Janet Rice (Victoria, Australian Greens) Share this | Hansard source

tor RICE (—) (): I want to put on the record Labor's excuse for not voting for this bill and how their excuse is not supported by the communication and the discussion that the Greens had had with the Labor Party. In fact, Labor asked us: what would be the additional cost to government? We replied that there would be no additional cost. As was noted in the speech on the bill, the scheme has been designed to be cost neutral to the government over time because, basically, although this is government reinsurance changing who pays for the insurance, there will still be insurance purchased by people. It will reduce the cost of insurance from these massive events by, essentially, nationalising that insurance, but the cost is designed to be neutral over time. Expanding the scope of the scheme to include all flood damage wouldn't impact upon this objective. The Australian Reinsurance Pool Corporation would price the additional flood damage risk on a cost-neutral basis.

Insurance is a really interesting representative of the issues that we are facing by living in a climate emergency, and the issues are not going to go away. The costs to Australian society and the costs globally of our climate emergency are going to continue to increase, and the reality of the floods that we have been experiencing over the past months are just an indicator of what we face in this country. It's not just flood damage from cyclones, as has been shown with the floods across Queensland and New South Wales in recent months. None of these would have been eligible for this insurance scheme because they're not cyclone related. But we know that the impact of the climate emergency is going to be increasing intensity and increasing frequency of flood events not just from cyclones but from those heavy downpours. Frankly the science shows why they are happening. It's because we have got a warmer climate and there is more moisture in the atmosphere, so there is more ability for these flood events to occur.

What we need—and this is the only way to be dealing with this—is for Australia to be playing its part globally, to be acting at emergency speed, to be safeguarding our future and to be reducing the damage from our climate emergency, and that means we've got to get out of the mining, the burning and the export of coal, gas and oil—full stop. That is what the science says. It's the only way that we're going to tackle the damage and the loss that is being felt by Australians and that is being felt around the world. Any government that is trying to delude themselves that there is any other way out is just that—deluded—and they are misrepresenting the situation to the Australian community.

It is very clear that we do not have a carbon budget left. There is no time to waste. We need to have an emergency shift and an emergency transition to get out of the mining, the burning and the export of coal, gas and oil. That is the reality that humanity is facing, and that's what this parliament needs to face up to. We need to work out how to do it in the way that best supports workers in that shift, and the Greens have got plans on the table as to how we would support workers who are currently working in those industries to be transitioned into new industries. We need to work out how to cope with the fact that there is already that climate change which is locked in. We're going to see floods, fires and other natural disasters due to the climate emergency continuing. Hence, measures like this reinsurance pool are important, but the reality is that they're not going to be enough. The only thing that is going to be taking the required action is to be getting out of the mining, the burning and export of fossil fuel, and both parties in this government need to realise that and need to be joining the Greens in taking the action that's required, if we are going to safeguard our future.