When a report materialises that points toward a big dip in the economy you can be sure that John Howard will take notice. The Blair inspired Stern report http://www.hm-treasury.gov.uk/independent_reviews/stern_review_economics_climate_change/stern_review_report.cfm is written from a perspective that implicates global environmental damage as the main culprit for future economic downturns, it changes the current political ground around Howard considerably.

Today in federal parliament Howard warned his back benchers not to get 'mesmerised' by one report.

Perhaps the horse has already bolted?

Neo-conservative governments have comfortably gestured in the direction of environment issues in the past while being able to maintain their underlying contempt for its most ardent proponents of Green politics. Will maintaining this contempt be political suicide for the Howard Coalition? How will the Coalition sell its self as a Green champion to an electorate that is much more informed about global warming than it is about national security?

If there is a ground swell of environmental concern in the electorate come next year in the federal election it will be interesting to see how the Federal Coalition will craft their re-election pitch to an electorate who are already debating how to get out of drought conditions and water shortages. While the Labor Party may well be the alternative party, it has no real political history or mandate around environmental issues. Environmentalism is no longer a fringe issue. Will this be the greenest federal election we have ever had? What do you think?

Stern is an economist. He knows no more about global warming than I do.
He has merely added the numbers to the wildest GHG models. I must say, he appears to know how to get the most mileage from a report.
Making this one realy wild should get him a bit of on going work, from the right people.

If it were to be a political concern for the goverment they would have acted promptly. The Prime Minister made some very valid points in parliament today, which convey a solid grounding for the refusal to ratify Kyoto.

If the global warming issue is to be addressed there needs to be some internationality about it, and not selective sanctioning.

Why should we sacrifice our energy sector and related industries, if at the end of the day, any cuts to emissions that may occur are to be surpassed by increases in emissions by the 'developing nations' such as China and India. An illogical sacrifice in the face of growing economic challenges.

Refer also to my comments in the Carbon Tax thread..

Hasbeen,
I suppose if Stern had been a climatologist you might critique him about knowing nothing about economics.
You say Stern "knows no more about global warming than I do."
You really must know a damn lot about it then.

Have you even looked at the report?

Stern has made a VERY serious attempt at understanding the science (and the uncertainty) involved in climate change.

"Understanding the scientific evidence for the human influence on climate is an essential starting point for the economics, both for establishing that there is indeed a problem to be tackled and for comprehending its risk and scale."
(Stern pp. 2 http://www.hm-treasury.gov.uk/media/9A2/80/Ch_1__Science.pdf)

You claim "He has merely added the numbers to the wildest GHG models."

Read the report.
There is nothing 'merely' about anything he has done.
This is a huge amount of work.

simply adding numbers to the wildest climate change models will come out looking a lot scarier than this.

nationalist_conservative
You say,
"if the global warming issue is to be addressed there needs to be some internationality about it, and not selective sanctioning."

if ? IF ?
I would like to see how on earth (forgive the pun) the 'global warming issue' cannot be addressed.
Kyoto IS international. It is about the countries that can (ie are in a position to) begin to reduce emmissions, reducing them together.
Considering how lightly Australia got off with our targets (compared to EVERYONE ELSE who signed), mainly due to our landclearing loophole, allowing us to INCREASE our industrial and transport emissions, it is outrageous that we are claiming "not fair".

Why shouldn't China and India and other developing nations be allowed to increase their emissions? I would obviously prefer it if they didn't have to, but of course there raises the issue that Developing nations should have the right to develop to somewhere at least close to the level we enjoy.
Shouldn't they be allowed to catch up?

what seems 'illogical' to me, is how a rich developed country like ours can be so selfish and non-international about this whole thing.

Howard claims we shouldn't ratify Kyoto because it doesn't include the worlds largest emitters- that around half of the emissions of the world are not included.

Well, by joining with the USA in undermining Kyoto, we are hardly helping this. Instead we point to the pathetic non-binding 'Asia Pacific Partnership' which itself only includes half of the worlds emissions- in a non binding way!

What a joke.
The Howard government seems to want to reinvent the wheel. And this time make it square.
Kyoto may not be perfect, but if Australia and America ratify, then we (the international effort) can apply considerable pressure to those like India and China to come into the fold.

Right on the button, Hasbeen. Stern is basing his scenario for economic ruin on the global warming theory and the belief that it is man made; even though many scientists are still saying that the whole idea is piffle.

Economists rarely agree on their own subject, anyway.

Interesting to note that today's Australian editorial opined that global warming was now firmly a POLITICAL issue. It certainly seems more political than scientific.