Speaker 1: Already and this is the Daily Off. This is the
Speaker 1: Daily OS. Oh now it makes sense.
Speaker 2: Good morning and welcome to the Daily OS. It is Wednesday,
Speaker 2: the twelfth of June.
Speaker 1: I'm Billy, I'm Sam.
Speaker 2: Australia's two major political parties are arguing over climate change again.
Speaker 2: They're arguing about what needs to be done and by
Speaker 2: when and by who.
Speaker 1: Now.
Speaker 2: Over the weekend you may have seen some headlines that
Speaker 2: Opposition leader Peter Dunnan was planning to pull out of
Speaker 2: the Paris Agreement if the coalition is voted in at
Speaker 2: the next election.
Speaker 1: This caused a big political callout.
Speaker 2: And a whole lot of name calling, before Dudden clarified
Speaker 2: that it is not his intention to pull out of
Speaker 2: the Paris Agreement if a coalition he is elected. Well,
Speaker 2: explain what you need to know in today's podcast. But
Speaker 2: before we get there, Sam, what is making headlines today?
Speaker 3: More than three hundred bonds of workers have had their
Speaker 3: employment contracts terminated more than a month after the Budget
Speaker 3: Airline went into administration. External accounting firm Hall Chadwick was
Speaker 3: appointed to wind up the domestic Budget Airlines operations or
Speaker 3: facilitate its sale to an investor. Haul Chadwick said it
Speaker 3: had not received any offers to purchase the airline, leaving
Speaker 3: it quote no option but to terminate all employees and
Speaker 3: cancel all future flights.
Speaker 2: Australia's property market reached a total value of ten point
Speaker 2: seven trillion dollars during the first three months of the year. Thus,
Speaker 2: according to new figures from the Australian Bureau of Statistics,
Speaker 2: the property market increased by more than two hundred million
Speaker 2: dollars between January and March compared to the previous quarter.
Speaker 2: The national average house price is now just over nine
Speaker 2: hundred and fifty nine thousand dollars. New South Wales remains
Speaker 2: the most expensive state to buy a home, with a
Speaker 2: one point two million dollar average price tag.
Speaker 3: Singapore Airlines has announced compensation for passengers on a flight
Speaker 3: hit by severe turbulence last month. One man died of
Speaker 3: a suspected heart attack and some passengers suffered brain and
Speaker 3: spinal injuries. The airline said travelers who sustained minor injuries
Speaker 3: will receive around fifteen thousand dollars in compensation, while those
Speaker 3: medically assessed as seriously injured have been offered thirty eight
Speaker 3: thousand dollars. Singapore Airlines said the payment is to address
Speaker 3: immediate needs of seriously injured passengers, but that it would
Speaker 3: work with individuals to meet their specific circumstances. All passengers
Speaker 3: on board the London to Singapore service on the twentieth
Speaker 3: of May will receive a refund quote, including those who
Speaker 3: did not suffer any injuries.
Speaker 2: In today's good news, this is a great one. New
Speaker 2: research has found that African elephants have names for each other.
Speaker 2: According to findings published in the journal Nature, researchers recorded
Speaker 2: elephant vocalizations and found the animals were addressing each other
Speaker 2: through unique calls. When the audio was played back to
Speaker 2: individual elephants, some flapped their ears and lifted their trunk
Speaker 2: when they heard their name. Researchers hope a better understanding
Speaker 2: of how elephants communicate will help foster stronger conservation strategy.
Speaker 3: You know how they talk to each other, right, no
Speaker 3: through the elephant. How long have we worked together? For?
Speaker 3: Three years?
Speaker 1: Four years, nearly three years.
Speaker 3: Nearly three years, And that means I spend a lot
Speaker 3: of time with you, and I know when you're actually
Speaker 3: really excited about the story, and for some reason this
Speaker 3: story has got you pumped up.
Speaker 1: I did not know where that was going.
