I am surprised that the usual suspects have not commented about climate change being "rubbish".

It has always seemed to me that the natural home for environmentalism is the conservative side of politics. This was always so in the early days of the Conservatives in England; it was only when they subsumed the Whigs, after the rise of British Labour, that Conservatives took on the "free market" mantra of the new urban business classes.

It is interesting to see the struggle within the coalition in the light of their current leadership troubles between market fundamentalists and social liberals. It is also interesting to see that those in marginal urban seats, and those who are younger are more likely to be climate change realists.

When one considers that age distribution of climate change denialism, it is largely confined to those of more advanced years - the ones who will probably be dead before the worst effects take place. They are also the ones who listen to the likes of Alan Jones.

Australia, like Canada, seems to take most of its news and opinion from the USA - the home of free market fundamentalism and climate change denialism. Colleagues who live in Europe tell me they are surprised at the level of denialism back home in Australia.

So much seems tied up in ideology and so little credit is given to proper science in the American hegemony. A sad reflection on our consumerist worldview.

Thankfully it was the 'inflexible right' who insisted on some science when the scaremongers were predicting an 'ice age' not to many decades back. I wonder how much money was made on this 'settled science'.

Krystian describes himself as 'promoting progressive policies and the renewal of social democracy'

That says it all. Another inflexible idealist who obviously is intolerant of others that don't share his 'progressive policies'. He obviously dislikes open debate which has been the hallmark of the 'experts' in the climate change debate. NO doubt he is comfortable with the deceit that has been covered in the formation of the gw policies.

There is no reason why true conservatives should shift any more than socialists should shift positions to fit in with trendy fads. The problem with the Liberal party is that it is a liberal party which no longer represents conservative voters.

That’s the reason for the turmoil, not any failure of the Right of the party to adjust to junk science and mumbo jumbo and other socialistic ideas. There is no conservative party in Australia.

Change should be brought about by people, not by governments, be they “Hawke-Keating Governments”, Rudd Governments, or Turnbull-led Oppositions.

As a conservative, I stopped voting Liberal long ago. I am now pleased to see people like Nick Minchin, Cory Bernardi, and Alan Ferguson in South Australia, and other senators interstate, at last jacking up on the liberals who would be more comfortable on the Labor side.

I look forward to a complete break by conservatives wasting their time in the Liberal Party, and the rise of a genuine conservative party to represent the 50% of Australian voters who are now virtually disenfranchised by wets like Malcolm Turnbull and his anything-for-votes cronies

Kristian wants to enmesh two quite different problems I cannot think why? The Global Financial Crisis was the banks lending money for assets that were just not worth it. Instead of governments letting the banks fail and then bankrupting and jailing the perps they paid them off sounds more communist than conservative.
Global warming is a hoax just like the hole in the ozone layer and the Y2K scam. The perps could not believe the stupidity of the people who fell for it and so went on to this latest nonsense and the governments...........

A telling comment from a scientist recently was that those scientists who agree with climate change have their research peer reviewed. Whereas those scientists who are critical/skeptical of the climate change view are not specialised in the science of climate and have no research which has been peer reviewed. The other matter is whether climate change is man created, or nature at work; provision needs to be made for rising sea levels, changes in sea currents, and major storm events.
Scientists are generally not particularly involved in politics and those who suggest that scientists are forming some kind of socialist vanguard do not forward any kind of logical argument; quite laughable actually. Scientists with a pro- climate change view come from all corners of the world.

It's the old political trick of denigrating people when the no proper debate can be brought to bear against the opponent.

"A telling comment from a scientist recently was that those scientists who agree with climate change have their research peer reviewed. Whereas those scientists who are critical/skeptical of the climate change view are not specialised in the science of climate and have no research which has been peer reviewed..."

This is precisely ass-backwards. Scientists who do not toe the AGW line are unable to get peer reviewed because they are blocked from publishing in major journals -- and if you want to see how this is done just read the Climategate emails. Sceptical scientists would love to be peer-reviewed, if only the outlets weren't blocked, and sceptical scientists would _really_ love to peer review the work of AGW proponents; but surprise! that's blocked as well, and the AGW enthusiasts with the aid of taxpayers' funds have sewn up a neat little racket for themselves.

