Russell Trood (Queensland, Liberal Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

My question is to the Minister for the Environment and Heritage, Senator Campbell. Will the minister advise the Senate of the action the Australian government is taking to address global climate change? Is the minister aware of any alternative policies?

Ian Campbell (WA, Liberal Party, Minister for the Environment and Heritage) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Thank you to Senator Trood, who has taken a long-term interest in sensible environmental policies with a practical approach to solving the problem rather than resorting to the rhetoric and rubbish we get from the other side. The government is committed to finding sensible, practical responses to climate change, and that is going to take two things. It is going to need a global response that includes all of the major economies. The great news out of the latest United Nations framework convention meeting in Nairobi was that the foundation for building a new and effective post-Kyoto regime was put in place. The world agreed to a thorough, timely and robust review of the Kyoto protocol because most of the parties to that United Nations framework convention know that the Kyoto protocol is simply not working, that under Kyoto greenhouse gas emissions will rise by 40 per cent and that the need for a new Kyoto protocol is well and truly with us. So that review is a good response from around the globe. We will work positively with the rest of the countries around the world to build a new Kyoto protocol which involves all of the economies, not just the 35 economies that are within the Kyoto protocol and have seen greenhouse gases going up.

You also need a strong domestic policy. You have seen over recent weeks the announcement by the Australian government of funding to build the biggest solar power station in the world in Mildura and two major clean coal and carbon capture projects. Also last week I was able to announce the funding for the biggest carbon capture and storage project anywhere in the world—to bury three million tonnes of carbon dioxide from the Gorgon project. It will be pumped 2.5 kilometres under the Indian Ocean and stuck under the ground where it belongs to stop it going into the atmosphere. You need a policy that is technology neutral. You need a policy that says: ‘Let us have energy efficiency. Let us have fuel switching to gas, which reduces your emissions by 50 per cent. Let us have carbon capture and storage to store the carbon from burning fossil fuels. Let us have solar. Let us have wind. Let us have all of these measures.’

But you also need a policy that does not discriminate against nuclear. You have got 440 power plants around the world creating low-emission energy and yet the Labor Party geosequesters their head—sticks their head in the sand—and says, ‘No, we cannot consider that.’ You have also got Mr Beazley leading a Labor Party that is anti coal. It is now 19 days since the Newcastle City Council passed a resolution saying that there would be no new coalmines and Mr Beazley has not got the backbone to come out, call them in and say, ‘Hang on, we need coal and we need new coal technologies.’

We have got a party that is conflicted on uranium. If you want to know how important uranium and nuclear is to the future of the world, do not listen to a Liberal politician here in Australia; listen to a Labor one in Great Britain. We need to quote the debate from the House of Commons Hansard on 15 November this year when Mr Tony Blair, the Prime Minister of Great Britain, said:

... we need to put nuclear power back on the agenda and at least replace the nuclear energy that we will lose. Without it, we will not be able to meet either our objectives on climate change or our objectives on energy security.

To the Prime Minister of Great Britain I say: hear, hear! To Mr Beazley I say: wake up!