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The ALP is melting down over climate policy, and Anthony Albanese is missing in action.
“The Government’s climate policy is shockingly weak, and rather than showing leadership, Labor looks like they’re about to join them. At a time when we need to be declaring a climate emergency, WA Labor is declaring climate surrender,” said Leader of the Australian Greens Dr Richard Di Natale.
“WA Labor’s decision to dump the emissions targets that Labor just took to the federal election and replace them with the Coalition’s shockingly weak targets follows Queensland Labor’s support for Adani and full throated attack on climate protesters. Anthony Albanese’s inability to reign them in shows just how adrift the Labor Party has become and why the Greens are now the real opposition.
“Labor has changed their climate policy half a dozen times in recent years and with every change its got weaker. With big donations from the coal, oil and gas lobby continuing to flow, Albo out to lunch and the ALP adrift at sea, it’s only the Greens who are prepared to take the fight up to this rotten government.
“Where is Albo, and when is he going to tell us what Labor’s climate policy is?”
“It looks like Labor and the Liberals are now on a unity ticket in backing Tony Abbott’s measly emissions targets, which are not consistent with global warming staying below two degrees,” said Greens Climate Change Spokesperson Adam Bandt MP.
“The Greens are fighting the Liberals’ climate denialism, but it looks like Labor won’t be with us.
“Anthony Albanese needs to get his colleagues on the same page, override the WA Labor party and help the Greens fight for emissions cuts consistent with the Paris ‘two degree’ goals, because otherwise we’re on track for climate disaster and Labor’s climate credibility is shot.

The Morrison Government will be responsible for the death of the Great Barrier Reef unless it takes urgent action on climate change, the Greens say.

“Today’s report is a Code Red on the survival of the Great Barrier Reef,” Greens Environment spokesperson Sarah Hanson-Young said.

“Today’s report confirms that things are getting much worse for the Great Barrier Reef under the Morrison government. We must have immediate and comprehensive climate action if we are to save it.

“The future of the Reef, the 64,000 jobs that depend on it, and its value as a World Heritage Area are all in peril because of the fossil-fuel loving Coalition.

“It’s not the Greens saying this, the Great Barrier Reef Marine Park Authority has again clearly said climate change is the biggest threat to the Reef and without national and global action, it won’t be ‘Great’ for much longer.

“Meanwhile, Matt Canavan is in India courting coal barons and putting the future of the Reef and the climate in further danger.

“If the PM and the Environment Minister insist on keeping their heads in the sand on climate change they’ll be to blame for the death of the Great Barrier Reef. Time to stop shuffling the deck chairs on the Titanic.”

Greens Oceans spokesperson and chair of the Senate Inquiry into the $444m grant to the Great Barrier Reef Foundation, Senator Peter Whish-Wilson said: “It’s official, the Great Barrier Reef, the planet’s biggest living organism, has been admitted to the emergency ward.”

“No amount of cosmetic surgery will save it from its inevitable total decline. The life support it needs is urgent and requires drastic climate action.

“Collectively, the world needs to reduce emissions. As custodian of this natural wonder, Australia must lead from the front and it isn’t doing that.”

The Biloela family must be allowed to stay in Australia, Greens Immigration and Citizenship spokesperson Nick McKim says.
“Trying to deport a family, including Australian born children, in the dead of night is emblematic of this government’s heartlessness,” Senator McKim said.
“Scott Morrison, Peter Dutton and David Coleman must listen to the community and allow Priya, Nades and their children to stay in Australia.”
“With the stroke of a ministerial pen they could be released from detention and allowed to get on with their lives.”
“This is their home. They are beloved members of the Biloela community.”
“The advocates and community who have tirelessly rallied behind this family have done a fantastic job.”

If the NSW Government was serious about preventing “Fish Armageddon” this summer, it would secure water supply for native fish so they don’t need rescuing in the first place, Greens water spokesperson Senator Sarah Hanson-Young said.
“The NSW Government’s refusal to accept the findings of the Natural Resources Commission is outrageous. The findings show over-allocation of water in favour of up-stream corporate irrigators pushed the river system into severe drought three years earlier than it would have, leading to the fish kills in the Menindee Lakes and Darling River.
“They’ve had more than six months since those devastating fish kills to stop over extraction and lift the freeze on buying back environmental water so native fish can get the water they need to survive.
“Instead, they plan to rescue dying fish from the river when the heat sets in and the water stops flowing, which does nothing to prevent future fish kills.
“It’s time the NSW Government stopped working in favour of big corporate irrigators and started acting in the best interests of family farmers, river communities, the environment and native fish.
“Water must be returned to the River and we must have a Royal Commission to fix the management of the Murray Darling Basin before it is too late.”

The Federal Government must accept the science pointing to the need for drastic emissions reduction to protect the Great Barrier Reef and actually take the necessary action instead of wasting time trying to influence UNESCO’s climate change policy, the Greens say.

“This looks a lot like history repeating itself when it comes to the in-danger listing of the Reef by the World Heritage Committee,” Greens Environment spokesperson Senator Sarah Hanson-Young said.

“Australia has form when it comes to spending hundreds of thousands of dollars lobbying UNESCO to influence its decision making on the Reef so it can push ahead with climate-destroying projects like Adani’s Carmichael coal mine.

“If the Reef is to survive, the Morrison Government must accept climate change is the Reef’s greatest threat and they must stop stalling on meaningful action to drastically reduce emissions.”

Greens Oceans spokesperson and chair of the Senate Inquiry into the $444m grant to the Great Barrier Reef Foundation, Senator Peter Whish-Wilson said, “Australians are custodians of this international icon for the whole world”.

“We know climate change is the greatest threat to the Great Barrier Reef. Yet our emissions have been rising under the Morrison Government, and we are pushing on with massive new coal mines that will export global warming to the world,” Senator Whish-Wilson said.

“Our role as both custodian of this treasure and coal-plugger is a shameful conflict of interest that this government has gone to great lengths to hide and spin their way out of.

“As chair of the Senate inquiry into the $444m grant to the Great Barrier Reef Foundation, I discovered the main motivation for this grant was to avoid an ‘in danger listing’, to avoid telling the truth about the tenuous future for the reef, and for more spin and greenwash to hide this government’s shameful record on climate action.

“Scott Morrison shouldn’t be trying to hide the truth, which is as plain as daylight: the GBR is ‘in danger’ whichever way you look at it, and the actions of his government have played a role in the unfolding tragedy we are seeing on this massive ecosystem visible from space.”