Zero sum game may reward Libs at the ballot box
Labor says that the government hasnât changed a thing with its newfound conversion to net zero carbon emissions by 2050. âIt was really about nothing today,â said Anthony Albanese in response to Scott Morrisonâs announcement.
Thatâs not true. The Prime Minister has changed one word in the governmentâs policy. Until this week, heâd pledged Australia to âreach net zero, preferably by 2050â. The new policy omits the word âpreferablyâ.
And that one-word edit carries some remarkable implications. Not for the climate. Morrisonâs new 126-page âplanâ wonât actually cut an extra tonne of emissions from the atmosphere. As it says, itâs âbased on existing policiesâ.
Scott Morrison launching the governmentâs net zero emissions plan, âThe Australian Wayâ on Tuesday.Credit:Alex Ellinghausen
It holds the possibility of serious action eventually, but the governmentâs new brochure offers nothing to accelerate decarbonisation of the existing economy or investment in the new.
The Australian tech entrepreneur Mike Cannon-Brookes is investing billions in renewable energy. He read the âplanâ and judged it âridiculously embarrassingâ: âI understand technology damn well. This isnât a âtechnology-driven approachâ. Itâs inaction, misdirection and avoiding choices.â
As policy, itâs junk. As politics, itâs remarkable. Most startling is the implicit admission that the Coalition has been misleading its own supporters for a decade. From the moment Tony âclimate change is crapâ Abbott took the leadership, Coalition policy has been infused with climate scepticism and predicated on falsehoods.
Remember how cutting emissions was going to destroy the economy? Now Morrison boasts repeatedly that Australiaâs emissions have fallen by 20 per cent since 2005 while the economy has grown by 45 per cent in the same time.
The same Morrison who once held aloft in the House of Representatives a black lump of coal now holds aloft a blue-covered âplanâ that envisages cutting carbon emissions from the electricity sector by 91 to 97 per cent between 2005 and 2050, implying the virtual elimination of coal-fired power.
The same Prime Minister who told us two years ago that electric vehicles would âend the weekendâ now promotes a âplanâ that rejoices in the economic potential of EVs.
Illustration: John ShakespeareCredit:The Sydney Morning Herald
âAustralia,â points out Morrisonâs blue brochure, âis uniquely placed to benefit as this global shift unfolds. We can prosper in a world in transition and capitalise on the global shift to a new energy economy.â
Why the dramatic reversal? The new position, like the old position, is founded on politics. The policy that helped deliver power at the 2019 election would deliver defeat in 2022, Morrison concluded. He told his MPs that some 80 per cent of Australians wanted the government to do more about climate change. He had to respond.
Voters concerned about the climate emphatically ejected Tony Abbott from the Sydney seat of Warringah in 2019. Morrison faced a real risk that in 2022 they would eject up to half a dozen others from wealthy, educated urban seats in Sydney and Melbourne, including Katie Allen from Higgins, Dave Sharma from Wentworth, Trent Zimmerman from North Sydney, Jason Falinski from Mackellar and perhaps even Josh Frydenberg from Kooyong.
Morrison holds the House by the barest majority. He canât afford to lose one seat, much less five or six.
Will the trick work? The city-based Liberals are enormously relieved. The regional-based Nationals are another matter entirely.
âItâs momentous,â says the Liberalsâ Katie Allen from the affluent seat of Higgins in Melbourneâs east. âI think itâs the equivalent of the gun laws moment for John Howard â" itâs pivotal. Labor will complain and point-score, thatâs democracy. The point is, we now have a plan.â
The turning point for Howard was the Port Arthur massacre. For Morrison, she says, it was Australiaâs season of flames, the 2019-20 Black Summer: âPeople saw the palls of smoke over their cities for three or four months and the connection with climate change was made. Scott Morrison realised then we had to move, but for the last year he was distracted by COVID.â
The Liberalsâ Dave Sharma from Malcolm Turnbullâs former seat of Wentworth in Sydneyâs east describes the governmentâs new policy as âan enduring political achievement for us as a Coalition and also for the state of national politics. It indicates to voters in my electorate that we are taking this issue seriously, and weâre addressing their concerns. Weâve buried the climate wars and can move ahead now. Weâve agreed on the diagnosis and the remedy, and now itâs an argument about treatment.â
âIf Iâve got to be a prostitute, Iâm going to be a bloody good one.â
What Nationals leader Barnaby Joyce told his colleaguesThe Nationals are getting a very different reaction. Hereâs an indicator. Katie Allen tells me sheâs had dozens of calls and emails from voters happy with the pivot, although many say they now want to see details of the plan. On the other hand, sheâs had just two emails and one phone call from voters angry at the new policy.
