AUSTRALIA'S minister responsible for drought and natural disasters, David Littleproud, provided the best evidence last week why tens of thousands of people will be on the streets across the country next Friday supporting a youth climate action strike.
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Mr Littleproud made headlines around the world after an interview in which he said he did not know if climate change was man-made.
Australia had been "adapting to a changing climate since we first settled this country and we'll have to continue to do that and do that with the best science we've got available", he said.
When asked if human-induced climate change was making bushfires more intense, Mr Littleproud replied: "We're adapting to it as the climate continues to change and we'll continue to equip our service workers... Whether it's man-made or not is irrelevant."
His equivocation about the role of human activities leading to rising temperatures, and the equivocation of many other political and corporate leaders, is one of the reasons why Australia does not have a national energy policy linking carbon emissions with energy production. It's one of the reasons why so many in the Federal Government are championing coal, and why the Federal Opposition doesn't seem to have a clear position on the need for immediate climate change action.
The politics of climate change in this country has stopped Australia from capitalising on the renewable energy sources we are blessed with, because continuing to pull coal from the ground is what we have always done. It provides jobs and a reliable, and extremely large, source of easy funding for governments.
But it flies in the face of what Australia has, on paper, said it accepts in its commitment to the Paris Agreement on a climate response - the need for immediate action to stop the increase in global emissions by 2020, reduce greenhouse gas emissions by 45 per cent over the next decade, and reach net zero emissions by 2050.
Next week Australia will take part in the United Nations Climate Action Summit in New York, called by UN Secretary General Antonio Guterres, to push for a leap in "collective national political ambition" to meet the Paris Agreement targets.
At the recent Pacific Islands Forum Australia made clear its sensitivity on the mere mention of coal in a final communique, or working on a transition - over years - away from coal and towards a future based on renewables, via a national energy system tailored for that, in the way that the existing system has been tailored for coal and other fossil fuels.
Young people will march in Newcastle and across the country on Friday pushing for Australia's leaders to get real about climate change. They will be backed by adults who are also tired of a climate change "debate" that is stuck on political denial.
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