(AU) Scott Morrison Says He Won't Be 'Bullied' On Climate By Inner City Voters

SBS - Tom Stayner

Prime Minister Scott Morrison says he "won't be bullied" into changing his government's position on climate change as National MPs renew demands for more investment in coal.

Prime Minister Scott Morrison speaks in Parliament House, Canberra. Source: AAP

Prime Minister Scott Morrison has declared he won't be "bullied" by inner-city voters as he downplayed concerns of a fresh climate war inside the Coalition.
Some National MPs are demanding more coal-fired power stations and urging Scott Morrison to resist calls to take stronger action on climate change.
Nationals Leader Michael McCormack also declared the Coalition should hold the line on climate policy, following a challenge to his leadership from former leader Barnaby Joyce.
Mr Morrison said being in coalition with the Nationals had ensured the government's response to climate change was sensible and balanced, rather than being dictated by those in the inner city.

Re-elected Nationals Party leader Michael McCormack and newly-elected deputy leader David Littleproud maintain the Coalition is united on climate policy. AAP /Lukas Coch)

"We listen to all Australians and we listen to Australians right across the country, not just those in the inner city," he told Nine's Today. 
He said action should not come at the expense of jobs and industries.
“What we’ll do is take practical actions that deal with these challenges and that challenge is living in a hotter, drier and longer summer.
“So we won’t be bullied into higher taxes and higher electricity prices.”
Mr Morrison's comments echoed those of his deputy prime minister during the height of the bushfire crisis.
In November, Mr McCormack attacked those who were linking climate change to the severity of the bushfires, labelling them "inner-city raving lunatics".
Mr McCormack held off an attempt by Barnaby Joyce to reclaim the Nationals’ leadership at a party room meeting on Tuesday.
Mr Joyce's platform had been backed by Senator Matt Canavan, the pair urging the government to increase support for coal and investment in new coal-fired power stations.
It is understood Nationals MP George Christensen also spoke out against climate change policy and advocated for coal at the first Coalition meeting of the year held hours after the leadership spill.
While Mr Morrison has previously said the government's policy on climate would "evolve" in the wake of the bushfire crisis, Mr McCormack said the Coalition should not stray from its current climate policies.
“It’s all well and good for some people to say we should stop all fossil fuels,” he told SBS News.
“Well go and tell that to somebody in central Queensland who is working hard for and on behalf of their family … they deserve a job too.”
The Morrison government has committed to reducing emissions by 26-28 per cent on 2005 levels by 2030 under the global Paris Agreement.
But it has faced pressure over its planned use of so-called carry-over credits to meet this target from previous emission agreements.
Nationals Deputy Leader David Littleproud maintained the Coalition is united on taking action on climate change.
“We made international commitments and we are going to live up to them and instead of us beating ourselves up saying we’re this boogeyman in the global stage – we’re not,” he said.
“The quiet Australians out there have had a gutfull of all of this narrative … they just want action … they want us to get on with the job.”

Links

• Protesters call for greater action on climate change outside Parliament House
• Climate scientists and museum directors urge leaders to take stronger action
• (AU) Is Morrison Government Fit For Purpose, Or The Greatest Danger To Our National Security?
• (AU) Morrison Questions Importance Of Global Climate Treaties, To Treat Symptoms Of Climate Change
• (AU) Climate Change Is A Serious Threat To National Security
• (AU) Too Clever By Half? PM Has Let The Climate Cat Out Of The Bag – And There’s No Putting It Back
• (AU) Behind The Smokescreen, The Coalition's Stance On Climate Change Hasn't Changed At All
• (AU) Can Scott Morrison Seize This Watershed Moment For Climate Policy?
• David Attenborough Says Australia's Bushfires A 'Major International Catastrophe' And Calls For Climate Action

(AU) If There's A Silver Lining In The Clouds Of Choking Smoke It's That This May Be A Tipping Point

The Guardian - Michael Mann

Australia’s horrific bushfires could be the catalyst that pushes the world to a mass recognition that it’s time to act