Speaker 2: But yes, I am excited, and I'm considering it my
Speaker 2: mission to make the listeners who perhaps clicked on this
Speaker 2: and you didn't know whether they would be interested, to
Speaker 2: be really interested in it, because I just think it's
Speaker 2: so fascinating what has happened over the weekend.
Speaker 1: I remember seeing so much news.
Speaker 2: About dudden pulling out of this Paris agreement, which is massive.
Speaker 3: News if you did do so. That was Saturday, right.
Speaker 2: Exactly, But then Dunnan clarified that they wouldn't pull out
Speaker 2: of Paris, and I was just so confused, and I
Speaker 2: imagined that I'm not the only one who was in
Speaker 2: that case.
Speaker 1: I know you were Sam as well. We were talking
Speaker 1: about it yesterday.
Speaker 2: And I think it's these kinds of stories where the
Speaker 2: Daily Oz really has an opportunity to cut through all
Speaker 2: of the noise and just explain what actually has happened and.
Speaker 3: What you need to know, but also why it matters.
Speaker 3: And I'm really keen to get to that bit as well.
Speaker 3: But why don't we just take this a little slower.
Speaker 3: That was quite a chaotic little introduction from you. Where
Speaker 3: does this story actually start?
Speaker 2: I won't take offense to that Sam. So on Friday night,
Speaker 2: the Australian newspaper publish an interview with opposition leader Peter
Speaker 2: Dunden where he said that a coalition government would scrap
Speaker 2: Labour's twenty thirty emissions target if he's elected at the
Speaker 2: next election. Now side note, you might be wondering when
Speaker 2: the next Australian election is. It's sometime before May next year.
Speaker 3: We don't know the latest point.
Speaker 2: That's the latest point it can be. We don't know
Speaker 2: exactly where it will be, but we know it soon.
Speaker 2: And that is why the coalition, who is currently in opposition,
Speaker 2: is starting to tell us more about what their policies
Speaker 2: would be if they do get elected. So back to
Speaker 2: this news, So, Duddan said that a coalition government would
Speaker 2: scrap Labour's twenty thirty targets because he claims there is
Speaker 2: quote no sense in signing up to targets you don't
Speaker 2: have any prospect of achieving. So basically he's saying, we're
Speaker 2: not going to meet these targets, so why have.
Speaker 1: We legislated there.
Speaker 3: So he didn't directly say we're pulling out of Paris.
Speaker 1: No, and that's the important point.
Speaker 2: I think that Duddin didn't actually explicitly say the Coalition
Speaker 2: would pull out of Paris. Those words did not come
Speaker 2: out of his mouth, but just the suggestion that he
Speaker 2: would scrap these targets which have been legislated under the
Speaker 2: Paris Agreement led to a lot of speculation that a
Speaker 2: coalition government would pull Australia out of the Paris Agreement,
Speaker 2: and that is where these headlines came from. But that
Speaker 2: is not the case, and I'll explain more in a bit.
Speaker 3: Because that really is going to get to the heart
Speaker 3: of what the coalition's policy actually is rather than what
Speaker 3: it's not. So there's a lot of moving parts in
Speaker 3: this story. The key part, though, seems to me to
Speaker 3: be the Paris Agreement itself that was in twenty fifteen.
Speaker 3: Take us back there and tell me about that agreement.
Speaker 2: So back in twenty fifteen, Australia was one of one
Speaker 2: hundred and ninety six parties who signed up to this
Speaker 2: Paris Agreement, which was a promise to limit global temperatures
Speaker 2: to one point five degrees celsius above pre industrial levels.
Speaker 1: Now, it was actually.
Speaker 2: Under a coalition government that Australia did this, which I
Speaker 2: think is interesting in the context of this conversation. I
Speaker 2: think it adds a little bit of nuance because that
Speaker 2: would make it even a bigger deal if the Coalition
Speaker 2: did then get back into government and pull us out
Speaker 2: of it now to achieve this limit of one point
Speaker 2: five degrees celsius, the United Nations states that the world
Speaker 2: must reach net zero by twenty fifty.
