WEBVTT - How Albanese killed the climate wars 0:00:00.640 --> 0:00:03.760 Anthony Alberanzi was first elected on a pledge to fix 0:00:03.760 --> 0:00:07.240 the climate oars. The most recent test of that promise 0:00:07.320 --> 0:00:10.240 was the emissions targets he announced and broadcast on the 0:00:10.240 --> 0:00:14.080 world stage. But if the targets themselves don't meet the 0:00:14.120 --> 0:00:17.760 standard set by scientists, and the policy underpinning them hasn't 0:00:17.840 --> 0:00:23.520 dramatically altered, then what's really going to change. I'm Ruby 0:00:23.600 --> 0:00:32.919 Jones and you're listening to seven AM Today journalist Nick 0:00:33.000 --> 0:00:36.680 fake on the inadequacies in the government's climate policy and 0:00:36.720 --> 0:00:40.280 how the media has allowed a political narrative to overshadow 0:00:40.320 --> 0:00:49.120 the reality of the climate crisis. It's Thursday, October nine, 0:00:54.680 --> 0:00:58.720 So Nick, the Prime Minister, Anthony Alberanzi, he made the 0:00:58.760 --> 0:01:02.200 most significant climate announcement of his second term, which was 0:01:02.240 --> 0:01:04.400 these new emissions targets recently. 0:01:04.800 --> 0:01:07.880 He then went on to present them at the United Nations. 0:01:08.040 --> 0:01:11.440 So to begin with, just tell me a bit about 0:01:11.560 --> 0:01:14.480 how alban Easy has described what it is that Australia 0:01:14.600 --> 0:01:16.560 is doing to the rest of the world. 0:01:17.160 --> 0:01:19.759 So when the Prime Minister spoke to the UN summit 0:01:19.840 --> 0:01:23.200 recently in New York, he told world leaders this is 0:01:23.240 --> 0:01:26.600 the decisive decade for acting on the environmental challenge of 0:01:26.600 --> 0:01:27.800 climate change. 0:01:28.000 --> 0:01:32.760 Australia is acting to meet the environmental challenge of climate 0:01:32.840 --> 0:01:37.960 change while working to seize and share the economic opportunities 0:01:38.000 --> 0:01:44.280 of renewable energy. Our target is ambitious, but importantly it 0:01:44.440 --> 0:01:46.160 is achievable, and if. 0:01:46.080 --> 0:01:49.520 You read most Australian media over the past fortnite, you'd 0:01:49.520 --> 0:01:54.280 think Australia's charting a path towards climate action, A pragmatic, 0:01:54.440 --> 0:01:57.040 realistic middle path was the way that most of the 0:01:57.160 --> 0:02:01.960 media covered the emission's target announced When he spoke to 0:02:02.000 --> 0:02:05.720 The Australian last week, Albanese he cited his government's new 0:02:05.720 --> 0:02:09.680 emissions target rangers too high for business groups and the 0:02:09.680 --> 0:02:13.160 opposition not high enough for the Greens, as if this 0:02:13.360 --> 0:02:16.440 sort of proved that it struck the right balance. So 0:02:16.480 --> 0:02:19.360 you'd think, in general reading the coverage that his plan 0:02:19.480 --> 0:02:23.640 was sensible and responsible, a plan for serious climate action. 0:02:24.320 --> 0:02:26.519 Okay, So what is actually in the plant? 0:02:26.840 --> 0:02:30.040 So the plan is for a sixty two to seventy 0:02:30.200 --> 0:02:33.560 percent So it's a range of emissions reduction over the 0:02:33.600 --> 0:02:34.280 next ten. 0:02:34.160 --> 0:02:40.240 Years, cutting emissions by sixty two to seventy percent. We 0:02:40.400 --> 0:02:44.320 are honoring our commitment to the Paris Agreement and each 0:02:44.440 --> 0:02:48.639 goal of keeping global temperatures below dangerous levels. 