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Wong defends emissions target delay

Posted December 1, 2008 13:01:00
Updated December 1, 2008 14:44:00

Change of plan: Penny Wong (AAP: Ketut Karna, file photo)

• Related Story: Greens lash emissions target 'cop-out'
• Related Story: Wong backflips on emissions target announcement

The Federal Government has defended its decision to delay the announcement of its 2020 emissions cuts target until after global climate talks in Poland.

Climate Change Minister Penny Wong previously said the Government intended to announce the target ahead of the global talks, which start today.

But she has told The World Today it is more beneficial to reveal it at the same time as the emissions trading scheme white paper.

"Our priority is to provide business and the Australian community with certainty," she said.

"As we consulted on the green paper it became increasingly clear that it would benefit from the announcement of the target range and the design decisions on the carbon pollution reduction scheme at the same time.

She says both the target and the white paper will now be released later this month.

Senator Wong says the Government will play its full role at the Polish meeting in the city of Poznan.

"Poznan is the mid-point of those meetings and the important point at which we are seeking to get global agreement," she said

"So Poznan is not the conference at which countries will be asked to make binding commitments."

Greens leader Bob Brown labelled the decision a cop-out.

"This is a complete shemozzle from the Government. Here's Australia, which was the big sensation at Bali is going to be the big cop-out at Poznan," he said.

"It's all happened in 12 months, it's quite astonishing."

In Question Time, today Senator Wong hit back at the Greens' attack over the delay.

"There is one political party in this chamber which has no political commitment to targets of any sort and that is the Opposition," she said.

"So we are very clear about which political party in this place, Senator Brown, if you're going to fight with me, which political party in this place is committed to climate change."

Tags: environment, climate-change, government-and-politics, federal-government, world-politics, australia, act, canberra-2600, poland

Comments (81)

Comments for this story are closed. No new comments can be added. If you would like to have your say on this issue, you can do so via the Emails section of our Opinion pages.

• JC:

  01 Dec 2008 2:01:52pm

  I cant wait to read the comments from people saying "Ms Wong is right to wait." When those very same people just a week or so ago were saying that businesses were wrong to wait for all the details to be provided by the Govt. This is the very reason why business did wait - mixed signals from a minister that is unsure of herself, unsure of her portfolio, and unsure of the legislation she is being asked to "sell." Ms Wong is doing herself, her credibility and her cause no favours.
  
  

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  • BJ:

    01 Dec 2008 2:20:03pm

    Clever Ms Wong, now she will have the Liberal Climate Change Deniers screaming for the scheme to be introduced sooner ;)
    LCCD's and L's in general are so predictable.

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  • acker:

    01 Dec 2008 2:26:37pm

    Judging by the deafening silence of Malcolm Turnbull and the Lib's I take it they fully support Senator Wong on this call.
    
    So watch the first politician to comment
    
    "Ms Wong is right to wait."
    
    Might be a Liberal or a National.

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• Pen Pal:

  01 Dec 2008 2:02:11pm

  Talk about accusing the Opposition of flip flop - this is the biggest flip flop of them all - Does this Government ever do what it says it is going to do?
  
  One was lead to believe that climate change was right up there and not for negotiation.

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  • Lament:

    01 Dec 2008 2:20:03pm

    Yeah, well... in the fullness of time we will look into it some more and that review will bring greater clarity to a presently unclear position which stems from the review which we had with Miss Blanchett all that time ago when we discussed so many of these important things and arranged many reviews, so many in fact that we have forgotten what the original unclear position was in the first place.

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    • Glasswalker:

      01 Dec 2008 4:53:40pm

      Did you learn that speil from "yes minister"? It is exceptionally well put, almost like Rudd himself had said it.

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  • Glasswalker:

    01 Dec 2008 4:48:45pm

    Of course we were lead to believe it... we were lead to believe a lot of things... I managed to lift the wool from my eyes about a month after the election and thought "OMG what have we done?"

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• Si:

  01 Dec 2008 2:02:30pm

  At least the Liberals didn't pretend they gave a stuff.

