Thirty five years ago, on this day, November 6th, 1991,
A leading Australian conservationist has denounced the “new federalism” initiative as being “old federalism rejigged” and if implemented could jeopardise the future of proposed ecologically sustainable development policies.
Speaking at the National Press Club in Canberra yesterday, the executive director for the Australian Conservation Fund, Phillip Toyne, said that the initiative put forward by the Prime Minister, Bob Hawke, was not “a rethinking of our apportionment of power in government” but mere “rhetoric of change, not change itself”.
Iffland, K. 1991. Toyne: new federalism old federalism rejigged. Canberra Times, 7 November, p.3.
The amount of carbon dioxide in the air was 355ppm. As of 2026, when this post was published, it is 430ppm. This matters because the more carbon dioxide in the air, the more heat gets trapped. The more heat, the more extreme weather events. You can make it more complicated than that if you want, but really, it’s not. Fwiw, I have a tattoo of the Keeling Curve on my left forearm.
The broader context was that in 1988 the Australian public had been woken up to the threat of carbon dioxide build up, thanks in part to hard work by the CSIRO and various politicians. There had been an intense period of promises of policy making, etc. etc. including the Ecologically Sustainable Development (ESD) process. There had also been loose talk about holding a referendum, so that the federal government would have more power over states around greenhouse issues. This had come to nothing. The ESD, by this stage, was a dead letter, and everybody kind of knew it. Everyone was waiting for former treasurer Paul Keating to make his move to become Prime Minister, and Keating was infamously opposed to climate action.
What I think we can learn from this is that by late 1989 sorry, 1991 unless you were really sucking hard on the hopium pipe, you knew that there were serious problems ahead.
What happened next Keating did, in fact, topple Hawke, and he did bin all of the ecologically sustainable development stuff. Australia announced an absolutely pitiful National Greenhouse Response Strategy, which they then ignored, and Australian emissions domestically climbed, and their coal exports climbed, and Australian prime ministers like Keating and Howard and Rudd do belong at The Hague, (it would be a relatively crowded dock).
On this topic, you might like these other posts on All Our Yesterdays
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You can see the chronological list of All Our Yesterdays “on this day” posts here.
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.
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Also on this day:
November 6, 1961 – “Air Over Cities” pollution conference begins
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, 2001 – Howard plays the jobs-card vs Kyoto in Hunter Valley
November 6, 2009 – Kevin Rudd playing politics with the climate