Smoke form the almost-biblical fires bearing down on Canberra: ‘This is a stark reminder that climate change seems gradual until it is on your doorstep.’ Photograph: Xinhua/Barcroft Media

Michael E Mann Michael E Mann is distinguished professor of atmospheric science at Pennsylvania State University. His most recent book, with Tom Toles, is The Madhouse Effect: How Climate Change Denial Is Threatening Our Planet, Destroying Our Politics, and Driving Us Crazy (Columbia University Press, 2016)

As a climate scientist on sabbatical in Australia, I’ve had plenty of conversations about the climate crisis lately as bushfires have burned their way to the front of everyone’s mind. Although the Murdoch media make it seem as if there’s plenty of debate, the reality is that most Australians I talk to get it.
And why shouldn’t they? More carbon pollution means warmer temperatures which dry out the landscape, making it easier for fires to spread. The fact that the bushfires tore through Australia as we ended the hottest decade ever recorded is no coincidence.
But those opposed to climate action have tied themselves in knots trying to fool the public into believing that it’s really environmentalists and arsonists at fault.
Yet it’s hard to sell denial when people are busy fleeing the flames. It’s tough to distract from the reality of climate change when plumes of smoke dim the sky, and when every breath of soot-filled air stings your throat. As one climate scientist colleague put it in response to the almost-biblical fires bearing down on Canberra: “This is a stark reminder that climate change seems gradual until it is on your doorstep.”
That’s precisely what happened to Jeremy Wright, a Rotary Club member who came to a lecture I gave the other day at the University of New South Wales, in Sydney. Wright lost much of his family farm that has been around for 180 years, outside Milton in south-east NSW where the Australian author Henry Kendall was born. The bridge that provides access to the farm burned and he lost a herd of steer, several vehicles and his farm shed. Climate change is no longer just a theoretical construct for Jeremy.

Some of the steer that died in the fire on Jeremy Wright’s farm on New Year’s Eve.

Despite the tragedies playing out around the country, I’m hopeful we’re hitting a tipping point. Not a physical one – which we will hopefully avoid, where the global climate undergoes dramatic, irreversible and catastrophic change – but a psychological one.
Here and around the world these fires appear to be pushing us toward a tipping point in public consciousness, a mass recognition that we must act.
But there has always been a disconnect between what the public knows and what their elected leaders choose to do. Ruling political parties in Australia, the US and Britain are particularly intransigent, their denial driven by ties to fossil-fuel interests and bolstered by the Murdoch media’s steady drumbeat of denial.
It’s something I’ve noticed quite clearly in my time here. The Australians I’ve talked to about climate change seem well aware of the science, are very concerned about reducing emissions and, most of all, are frustrated by their leaders’ unwillingness to take meaningful action.
If there can possibly be a silver lining to the clouds of smoke from the bushfires, it is that they are galvanising public opinion, making it clear that deniers’ and delayers’ rhetoric is a smokescreen to cover for the fossil-fuel industry. Much like how sea level rise and unprecedented wildfires, heatwaves and floods in the US have begun softening the Republican party’s staunch denial, the bushfires have brought the climate crisis to the front and centre of Australian consciousness.
For years, fossil-fuel-funded voices have taken to Rupert Murdoch’s media outlets to tell the public that climate change isn’t real, or it won’t be a problem until years from now, at which point we’ll all be so rich we can just buy our way out of trouble. They told the public to ignore climate scientists who are ringing the planetary fire alarm, that all is well despite the increasingly stark warnings from those who have devoted their lives to studying the issue.
Sadly, despite criticism from within the Murdoch empire, and even from Murdoch’s son James, the promotion of denial and delay continues unabated. “Warming is good for us” read the headline on Andrew Bolt’s column in the Herald Sun the other day to widespread derision as climate change-fuelled bushfires continue to engulf the continent. The headline on Paul Kelly’s column in the Australian read “Any climate policy change is going to be slow burn”, with no apparent sense of irony.
But telling people to ignore the fire alarm doesn’t work so well when they can feel the heat, with flames consuming their country and with so much smoke it’s made a full circuit around the globe.We won’t know if this will be a tipping point for the public’s demand for climate action until we have the benefit of hindsight. But people will have an option: to vote out politicians in denial, and vote in candidates who are honest about the issue.
Perhaps we shouldn’t call it a tipping point, but a flipping point.
Then perhaps she’ll be right, mate.

