Political thuggery and climate change

The University of Queensland’s survey of politicians on climate change (see also discussion on the earlier post) contained some disturbing information, including:

Asked whether the planet was warming because of human activity producing greenhouse gases, 98 per cent of Greens said “yes” compared to 89 per cent of Labor, 57 per cent of non-aligned politicians and 38 per cent of Liberal-National politicians. (Emphasis added)

With those stats the political thuggery on climate change which brought Tony Abbott to the leadership is not surprising. The whole sorry saga is well-outlined in Sh*tstorm by Lenore Taylor and David Uren.

The first thing to understand is that Labor made a political decision that they were going to negotiate in the Senate with the LNP rather than with the Greens and the independents. Hence the CPRS began brownish rather than green and was always going to become browner to be passed. Those who might be characterised as having spoken up for the environment at various stages included Albanese, Combet, Garrett, Tanner and Wong.

The Rudd Government had every reason to expect that the LNP would support some form of ETS. After all, Howard had taken an ETS proposal to the 2007 election. Malcolm Turnbull, who took over as leader from Brendan Nelson was known to be personally committed. Emissions spokesman Andrew Robb said they would approach the Government’s plan ‘with an open mind’.

What they came up with turned out to be virtually friendless. As Penny Wong explained in May 2009:

“I think we were at risk of [an Australian] republican-type outcome where loss of support on the left and right, for totally different reasons, meant you ended up with nothing.”

The Nationals were always clear. Warren Truss described the CPRS as

a job-destroying rabid dog that should be put down.

Turnbull, who squandered much of his political authority by calling for Rudd’s resignation on the basis of the Godwin Grech forged email, found himself in a deep and personal struggle with Robb. Robb who was supposed to be working on amendments to the CPRS legislation claimed to be doing ‘truckloads of work’ but senior coalition sources said he did close to none.

When Robb took sick leave to recover from depression Ian Macfarlane took over negotiations. It’s worth considering why climate spokesman Greg Hunt didn’t get the gig.

First up, “Penny Wong flat-out refused to deal with him”. She had been unimpressed with his behaviour at Bali in December 2007 (whatever that meant) and then he had announced a deal she had negotiated with him on renewable energy to the press before he told her that the Coalition had accepted it.

Furthermore, he was considered too green by some in the LNP to be let out on his own.

I won’t go through in detail the tortuous path that Turnbull took in getting an agreement on his side of politics. The negotiations with Labor were tough but relatively straightforward. Macfarlane was able to say that they got 80% of what they wanted. Robb’s view was different.

“My view was that the deal was mutton dressed up as first class lamb: it wasn’t an 80 per cent result, it was a 10 to 15 per cent result”, he said.

So when a scheme that had three times become browner was finally taken to the party room it looked as though a majority would reluctantly swing behind it, that is until Robb rose as the 17th speaker.

Robb had been kept in the loop with the highly secret negotiations since returning from sick leave and had seen the final deal. He deliberately stayed away from shadow cabinet meeting in the morning and said nothing of his view to Turnbull or Macfarlane. His vigorous attack in the party room was calculated to inflict maximum humiliation on Turnbull. Essentially he told them, to rousing applause from the anti-ETS camp, that the deal would be a disaster for their constituency and that they were being snowed by Turnbull.

Joe Hockey described what happened as:

“the worst act of political treachery I have seen in twenty years of politics”.

Turnbull said it was

“an act of almost inconceivable treachery and dishonesty”.

Macfarlane concurred:

“If it wasn’t a result of his state of mind at the time [a reference to Robb's depression], it was an act of complete treachery”.

Still Turnbull battled on for 7 angry hours with the media camped outside being fed by sometimes inaccurate text messages from inside the room as to what was going on. In the end Turnbull claimed he had the votes, but it turned out that depended on how they were counted. The Liberal back bench supported the deal 35 to 30. Add 10 Nationals and that became 40 against to 35 for. If you add shadow cabinet ministers, the vote was 49 to 46 in favour.

