E&OE….
Topics: WA EPA Shark Report, Bill Shorten on submarines, Direct Action, Renewable Energy Target
PETER VAN ONSELEN:
As promised earlier in the program, I’m joined now live in the studio here with me by Greg Hunt, the Environment Minister.
I appreciate your time.
GREG HUNT:
It’s a pleasure.
PETER VAN ONSELEN:
I’ve got to start by asking you a question. It’s also breaking news. My daughter, my seven year old daughter Sasha wanted me to ask you an environmental question – or, in fact, she wanted to originally do a petition to the Prime Minister.
GREG HUNT:
Yeah.
PETER VAN ONSELEN:
But I said the Environment Minister on the show so she could ask her question. There’s breaking news today which affects it.
Her question, to put it exactly, was how do we stop the Western Australian Government from culling sharks?
GREG HUNT:
So for the audience, what’s just happened is that the Western Australian Environment Protection Authority has, as I understand it, expressed concerns about the practice in WA. Of course, it occurs in New South Wales and Queensland in different forms, but has for 50 and 75 years.
I haven’t read the decision of the EPA because it’s just occurred and I understand the WA Government is considering it but there are some indications that they may not proceed.
PETER VAN ONSELEN:
It seems to me that they may not proceed. This is almost for them a bit of an out. But just as a follow up to the question, I mean, I’ve previously – I probably shouldn’t – I hope Sasha’s not watching. I’ve previously said that I didn’t have a problem with the shark cull.
As the Federal Environment Minister, is it right to say that you approved it or that you authorised it?
GREG HUNT:
Not correct.
PETER VAN ONSELEN:
Okay.
GREG HUNT:
The way it works is this: that the EPA gives its advice in Western Australia. Then the Western Australian Minister has to make a decision on WA and because there is a protected species involved, which is the great white shark, what I gave was an exemption for WA to carry out an emergency action, remembering that they’d had seven…
PETER VAN ONSELEN:
Shark attacks.
GREG HUNT:
…seven tragedies in three years. So they had some very significant issues. They’ll have to make their own decision. If they decide to proceed, then it would become a Federal matter for me to determine and I would rightfully never pre-empt those.
But, you know, the EPA has apparently given – well, has given advice which apparently rules that they have significant concerns at the very least. I’ll review that and then the WA Government will make their own decisions, so…
PETER VAN ONSELEN:
I guess it’ll be interesting to see what may or may not happen in other States. The broader issue though, other than the shark culling – which is, obviously, in a sense putting – if you believe it works – there are question marks around that.
GREG HUNT:
Yeah.
PETER VAN ONSELEN:
But if you believe it works, then it’s putting humans ahead of sharks. A few people would have a problem with that. It’s an issue of whether it works.
On some of the other issues though, just to fill the circle on this and then we’ll move on to some other issues, some of the figures that were presented to me – 73 million sharks are getting killed every year – this is obviously global – mostly for their fins for making soup and a number of shark species are nearly extinct.
Are you concerned not so much about the shark cull that’s specific to humans swimming at beaches but about the broader, perhaps, over-fishing of sharks?
GREG HUNT:
Yeah. So this is a very important point because the Western Australian practice literally affected 100 sharks along a coastline of well north of 10,000 kilometres. So it was literally two dots on an entire coastline where these majestic creatures were allowed to roam. They were just protecting those two dots of high population and high interaction.
Around the world, Australia’s a very strong advocate for broader shark protections under the Convention on Migratory Species. In particular, we are against and we have banned shark finning and we are working through the convention process – the Convention on Migratory Species, I’d say to Sasha, to try to stop this practice.
We think it’s inhumane and unacceptable, and whereas what occurred in Western Australian and what occurs in New South Wales and Queensland …
PETER VAN ONSELEN:
Different situation.
GREG HUNT:
…is a micro dot. This is about a systemic threat to, you know, a fundamental part of the oceanic system. So we are involved. One thing I want to achieve as a signature of my time is a global oceans agreement working with the United States, New Zealand, with countries from around the world. This is dealing with over fishing and unregulated fishing on the high seas.
PETER VAN ONSELEN:
Well, I might get her to do a petition on that and your signature as the Environment Minister can be the first name on it. Let’s move onto other issues.
GREG HUNT:
Alright.
PETER VAN ONSELEN:
Front page of the Australian today. Very strong comment piece my colleague there, Troy Bramston, about some words and rhetoric used politically by Bill Shorten, the Opposition Leader, in relation to the submarine issue and the idea that they’ll be built, perhaps, in Japan.
The headline, very strong – ‘Racist and Protectionist: Shorten’s Submarine Speech Plumbs the Depths’. What’s your view on this? I mean, is – are you deeply concerned about this?
