Christine Milne in the leadup to the 2010 Australian Federal Election

Beyond Zero's Matthew Wright and Scott Bilby speak to Australian Greens Senator for Tasmania, Christine Milne, about climate change and renewable energy policy in Australia in the leadup to the 2010 Australian Federal Election.

Beyond Zero speaks to Greens Senator Christine Milne

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Scott Bilby:     My name is Scott Bilby and with me in the studio is Matthew Wright.  How are you going Matthew?

Matthew Wright:     I'm good, how are you?

Scott Bilby:     ...and I'd just like to ask a little bit -we've got a guest coming on soon but just before that guest comes on I'd like to talk a little bit about a certain launch that happened in Sydney earlier in the week.  Could you tell me about that, please?

Matthew Wright:     Yes, in fact on Thursday last week, Beyond Zero launched the Zero Carbon Australia Stationary Energy Plan at the Sydney Town Hall, thanks to the support and sponsorship of the City of Sydney, they gave us the Town Hall.  And we had the support of Malcolm Turnbull who came along and gave a bit of a talk, we had Bob Carr the former Premier and Scott Ludlam the Greens WA senator.  We then went to myself, and I gave a bit of a rundown of Beyond Zero's Zero Carbon Australia Stationary Energy Plan.  We had Allan Jones from the City of Sydney who's looking at distributed generation through the city, we're trying to push him in the direction of renewable ambient heat and renewable geo-source heat, so using the heat that's in the city because most of the use of energy is heating and cooling load in cities.  And then we had a debate, a bit of a discussion panel with Robin Batterham the former Chief Scientist of Australia, who else was on that?  Roger Dargaville from the University of Melbourne and Lane Crockett from Pacific Hydro and Dr Keith Lovegrove from ANU, so that was great.  But for today's election edition of the Beyond Zero show on the line we have Christine Milne, Senator Christine Milne, Greens senator for Tasmania…

Scott Bilby:     …and Deputy Leader for the Australian Greens.  Hello Christine Milne it's good to talk to you. 

Christine Milne:     Thank you.  Good morning

Scott Bilby:     Now it's a very exciting time leading up to a federal election, and that's happening on August 21st which is tomorrow.  Now I just want to jump right into this question, I've been itching to ask it.  Prime Minister Gillard goes on about continuing our record investments in renewable energy, I've heard her say it a few times now.  What she doesn't say is that this is starting from a very, very low base of previous renewable energy investment and now, despite this very low base of previous renewable energy investment, she's decided she wants to cut a few $100 million from the renewable energy budget.  Can you tell us a little bit about that and your thoughts on that?

Christine Milne:     Yes, it's been one of the frustrations of the campaign that this has been part of Labor's mantra throughout, a record investment in renewable energy and I've heard the Prime Minister say it time and time again.  And we have been pointing out time and time again that the only thing that is a record in terms of renewable energy is the amount of money she, and the Coalition, has decided to take away from renewable energy.  So when the Cash for Clunkers was announced there was plenty of fanfare about 200,000 cars attracting a $2000 discount on a new car, but there was virtually no focus on the fact that $220 million of the money to finance it was coming out of the Solar Flagship Program.  Also, $150 million out of solar hot water and then when the Prime Minister went into the Queensland bush to announce her tree farming plan what was not indicated was that $46 million was taken out of the renewable energy fund in order to finance the National Carbon Offset Standard which had already been announced.  So that was effectively a cost shifting exercise in the budget disguised as an election announcement.  So what we are seeing is this constant draining of renewable energy programs and yesterday or the day before they made an announcement that they were going to put $40 million or thereabouts into geothermal and wave power.  But that's coming out of the money that they saved by not proceeding with the carbon price.  And what she hasn't acknowledged at any time is that the one thing they all refuse to do is a feed in tariff, a national growth feed in tariff, and throughout this election we have had news from several parts of the world, the most recent being Portugal, of having driving to much higher renewable energy component of their system all using gross feed in tariffs.  So I don't know what is wrong with the leadership in this country that they can't understand that mechanism is the best way of really driving investment in renewables.

