Scott Morrison's Climate Pact With The Pacific 'Family' Exposes The Hollowness Of His Words

The Guardian - Katharine Murphy

One small exchange in Senate estimates has exposed the measurable gap between the prime minister’s rhetoric and actions

Scott Morrison signed a document with Pacific leaders that suggests we are as one on the climate crisis, but in reality we have very different objectives. Photograph: Mick Tsikas/AAP

I pointed out last weekend Scott Morrison spends a large proportion of his time doing two things: talking about how bad Labor is in the hope voters will conclude they made the correct choice in returning him to government in May, and trying to be relatable to people who don’t like politics and tune in as little as they have to.

As a subset of these two objectives, Morrison speaks constantly about how stable and dependable his government is (as opposed to his political opponents, who are cast as reckless and engaged in headless chookery).
In order to nail the requisite talking point, backbenchers rise loyally, one after the other, every question time, and ask the dear leader and his cabinet colleagues to explain how calm and wise the government is. Morrison has these formulations read out each sitting day by willing automatons, who periodically inject a lilt or a Pinteresque pause into their questions, like they are at a Toastmasters session at the local Rotary club.
Those of us forced to watch this pantomime daily do periodically worry this could be a plot to drive us all bonkers; to force the journalists of the Canberra press gallery to flee, screaming, from the building, leaving them to whatever they want to cook up. But in reality the government couldn’t give a stuff about us, whether we persist or whether we flee – it is speaking over our heads, to the voters.

By hammering these messages, Morrison wants one thought to penetrate the great national switch-off: he wants voters to trust him. He wants voters to believe he is a man of his word, that he means what he says, and follows through on commitments. It seems an audacious strategy for a leader in an age when people are inclined to think all politicians stink, but that’s what Morrison wants.
Trust.
With that thought in mind, it was interesting this week to watch one small exchange in Senate estimates exposing a measurable gap between the prime minister’s rhetoric and actions.
Readers will remember Morrison took some heat at the Pacific Islands Forum earlier in the year when he presented as insufficiently empathetic about the threat the climate emergency posed to the region. There were some harsh words.
But at the end of the day, despite all the thundering and virtue signalling on the greatness of coal, Australia signed on to a communique that was actually pretty forward leaning on climate change.
As I noted at the time, despite all the arm twisting in Tuvalu, Morrison did, in the end, sign up to a statement that committed Australia to pursuing efforts to limit global warming to 1.5C, and to produce a 2050 strategy by 2020 – no small things. This 2050 strategy, the statement said, “may include commitments and strategies to achieve net zero carbon by 2050”.
Navigating that harmonious landing point with Pacific leaders was, presumably, an important gesture for an Australian prime minister fond of calling his counterparts in the region “family”.
But Labor’s Senate leader, Penny Wong, during this week’s Senate estimates hearings, decided to do a little bit of due diligence about what Australia had actually signed up to at the Pacific Islands Forum, and whether we actually meant it.
With foreign affairs department officials arrayed before her, Wong asked first whether or not Australia had sought any reservations or exceptions to the PIF communique (which just means did we opt out of any part of the statement). Kathy Klugman, the official responsible for Pacific strategy, said no exceptions had been sought. When it came to the PIF communique, Australia was all in.
Having established that we were all in, Wong professed some curiosity that the Morrison government had signed a communique declaring that a “climate change crisis” was facing Pacific Island nations, when the Coalition rejects that language at home as alarmism.
Were we on board with that bit – the climate crisis? Klugman replied that Australia had signed the declaration and “we associate ourselves with all parts of it, including that part”.
Wong then asked whether the government agreed that emissions needed to be reduced to net zero by 2050 in order to achieve the goals articulated in the PIF declaration. Things then got a bit stickier.
Clare Walsh, a deputy secretary of the department, joined the conversation. Walsh noted that achieving net zero emissions by 2050 was “an aspiration by some countries”. But the Australian government had not signed on to that “in terms of its domestic application”, she said.
Wong then translated. So we’ve associated ourselves with that objective internationally in this communique, but would not take the requisite action domestically? Walsh ploughed on. She said the PIF declaration recognised the importance of that issue to the Pacific and recognised net zero by 2050 as a “commonly referenced target – but it isn’t one that Australia has signed up to domestically, no”.
Wong then wondered why Australia had signed up to a document which said pursuing global efforts to limit global warming to 1.5C above pre-industrial levels was “critical to the security of our Blue Pacific” when Australia’s domestic emissions reduction targets – the ones we’ve signed on to as part of the Paris agreement – were not consistent with achieving the 1.5C objective.
Was the government planning to increase the level of ambition to square those circles, Wong wondered? “There is no change to the government’s policy senator,” noted the foreign minister, Marise Payne, who was at the table.
Wong evidently thought she’d reached the moment to deliver the moral of the story.
“So we go along to the PIF and tell them we think 1.5C is important but we are not prepared to put targets on the table that are anywhere near consistent with it – just so we are clear about what we are doing,” she said.
Payne replied that Wong could “put it in those terms” but the government had been very clear it was persisting with the policies it took to the election.
So, to cut a long story short, Morrison has signed a document with Pacific leaders, with the “family”, that suggests we are as one when it comes to managing the risks of climate change, yet in reality we have very different policies, goals and objectives.
It pays to remember things like this when our prime minister asks you to trust him.

Links

• Former Tuvalu PM says he was 'stunned' by Scott Morrison's behaviour at Pacific Islands Forum
• Pacific Leaders Urge The World Not To Accept The 'Living Nightmare' Of Climate Change
• ‘Our People Are Dying’: Australia’s Climate Confrontation In The Pacific
• Scott Morrison's Betrayal Of The Pacific Was Immoral – And Completely Unnecessary
• How Rising Sea Levels Erase Culture
• Revealed: 'Fierce' Pacific Forum Meeting Almost Collapsed Over Climate Crisis
• Pacific Leaders, Australia Agree To Disagree About Action On Climate Change
• New Zealand Caught In The Middle Of Australia's Climate Change Tussle With The Pacific
• John Hewson Slams Coalition On Climate Change While Business Takes Lead Reducing Emissions
• PM Sledges Media Over Climate
• Scott Morrison Is Trying To Turn Himself Into The Ocker Trump – Australian Media Beware
• We Fact Checked Scott Morrison's Speech To The United Nations. Here's What We Found
• The Week Australia Failed On Climate Change
• How Does Scott Morrison's Climate Declaration At The United Nations Stack Up?