0:02:48.880 --> 0:02:52.440 So the low end sixty two percent, which you'd have 0:02:52.520 --> 0:02:55.120 to say, is surely more likely than them reaching the 0:02:55.200 --> 0:02:59.639 higher end, it wouldn't meet our international obligations. Even the 0:02:59.720 --> 0:03:03.800 high end is actually behind other Western nations like the UK. 0:03:04.080 --> 0:03:07.560 So bear in mind that Australia is already the second 0:03:07.680 --> 0:03:13.119 highest per capita emitter in the world. Currently, Australia's emissions 0:03:13.400 --> 0:03:17.080 aren't really falling. Even its domestic emissions. They haven't fallen 0:03:17.120 --> 0:03:20.560 significantly since about two thousand and five. I think we 0:03:20.680 --> 0:03:23.480 might have fallen but within a percentage point under the 0:03:23.560 --> 0:03:27.560 Labor government, so we haven't begun major emissions cuts yet. 0:03:28.320 --> 0:03:32.920 But even then the target doesn't even count exports. So 0:03:33.120 --> 0:03:36.440 put another way, the emission's targets that were announced last week, 0:03:36.880 --> 0:03:40.360 they don't apply to around eighty percent of the emissions 0:03:40.400 --> 0:03:42.160 for which Australia is responsible. 0:03:43.040 --> 0:03:45.320 Okay, we'll talk to me a bit more about that 0:03:45.400 --> 0:03:49.640 if you focused in on domestic emissions, to what extent is. 0:03:50.160 --> 0:03:52.720 Our target undercut by our policy? 0:03:53.000 --> 0:03:57.000 So despite announcing a new emissions target, the Albanesi government 0:03:57.080 --> 0:04:02.240 has no legislative policies to enforce actual emissions cuts across 0:04:02.280 --> 0:04:05.920 any part of the domestic economy. So after they won 0:04:06.040 --> 0:04:08.920 the twenty twenty two election and came to power, even 0:04:08.960 --> 0:04:11.360 as they hailed at the climate wars were over, they 0:04:11.360 --> 0:04:13.880 talked about the defeat of Scott Morrison as a win 0:04:14.000 --> 0:04:17.760 for the climate. They didn't pass a whole new emission scheme, 0:04:17.839 --> 0:04:20.359 so that they didn't pass like an ETS or a 0:04:20.400 --> 0:04:23.440 carbon price. The only legislation they passed was to tweak 0:04:23.520 --> 0:04:27.520 what was essentially a coalition policy, the Safeguard mechanism, and 0:04:27.560 --> 0:04:31.360 this applies only to Australia's top two hundred biggest polluters, 0:04:32.000 --> 0:04:34.599 and in fact it's so badly designed that it allows 0:04:34.720 --> 0:04:40.279 even these companies to buy unlimited, cheap bogus offsets instead 0:04:40.320 --> 0:04:44.600 of cutting emission. So there's nothing that makes these polluters 0:04:44.600 --> 0:04:48.080 have to cut their real emissions. So even the inadequate 0:04:48.120 --> 0:04:50.680 target that we do have, we've got no way of 0:04:50.720 --> 0:04:54.039 stopping big polluters even from putting the same amount of 0:04:54.040 --> 0:05:00.440 emissions into the air to fulfill their legal obligations. Pointing 0:05:00.480 --> 0:05:04.480 at bogus sort of offsets, it doesn't reduce emissions. And 0:05:04.920 --> 0:05:06.800 these are the kind of a canning tricks. They just 0:05:06.839 --> 0:05:11.840 don't have any scientific validity. They don't address climate change. So, 0:05:12.279 --> 0:05:15.160 you know, while the government talks a lot about renewable energy, 0:05:15.200 --> 0:05:18.800 and renewable energy is going up in Australia, it kind 0:05:18.839 --> 0:05:22.799 of doesn't matter if you're not reducing your fossil fuel emissions, 0:05:22.839 --> 0:05:27.640 which we're not doing. So we're exploring huge amounts of emissions. 0:05:27.960 --> 0:05:32.200 We're not actually cutting our local domestic emissions. So the 0:05:32.240 --> 0:05:35.200 idea that we have this strong climate plan, where were 0:05:35.240 --> 0:05:39.200 the policies that were associated with this target? There were 0:05:39.240 --> 0:05:42.880 no new policies. It's a number. It means nothing. 0:05:44.400 --> 0:05:44.960 Coming up. 0:05:45.120 --> 0:05:48.400 How the media covers climate change through the game of politics. 