On this day, June 8, 1973, the Australian Treasury released a report on economics and growth that even mentioned… climate change. Here’s a newspaper report first.
“The other difficulty in assessing resources policy is that the term first appeared in Australian Government circles last year from the Department of Foreign Affairs and was based on the assumption that resources were finite and therefore somebody should be thinking about the implications for the future and producing policies on development, use and sales.
“The Treasury Economic Paper No 2, ‘Economic Growth: Is it Worth Having?’, published today, pours a bucket of cold water on that ‘assumption, arguing that resources are not finite, that they are dynamic, growing in line with technology and demand. As an example it points out that back in the ’30s the iron ore at Pilbara was known, but it was not a resource because there was not the technology to mine it economically.
Davidson, G. 1973. Planning ahead for wise use of Australia’s resources. Canberra Times, 8 June, p.2. [Trove]
On this day, 7th June 1971, South Australian John Coulter appeared on the ABC discussion programme “the Monday Conference.”
“It all started in 1970, when Dr John Coulter, later a Senator and leader of the Australian Democrats, met with eminent gynaecologist Derek Llewellyn Jones to establish ZPG in Australia. Over the next six months they met with leading scientists to formulate a full page open letter in the Australian newspaper in 1971 entitled “To Those Who Shape Australia’s Destiny”. It urged the Australian Government to investigate not only the population that Australia could support over the long term but also the details of a balanced economic system, that is, a system in which economic productivity is balanced against the capacity of the environment to maintain itself.”
“As a consequence of this open letter, John and others were invited to a debate on population on the new and influential ABC TV program Monday Conference in 1971. This led to Paul Ehrlich being invited to appear on a later program. Paul’s appearance there and subsequent lectures around Australia had a tremendous impact.”
Here’s a couple of grabs of what Coulter said, 51 years ago.
and
Why this matters.
There was knowledge for those who wanted it. Our problem has not been, since then, one of information, but ability to “maintain the rage” at an individual and collective level.
(“Maintain the rage” is a mid-70s slogan, that only decrepit Australians would know)
What happened next?
We ignored the warnings, went back to sleep. Woke periodically, as the house burned to the ground. So it goes.
On this day, 5 June, 1993, Green Groups tried to keep the show on the road, despite the evident contempt of Australian Prime Minister Paul Keating for all matters green (because, well, what else can they do?)
Anon. 1993. Top Green Group plans March for the Future. Green Week, May 25, p.3.
The Australian Conservation Foundation public launch of Environment Week at Darling Harbour will feature a March for the Future through city streets on June 5, World Environment Day.
And 18 years later in 2011, on the same day of the year,, Green Groups try to keep the show on the road, because, well, what else can they do. Already sold down the river by one Labor Prime Minister, they try to get behind another minimalist technocratic approach (because, well, what else can they do?)
For more about this, see this news report, from which I grabbed the image above..
Why this matters.
We’re caught in some traps, that are not entirely “our fault,” but we don’t even recognise them as traps. We just see them as normal, inevitable, like a goldfish (is capable of) seeing water…
What happened next?
The people who had to Say Yes – MPs, said yes later in 2011. Then a new bunch of MPs said “No,” and the Emissions Trading Scheme was ended.
So, a slightly different take on “All Our Yesterdays” – I will look at three events that occurred on June 4, but, as per the title, across seven years. These nicely summarise the arc of concern, hedging to effective resistance to action.
First up – in the first flush of newfound concern about The Environment, a “get together” when such satellite link-ups were relatively rare (but by no means unheard of).
Anon, 1989. Environment focus of global TV show. Canberra Times, 4 June p. 3.
SYDNEY: Australians play a part in a television program on the environment to be seen live in almost 100 countries today. Our Common Future, based in New York, will bring celebrities and world leaders together to spearhead the push towards environmental awareness.
