Thirty-six/thirty-three years ago, on this day, December 7th, 1989/1992, ESD went from hero to zero.
CANBERRA: The Prime Minister, Mr Hawke, won approval yesterday from industry, union, farm and green groups in aiming to achieve the “ecological sustainability” of all Australia’s major resource industries within a year.
Seccombe, M. 1989. Hawke backed in bid to gain ecology-industry harmony. Sydney Morning Herald, December 8, p.4.
and
ESD and greenhouse agreement COAG, Perth Council of Australian Governments (COAG), Communique, ‘Environment – ESD and greenhouse’, COAG Meeting, Perth, 7 December 1992,
(By this time Keating and his gang had obliterated all concern for environment, and especially greenhouse gas reduction hopes).
The amount of carbon dioxide in the air was 353-356ppm. As of 2025, 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 there had been a previous wave of eco-concern from the late 1960s to the early 1970s. It had run into the buffers, thanks to industry lobbying, state resistance and civil society exhaustion. From 1987 or so, first with the ozone layer and then the “greenhouse effect”, demands for actual action had grown.
The specific context was that these two events mark the beginning of hope and the triumph of experience.
What I think we can learn from this – the defeat then shaped the battlespace forever after.
What happened next – failure and defeat piled upon failure and defeat, as the scale of the problems grew beyond wicked to, well, existential and impossible. And yet we breed…
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.
The Australian federal government led by Labor’s Anthony Albanese has just announced an “emissions reduction” target for 2035 of “62-70%.” You can read about the ins and outs of this in Crikey, Crikey, the Guardian, the Conversation, the ABC , the Australia Institute, Climate Council etc.
As the last notes if the point of the exercise is “to contribute to keeping heating well below 2ºC above pre-industrial levels, after which climate impacts become especially catastrophic and severe” well then “to have a strong chance of meeting this goal, Australia would need to set a net zero target for 2035).“
In this piece I (who the hell am I? (!) want to step back from the (important and justified criticism of Team Fossi, sorry Team Albanese and take a more historical perspective.
The essay below is divided into four sections. The first three are historical – covering 1988-1996 (“let’s make promises”), 1996-2014 (“let’s NOT make promises”/”let’s get this off the table so I can have a government”) and 2014 to the present (“A brain Paris-ite ate my brain”). The final section – “what next/what does it all mean” – suggests kayfabe is no longer an adequate epithet, but “the peek-a-bo Fafocene” might just work.
Period 1: 1988 to 1996 – “let’s make promises, but with caveats”
The possibility of carbon dioxide build-up in the atmosphere really screwing things up first appears in a parliamentary document in September 1969
Things changed after 1985. Atmospheric scientists had high credibility and media reach because of the recently discovered “Ozone Hole”. A scientific meeting in Villach, Austria, set the ‘greenhouse effect’ running. Australia was well-positioned to respond, thanks to Barry Jones, the Minister for Science. He had set up a “Commission for the Future” (in the face of hostility and derision from his Labor colleagues, of course) and it had worked with the CSIRO’s Atmospheric Physics division to start to inform people via “The Greenhouse Project”.
1988 was the year the issue properly exploded, internationally and nationally. In June an international conference in Canada on “The Changing Atmosphere” ended with the “Toronto Target” – the proposal being that rich nations commit to reducing their carbon dioxide emissions by 20 per cent by 2005, against a 1988 baseline.
Various State governments expressed tentative interest. Then Federal Minister for the Environment Graham Richardson tried to get Prime Minister Bob Hawke’s Cabinet to adopt it in May 1989, before being shot down by Treasurer Paul Keating..
The Hawke Government prevaricated. It won the March 1990 Federal Election, which was agonisingly close for the Liberals (who had gone to that election with a proposal to go BEYOND the Toronto target and do the 20 per cent cut by the year 2000).
