Latest / Inside Politics / The Coalition’s net zero word salad, and Ley’s leadership ‘not safe’

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The Coalition’s net zero word salad, and Ley’s leadership ‘not safe’ · Inside Politics

0:01
S1: From the newsrooms of the Sydney Morning Herald and The Age.
0:03
S1: This is inside politics. I'm Jacqueline Maley. This week in
0:08
S1: federal politics, there was really only one show in town,
0:11
S1: and that was the compelling and can't look away car
0:13
S1: crash that is the Liberal Party's continued ructions on its
0:16
S1: net zero policy. They culminated or maybe even concluded on
0:21
S1: Thursday afternoon, when the Liberal Party met and finally came
0:25
S1: up with a policy.
0:25
S2: Liberal party will remove a net zero target from our
0:29
S2: policy and if elected, we will remove the 43.
0:33
S1: I'm talking to our chief political correspondent, Paul Cicala, as usual,
0:37
S1: and our special guest, chief political commentator James Massola, who
0:40
S1: have both just come out of the press conference at
0:44
S1: Sussan Ley held after that Liberal Party room meeting. Welcome, fellas.
0:48
S3: Hey, Jack. Hey, Jack. Good to be with you. Welcome back,
0:50
S3: James Long. A long hiatus from the pod. Was just
0:53
S3: admiring your blue shirt.
0:54
S1: Paul, we've been teasing Paul about his shirt offline, but
0:58
S1: you know, the listeners won't be able to you, the
1:01
S1: listeners should be picturing Paul in a nice denim shirt anyway.
1:06
S3: If I watched the Susan Lee press conference, I could
1:07
S3: have seen the shirt. I'm sure many, many people paused
1:09
S3: to try and do a Google reverse image search to
1:12
S3: see where they could buy it.
1:12
S1: Yeah, yeah, we'll put that in the show notes, actually,
1:15
S1: where Paul shops through denim shirts. Now, fellas, what happened
1:18
S1: in the in the Liberal Party meeting the long awaited
1:21
S1: Liberal Party meeting Thursday afternoon.
1:23
S3: So this has been the culmination of really months of
1:26
S3: internal debate inside the Liberal Party on where they land,
1:29
S3: on energy policy going back from the start. There's a
1:32
S3: debate right after the election between the nationals and the
1:35
S3: liberals on whether they remain together as a party. A
1:38
S3: key sticking point for the National Party, led by people
1:40
S3: like Matt Canavan, Bridget McKenzie, Barnaby Joyce, who now appears
1:43
S3: to be splitting off from the nationals, is that they
1:46
S3: want to drop the net zero target to keep the
1:48
S3: party together. Sussan Ley tries to find this pathway through,
1:53
S3: which is to review all energy policies so she doesn't
1:56
S3: commit either way to net zero. She gets the coalition
1:59
S3: back together after a brief split, and the party goes on.
2:01
S3: This long process of reviewing all of its policies, but
2:04
S3: particularly net zero because there's so much heat around it.
2:07
S3: The process is pretty slow. It's led by the energy spokesman,
2:09
S3: Dan Tehan. There's this working group that meets sometimes but
2:13
S3: doesn't make much make many tracks.
2:16
S4: It's not clear what they actually achieved, is it? It's not.
2:18
S4: Go on.
2:19
S1: I want to get to that because I feel like
2:20
S1: they haven't really shown us their homework for us to mark.
2:24
S3: I had one of a Liberal MP say to me
2:26
S3: last night that when they saw the document that Dan
2:28
S3: Tehan was drafting for today, that it looked like, uh,
2:32
S3: just a cobbling together of some thoughts in the last week.
2:36
S3: And they were stunned at how little work had been done.
2:38
S3: Dan Tehan would, would object to that because there were
2:40
S3: a lot of dot points in it today. Um, but
2:43
S3: it wasn't.
2:43
S1: A dot point love a dot point.