Or at least they HAD... until some public-spirited employee got fed up with the whole web of lies and connivance and went public. Read http://wattsupwiththat.com/2009/11/25/climategate-hide-the-decline-codified/ and tell us honestly: does this computer program read like the work of a group that ever expects to be 'peer reviewed'?

"You can't accept that climate change is real, and still think that free markets can solve all our problems". So why opt for a market-based mechanism viz Emission Trading Scheme which allows for off-shore use of carbon credits instead of a carbon tax?
"Put simply..... They need to realise that markets are not infallible, and they need to develop a much more informed awareness about the strengths and weaknesses of markets."
Er the Right in Australia opposed our current banking laws, opposed regulation of business through such institutions as ASIC and ACCC?
Irrespective of whether man-made climate change is "real" or not, it would be remiss of any Opposition party not to argue against features of a Government policy which they believe has not been fully explained and may have,on balance, deleterious effects on the nation's people.

Nice article. Hit the nail on the head.
The Right has not a coherent philosophy, it is simply "Me! Me! Me!".
Democratic government is by the people, so the monopolists and exploitative capitalists naturally oppose too much power opposing them.
If they truly believed in free markets they would have opposed the bank bailouts and private health prop-ups currently being paid for by taxpayers. the Right frequently wants government intervention, they just believe the flow should go from many poor/powerless to the few rich/powerful. The religious viewpoint of "God put me here: He knows what He is doing!"...is typical and explains the complete lack of compassion from the Howard/Bush generation of the Right.
The cognitive dissidence theory does explain the older folks inability to accept real science: simply too hard to throw away cherished fallacies held for a life time just to compensate for new knowledge.
Runner: Ever wonder whey there was not a Global Ice Age Scare? Because the science *was* done! the science is continuing to be done by many countries and it all points to the same, scary thing. If anything the recent data points to more concern.
I'd like to see the Libs split: the far Right should declare itself a new party and half the Labour party can join them. That would leave the real Left to the Greens, and the genuine Labour candidates can join them. Perhaps we could even have a 3 party democracy? That would give the lobbyists and media some stress. (hard to pick/bribe a winner in a 3 way race!)
We live in interesting times!

“Accepting the reality of climate change and the consequent need for government action involves an acknowledgment that free markets are not infallible.”

Re not infallible

nor are so called “climate scientists” who rely on fallible computer models bodgie, discredited theories and dubious “peer review”

nor are the governments, who listen to egocentric scientists before they listen to the “market”

the freedom or otherwise (presumably the imprisonment of markets in regulation and government meddling) will make no difference to the certain fallibility of public policy.

Imho I have always found the experts in any field of human endeavour are never found in government but in the endeavour itself, often creating their own wealth, which is then taxed by and regulated by those who wield the power of government.

Thus, presuming that climate, human endeavour or anything else will benefit from “accepting the reality” of anything being insisted upon by government is a strategy doomed to failure, regardless what those who are supposedly motivated by the noble ideals of egalitarianism would have us believe.

“climate change is a result of the greatest market failure the world has seen.”

the world experienced ice ages in times before modern economies and human population.

Somehow I feel Mr Sterns allotment of “blame” could hardly be laid at the feet of any “market failure” for climate change in those times –

although I am open to listen to him try and prove how.

“it will remain a party incapable of addressing the challenges facing Australia.”

Conversely the challenges facing Australia are constant and little different to those of several decades ago, excepting the appalling failures of “the ideology of the left”, as observed in the collapse of USSR and its associated despotic tyrannies.

Like dearest Margaret said.. “Socialists have always spent much of their time seeking new titles for their beliefs, because the old versions so quickly become outdated and discredited."

The political pendulum will continue to freely swing……

From socialist hysteria and back to conservative reason…

I suggest the author get a shave and a haircut and find himself a real job

Isn’t it just perfectly obvious to any thinking person that the conservative free market fundamentalists are just completely out of touch with reality?