The New York Times was lukewarm at best –
The oddest, most incoherent global television broadcast since the 1989 Academy Awards took place on Saturday afternoon. ”Our Common Future,” a five-hour program relayed to about 100 countries, was intended to create awareness of environmental problems and to urge global cooperation. For five hours, broadcast live from Avery Fisher Hall with material from the Soviet Union, England, Australia, Poland, Norway and Brazil, the program mixed musical performances with pro-environmental statements, a format akin to Live Aid, with which it shared a producer (Hal Uplinger) and director (Tony Verna).
Unlike Live Aid, the program was not a benefit, and it was less a live concert than a staged event; the audience was largely an invited one, and many of the performances were on tape. It was also considerably lower in star power than Live Aid, with Sting, Stevie Wonder, Elton John, Diana Ross, Joni Mitchell, R.E.M. and Kenny Loggins as its best-known names – although an African tawny eagle stole the show when it flew from the stage to roost on the second balcony.
And three years later, after a global treaty was “negotiated”, we have this –
“Australian signs the UNFCCC Roz Kelly (Minister for the Arts, Sport, the Environment and Territories), Australia signs UNCED climate change convention, media release, 4 June 1992.
Australia’s new Prime Minister, Paul Keating couldn’t be arsed to go (almost all other world leaders attended). Meanwhile, the Liberal National Party were already throwing shade –
“The opposition’s delegate to UNCED in 1992, for example, had criticized the Labor Government’s willingness to give away Australia’s sovereign rights and had emphasized the debilitative economic costs of reducing greenhouse gas emissions”.48
CPD, Senate, 4 June 1992, p. 3350.Matt McDonald, 2005 Fair Weather Friend
And, sure enough, once they were in charge again, this –
Australian industry has applauded the Federal Cabinet’s decision yesterday to oppose a targets and timetables approach to international climate change negotiations, made on the eve of World Environment Day today.
The Howard Government’s position effectively reaffirms that taken by the Keating government and its minister for the Environment, Senator John Faulkner.
The Minister for Foreign Affairs, Mr Alexander Downer, the Minister for the Environment, Senator Robert Hill, and the Minister for Resources and Energy, Senator Warwick Parer, said in a joint statement: “Australia will insist that the outcome of current international negotiations on climate change safeguards Australia’s particular economic and trade interests.”
Mr John Hannagan, chairman of the Australian Aluminium Council’s major policy group, said industry welcomed this statement, “reinforcing its no-regrets position as its negotiating stand at the forthcoming Geneva talks”.
Callick, R. 1996. Coalition backs industry on climate change. The Australian Financial Review, 5 June, p.2.
Why this matters.
These things follow a pattern – excited/exuberant “we can fix this,” (1989) then some sort of legislation (usually quite weak – 1992), then the pushback even from that…
What happened next?
We went through more waves of excitement, legislation, pushback. On a couple of occasions (2006-2009, 2018-2021). It is connected to what I call “the emotaycle.”
On this day, June 3 1989 the Australian Liberal Party’s environment spokesman told reporters about their ambitious environmental policies for the upcoming Federal election.
THE Federal Opposition is preparing a separate “climate policy” bringing together all issues relating to world climate change.
The document, compiled by a climate policy task force, is expected to be released within a fortnight after endorsement by shadow cabinet.
The Opposition Environment spokesman, Senator Chris Puplick, said yesterday: “The policy will take in the greenhouse effect, the ozone layer, industrial pollution, recycling, tree-planting and climate research.
“At the moment these issues are scattered over a number of policies and it’s an attempt to integrate them and find out where there might be any gaps. Obviously, it will also update things in the light of new standards being set and new technology being introduced.”
Senator Puplick criticised the proposal by the Federal Environment Minister, Senator Graham Richardson, for a referendum to increase the Commonwealth’s powers to override the States on environmental issues.
“I think it is just a bit of very silly kite-flying in the sense that firstly you would have enormous problems in actually drawing up a piece of legislation to amend the Constitution,” he said.