2:45
S3: And so they embark on this process, uh, that Dan
2:49
S3: Tehan says publicly could go for about 12, 9 to
2:51
S3: 12 months. So they'd land an energy policy sometime in
2:55
S3: the middle of next year. But then it all accelerates
2:57
S3: over the last month or so. The National Party does
3:00
S3: its own review, led by Matt Canavan and another MP,
3:02
S3: but Matt Canavan is a hardcore anti-net zero. And they
3:05
S3: jump the liberals and they say we have no plans
3:08
S3: to do net zero junking it entirely. And this jolts
3:11
S3: the liberals into action because they necessarily need to speed
3:14
S3: up their process to unite on a coalition policy. And
3:18
S3: the nationals move, and just the general hostility towards net
3:21
S3: zero and Liberal Party base starts to shift attitudes. In
3:24
S3: the middle of the Liberal Party room, it shifts from
3:27
S3: key right wingers like James Patterson and Angus Taylor from
3:29
S3: pro net zero, or at least pro some watering down
3:32
S3: of net zero to hard anti net zero. And then
3:34
S3: we land today after this real leadership crisis that's occurred
3:37
S3: over the past two weeks for Sussan Ley to try
3:39
S3: and land a Liberal policy, and here we are today.
3:41
S2: Australians deserve affordable energy and responsible emissions reduction.
3:49
S1: James tell us about the press conference afterwards. Because, I mean,
3:52
S1: going into that meeting. It was pretty much openly reported
3:56
S1: by you and other people that they they decided to
3:59
S1: dump it or it was it was a done deal
4:01
S1: because the numbers for keeping net zero just weren't there.
4:04
S1: There weren't enough moderates in the party room to keep
4:06
S1: the policy. So what did Susan Lee to sort of justify, say,
4:10
S1: to justify this position in, you know, what was quite
4:12
S1: a strong press conference afterwards?
4:14
S4: Yeah. Look, it was a reasonable performance. And I choose
4:17
S4: that word performance very carefully, jacki. Yeah.
4:19
S1: Good, good. Good work.
4:20
S4: Yeah. Um, so where we've landed, of course, is the, uh,
4:24
S4: liberals now remain committed to Paris, but are coming out
4:29
S4: of or would get out of the net zero, uh,
4:32
S4: legislative agreement or deal that would repeal the legislation that's
4:36
S4: been passed. Susan Lynn was specifically asked, you know, more
4:40
S4: than once, um, what about 2030 and 2035, our interim,
4:45
S4: what are called nationally determined commitments to reduce emissions ahead
4:49
S4: of 2050? And she said, well, you know, they're gone too.
4:52
S4: And then, I mean, you know, she said, we're doing
4:55
S4: this because we're siding with Australians. We want affordable, reliable
4:59
S4: power for them. Like the talking point, she hit all
5:01
S4: the talking points. She sounded reasonably good. But, you know,
5:06
S4: and she accused the PM of lying about power bills
5:08
S4: coming down. And power bills will always be cheaper under
5:11
S4: the liberals. But at the end of the day, she
5:14
S4: couldn't answer a pretty straightforward question, which is how can
5:18
S4: you be in Paris but not committed to net zero
5:21
S4: and not have interim targets? Because Paris is a framework
5:25
S4: to get to net zero and she doesn't have an answer.
5:29
S4: And that, I think, goes to the heart of why
5:31
S4: this was not necessarily the most convincing position. It's not
5:36
S4: necessarily the most convincing position they've landed in or policy outcome. But,
5:40
S4: you know, it was a good performance.
5:41
S1: There isn't a policy, I would argue. And this gets
5:44
S1: back to the jokes that we're making about Danton's working group.
5:47
S1: And no offense to Jan ten or the working group,
5:49
S1: but it has been a long time coming that they've
5:51
S1: been moving through this process, which has looked very disorderly.
5:55
S1: And finally, at the end of the process, all they've
5:57
S1: told us is what we kind of already intuited, which
6:00
S1: was that they're dumping net zero, just, you know, for listeners,
6:03
S1: just to clarify. Australia has ratified into law under Malcolm
6:06
S1: Turnbull's government its commitment to the Paris Agreement and and
6:10
S1: the target. And then within that, the labor government has
6:13
S1: come in. Albanese government has come in. And in 2022
6:16
S1: it's legislated its interim targets, including the net zero target. Right.
6:20
S1: So so Leigh's basically come out for the first time
6:22
S1: and said categorically, if the coalition wins government, we are
6:25
S1: going to get rid of those interim targets and long
6:28
S1: term targets from Australian legislation. But we're keeping our commitment
6:33
S1: to Paris. Nobody knows how that's going to work, and
6:35
S1: they haven't told us yet.