Scott Bilby:     And another thing -sorry Matthew and I were about to ask a question at exactly the same time and I just pipped him at the post.  And there's also in the US they have a loan guarantee scheme, which might be a hundred per cent guarantee, I'm not a hundred per cent sure there (that's the only thing I know that's a hundred per cent!).  But that's really driving renewable energy there and it's really starting to kick off and we're very excited at Beyond Zero Emissions to find out what's happening in the United States.  Can you tell us about what's happening in Australia and what the Greens are saying about the loan guarantee?

Christine Milne:     Yeah, well it's quite obvious talking to people in the sector that they not only need the right policy settings in place, but post the global financial crisis it is very difficult to raise capital.  So what has been shown to work elsewhere, and it's a combination of things and I'll get to those in a minute, but one of them is definitely the loan guarantee.  And so the Greens, having spoken to people at length, came out and said, right we need to have not only a grants program for R&D and commercialisation, but we also need to have loan guarantee.  And so the Greens announced a loan guarantee system of up to $5 billion arguing whilst that does transfer some risk to the government the benefits are enormous because where it has occurred, the private sector finance market has been prepared to come in and you are seeing the investment that otherwise wouldn't occur because of the global financial circumstances.  And what we are hearing at the moment out of the US is of course bad financial news, high levels of unemployment, and a bit of gradual talk about a double dip recession, but yet because of the loan guarantees you are still getting investment in renewables.

Matthew Wright:     Now, I think what Australians want to find out about the Greens is what a Greens government would be like.  Or in terms of what's the likely outcome of the election, one possible outcome of course, if people do choose to vote green, is you'll have Greens in the balance of power so that will put the Greens in a negotiating position to green the government.  So can you tell us a bit about what a Green government would be like, what they would be like for the research and development, the R&D sector, in renewables and energy efficiency, what that would be like, we could start with that one…

Christine Milne:     Well basically, a Green government, for the future of Australia, a Green government is really set out in our Safe Climate Bills which really set out a list of about 12 pieces of legislation that we've got up on the net.  But we would be saying to Australia in this election that we are in a climate catastrophe globally, that it is time to move to a rapid transition to a low carbon and a zero carbon economy and we should be aiming for net carbon zero by 2050 and a hundred per cent renewables as quickly as possible.  So we would set the vision, just as JFK set the vision for getting a man to the moon and back within a decade.  That is the kind of vision we would put to Australians, that now it is time for every person, wherever they are, to focus on how they can create jobs, increase manufacturing, redesign their cities, be healthier and happier by making this transition.  And I think that will have galvanised the entire population around that kind of goal.  However, in balance of power, if we do achieve balance of power and I sincerely hope we do and I hope people listening will really think about this because if the Greens have balance of power we are going to be the only force in the parliament really driving on climate agenda really taking it up to the government on the global news on the science and actually saying this is what the science says, this is what this government should be doing.  If the Greens don't have that voice it won't even be mentioned.  Note in the election campaign nobody talks about climate change except for the Greens and we are the ones pushing it on the agenda. So what you could expect from the Greens in terms of what we'd do in the parliament?  Well, we've said clearly that we will push very hard for a carbon price because not only does the community want the action on climate change but the business community is crying out for it.  Everywhere I've met businesses they're saying let's go for it, we need a carbon price because then we need certainty and we can make investment decisions into the future.  But, on energy efficiency we've got a comprehensive set of bills in relation to that, which we will be -I've already introduced them into the Senate, I've sent them to Senate committees for assessment.  And we'll be reintroducing all the legislation that we have put into the Senate before and pushing very hard to have an energy efficiency, a national energy efficiency target and then that's supported by a white certificate trading scheme and also our efficiency scheme for commercial buildings.  So there's a lot of things we'll be doing and at the highest end those facilities that use more than 0.5 petajoules of power, so the ones now covered by the Energy Efficiencies Opportunities legislation, we'll be pushing much harder to make sure that they are encouraged to actually implement the findings of the -when they discover energy efficiency opportunities to actually act on them, not just note them in a report.