Speaker 3: And just in case we haven't thought about net zero
Speaker 3: on this Wednesday morning, give me a quick sense of
Speaker 3: what that is.
Speaker 2: So net zero means balancing how many greenhouse gas emissions
Speaker 2: enter the atmosphere against how many are taken out.
Speaker 3: So the metaphor that people use when explaining net zero
Speaker 3: is this idea of a bath tub, and you need
Speaker 3: the water to be coming out of the plug at
Speaker 3: the bottom at the same rate as new water is
Speaker 3: coming in at the top, and you need that level
Speaker 3: of water to be the same in the bath that's
Speaker 3: net zero exactly.
Speaker 2: Doesn't mean absolutely no emissions, It just means taking out
Speaker 2: the same amount as you're putting in now. Under the
Speaker 2: Paris Agreement, the general goal, like I said, is to
Speaker 2: reach net zero by twenty to fifty. So what are
Speaker 2: we in now twenty twenty four? We have twenty six
Speaker 2: years to get there now. Importantly, signatories to the Paris
Speaker 2: Agreement must have progressive targets to cut emissions. So you
Speaker 2: can't just say we're going to get there in twenty fifty.
Speaker 2: You know, we're going to think about it in twenty forty.
Speaker 2: We've got ten years.
Speaker 3: Then we need to kind of show the roadmap, show
Speaker 3: the working out exactly.
Speaker 2: And it works in five year cycles, so signatories are
Speaker 2: expected to have a plan every five years to progressively
Speaker 2: cut their emissions. And that's where our twenty thirty target
Speaker 2: comes from.
Speaker 3: And I think part of the way that countries and
Speaker 3: parties keep themselves accountable is they kind of come back
Speaker 3: together every so often and say, well, how are you
Speaker 3: going to achieve this and how are you held accountable?
Speaker 3: So what's Australia's plan right now?
Speaker 2: So right now, Australia's twenty thirty target is to reduce
Speaker 2: greenhouse gas emissions by forty three percent below what they
Speaker 2: were at in two thousand and five. And that target
Speaker 2: was set by the Labor government after they got in
Speaker 2: at the twenty twenty two election.
Speaker 3: It was a big issue in that election.
Speaker 2: Massive issue. I think it was widely seen as a
Speaker 2: climate change election.
Speaker 3: I remember we did polling at the time of what
Speaker 3: issue mattered to younger voters, especially in climate change was
Speaker 3: just miles out in front even then at that point,
Speaker 3: well ahead of cost of living.
Speaker 2: Yeah, and I think now, you know, cost of living
Speaker 2: and climate change are still equally just as important in
Speaker 2: young voters' minds. Now Here, it's important to acknowledge that
Speaker 2: it is a fact that Australia is not right now
Speaker 2: on track to reach our target. Last month the government's
Speaker 2: Climate Change Department revealed that Australia will achieve a reduction
Speaker 2: of forty two percent by twenty thirty at the current rate.
Speaker 2: So just to remind, Australia's target is forty three percent,
Speaker 2: were on to achieve forty two percent. So that's a
Speaker 2: difference of one percent, which might not sound like a lot,
Speaker 2: but of course experts would tell you that, you know,
Speaker 2: a percentage is a lot in the context of what
Speaker 2: it can mean for extreme weather and sea level rises
Speaker 2: and food scarcity and a whole range of things that
Speaker 2: climate change impacts. And one more important thing that I
Speaker 2: was reading about this morning, the Climate Change Authority found
Speaker 2: last year Australia's emissions actually increased in June twenty twenty
Speaker 2: three compared to the year prior. So we are behind
Speaker 2: on this target and there is no disputing that.
