Nita Green (Queensland, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Hansard source

I've said this before and I will say this again: I'm very proud to live in regional Queensland, an area that boasts rich resources and natural wonders. Despite the distance between towns and the diversity between each regional community, we are very proud of where we live and the contribution that regional Queenslanders make to Queensland and the national economy.

In North Queensland, you can drive from the Great Barrier Reef and the World Heritage listed rainforests that tourists from all over the world come to see through to cane farms and agricultural land. You can drive past sugar mills and manufacturing hubs, past ports and our marine industry and up to mines and processing refineries for every mineral and resource that we have to offer. Regional Queenslanders understand very deeply the connection between our lands, our environment and our jobs. Regional Queenslanders also understand the threats that climate change and the government's inability to implement genuine policies to combat climate change pose to our economic prosperity and to our livelihoods. Regional Queenslanders have experienced fires, floods, cyclones and higher water temperatures, increasing the costs of recovery and insurance for households.

The government's policy paralysis on energy has led to instability and uncertainty for jobs and businesses in regional Queensland. We know that climate change is impacting the health of the Great Barrier Reef, which supports thousands of jobs. In Far North Queensland, islands in the Torres Strait are bracing for rising sea levels. They may be Australia's first climate change refugees if predictions of sea level rises are accurate.

When we talk about climate change in this place, it's never lost on me that the Queenslanders least responsible for the emissions that cause the climate to change are the least equipped to defend against the effects that they will feel before any person in any city who waves a placard around in support of either side of this debate. This dichotomy that lives and breathes in regional Queensland every day is why, in my first speech, I said:

Job security for Queenslanders and the dangers of climate change are interlinked. Queenslanders want and deserve secure jobs.

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The only way to win an outcome that ensures a prosperous and healthy future for our state is to listen to Queenslanders, not talk at them or speak about them in abstract terms. Every regional Queenslander deserves to be treated with respect.

This Galilee Basin (Coal Prohibition) Bill 2018 doesn't respect regional Queenslanders. It singles out regional Queensland. It doesn't talk about jobs or the future of jobs and it doesn't talk about the economic plan required for Australia to reach emission goals. It doesn't give regional Queenslanders a stake in their prosperity or recognise their right to have their voices heard. This bill singles out regional Queensland unfairly and unjustly for the sole purpose of wedging this parliament and the members of the Labor Party who care about climate change and care about jobs. It is wedge legislation at its very finest—another stunt from the Greens.

It was less than two minutes into Senator Waters's speech today before she attacked the Labor Party and before she attacked the Queensland state Labor government. So we know what the true purpose of this bill really is. It's about Maiwar; it's not about Moranbah. It's about South Brisbane; it's not about South Johnstone. This is a legislation version of the Greens' convoy to Clermont in the lead-up to the election. And didn't that go so well, as we all know. You would have thought that the Greens had learnt from their catastrophic failings at the last election, but, clearly, they haven't.

Former senator Bob Brown last week described regional Queenslanders who stood up to the convoy as 'cranky, nasty and inhospitable' and went on to call them an 'unruly mob fuelled by grog'. That's what the Greens think about regional Queenslanders. They haven't learnt their lessons. When there is so much at stake for our country if we don't get climate change settings right, stunts from the Greens are selfish and self-indulgent.

This bill does nothing to reduce Australians' climate emissions. While alternative sources of energy are being produced in places like regional Queensland, a switch to low emissions can't happen overnight, and this bill isn't actually proposing any plan to make that switch happen. It just wants to turn the switch off overnight. And when it comes to protecting local jobs, this bill is poorly thought out.

In her second reading speech, Senator Waters said that the Greens were prepared to consult with communities affected by market changes in the demand for thermal coal, but the explanatory memorandum to this bill says that the bill would have no financial impact. We know that that is not true. The truth is the Greens pretend to listen. They pretend to be interested. But I haven't heard them listening to people in Mackay or Townsville or workers who would be affected by a bill like this.

What bills like this do is give a platform to the climate change deniers in the government who claim that any action on climate change will result in job losses across places that can afford it the least. It gives them a platform to argue against more renewable energy and for less action on climate change. You will note that Senator Canavan took the opportunity to also attack the Queensland Labor government in his second reading contribution today. It's quite a common theme coming from that end of the chamber. These so-called defenders of coal workers have never stood up to labour hire. They have never stood up against automation. They want to make workplaces less safe, so more people die in coalmines across Queensland. They have never seen a manufacturing job they wouldn't privatise or casualise or send offshore. But they come in here saying they are standing up for coal workers. We know that is not the truth.

The truth is, because the government is being held back by climate change sceptics on their backbench, and even on their frontbench now, they have failed to take any meaningful action on emissions. We know that the latest emissions data confirms that the Morrison government's climate change policy is hopelessly inadequate. There was no reduction in emissions in the September quarter of 2019, and annual emissions have reduced by only a pitiful 0.3 per cent year to date. Australia will not meet its Kyoto commitment to cut emissions by five per cent in 2020. In fact, emissions reductions will amount to little more than a rounding error. The government's own data suggests that emissions will come down during the next years but only by less than five per cent. At that rate, it will take Australia 230 years to reach net zero emissions, rather than the 30 years scientists tell us is necessary. While the hard Right of the divided government party room continues to dictate climate policy, there will be no progress in tackling climate change.

Labor has been listening and understands that our economy and jobs are at risk if we do not address climate change. That is why Anthony Albanese announced last week that a future Labor government will commit to net zero carbon emissions by 2050. We are doing that in a practical way, with a long-term target, without singling out any community, region or industry. Labor is committing to net zero emissions by 2050 because that is what the science tells us we need to do, to avoid the worst outcomes of climate change. This is sensible and will bring us in step with other states and territories, and it is supported by the Business Council of Australia and energy companies because they want certainty. They want a long-term target. It is good policy.

It's interesting to note that this announcement has triggered the climate change deniers in the government and the Greens on this side of the chamber equally, which just shows you how sad and sorry sensible debate in this space has now become. Even though so-called moderate Liberals, like Trent Zimmerman, have called on the government to support net zero emissions by 2050, we've still got members of their government out there banging their pots and pans on their heads and making outlandish doomsday claims. The Greens have also attacked the target. If you have a look at the Twitter feeds of some of the Greens over the last couple of days, it's easy to see who they think the target is at the next election. It's not the conservatives over there, who are doing nothing about climate change; it's the Labor Party, who want to introduce a plan to help workers and prevent further changes in our climate. Regional Queenslanders deserve better than the nonsense coming from that end of the chamber, from both sides of the chamber, on this debate. We need to take action on climate change. We want to create jobs and protect jobs, and only the Australian Labor Party wants to do both.

Finally, I'll refer back to what I said in my first speech: there are regional Queenslanders, right now, who are desperate for jobs.

Debate interrupted.