Industry hands Scott Morrison political cover on climate

Scott Morrison in Canberra. Picture: Getty Images

Scott Morrison has been handed political and economic cover by the nation’s biggest companies to upsize Australia’s climate change targets ahead of the UN climate change conference in Glasgow.

The Business Council of Australia – representing the country’s largest employers and emitters – has delivered a net zero emissions by 2050 blueprint promising a carbon neutral future will not cripple jobs, the regions and exports.

With Australia’s private sector, state and territory governments, trading partners, global capital markets and Liberal Party colleagues sprinting towards net zero, Morrison knows he must land a deal with the Nationals next week.

The Coalition’s “technology, not taxes” mantra, which served them well as Anthony Albanese retreated from Bill Shorten’s election-losing climate policies, will now be backed up with new ambition and tangible targets.

The pressure for Australia to follow the world down a net zero path is a world away from the 2019 election, when the Coalition announced a feasibility study into a new coal-fired power station in the marginal Queensland electorate of Capricornia.

Shorten was slammed for wrecking coal communities with his 45 per cent emissions reduction target by 2030 and accused of “ending the weekend” over his electric vehicle policy.

The reality is, plenty has happened in two years.

The big banks have adopted climate change as a condition of lending and pledged to transition away from heavy-emitting clients.

Shareholder activists have heaped pressure on the big miners, led by BHP, to change their business models and exit fossil fuels.

When Morrison and Barnaby Joyce commence formal talks next week over the long-term emissions reduction strategy and positioning on net zero emissions by 2050, in which both sides will put forward their demands on medium and long term targets, they will need to formulate a plan that can be sold in both the regions and cities.

There is no pathway to electoral victory that allows the Coalition to choose one over the other.

British Prime Minister Boris Johnson and US President Joe Biden, Morrison’s AUKUS allies, want Australia to step-up on climate change.

If Morrison travels to Glasgow in November, he will not arrive empty-handed.

Whatever deal is agreed to with the Nationals, the language will be careful and the targets realistic.