it's not easy (or practical) being green

Rudd finds it's not easy (or practical) being green | theage.com.au

* Paul Daley
* December 21, 2008

AT THE last election, Kevin Rudd declared climate change to be "the great moral challenge of our generation".

He did so as a man who was somehow above the cut and grubby thrust of realpolitik. But perhaps that's always been Rudd's great natural gift: to appear utterly uncynical when he is acutely political. He vowed to ratify the Kyoto Protocol where Jurassic John Howard — stuck in a bubble of climate change denial — would not. Perhaps the biggest part of the great moral challenge, he led us to believe, was to lead the world through example by imposing meaningful emissions targets on Australia's big carbon producers.

Climate change mitigation has turned out to be less of a moral challenge for Rudd than a great political obstacle. As a senior Government figure said on the eve of the release of the emissions targets: "If we bugger this up, then we lose government at the next election."

Rudd has been condemned for setting a low carbon-reduction target of just 5 per cent on 2000 levels by 2020, and up to 15 per cent in the improbable event that developing nations agree to bigger reductions. Environmentalists have condemned him as betraying ordinary voters, who were captivated by his green hue at the last election. They are also appalled that big trade-exposed industries will win hefty concessions when permits to pollute are sold and traded.

The heaviest polluters are, however, still displeased, despite the massive subsidies promised to them. Some are still threatening to move their operations — and jobs — to places with no fixed targets. Therein, of course, lies the real moral quandary for Rudd: getting the biggest carbon producers to take responsibility for changing the nature of their businesses, rather than just transporting their problems to parts of the planet with Third World regulation and endless cheap labour.

But on this, political necessity dictated he effectively raise the white flag — for now at least.

Of the $11.5 billion raised through the sale of permits for carbon production, $2.9 billion will be returned to heavy polluters in the form of free permits, while the coal-fired-power industry will receive almost $4 billion over five years to offset rising prices. Another $4 billion will be carefully targeted at politically volatile low and middle-income earners to offset rising prices.

Herein, perhaps, lies the real reason why Rudd settled on 5 rather than 10 or 15 per cent minimums by 2020. For every percentage point of targeted reduction, the Government would find itself under even greater pressure for more compensation from the heaviest polluters.

It sounds as if Rudd is in an invidious position, right? Well, no.

Days before he released his 5 per cent target, some of his more trusted senior colleagues were expressing utter confidence that, in such a foreboding economic environment, he had the politics — if not the short-term policy — absolutely right.

He had effectively orchestrated a charade whereby what amounts to little more than a wait-and-see policy would be attacked from all sides. He could be Mr Middle Ground in the face of industry and green hardliners.

There was, it is said, deep concern among some in cabinet (including, perhaps, Climate Change Minister Penny Wong and Environment Minister Peter Garrett) that Rudd's 5 per cent did not go nearly far enough.

But Rudd prevailed, as he invariably does. It is why he is a much better politician than Wong or Garrett can ever hope to be.

Once Australia was faced with a recession, Rudd's political pragmatism was always going to triumph. And so, his 5 per cent target should not be seen as a policy about climate change at all. It is foremost a policy for winning a second term.

Rudd's target was roundly dismissed as both "conservative" and "moderate". But it's also, I believe, a radical personal capitulation to a base instinct for electoral survival. As such, Rudd runs the risk of looking to the electorate as if he's not such a different hue from the bloke he knocked off a year ago.

Then there's Malcolm Turnbull — a comparative progressive on climate change mitigation. But his Coalition is divided on whether to oppose the 5 per cent target when the legislation reaches the Senate.

Turnbull's preference is to support the legislation, it is said, because to oppose such a moderate cut would make him captive to Howard's legacy of climate change intransigence.

Rudd's pragmatism on climate change should not, meanwhile, be seen in isolation. It is a talisman for the political problems he is beginning to face as long-awaited policy reviews are finally delivered. All will demand big-spending responses to meet recommended reforms.

Paul Daley is The Sunday Age's national political columnist.