Net-zero emissions: Barnaby Joyce will own the consequences

Nationals Bridget McKenzie, left, Kevin Hogan, barnaby Joyce, Keith Pitt and Kevin Hogan at Parliament House in Canberra on Sunday. Picture: Gary Ramage

Barnaby Joyce has completed the Coalition’s climate transformation by giving in-principle support to a net zero emissions target for 2050.

It is a move that ushers in a new era of politics and presents fresh challenges for his leadership and the Nationals Party.

Joyce has achieved two political outcomes. The first and most important was trumpeted by Joyce himself in the moments after the deal was struck — the Nationals remained in the tent.

This was crucial. Joyce argued the decision would keep the Nationals relevant as a political entity.

His message to voters concerned about long-term climate targets was simple: it was better to strike a deal and secure protections for rural communities on the path to net zero than to oppose the decision.

“I would say to people in regional Australia: I understand — I understand completely some of the sentiments that are held there,” Joyce said.

“But I say to you as earnestly as I can, there is no way we can deal with any of those if we are outside the tent. There is no way we can deal with any of those beyond reverberating and echoing your concerns from a point of complete and utter irrelevance.”

The writing was on the wall. Net zero was always going to win the majority support of the cabinet and Prime Minister Scott Morrison was always going to take it to Glasgow.

Opposition to the target would have seen the Nationals consign themselves to a party of protest and put at risk their frontbench positions — a move that would have fractured the Coalition months out from an election.

This was a decisive moment for the future of the Nationals and the Coalition.

Morrison was betting that Joyce would join him in backing net zero. It was a high-stakes gamble, but Morrison has now secured the crucial outcome he needed: Nationals support.

The reality is that it may well be that Joyce was the only Nationals leader that could have secured this outcome without an internal revolt against his leadership.

The second political outcome is that Joyce has now made the Nationals a partner in the effort to achieve net-zero emissions by 2050. And he has already started framing the politics of how the Nationals will embrace this new role: as the watchdog protecting rural communities from radical climate action that threatens jobs and traditional industries including agriculture and mining.

How successfully the Nationals will be able to play this role is not yet known. It will depend on the strength of the conditions and safeguards that Joyce claims to have secured. The Nationals will need to campaign on them.

Whether these stand up to scrutiny will emerge as the next key test for Joyce once they are made public in coming days. For now, Joyce is asking to be taken on trust.

Safeguards that are seen as too weak or which are dismissed by rural constituencies will be politically toxic for the Nationals and risk triggering an exodus towards other political alternatives in One Nation and Clive Palmer’s United Australia Party.

Joyce will own the political consequences. But this also means that, if the Coalition is successful at the next election, he will be remembered as one of the key figures responsible for scaling up Australia’s ambition in the global emissions reduction effort and for bringing the nation into a new net zero future — an unthinkable outcome at the last election.