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| Does our political system still work? Finkel test will provide the answer | Does our political system still work? Finkel test will provide the answer |
| (17 days later) | |
| The most interesting thing about Malcolm Turnbull’s now globally shared speech to the mid-winter ball was not the Trump parody, fun as it was, but its tone. It revealed something of the prime minister’s current mood. | The most interesting thing about Malcolm Turnbull’s now globally shared speech to the mid-winter ball was not the Trump parody, fun as it was, but its tone. It revealed something of the prime minister’s current mood. |
| Delivered in the middle of a difficult week, when Turnbull was once again being publicly defied by the man he replaced and by a bunch of mouthy colleagues who always knew best andweren’t inclined to yield, Turnbull was sardonic and self-parodying, a little bit devil-may-care, a lot defiant. | Delivered in the middle of a difficult week, when Turnbull was once again being publicly defied by the man he replaced and by a bunch of mouthy colleagues who always knew best andweren’t inclined to yield, Turnbull was sardonic and self-parodying, a little bit devil-may-care, a lot defiant. |
| The outing wasn’t a lapse or a brain snap, it was entirely, ruthlessly, focused. | The outing wasn’t a lapse or a brain snap, it was entirely, ruthlessly, focused. |
| If you had to chart a prime ministerial mood between fight or flight, between defiance and deference, you would say Turnbull is limbering up with the boxing gloves on. It was like he said to the room: the colleagues, journalists, suits, log rollers – just because you don’t know what my plan is, doesn’t mean I don’t have one. | If you had to chart a prime ministerial mood between fight or flight, between defiance and deference, you would say Turnbull is limbering up with the boxing gloves on. It was like he said to the room: the colleagues, journalists, suits, log rollers – just because you don’t know what my plan is, doesn’t mean I don’t have one. |
| Defiance in politics can be a lionised quality among professional myth makers, chroniclers who are paid-up members of the Great Men of History Club, where inspired prime ministers prevail by singular acts of will. | Defiance in politics can be a lionised quality among professional myth makers, chroniclers who are paid-up members of the Great Men of History Club, where inspired prime ministers prevail by singular acts of will. |
| But it doesn’t always deliver the desired result, and certainly not in contemporary politics, which has an animating current of permanent contest. | But it doesn’t always deliver the desired result, and certainly not in contemporary politics, which has an animating current of permanent contest. |
| Relentlessly pushing forward in presidential mode carried a high personal price for Turnbull in 2009, when Tony Abbott outflanked him in the last internal fight about climate policy. | Relentlessly pushing forward in presidential mode carried a high personal price for Turnbull in 2009, when Tony Abbott outflanked him in the last internal fight about climate policy. |
| The current fight inside the Coalition about the Finkel review isn’t a perfect facsimile of 2009 – in fact, several things are fundamentally different. But one question does linger, and it frames the whole enterprise. Has the prime minister learned how to bring detractors and wreckers to heel, without self-immolation? | The current fight inside the Coalition about the Finkel review isn’t a perfect facsimile of 2009 – in fact, several things are fundamentally different. But one question does linger, and it frames the whole enterprise. Has the prime minister learned how to bring detractors and wreckers to heel, without self-immolation? |
| As interesting as this question is, bigger ones loom in the energy debate, which from my perch is the most consequential conversation we are going to have in Australian politics this year. | As interesting as this question is, bigger ones loom in the energy debate, which from my perch is the most consequential conversation we are going to have in Australian politics this year. |
| The challenge imposed by the Finkel review is more substantial than whether Australia should adopt a clean energy target to deliver policy certainty and help reduce carbon pollution. | The challenge imposed by the Finkel review is more substantial than whether Australia should adopt a clean energy target to deliver policy certainty and help reduce carbon pollution. |
| I’ve said before it is a litmus test of whether our political system still works. | I’ve said before it is a litmus test of whether our political system still works. |
| The case for action is obvious. Australia needs an energy grid that functions and we need to reduce carbon emissions. No ifs, buts or maybes – for any responsible government, that’s the task. | The case for action is obvious. Australia needs an energy grid that functions and we need to reduce carbon emissions. No ifs, buts or maybes – for any responsible government, that’s the task. |
| But climate policy remains a form of political kryptonite. Rational action must always run the gauntlet of, first, the blowhards of the reactionary, hate-spewing media, intent on substituting culture war for fact and wrapping their thuggishness in a cloak of victimhood; and, second, the lingering fog of special interests. | But climate policy remains a form of political kryptonite. Rational action must always run the gauntlet of, first, the blowhards of the reactionary, hate-spewing media, intent on substituting culture war for fact and wrapping their thuggishness in a cloak of victimhood; and, second, the lingering fog of special interests. |
| Past dynamics have poisoned this debate so comprehensively that we are now reduced to squabbling over a third or fourth best policy option to solve a pressing problem that directly affects every person in the country. | Past dynamics have poisoned this debate so comprehensively that we are now reduced to squabbling over a third or fourth best policy option to solve a pressing problem that directly affects every person in the country. |
| That’s what a clean energy target is. It’s not a magic bullet, or a perfect solution that has fallen, fortuitously, from the sky. | That’s what a clean energy target is. It’s not a magic bullet, or a perfect solution that has fallen, fortuitously, from the sky. |