Speaker 3: And I'm sure whenever this next election will be, it
Speaker 3: will continue to be a really important part of who
Speaker 3: gets elected. But one thing that's different this time around
Speaker 3: is that those targets are now set in Australian law.
Speaker 2: Right, Yeah, this is an important difference because, like you said,
Speaker 2: the targets are now legislated and they were done so
Speaker 2: by the Labor government, and that just means that there's
Speaker 2: more accountability if it fails to meet the target, and
Speaker 2: it also means that it can't be scrapped unless a
Speaker 2: new LA law is passed. So if the coalition government
Speaker 2: comes in, they can't just say we're not going to
Speaker 2: do that. They actually have to pass legislation.
Speaker 3: Which wouldn't be a problem for a future potential coalition
Speaker 3: government if they controlled both the House and the Senate.
Speaker 3: We know that that's not necessarily the status quoit, or often.
Speaker 2: The case that you control the lower House and the
Speaker 2: upper house.
Speaker 3: Right to be harder, and you could envision then another
Speaker 3: round of fighting about climate policy to happen even with
Speaker 3: a change of government.
Speaker 1: Definitely.
Speaker 3: So what is the coalition saying. I mean, we've talked
Speaker 3: a lot about what they're not saying. They're not saying
Speaker 3: they're going to pull out of Paris. What are they saying?
Speaker 2: So the Coalition has now clarified that what they're saying
Speaker 2: is that they believe Labour's targets are not achievable and
Speaker 2: so their argument is what is the point of having
Speaker 2: these unachievable targets If, again these are their words, you
Speaker 2: don't have a plan to actually get there. Obviously Labor
Speaker 2: disputes that, but that's what the coalition is saying, and
Speaker 2: the coalition climate change spokesperson, who is Ted O'Brien, he
Speaker 2: confirmed that it would not maintain the twenty thirty target
Speaker 2: if it were elected. So just to be clear, they
Speaker 2: definitely are planning to scrap Labour's targets. Just one quote
Speaker 2: from him that I think really paints their perspective. He
Speaker 2: said the government quote has basically locked Australia into a
Speaker 2: target without knowing how it's going to get there, how
Speaker 2: much it's going to cost, or who's going to pay
Speaker 2: for it. And in light of the weekend's news, he
Speaker 2: also just clarified one hundred percent that the Coalition is
Speaker 2: committed to Paris and he said that any suggestion that
Speaker 2: it will pull out is a lie. And he also
Speaker 2: clarified that the Coalition is committed to net zero by
Speaker 2: twenty fifty.
Speaker 3: That's really interesting, right, So both major parties are saying
Speaker 3: we are going to be at net zero by twenty fifty.
Speaker 2: Yes, but the key difference is twenty thirty and that's
Speaker 2: kind of what this whole discussion revolves around. In terms
Speaker 2: of twenty thirty, we know they're going to scrap Labour's plans,
Speaker 2: but what Duddan said yesterday is that the Coalition would
Speaker 2: replace the twenty thirty target, but we i don't know
Speaker 2: what they plan to replace it by until after the
Speaker 2: next election, right, So basically he's saying that we will
Speaker 2: go to the polls without knowing what the Coalition's planned
Speaker 2: to reduce emissions by by twenty thirty is.
Speaker 3: So basically we are going to get painted with a
Speaker 3: longer term vision without necessarily understanding the steps to get
Speaker 3: there exactly. So Peter Dutton and the Coalition have laid
Speaker 3: out they've kind of taken the first moves in this
Speaker 3: climate fight or this round of the climate fight. What
Speaker 3: has the reaction been.
Speaker 2: I'll go through a few different perspectives quickly, so Prime
Speaker 2: Minister Anthony Albanizi he actually held a press conference on Monday,
Speaker 2: which was a public holiday, and that's quite rare for
Speaker 2: the Prime minister to do, but kind of just shows
Speaker 2: what big news this was.
