Extract from ABC News
The federal government and Resources Minister Keith Pitt have come under fire on Q+A over Australia's plan for a gas-led recovery from COVID-19.
Key points:
- Former prime minister Malcolm Turnbull labelled Australia's 'gas-led recovery' a slogan
- Resources Minister Keith Pitt was heavily criticised over Australia's emissions targets
- Journalist Narelda Jacobs called for reform when it came to policing issues involving Indigenous Australians
The episode came after Prime Minister Scott Morrison earlier this week said Australia's target of net zero emissions by the year 2050 would not be met in inner-city wine bars.
That triggered a question from audience member Madeleine Johnston about framing climate change as identity politics, which in turn triggered a debate amongst all five panellists on the show.
That debate led to former prime minister Malcolm Turnbull lambasting the government's "gas-led" recovery as a slogan and nothing more, as well as allegations of "cheap blows", "patronising" behaviour and "mansplaining".
Mr Pitt, whose portfolio also includes water and northern Australia, bore the brunt of the criticism after he defended the government position and policy on climate change.
The current position is to reduce greenhouse gas emissions by 26-28 per cent by the year 2030, while the US has just announced its ambition to cut emissions from 2005 levels by 50-52 per cent in the same timeframe.
The UK has gone even harder with British Prime Minister Boris Johnson looking to cut emissions by 78 per cent by the year 2035, leaving Australia lagging when it comes to its targets.
Still, Mr Pitt said Australia was doing the right thing by taking what he said was a measured approach to help those in energy and agricultural sectors adjust to change.
"This is about who pays, and who pays is regional Australia because they are the ones that rely on the mining sector, the gas sector, the agricultural sector, our big exporters, our intensive industries in terms of where we deliver our products right around the world," Mr Pitt said.
"We need to take an approach which is balanced, based on technology, which doesn't leave them behind, which ensures the cost for them is not something they can't afford."
That answer earned a swift rebuke from Greens senator Sarah Hanson-Young, who took aim at Mr Morrison in her response after she said those in regional Australia could not afford a dead Murray River or yearly bushfires.
"We have to get realistic about the fact climate change is here and it's here because we have polluted the atmosphere," Senator Hanson-Young said.
"We have to get out of fossil fuels, which is making our planet sick.
"I know it's hard for you, Minister … because you've been given this job from the Prime Minister.
"What he said about trying to divide the cities and the country is just lazy, lazy politics. This issue is not going to be won and dealt with by dividing the nation.
Mr Turnbull joined Senator Hanson-Young in her criticisms of divisive politics and called for an approach to global warming that does not involve ideology.
"Saying you believe or disbelieve in global warming is as intelligent or sensible as saying you believe or disbelieve in gravity," Mr Turnbull said.
Mr Pitt objected and said Australia was reducing pollution and had since 2005 "outstripped Japan, New Zealand, Canada, the US" in terms of reducing emissions.
Senator Hanson-Young said we were "left in the wilderness" compared to other nations.
To which Mr Pitt replied "and yet we are in front".
The comment left both Mr Turnbull and the Greens Senator somewhat stunned.
"This is bonkers," Mr Turnbull said after Senator Hanson-Young told Mr Pitt "you are crazy".
'Gas-led recovery' just a slogan
The conversation then turned to whether Australia needs a gas pipeline across the Nullarbor.
Andrew Liveris, former chief executive of US company Dow Chemical, who has been backing the notion of Australia having a gas-led recovery, would not give a direct answer to the question, only insisting a gas pipeline would be used as Australia transitioned to green or clean energy.
Me Liveris had earlier been labelled as "patronising" by Ms Hanson-Young over a comment he made to another panellist that he would offer her a "chemistry lesson" as he attempted to explain fossil feed stock.
Mr Turnbull would later tell Mr Liveris "I don't mind you mansplaining me", which Mr Liveris called a "cheap blow".
Ultimately though the question of a pipeline and recovery fell to Mr Pitt.
"Gas is a critical feed stock and critical to our potential success to drag manufacturing back on shore," he said.
"I want to see more of our resources used downstream in terms of the processing before they leave Australia to go somewhere else, that drives jobs into this country and to do that we need the fundamentals right."
"That is the price of gas, the price of electricity the availability of the skilled workforce."
He elaborated that the notion of a pipeline was being worked on, before Mr Turnbull questioned the suggestion that gas would help Australia in a post-COVID world and that a potential $5 billion price tag may not be worth it.
"My concern is we're going see a classic exercise in industry rent-seeking," he said.
"Billions of dollars of taxpayers' money being transferred to the fossil fuel sector in assets that will be shortly stranded.
"I'm really worried about what's happening here.
"You start getting this fossil fuel sector, the gas industry, saying, 'all we need to make this worthwhile is for the government to build this pipeline and that pipeline and another pipeline'. And suddenly you've got a wealth transfer from the taxpayers of Australia to an industry whose prospects are time limited.
'Stop funnelling Indigenous people into prisons'
With former Minnesota police officer Derek Chauvin convicted of murder and manslaughter over the killing of George Floyd, attention turned to Indigenous deaths in custody in Australia.
Channel 10 journalist Narelda Jacobs called on authorities to make changes to existing laws to reduce the incarceration rate, including raising the age of criminal responsibility from 10 to 14.
"We're still seeing officers using discretionary powers where they could be driving people home, yet they're locking people up," she said.
"These are the reasons Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people are being locked up, and the reason there are so many deaths in custody because there's an overrepresentation in our prisons.
"That needs to stop."
She also called for discretionary powers police hold to be used in a better way.
"Officers, they're making split decisions whether to put someone in jail or not and they're using that in the wrong way'," Jacobs said.
"That's what it comes down to. Stop funnelling Indigenous people into prisons.
"It costs over $100,000 a year to imprison someone. That money can be better spent preventing in the first place."
Watch the full episode of Q+A on iview.
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