EDITORIAL: Aussies just want cost-effective decarbonisation

The so-called climate wars are over.

Australians overwhelmingly want meaningful action on climate change. They want to be part of the solution.

They’re more or less agnostic on the method; that’s the job of the politicians they elect to figure out.

But they have been more than clear at consecutive elections: climate change is a serious and mainstream concern and any party which wants to govern had better get on board.

The vehicle we’ve arrived at as a nation is a 2050 net zero emissions policy, which has been widely accepted by voters and industry.

It’s clever, cynical politics by Labor

Among the bodies to have read the room and endorsed a 2050 net zero ambition include Australian Energy Producers, the Business Council of Australia, the National Farmers Federation and the Minerals Council of Australia — hardly sandal-wearing lefties.

Few voices in the mainstream argue against a 2050 net zero target, because who would bother wasting breath and political capital by arguing against an aspiration which is a quarter of a century into the future?

Barnaby Joyce, that’s who. The Nationals MP’s private member’s bill to abandon the 2050 emissions target is once again stirring up this long-settled debate.

Labor can hardly believe its good fortune.

The Albanese Government has taken the rare step of allowing debate on the Bill to go ahead.

They’ve reasoned that doing so is to their political advantage: give the Liberals and Nationals enough rope and watch them swing in full view of voters.

“If you don’t support net zero, you don’t support action on climate change — it’s as simple as that,” a gleeful Anthony Albanese said on Monday.

“The fact that the Coalition have become more right wing and more entrenched in their opposition to climate change action than the Morrison government was, is rather extraordinary.”

It’s clever, cynical politics by Labor.

Allow the Coalition to set themselves up as climate villains in voters’ minds and Labor by default get to claim to be the good guys.

But it’s detrimental to the thing voters actually want: a cost-efficient, effective energy transition.

The truth is the renewables revolution isn’t going so great.

Emissions increased last year.

Projects which have been touted as key planks of our green energy future have fallen over, some at considerable expense to the taxpayer.

Meanwhile, electricity prices are through the roof and there are serious concerns about reliability.

These are tricky problems Labor is yet to show any indication of answering.

In-fighting within the Coalition provides convenient cover for Labor’s lack of solutions for now.

But it’s a ruse that can’t be kept up forever.

Voters want to decarbonise in a way that won’t destroy the economy.

Eventually, that is a question that Labor is going to have to answer.