6:36
S4: One extra little thing I have to add, Jacqui. Um,
6:40
S4: it was Scott Morrison and Angus Taylor as energy minister
6:43
S4: who signed us up to the 2050. Now they didn't
6:45
S4: legislate it. Labor did that. But it was Scott Morrison
6:48
S4: and now and sorry and Angus Taylor, who's now one
6:51
S4: of the leading proponents of dropping net zero. Yeah. The
6:54
S4: other thing I think that's worth pointing out is that
6:56
S4: where we've landed now is, you know, okay, they're dropping
6:59
S4: support for net zero, but we've arrived here, much like
7:02
S4: we did with the voice to Parliament, with the nationals,
7:06
S4: the smaller coalition party leading the liberals by the nose
7:10
S4: to a position that a lot of liberals, particularly in
7:13
S4: the moderate grouping, are not comfortable with. You know, one
7:16
S4: of them said to me the other day, why did
7:18
S4: we bother supporting Susan to be leader when we're going
7:22
S4: to end up with the National's climate policy? And it's
7:24
S4: a fair point.
7:25
S1: And, Paul, I want to ask you about that, because
7:28
S1: the voice is a very interesting comparison, because the voice,
7:31
S1: as James has just said, the coalition position ended up
7:33
S1: being sort of led by the Nats, and they managed
7:36
S1: to turn public opinion around or they managed to kind
7:38
S1: of I don't know how you would put it, but
7:39
S1: basically they ended up being on the right side of
7:41
S1: that argument in terms of what the Australian public wanted.
7:44
S1: You know, the Susan Lee press conference was all about
7:47
S1: pursuing cost reduction, focusing on households. She talked about being
7:50
S1: a mum, you know, with bills, electricity bills piling up
7:53
S1: on the windowsill, like she was sort of empathizing with
7:56
S1: householders in that same position. Could that be an effective
7:59
S1: strategy for them?
8:01
S3: Well, I think liberals are right when they they have
8:04
S3: justified hope that if they get their show in order
8:07
S3: and develop a coherent plan around climate change and electricity prices,
8:11
S3: that there are serious chinks in Labor's armoury. And people
8:15
S3: inside the Labor Party know that. A senior staffer I
8:17
S3: remember last week said to me that if this if
8:19
S3: they do get out of this alive, Sussan Ley, if
8:21
S3: she gets out of this alive and the party unites,
8:24
S3: that Labor's going to go through a really tricky next
8:26
S3: few years as the as more renewables come online, because
8:29
S3: there's not much of a trajectory for power prices to
8:32
S3: come down. But to make that argument convincingly, you need
8:35
S3: your own coherent plan, not just around the detail of
8:38
S3: the policy. I mean, in this new energy policy we've
8:41
S3: seen today, there's actually no other Explanation. No new line
8:46
S3: item on how they will reduce emissions other than to
8:48
S3: speak vaguely about technology. They don't have much of a
8:51
S3: leg to stand on when they talk about climate credentials,
8:53
S3: which are even if it's not a top priority in
8:56
S3: the suburbs and inner cities of major cities. It's kind
8:58
S3: of seen as a minimum standard for a major party
9:01
S3: these days.
9:02
S1: They did talk about, um, uh, the capacity investment scheme.
9:06
S1: So basically, which new energy projects a government would underwrite.
9:10
S1: And at the moment that's focused on renewable energy. And
9:13
S1: they basically said more or less, yep, we would underwrite
9:16
S1: or we would put taxpayer money into new gas fields
9:19
S1: and new coal fired power stations.
9:21
S3: Opening that up. And they say that government subsidies are
9:23
S3: too targeted towards renewables, and we need to be technology neutral.
9:26
S4: I mean, I mean, it's maybe a slightly off Broadway point,
9:30
S4: but and as Paul says, Susan Lee railed against these
9:33
S4: subsidies for renewable energy. But, I mean, there are subsidies, right?
9:37
S4: Throughout the federal budget, there's a diesel fuel rebate subsidy
9:41
S4: worth tens of billions of dollars every year to big
9:43
S4: miners because they build and maintain the roads that their
9:46
S4: trucks drive on, for example. You know, it's not unusual
9:50
S4: for governments to pick winners and, uh, try and steer
9:53
S4: an industry in a certain direction. And that's exactly what
9:56
S4: the liberals, when they were last in government, did, too.