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  • Pete:

    01 Dec 2008 2:25:12pm

    Well, the surplus has been spent on populist policies and we're headed for a recession - no money left. A 1 term government is on the cards.
    
    So voters have a choice at the next election... vote the Libs back in who'll continue to deny climate change or for the Greens - Lindsay Tanner will lose his seat to the Greens, no doubt.
    
    With Bananaby Joyce siding with the greens of late on a variety of issues, a Greens/National collective could deliver great outcomes for both conservationists and sustainable agriculturalists alike.
    
    To court the green vote, Malcolm Turnbull could do worse than appoint John Hewson as environmental consultant. Since a humiliating defeat by Keating, the man has re-invented himself as a green crusader ala Al Gore.

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    • Remark:

      01 Dec 2008 2:33:52pm

      "no money left"
      
      ---
      
      The Liberals blew nearly all the proceeds of the mining boom - 390 billion dollars worth, leaving only approximately 20 billion in surplus. They asset-stripped the country, and ran in deficit as recently as 2001-2002.
      
      If they hadn't blown the mining boom bonanza on populist vote-buying, pork-barrelling, middle class welfare, inflationary tax cuts to the rich, and advertising, we would be much better placed today.

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      • Mark:

        01 Dec 2008 2:55:30pm

        And what is Labor blowing the surplus on? More populist vote-buying and pork-barrelling.

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    • BJ:

      01 Dec 2008 2:37:21pm

      An OECD report just last week stated that Aus is not headed for a recession.
      
      The only thing that can cause one is people talking down the economy, which is where the Liberals cheer squad comes in...

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      • Mark:

        01 Dec 2008 2:59:23pm

        BJ, sadly your day of credibility last week has come to an end.
        
        1. A recession may happen regardless of commentary. We're in this position now because of international factors and they will largely decide whether we end up in recession.
        
        2. Commentary on the economy from the opposition has NO EFFECT on economic expectations. The simple reason is that oppositions have an incentive to talk down the economy, so their message has no credibility.
        
        3. What was of more concern was Rudd and Swan talking down the economy earlier this year in an attempt to discredit the Howard government. Turnbull is right on this one (and it didn't take him saying it for me to think it), this government's commentary on the economy is solely based on what is in its political interests. This government has no economic strategy, it has a political strategy.

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      • Tag:

        01 Dec 2008 3:23:11pm

        However, the financial policies of the Government are another thing entirely. Every blunder makes me flinch.
        
        As it is obvious that Rudd does not have the skill to manage the crisis, he has decided to spend all of the surplus in various vote grabs.
        
        That way, he at least has a chance in 2011.

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      • GregH:

        01 Dec 2008 3:04:04pm

        talking down the economy?
        
        You means the Libs are doing the same thing which Rudd and his mob did before the last elections to get votes.
        
        Remember the Rudd campaign ?

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    • GregH:

      01 Dec 2008 3:02:57pm

      Australia is heading for a economic downturn thanks to this useless and hopeless Labor govt.
      
      But i dont this means a one term Govt as history has shown that Labor did get elected back even though it has stuffed up the economy.

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• Adeena:

  01 Dec 2008 2:03:00pm

  Senator Wong needs to wait to hear from our supervisors in the Chinese Government and what their plans are for Australia before we can commit to any climate change policies.
  
  Can't be enforcing carbon reduction schemes when we are about to sell off far north Queensland for mining and smelting operations.

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• Lament:

  01 Dec 2008 2:03:19pm

  Huff and puff and lots of fluff ... I think the electorate got it wrong, don't you?

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  • Chris of QLD:

    01 Dec 2008 2:22:09pm

    There is no doubt the electorate got it wrong.
    
    Climate change was a fantatical CON trick which Labor used to manipulate voters fears - and ride into office.
    
    Now that it is even more discredited than one year ago, those voters are left looking like fools for being so gullible and Labor, well, full of tales told by idiots, signifying nothing.

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    • Charles:

      01 Dec 2008 2:34:06pm

      If only you were right about the science supporting AGW having been discredited...

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    • BJ:

      01 Dec 2008 2:45:11pm

      90% certainty held by climatologists and climate experts that elevated CO2 levels cause climate change.
      