Whereas the Nationalsâ leader, Barnaby Joyce, says heâs been fielding angry phone calls non-stop. Joyce and the other Nationals knew to expect a hostile reaction. It turns out many of their constituents truly believed the pro-coal, anti-climate rhetoric the Coalition has been saturating them with for the last decade. They feel betrayed at the reversal.
So the Nationals negotiated secretly with Morrison an agreement on nine key demands as the price of their acquiescence in the new policy for net zero by 20250. Joyce is unabashed about this: âIf Iâve got to be a prostitute, Iâm going to be a bloody good one,â heâs told colleagues.
The nine commitments will form the basis for much of the Nationalsâ election campaigning in the months to come. They will be offered in an effort to offset electoral anger at the net zero policy.
One is that Australia will not sign up to any COP26 climate summit commitment to cut output of methane, a potent greenhouse gas. This was implicit in the governmentâs position; the Nationals insisted it be made explicit. A group of nations, including the US, is pressing for countries to cut their 2020 methane output by 30 per cent by 2030. Australia will not be among them.
âMethane is incredibly important not only for the farm economy but for the regions,â says Joyce. Livestock is a major source of Australiaâs methane. âTo cut methane youâd have to cull cattle. Talking about cutting methane is like talking about shutting down lanes on the Sydney Harbour Bridge â" soon youâre going to have real problems.â
Another is a multi-billion dollar commitment to set up a fund to develop alternative industries in the regions, principally hydrogen fuel. The idea would be to expand new industry against the likely shrinkage of coal mining as world demand falls. Itâs expected that this money would be allocated in the next Coalition budget.
A third is that Scope 3 emissions from coal mining are not counted in achieving Australiaâs national net zero commitment. Scope 3 are the emissions not given off directly by a coal mine or other facility but by the customers or others who use their product.
A fourth and well publicised commitment was for the Queensland LNPâs Keith Pitt, Minister for Resources and Water, to be moved from the outer ministry into the cabinet. Pitt is an opponent of any moves to curb coal or cut emissions.
A fifth is that the government commits to a review of the Environment Protection and Biodiversity Conservation Act. This is Australiaâs overarching mechanism for environmental protection. Its summary says it is âthe Australian governmentâs central piece of environmental legislation. It provides a legal framework to protect and manage nationally and internationally important flora, fauna, ecological communities and heritage places.â
Any review of the EPBC Act by a Coalition government would be politically incendiary, especially if itâs conducted in response to Nationalsâ demands. Under the internal Coalition agreement, the review would be conducted jointly by the Environment Minister, Sussan Ley, and the Minister for Resources and Water, Keith Pitt.
Itâs not expected that this would occur before the next election, which must be held by May at the latest.
A sixth is government commitment to a range of infrastructure programs for the regions and the bush. This would include the extension of the Nationalsâ pet project, the Inland Rail freight line, pending the result of a business case study into its feasibility. This extension from Gladstone to Toowoomba is estimated to cost some $4 billion, which could be funded by the taxpayer or by business.
Altogether, tallying the promise of a new industries fund plus the infrastructure plans could quickly add to more than $10 billion in concessions to the Nationals. Many would argue that any review of the EPBC could cost infinitely more in non-financial, environmental terms.
This combination â" a net zero by 2050 target for the Liberalsâ city seats plus a nine-point, $10 billion package for the Nationalsâ regional seats â" is Morrisonâs formula for retaining government.
Could it work? The pollster for Essential Research, Peter Lewis, points out that Morrison has split the electoral bloc that has long favoured more active climate policy. In his polling, about 60 per cent of the Australian electorate wanted more action on climate change.
By promising net zero by 2050 â" but no new emissions target for 2030 â" Morrison has split this into two. Roughly half of the 60 per cent are content with a 2050 commitment. If you add the voters who want no emissions cuts at all, or are unsure, you get a majority of the electorate, approaching 60 per cent, that might be persuaded that Morrison has done enough, on Lewisâs numbers.
âItâs given him a device,â says Lewis. âItâs terrible policy, but he has a plan he can defend. Whereas his position before was indefensible.â One word has changed, yet it has changed so much.
Peter Hartcher is political editor.
Peter Hartcher is political editor and international editor of The Sydney Morning Herald and The Age.Connect via email.
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