Post by pim on Jun 4, 2021 9:11:49 GMT 10
The reality could be that the real change in Australian politics is the move towards governments with razor thin majorities or minority governments who rely on making deals with non party-aligned independent MPs. Last March, according to John Hewson, there was an online conference of independents - both sitting MPs and candidates - from 80 federal electorates. Now realistically no-one is suggesting that all of those 80 electorates will return Independent MPs to Canberra but it is realistic to predict that the next federal election will see more Independents elected to federal parliament and not fewer. The catalyst is the race to the bottom by both major parties on climate change: the punters out there want action on climate change and so far this has seen a number of Coalition MPs defeated by Independents who decades ago when the Liberal Party was more in the Menzies tradition would have found a place in the pre-Howard Liberal Party but these days have to present as Independents. So the rise of Independent MPs thus far has been at the expense of the Coalition. In Labor held seats the threat on the issue of climate change comes from the Greens. Watch this space if Albo Labor squibs it on climate change and joins the Coalition in their unseemly race to the bottom. The sleeper in the forthcoming federal election is the rise of the independents as the deciding factor in the upcoming 47th parliament.
The sleeper election issue that could bite Morrison and Albanese
John Hewson 2 June 2021 www.smh.com.au/environment/climate-change/the-sleeper-election-issue-that-could-bite-morrison-and-albanese-20210602-p57xak.html
Scott Morrison has rightly followed the science and medical advice in responding to COVID-19. If his government hadn’t closed our borders, and the states hadn’t enforced lockdowns and social distancing, imagine the catastrophe.
The Prime Minister quantified it recently when he said Australia had avoided 30,000 COVID deaths. That compares with the 910 deaths caused by the pandemic to date. “I’m not going to take risks with Australian lives,” Morrison said.
His government is not treating the hard climate science with the same urgency, although it has been developed over many more decades than the more rudimentary medical science it relied upon in responding to the pandemic.
Last month, the International Energy Agency, a long-time mouthpiece for fossil fuels, called for a global halt to new coal and gas ventures. At the same time, the Morrison government committed to spending $600 million of taxpayers’ money on a new gas-fired power plant in NSW’s Hunter Valley.
Inaction on climate change presents us with real costs – in lives, livelihoods and the lost economic growth that would come with sustainable industries and jobs. Economist Nicki Hutley has summarised some of the likely consequences of inaction: “The cost of extreme weather disasters in Australia has doubled since the ’70s, reaching $35 billion over the decade to 2018-19. Economic damages per person are around seven times the global average.”
The recent Black Summer fires are estimated to have cost about $100 billion – 14 times the economic and social costs of the 2009 Black Saturday fires.
Health costs are just starting to be recognised and counted. Hutley reports that the 2011 heatwave “saw a 14 per cent rise in ambulance call-outs and a 13 per cent increase in excess deaths”. Particulate emissions from dirty petrol have been reported to kill multiples of the road toll each year.
Research from the Australian National University and the University of Melbourne suggests economic losses from climate change in a few decades could be like a COVID-sized economic shock every year. A similar prognosis has been suggested by modelling for the NSW government.
Australia also runs the genuine risk that, as a global climate laggard, significant trading partners will levy carbon border taxes on our exports, costing billions in lost revenue and thousands of lost jobs.
The benefits of an effective and just transition, meanwhile, are supported by Deloitte, Beyond Zero, the Climate Council and many more in Australia, and by strategies adopted globally, including in the United States, Canada, Britain and Europe.
While Joe Biden and Boris Johnson push for greater emissions reductions, investor pressure mounts on fossil fuel companies. Shell was ordered by a Dutch court to slash its emissions; 61 per cent of Chevron shareholders backed a resolution to force an emissions reduction; and an activist hedge fund won two seats on the ExxonMobil board.
Australia’s Federal Court found, in assessing a new coal mine, that our Environment Minister had a “duty of care” to younger people to avoid causing them personal injury from climate change. Expect more class actions against governments on climate.
Disturbingly, Australia’s two major political parties are engrossed in a race to the bottom on climate change, seeing who can be less specific about targets and commitments.
With the prospect of an early federal election this year, there is growing interest in running independents in key seats, focusing heavily on climate issues. In an online independents’ convention in March, 80 electorates were represented. In 38 electorates there are community-based groups under the banner of Voices, and movements such as “Vote Angus Taylor Out”. Clearly, independents will not be elected in all these seats, but they may well claim enough seats to swing the balance of power.
