Theresa May urges Australia to do more on tackling climate change

Former UK prime minister Theresa May has urged Australia to be more ambitious in tackling climate change and said it was a fallacy to argue legislating net-zero by 2050 would irrevocably damage the economy.

Speaking at a Victorian Chamber of Commerce and Industry event on Friday afternoon, Lady May acknowledged Australia relied heavily on its mining and resources sector but warned the future of the planet depended on nations leading the charge on climate action.

Former UK prime minister Theresa May urged Australia to be more ambitious tackling climate change.

“You can do well by your economy and deal with climate change, but it just means you have to do this in a different way,” she said.

“I hope Australia is going to pick up this agenda of climate change that’s rather more proactively than it has done [until now] ... This really is the way of the future and for younger generations it is so important.

“The future of the planet is their future and if we don’t do something about this, then sadly that future will be a rather different one from the prosperous and exciting future that we want it to be for them.”

Climate change policy is a flashpoint issue for Australian governments, with both sides unable to reconcile strong action on global warming with the future of the economy.

Malcolm Turnbull lost his job twice over the issue, Julia Gillard was pilloried over her carbon tax and Bill Shorten lost the “unlosable” election in 2019 over a range of lofty policy positions, including tackling climate change.

Prime Minister Scott Morrison late last year pledged net-zero emission by 2050, and forecast cutting greenhouse gas emissions by 2030 but refused to set the target. While Labor leader Anthony Albanese set a target to slash emissions by 43 per cent by 2030 if he wins the next election, due before May.

The Conservative British MP is in Australia for five days to hold a series of talks about improving gender diversity in politics and business, particularly in leadership positions. She will address the Victorian Liberal party room, where fewer than a quarter of parliamentarians are women, on Saturday.

Lady May, Britain’s second female prime minister after Margaret Thatcher, told Friday’s function including more women in positions of power was not simply a “box-ticking” exercise, but important for productivity.

“What nation would not want to use the talents of the whole of its population,” the former prime minister said.

“Any business – just as any government or political party – if it is made up of people of the same gender, from the same sort of background and same sort of education will not make as good decisions as a government, a business, a political party that is made up of people from different genders with a variety of experiences and a variety of backgrounds.”

She highlighted the importance of ensuring women are given a breadth of business experience – including in finance and management – to prepare them for leadership positions.

As prime minister, Lady May took steps to promote flexible working as part of a push to get women into the workforce.

She told the VCCI event the COVID-19 pandemic proved that people could successfully work from home, and that flexible working should be embraced more widely.

“Flexibility is an advantage, but it has to be used properly, in order to ensure that it does not have any unintended consequences, and that certain parts of the workforce don’t feel that they are losing out as a result of that flexibility,” Lady May said.

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