9:58
S1: And I would say the Nats probably benefit from those
10:00
S1: kinds of subsidies the most. But that doesn't mean that
10:04
S1: it's not a powerful line of attack for the coalition.
10:07
S1: And we heard Jane Hume sort of raising some of
10:09
S1: those arguments on this podcast last week, the sort of
10:12
S1: subsidies that renewable energy is getting. And, you know, the
10:15
S1: idea that the government is picking winners in this race.
10:17
S4: Jack, can I just pick up a point that Paul
10:19
S4: made earlier? What I think is happening here, in part,
10:23
S4: is an attempt at a rerun of the Tony Abbott
10:26
S4: strategy when he became opposition leader late 2009, early 2010,
10:31
S4: the liberals gambled that public sentiment would turn on climate.
10:34
S4: As you know, the impact on households became more visible.
10:38
S4: And I think that's exactly what the coalition is doing now.
10:41
S4: And to Paul's exact point, there is a chance, and
10:44
S4: labor knows that there's a chance that public sentiment could
10:46
S4: shift again.
10:48
S1: Yeah. We had I mean, that was an incredibly well
10:50
S1: run and effective political campaign that Tony Abbott ran. He
10:54
S1: won a huge, huge majority in Parliament with that campaign.
10:58
S1: You know, the $200 lamb roasts and so forth. It's
11:01
S1: a really good point. It's kind of like a rerun
11:03
S1: of that.
11:03
S3: Times have changed, though. I mean, the the level of
11:06
S3: investment in renewables has the economy is locked in on
11:11
S3: the green energy transition. Big super funds invest in green energy.
11:16
S3: All the big miners are committed to 20, 50 net
11:21
S3: zero targets and are trying to reform the way they
11:22
S3: go about business. The whole business community is going down
11:26
S3: that path. So there is there is an opportunity for
11:29
S3: the Liberal Party to hone in very narrowly on energy
11:33
S3: prices and say, and there's actually widespread consensus on this
11:36
S3: on the left and right, right of the Liberal Party,
11:38
S3: that the way labor is going about the green transition
11:41
S3: is imperfect. There needs to be more focus on gas,
11:46
S3: less ideological, less ideological opposition to things like nuclear. But
11:50
S3: if you junk the net zero aspiration or target entirely
11:54
S3: the fear of a character like Tim Wilson or Jane
11:56
S3: Hume is that you pull the rug out from underneath
11:59
S3: the whole thing, have no credibility to rest on, and
12:02
S3: you can't win that argument about how how you navigate
12:05
S3: the green transition because you don't look committed to it
12:07
S3: in any way.
12:08
S1: Yeah. You don't you don't have any credibility on the issue,
12:10
S1: so don't bother arguing it kind of thing.
12:12
S4: Bizarrely, in a way, um, Peter Dutton has arguably more
12:17
S4: credibility on climate. Uh, back when he was leader than
12:20
S4: Sussan Ley now does because they were committed to 2050
12:24
S4: under Peter Dutton. And that allowed them to argue for
12:27
S4: in part allowed them to argue for nuclear power. Now
12:30
S4: we've got the liberals saying we oppose net zero by 2050. Oh,
12:33
S4: but we do care about the climate. We really do.
12:35
S1: Let's talk about that, because that's a really good point.
12:37
S1: I want to talk about Suzanne Lee's leadership. She played
12:40
S1: her cards so close to her chest she did not
12:42
S1: we did not know what her position was on net
12:44
S1: zero going into that meeting. I don't believe she spoke
12:47
S1: in the meeting about what her position was. So we
12:50
S1: still don't really know what she really, really in her
12:52
S1: heart of hearts thinks was that an effective strategy and
12:55
S1: is her leadership secure now that she's, um, she's fought
12:59
S1: her way through this issue?
13:00
S4: James, I'm in the middle of writing a column on
13:02
S4: exactly this, Jackie. And look, the truth is, um, I
13:06
S4: think she I mean, my view is, I think she
13:09
S4: led from the back, not the front, and that that's disappointing. She, um,
13:14
S4: kind of almost abandoned the moderates who helped install her
13:18
S4: to appease the conservatives who don't want her. And that,
13:22
S4: you know, okay, the conservatives have had their win here.