Matters came to a head though, in October. The Second World Climate Conference was about to happen, and was regarded as the starting gun for negotiations for an international climate treaty. Australia, represented by new Environment Minister Ros Kelly, could not turn up in Geneva empty-handed. A compromise was hammered out, known as the Interim Planning Target which intoned the relevant dates and numbers and then added
“…the Government will not proceed with measures which have net adverse economic impacts nationally or on Australia’s trade competitiveness in the absence of similar action by major greenhouse-gas-producing countries.”
Where did these caveats come from? There’s a lovely anecdote in “The business response to climate change: case studies of Australian interest groups“ the 2005 PhD thesis of Guy Pearse (not the actor) which I can’t help but add –
{I mean it strikes me that the policy trajectory going way back to the late eighties—we were headed in one direction when we had that interim planning target, and then there was a sudden shift in trajectory and pretty much we have stayed on it ever since. Because while the media coverage in recent times would give the impression that the Howard Government have been the one that has made the big shift and been the international pariah and so on—you can actually trace that line back in terms of policy to a cabinet decision when Kerin was around and Richo was around.}
That’s right, that’s right.
{And there was a battle in cabinet where they said—OK, we will keep this interim planning target but always on the proviso that Australia will not take any action which jeopardised the economy.}
Dick Wells wrote those words with Craig Emerson.
{And they have been pretty much the same ever since. The trajectory has been pretty much the same?}
Craig Emerson was the economics adviser to Keating at the time—and he is now a shadow minister, right. They sat—I can remember the cabinet meeting very clearly—because Ros Kelly was banging them around the ears—and called them liars and all sorts of things—but the cabinet decision that went up was rejected and I can remember it was about eight o’clock at night and Craig and Dick were sitting in the conference room in John Kerin’s office trying to redraft this cabinet decision. And Keating wanted to go and have dinner with his family and so Keating is standing over them—he is not prime minister at this stage—he is the treasurer. And he is standing around over the top saying – ‘come on you bastards.’ And they are trying to draft these caveats. All right—and so they drafted those caveats, and so then they reconvened cabinet and they signed off on the cabinet decision. And, Ros Kelly never forgave them. [13;415–32]
Footnote 699, page 355
As green groups noted at the time, there was so much hedging as to make this meaningless.
In the end, the treaty signed at the Rio Earth Summit in 1992 included nothing like the Toronto Target, which had very few national governments behind it. The treaty (what we now call the UNFCCC) had no targets and timetables for any emissions reductions by anyone, thanks to the US threatening to veto the whole deal if these were included. The closest that we came to an official target was an aspiration to return emissions to 1990 levels by 2000.
Climate policy, and especially emissions reductions policies were definitively destroyed when Keating came from the back-benches to topple a tired Bob Hawke, who had no answers to the new Liberal leader, one John Hewson (he has changed his tune on the importance of environmental issues – at the time, he clearly did not rate them as important).
A “National Greenhouse Response Strategy” was utterly toothless and meaningless. It seemed not to matter to anyone in power. However, the UNFCCC was ratified more quickly than had been anticipated and this meant that the “Conferences of the Parties” (COPs) were going to start sooner rather than later. Australia was in an awkward position – with a clearly inadequate set of policy tools. Keating told people not to concentrate on the “amorphous” issue of climate change. A carbon tax was proposed, and given a boost by evidence from the first “Greenhouse Gas Inventory” not only was Australia never going to hit the Toronto Target, it wasn’t even anywhere near returning to 1990 levels by 2000.
1996 to 2013: “let’s not even pretend”/”dammit, I have to push through a policy”
The second period is a decade of determined resistance to action for a decade, followed by a few years of extraordinary policy chaos and bloodletting.