Scott Bilby:     We're speaking to Christine Milne, Senator and Deputy Leader of the Australian Greens.  Christine, your Safe Climate Bill does incorporate a range of things and it was interesting to hear and read some of the stuff about transport.  Now in Australia, even an Australian Government report earlier this year has reported that congestion on Australia's roads will be about $20 billion by 2020. Tell us about your Safe Carbon Bill's transport policy.

Christine Milne:     Well we want to see a rapid transition to public transport.  It's really about redesigning the cities to be more people friendly, to have more cycle-ways and to really be redesigned to be urban villages linked by rapid mass transit.  That is really the agenda for changing the transport system and then between our cities we need to have very fast trains.  If you just go to Spain, if you look what China is doing, and France have had them for years.  We need to have some very fast trains linking our cities, and so one of the things we have achieved in the election campaign is to get the agreement of both the Liberal and Labor parties to agree to a feasibility study for very fast trains.  But we also want to see the freight going off our roads and onto rail, and I noted just yesterday that the coalition of the cyclists and the bus industry and public transport groups came together saying, will the parties commit to making sure that we have a full report from the Productivity Commission on the real cost of congestion?  So in the big picture sense we want a real transformation.  We want people to drive less, because apart from anything else, it makes for a healthier person and a healthier air quality in the cities.  But when people do drive, we want them to drive more efficiently.  So that means that we need mandatory fuel efficiency standards, and we've been campaigning for them for a long time.  Now the government has finally said okay we will move to those, but the standards that they’ve set are really not acceptable at all.  Europeans we expect, by 2013 to be going to a mandatory standard of 95 grams and Australia is only looking at, I think, 150 by 2024.  So we're nowhere in the ballpark and in terms of subsidies what we've said clearly is that if the government is going to subsidise the car industry then it should be tying any government money to the highest vehicle fuel efficiency standards so we'll certainly be looking at that.   But ultimately we need electrification of the car fleet which comes back, always, to the hundred per cent renewables plan, because if you're going to electrify your transport fleet it's no use if you're still producing your energy from coal in terms of a climate outcome.  So we're got a range of policies there and I mentioned not only fuel efficiency but subsidies and the Greens will, and have been and will continue to, move to get rid of the fringe benefits tax concessions for motor vehicle use and we will -that's a ridiculous subsidy to encourage people to drive more.  And also government procurement, to make sure the government procurement strategy is to procure the most efficient vehicles, and if they're made in Australia, electric cars made in Australia, would be the ultimate if we're going to go a drive less, but drive efficiently strategy. 

Matthew Wright:     Now actually, all signs are that we're going to be in for a fair shock, a crude shock in Australia with 80 per cent oil imports is the official statistic by 2015 and if oil prices are $100 to $200 a barrel that could $30 to $60 billion of oil imports.  Now Martin Ferguson’s got his head in the sand, or nowhere to be seen on this.   What do you think this will do to the policy environment given that the Greens seem to be the only ones talking about electrification of transport and ending that dependence on foreign oil, that security risk?

Christine Milne:     Well I just think that both the government and the Coalition and whoever wins government out of either of them is going to have to wake up to the fact that we’ve reached peak oil.  I just don't know what statistics they have to see before they recognise that.  And as far back as 2006 when I drove that Senate inquiry into Australia's oil consumption and dependence on foreign oil and alternatives, even then the recommendations of that Senate inquiry said we really need to look at this.  But the big problem there was the government of the day, which was the Coalition, and now the Labor party are now completely captured by their bureaucracy on this.  And I will never forget Brian Fisher heading up the agency, as he did at the time, ABARE, saying ah look it's not a problem if we run out of oil we've got plenty of coal in Australia, we'll just liquefy coal.  And I said at the time, but what about the climate impacts of liquefying coal?  And they just said, putting climate change to one side and just proceeded saying Australia will never run out, and Martin Ferguson's own predisposition is to liquefy coal which is why they have funded that pilot project in Victoria to do just that.  And it just demonstrates the complete backwardness, it doesn't matter whether you're talking about energy, they keep talking about carbon capture and storage as an excuse to keeping on mining and generating energy from coal.  And when you talk about oil and transport they just say oh never mind we'll liquefy coal.  And then you get on to agriculture and you say what is going to be the impact on farmers, not only in terms of the machinery they use, but their dependence on petrochemical fertilisers which will go through the roof and we've just had an example of that with BHP and others making a real bid around the world to buy up fertiliser companies.  They all know this is coming and they just shrug their shoulders and then they come up with schemes about anything they can think of that doesn't require getting off petrochemical fertilisers when they should be moving to more biological systems which have better carbon retention and better water retention.  So I am frustrated that we can’t seem to have a sensible policy debate in Australia on peak oil and that is largely because ABARE, the department, is absolutely wedded to an oil future and so is Martin Ferguson wedded to a coal future and I don't see the Coalition saying anything to the contrary. 