But the destabilisation had worked. Wilson Tuckey called for a spill motion, Kevin Andrews announced he would stand, three shadow parliamentary secretaries resigned. Soon Minchin and Abbott were able to tell Turnbull he could only keep his job if he changed his stance on the CPRS.

In the event, Abbott said he wouldn’t run if Joe Hockey did. But Hockey told Minchin, Abbott, Abetz, and Julie Bishop, labelled ‘the cockroach’ (survivor) by some of her colleagues, he would only run if senators were given a free vote on the CPRS. Hockey had been part of the 2002 push to introduce an ETS, he believed in the democratic mandate school of politics and in market mechanisms as the best way to price a commodity.

Abbott, troubled by none of these principles, overnight made up his mind to run as the only genuine anti-ETS candidate.

So on 1 December, 2009 the party voted. Hockey dropped out first and Abbott won 41 to 40 with one informal vote and Fran Bailey, a Turnbull supporter, unable to attend through illness.

Abbott’s first act as leader was to call a secret ballot on his proposal that the Liberals should reject the CPRS in the senate. The proposition was accepted 54 to 29.

I want to return briefly to Abbott’s role leading up to this state of affairs.

Back in July Abbott had been supporting Turnbull in doing a deal on the CPRS simply to get it off the agenda. Over subsequent months he repeatedly changed his mind, adopting six different positions in all. Turnbull told Taylor and Uren:

“His only redeeming virtue in this remarkable lack of conviction is that every time he announced a new position to me he would preface it with, ‘Mate, mate, I know I am a bit of a weathervane on this but…’”

Laurie Oakes, in an interview that went under the radar in the campaign, demonstrated that this self-administered moniker applies more generally to Abbott. Pragmatism trumps principle in his search for power.

At one point in his vacillation Abbott did turn decisively against the ETS. Rather than denialism Macfarlane puts this down to Abbott’s perception of deep divisions within the party when Turnbull won the right to negotiate. Immediately after the meeting Macfarlane recalls Abbott putting his arm around Macfarlane’s shoulders saying:

“Now mate, you know it’s in the best interests of everyone if we don’t get too much out of this negotiation.”

In other words, run dead during the negotiations and have them fail.

Turnbull on Minchin and Abbott:

“Minchin and Abbott always made it clear they thought climate change was bunkum. Even when he was advocating passing the ETS Abbott said he thought the science of climate change was complete crap, but we had to be electorally practical”.

When Minchin, Abbott and co told Turnbull they wanted him to stay on as leader on the condition that he changed his stance on the CPRS, Turnbull told front bench colleagues that they wanted him as a figleaf to cover their denialism.

The same can be said for Greg Hunt and the Coalition’s climate policies now. They are designed to ensure that nothing of substance happens while giving the appearance of concern.

What then of Gillard’s desire for bipartisanship? Given the beliefs of the Opposition and their ruthlessness in stopping an ETS, is her position is hopelessly naive?

Remember Guy Pearse and his book High and dry? Pearse found that the greenhouse mafia were deeply embedded in the bureaucracy and speculated that they might prevent a Rudd government from making real progress. This comment from a credible source addresses the matter of leaks:

There are a number of culture warriors very high up in the Canberra PS who would be privy to cabinet deliberations. They are implacably opposed to climate change policy or any similar policies that upset established relationships between government and business in promoting economic growth, and opposed to governments who would entertain such policies. They are much smarter than Godwin and could spin a leak well enough to suggest where it came from.

The PS cultural warriors may or may not have been the source of some or all of the leaks. But what this indicates is that the opposition to desirable change is deeply embedded in the power structures and is capable of disturbing ruthlessness in subverting the democratic will.

The best interpretation is that Gillard is aware of the situation and is appealing over the heads of the nay-sayers to the people. I wouldn’t bet on it, however.