Speaker 3: But he showed he was in holiday mode by not
Speaker 3: wearing a suit. You're kind of a casual jacket.
Speaker 2: Yes, And unsurprisingly he just completely slammed Duddin's initial comments.
Speaker 2: He said, quote Peter Dutton is worse than Scott Morrison
Speaker 2: on climate change. That quote stood out to me. And
Speaker 2: then the Climate Change Minister Chris Bowen said that the
Speaker 2: twenty thirty reduction is achievable, so he is disputing the
Speaker 2: coalition's line that it's not achievable, and he added quote
Speaker 2: Dudden is giving up on it, but we are saying
Speaker 2: we're still working to achieve it. Another perspective that I
Speaker 2: think is worth mentioning is the Greens leader Adam Bant.
Speaker 2: He accused both major parties of failing to take the
Speaker 2: Paris agreement seriously and he said quote labor cries Paris
Speaker 2: crocodile tears while opening more coal and gas mines, while
Speaker 2: the Liberals don't even pretend to care.
Speaker 3: When you put it like that, it's a bit of
Speaker 3: a sorry state of affairs in our politics. Have there
Speaker 3: been other responses, perhaps not from politicians, Yeah, I.
Speaker 2: Think one worth mentioning is from business perspectives. I was
Speaker 2: reading in the Australian Financial Review yesterday morning that this
Speaker 2: discussion just creates so much uncertainty for the industry, which
Speaker 2: I think is a really interesting point when we think
Speaker 2: about the facts that Australia has elections every three years.
Speaker 2: That potentially means that we have a new government every
Speaker 2: three years, which you know, if one government is introducing laws,
Speaker 2: the next government is scrapping it, and then you just
Speaker 2: go in this constant cycle. There is a lot of
Speaker 2: uncertainty I can completely understand.
Speaker 3: Especially for something as major as an energy transition and
Speaker 3: all the different various ways that that's being proposed to happen.
Speaker 3: I mean, this is really serious policy that we're talking about,
Speaker 3: and it's perhaps one of those points where the regularity
Speaker 3: of our elections actually can make things a little difficult.
Speaker 2: Yeah, it's really interesting when you put it in that context,
Speaker 2: because you know, obviously having long term goals is really important,
Speaker 2: but it's just about how do we do that when
Speaker 2: there is such constant change in government.
Speaker 3: It's also important to say that the alternative to that
Speaker 3: model of government is somebody who's there as the prime
Speaker 3: minister for twenty years, which we don't want either. So
Speaker 3: it's one of those key teething issues with our modern
Speaker 3: democracy with a challenge like climate change that is inevitable
Speaker 3: that we're going to come across on that slightly disheartening note,
Speaker 3: but I will actually on that point, there are so
Speaker 3: many people working to find solutions, and I think the
Speaker 3: one voice that we haven't mentioned today is climate scientists
Speaker 3: and the scientific community, and their position on climate change
Speaker 3: is abundantly clear and hasn't really moved. But I think
Speaker 3: that whilst these policy discussions continue, there is a whole
Speaker 3: cohort of people looking for innovative ways to try and
Speaker 3: divert the course here. Thanks so much for explaining that, Billy,
Speaker 3: and thank you for listening to that episode of The
Speaker 3: Daily Os. We'd love to know what you think. You
Speaker 3: can leave a comment if you're on Spotify, or give
Speaker 3: us a rating if you're listening on Apple. We'll be
Speaker 3: back again. You know years tomorrow morning. Until then, have
Speaker 3: a good day. My name is Lily Madden and I'm
Speaker 3: a proud Arunda Bujelung Kalkutin woman from Gadigl Country.
Speaker 2: The Daily os acknowledges that this podcast is recorded on
Speaker 2: the lands of the Gatighl people and pays respect to
Speaker 2: all Aboriginal and Torres Strait Island and nations.
Speaker 1: We pay our respects to the first peoples of these countries,
Speaker 1: both past and present.