Bill Kelty weighs in on latest Labor climate brawl

The former ACTU secretary says Labor’s net-zero emissions by 2050 plan must be accompanied by an adjustment package.

Bill Kelty says Labor’s ­support for net-zero emissions by 2050 must be accompanied by an adjustment package that supports impacted businesses, workers and communities. Picture: Aaron Francis

Former ACTU secretary Bill Kelty has weighed in on Labor’s climate row saying outspoken MP Joel Fitzgibbon is “half right and half wrong’’ when he calls for the party to adopt a more moderate position on its emissions policies.

Mr Kelty, who led the union movement from 1983 to 2000, also told The Australian there wasn’t the “slightest doubt” that Joe Biden won the climate change debate and that the world was “going to move to that target by 2050”.

But Mr Kelty said Labor’s ­support for net-zero emissions by 2050 must be accompanied by an adjustment package that supports impacted businesses, workers and communities.

Labor’s internal climate change debate intensified this week when Mr Fitzgibbon quit as the party’s resources spokesman after complaining it spent too much time talking about climate change “and not enough on issues important to our traditional base’’.

Mr Kelty said: “I don’t think he’s right to say walk back on the target and don’t say anything and join the Liberal Party as probably one of the last parties on Earth to come to meeting the target,” he said. “But he is right to say you have got to have an adjustment process. Just about every country in the world will endorse the target. Industries are impacted so let’s have adjustment processes for those industries.

“Look after those communities, look after those workers.”

Mr Fitzgibbon on Thursday called for Left faction heavyweight Mark Butler to be dumped from the climate change portfolio in a move that has infuriated Anthony Albanese’s supporters and escalated chaos in Labor’s caucus.

Joel Fitzgibbon in Parliament House, Canberra, on Thursday. Picture: Gary Ramage

The Hunter MP, who supports net-zero emissions by 2050 but wants Labor to adopt a short-term position closer to the Coalition’s, was slammed as “self-indulgent” by the Opposition Leader’s inner circle after he declared Mr Butler would not win working-class voters on climate change policy.

Mr Butler has been Labor’s climate change and energy spokesman since 2013 and was the architect of the party’s uncosted 45 per cent emissions reduction target that stumped Bill Shorten during the last election campaign.

“(Mr Butler) has been in that portfolio for seven years, we’ve lost two elections, we’ve had two climate change and energy policies that have not been embraced by the Australian people, in fact they’ve been rejected,” Mr Fitzgibbon told Sky News. “We need a new advocate, bringing a fresh face and a fresh approach, somebody who can reach out to both the community and industry and say, ‘hey, the new person’s in town’.”

Other Labor MPs, including South Australian senator Alex Gallacher, say they believe Mr Butler should be moved from the portfolio at a likely December reshuffle, arguing there needed to be a figure in the role who could unite warring factions.

“Any leader worth his salt would force Butler out of the portfolio in the reshuffle,” Senator Gallacher said. “He has had two goes and two resounding failures.”

Mr Kelty said a 2050 net-zero emissions target would require assistance similar to support given to industries, workers and communities when changes were made to timber industry practices or when tariffs were reduced. “The world is progressively coming to targets which we should be part of. To resist that, to argue against it, is nonsense,” he said. “The second argument that is right is it is unfair to communities and businesses and employees that there is no proper adjustment process.

“You sit down and say, what is the impact? What is the role of coal in our energy mix? What is the nature of the security of supply? Where will it be in the marketplace in 2030, 2040, 2050? What impact will those changes have on those communities? What recompense is made to the business in terms of reallocating their capital investment or losses? What recompense is there for the employees? What additional support is there for communities?”

Left faction heavyweight Mark Butler in the House of Representatives at Parliament House on Thursday. Picture: Sean Davey.

Some Labor MPs said on Thursday that Mr Fitzgibbon’s intervention had made it more difficult for Mr Albanese to hand his factional ally another portfolio, with Mr Butler declaring: “Australians are ambitious for strong climate action. Australians want to embrace the opportunity of Australia becoming a renewable energy superpower, which will create hundreds of thousands of jobs, lower power prices, create new industries like hydrogen and batteries, and reinvigorate our traditional industries like steel and aluminium. Anthony Albanese is committed to climate action and the jobs it will create, and so am I.”

Mr Fitzgibbon again on Thursday refused to rule out running for leader with some colleagues suggesting he was setting the scene for ongoing leadership destabilisation in the hope a Right faction candidate will step up.

Deputy Labor leader Richard Marles, seen as a potential future leader, backed Mr Butler remaining in the portfolio but lauded Mr Fitzgibbon’s efforts in trying to give Labor a bigger footprint in the regions.

Mr Fitzgibbon leads a group of Right MPs who want the party to adopt a more moderate climate change agenda so it can win in regional NSW, Queensland and WA. It is backed by the Australian Workers Union and CFMEU but opposed by the Australian Manufacturing Workers Union.

Labor’s former member for the central Queensland seat of Flynn, Chris Trevor, backed Mr Fitzgibbon’s call for a “balanced” policy.

“Central and north Queenslanders are not silly … we know when we are being played for fools. We are proud of our coalmining industry,” he said.

“We’ve got to get our messaging right; you can’t say one thing in Canberra, Melbourne and Sydney and say another thing in central and north Queensland. They know whether they’re being had. Flynn, Dawson, Herbert, they’re full of working families,” he said.

Victorian Right MP Josh Burns condemned Mr Fitzgibbon as “self-indulgent”. He said Mr Fitzgibbon was out of touch with concerns of his constituents in inner Melbourne. “I’m worried about their families, jobs and businesses and the self-indulgent games being played by some need to stop,” he told the ABC.

Mr Fitzgibbon denied claims by Labor MPs he was using this term of parliament to secure a post-politics role in the resources sector.