Links

• Now that climate change is irrefutable, denialists like Andrew Bolt insist it will be good for us
• Australia, your country is burning – dangerous climate change is here with you now
• Earth's Hottest Decade
• When It Comes To The Australian Bushfires, Rupert Murdoch Is An Arsonist | Opinion
• Wildfire smoke to circle planet and return to Australia, NASA says

(AU) Fire Royal Commission Accepts The Role Of Climate Change: PM

AFR - Phillip Coorey

The royal commission into the bushfires will operate on the assumption that the scale and severity of the blazes was fuelled by climate change, Scott Morrison says.
As the Coalition again grapples with internal divisions over climate change, the Prime Minister gave the undertaking to stop the royal commission being distracted by the brawl over whether climate change was real.

Scott Morrison and Michael McCormack in parliament after the Nationals leadership spill. Alex Ellinghausen

While Mr Morrison is unambiguous in drawing links between the fires and climate change, others in his party continue to hedge or deny.
Nationals leader Michael McCormack, who on Monday survived a leadership spill led by Barnaby Joyce and others who do not subscribe to climate change science, is choosing his words carefully so as not to further inflame his already-fractured party.
"What we do, no doubt,  probably has a fair effect on the climate and where we're going to,'' he said of the contributions of humans to global warming.
"How much? That's for scientists to determine.''
Home Affairs Minister Peter Dutton was also sceptical, saying arson was partly to blame for the fires.
"I don't see huge points of difference in our party room ... we're experiencing hotter weather,'' he said.
"But did the bushfires start in some of these regions because of climate change? No. It started because somebody lit a match."
Mr Morrison has announced that former defence force chief Mark Binskin will lead the royal commission into the fires which continue to burn in NSW and the ACT.
The Prime Minister has written to the states seeking input for the terms of reference. Under pressure not to ignore climate change, Mr Morrison said that would be the operating premise of the probe.
"It is accepted that climate change has impacted Australia, and that we're in for longer, hotter, dryer summers,'' he said.
"The royal commission assumes that our climate has changed and there is climate change.
"The issue is what you do about it, the practical actions that keep people safe, and emissions reductions, land clearing. All of these things are critical to that."
He maintained the hazard reduction was just as, if not more, important than emissions reduction.
Despite pressure from within sections of his party, Mr Morrison is holding firm against doing more to decrease Australia's emissions.
He was lukewarm when asked whether he would follow the example of Britain's conservative Prime Minister Boris Johnston, who has committed his nation to zero net emissions by 2050. Also, from 2035, the sale of new petrol, diesel and hybrid cars will be banned in the UK.
"I would never make a commitment like that if I couldn't tell the Australian people what it would cost them,'' Mr Morrison said of the 2050 target.
The leadership challenge in the Nationals was sparked by the sacking from cabinet of the party's deputy leader, Bridget McKenzie, over the sports rorts affair. That, in turn, has rekindled old tensions over climate change.
Mr McCormack told Sky News on Wednesday that Senator McKenzie would return to the frontbench at some stage.
He also said he wanted to change the rules in his party to make leadership challenges harder by introducing a threshold, similar to those Labor and the Liberals have introduced.
Having these rules adopted looms as another test of his leadership next week.
Mr Morrison will announce his new ministry today, Nationals Darren Chester and Keith Pitt are expected to take the cabinet spots of Senator McKenzie and Matt Canavan, who quit in an unsuccessful attempt to generate momentum for Mr Joyce's challenge.

Links

• RFS boss relaxes position on national bushfire inquiry
• Official request for bushfire royal commission goes to states
• 2009 Victorian Bushfires Royal Commission - Wikipedia
• NSW needs a royal commission into bushfires
• Failed Joyce coup sparks fresh climate row
• Populist politics is polarising the climate debate