Twenty-three years ago, on this day, November 6th, 2001 days before the election,
CANBERRA, Nov 6 AAP – The government today chose an industrial heartland to warn that Labor’s promise to ratify the Kyoto Protocol on climate change would cost jobs and harm the economy.
Prime Minister John Howard toured the industry-rich Hunter Valley area north of Sydney to sell his message that ratifying the agreement would cost jobs, pump up petrol and power prices and hurt industry.
The comments came on the eve of a high-level meeting in Morocco tomorrow night when officials from around the globe will debate the finer points of ratifying the protocol….
Modelling quoted widely by the coalition was based on inaccurate assumptions that unrealistically inflated the costs of meeting Australia’s targets, opposition environment spokesman Nick Bolkus said.
2001 McSweeny, L., Polglaze, K. and Hamilton, F. 2001. Fed – Govt warns of job losses under ALP Kyoto plan. Australian Associated Press, 7 November.
The amount of carbon dioxide in the air was roughly 371ppm. As of 2024 it is 423ppm, but check here for daily measures.
The context was that John Howard was using the old line about jobs to defend his mates in the fossil fuel sector, even though as a whole mining did not provide that many jobs primarily or secondarily, especially when it comes to open cast.
What we learn is that it’s all Jobsngrowth, Jobsngrowth. The reliable standbys when talking to the electorate, just as technology is the standby when talking to society more generally.
What happened next, Howard had another six years of mayhem and the Hunter is still coal central despite what it’s doing to all the other sectors, whether it’s tourism or agriculture, or what, or horse-racing.
What do you think? Does this pass the ‘so what?’ threshold? Have I got facts wrong? Interpretation wrong? Please do comment on this post, unless you are a denialist, obvs.
Also on this day:
November 6, 1988 – Australian cartoonist nails response to #climate change
November 6, 1989 – Noordwijk conference – “alright, we will keep talking”
November 6, 1990 – Second World Climate Conference underway
November 6, 2009 – Kevin Rudd playing politics with the climate