      Please point out, with facts, how they have been discredited. I want to believe you.

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      • Mark:

        01 Dec 2008 3:14:28pm

        The global warming debate represents a horrible bastardisation of science that will take it decades to recover from.
        
        Scientific consensus does not come from a group of self-interested people reviewing their findings and agreeing that their point of view is correct. Scientific consensus comes from vigourous testing of a model and that model standing up to scrutiny.
        
        Einstein once said about science "A model can be proven correct by 19 scientists, but if one scientist proves it incorrect, it must be discarded".
        
        There are many credible scientists who have disproved the model that rising CO2 levels have caused rising global temperatures that have reached an unnatural peak. However, no credible scientist has disproved the model that rising temperatures are a result of natural phenomona that occur throughout history.
        
        The global warming story is a result of a very short-sighted view of history, that because temperatures and CO2 levels have increased in past decades (and whether the globe has heated in the past decade is debatable), the two must be related. In fact, there is no evidence that temperatures have reached unnaturally high levels in recent decades. The story ignores the fact that in the billions of years of earth's existence there have been heating and cooling periods much more severe than the current one.
        
        It's sad that for many of its followers, global warming has become some sort of spiritual following among left-wing atheists, complete with god (mother nature), prophets (Al Gore), ruling body (IPCC), set of rules (cut carbon emissions) and punishment for not following those rules (global ruin). If people want spirituality, they should just go to a church.

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      • amortiser:

        01 Dec 2008 3:18:23pm

        BJ:
        There is a slight problem with the theory that ever increasing levels of CO2 in the atmosphere will lead to accelerating global warming.
        
        The computer models that have predicted this result do not bear any relationship to reality. Under the scientific method if the empirical evidence does not support the hypothesis then the hypothesis is discarded and a new explanation sought.
        
        The facts are that although CO2 levels continue to rise the temperature has not risen for quite some years which is the opposite result of the output of the models that the theory is based on.
        
        Time to go back to the drawing board and stop wasting our time and hard earned money.

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    • Patch:

      01 Dec 2008 2:47:06pm

      Except that climate change has not been discredited at all, and is in fact still widely believed among the scientific community. Massively widely infact.

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      • Emma:

        01 Dec 2008 3:11:35pm

        The only safe vote if you care about climate change is to vote Green.
        
        That's what I did and millions of others - no-one else is going to take it up to them when it's discovered that Bali was all PR and the plan all along has been to keep Big Coal happy.
        
        Labour has been co-opted 100% into the greenhouse mafia. They took a look at the numbers of people intending to vote Green and spun a pretend point of difference with the coalition - the sum total of which to date has been showing up at Bali and very little else.
        

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      • Billy Bob Hall:

        01 Dec 2008 3:23:22pm

        I believe in Santa Claus too...
        I don't believe any Science. I read it.

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  • Remark:

    01 Dec 2008 2:26:28pm

    The electorate didn't get it wrong. We voted against the Liberal SerfChoices erosion of our kids pay and conditions. Did you vote for pay cuts for your kids?

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    • RG:

      01 Dec 2008 2:43:15pm

      It's a bit difficult for your kids to have a job when employers who don't want to deal with a union will simply not empoy or prefer to simply employ relatives and friends.

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      • Remark:

        01 Dec 2008 3:11:31pm

        Unions are the only force standing between our kids and Third World pay and conditions. It's because of unions that your kids did not inherit coalmine and sweatshop conditions. Spare us the 1950s bogey-man nonsense. People are smarter than that.
        
        Liberal Party ideology is to demonise and ultimately destroy workers' representatives, leaving our kids on their own ... while tilting the balance in favour of big business and that element of employers who would like to see everyone's kids reduced to Serfhood (including, presumably, their own).
        
        That's why it's known as SerfChoices.

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      • Mark:

        01 Dec 2008 3:17:56pm

        Spare us the 1950s bogey-man nonsense. People are smarter than that.
        
        Your 1950's politics of envy is of equal nonsense, and it is gratifying that most people will merely read your posts and have a quiet laugh.