John Howard became Prime Minister in March 1996. He was and remains the poster-child for “anti-reflexivity.” In April 1997 he told ABC radio that Australia should never have signed, let alone ratified the UNFCCC. But the previous government had said yes to the “Berlin Mandate” in April 1995, meaning at the third COP rich nations were expected to turn up with pledges to reduce their emissions. Howard sent emissaries around the world trying to convince other nations’ governments that Australia was a special case (“differentiation”), and deserved exemptions. His position sparked indifference, contempt and occasionally outright mockery. However, through sheer intransigence and exhaustion, Australia managed to get (I would say ‘extort’ an emissions “reduction” target of… wait for it… an 8 per cent increase in its emissions. The Environment Minister received a standing ovation from his Liberal and National Party colleagues. And in fact, it was worse than that – the 108% figure was de jure, but de facto the increase in emissions was, thanks to a clause pushed through at 3am in a conference hall in Kyoto, Japan, as delegates fell asleep, meant Australia really had 130% of its 1990 emissions as its “target.”
Ratification of the Kyoto Protocol then became a bizarre symbol of virtue/vice, despite the fact that the whole thing was a totally inadequate farce. There’s a good 2010 academic article you can read about this, if you’re so inclined – The Veil of Kyoto and the politics of greenhouse gas mitigation in Australia.
Anyway, in September 2006 the climate issue returned to the Australian political scene, really for the first time since 1990 (this is not to throw shade at those activists who tried to get it onto the agenda). John Howard was then forced into one of his U-turns, and appointed a group of fossil-fuel representatives to work with a civil servant to produce a study on the possibility of an Emissions Trading Scheme (something Howard had personally vetoed in 2003, btw).
The point here is that if you are going to have an emissions trading scheme, then questions of what you are aiming at, in terms of percentage reduction of emissions, or a temperature target or whatever, can only be fudged a little bit. The whole point (in THEORY) of an ETS is that you only have a certain number of “emissions reduction certificates” available, and the price of these goes up as they become more scarce (again, in THEORY).
So, if you’re only planning a small “reduction”, lots of certificates can be issued… (keeps the price low, but the consultants and bankers can still get rich, and big polluters can pretend to be pure at low cost. What’s not to love?)
Kevin Rudd, newly minted Labor leader, swept the 2007 election, started the process of ratifying the Kyoto Protocol and took himself off to the COP in Bali, Indonesia. There the very first cracks started to show, because the Europeans wanted him to sign up to a 25 per cent in emissions by 2020, and he dug his heels in at the 5 per cent he’d already committed to.
But EU environment commissioner Stavros Dimas says he has voiced regret to a top Rudd adviser that the PM did not back an EU-led proposal calling for carbon emission cuts by 25 to 40 per cent by 2020 from 1990 levels.
The next few years – 2007 to 2012 – are scarcely believable – it makes Quentin Tarantino’s Reservoir Dogs look like a particularly saccharine Disney rom-com. There were all sorts of announcements of provisional targets, by 2050 (still a long way off, of course, unlike now). Guy Pearse’s Quarterly Essay, Quarry Vision, is a great read on all this.
Ultimately, in order to form a government after the 2010 election that had resulted in a hung parliament, Julia Gillard, who had toppled Rudd, had to agree to introduce an emissions trading scheme (Rudd had failed in this, and had been too cowardly/chaotic to go for a double dissolution election).
Again, the question of what the percentage reduction target was there, with the Greens wanting a higher target, but knowing that this would mean a higher carbon tax (remember, the theoretical point of a price on carbon is to drive behaviour change – for individuals, investors, technology etc)
Gillard got her “Clean Energy Future” legislation through, but Opposition Tony Abbott, helped enormously by the Murdoch media, had destroyed it and her. As Prime Minister he repealed the ETS (but was unable to do away with some other things in the package, so they were slowly white-anted).
2014 to present (“a brain Paris-ite ate my brain. Why is it so hot?”
The whole UNFCCC process had almost collapsed at the December 2009 Copenhagen conference (it turns out the Danes somewhat over-estimated their hosting capacity and diplomatic prowess). The French had stepped in, and basically the whole thing got saved because an old and discredited (and discreditable) proposal got dusted off. “Pledge and Review” meant that nations would make promises, then get together periodically to see how they were doing and whether the latest science meant they really needed to up their pledges.
When proposed in 1990 this was laughed at as an obvious recipe for inaction and failure. By 2013 or 2014 it had become “a pragmatic way forward and how dare you extremist virtue signallers allow the perfect to be the enemy of the good.”
