The UK election forced our own climate change and energy policy deliberations off the front pages this long weekend – which was merciful, really, and not just for Theresa May's pollster Mark Textor. After all, the PM's new chief of staff is Gavin Barwell who wrote the book How to Win a Marginal Seat then lost a marginal seat.
Let's return to the issue, especially given the revelation (courtesy of the inimitable Phil Coorey) that Tony Abbott has broken bread in recent months with Frontier energy economist Danny Price – to an Emissions Intensity Scheme what Benjamin Franklin was to electricity. "The cost of not putting in an EIS in place could well be in the order of about 30 to 40 per cent" Price told ABC Radio's AM last month. Chief Scientist Alan Finkel, notably, considers an EIS a recipe for higher power prices.
What a pair Price and the Mad Monk make. Abbott last week told 2GB that Australia's emissions reduction targets under the Paris agreement are "aspirational only, it is not binding, it is not mandatory." The former prime Mmnister has by his own words made himself so pitiable – far more so than any of his predecessors, bar none – that he's become the political equivalent of the punchline to a fart joke. Here he is a month before being blasted out of Kirribilli House: "There is a definite commitment to 26 per cent but we believe under the policies that we have got, with the circumstances that we think will apply, that we can go to 28 per cent". And again: "We will reduce our emissions by 26 to 28 per cent. This is a very strong and responsible target; it is environmentally responsible; it is economically responsible". And again: "There is an internationally agreed target – the Lima target – and Australia supports that. As you know, we are making a big effort to get our emissions down. Unlike some other countries which make these pledges and don't deliver, Australia does deliver when we make a pledge".
Of course Abbott is incapable of consistency. Having presided over record immigration levels – skilled worker immigration was 11 per cent higher than on Malcolm Turnbull's watch (and its still falling) – he now argues that "one thing the federal government could do … is to scale back immigration at least until land release and infrastructure can keep up".
Having hiked petrol excise and introduced the Temporary Deficit Levy (which on July 1 will finally live up to its name), creating an effective personal income tax rate of 49 per cent, Abbott now wants to "stop increases in taxes".
Abbott now wants to abolish the Human Rights Commission having squibbed amendments to 18C that Turnbull has since put to Parliament. "I don't believe the advocacy of terrorism is something that really has a place in our society and that's one of the reasons why under today's circumstances… I decided that it was bet not to proceed with our earlier commitment on section 18C", he said in 2014. And Andrew Bolt wastes nightly Murdoch spectrum proselytising for this clown.
And, circling back to climate change politics, the most lethal politics of all, Abbott now wants the Renewable Energy Target frozen at 23.5 per cent, having said at the time his own government instituted it, that: "We passed legislation last night to reform the renewable energy target, and that will put downward pressure on electricity prices while also providing certainty for the industry." And the following month: "There is new certainty and confidence in that sector. This is a government which supports renewables." Thank heavens his government isn't renewable. Or is it?
