On this day, August 9, 2001, the OECD called on Australia to introduce a carbon tax. Was told to piss off.
CANBERRA, Aug 9 AAP – An OECD call for Australia to introduce environment taxes was today ruled out by the government and opposition despite support from rural backbenchers.
The Organisation for Economic Cooperation and Development’s latest report showed that Australia’s economy was faring well, and that a carbon tax would be a cost-effective way to benefit the environment.
“Setting up a trading scheme or a carbon tax of broad sectoral coverage is the most cost-effective way to achieve emissions reductions,” the OECD report said.
Environment Minister Robert Hill branded the call Eurocentric, saying the government was instead focused on building economic growth with a low-tax environment.
McSweeny, L. 2001. Fed – Major parties reject OECD call for environment tax. Australian Associated Press, 10 August
Hill’s “Eurocentric” line would later be deployed by his boss John Howard, when Nick “Stern Review” Stern was dismissed for being (checks notes) English.
The depths of banality and venality. It is staggering, isn’t it?
Fun fact – Matthias Cormann, who helped stop the Liberal Party do anything even remotely un-cray on climate in the 2010s is now head of the OECD. Oh how we laughed.
On this day atmospheric co2 was 369.78 ppm. Now it is 421ish- but see here for the latest.
Why this matters.
A carbon price was not a communist conspiracy. It really wasn’t. And it would have, with other measures, made some difference, delayed the apocalypse by a few days/weeks/months. Oh well…
What happened next?
The Howard government kept on shitting on everyone’s future. The Rudd government said it would do better. Didn’t. The Gillard government got the climate legislation through, but in the process gave the Murdoch press and the wrecking ball known as Tony Abbott all the ammo they needed (but to be clear, no matter WHAT Gillard did, they were going to try to destroy her).