We’re talking about market forces that take no account of stressed resources or of environmental impacts, that are responsible for the continuous promotion of expansionism with no end in sight, which is of course crazy once the scale of operations and the population size become so large as to seriously impact on various quality-of-life factors, such as water supplies.

The free market leads directly to totally unsustainable practices! If free markets actually catered for existing populations and steadily improved their affluence or wellbeing, instead of battling (and failing) to provide the same level of affluence to ever-greater populations, then there might be some merit in sticking with free market philosophy.

Free market philosophy is such a crock of crap. It is no wonder that those who worship it also have another major mental condition regarding the denial of anthropogenic climate change and will, as the author suggests, resort to almost anything to uphold their insistence that AGW is bunkum!

What sort of an utterly insane market / economic system would just continue to take the demand side of the equation further and further out of balance with the supply side, instead of bringing them into balance?? The population continues to grow at a massive rate, while our ability to feed and provide a reasonable quality of existence is sitting precariously ready to rapidly decline.

The conservatives are dinosaurs! The Liberal Party urgently needs to override the Minchinites and Tuckeyites and get stuck into some progressive politics in line with the achievement of a sustainable future.

Unfortunately, they ain’t gunna do it with Mad Monk as their leader!!

Can someone save us from self important pompous idiots who make statements like this "Indeed, as pointed out by Nicholas Stern, climate change is a result of the greatest market failure the world has seen."

Climate change is not caused by market forces, climate change is a physical phenomena of the real world.

Nick Stern did not say that, you made it up and it is self evident you are an idiot, I am sick of tendentious pontificating fools like you.

What you probably mean you twit, is Anthropogenic Climate Change is caused by Market Forces.

There's a really big difference.

No one disputes that the climate changes, and you know it - but your sleazy little trick is to try to make out that anyone who doesn't believe in AGW also doesn't believe the climate actually changes - it's a cheap trick and doesn't work except on small minded people who probably hang on your every word in whacky little eco sects.

Eco groups are full of such fools who can be swayed into thinking that "wow, people really don't believe the climate is changing, I mean, wow, don't you go outside man and see that it is?"

What a jerk .. and this crapola comes from a think tank, I can see we have an interesting future if this is the standard of "intellectual thinking", but it's not is it, it's just some prat who thinks everyone is like the people who respond to AGW believer blogs.

jimoctec - Climate Change is real, Man Made climate change is rubbish, OK, do you get it yet?

No, an inflexible, lunatic, left is at it again. Labour only won the last election because of workchoices. Their anti business, anti family, pro child abuse policies are sending all the "John Howard Battlers" straight back to the conservatives, Tony Abbott is just the poster boy they are looking for. I have even heard people speak of resurrecting the DLP.

Fair point Col Rouge.

>>Like dearest Margaret said.. “Socialists have always spent much of their time seeking new titles for their beliefs, because the old versions so quickly become outdated and discredited."<<

I think we should all take far more notice of Margaret Thatcher, when it comes to matters as important as climate change.

How well I recall her stirring speech on the topic to the United Nations, back in 1989.

http://www.margaretthatcher.org/speeches/displaydocument.asp?docid=107817

"What we are now doing to the world, by degrading the land surfaces, by polluting the waters and by adding greenhouse gases to the air at an unprecedented rate - all this is new in the experience of the earth. It is mankind and his activities that are changing the environment of our planet in damaging and dangerous ways."

And her solution.

"We can then agree to targets to reduce the greenhouse gases, and how much individual countries should contribute to their achievement."

Of course, she didn't really mean it.

Two days before she made this very speech, she voted down the proposal at the Noordwijk Ministerial Conference for a 20% reduction in carbon dioxide emissions by 2005.

So what was she?

An ardent AGW activist? Or a pragmatic, down-to-earth climate change denier?

Naturally, being a consummate politician, she was both, at different times, when it suited her.

Or indeed, as she herself would put it, every time "the old versions so quickly become outdated and discredited"

To be expedient is a normal attribute of a politician.

But to be so consistently expedient takes a very talented politician indeed.