concerning people thinking about urban planning. In fact, the government, instead of investing in public transport, is putting pressure on the states to free up more land outside the cities—further and further from the heart of the city—without a commensurate investment in public transport. You can say that that is a state issue, but the point is: if you are interested in nation building, where in the world have you got a major, progressive city without a highly efficient public transport system? Go to Tokyo, go to New York, go to Paris, go to London and you find that level of public transport. Go to Sydney and you end up in Western Sydney and there is no access to public transport at all. That is a major infrastructure failure.

I would like to use the last few moments to speak about the school outcomes because I find this devastating. There was an opportunity in this budget to invest heavily in high-quality public education, and it has not happened. Australia’s public schools are dying for more adequate funding, and, frankly, to say to Australia’s public schools that we are going to give students money to go off for tutoring out of hours or after school for literacy, but not provide schools and teachers with the capacity to deliver that literacy in the schools, is a disgrace. Giving a $50,000 bonus to schools that make significant improvements in literacy just does not show any realistic understanding of the difficulties faced by a school. Not all schools are equal in the catchments from which they draw their students and in the difficulties associated with teaching those students. All this is doing is creating the kind of competition in the education sector which will undermine one of the pillars of a progressive society, and that is public education. The government’s refusal to fund public education and to keep putting the dollars into the private sector in the long term will be seen as one of the absolute disasters and failures of nation building.

As for performance pay for teachers, I find that totally and utterly unacceptable. I cannot believe it actually, having taught in public schools myself. It takes a whole school to manage some students—that is the fact. If you set up competition between teachers, if you leave a principal to determine that one teacher will get a bonus and another teacher will not get a bonus, then you will have the teacher without the bonus saying, ‘You take those difficult children; why should I have to do that? You don’t think I am a particularly good teacher; you get more money, you take those students.’ You are going to get that kind of behaviour in schools which will undermine their capacity. Both nursing and teaching are collegiate professions. You need to work with your colleagues and you need to be treated fairly, justly and equally. I find this whole notion of performance based pay an affront. It is going to be more and more difficult to staff those difficult schools because if your pay depends on performance you will want to work in the schools where the social capital of those students enables you to get a bonus. Who will want to go to a school where that is more difficult to achieve? Let us fund schools to be collegiate in the way they operate. Let us give them the resources to deliver the literacy and numeracy outcomes that we want. Let us not keep undermining the morale of teachers. Let us not keep pretending that the private sector, in terms of these literacy and numeracy bonuses or payments to go off to after-school learning and whatever, is going to replace a qualified and dedicated teacher at a public school, because it never ever will.