The Australian
On November 6 the PM makes his case
When you strip away all the political rhetoric, all the political excuses, there are two stark choices: Action or inaction. The scientific evidence from the CSIRO and other expert bodies have outlined the implications for Australia, in the absence of national and global action on climate change: Storm surges and rising sea levels putting at risk over 700,000 homes and businesses around our coastlines, with insurance companies warning that preliminary estimates of the value of property in Australia exposed to the risk of land being inundated or eroded by rising sea levels range from $50 billion to $150bn.
The truth is that the do- nothing climate change skeptics offer no alternative official body of evidence from any credible government in the world. Instead they offer maximum fear, the universal conservative stock in trade. And by doing so, these do-nothing climate change sceptics are prepared to destroy our children's future. Climate change deniers are small in number, but they are too dangerous to be ignored.
Has the PM been stung into action by Peter Hartcher's column in The Sydney Morning Herald on October 24?:
Can you guess when Kevin Rudd last gave a speech on the subject he once called ``the great moral and economic challenge of our time'', climate change? It was six months ago. Rudd's promise to act on global warming was one of the central campaign pledges that carried him to the prime ministership in 2007. It is a mandate issue for him. Yet he has not made any serious effort to argue his case for six months.
Virginia Trioli gets sceptical with Steve Howard, CEO of The Climate Group on ABC2's Breakfast Television on Friday
Trioli: And Steve Howard, finally, what if we're wrong and what if those naysayers are right, if global warming is not human-induced but actually is a cyclical thing. Are you prepared to take responsibility for the economic and financial damage that might be done to some industries in the rush to try and fix it?
Howard: In the same way, yes, if we discover the world is flat then I'll actually pay for all of the little globes to be reproduced.
Trioli: No, the suggestion is not as outrageous as that.
Howard: It's close to it.
Trioli: It's just some honest dissenters and I think they have to be given their place too.
Howard: I think it is actually akin now to saying tobacco is not linked to lung cancer. It's about that level of certainty on the science. But let's say, even then they are right, the worst we will do is create a greater energy security, a clean economy, we'll clean up air pollution, and we've done a macro-economic (study) with our partner, with Tony Blair, and we found that if we have very deep emissions reduction cuts we'll overall stimulate the global economy, we'll create more jobs, so overall we're better off if we do this. The worst we can do is be better off. We have the technology, we understand the policies, let's just get on and do it.
Eleanor Hall gets sceptical with Environment Minister Peter Garrett on Meet the Press yesterday:
Hall: The Prime Minister launched an attack on climate change sceptics on Friday as scaremongerers but couldn't you be accused of being a scaremongerer on sea-level rise? Do you stand by your comments on Lateline that the sea level will rise by 6m by the end of the century.
Garrett: As you know that discussion was a discussion about what scientists were saying about potential sea-level rises. I make this simple point about sea-level rises and climate change generally. The debate has become very skewed in this country by the sceptics. The fact is that the most comprehensive scientific endeavour to look at issues surrounding greenhouse gas emissions . . . has been conducted by the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change. It's fourth assessment report is crystal clear. It says it's unequivocal that there are greenhouse gas emissions . . .