Matthew Wright:     And it seems that the regimes that have gone with liquidification of coal in the past were desperate regimes like apartheid in South Africa and the Nazis in Germany when they were starved of oil through various embargoes and supply line cut-offs so I don't think Australia needs to go down a desperate future when it can go down a sunny future.

Christine Milne:     Well that's exactly right and the other thing they mistake, and you're right in saying that and South Africa, interestingly its coal to liquids plant is the largest point source of greenhouse gas emissions in the southern hemisphere so hardly a situation you would want to be emulating.  But certainly it shows complete backwardness and desperation and the other thing that they're not facing up to is that they keep saying we've got, in terms of energy exports and imports, we are net positive because we've got gas.  But what they not facing up to with oil is that it doesn't matter how much money you've got, many of the regimes ultimately may not sell you oil in the end because the oil resources are increasingly being bought up by foreign governments, not private companies but governments, and they will keep those resources to be shipped to their own people.  So we are really making ourselves extremely vulnerable into the future when we don't have to because we have got the best solar resource in the world.  We've got fantastic renewables and it's a matter of really getting people to link the oil debate with the climate debate with the fact that the economy could really desperately do with new manufacturing and jobs.  All of that is sitting here in Australia, brilliance in our universities and all it needs is a shift in focus with a different direction saying we will go to a hundred per cent renewables, we will make the transformation, we can do this and let's get on and do it.  And if we did do that, people would be really excited and would stop calling this election beige.

Scott Bilby:     We're speaking with Christine Milne, Deputy Leader of the Australian Greens.  Christine, speaking of transitions, yes clearly we need a transition to one hundred per cent renewable energy ASAP and as you say Australia can do it.  We've spoken to many experts from across the world and in Australia, scientists and industry specialists who keep saying this can be done, it needs to be done, not just for the environment but for our economy too.  Now there's another obvious transition that needs to be made too and that is in the native forest logging sector and there are some interesting talks going on at the moment which I think outcomes will probably be hitting the news in the next few weeks hopefully.  Can you tell us a little bit about -do you have any idea what the future might be down there in Tasmania with old growth logging because if Tasmania changes then it's going to have a knock on effect around the country?

Christine Milne:     Yes, and that needs to be a national strategy because if we're talking reassessing our carbon future we have to be doing both things at once.  We have to be stopping carbon dioxide emissions going to atmosphere from the stacks, we have to stop the brown carbon, and at the same time we have to protect our carbon stores in the landscape, our green carbon if you like, in our living system, protect it in the landscape and keep it stored there rather than sending to atmosphere.  And the stupidity of logging Australia's carbon stores is just unbelievable in a global context especially when we are in the UN year of biodiversity, next year is the UN year of the forests and the year after that is Rio plus twenty.  So it really is time up for the nonsense of destroying carbon stores and biodiversity in our forests.  And we've been arguing that for a long time and as you rightly say, in Tasmania there are now talks between the logging industry and the conservation movement.  The Greens party as such, the political party, is not part of those talks but the reason that they've come about is that the rest of the world has just said enough is enough we do not want wood chips from native forests anymore, it is not ethical, it doesn't meet our triple bottom line, it's not sustainable, and so the market has completely collapsed for native forest timbers.  And as a result, that's down the supply chain people are being put out of work and so it has come to pass that there’s a recognition now that they have to make the transition into the plantation estates.   So the discussions that are taking place at the moment are how to get the native forests protected and transition the entire industry out of native forests and downstream the existing plantation estate.  Having said that we most certainly do not want to see more managed investment schemes, or plantation carbon sink forests if you like, taking over farmland and intercepting water and so on.  We have to go with the estate we've got, we have enough plantations in the ground right now to meet all our wood products needs in Australia and that's what we should be using.  So where these talks are up to, it's clear that nobody wanted a result in the context of an election campaign because this needs to be a sensible transition and not subject to the pork barrel and hopefully we're going to get a sensible outcome.  And as you rightly indicate if we get a recognition in Tasmania that it is stupid to be logging native forest that will have to then roll on for Victoria, south east New South Wales and so on. 

