On this day, sixth of April 2006, the “Australian Business Roundtable on Climate Change” released its first and I think only report, “The business case for early action,” a 25 page extravaganza of nice pictures and nice rhetoric..
The ABRCC was made up of insurance, banking and service sector outfits. (The manufacturing and extractive industries were conspicuously absent).
They were trying to combat the impression that John Howard, Prime Minister of Australia since March 1996, had been able to give of business was against climate action because it would destroy the economy.
It was not the first attempt to create a business pressure around climate action; WWF had been trying in 2003 or so. And of course, there were open letters and surveys and all sorts of other efforts before 2006.
Why it matters
Well, it doesn’t, but it reminds us that service sector (esp banking and insurance types, and sometimes “gas rather than coal” outfits are keen to seek out business opportunities, and to undermine the pro-coal/anti-carbon trading outfits. And that one of the ways they do that is via these sorts of gaudy one-offs…
What happened next
In retrospect, this report can be seen as one of the opening salvo softening up for what would happen later that year, which is one of these periodic explosions of concern about climate change that swept Kevin Rudd bless his cotton socks to power.
The ABCC to my knowledge to do much more. It had served its purpose. And once these loose coalitions have said their piece, it’s hard and “not worth it” to most of the members to start saying what they DON’T agree with – too much cost in co-ordinating, negotiating, reputation-managing for very little return. There are other ways to make their point, so these outfits tend to fold…
Fun fact, the guy in charge of Westpac (big bank, and one of the signatories) at the time, David Morgan, is married to Ros Kelly, who was the third Australian was the the Australian Minister for the Environment back in 1990 when Australia made its first empty promise on emissions reductions. The Australian business elite have known about this issue for a very very long time.