LABOR: Labor won’t want to talk about climate change during the election (except where it is under threat from the Greens) and is very unlikely to make any new commitments, a bit like their 2010 election campaign.

What will Labor do on climate in opposition? If the actions of the State Labor oppositions are any indication, very little. The big parties on both sides of politics at State level are united in not making global warming action any sort of priority. Both sides have used the 2011 federal legislation as an excuse to abandon State efforts in the name of removing “duplication of roles in relation to climate change mitigation and the implementation of the carbon tax”. If Team Abbott abolishes the carbon price, will the States move back into the field? Very doubtful.

It’s a good bet that the conclusion that Labor will draw from the current period is to not champion climate action from now on. There will be a push to go quietly on some of Abbott’s proposed roll-backs. Have a look at the efforts on climate of Daniel Andrews in Victoria and John Robertson in NSW as state opposition leaders!

Inside the Labor Party there is a strong, if fallacious, view and especially in the right faction that climate policy has been at the centre of the Gillard government’s problems. Australian Workers Union boss and right-winger Paul Howes, a proud architect of Rudd’s execution and Team Gillard cheer-leader, says he is a “dig it up, cut it down type of guy” and is the coal and gas industry’s best friend. For him, The Greens are Labor’s biggest enemy.

In reality, Labor’s climate problems are of their own making. As discussed last year, Labor’s strategic errors included:

    Kevin Rudd’s strategic decision to isolate the Greens and deal with the opposition on the CPRS in 2008-09 kicked back in his face with the defeat of Malcolm Turnbull as opposition leader, unleashing the deny-and-delay Tony Abbott.
    A failure to act decisively. The sense of urgency was lost in 2008, according to public opinion researcher Hugh Mackay, who says that the fall in public support was evident by mid-2008, when the sense of expectation accompanying the change of government was deflated by inaction in the first six months of Rudd’s term, creating “a very critical vacuum” in which “people kind of shrugged and said well, it is not that serious after all … It was seen as much more about a talking game than an acting game … When we were not called upon to act, the opportunity was lost.”
    Getting Copenhagen wrong. Despite the gathering evidence throughout 2009, Rudd and climate minister Penny Wong bound their strategy to a good outcome at the Copenhagen climate meeting, and when it all went belly-up they were left high and dry.
    More procrastination: Senior government figures thought they had a deal with Rudd to go to a double dissolution in early 2010 on the CPRS, before the worst of the Copenhagen fallout rained down. But Rudd prevaricated and lost his nerve; then Gillard and Swan pushed him into a backflip on carbon pricing, and by June 2010 he was gone.
    Two backflips in five months. Gillard went to the August 2010 election with a climate policy fit only for comedians, promising no carbon tax but “cash for clunkers” and a 100-person national consultation. Weeks later, and needing The Greens’ and independent support to save her face and her government, she backflipped and set the Multi-Party Climate Change Committee in process. Given the nature of the coup against Rudd and the election result, Gillard’s credibility was half-shot before she started and her subsequent handling of the climate issue – evasive, dispassionate, disinterested, poorly communicated – did more damage to Labor’s credibility. And it probably also did damage to the case it was prosecuting: climate action.
    A critical failure to sell the carbon tax by taking “climate” out of climate-change policy public messaging. The “Clean energy future” campaign in 2011 was classic bright-siding. All clean energy and barely a mention of climate change or impacts.  And so was the “Say Yes” campaign run by  a number of Australian environment/climate non-government organisations (eNGOs), together with the ACTU and GetUp, in 2011.
    Since the legislation passed, the government has rarely talked about climate change.

It will take years for the Labor hierarchy to untangle themselves from their present pain and poor electoral standing. Just how vigorously will Labor defend the carbon pricing, the CEFC and the RET? Will Labor campaign for new initiatives and a much higher level of ambition, as the scientific understanding of future clime impacts dictates we must?

Perhaps that depends on whether there is a productive reflection and some caucus members – particularly on the Labor left who are better on climate but zipped their mouths in the cause of unity – lead a useful debate inside the Labor party on its climate record of high aspirations, multiple back-flips and a complete failure of courage to explain and defend their own legislation. The worse outcome would be for all this to be swept under the carpet and denied.

As well, Labor cannot take climate off the agenda if it wants to hold onto marginal, inner-city Green–Labor seats. Adams Bandt’s 2010 victory most potent political message – “I will not backflip on climate” – was in pointed contrast to the actions of Labor leaders Rudd and Gillard. No matter how climate tracks as a political issue a

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Yes, gillard took power for pure greed and power and the greens forced their 10%er on all Australians.

labor and greens are as extreme as each other

____ wrote on Apr 9^th, 2013 at 11:22am:

Yeh, according to Windsor. Sure believe him if you are an idiot.

And lastly, Abbott didnt sell out the people, even if implied, so that is yours, labors and the greens issue. You cant change that fact, no matter how hard you try.

____ wrote on Apr 9^th, 2013 at 11:34am:

Cant answer that until we hear from the party to what they are taking to the election.

Something to ponder on this conversation. I have put together a website that tracks a basket of groceries that Wayne Swan purchased to see if the carbon tax is effecting the price of groceries.

Have a look for yourselves but at this stage the basket hasn't really changed at all!

swannysbasket (dot) com (dot) au

As can be seen on all economic indicators, the carbon tax has had almost zero impact on the economy.

I think labor will work the climate change angle in the election.   75% of Australians want action on climate change, and dare I say it, the liberals climate change policy is even more idiotic than their lampooned NBN one.

Labor will talk about climate change on three platforms.
1)  The non-impact of the carbon tax
2)  The renewable investments its funding
3) The move to a carbon price next term as planned (to the simpletons that will be seen as removing the carbon tax)