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• Billy Bob Hall:

  01 Dec 2008 2:07:36pm

  So she should. It's about time Penny actually reviewed the Science. Well done Penny. Credit should be given where credit is due.
  An ETS will not "stabilize" climate, or cause the Murray River to flow.

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  • Charles:

    01 Dec 2008 2:32:20pm

    Of course an ETS won't restore the flows to the Murray. Fewer water leases would though!

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  • Patch:

    01 Dec 2008 3:53:20pm

    Try reading a bit more science Billy Bob Hall also try understanding it. Also try understanding the fact that there are a lot of people working on this, and they're all saying the same thing.
    
    You know, im glad that the only place deniers get published is in small places like web forums (plus the occasional crackpot scientist/conspiracy theorist), it means that while argument about it might be furious here, its really not something that people in the know are questioning anymore.

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    • Billy Bob Hall:

      01 Dec 2008 4:36:39pm

      As a scientist, I am obliged to be skeptic and denier and a heritic. I wear all these badges with honor.
      As far as the deniers being a minority, be aware they are not as "Fringe" as you may think.
      The Heidelberg Appeal - Signed by more than 4,000 scientists from 106 countries.
      The Leipzig Declaration - More than 100 signatories, including editors of Climate Research and Atmospheric Research, former presidents of the U.S. National Academy of Sciences and the U.S. Weather Satellite Service, and a member of the Nobel Prize selection committee in Physics.
      The Oregon Petition - Signed by more than 19,000 professional persons including 2,660 physicists, geophysicists, climatologists, meteorologists, oceanographers and environmental scientists, and 5,017 scientists from other disciplines. Includes, inter alia, the statement; Not only has the global warming hypothesis failed the experimental test; it is theoretically flawed as well.
      

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    • Joel B1:

      01 Dec 2008 4:39:06pm

      good point Patch,
      
      Because reports like those showing that Arctic ice is increasing don't get published.
      
      ABC Board member K Windshuttle said "the national broadcaster was in breach of its charter to provide a diversity of views... the science is not settled"
      
      "We are seeing INCREASING numbers of people with impeccable scientific backgrounds questioning part or the whole of the story"
      
      Read about that on the ABC did you?

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• Charles:

  01 Dec 2008 2:11:47pm

  The government is stalling.
  Besides watering down carbon reduction targets the government will scuttle Independent MP Tony Windsor's Climate Protection Bill. It's been written and endorsed by hundreds of community climate action groups across Australia...
  The Rudd Labor government has a mandate for action against global warming. They must deliver decisive measures without delay.

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  • Billy Bob Hall:

    01 Dec 2008 2:43:18pm

    An ETS will not "stabilize" climate. Carbon is not a "pollutant".
    The Government should not only stall now, they should actually abandon the whole sorry program in place.

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    • Charles:

      01 Dec 2008 2:52:30pm

      It is obvious that the ETS is a tool to make carbon reductions economically favourable. There is no doubt that many other initiatives will be necessary to solve the AGW problem that is recognised by the world's peak scientific bodies and the world's governments.
      Fringe beliefs and conspiracy theories about the veracity of AGW and the veracity of related concepts such as the definition of pollution should not determine important legislation that deals with it.

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    • G:

      01 Dec 2008 4:01:24pm

      sigh. this tired argument again?
      
      Anything is a pollutant if there is so much of it that it causes an imbalance in a system that is equalibrium.
      
      Sorry, CO is, in this case, a pollutant; it causes imbalance. you can argue till the cows come home about where it comes from, or what to do about it, but the point of fact is; it is peturbing a system to a point where it cannot recover quickly or easily.
      ERGO IT IS A POLLUTANT!
      
      sheesh.

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      • Billy Bob Hall:

        01 Dec 2008 4:40:17pm

        True G, Carbon-monoxide as you have stated is indeed a recognized toxin and pollutant. Carbon (the element) is not.

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  • Scott:

    01 Dec 2008 3:11:39pm

    Mr Windsor's Climate Protection Bill 2008 called for emissions reductions of 30% from 1990 levels by 2020.
    