| In fact as policy goes, it’s pretty suboptimal. | In fact as policy goes, it’s pretty suboptimal. |
| It’s what you get when you reach a policy nadir so shameful that even the immaculately suited short-termists, who worked to sink Labor’s carbon price a couple of years ago, are too embarrassed to own their own misjudgment, and are largely lining up on the side of action. | It’s what you get when you reach a policy nadir so shameful that even the immaculately suited short-termists, who worked to sink Labor’s carbon price a couple of years ago, are too embarrassed to own their own misjudgment, and are largely lining up on the side of action. |
| So, as both contributor to the sum of these parts, and inheritor of the consequences, the Coalition has to work out whether it can set aside its taste for lethal factionalism, for jostling, preening and indulging its own operatic yet entirely dull and predictable feelpinions – and remember that the voting public wants answers. | So, as both contributor to the sum of these parts, and inheritor of the consequences, the Coalition has to work out whether it can set aside its taste for lethal factionalism, for jostling, preening and indulging its own operatic yet entirely dull and predictable feelpinions – and remember that the voting public wants answers. |
| Not more failure. Answers. | Not more failure. Answers. |
| And apart from the challenge of not behaving like a querulous rabble at taxpayers’ expense, in practical terms the government has also got to work out how it squares its own circles. | And apart from the challenge of not behaving like a querulous rabble at taxpayers’ expense, in practical terms the government has also got to work out how it squares its own circles. |
| As the Victorian Liberal Russell Broadbent asked, not unreasonably, during the special party room meeting this week – how is it that we have spent the last six months railing against the evils of renewable energy targets and are now proposing one as the answer to the energy policy problem? | As the Victorian Liberal Russell Broadbent asked, not unreasonably, during the special party room meeting this week – how is it that we have spent the last six months railing against the evils of renewable energy targets and are now proposing one as the answer to the energy policy problem? |
| As Homer Simpson might say, d’oh! | As Homer Simpson might say, d’oh! |
| Assuming the government can emerge with a workable energy policy proposal despite the dogged internal unreason – let’s call that The Big If – Labor then has to decide whether to sign on. | Assuming the government can emerge with a workable energy policy proposal despite the dogged internal unreason – let’s call that The Big If – Labor then has to decide whether to sign on. |
| Let’s boil this down to the simplest, most clear-eyed assessment on current information. It’s clear coal will have to be in the scheme if it is to clear the Coalition party room. That means a baseline somewhere north of 700kg of CO2 per megawatt hour. | Let’s boil this down to the simplest, most clear-eyed assessment on current information. It’s clear coal will have to be in the scheme if it is to clear the Coalition party room. That means a baseline somewhere north of 700kg of CO2 per megawatt hour. |
| Labor has approached the Finkel process offering bipartisanship, and probably even meaning it at some level, but the opposition has also preemptively drawn the coal line. | Labor has approached the Finkel process offering bipartisanship, and probably even meaning it at some level, but the opposition has also preemptively drawn the coal line. |
| Labor’s climate change spokesman, Mark Butler, makes the entirely correct point that a clean energy target that includes coal is not a clean energy target. | Labor’s climate change spokesman, Mark Butler, makes the entirely correct point that a clean energy target that includes coal is not a clean energy target. |
| But in the real world, it’s clear that no one wants to build a new “clean” coal plant, given the risk of it being a stranded asset. Governments could, of course, intervene if they were inclined to make a deeply stupid investment more attractive, but the economics of coal investment won’t shift decisively as a consequence of coal-fired power operators being eligible for a small proportion of certificates under a clean energy target. | But in the real world, it’s clear that no one wants to build a new “clean” coal plant, given the risk of it being a stranded asset. Governments could, of course, intervene if they were inclined to make a deeply stupid investment more attractive, but the economics of coal investment won’t shift decisively as a consequence of coal-fired power operators being eligible for a small proportion of certificates under a clean energy target. |
| With that in mind, hard heads in Labor will say sign on, because we have to hold coal seats ourselves at the next election, we are only really talking about theoretical coal, and we can also reserve the right to adjust the scheme in government. | With that in mind, hard heads in Labor will say sign on, because we have to hold coal seats ourselves at the next election, we are only really talking about theoretical coal, and we can also reserve the right to adjust the scheme in government. |
| But that won’t be the universal view in the opposition. | But that won’t be the universal view in the opposition. |
| For MPs defending seats targeted by the Greens, defending support for a clean energy target with coal in the mix is a pretty tough proposition. | For MPs defending seats targeted by the Greens, defending support for a clean energy target with coal in the mix is a pretty tough proposition. |
| Labor has been trying to hover at a point in its own climate policy deliberations where it can sound negative about coal without totally abandoning coal. | Labor has been trying to hover at a point in its own climate policy deliberations where it can sound negative about coal without totally abandoning coal. |
| But at some point that artful levitation will have to end – and clear lines will have to be drawn. | But at some point that artful levitation will have to end – and clear lines will have to be drawn. |