As the philosopher Karl Popper said, the party system robs individual politicians of responsibility, “makes [them] a voting machine rather than a thinking feeling person … what we need in politics are individuals who can judge on their own and who are prepared to carry personal responsibility”.
Scott Morrison will no doubt attempt to keep the election focus on his handling of the pandemic and the economy, capitalising on his poll superiority to Labor leader Anthony Albanese. The sleeper election issue of climate may have to be carried by the independents. The Prime Minister would be wise to remember the Wentworth by-election.
John Hewson 2 June 2021 www.smh.com.au/environment/climate-change/the-sleeper-election-issue-that-could-bite-morrison-and-albanese-20210602-p57xak.html
Scott Morrison has rightly followed the science and medical advice in responding to COVID-19. If his government hadn’t closed our borders, and the states hadn’t enforced lockdowns and social distancing, imagine the catastrophe.
The Prime Minister quantified it recently when he said Australia had avoided 30,000 COVID deaths. That compares with the 910 deaths caused by the pandemic to date. “I’m not going to take risks with Australian lives,” Morrison said.
His government is not treating the hard climate science with the same urgency, although it has been developed over many more decades than the more rudimentary medical science it relied upon in responding to the pandemic.
Last month, the International Energy Agency, a long-time mouthpiece for fossil fuels, called for a global halt to new coal and gas ventures. At the same time, the Morrison government committed to spending $600 million of taxpayers’ money on a new gas-fired power plant in NSW’s Hunter Valley.
Inaction on climate change presents us with real costs – in lives, livelihoods and the lost economic growth that would come with sustainable industries and jobs. Economist Nicki Hutley has summarised some of the likely consequences of inaction: “The cost of extreme weather disasters in Australia has doubled since the ’70s, reaching $35 billion over the decade to 2018-19. Economic damages per person are around seven times the global average.”
The recent Black Summer fires are estimated to have cost about $100 billion – 14 times the economic and social costs of the 2009 Black Saturday fires.
Health costs are just starting to be recognised and counted. Hutley reports that the 2011 heatwave “saw a 14 per cent rise in ambulance call-outs and a 13 per cent increase in excess deaths”. Particulate emissions from dirty petrol have been reported to kill multiples of the road toll each year.
Research from the Australian National University and the University of Melbourne suggests economic losses from climate change in a few decades could be like a COVID-sized economic shock every year. A similar prognosis has been suggested by modelling for the NSW government.
Australia also runs the genuine risk that, as a global climate laggard, significant trading partners will levy carbon border taxes on our exports, costing billions in lost revenue and thousands of lost jobs.
The benefits of an effective and just transition, meanwhile, are supported by Deloitte, Beyond Zero, the Climate Council and many more in Australia, and by strategies adopted globally, including in the United States, Canada, Britain and Europe.
While Joe Biden and Boris Johnson push for greater emissions reductions, investor pressure mounts on fossil fuel companies. Shell was ordered by a Dutch court to slash its emissions; 61 per cent of Chevron shareholders backed a resolution to force an emissions reduction; and an activist hedge fund won two seats on the ExxonMobil board.
Australia’s Federal Court found, in assessing a new coal mine, that our Environment Minister had a “duty of care” to younger people to avoid causing them personal injury from climate change. Expect more class actions against governments on climate.
Disturbingly, Australia’s two major political parties are engrossed in a race to the bottom on climate change, seeing who can be less specific about targets and commitments.
With the prospect of an early federal election this year, there is growing interest in running independents in key seats, focusing heavily on climate issues. In an online independents’ convention in March, 80 electorates were represented. In 38 electorates there are community-based groups under the banner of Voices, and movements such as “Vote Angus Taylor Out”. Clearly, independents will not be elected in all these seats, but they may well claim enough seats to swing the balance of power.
As the philosopher Karl Popper said, the party system robs individual politicians of responsibility, “makes [them] a voting machine rather than a thinking feeling person … what we need in politics are individuals who can judge on their own and who are prepared to carry personal responsibility”.
Scott Morrison will no doubt attempt to keep the election focus on his handling of the pandemic and the economy, capitalising on his poll superiority to Labor leader Anthony Albanese. The sleeper election issue of climate may have to be carried by the independents. The Prime Minister would be wise to remember the Wentworth by-election.