13:25
S4: She's disillusioned her allies. And if you know, if this
13:29
S4: is even actually settled, then another issue is going to
13:32
S4: come up, like immigration, like the people who are gunning
13:35
S4: for Susan Lee will continue to gun for Susan Lee.
13:38
S4: I don't think her leadership is safe.
13:40
S1: Paul, what do you think?
13:41
S3: No, her leadership is not safe. Uh, in fact, it's
13:45
S3: if it continues to unravel in the next couple of weeks.
13:49
S3: I wouldn't have said this a week ago, but if
13:51
S3: if the if it continues to cascade and the net
13:55
S3: zero issue is not resolved today with this new position
13:57
S3: that talks about net zero as a, uh, what's the
14:02
S3: what's the term a welcome outcome rather than an aspiration?
14:04
S3: There's a chance that this just continues on and it
14:07
S3: gets to the point before Christmas, potentially, that the party
14:11
S3: makes a call to move on. I think it's more
14:14
S3: likely that she gets into next year because the right
14:17
S3: Andrew Hastie and Angus Taylor are not ready. Angus Taylor
14:20
S3: is not keen to become the leader in a in
14:22
S3: a kind of swift and haphazard way. He wants it.
14:25
S3: He wants the party room to be convinced of the
14:27
S3: need to move on. Susan Lee.
14:30
S4: That makes sense. There's also a bit of a a
14:32
S4: rolling the first female leader factor. I mean, she's been in.
14:36
S1: The jock factor to do with being a lady leader.
14:39
S3: And Angus Taylor is hugely cognizant of that in private.
14:42
S3: He doesn't want to appear to be, uh, the bloke
14:44
S3: who tore down the first leader. But there is a
14:46
S3: there is pretty widespread acknowledgement across the party room now
14:50
S3: that unless there is a turnaround, she's lost too much
14:56
S3: authority to retain and remain in the role for very long.
15:00
S4: Angus Taylor is so concerned about it that when he
15:02
S4: walked into the party room with Andrew Hastie yesterday, it
15:05
S4: just happened, coincidentally that Jess Collins, Jacinta Nampijinpa Price and
15:10
S4: Sarah Henderson were coincidentally, uh, placed right in front of
15:15
S4: the two blokes who want to be leader.
15:17
S1: You're so cynical, James. Maybe they're just faster walkers.
15:19
S4: Well, that's sensible shoes. Faster walkers. Could be anything.
15:23
S1: Clipping along, clipping along in their heels. Um, that's probably
15:27
S1: stereotypical and sexist of me to say that. Talk to
15:30
S1: me about what Polling. Internal polling was presented to the
15:33
S1: liberals at this meeting by Andrew Hurst, the federal Liberal
15:36
S1: Party director, because he sort of said, look, you guys
15:39
S1: do what you want. You do you, you vote the
15:41
S1: way you want. But this is what our polling is
15:43
S1: picking up will happen in the electorate if you guys
15:47
S1: adopt an abandoned net zero.
15:49
S3: Yeah. So Andrew Hurst is the federal director of the party.
15:51
S3: He runs the party's campaigns. He ran 20, 19, 22
15:54
S3: and 25 elections. He presented qualitative data. So no numbers
15:59
S3: because numbers get distorted by the different sides of the
16:02
S3: party to suit their agenda. He gave qualitative data out
16:04
S3: of focus groups, which showed that, particularly among younger and
16:07
S3: middle aged people, the term net zero has a strong
16:10
S3: connotation with addressing the issue of climate change. People see
16:14
S3: those two items as see the term net zero as
16:17
S3: a proxy for credibility on climate change. So that's a
16:21
S3: was a polite warning to MPs to say, hey, if
16:23
S3: you go down this path, you might struggle to convince
16:25
S3: these people to vote for you. But there was a
16:27
S3: bit there was something on the other end as well.
16:29
S3: He showed that there was an ability to persuade voters
16:33
S3: on the cost of net zero. If you convince them
16:37
S3: that it is directly lead into financial hip pocket concerns
16:40
S3: for you and your family, to say Labor's net zero
16:42
S3: policy is actually hurting you. That starts to shift opinion.
16:45
S3: If you educate people, the big task for the liberals
16:48
S3: is can you actually educate people to that effect?
16:50
S4: I'm not sure who's the advocate in the current party
16:53
S4: room who takes up the task and achieves this. And
16:57
S4: we were chatting about this in the office earlier, you know,
17:00
S4: could the Liberal Party miss Josh Frydenberg any more right now?