    

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• Ben Hermann:

  01 Dec 2008 2:14:00pm

  I can only subscribe to what Senator Brown said: This is just a cop-out. Minister Wong stating that "it would benefit from the announcement of the target range and the design decisions on the carbon pollution reduction scheme at the same time." What is "it"? is she referring to the certainty that the "business and the Australian community" require, even demand?
  I think there is hardly a better way to create the opposite than doing it as she is doing: Not deciding matters, holding back with information, hiding behind statements like the one published above.
  Is Minister Wong afraid she could say something that would slightly deviate from PM Rudd's opinion and receive a side-lining like Minister Garrett copped some months ago?
  is she starting entrenchment tactics already by putting more efforts in cover-my-backside activites than making any true progress?
  A shame if you ask me.

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• pikuks:

  01 Dec 2008 2:14:54pm

  Just typical.
  
  The only decisions that this governemnt can seem to make is to delay making a real decision and to decide to see what decision it should make.
  
  If the Libs would stop saying what they would do, then this lot wont have anything to poo poo and then copy.
  
  Taking me-tooism a bit far I think.
  
  

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• CF Zero:

  01 Dec 2008 2:30:10pm

  Minister Wong, Minister Wong we have lost all our environmental credibility.
  Really, what kind was it?
  The kind made of hot air.
  Dont worry, we will replace it at your local branch with more hot air from carbon sequestration.

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• Anton:

  01 Dec 2008 2:30:52pm

  Minister Wong can set whatever target she wants. It will be unreachable at any cost, and I'll explain why.
  CO2 emissions can be easily calculated. Take the emissions from Coal fired power plants, calculated by tons pf coal burned multiplied by 2.86 tons of CO2 per ton of coal. This works out to (conservatively) 250 Million tons. If that electrical generating sector produces 30% of the total, then the total from all sources is around 840 million tons. At the Government's amount of $26 per ton, then that totals out at almost $22 Billion each and every year.
  To actually replace those coal fired plants with solar plants or wind plants, going on the World's best time from thought bubble to sending power to the grid is around 8 or 9 years. Currently, no one is planning either of those plants, so coal fired plants will still need to run at the level now for that time, producing the same amounts of CO2.
  Given that, and the horrendous costs for those plants, still only running at 16 to 25% efficiency, then that amount incoming from the carbon tax will all need to be diverted to plant construction, and I cannot see that happening. Any reductions will be tiny, and just tinkering at the edges. Costs will be passed to the consumer, and that quoted $5 a week by the Government is the absolute minimum, because (also easily calculated) the average is around $9, or around an extra $120 on your quarterly electricity bill, just for household usage. Considering every sector will bear the cost of increased electricity, then costs of groceries will also increase by a relative factor, so the cost will also be further felt in everyday activities, grocery bills, etc.
  Those coal fired plants cannot be just shut down, so emissions will continue at basically the same rate.
  The only thing that has changed is money flowing to the Government in the form of this new tax, which is all it is.

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  • sojourner:

    01 Dec 2008 3:01:23pm

    Come off the grass Anton!
    
    You are now confusing the arguement with facts boy!
    
    Tut Tut.
    
    Next you might say that its silly to base emissions on production rather than usage.
    
    And then add some other silly comment to the effect that whatever we do will not make any differant to the worldwide effect and yet potentially 'break us' financially in the process.
    
    I suppose you are one of those who would argue the 2010 date is equally silly.
    
    I did read the 30 page summary of the famous report and started to count the hypotheticals, assumed premises, probable speculations and decided to flip a coin instead.
    
    I don't really care - I cherish clean water, clean air and clean oceans and go and hug a tree occasionally. So in a sense cleaning any mess up is good.
    
    But at what price? And I do think a lot still about the hyptheticals, the premises and 'what ifs' that lead to the inevitable 'the downside risk is greater than the upside gain by doing nothing and therefore despite the cost we will proceed' arguement.
    
    But Anton please dont confuse the debate by bringing in facts - I need a bex and a good lie down.

