Making a conundrum even more of a contortion

Life often throws up fascinating conundrums.



Environment Minister, Greg Hunt.

The latest arose when reading the “Ministerial Foreword” of the Emissions Reduction Fund green paper put out by our Federal Government on which public comment has been invited.

Nothing is more critical than preparing Australians to deal with the unfolding dilemma of climate change and so the content and intent of the Green Paper makes it the most important document in our country’s history.

Written with a sense of intergenerational responsibility, the Green Paper, which has at its heart the Coalition’s Direct Action Plan for the control of domestic carbon dioxide emissions, could make Australia a leader in climate change mitigation. It won’t though.

The final paragraph his Ministerial Forward, Australia’s Minister for the Environment, Greg Hunt, wrote: “Our goal is to conserve our natural environment while ensuring strong economic growth”.

Mr Hunt is celebrated in many quarters as a remarkably intelligent, quick thinking fellow, making it curious that he fails to understand that such an observation is contradictory.

Strong economic growth and preservation of the natural environment are diametrically opposed.

The first is about the creation of high entropy goods resulting in obscene waste that is offensive, and ultimately destructive, to the latter, the natural environment.

The irony of the document arrives in the “Executive Summary” where is says: “The Australian Government acknowledges the science of climate change and supports national and global efforts to reduce greenhouse gas emissions”. It clearly doesn’t.

That is a cleverly worded statement as acknowledgement of and resultant action because of that recognition are decidedly different things and nothing our relatively new Tony Abbott-led Government has done yet suggests it actually understands the seriousness of the science.

Australia is considered a mature civilization and in claiming such a lofty position, the responsible men ought to take the time to read the thoughts of Melbourne-based philosopher, John Armstrong who wrote, “In Search of Civilization: Remaking a tarnished idea”.

He said: “Civilization is seen as a rigorous artifice, designed to save us from ourselves. Life is regarded as a mess that needs to be cleaned up.

“We need to subordinate our wayward desires to law or rationality or justice; ideas that carry a prohibition, that deny our wishes,” he wrote.

So here we face another conundrum – are we or are we not civilized? Should we opt for the latter then there is nothing else we can do but demand that our Federal Government act in a way that illustrates deep concern for those yet unborn and so without a vote or influence.

A target of five per cent drop in carbon emissions by 2020 is pitifully inadequate and if the world is to have any understandable chance of avoiding catastrophic change we need 80 per cent this decade.