17:03
S4: You know, as a, as a, you know, advocate, he's,
17:06
S4: you know, still got the scars on his back from
17:08
S4: the National Energy Guarantee debate back in 2017.
17:12
S1: Yeah. But that didn't I mean just cutting in there.
17:14
S1: He was running that policy but he didn't lose any
17:17
S1: political skin over it. It was Turnbull who got knifed
17:19
S1: over that policy as a result of that policy, Josh
17:21
S1: Frydenberg walked away scot free.
17:23
S4: Absolutely agree. My my point is more that he knows
17:25
S4: how to navigate a climate fight within the coalition party room.
17:29
S3: I mean, in the public, this is a party that,
17:33
S3: you know, I mean, I think the voice, the voice
17:35
S3: is almost an exception. It's really an exception to this rule.
17:37
S3: But this is a party that's now disconnected with so
17:39
S3: many of the kind of centers of power across Australia.
17:43
S3: And just like parts of the community across Australia, big
17:46
S3: sections of younger voters, the business community at corporate level, uh,
17:52
S3: the Liberal Party has much less influence than they used to.
17:55
S3: Their ability to reach voters and shift opinion across culture
18:00
S3: and society has been diminished for such a long time
18:03
S3: that to create this huge national fight on a policy
18:07
S3: area where really there is a widespread consensus that the green,
18:13
S3: the green transition is something that is occurring, is a
18:16
S3: huge fight for a disheveled opposition to take on its mainstream,
18:20
S3: let alone.
18:21
S1: Mainstream Australian values. Kind of issue for me because, as
18:23
S1: you say, since Tony Abbott and Andrew Hearst. You know,
18:26
S1: the director of the Liberal Party knows this better than
18:28
S1: anyone else because he worked for Tony Abbott when Tony
18:32
S1: Abbott was doing his anti-carbon tax campaign and beyond. Um,
18:38
S1: times have moved on and Australian values have changed around
18:41
S1: this stuff. And Scott Morrison probably knows that better than most.
18:45
S3: But there is growing scepticism around how quickly we're moving
18:49
S3: on renewables. And that's a global that's a global thing.
18:51
S3: And you see that in research across the Western world.
18:53
S3: So this is not it's not I don't want to
18:55
S3: create the impression that there's kind of, um, the people
18:59
S3: adore how labor is going about this.
19:01
S1: You bring up the global context. And that was um,
19:03
S1: that was in the press conference as well. I think
19:06
S1: Dan Tehan talked about Australia under a coalition government would
19:09
S1: move in line with comparable countries to reduce emissions. So
19:14
S1: he was sort of pegging our fortunes or our aspirations
19:16
S1: under a coalition government to how the rest of the
19:20
S1: world's going and what they're deciding. And we all know
19:22
S1: that there is a bit of a retreat on emissions
19:25
S1: reduction and commitment to, you know, energy transition in the
19:29
S1: global context. So that could help the Liberal Party, couldn't it, James?
19:32
S4: Yeah, potentially. I mean, a couple of things. I'd say Jack's, um,
19:35
S4: net zero is a proxy for the future. And if
19:39
S4: you're a political party that says, um, you know, we
19:41
S4: don't believe that we need to reach this, then you
19:44
S4: run the risk of saying we don't care about the future.
19:47
S4: I was talking to a liberal about this earlier today.
19:49
S3: In terms of, like, looking like a modern political.
19:50
S4: Yeah, exactly. And they said, look, there's a reason why
19:53
S4: Queensland Premier David Crisafulli, why WA and New South Wales
19:57
S4: opposition leaders Basil Zempilas and Mark Speakman are still committed
20:01
S4: to net zero, even though the rank and file don't
20:03
S4: want it. And that's that future framing in the international context.
20:07
S4: You are absolutely correct that support is softening. And the
20:11
S4: other thing I wanted to say, Jack's is, um, we
20:14
S4: ran a poll earlier this week, a poll about people's
20:18
S4: preferences for net zero, how quickly we should get there,
20:21
S4: and actually in the Australian community, support has softened a
20:24
S4: little bit for getting there no matter what. Um, and
20:28
S4: it certainly softened in the last sort of 3 or
20:30
S4: 4 years from I think it was 2021, just as
20:35
S4: Scott Morrison and his government were battling with it. Liberals
20:38
S4: supported it at something like 55%. Like 55% of Liberal
20:41
S4: voters supported reaching net zero. That number has crashed. And
20:45
S4: I think in part, that's what Liberals and Nationals are
20:49
S4: sort of gambling on or hoping will continue that consensus breaks.