Scott Bilby:     Yes and as we know wood chipping our native forests -well wood chips are just a commodity product which means we're competing with third world countries that can knock these things out a lot cheaper than us and have even, believe it or not, lower environmental grading, agreements and stuff like that.  It's not just going to ruin the environment but nukes all our jobs and it ruins the economy too.  Now I'd like to talk just a little bit before we go about how your day's panning out tomorrow.  I'm assuming you're going to be quite busy, so where are you going to be tomorrow and what's the day's activities going to be like?

Christine Milne:     Well it will be quite a hectic day tomorrow.  I start the day with a television interview at five past eight.  Then I'm meeting my family for breakfast, and Bob Brown's joining me for that.  Then Bob and I will walk through Salamanca and then I'll be voting at the Hobart Town Hall at about 11 o'clock and then the rest of the afternoon I'll spend going around the polling booths, as many as I can get to in the south of the state.  And then the Greens are getting together in Hellenic Hall in Hobart to watch the results as they come in.  So it's been a really fantastic campaign for the Greens, Bob Brown has been absolutely inspirational at the national level and tireless in trying to raise the profile of the Greens around the country.  And in Victoria I think there is the best hope we've ever had of getting a Greens senator and breaking through into the House of Reps with Richard Di Natale and Adam Brandt.  So there's a lot of excitement in the Greens around the country.  But again there's a lot of determination and that's going to be needed and greater numbers are going to be needed to be able to take on both of the Liberal and Labor parties on climate change because as I indicated without the Greens in the Senate in greater numbers there will be no advocacy for the climate.  I mean really the only people who put new ideas on the agenda in the climate and really take it up to the others is the Greens, so this is really the hope of the community movement, for the science community and the business community who want the transformation.

Matthew Wright:     And Senator Christine Milne, your tip for the election, how do you think the cards will fall?

Christine Milne:     It's very hard for me to say from the Tasmanian perspective, whilst I was on the mainland a fair bit early in the campaign for the last couple of weeks I've been mainly in Tasmania.  Tasmania is a Labor state and I think Tasmania will return all five House of Reps seats to Labor.  So I think it is going to be determined in the marginals in Queensland and New South Wales to a lesser extent in Western Australia.  And that's where I think the absolutely ruthlessness of the mining industry and the coal industry in particular are going to kick in.  So I think it's going to be really tight but the Greens will be campaigning for the zero carbon future wherever we are.  And we're also campaigning strongly in rural Australia, Matthew, because I think there's such common interest between us and people on the land in trying to take on the coal industry in particular and make sure there's a sustainable future on the land for people.  So, it's going to be down to the wire but so long as the Greens do well around the country we need to focus on that.  But for me getting the national broadband is really important as well, that's going to make health and education better to deliver.  I think the issue of asylum seekers also rests heavily on people's shoulders and again there's not much between the majors in relation to that.

Scott Bilby:     Christine, good luck tomorrow.

Christine Milne:     Thank you very much.

Scott Bilby:     We've just been speaking to Christine Milne, Deputy Leader of the Australian Greens and a senator for Tasmania.  If you'd like to know more about Beyond Zero Emissions go to http://www.beyondzeroemissions.org

Matthew Wright:     And I'll also mention the vote climate website at  http://www.voteclimate.org.au gives a comprehensive rundown of all the policy areas and you can see which parties achieve the best results.  Thank you.

 Transcript by Anne