0:05:57.080 --> 0:05:59.040 Can we talk a bit more nick about how we 0:05:59.320 --> 0:06:02.320 got into this position, because, as you say, when Albanzi 0:06:02.440 --> 0:06:04.400 first came to power, it was the you know, the 0:06:04.440 --> 0:06:08.440 quote unquote climate election, and the people who voted in 0:06:08.720 --> 0:06:13.560 the Labor government then and more recently clearly care about 0:06:13.600 --> 0:06:18.520 climate action taking place. However, it seems to have become 0:06:18.960 --> 0:06:21.240 neutral as a political issue. So tell me about how 0:06:21.279 --> 0:06:23.200 you think Albanezi has managed to do that. 0:06:23.640 --> 0:06:25.560 Well, I think a lot of there was a lot 0:06:25.600 --> 0:06:28.919 of rhetoric and people will relieved to hear that the 0:06:28.960 --> 0:06:32.359 government was acting on climate change. You know, the rhetoric 0:06:32.480 --> 0:06:36.400 was about boosting renewables. It was about having this new 0:06:36.440 --> 0:06:39.599 safeguard mechanism that would stop the biggest ballooters, et cetera. 0:06:40.080 --> 0:06:42.520 I think a lot of people assumed that things were happening, 0:06:42.520 --> 0:06:44.960 and I still have a lot of conversations with people 0:06:45.000 --> 0:06:47.640 who say, oh, well, there, it might not be perfect, 0:06:47.680 --> 0:06:49.880 but then much better than the opposition was. Well, the 0:06:49.960 --> 0:06:53.599 rhetoric's a lot better, but the actions on the ground 0:06:53.920 --> 0:06:58.679 are not dissimilar. So essentially people stopped wanting to read 0:06:58.720 --> 0:07:01.240 about it because the policy these were too complex. No 0:07:01.240 --> 0:07:05.040 one could understand what the safeguard mechanism was. The media 0:07:05.080 --> 0:07:09.160 couldn't be bothered doing long explainers. It was too complex. 0:07:09.880 --> 0:07:13.080 You know, arguably this is deliberate. It's a deliberate way 0:07:13.120 --> 0:07:17.600 of pushing people out of the policy conversation. Instead, the 0:07:17.680 --> 0:07:20.680 media just basically now report on the politics of it 0:07:20.720 --> 0:07:23.840 as if it's a game of strategy. Who's up, who's down? 0:07:23.880 --> 0:07:26.600 Who looked good while making their announcement? What does it 0:07:26.640 --> 0:07:30.560 say about Susan Lee's leadership. To me, this was the 0:07:30.560 --> 0:07:34.120 most noticeable thing about the past two weeks of the 0:07:34.160 --> 0:07:38.000 conversations that we were supposedly having about climate change in 0:07:38.040 --> 0:07:41.400 climate politics, you know. For example, so in the Guardian, 0:07:41.480 --> 0:07:44.800 under the headline from New York to London, Anthony Albanezi 0:07:45.000 --> 0:07:50.000 plots of statesmanlike course through global turmoil. Their chief political correspondent, 0:07:50.040 --> 0:07:54.280 Tom McElroy kind of waxed on that Albanzi had shown 0:07:54.360 --> 0:07:56.440 that he can hold his own on the global stage 0:07:56.440 --> 0:08:00.840 while promoting Australian ideas on climate and that Australia is 0:08:00.920 --> 0:08:03.920 viewed as moving in the right direction. This is a 0:08:03.960 --> 0:08:08.400 perception that he's creating in this piece. Jacob Grieber, the 0:08:08.440 --> 0:08:11.480 political editor for the ABC seven point thirty, praise the 0:08:11.520 --> 0:08:14.720 government's handling of its climate announcement in terms of its 0:08:14.760 --> 0:08:18.960 political craftsmanship. He said, it's been a stunning display. The 0:08:19.000 --> 0:08:22.560 whole package was a masterclass in media management by the government. 0:08:22.840 --> 0:08:26.520 So you've got a political journalist congratulating a government for 0:08:26.640 --> 0:08:31.480 dodging the inconsistencies and fallacies of its most important climate policy, 0:08:32.160 --> 0:08:35.800 not to mention the inconvenient fact that Labour hasn't significantly 0:08:35.840 --> 0:08:39.280 reduced emissions and doesn't have the policies. 0:08:38.800 --> 0:08:42.800 To do so, And so what effect does it have 0:08:43.120 --> 0:08:46.280 Viewing climate policy through the prism of politics like this. 0:08:46.679 --> 0:08:50.640 Well, I think essentially you just never canvass the real issues. 