This being the UN, there had to be a three or four letter acronym, to make it all sound official and effective, and to bewilder the ignorant herd. And the acronym was “INDC” – intended nationally determined contribution..
So the whole pretend aspect of target-setting has basically been institutionalised. The loopholes and bullshitting opportunities are endless. That’s really all you need to know about this latest (last?) phase.
Under Tony Abbott, we had this.
“On 11 August 2015, the Government announced that Australia will reduce greenhouse gas emissions so they are 26-28 per cent below 2005 levels by 2030. According to the Australian Department of the Environment’s 2030 target document:
[i]n terms of reduction in emissions per capita and the emissions intensity of the economy, Australia’s emissions intensity and emissions per person [will] fall faster than many other economies…emissions per person [will] fall[s] by 50–52 per cent between 2005 and 2030 and emissions per unit of GDP by 64–65 per cent.”
A few weeks later, he was toppled by Malcolm Turnbull. Turnbull clung to power, but then had to abandon his “Notional Energy Guarantee”-
“Australia removed requirements from its National Energy Guarantee plan that would have mandated that greenhouse emissions from its power industry decrease by 26 percent from 2005 levels by 2030.”
It didn’t save him, and he was replaced by Scott Morrison, a flat earth… sorry, flat out marketing genius.
“Morrison went to Glasgow armed with the same short-term emissions reduction target (a 26-28% cut compared with 2005) set under Tony Abbott six years ago.
The prime minister was in the awkward position of having to tell the summit in his speech that the country would probably make a 35% emissions cut by 2030 – official government projections said so – but that he would not commit to doing it.”
But then, in 2022, Everything Changed and the adults who care about the world and are willing to stand up to the fossil fuel companies took power.
Yes, sarcasm is indeed the lowest form of wit. But it is all the lowest form of politician deserve, isn’t it? I think there is a strong and getting stronger case to be made that Albanese is a bigger climate criminal than John Howard.
Before I get philosophical, let’s check in on Australia’s annual C02 emissions
If we’d listened to the scientists and activists who were pushing the Toronto Target back in 1988, and taken those actions (one percent reduction per annum would more or less have done it, and that was achievable via energy efficiency, a bit of light fuel-switching etc) then we would STILL be facing serious problems with the climate. But they would, I suspect, be manageable.
That, combined with sink failure (deforestation, ocean acidification) has meant that the blanket of carbon dioxide that traps heat on our planet (in moderation a very good thing) isn’t 350ppm as it was when those people met in Toronto, but about 428ppm, and climbing rapidly.
We’re in such deep and hot shit, and most of us have no idea.
Targets functioned (we should begin to talk in the past tense when referring to meaningful climate policy, imo) as a way of soothing ourselves that matters were in hand, that pragmatic action could be taken. It was a way – as per the Veil of Kyoto article – of not talking about wider deeper transformations that were becoming unavoidable because the incremental had been thrown in the bin. Targets still function that way, I guess.
Kayfabe or peekaboo?
For the last few years I have talked about climate policy, and climate activism (see my review of a dreadful documentary here) as “kayfabe” – the make-believe that wrestlers and fans engage in willingly and knowingly, about the “characters” (faces and heels) being real.
I think that’s no longer adequate as a metaphor, for three reasons. First, because kayfabe can continue indefinitely. Second, because there’s a kind of enjoyment to it. Third, because it takes place between consenting adults.
I think I am going to shift to “peekabo” – where a child covers its eyes with its hand and thinks that because it can’t see you, you can’t see it. Most children grow out of this delusion by, what, age 5? We (2) are playing peekabo with the climate (and therefore other systems) of the only habitable planet for many light years. It’s aggravatingly stupid, and has proven fatal, we just don’t know it yet.
There is a brilliant cartoon by the brilliant David Pope – “you are now leaving the Holocene” (see interview with him here)
My bona fides – I did a PhD that covered the period 1989-2012, looking specifically at four episodes of public (incumbent) opposition to carbon pricing (there were other, more private ones).