GREG HUNT:
I am. And the reason why is I would use the term irresponsible and xenophobic. I think these were…
PETER VAN ONSELEN:
Strong term.
GREG HUNT:
…some of the most irresponsible and I deliberately say xenophobic words used by any Opposition Leader or political leader of either of the two major parties or political streams in the last 50 years. He invoked the spectre of World War 2.
He tried to make out that – you know – the same conditions applied. It was a nasty, sleazy, low, unacceptable, irresponsible and deliberately xenophobic act.
PETER VAN ONSELEN:
Do you think it was calculated or do you think he got caught up in the moment and went too far?
GREG HUNT:
No. You don’t stand on the flatbed of a truck in the middle of a union movement as Australia’s most experienced union operator and not know what you’re doing. He knew what he was doing. He was playing to the crowd. I think he might have been caught by surprise that he could say one thing there and then not hide it from the public.
He didn’t put out the transcript, as I understand it. So they were ashamed. He did the wrong thing and, seriously, this raises questions about his fitness to carry out the high office of Prime Minister.
PETER VAN ONSELEN:
Back on – and, by the way, Twitter traffic today from left wingers, not just right wingers, was pretty critical of the Opposition Leader. On Twitter, an interesting question came from a fellow named Tom, a Liberal, about the issue of Direct Action.
He pointed out in his tweet – I’m paraphrasing now – that a lot of members of the Government – I’m not necessarily – yourself included in this – criticised the ETS as something of Australia acting when, if the rest of the world weren’t acting, it was such a small percentage difference that we could make anyway. His question was wouldn’t that also apply to Direct Action.
GREG HUNT:
No. I think there’s a misunderstanding. I appreciate the question. The misunderstanding is this, that we have set out that the carbon tax that Australia had was not like anything else in the world and it was the Productivity Commission that said no other country has an economy wide ETS or carbon tax.
What was happening in Australia is that we were taxing almost the whole economy and you could see that in a country – you know – of our size with a $7.8 billion tax, it was a massive dead weight.
The United States has moved in the other direction away from a carbon tax. Canada has moved in the other direction. Japan has moved in the other direction. Europe only covers a – the top thin layer of its own emissions and…
PETER VAN ONSELEN:
See, can I just interrupt…
GREG HUNT:
…over 150 sectors…
PETER VAN ONSELEN:
The two sides of politics seem to be using the same examples to argue different points. Because you say that they were all moving away. Labor, if I was sitting here talking to Mark Butler, would say that X number of states are moving towards emissions trading in the United States. We see it in China. They use some of the same examples to make the exact opposite point. How does this happen?
GREG HUNT:
Well, let me give you an example. The – and I have great respect for what China is doing to reduce emissions and to clean up their urban air quality and what they’re actually doing is reducing the rise or the trajectory of their emissions. But the vast bulk of it is directly cleaning up power stations, directly transitioning from old…
PETER VAN ONSELEN:
So it’s a form of direct action, you would say.
GREG HUNT:
From old style power stations. The pilot ETS’s that they have – or Emissions Trading Scheme – essentially give away a hundred per cent or ninety-nine per cent of the emissions for free. In other words there’s no actual cost to the economy. There’s no actual cost to anybody.
PETER VAN ONSELEN:
Presumably with a view to not doing that one day.
GREG HUNT:
Well, who knows.
PETER VAN ONSELEN:
Yeah.
GREG HUNT:
But these schemes are presented as if they’re comparable. Virtually a hundred per cent of credits are given away for free whereas we’ve just taxed our country $7.8 billion. Since the tax has gone – because I was updating it today – there have been over a hundred what are called substantiation notices, effectively carbon tax reduction notices from companies about gas and electricity reductions across the States and Territories.
The carbon tax is gone – the bottom line: gas and electricity prices are being reduced by the full amount of the tax.
PETER VAN ONSELEN:
Well, let’s get onto your scheme.
GREG HUNT:
Sure.
PETER VAN ONSELEN:
The Direct Action scheme. Some commentators have predicted that it just won’t get through the Senate. You’ve been more, you know, obviously understandably more confident than that.
Where is it at? It’s out of the public gaze at the moment because of all these other measures that are being discussed. Is it looking likely, less likely, where are we at?
GREG HUNT:
Look, I am quietly confident that it will be in place.
PETER VAN ONSELEN:
Because of the reaction you’ve got from the Palmer United Party about it?
GREG HUNT:
Look, we’ve having very constructive discussions both with the crossbench, also, you know, I would be happy to work with the ALP or the Greens and remember this: all we are doing now – because the funds have been through and passed by the Senate – is ensuring that the supporting legislation for what’s called the Carbon Farming Initiative gets through.
