Top climate adviser warns: don't go alone on global warming

Slowly backing away from the Messianic nonsense

CLIMATE change adviser Ross Garnaut has warned that developed nations will be unable to avert global warming by simply setting exemplary emissions targets in the hope that developing nations will follow, saying China and India must join a global action plan from the start if there is to be any hope of success. As Climate Change Minister Penny Wong prepares to fly out today for talks in Poland on a post-Kyoto agreement, Professor Garnaut says the current framework is obsolete, arguing that there must be progress on a global plan within months based on a per capita allocation of emissions.

Writing in The Australian today, he warns that reaching agreement on climate change will be harder than reaching accord on trade liberalisation or arms control. But time is running short if there is to be progress at the UN climate change conference in Copenhagen in December next year, Professor Garnaut says. "Unless there is a coalescing of international support around clear principles through the first half of 2009, there is no prospect that a good agreement will be reached in December at Copenhagen," he writes. "In the absence of early constraints that hold developing-country emissions well below business as usual, no degree of constraint from developed countries will avoid high risks of dangerous climate change."

While global business leaders will today urge deep cuts to emissions in a communique signed by Westpac and NAB, Australia is expected on December 15 to announce a "soft start" to pollution-reduction targets of between 5 and 15 per cent by 2020.

Professor Garnaut argues that even a cut of 10 per cent by 2020 would be much more significant on a per capita basis than European targets of 20 per cent. He says equality on per capita emissions targets by developed and developing countries should be the long-term goal, and with Australia being one of the world's largest per capita emitters, a reduction of 10 per cent from 2000 levels by 2020 "would represent a full proportionate contribution to a global effort".

"Most of the growth in emissions over the next two decades and beyond will be from the developing countries," Professor Garnaut warns. "No country acting alone not even the biggest emitters of greenhouse gases, the US and China can cause the risks of dangerous climate change to fall substantially by its own actions alone. "Any allocation of emissions entitlements with any prospects of being accepted by most developing countries must be based on convergence towards low levels of per capita entitlements at some time in the future."

Senator Wong has played down the prospect of binding commitments this week, but a spokeswoman confirmed that the Government had outlined in submissions to the talks that "Australia considers that per capita effort is an important consideration in determining the action each country should take to reduce emissions as part of a global agreement". "This is a negotiation and Australia absolutely recognises our obligations as a developed nation to ensure that we reduce our carbon pollution," Senator Wong said yesterday.

In the past, nations including China have argued developed countries should continue bearing the burden of slashing emissions because they have created most of the carbon dioxide currently in the atmosphere.

But Professor Garnaut said the approach to allocating emissions entitlements at Kyoto, and by default being taken into the discussions at Poznan, "will not serve". "Within principles designed to reduce global emissions through convergence over time towards equal per capita entitlements, a reduction of 10 per cent from 2000 levels by 2020 in Australia would represent a full proportionate contribution to a global effort to hold concentrations of carbon dioxide equivalents to 550ppm," Professor Garnaut said. "It would represent a larger per capita reduction than was required of the US or the European Union. It would represent a larger per capita reduction for Australia than the European Union's implementation of its proposed unconditional commitment to reduce emissions by 20 per cent from 1990 levels."

He proposes the future agreement would need to include development assistance for complying developing countries to adapt to climate change. "It could be supported by WTO rules that constrained individual countries' measures to restrict trade with countries that are not reasonably complying with the requirements of an international mitigation effort," he said.

But the Climate Institute and the newly formed Global Climate Network will argue today that an emissions gap, or the difference between the developed countries' overall pollution reduction target and the global target with extra developing country effort, would cause an overshoot in the safe global pollution levels. "To close the gap and engage developing countries, developed countries need to bolster their 2020 targets and support proposals for multi-billion dollar investments in new clean technology in developing countries," Climate Institute director of policy Erwin Jackson said. "Australia can't help close the emissions gap if our target is just a 15 per cent reduction by 2020 and there is no plan to provide finance through emissions trading permit revenue or other sources."

Global business leaders are also urging Australia and other developed nations to agree on immediate deep and rapid cuts in greenhouse gas emissions. The leaders of 140 global companies have rejected arguments that the economic downturn is reason to tread softly, saying decisive action now will stimulate economic activity. They said even an immediate peak in global emissions would require a subsequent reduction of 50 to 85 per cent by 2050.

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Sixth boat belies strong border claim

Stupid do-gooder Kevvy has opened the floodgates

BORDER Protection Command is scrambling to reinforce its patrols after the interception yesterday of the sixth people-smuggling boat to be caught in Australian waters since the Immigration regime was softened five months ago. The Indonesian boat, the biggest load of the year with 47 suspected asylum-seekers and a crew of three, was spotted yesterday off Broome in international waters by an RAAF Orion P3-C surveillance plane. Its arrival comes despite Kevin Rudd's claims last week that there had been no surge in unauthorised vessels this year, and at a time when the Royal Australian Navy is about to send thousands of sailors on extended Christmas leave.

HMAS Maryborough apprehended the vessel as it crossed into Australian waters. The patrol boat was escorting the vessel to Christmas Island, where the asylum-seekers - understood to be Afghans - will be detained and processed. A boat carrying 35 Afghan asylum-seekers and five crew was intercepted off Ashmore Reef - 600km north of Broome - on Thursday. They arrived at Christmas Island yesterday. The week before, a group of 12 Sri Lankans were caught off Steep Point near Carnarvon, on November 27. The total number of asylum-seekers detained this year stands at 127. Last year, 150 arrived on five boats, and in 2006, 60 asylum-seekers arrived in six boats.