The whole question of who “we” is in this sentence and others above is for another time. #NotAllHumans
Thirty one years ago, on this day, June 16th, 1994, Australian business interests were looking for people who could help them out in avoiding any significant climate commitments.
BUSINESS groups have called on the Federal Government to form strategic alliances with other countries to maximise its negotiating position in future climate change negotiations. The suggestion at yesterday’s [June 16] round table follows widespread concern in the business community that Australia might be forced into a greenhouse response which is not in its interests. While the form of any alliance on greenhouse gas has not been spelt out, it could be modelled on the Cairns Group of 14 agricultural exporters which played a key role in the Uruguay Round of world trade talks. It is understood the Cairns Group model has been informally discussed by industry representatives concerned that Australia will have little influence in the negotiations. A paper prepared for yesterday’s round table by the Australian Coal Association and the Australian Mining Industry Council says it is “high time we stopped mouthing undefinable expressions” and pursued more precision in a so-called “burden-sharing agreement”.
Gill, P. 1994. Call to form strategic alliances. Australian Financial Review, 17 June.
And
“Canberra has been remarkably close-mouthed about how Australia is to reduce emissions. The Prime Minister, the Environment Minister and the Resources Minister met yesterday with the NGOs and State Government ministers to exchange views on this and related matters.”
Moran, 1994, 17 June.
And
The Federal Government has assured business groups that Australia won’t be financially penalised in meeting its international obligations to reduce greenhouse gas emissions.
“We have got to set an example on greenhouse gases but there has always been a caveat in our negotiations that it won’t be at an economic cost to Australia,” the Minister for Resources, Mr Beddall, told The Australian Financial Review.
The Prime Minister, Mr Keating, had earlier yesterday given similar reassurances at a high-level forum on the environment in Canberra.
Mr Keating told the meeting of more than 100 business and environmental representatives that the Government was aware of the “economic implications” of adhering to international guidelines on greenhouse gas emission.
The meeting thrust the greenhouse issue onto the economic agenda, with 10 business groups demanding the Government adopt measures that reflected Australian industry’s greater use of energy before agreeing to further international targets on greenhouse gas emissions.
Environmental groups mounted a strong counter-attack at the meeting by accusing the Government of failing to match the effort of other countries in responding to the United Nations Climate Change Convention.
Dwyer, M. 1994. Greenhouse ‘won’t put us in the red’. The Australian Financial Review, 17 June, p.3.
The amount of carbon dioxide in the air was roughly zzzppm. As of 2025 it is 430ppm, but check here for daily measures.
The broader context was that Australia had ratified the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change in late 1992, along with a surprising number of other nations. The treaty was now international law, and the first Conference of the Parties was to be held in Berlin next March. Australia was already in an awkward position – it had promised (with caveats) steep domestic emissions cuts which were not in fact happening. Meanwhile, its coal exports were raising eyebrows….
The specific context was that Environment Minister John Faukner had already floated the idea of a carbon tax, and business was nervous.
What I think we can learn from this
The solutions – or some of them – were staring us in the face. The rich didn’t like those solutions, so they kicked the can down the road. And down the road. And here we are in 2025.
What happened next Faukner’s carbon tax proposal met fierce, fierce opposition and came to a grisly end in February 1995. The Berlin COP happened and Australia signed on to turn up at the 3rd meeting with a plan to reduce its emissions. But by then it was no longer Keating in charge – John Howard became Prime Minister in March 1996, and had other ideas…
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.
Thirty years ago, on this day, February 7th, 1995,
Treasurer Ralph Willis stated that the UNFCCC contained ‘let-out clauses’ and that the government might decide that a less ambitious target was appropriate Parliamentary Debates, House of Representatives, 7
February 1995, 582 (Ralph Willis, Treasurer).
The Government also confirmed yesterday that it would be forced to renege on international targets to reduce greenhouse gas emissions by the turn of the century.
