May 19th, 2019

How did this happen?  I have never felt so depressed following a federal election result.  It is not that one party has won and the other lost, but that hopes for genuine action on fundamental issues requiring reform seem to be dashed. At the top of the list is genuine policy to deal with carbon emissions. I am depressed because reasonable calculations show that the world will have spent its carbon budget for keeping temperature rise to 1.5 degrees within five years. For Australia to wait for the next election in another three years to join the rest of the world in responsible action will be virtually too late.
 
Both sides of politics understand two factors always underlie election results: self-interest and rallying around what is opposed, rather than what is supported.  In this election Labor has done its best to outline a significant range of policies (right or wrong) and sought support from the electorate.  On the other hand the coalition have not outlined a single policy that I can remember, having devoted all their energy in making the electorate afraid of Labor policy.
 
Many aspects of the Australian landscape are in desperate need of reform, but it appears almost certain none will be addressed during the next term of government.  Reform implies movement from the known and familiar to a hoped-for better place. Movement always includes risk, imagined or real. For a group or nation to embark on such a step dynamic, empathetic and intellectually sharp leadership is required. These and other attributes undergird the trust required. It is hardly surprising that Bob Hawke is arguably the most reforming Prime Minister since WW2 and that he and  Paul Keating laid the foundations for modern Australia. The polls have consistently showed that Bill Shorten was never going to be that person for the Australian people, despite formulating a formidable reform agenda.  Taxation is in desperate need of reform.  Indigenous Affairs is in desperate need of reform – Senator Dodson could have delivered this.  Immigration is in desperate need of reform – Dutton can never deliver this. Above all climate and energy policy are in desperate need of reform – Mark Butler could have delivered this; in the meantime we are stuck with Melissa Price, the coalition minister for climate change denying and non-environmental policy making.
 
We need a government capable of standing on its own two feet, not humiliating the Australian people by bowing the knee to News Limited and the shock jocks.
 
That is another story, let me stay with climate policy.
 
The situation is now quite desperate. We do not have the luxury of spare time to ‘work things through’. Unless immediate global action is taken, we will pass further irreversible tipping points.  We are already experiencing at least 1.1 degrees of warming and we know what difference that has already made to global climatic conditions.  We know, for example, that 2 degrees will almost certainly wipe out all coral reefs.  The cost of inaction is infinitely greater than action.
 
The mistake Labor has made in Queensland is to have missed the opportunity of pumping billions of dollars into that state to make it the national hub of climate change technologies and renewable energy initiatives.   Such an investment would have delivered infinitely more jobs than will be lost as the coal industry is phased out.  As it is, escalating global warming will cut a swathe through their tourist industry which is worth far more jobs that the mining industry ever will.
 
I hope everyone watched last week’s The Weekly and Charlie Pickering.  Alan Jones, that superstar of self acclaimed intellectuals who are more knowledgeable than scientists, has been constantly repeating that Australia’s contributions to carbon emissions at 1.3% of the global total is not making the slightest difference. Charlie made the point that a little short of 50% is emitted by nations like Australia, the rest being emitted by the three or four big polluters.  At 0.3 percent of global population we are significantly over our fair share. If other nations have this attitude nothing is possible.
 
With no disrespect to scientists, the science is not hard to understand.  Lighter greenhouse gas traps less heat, denser greenhouse gas traps more heat. Heat is energy, and while one degree looks insignificant the extra trapped energy multiplies the effect of normal weather events resulting in the extremes of rain, drought, storms etc that have become so observable.
 
Electors over the age of 50 probably lost little in this election (those with franking credits may feel they have gained a lot).  Those who lost terribly are those under that age and especially those who were too young to vote.  The world of the future is not going to be a continuation of the Holocene, enjoyed by humanity for the last 200,00 years or so.  It is going to be a far more unstable world in which those with financial resources will try to protect themselves and seek insurance from an industry with growing reluctance to write a policy, while those with fewer resources and living in low lying areas of the Pacific or Bangladesh  will seek to move to where the more fortunate live.
 
This election has been like all previous elections, “about the economy – stupid”.   We can only hope that before it is too late the electorate and its political leadership will realise this is a terrible mistake – it is not about the economy, but about the ecology -stupid.  There can be no guaranteed health for any individual unless the total environment is healthy and there can be no stability for the economy if the very source of the world’s economic resource – the environment, is imperilled.
 
I call on the growing number of citizens who understand the perilous situation in which we currently live not to give up, to join the children in saying you cannot and must not steal our future simply because vested self-interest wants to draw an income from fossil fuels for a few more tawdry years.
 
No new mine must be allowed to start,  and every endeavour must be made to help Australian citizens move to a zero-carbon footprint in the immediate future.