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    • Billy Bob Hall:

      01 Dec 2008 3:35:53pm

      You cannot have Bex sojourner, I understand this releases CO2 when it comes in contact with the Hydrochloric Acid in your stomach. A good lie down is ok though, probably what you guys should do more often, and let us get on with the real work. ;-)

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  • Billy Bob Hall:

    01 Dec 2008 3:32:44pm

    Your logic is just about correct in every count. Your assessment is correct. This can end (if it is indeed even allowed to begin) as just another un-needed tax. That's all.
    Coal is cheap and abundant. Ole King Coal is the right choice to energy production needs for at least a couple of hundred years.
    As for Atmospheric CO2 it will go up a bit then stabilize, and then down a bit, whether we like it or not. Will this "destabilize" climate ? The answer is no.
    

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  • Anton:

    01 Dec 2008 4:07:53pm

    I'm with you guys.
    Just one time, I'd like the vast implications of what these people wish for to sink in.
    You just cannot replace those coal fired plants in the short term, let alone the long term.
    Northern European Countries that have had wind power farms for a number of years now feeding power to the grid for peaking power only, (as they cannot replace base load power at any stretch of the imagination), and incidentally only running at around 16 to 18% efficiency, have not caused one coal fired plant to be removed from the grid.
    
    It is something that will cost hundreds of billions of dollars for virtually no result and will take 10 years to even provide that result.
    Ask an electrical engineer not a damned economist.
    
    The Government is relying on private enterprise to step into the frame, but at those horrendous costs not even they will go for it.
    Australia currently produces less than half of one percent of its power from solar or wind. If there was money in it, entrepreneurs would be flocking in with plans. It just cannot be made to work at the level required.

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• DJR:

  01 Dec 2008 2:32:25pm

  Maybe P Wong has seen the light that climate change is a furphy just like Y2K

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  • Patch:

    01 Dec 2008 2:53:13pm

    lol! y2k wasnt a furphy, the problem was diagnosed, acted on, and fixed in time.
    
    I hope for all our sakes that the same happens with climate change.

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    • Mark:

      01 Dec 2008 3:19:40pm

      It was a furphy, companies who spent millions fixing the "problem" had the same result as companies who spent nothing.
      
      Much like the story of the dog protecting Sydney from elephants. Because there's no elephants in Sydney, the dog must be doing a good job.

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      • Patch:

        01 Dec 2008 4:03:40pm

        No Mark, it wasn't. Your fact is untrue.
        
        So your evidence that y2k was never going to happen is this: People poured money and effort into fixing the problem and then... nothing happened! therefore surely nothing was going to happen anyway, and the money and effort was a waste. The flawed logic here is that potentially all the money and effort actually had the effect that it was supposed to have, it eliminated what would go wrong. Some would say that is quite a lot more probable even. But those people usually aren't conspiracy theorists who think the least likely possibility is difinately the truth.
        
        Your second logical flaw is in saying because 'some' companies spent nothing. apparently. Which ones by the way? Then the companies/governments/military/etc (who are all stupid obviously...) which did spend money clearly didn't help anything. You reasons are illogical, evidence, questionable though it is, that certain companies did nothing and were ok, does not add any weight to the proposition that companies that did do work, shouldn't have and would have been fine anyway. Perhaps the companies that did do work had reasearched what could happen and couldn't take the risk? Or perhaps companies just like spending piles of money for no reason.

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      • Joel B1:

        01 Dec 2008 4:11:54pm

        Honestly, just look it up on wiki
        
        Some countries spent nothing on Y2K and had the same amount of problems ie NOTHING!
        
        Billions of dollars and no-one knows where it went...
        
        Sounds like CC to me.

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      • Trevor:

        01 Dec 2008 4:50:49pm

        And some computers which were redundant were left running un-fixed just to see what happened...
        
        Some of them were fine. Some of them crashed spectacularly.
        
        The issue wasn't that every single system would crash. The issue was a RISK that they would crash.

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      • Joel B1:

        01 Dec 2008 5:04:07pm

        Trevor,
        
        That's not quite right. The problem was in some dedicated chips, not in computers per se.
        
        that's why it was never going to be a real problem

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      • G:

        01 Dec 2008 4:04:17pm

        That's a furphy!
        
        It's a rock, and it repels tigers. Anyone knows that.

