Nuclear ban treaty a landmine for Shorten

Bill Shorten’s foreign policy agenda is set to come under attack at Labor’s national conference.

Bill Shorten is set to face a push from the Labor Left to endorse a UN treaty banning the development, storage and use of nuclear weapons. Picture Gary Ramage

Bill Shorten’s foreign policy ­agenda is set to come under attack at Labor’s national conference, with a push for a future Labor government to sign a UN treaty banning the development, storage and use of nuclear weapons.

The Opposition Leader is set to face a push from the Labor Left to endorse the treaty, with powerbrokers from both the Left and Right expecting it to be one of the major debates at next month’s party conference in Adelaide.

Opposition foreign affairs spokeswoman Penny Wong will stare down her own factional allies and argue against the proposal, which would urge Labor to sign up to the Treaty on the Prohibition of Nuclear Weapons.

Lobby group The International Campaign to Abolish Nuclear Weapons says it has signed up 78 per cent of Labor caucus to a “parliamentary pledge” to work towards the signature and ratification of the “landmark treaty”.

But senior Labor Right figures said it would be “silly” for Australia to sign the treaty as it was “benign” and would be viewed unfavourably by the US and Britain.

Senator Wong said in October the treaty would have no impact without the five nuclear weapons states — the US, Russia, UK, France and China — as well as the nuclear-armed states — India, Israel, Pakistan and North Korea — as signatories.

“While the objective of the ban treaty is one I strongly share, the treaty has significant shortcomings,” Senator Wong said.

“There is no realistic prospect of any or all of the existing nuclear weapons states signing, let alone ratifying, the ban treaty.

“A treaty banning nuclear weapons will have no effect without the support of those states that possess them.”

Labor MPs, including Josh Wilson, are in favour of pushing Labor to sign up to the treaty in the ­motion to be passed by conference.

Other opposition MPs, however, are in favour of a form of words which does not lock Labor into signing up to the treaty but leaves open the possibility of the future foreign and defence ministers signing up in the future.

Senator Louise Pratt is listed as a speaker on “Labor and the nuclear weapon ban treaty” at a fringe event on December 18 at the Labor conference.

Labor caucus members, including opposition defence spokesman Richard Marles, met former Barack Obama nuclear security official Madelyn Creedon on Tuesday at Parliament House.

Other foreign policy issues that could be contentious at the Labor conference include the unilateral recognition of a Palestinian state, trade deals, and war powers.

Labor Left MP Andrew Giles and Labor Right MP Mike Kelly will debate at a Labor conference fringe event whether the decision to go to war should be approved by parliament rather than a prime ministerial edict.

Mr Marles has argued the problems of the treaty go further and the new 2017 deal could even undermine the previous global nuclear ban treaty — the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty.

“The verification elements of the ban treaty are arguably weaker than the (Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty). But, more significantly, its whole implication is that the NPT is impotent,” he said in November.