The latest arrivals showed there was a "real problem" with border security, Malcolm Turnbull said yesterday. "We have seen six boats arrive since August, since the Government abolished temporary protection visas," the Opposition Leader said. "They were introduced in 1999 specifically for the purpose of discouraging people smuggling. This sixth vessel is a ... wake-up call to Mr Rudd that his policy in August has been a mistake."

On Friday, Mr Rudd's new National Security Adviser, former SAS commander Duncan Lewis, vowed to tackle the people smuggling problem "at source". "The issue of unauthorised boat arrivals is an enduring one for this country," he warned.

Home Affairs Minister Bob Debus yesterday announced a boost in patrol capability off the Top End and northwest coast. "The Government will also provide an additional navy vessel and surveillance aircraft to protect Australia's offshore maritime areas from illegal activity, including people smuggling," Mr Debus said. "The increase along with existing defence and customs assets already operating, will provide a significant deterrent to anyone seeking to break Australia's maritime laws or enter Australia illegally."

The surge in people smuggling boats follows an announcement last month by the navy of three months' leave for officers and other ranks over Christmas, a story which gained international prominence. The navy denied operational capability was being undermined but the announcement left an impression the RAN was shutting down for the festive season.

Border Protection Command's 12 aircraft fly more than 2400 missions every year and the new measures meant there were 17 navy and Customs vessels patrolling year round, Mr Debus said.

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Absurd salaries for health bureaucrats

WA nurses are demanding a better deal after Premier Colin Barnett defended salaries of $400,000 or more for 11 of the state's health bureaucrats. It was revealed in today's The Sunday Times that four Health Department bosses were on contracts that enabled them to earn $480,000 a year, while seven more could earn up to $420,000. Health director-general Peter Flett earns $540,000 after being appointed to the top job in October, $90,000 less than his predecessor Neale Fong.

Dr Fong, Australia's highest-paid public servant, resigned in January after the Corruption and Crime Commission found he had engaged in serious misconduct with disgraced former Labor premier turned lobbyist Brian Burke.

While in opposition, the current government pledged to cut excessive public service salaries once it took office. But Mr Barnett said the government had to pay high salaries to attract good administrators. "They are high salaries, but if you're talking about leading clinicians in the health sector that's the sort of salary level that prevails,'' he said today. "If we want top-quality people working within government, whether it's in health, education or legal areas, you're going to have to pay competitive salaries. That is a reality.''

WA Nurses Federation secretary Mark Olson said he was surprised at the number of health administrators on $400,000-plus salaries in WA. He said Mr Barnett was mistaken to claim that the wages of the state's top paid health bureaucrats were commensurate with similar jobs in the private sector. "It's just a fallacy. The previous government ran the same line,'' Mr Olson said. "When they paid that excessive salary to Dr Fong they said they had to pay him that money to get him from the private sector. "It turned out that he had been on about $330,000 a year and got more than a 200,000 pay lift when he went from St Johns (private) Hospital to the public sector.''

Mr Olson said Mr Barnett had also appeared to indicate that only doctors or people with a medical background could be appointed to top-level management positions in the health sector. "They don't have to be clinicians to move into these areas,'' Mr Olson said. "People who don't have medical qualifications are running very large health organisations around the country and around the globe.''

He said the current level of salaries was sending the wrong message to the people working ``on the floor'' in the state's health system. "It's a pure and simple equation - we are short of doctors on the floor, we are short of nurses on the floor,'' Mr Olson said. "I'd like to see the money going in that direction rather than to bureaucrats. There's no shortage of bureaucrats, there never has been.''

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Cattle ranchers defeat Greenies over Gamba grass

Gamba grass is TOO green!

Northern Territory Grazier Rashida Khan writes: The recent decision to ban Gamba grass in the NT if it was not on grazing land was met with much excitement from the people who wished to see it banned. They went on to claim, they had "won the hard fought battle".

What battle? No one has ever told these people that they must keep the plant! Rather it was vice-versa that those using the plant and managing it would have to get rid of it. The NT Government considered the agricultural stakeholders concerns and reached a sensible decision which boiled down to, `if you're not using Gamba and don't value it then do something about it'.

The decision is to divide the NT into two zones, one from Darwin-Katherine-Arnhem where Gamba must be managed and the other was land outside that where Gamba must be removed. Now that there are some Government guidelines in place, tracts of land that are currently not adequately managed, including crown land, aboriginal trust, absentee owned land and national parks must now be held accountable.

I was disappointed to see Dr Stuart Blanch from the WWF quoted in the NT News as saying, "The size of this (managed) zone must be reduced in the years to come". The zoning decision has been a positive outcome for all stakeholders and offers a platform from which to move forward, not an excuse to foster a disturbing desire for conflict.

Throughout the debate, there has been media attention about the danger of gamba fires, the damage it does to wildlife and the environment. What has been largely ignored is the immense benefit it offers to sustainable farmers.

It is a carbon sequestrating, erosion- controlling, self-seeding, hardy, economic, palatable and nutritious pasture plant. When managed correctly Gamba is one of the most important improvements to the Northern cattle industry. Wildlife are also adapting to the presence of Gamba Grass with many animals eating the seeds and leaves.

We are now at a time of change. We can continue to make noise and waste time and paper or we can adapt and see this grass as just another tool to help us sustainably improve northern land management practices.

There is no environmental or economic way of eradicating the plant so it must be understood and utilized. It would now be stupid to let prejudice cloud our judgment and ignore the opportunities offered by this versatile plant.

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