The Treasurer, Mr Willis, told Parliament the Government would examine the “let-out clauses” of the United Nations agreement to stabilise greenhouse gas emission levels to 1990 levels by 2000.
“Those are not unimportant clauses (and) they have to be taken into account when considering whether we need absolutely to tie ourselves to achieving the (targets),” he said. “(But) we are concerned with ensuring that Australia does everything in its power to try to live up to its obligations to the convention.”
The backdown would be highly embarrassing for the Government in the lead-up to the International Convention on Climate Change in Berlin next month
The amount of carbon dioxide in the air was roughly 361ppm. As of 2025 it is 426ppm, but check here for daily measures.
The context was that very day, there was a round table about a carbon tax. Ralph Willison was in Parliament and was busy saying that there were get out clauses in the UNFCCC document that Australia would investigate and, if necessary, exploit so much for Australia as a middle power.
What I think we can learn from this is that there is no bit of paper that anyone will sign that won’t be ignored if it becomes inconvenient to them.
What happened next
There was no carbon tax. There was finally a carbon price in 2012 that didn’t last very long. Tiny Abbott abolished it. The emissions kept climbing, and we’re absolutely doomed.
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.
Thirty years ago, on this day, February 3rd, 1995, a Labor Senator – and I hope you are sitting down when you read this – assures business-types that “the economy” [i.e. corporate profits] is a higher priority than reductions in greenhouse gas emissions.
In a largely unreported speech to the Committee for Economic Development of Australia in Melbourne on Friday [3rd February 1995] , Senator McMullan said: “The levy will be dealt with on the basis of its appropriateness as a measure to reduce Australia’s greenhouse gas emissions rather than on the amount of revenue it might raise.” “What we need to avoid is any situation where we unilaterally place a wide range of export and import-competing industries at a competitive disadvantage without actually contributing effectively to reducing global or domestic greenhouse emissions,” he added.
Gill, P. 1995. Official warns of small cut in gas with carbon tax. The Australian Financial Review, 7 February, p.3.
The amount of carbon dioxide in the air was roughly 361ppm. As of 2025 it is 428ppm, but check here for daily measures.
The context was that there was an almighty battle going on within the Keating government about a carbon tax and the opponents of said tax were trying to ally shop and venue shop and water down and weaken as much as they could. This speech to an economics business think tank/talking shop called CEDA should be seen in that context.
What I think we can learn from this is that introducing a new order of things, as per Machiavelli, is extremely difficult, even if it’s urgent and important. Perhaps especially if it’s urgent and important.
What happened next: The carbon tax was defeated. Emissions trading schemes were defeated. Finally, Julia Gillard in 2011 got one through. But oh my, what a shitshow.
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.
Thirty two years ago, on this day, December 21st, 1992, Australian Prime Minister Paul Keating went to the provinces…
“Adopting clean production methods which minimise waste and pollution and maximise efficient use and recycling of resources is essential to the success of our manufacturing industry. The market is there for cleaner industries and cleaner products. It is also there for environmental management systems and technologies. Australians are developing those things. The drive for environmentally friendly industries and the protection of our natural environment is, in short, part of the economic drive, part of the international competitive drive in which Australia is engaged.” (Paul Keating: Statement on the Environment 21 December 1992)
Also – The Prime Minister, Mr Keating, will announce today the ratification of two international treaties that will extend Federal Government powers over the environment.
Garran, R. 1992. Keating to flag new environmental leap. Australian Financial Review, December.21
And
The Prime Minister’s Environment Statement, released in Adelaide on December 21, last year, was weighted heavily towards water and air quality.
It was noticeable for its lack of any of the most contentious of the pressing environmental problems, such as the setting of firm greenhouse-gas reduction targets; any attempt to implement the recommendations of the ecologically sustainable development working groups; the introduction of effective national endangered species legislation – to name just some.
The amount of carbon dioxide in the air was roughly 357ppm. As of 2024 it is 425ppm, but check here for daily measures.
The context was that Keating had come to power exactly a year previously. He had inherited an Ecologically Sustainable Development policymaking process, which neither he nor the federal bureaucrats were at all fond of.