Jones, B. 1989. Libs endorse ‘Climate Policy’. Sun Herald, 4 June, p.5.
The context was that ozone hole/the greenhouse effect had exploded onto the scene the year before. The European elections – and the Tasmanian state elections – of May 1989 had made politicians think that votes were to be had in the green… It did not last very long, of course.
Why this matters.
We need to remember that there was a brief moment of “competitive consensus” way back at the beginning of the climate issue, but it did not last. The pressures pulling apart “right-wing” parties are still there – the need for votes, and the need also to protect continued capital accumulation in the same vein…
What happened next?
The incumbent Australian Labor Party squeaked home at the March 1990 Federal Election, thanks to small-g green voters (the Green Party did not exist yet) preferencing them over the Liberals, despite the Liberal Party’s more ambitious targets. Puplick’s career was toast, and the Liberals decided they had been stitched up by the Australian Conservation Foundation (the largest green group), leading to decades of suspicion and animosity.
(For an account, see Paul Kelly’s “The End of Certainty”)
See also (and thanks to the person who tweeted it! this I wrote for The Conversation.
On this day, May 30, 1990, Australian band “Midnight Oil” held an impromptu concert in New York, outside Exxon’s HQ. You can see the footage here
Exxon were villain du jour because of a certain carelessness the previous spring in Alaska.
We didn’t know then, but Exxon already had a solid ten years of climate knowledge under its belt – they knew that their product would wreck the planet, but why, erm, rock the boat?
You might also like this song, by “Max Q”
Why this matters.
Culturally, we can resist. Economically, persistently, strategically? Not so easy.
What happened next?
Midnight Oil kept burning. They stopped while Peter Garrett, lead singer tried to change the system from within. Have since resumed.
Exxon? Oh, Exxon kept up their boundless love and generosity for future generations by, you know, funding denialist outfits, getting IPCC chairs sacked – the usual.
On this day, May 1996, a climate denialist professor gave a speech to fellow climate denialists in Australia.
Climate denial outfits like the IPA and Tasman Institute had been inviting various (US) climate denialists to Australia for speaking tours (this was a repertoire that would continue). They’d started in the early 1990s and, of course, kept going.
“On 27 May 1996, Prof Patrick Michaels delivered a lively and entertaining presentation, outlining empirical difficulties with the Enhanced Greenhouse Global Warming Hypothesis. Through Tasman, Prof. Michaels also published an article on greenhouse issues in the Australian Financial Review of 30 May 1996. The article was subsequently cited by Deputy Prime Minister Tim Fisher”.
Tasman Institute 1996 Annual Review
Why this matters.
You can see in that quote the sequence – get someone over on a speaking tour. Lean on your mates in the media (with whom you are in a symbiotic relationship anyway) to get an opinion piece in a prestigious newspaper. THEN get one of your parliamentary goons (in this case Deputy Prime Minister – how cool is that?) to mention it in parliament.
All the way along, you’re creating more “credibility” and heft for your views, which are aimed at creating doubt, delay, uncertainty, so your friends can keep raking in the big bucks.
What happened next?
The denial campaigns continued. Australia extorted an extremely sweet deal at the Kyoto COP in December 1997, and still didn’t ratify it.
On this day, May 26, 1994, the Australian Liberal Party’s spokesperson on foreign affairs offered an (unintentionally prophetic) warning about future climate diplomacy.
“The concern of industry groups that Australia might similarly be forced into a consensus on climate change was echoed yesterday by the Opposition spokesman on foreign affairs, Mr Andrew Peacock. He said there was a danger Australia’s stance that it would not implement measures that would damage its trade competitiveness unless other greenhouse gas producers did likewise could become increasingly devoid of substance.” Gill, P. 1994 Industry voices greenhouse fears. Australian Financial Review, 27 May,
The context was that Australia had ratified the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change in December 1992 (Prime Minister Paul Keating loathed greenies, but I think just couldn’t be bothered NOT to ratify). It was by May 1994 clear that there would be a global meeting soon at which rich countries would be expected to announce not just stabilisation of emissions targets, but actual cuts. Australia did not want this (who would they sell all their coal to, how would they power a currently coal-based energy system?).