0:08:51.080 --> 0:08:54.720 Editors and political journalists have begun to shape the national 0:08:54.760 --> 0:08:59.040 conversations that we have. So while you have great environmental 0:08:59.120 --> 0:09:02.800 journalists in the country and they're working hard and they 0:09:02.840 --> 0:09:06.160 do cover these issues, I'm not saying that the papers 0:09:06.160 --> 0:09:11.080 and the media generally don't give us information about climate change, 0:09:11.240 --> 0:09:14.120 but they're not the ones that are framing our national debates. 0:09:14.200 --> 0:09:17.960 They're not framing our thinking about these issues. So you 0:09:18.000 --> 0:09:21.200 don't have a political journalist talking about the very real 0:09:21.200 --> 0:09:26.320 implications of sea level rises on insurance costs, the costs 0:09:26.360 --> 0:09:31.480 of droughts or algal blooms on endangered ecosystems. You don't 0:09:31.520 --> 0:09:35.400 talk about the rising cost of natural disasters. Instead, they 0:09:35.440 --> 0:09:38.280 allow the policy debates to be framed by, on the 0:09:38.320 --> 0:09:42.960 one hand, large polluters and a denialist opposition on the 0:09:43.000 --> 0:09:47.080 other hand, increasingly right wing national news outlets. So the 0:09:47.160 --> 0:09:50.640 middle path is in the middle of people that essentially 0:09:50.640 --> 0:09:53.880 don't really want to do anything and talk about the issue. 0:09:55.280 --> 0:09:57.800 And can we talk a bit more about the Tills 0:09:58.000 --> 0:10:01.360 and the Greens. I mean, they were even more than 0:10:01.640 --> 0:10:03.640 labor elected on a climate platform. 0:10:04.240 --> 0:10:06.319 They voted for the safeguard mechanism. 0:10:06.440 --> 0:10:09.760 So to what extent do you think that they've has 0:10:09.800 --> 0:10:12.320 some responsibility for the position that we're in. 0:10:12.880 --> 0:10:16.080 I know that the Greens were really pushing for a 0:10:16.120 --> 0:10:20.480 better safeguard mechanism, and they thought that they'd had a 0:10:20.520 --> 0:10:26.160 win in imposing a hard cap on emissions in that legislation. 0:10:27.400 --> 0:10:31.200 I think they fought and got the best that they 0:10:31.800 --> 0:10:35.640 possibly could, and they thought that it would allow them 0:10:35.880 --> 0:10:40.720 to run very hard against labor on no New minds 0:10:40.960 --> 0:10:45.440 for example, and fixing the EPBC Act, putting a climate 0:10:45.559 --> 0:10:50.560 trigger in environmental legislation. I think the Greens thought that 0:10:50.720 --> 0:10:53.480 they weren't getting a perfect mechanism, but it would allow 0:10:53.520 --> 0:10:58.520 them the space to fight on another substantive issues, the tials. 0:10:58.559 --> 0:11:02.640 I just think they didn't really understand the complexity of 0:11:02.679 --> 0:11:05.120 the legislation, and that's a shame. I don't think they 0:11:05.160 --> 0:11:09.479 would have passed it even the NGOs see Environmental NGOs. 0:11:09.880 --> 0:11:12.960 At the end, we're backing the safeguard mechanism on the 0:11:12.960 --> 0:11:15.959 grounds that it was better than nothing. Well, arguably it 0:11:16.040 --> 0:11:19.040 wasn't better than nothing, because it ended up we ended 0:11:19.120 --> 0:11:23.400 up with nothing, as in, it hasn't really brought emissions reductions, 0:11:23.880 --> 0:11:27.760 so I think the blame can be spread pretty widely. 0:11:27.840 --> 0:11:31.840 Actually, it hasn't brought emissions reductions, but it has allowed 0:11:31.840 --> 0:11:35.240 people to think that a solution has been delivered, which 0:11:35.240 --> 0:11:36.680 is the danger right exactly. 0:11:36.720 --> 0:11:39.760 We're living in this world where people think we're acting 0:11:39.800 --> 0:11:44.080 on climate change. In Australia, we are not acting on climate. 0:11:43.720 --> 0:11:47.960 Change, and there's a huge amount of declining trust a 0:11:47.960 --> 0:11:51.079 lot of citizensm both in the media and in politics 0:11:51.120 --> 0:11:54.960 more generally. So, as the impact of climate change grows, 0:11:55.000 --> 0:11:57.839 as we see more disasters, as we start to feel it. 0:11:57.800 --> 0:11:59.800 More and more in our everyday lives. 