Keating had not gone to the Rio Earth Summit, the only one of the OECD leaders not to do so.
There had been a National Greenhouse Response Strategy released a couple of weeks before early December
This was him, probably through gritted teeth, having to talk about stupid green issues. And as Toyne said, it was silent on the all-important question of greenhouse targets.
What we learn is that in the same way that in nature, you’ll find the cubs and babies of another father getting unceremonious killed by the new father (and this being genetically the smart thing to do) you’ll find policies – good, bad and indifferent – that were put forward by the previous person, whether they’re in your party or on the opposition party, unceremoniously wiped out and that’s what happened here. Though you can overgeneralise this, it was simply that Keating was in thrall to the neolibs, who had hated and still hated environmentalist issues which they regard as silly green irrelevant externalities and a Trojan horse for SOCIALISM.
In 1994 Keating would chide environmentalists for their focus on the “amorphous” issue of greenhouse gases. https://allouryesterdays.info/2022/08/01/august-2-1994-australian-prime-minister-paul-keating-says-greenies-should-ignore-amorphous-issue-of-greenhouse/
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.
Thirty four years ago, on this day, December 12th, 1990,
The Federal Government’s plan to reduce greenhouse gas emissions by 20 per cent by 2005 will be investigated by its main advisory body of micro-economic reform.
Treasurer Paul Keating announced on Wednesday[12th] he has referred the plan to the Industry Commission, which must report by September 30 next year.
The inquiry will cover “the costs and benefits for Australian industry of an international consensus in favour of a stabilisation of emissions of greenhouse gases and a reduction in those emissions by 20 percent by the year 2005.”
It will also look at what new opportunities may arise for Australian industry as a result of the reduction, and how Australia could best prepare to respond to the costs and benefits of the plan.
Some scientists believe Australia could become a world leader in environmentally-friendly technology as a result of added research flowing from the government decision.
Anon,1990. Paul Keating refers greenhouse to Industry Commission. Green Week, December 18,p.7.
The amount of carbon dioxide in the air was roughly 354ppm. As of 2024 it is 425ppm, but check here for daily measures.
The context was that as part of the quid pro quo for accepting the Interim Planning Target through Cabinet in October 1990, Keating had managed to extract permission to send the greenhouse issue to one of the pet neo-liberal outposts, the Industry Commission.
What we learn is that if you want to get anything through a group, there’s always going to be compromises. Some of them consequential, some of them not. It can be hard to tell beforehand.
What happened next. In September of 1991, the Industry Commission released its report, but basically gave loads of ammunition to the denialists and the delayers saying “nothing to see here shouldn’t take action cheaper not to do anything,” etc, etc. And this was another nail in the climate issue’s coffin. By this time, it was getting harder and harder to sustain interest. There was the Ecologically Sustainable Development process coming to an end, the backwash of the Gulf War, people preparing for Rio.
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.
Twenty-nine years ago, on this day, December 1st, 1995, bullshit “ABARE” climate modelling put out by Australian government, as part of its push for special treatment internationally.
1995 Release of “Global Climate Change” report by Keating Government, based on ABARE AND DFAT “modelling”.
This was hardly a surprise. At the beginning of the year a front page story on The Australian (back when it was still almost a newspaper) had said as much. From January 18, 1995.
The amount of carbon dioxide in the air was roughly 361ppm. As of 2024 it is 423ppm, but check here for daily measures.
The context was that the first Conference of the Parties (COP1) had happened in Berlin in March. Australia was one of the nations that, thanks to the Berlin Mandate, was expected to turn up a couple of years later, with a plan for emissions reductions. But Australia had already comprehensively failed to take any action towards its first proposed target, the Interim Planning Target of October 1990. And so it was going to need other ways of responding to the challenge, as in denying the challenge and trying to push it on to other people. ABARE had already done some idiotic plant modelling and now the Department for Foreign Affairs and Trade were happy to take ABARE’s modelling and create an argument that said Australia shouldn’t have to x. In essence, this was not under that wicked, wicked man, Liberal John Howard. It was under St. Paul Keating.
