Chris Bowen (McMahon, Australian Labor Party, Minister for Climate Change and Energy) Share this | Hansard source

I thank the honourable member for her question and thank her for her leadership on climate issues. I very much enjoyed working with her on things like a community battery for her electorate and other things.

The honourable member knows we are acting domestically and we are acting in our region, and we are acting internationally to restore our nation's reputation as well. In this government, we understand that better climate policy is better foreign policy and is better economic policy as well. It's in our national interest. It's in our region, where our brothers and sisters in the Pacific are at the front line of the climate change crisis. They know how much is at stake, and we know how much is at stake as well.

For some small island developing states, climate related natural disasters have already cost them 200 per cent of the size of their economy. That's the sort of thing at stake here, including in our broader region, as a country that neighbours the world's largest archipelago, Indonesia, which has so much at stake. I very much enjoyed the working relationship I've developed with my counterpart, Arifin Tasrif, as chair of the G20 energy ministers meeting in recent months. Better international engagement is also important for our ambition for Australia to be a renewable energy powerhouse, our ambition to export renewable energy around the world, creating jobs and investment as we do so. This is a key fortnight for international engagement, with the COP convening in Egypt.

When parliament rises I'll be departing for Egypt with my assistant minister, Senator McAllister, representing Australia for the negotiations next week. I know that Australia will receive a warm welcome there. I know that, because that warm welcome has been expressed over the last 24 hours,

The outgoing president of the COP, the Rt Hon. Alok Sharma, said this overnight: 'How can I put this this diplomatically? The government of Australia is back at the front line in the fight against climate change'. I note the comments of the former US president Al Gore, who said: 'Earlier this year, the people of Australia chose to start leading the renewable energy revolution.'

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