0:12:00.200 --> 0:12:03.320 What do you think these big institutions are risking by 0:12:03.360 --> 0:12:05.079 not taking. 0:12:04.679 --> 0:12:07.600 This as seriously as they could. 0:12:07.880 --> 0:12:13.560 I think essentially the major media institutions are risking their 0:12:13.559 --> 0:12:19.280 own future audience by not treating this issue with the 0:12:19.520 --> 0:12:24.360 due seriousness. If you google temperature records this month, you're 0:12:24.360 --> 0:12:27.600 going to get a lot of results. If people are 0:12:27.640 --> 0:12:32.000 looking at their insurance policies that are coming through this month, 0:12:32.400 --> 0:12:35.560 they're seeing the effects of these things already starting to 0:12:35.559 --> 0:12:39.400 come through. Now, when we have a media that is 0:12:39.480 --> 0:12:44.000 simply not willing to take these issues seriously, it really 0:12:44.120 --> 0:12:48.320 risks their relationship with their audience, as in who's telling 0:12:48.360 --> 0:12:51.640 the truth? How can we possibly be having an argument 0:12:51.679 --> 0:12:55.880 about climate action where you say the government is acting responsibly, 0:12:55.880 --> 0:13:00.199 they're very sensible, at the same time as they're expand 0:13:00.400 --> 0:13:03.480 our fossil fuel extraction, at the same time as they're 0:13:03.520 --> 0:13:07.360 subsidizing fossil fuels by ten billion dollars a year, at 0:13:07.400 --> 0:13:11.800 the same time as they're ignoring recommendations from their own 0:13:11.840 --> 0:13:15.440 climate risk assessments. All of these things point to a 0:13:15.480 --> 0:13:18.880 government that's completely in denial and they're being applauded for 0:13:19.000 --> 0:13:22.400 it by the media. Essentially, I think it's no wonder 0:13:22.440 --> 0:13:26.600 that people are losing trust in the major parties and 0:13:27.040 --> 0:13:27.960 the major media. 0:13:31.120 --> 0:13:33.120 Wennick, thank you so much for your type. 0:13:33.280 --> 0:13:35.000 Thanks very much. Ruby. 0:13:44.320 --> 0:13:47.319 Also in the news today, a senior government official says 0:13:47.320 --> 0:13:49.960 I've just emailed the wrong address when it notified the 0:13:49.960 --> 0:13:53.640 Department of Communications about a major triple zero outage on 0:13:53.760 --> 0:13:57.520 September the eighteenth. Communications Minister Anika Wells has said she 0:13:57.679 --> 0:14:00.240 was not notified of the outage until more than twenty 0:14:00.280 --> 0:14:01.240 four hours after. 0:14:01.040 --> 0:14:01.720 It first began. 0:14:02.760 --> 0:14:06.120 The department's Deputy secret treat James Chisholm, made the disclosure 0:14:06.160 --> 0:14:09.280 during Senate estimates, adding that the Optus email also didn't 0:14:09.320 --> 0:14:12.480 outline the breadth of the outage, which affected six hundred 0:14:12.520 --> 0:14:17.960 calls and one of the seven Australians detained in Israel 0:14:18.000 --> 0:14:20.560 for attempting to deliver aid to Gaza says the group 0:14:20.600 --> 0:14:23.400 has received what she calls a shameful lack of support 0:14:23.440 --> 0:14:26.760 from the federal government. Juliet Lamont, who was deported to 0:14:26.840 --> 0:14:29.480 Jordan with the other Australians, has told the ABC their 0:14:29.520 --> 0:14:32.920 flight out was not facilitated by the Australian government. The 0:14:32.960 --> 0:14:37.080 Australians claimed they were violently physically abused by Israeli authorities. 0:14:37.720 --> 0:14:41.600 Israel has denied any mistreatment, and an Australian government spokesperson 0:14:41.680 --> 0:14:44.560 says DEFAT is continuing to provide consular. 0:14:44.080 --> 0:14:47.120 Assistance to the group. I'm Ruby Jones. This is seven AM. 0:14:47.280 --> 0:15:04.360 Thanks for listening.