David Pocock (ACT, Independent) Share this | Hansard source

I too rise to talk about the IPCC report released overnight. It is right that we turn our attention towards this survival guide for humanity. The report paints a bleak and sobering picture if we do not act decisively. But it also offers hope. If we are able to muster up the political will to implement the solutions that we already have, then there is a narrow window where we can secure a future for all the people and places we love. In all of the debate in this place, the thing that is not often talked about is that this is about the people and places we love.

The report says that the world is likely to hit 1.5 degrees of warming within the next decade. We've just lived through a summer with 1.1 degrees of warming. This is the new normal. This is what we're facing, as communities and as a nation. It is irresponsible to put up policy that isn't up to scratch and doesn't guarantee that emissions will start to go down. It's policy that hopes our biggest emitters will do the right thing. It's policy that puts us next to Kazakhstan as one of only two countries in the world that allow unfettered access to offsets. We can do better.

When then prime minister Tony Abbott repealed the carbon tax there was an IPCC report. There's now an IPCC report and a Senate that wants bold climate action. I implore the government to take up that offer and to head in the right direction, not to continue on this path we've been going down. (Time expired)