Industry was already mobilising by May 1994, and telling their natural allies, the Liberal Party, what they wanted…
[The other context is that the Liberals felt that they’d had the 1990 Federal election stolen from them by nefarious greenies. Their leader at the time? Why, Andrew Peacock.]
Why this matters.
Let’s think always in terms of ideas, interests and ideology, rather than the goodness or badness of specific individuals (I know, it’s hard, I fail at that most of the time, but let us at least make the effort…)
What happened next?
Labor Environment Minister tried to introduce a carbon tax, and was defeated by a very clever, determined campaign..
A Liberal-National Government took charge in Australia from March 1996, hardened the existing opposition to emissions cuts and generally played as much of a blocking role as it could. The emissions climbe and climbed and the opportunity to do anything meaningful about climate change was squandered. So it goes.
On this day, May 25, 2011 noted climate scientist and deep thinker Alan Jones [that is irony – the man is a particularly shocking “shock jock”] tried to undermine a climate scientist on his radio show.
The context was that the minority Labor government of Julia Gillard was trying to get a carbon price (“a carbon tax” according to its opponents) through Parliament. There was an extremely virulent agitation against this.
Jones had David Karoly, Professor of Meteorology at the University of Melbourne and a contributor to the Fourth Assessment Report of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change on his show.
Jones: Are you being paid for being on the Government’s Climate Commission Science Advisory Panel?…
Karoly: No, my salary is not being paid by that.
Jones: Are you in any, and in receipt of any, benefits or funds or anything at all from the…
Karoly: I am receiving a travel allowance to cover the costs of going to meetings of the Science Advisory Panel and I am receiving a small retainer which is substantially less than your daily salary.
Jones: So you’re paid by the Government and then you give an opinion on the science of climate change. Have you ever heard about he who pays the piper calls the tune?’ (Cited in Barry 2011b) (Ward, 2015: 235)
Why this matters.
This is a classic technique, to say that if someone gets any money at all from Them, then they and their work can be dismissed without any discussion of its merits, shortcomings, implications.
It’s a lazy (but necessary for the thick) shortcut to “winning.”
What happened next?
The Gillard legislation got up, and was then repealed by the next Prime Minister, Tony “Wrecking Ball” Abbott.
Gillard lost a leadership challenge in 2013, was replaced by Kevin Rudd.
Jones finished as a radio presenter in 2020. His Sky News Australia contract was not renewed.
On this day, 23 May 1980, Don Jessop, a Liberal senator from the great state of South Australia raised the alarm about climate change from carbon dioxide build-up in the Australian senate.
Senator JESSOP (South Australia) – “I also welcome the Antarctic Treaty (Environment Protection) Bill 1980 and will make a few brief remarks about it. “ “The first article, entitled ‘World ecology is endangered’, is from the Melbourne Age of 16 April, and deals with an examination by a panel of internationally recognised scientists. They told the United States Congress: . . that the world could face an ecological disaster unless the amount of carbon dioxide pumped into the atmosphere is controlled. The second article is older, having been written on 28 February 1977. It is entitled ‘Heating Up: Global Race for Antarctic’s Riches’, [From U.S. News & World Report] and I wish to have only highlights of that article incorporated in Hansard.
Leave was granted.
Here’s the wikipedia picture of Jessop
Why this matters.
We knew. The people who get elected to look after the future, who are paid to look after the future – they knew.
What happened next?
Jessop, who had raised the climate issue as early as 1973, was dropped by his own side-
Grattan, M. 1987 SA Libs demote Hill, drop Jessop. The Age, 9 June. p 3 Senator Jessop “is known for his independence and willingness to be outspoken”