What we learn is that the Australian political elites’ mendacious and rapacious hostility towards climate ambition is essentially bi-partisan and has been going on for 30 however many years and here we are,
What happened next? Keating lost office in March of 1996. Howard simply turbo-charged the hostility to all things environmental and especially climate.
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.
Twenty-nine years ago, on this day, September 27th, 1995, the government has to admit that there has been no progress on reducing emissions.
The Keating Government’s action plan to curb emissions of harmful greenhouse gases has failed to produce any significant benefits in the almost three years since it was endorsed by the Commonwealth and all State and Territory governments.
Despite the plan, and a further commitment for action in this year’s Greenhouse 21C, independent analysts can find no evidence that any measure is working.
Six months after the launch of Greenhouse 21C, no director has been appointed to run its key initiative. Interviews were held only last week.
The director’s position carries only a middle-management grade in the Public Service, even though that person’s task will be to hammer out voluntary agreements on cutting greenhouse gas emissions with the heads of some of Australia’s biggest companies.
Gilchrist, G. 1995. Greenhouse Project Fails To Curb Gases. Sydney Morning Herald, 27 September, p11.
The amount of carbon dioxide in the air was roughly 361ppm. As of 2024 it is 422ppm, but check here for daily measures.
The context was that Australian governments had been making big promises about climate action, for some years. The most notable had been the “Interim Planning Target” in October 1990. And here we were five years later, with the carbon tax defeated in February, with new coal-fired power stations, new freeways. It was totally clear that the Australian Government was not pressing industry, and that the upward trajectory and emissions would continue.
What we learn is that getting governments to make promises is not actually that difficult. Getting them to keep those promises is.
What happened next? Well, two months after this story in December of 1995, the Keating government started promulgating ridiculous ABARE modelling on the global level to try and be more aggressive against the Berlin Mandate. In March of 1996, John Howard took office. And then the fun and games on climate delay and denial really kicked in.
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.
Thirty years ago, on this day, September 14th, 1994
CANBERRA NOTEBOOK
Industry can expect tougher government action as a result of publication in the past week of Australia’s first inventory of greenhouse gas emissions. The Environment Minister, Senator John Faulkner, says he is working on a range of measures to take to Cabinet by December to help cut Australia’s gas emissions in line with international obligations.
Hooper, N. 1994. Greenhouse Action. BRW, 19 September, p.14.
and
A carbon tax, which could have a significant impact on Australia’s resources sector, will be examined as part of the Federal Government’s business tax reforms.
While it is not one of the Ralph report recommendations, a paper has been prepared by Treasury that is expected to be used by the Government when it begins negotiations with the Australian Democrats on the business tax reform package.
In negotiations to secure approval for the Government’s landmark business tax reforms, the Democrats are expected to push for a more systematic approach to Australia’s commitment to reduce greenhouse emissions under the Kyoto targets. This might involve a tax on emissions or other measures, such as greenhouse credits for tree plantations.
Dodson, L. and Lewis, S. 1999. Government puts carbon tax on agenda. The Australian Financial Review, 14 September, p.1.
The amount of carbon dioxide in the air was roughly 359ppm. As of 2024 it is 420ishppm, but check here for daily measures.
Businesses told that they can expect regulation, that they should brace for it.
The context was that the carbon tax idea that had been promulgated, put forward in the late 80s, early 90s And then defeated was on its way back. It seemed John Faulkner who was the Environment Minister for Keating was proposing attacks that would raise some funds, needed funds for Treasury and also pay for a little bit of research and development of solar power. Business knew that business groups would fight very hard; but they were realistic that things could go wrong and that they might end up with regulation or taxation. This of course might also have been a warning in order to whip up more interest and finance from potentially affected groups, so the troops were energised; who can say.
What we can learn is that business fights dirty and hard, obvs.
What happened next Business won that round, and almost all of the rounds to follow. And the emissions kept climbing.
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.