20:54
S1: But Paul, doesn't this come back to what the question
20:57
S1: that you the great question that you asked Sussan Ley
20:59
S1: in that press conference, that it's kind of word games,
21:01
S1: like most people in the electorate, I'm going to say,
21:03
S1: probably couldn't give you a breakdown of what net zero
21:06
S1: really means. It's just become a proxy for whether or
21:09
S1: not you're actually, you know, you want to take the
21:11
S1: step to, to get to the outcome.
21:13
S3: Yeah. It's become the debate over net zero has become
21:16
S3: a vehicle for so many different contests over values and
21:20
S3: grievances within the Liberal Party, its base and its party room.
21:26
S3: As we talked about with Jane Hume a couple of
21:27
S3: weeks ago here, this party room debate on net zero
21:31
S3: had become so reductionist and semantic. There is now a
21:36
S3: few weeks ago, there was a strong consensus across the
21:39
S3: left and the right to maintain some sort of aspiration
21:42
S3: towards net zero. So strip it out of legislation so
21:45
S3: that you don't have to use government subsidies and other
21:49
S3: harsh interventions to get there, which in the mind of
21:52
S3: a liberal cost the economy but maintain it as an
21:54
S3: aspiration because clearly it's a good thing to get to
21:56
S3: if you can. And then as the weeks go on,
21:59
S3: support inside the right diminishes for that prospect. And so
22:03
S3: what you end up with this week is a more
22:06
S3: mealy mouthed, watered down version of an aspiration to net zero.
22:11
S3: And that's described by Susan Lee and Dan Tehan as
22:14
S3: an outcome that would be welcome. Quote. Welcome. And so
22:18
S3: you asked Susan Lee, what's the difference between an outcome
22:21
S3: that is welcome and that you'll use technology to try
22:24
S3: and achieve and an aspiration or a goal or a target?
22:27
S3: You think these are all synonymous terms, but because net
22:30
S3: zero has become so toxic and because it's become wrapped
22:33
S3: up in so many different brawls and has become totemic
22:37
S3: leader of the Liberal Party who's trying to save her job,
22:41
S3: cannot say she aspires to it. She can only say
22:43
S3: that it would be welcome. So it's words. It's word salad,
22:46
S3: and it's absurd.
22:47
S1: I actually love that phrasing, and I really want to
22:49
S1: adopt it on the podcast. Like we can talk about
22:51
S1: things as being welcome outcomes. Like, you know, we won't
22:55
S1: necessarily ask Paul Kyle to be on the podcast again
22:58
S1: next week, but it would be a welcome outcome if
23:01
S1: he just turned up at the same time as we
23:03
S1: were recording it.
23:03
S3: But don't make it a target or an aim.
23:05
S1: No, and we're certainly not going to do anything.
23:07
S3: That would be highly improper.
23:09
S1: Yes. Yeah, guys, it is a welcome outcome that you
23:11
S1: have both wandered into the podcast studio at the same
23:14
S1: time to record this podcast with me immediately after this,
23:17
S1: this interesting press conference that we saw on Thursday Arvo.
23:20
S1: We've run out of time. We want to have you
23:22
S1: both back on again soon. James. It's been way too
23:24
S1: long and we will see you both very soon.
23:27
S4: You're most welcome, Jackie. Thanks for having me on.
23:29
S3: If anyone needs a discount code for my shirt. Um.
23:32
S4: Oh, it's in the show me one. Thanks.
23:35
S1: Oh, dear. Today's episode was produced by Kai Wong with
23:42
S1: technical assistance from Michael Pack. Our executive producer is Tammy Mills,
23:46
S1: and Tom McKendrick is our head of audio. To listen
23:49
S1: to our episodes as soon as they drop, follow Inside
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S1: news and exclusives, visit The Age and The Sydney Morning
24:01
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S1: visiting The Age or smh.com.au. Subscribe. I'm Jacqueline Maley. Thank
24:11
S1: you for listening.