That exists, it’s popular, it has got support from Greens, the ALP and the Coalition.
PETER VAN ONSELEN:
But you don’t want piecemeal elements of direct action just getting through. You want the scheme.
GREG HUNT:
No. But if we can get this last little bit of legislation through then what we can do is go and clean up power stations which the Greens and the ALP would want. We can engage in large scale energy efficiency.
We can clean up waste coalmine gas and waste landfill gas and we can also ensure that there’s forest protection, protection of native vegetation – all things which either prevent emissions going up or bring emissions down.
PETER VAN ONSELEN:
Okay. And the other issue in terms of dealing with Direct Action, I suppose, is you may or may not get that scheme through – obviously you’re hopeful that you will but then there’s the Renewable Energy Target.
Now, it may well be a situation here where your own side of politics decides that they want to walk away from your stronger commitment to it but so what, because you get saved in the Senate by Palmer, Labor and the Greens.
GREG HUNT:
Look, the answer is we have a long-term commitment to a balanced Renewable Energy Target but…
PETER VAN ONSELEN:
But there’s been a wind back. I mean, there has been a wind back since winning the election.
GREG HUNT:
Look, there is a bipartisan commitment to twenty per cent. That’s the historic position. We are now looking at the outcomes of the Warburton review which showed that it was inadvertently heading to twenty-six per cent because of a flaw in Labor’s legislation.
We are committed to the Renewable Energy Target. It’s not going to be scrapped.
PETER VAN ONSELEN:
That’s the so called option two that you’re interested in.
GREG HUNT:
And there’s a balanced middle way forward and I would say to the ALP because ideally in this space you really do want bipartisanship, we are inviting you in a constructive way to work with us, to sit down with us and to negotiate a balanced pathway forward. There’s a big problem at the moment where Labor created what were called phantom credits. They had…
PETER VAN ONSELEN:
But can I just interrupt you, Minister…
GREG HUNT:
They stopped new development and we need to fix that problem.
PETER VAN ONSELEN:
But before you get to that – but before you even get into that, I mean, you’ve got to concede that your side there are, if you like, mavericks on your side that don’t even want a slightly reworked version of a Renewable Energy Target. There are groups that would like to see the Coalition just walk away from it altogether.
GREG HUNT:
Look, I think there’s overwhelming support within the Parliamentary party for a balanced middle path here, and I’m actually very, very confident about that. And of course…
PETER VAN ONSELEN:
More confident or less confident that you were – that the party would stay behind Malcolm Turnbull way back when?
GREG HUNT:
I am extremely confident.
PETER VAN ONSELEN:
All right.
GREG HUNT:
And hopefully I’m reasonably informed on this, having spoken with numerous colleagues. And I think what’s happening is, there’s been a valuable report. There’s a valuable public debate, and we’re heading towards a sensible compromise which will actually build back stability whilst taking pressure off any future rises.
There’s a real risk that if you don’t do anything, you neither get the build nor get the reduction in electricity prices because you just hit a penalty price which is like a shadow massive carbon tax, and nobody wants that.
PETER VAN ONSELEN:
I want to, before we run out of time, just ask you finally about the target – the five per cent target by 2020. Now, obviously I’m guessing that if you can’t get Direct Action through, then you can’t achieve the target. Would that be a fair comment?
GREG HUNT:
Look, we need a system for Australia which is a fundamental and primary system. I am very confident that we will not only get our system through but absolutely so that we will achieve our targets, and I’m not going to accept the possibility of failure on either front.
PETER VAN ONSELEN:
Are we on track? I mean, I realise that there’s been a…
GREG HUNT:
Yes, we are.
PETER VAN ONSELEN:
We are on track? Because I mean, the clock’s ticking. 2020 is actually not, sadly enough, that far away now. We’re looking like we’re on track. If you don’t get direct action through, what do you do to get there?
GREG HUNT:
Well…
PETER VAN ONSELEN:
You’re not thinking that way?
GREG HUNT:
I’m certainly not looking at an alternative, because we’ve got a ready-made program, and if it were knocked back, then 159 carbon farming projects in which people have invested would suddenly risk collapse in February and March and April of next year at the hands of the ALP and the Greens, and I don’t think they want that. So I do think we will get there.
More significantly, at the moment, there’s a gap over the next six years of about 420 million tonnes which we have to close. I think that will be reduced in the latest figures in the coming months, and our proposals will cover the gap, and we’ll be in very good shape. We can do the right thing by the world without doing the wrong thing by businesses, the economy and families in Australia.
PETER VAN ONSELEN:
Environment Minister Greg Hunt, appreciate your time.
Thanks very much.
GREG HUNT:
Thanks, Peter.
(ENDS)