Net zero: ‘I can’t support a policy that demands a blank cheque’
“Authority forgets a dying king.” Tennyson’s reflection on the last days of Camelot rings as true for King Arthur as it does for Peter Dutton.
In the chaos of the last weeks of the campaign the one constant was Liberal supporters wanting my acknowledgment that something had gone wrong.
Anthony Albanese hadn’t claimed ground on the right. The nation’s mood had not swung to the left.
The principles of conservatism had not been found suddenly wanting and the long, proud history of the Liberal Party rewritten as a series of unfortunate events.
What people could see clearly was that we had lost our way.
Losing one’s way rarely has a single point of misstep but rather a series of landmarks that reveal to you the growing suspicion that you are not where you were supposed to be.
What is certain for the Liberal Party in our coming review of the 2025 election is that before Christmas we were headed in the right direction. Within a few weeks of the new year it was clear that we were not.
My purpose is not to identify those mistakes, to trace back breadcrumbs in the forest, but rather to highlight the difference between a political party and the values it is built upon. Values don’t make mistakes, people do.
As surely as we have made mistakes in the past, we will do so again in the future. It would be a mistake now to think the current issues that plague the Liberal Party are the result of mistakes made only in the last term.
Before Christmas voters could see something of our values but when they came to those polling booths they could see so much that was unreconciled within us, the tangled webs that three terms of government under three different leaders had left us in.
We were still carrying on, somewhat valiantly, shouldering policies and counter-policies out of obligation to long-lost causes.
The best thing about Peter Dutton was that he brought peace and stability to our party. The worst thing about Peter Dutton was that he brought peace and stability to our party.
We needed to rid ourselves of some of that baggage. We needed to have a few internal policy fights to test our resolve. Thomas Jefferson believed every generation needs a new revolution, and I believe the new generation of Liberals needs that too.
I didn’t enter politics to carry the crosses of previous iterations of the Liberal Party but rather to apply its values to the problems of today. It’s the values that bind me, not their application.
I’m not sure why Scott Morrison decided to agree to net zero. I have no interest in tracing back the steps or committing to memory the logic that took him to that outcome.
What I do know is that I cannot support any policy that demands a blank cheque and defers the costs of today on to the taxpayers of tomorrow.
No matter how righteous a cause, even in war, there is a horizon beyond which a civilised nation cannot allow itself to drift.
Our economy cannot be funded by the labours of our children.
The Liberal Party has been the safe harbour Australians have sought when their thoughts turn to the troubled waters of tomorrow. We’ve been that because our economic credentials have been excellent for generations.
However, our relatively recent support of blank-cheque policies such as net zero have not gone unnoticed by the Australian voting public.
To round out the narrative, turn to our support of the ever-growing NDIS, a funding model that is so totally flawed and yet has an assured growth profile well off into the future.
I could include defence spending on helicopters we’ve decommissioned and submarines we’ve cancelled. I could speak to our management of the federation that sees the states compete only for budget blowouts, new taxes, bureaucratic latency and record low housing approvals.
The point is that we’ve changed, we’ve lost the economic argument. That’s the hard truth.
The good news is that we don’t have to turn backwards, to chase those breadcrumbs, to find our way again. Just as you can follow the morning sun to head east, we can follow our values to head home.
We’re a centre-right party. If we move towards smaller government, balanced budgets, the individual above the state, we will always be headed in the right direction, and Australians with a mind to tomorrow will follow us.
This won’t be an easy path and I’ve no doubt we’ve many policy fights ahead. But it’s time to acknowledge the peace the Liberal Party enjoyed in the last term, the unity and stability we praised ourselves for, came at a cost.
Like all bad politics, that cost has been passed on to the next generation. We now have to deal with it.
Garth Hamilton is an LNP member of the House of Representatives
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