Larissa Waters (Queensland, Australian Greens) Share this | Hansard source

Sadly, once again, the government is refusing to disclose even the most basic of materials to the Senate. This is a very simple and straightforward request to provide documentation within a fairly narrow timeframe that relates to the 2035 climate targets. Labor is due to announce Australia's 2035 climate targets this month, but it is hiding the true impacts of climate change from the public by hiding the National climate risk assessment report, and they're now hiding documents that would show whether or not the Climate Change Authority and the minister are working together.

The Greens and Labor worked together to create the Climate Change Authority to be an independent climate adviser to government. The documents that this OPD and attendants are seeking to reveal could ascertain whether or not the climate minister is trying to direct or corral the Climate Change Authority, which would be a breach of its statutory functions. But once again the government has claimed public interest immunity, and it's difficult to escape the conclusion that the government is so full of hubris that it feels like they are a walking claim of public interest immunity from parliamentary oversight. It seems that the only people whose views this re-elected government cares about are coal and gas companies. What we need is a science based 2035 climate target to keep us all safe, to keep our communities safe and to keep nature protected. A low target, a target that is not based on science, will simply favour coal and gas profits—those same folks that donate to the government's re-election coffers.

It's pretty clear that this Labor government wants to roll out the red carpet to the fossil fuel industry, whether it is approving Woodside's mega gas plant within 16 days of taking office or failing to hold Santos to account for leaking toxic methane for 19 years, which three federal agencies knew about but nobody did anything to stop—and they kept giving them fresh approvals. But that's not all. Overnight, they've approved yet another thermal coalmine by a multinational tax avoider, Glencore. This is clearly not a government that takes the climate crisis seriously, and they are definitely not a government that takes parliamentary oversight seriously. If the government were serious about action on climate and the environment, it would stop approving coal and gas projects and, to boot, it would end the free public money—those fossil fuel subsidies—provided to those dirty, polluting, tax-dodging industries that are cooking the planet for all of us.

The stakes are very high. Ordinary Australians are already feeling the impacts of the climate crisis: algal blooms, insurance premiums going through the roof, bleached reefs in Ningaloo and the Great Barrier Reef. And all of that is just the beginning; it will only get worse from here if the government keeps on approving coal and gas projects and sets a low 2035 target. What with Woodside, what with turning a blind eye to Santos's gas leak and what with approving a thermal coalmine for multinational company Glencore overnight, it's pretty hard to escape the conclusion that Labor is addicted to coal and gas. It's sitting like a dark cloud on the parliament's climate ambition.

Approving coal or gas in this day and age is a climate crime, and yet, for Labor, propping up the coal and gas export industry seems to be business as usual. But you've got to stop gaslighting the public. Opening new coal and gas is the opposite of the climate action that people voted for at the most recent election and at the one before. Opening these new coal and gas projects simply locks Australia into providing the world with yet more coal and gas for decades to come and puts threatened wildlife, like our precious koala, further at risk. This is an extremely concerning trend. We are in the throes of the weeks and days before the 2035 climate target will be announced by this government, and we are seeing this government sneak through approvals for thermal coalmines, extending them out to 2045, extending Woodside's gas out to 2070 and refusing to release a report that warns about the massive damage from coal and gas. And now they're trying to hide the receipts about whether or not they have been pressuring the climate authority to lower the potential ambition for our climate targets. Stop letting coal and gas run this place and start letting science, nature and the public interest do that. (Time expired)