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  • Charles:

    01 Dec 2008 3:35:30pm

    Global Warming is nothing like 'Y2K bug'. If you must have a comparison, think ozone hole...

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    • DJR:

      01 Dec 2008 4:20:10pm

      y2k, ozone hole = same hype. It's (ozone hole) probably been around for eons. Nothing new!

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  • Joel B1:

    01 Dec 2008 4:03:42pm

    No chance, unfortunately.
    It's merely that it's a lot easy to say "we'll fix-it" when you you don't have to.
    Reality bites a lot harder though as Rudd and comrades have discovered to their chagrin.
    
    ps Have you ever seen a grumpier looking lot of pollies? I thought they won! Certainly I get reminded of it in every ABC comments section.
    
    My how the grins have faded....

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• Rocky:

  01 Dec 2008 2:35:13pm

  I suppose we should give Ms.Wong and her government the benefit of the doubt, give them a round of applause for,hopefully, taking notice of the facts that while there IS climate change, it cannot be attributed to man and a carbon emissions trading scheme will do nothing but send us broke.

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• wmc:

  01 Dec 2008 2:38:43pm

  There they were at the last election, The Great Green Warriors who'd deliver the nation from climate change. But my, how their tune is changing. Penny Wong and Peter Garrett - what a team.

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  • Mark:

    01 Dec 2008 3:20:13pm

    Does "Once we get in, we'll just change everything" ring a bell?

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• Jim Bendfeldt:

  01 Dec 2008 2:39:41pm

  Prior to last year's election, the Australian electorate anticipated that a Rudd Government would do more to address climate change and protect the environment than the blinkered coalition.
  
  What a different scenario 12 months later!
  
  The protection of mining and forestry jobs has once again been given priority over environmental protection, and nothing substantive has eventuated regarding the protection of the lower Murray-Darling Basin and Great Barrier Reef.
  
  There will be no monitoring of the Japanese commercial whale meat harvesters in the Antarctic this year, uranium is back on the agenda, and now we have the prospect of international embarrassment over our timing of greenhouse targets, given all the hullabaloo in Bali last year.

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• PoorMac:

  01 Dec 2008 3:06:04pm

  The only time the electorate got it wrong was from 1996 to 2006 when thye kept voting for John Who? thanks for the GST and High property prices

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• Robert Kennedy:

  01 Dec 2008 3:15:04pm

  Appalled at the lack of progress in relation to the elimination of non-sustainable water rights by multiple governments over a long period of time and the consequent destruction of the MBD, I fire off an email to Senator Wong many months ago. In short, I made the point that the Minister should stop dissembling. It does her or the government no credit. Worse, we are fiddling while the fire rages.
  
  A clearly articulated policy (with the consequent economic "losers" i.e irrigators and those holding water rights attached to land) ir preferable to misleading drivel. I mean why have the CSIRO and Marsden Jacob audits of the MDB not been made public? Is it because this allows the Minisister and the Government to dissemble and BS us? Err, Yes!
  
  Funnily , enough when I raised these points in my email (to the open and inclusive government) I did not even receive a reply from the Minister of her office. Yes, I was glad to vote against the previous spivs but dear me, we seem to have bought a pig in a poke with the current mob. Senator Wong is a very capable Minister and has a very dificult job in reconciling competing interests. Pity us, for the Government has squibbed the most pressing tasks in the history of human beings.

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• David:

  01 Dec 2008 3:18:20pm

  I sincerely hope Ms Wong deliberates and deliberates indefinitely. Never in the history of mankind has there been such global hoodwinking of the populous. Climate changing?.......probably, caused by mankind?...............rot!! With 70% of the Earths surface covered by water and with us taking up only a pin prick of the remaining 30%, are we truly expected to believe that the pin prick of industrialisation located within the pin prick of space that we occupy is responsible for climate change?? Come on!! We weren't here when the dinosaurs froze, and we weren't here when they thawed out. So who are we going to blame for that?

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  • Charles:

    01 Dec 2008 3:39:17pm

    Actually, the dinosaurs died out well before the last ice age.
    The land area taken up by our houses is a poor comparison, take a look at the actual and relevant statistics instead.

