Claire Moore (Queensland, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Hansard source

We should not be surprised by this urgency motion this afternoon. I am looking forward, in the next couple of weeks and the next couple of months of sittings, to seeing an almost weekly motion, replacing the word ‘Queensland’ with ‘Victoria’, ‘New South Wales’, ‘South Australia’ and ‘Tasmania’, so people have a chance to get up and make a short media grab that will link once again to a fear campaign which refuses absolutely and completely to acknowledge that the issues around climate change and our response to them as a nation are responsibilities that we must take. And it is not just a debate about individual states and the impact of the emissions trading scheme on those states; it is a clear discussion, a debate even, about what our response as a nation will be to the international problems of climate change.

We know that the only reason this particular motion is before us today is that in two weeks time there is going to be a Queensland state election. That was most clear in question time today. Those of us who are Queensland senators must engage in the debate because in fact what we must do as senators who represent Queensland is work with the communities in our state to make them understand that we are working towards a response to an international crisis. Indeed, part of the government’s program is a $2.15 billion Climate Change Action Fund, and the first part of that Climate Change Action Fund is information. It is not just a one-off process; it is about information. It would be really helpful in terms of any debate on climate change if we actually felt that all the senators in this place were effectively engaged in looking at real information about it. It is all too easy to have a simplistic political response, but it is important that we see that responding to the issue of climate change across our world is a responsibility that all of us have. The more we try and deny the issue, the more we try and avoid the issue, the more we try and divide, so that we put individual issues above wider expectations, then the more the globe, our world, will be affected.

It still surprises me that we have to reiterate in this place that climate change is real. It seems to me that some of the spending in the information program should be going to senators and other parliamentarians so that they will make a united effort to look at the problems and then engage across the board on the issues. Climate change is a real fear for all of us. Of course, no-one ignores the threat to jobs, no-one ignores the threat to industry, but what we see as being part of our response, as part of the Climate Change Action Fund, is to look at working with industry and communities to ensure that they see that there are real options.

Senator Milne responded, I think at the beginning of her contribution, to the issues around my wonderful state’s climate and environment. We have heard that there is clear evidence of the horror which awaits places like the Great Barrier Reef if we continue to use the world’s resources and do not respond to the worries of climate change. We know about the numbers of jobs in Queensland which are directly dependent on tourism and the environment. As for how we can move forward to build a new jobs stream for our communities, that is a responsibility on which we must work together. One of the components of the Climate Change Action Fund is to work on developing an industry plan for jobs—to work with existing industries to see how they can change the way they operate to respond more effectively and with less pollution and emissions which harm our planet.

First of all, there has got to be an acceptance that there is a problem. Only then will we be able to work on a response. It is still clear that the opposition have not been able to get their own response to this action together. It is easy to say, ‘What about jobs?’ This is the group that, in the first week of the Queensland election campaign which is happening—and I do not want to dwell on the election process—actually had a Your Rights at Work campaign. I know that taking others’ ideas that have worked is a great compliment. There is a lot of worry about what is happening with climate change, and I think people who deny the necessity of action underestimate the knowledge and understanding of this issue by many Queenslanders, many Australians and many other people across the world. People are worried about our climate and our future, and what we need to do is look at that realistically, not engage in a scare campaign. It is too simple to just scare. It is a simple, one-off media grab.

We need to look at the assistance which the government is putting into place, to see whether we can create jobs and make job transitions in this process. It is not a new thing to look at change in industry, and this is not an unexpected change. In terms of the knowledge that is out there about climate change and what is going to happen, it has been the subject of open discussion and debate in the community for years. Unfortunately, there has only been action on this issue in the last 12 months. If there had been a firmer and more immediate response many years ago to what was happening to our globe, we would not be at the point now where people are confronted by the issue rather than being involved in working on a response. In terms of what we need to do, in parts of my state—and I know it well—there is great reliance on resources, mining and investigation, as well as the coal industry. Those industries have been working with governments to look at their futures. It is not a new issue. What we must have is a COAG process involving all the state governments, the federal government and, I firmly believe, local government as well, because what we need to do is engage with communities at the local level—not just with the large employers but with the people themselves.

We hear figures being thrown around of how many jobs are going to be lost as a result of carbon emissions trading. They are not just the immediate jobs in the mines; they are jobs in the wider communities. We understand that. We cannot talk about individual industries. We need to look at the implications and work with some of the funding from the Climate Change Action Fund. It is not just about a single approach. It must engage with the other levels of government, with community organisations and with NGOs. They all have a role to play. That is integral to the plan that the government have put out. It indicates that we have an expectation that local communities, community groups, individual schools and the wide range of people who work together to form those communities will all have an active engagement in this process, based on knowledge, through the information program, and based on their own sense of responsibility.

Again I say that this is not just about Queensland. This is about each person in our country and across the world. Certainly we need to put into place industry plans that work with the places that are looking at emissions funds processes. We need to work at that level. But people continue to deny the threat. We continue to hear across this parliament different ideas about what exactly the threat is. I have heard recently that Mr Turnbull and Mr Hunt are suggesting that we might even have a higher target than that which has been put before the Senate at this time. We heard today that other people think we should not be rushing into it. It would be useful if we could at least have some common response. When we have that, we will be able to work effectively at building through this process and identifying what our responses should be. We are very much aware that people will have transition issues. No-one denies that. It is not as though we have suddenly come up with an idea and are expecting that no-one will be damaged through the process. We will work with people. That is the core aspect of the government’s proposal before us. But we do not need division. We do not need unnecessary diversion. Certainly, we do not need an issue such as global warming and the environmental threat turned into a simplistic political logo for a state election.