Tim Blair: Shrimp are on their way to a hot new climate BBQ

Peter Dutton has the chance to end the long tradition of self-immolation by Australian leaders over climate, but first some in his own party have to get out of his way

In ancient times, panic-prone populations would appease their weather gods by tossing children into volcanoes.

It was their answer to everything. Rainfall a bit light lately? Too many warm days? Autumn leaves not of a sufficiently attractive hue to merit some Instagram posts?

Not a problem.

Just round up a few kids – last-born are the best, before anyone’s become too attached – and throw another shrimp on the barbie, so to speak.

By and large, we don’t do anything quite so barbaric these days – although in search of bountiful harvests, Indonesia’s history-minded Tenggerese people still launch the occasional baby goat into bubbling Mount Bromo.

They’ve swapped kids for kids. Good for them.

“They simply queue up on the molten rim of Mount Greenvote and happily tip themselves in. Picture: ChatGPT

In Australia, this all runs very differently. Our more panic-prone politicians, desperate to please capricious climate deities, frequently cast not others but their own suicidal selves into volcanic oblivion.

They simply queue up on the molten rim of boiling Mount Greenvote and happily tip themselves in. It’s really something to see.

Kevin Rudd’s carbon dioxide fixation led him to the Copenhagen climate conference and away from the prime ministership.

Julia Gillard signed a carbon tax into law and simultaneously signed her own permanent political resignation letter.

Malcolm Turnbull, Australia’s first male Teal, volcanoed himself as opposition leader and again as PM.

2009: Then-Prime Minister Kevin Rudd delivers a speech at the COP15 United Nations (UN) Climate Change Conference in Copenhagen.

Liberal leader Peter Dutton’s entirely reasonable review of our self-destructive support for the Paris Agreement is now nudging Prime Minister Anthony Albanese and Climate Tantrum Bluster Minister Chris Bowen towards the lava line.

All Dutton has done is point out that it is “just fantasy” for the PM to be saying “we aren’t going to have coal, we aren’t going to have gas and were not going to have nuclear power and we are going to keep the lights on”. On that, Dutton is correct.

2011: Then-Prime Minister Julia Gillard delivers a speech during the Carbon Expo Australasia in Melbourne. Picture: AFP PHOTO / WILLIAM WEST

He is also correct to note, regarding Australia’s 2023 Paris carbon emissions aim: “There’s no sense in signing up to targets you don’t have any prospect of achieving.”

These are not controversial observations. In most Australian households, workplaces and pubs, one could loudly repeat Dutton’s comments without any risk at all of censure. Unless someone’s weird girlfriend with the inheritance and keffiyeh is within earshot.

Yet that’s all is has taken to turn 60-year-old Albanese into a shrieking teen who’s just got home from his first Socialist Alternative rally and been allowed a grown-up drink.

“Peter Dutton is walking away from climate action,” Albanese, probably predicting a banner at the next school strike for climate rally, told reporters yesterday.

A note for foreign readers: in Australia, “climate action” doesn’t mean action that will do anything to or for the climate. We don’t have the population for that.

Instead, “climate action” means going along with whatever the UN or Greta Thunberg tells us to do. It’s a quirky Australian vernacular thing, like up-themselves republican lawyers calling themselves KCs.

Environmental activists hold a protest rally in front of Kirribilli House, the official residence of the Australian Prime Minister, calling for the Albanese government to halt further approvals of coal and gas projects. Picture: Saeed KHAN / AFP

“His decision to abandon the 2030 target means he is walking away from the Paris Accord,” the prime minister desperately continued.

Tragically, this isn’t true. Dutton and the Libs are still mainly lame on Paris and related scams.

“We do support the Paris agreement,” Coalition climate squish and energy wimp spokesman Ted O’Brien said yesterday, possibly erasing any of his team’s immediate electoral gains.

“We’re fully committed, including to the target net zero by 2050.”

Ditch that commitment in the same way Labor ditched its tax cut commitment and the Coalition might reasonably target a return to office by 2050. But back to Albo.

“If you walk away from the Paris Accord,” our recently poll-punished PM said, “you’ll be standing with Libya, Yemen, and Iran, and against all of our major trading partners and all of our important allies.”

That’ll be news to Labor’s Hamas faction, otherwise known as Labor. Positive engagement with Middle Eastern nations is now a bad thing.

“Peter Dutton has never believed in taking action on climate change.”

Ted O’Brien reduces the Coalition vote, and Albanese instantly builds it right back up again. God bless him.

“You can’t shape the future if you’re afraid of it, and Peter Dutton is afraid of the future, and he’s incapable of leading Australia towards the future that we need.”

Dear God. Our PM has apparently been taking instructions on verbal recycling from vocally-looped US vice president Kamala Harris.

Then came the kicker: “For … Australia, which is so susceptible to cyclones, flooding, to bushfires, there are economic consequences behind not moving forward.”

It’d be a step forward if we just recognised that Australia always has tough weather. Grow up, Albo, or join your mates on the grill.