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• sinic:

  01 Dec 2008 3:28:43pm

  Princess Penny's pusillanimous prevarication on pollution power - she's waiting for Captain Kev to conjure a climate committee comment?
  
  Wot is the point of crippling our economy with measures that are not certain to have any effect on climate, especially when we don't know what is happening to climate? Environmentalism should not be a religion and the science behind the movement is too shaky to be a reliable predictor. Why not come out Ms Wong and can the whole scheme?

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• bitrich:

  01 Dec 2008 3:37:25pm

  There's always an excuse for this mob isn't there..............

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• d58:

  01 Dec 2008 3:38:59pm

  If Penny Wong can't/won't tell us what industries will have to close under carbon reduction targets, and Bob Brown is so angry, maybe he can tell us what will cease in this country pursuant to carbon reduction objectives.

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• GML:

  01 Dec 2008 3:39:56pm

  Excuse me...
  
  I thought our children and their futures were actually important?
  
  What kind of planet will they inherit and have to endure if this is put off any longer?
  
  Wake Up Australia!

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  • Billy Bob Hall:

    01 Dec 2008 3:54:14pm

    You children (and grand children etc etc..) will give as much though to what you may think as I do about what my grand-parents or great grand parent may have thought.
    My great grandfather or great great grandfather was probably more worried about the price of horses or that his ship may sink because he could not navigate at night because he had no GPS - who knows ? And furthermore who really cares now ?

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• G:

  01 Dec 2008 3:55:43pm

  What the heck happened to that "MANDATE" that was so lovingly talked about, back in the Kyoto-ratification era?
  
  I thought we voted out the buggers that were so wrapped up in protecting the money-grubbers, at the expense of anything else?
  
  "Provde the business with certainty"...
  If you want CERTAINTY, ms wong. go read a scientific journal, instead of listenting to your angry fatcat execs who think that it's appropriate to bully and shout at people until they get their way (ref. Turnbul et al).
  
  This is pathetic beyond comprehension. I was hoping against hope that rudd et al would have more guts than howards mottley crue. Obviously a naive hope.
  
  What a pathetic, malleable and weak lot you are, rudd, wong, garrett, and co. If it were possible, I'd retract any votes that had the possiblity of supporting your ascension to hypocrisy.

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  • Billy Bob Hall:

    01 Dec 2008 4:42:03pm

    I think they accidentally meant "Manchurian Candidate" ! ;-) (Not mandate ?)

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• Cf Zero:

  01 Dec 2008 4:20:50pm

  Something to consider with an ETS and why it is guaranteed to fail can be seen with what just happened to the US financial system. The big banks were so big we could not afford to have them fail and the same thing will happen with an ETS. The big polluters are just going to say, we are going to pollute, we will not buy into your ETS and if we ever did have to shut shop the social consequences will be a disaster.
  So these companies wont need permits because they have an exception.
  

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• aletea:

  01 Dec 2008 4:30:42pm

  This is a weak decision from a government that needs to find a backbone - and soon!

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• Glasswalker:

  01 Dec 2008 4:36:23pm

  I don't quite know what the fuss is about... this govt has proven itself to be a spend big do nothing govt... what we'll have next is a labor formed comitee to discus whether penny was right...
  
  give it up people, Rudd pulled the wool over our eyes and we fell for his populist agenda... when the recession hits, we've got no one to blame but ourselves... the country ALWAYS gets the govt they deserve.

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• DB:

  01 Dec 2008 4:39:56pm

  Disputers of climate change have a fairly simple understanding of science: it's right when it tells you what you want to hear, wrong when it doesn't.

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• Greg:

  01 Dec 2008 4:45:32pm

  Hmm! Global warming, it must connected to"Intelligent Design". In that case, we've got nothing to worry about because it should solve itself.
  

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• Trevor:

  01 Dec 2008 4:53:27pm

  Excuse me, but can someone tell me why some of the comments here are treating a delay of A COUPLE OF WEEKS like it's the end of the Government's stated commitment to implement an emissions cut?
  
  Thanks.

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