World News – AU – Unions urge ALP to accept need for gas and blue collar workers or lose next election

Union officials gave Labor MPs a message that gas will be needed in the transition to renewables, and urged them to stand up for blue collars in traditional industries or risk losing a another election

Leaders of the Australian Workers Union and the Construction and Mining Union attended a briefing this week hosted by the Labor Country Caucus, which is chaired by Ghost Resources Minister Joel Fitzgibbon

Guardian Australia reported in September that union leaders were on their way to war internally, demanding shadow climate minister Mark Butler to take a more favorable public stance on gas

With Parliament resumed, senior officials Tony Maher and Daniel Walton spoke to between 30 and 40 Labor MPs, including Fitzgibbon and other MPs, but not Butler or party leader Anthony Albanese

Participants say union leaders told MPs it was not possible for Australia to switch to 100% renewable energy overnight and that gas would be needed to secure renewables for the transition

The two MPs warned MPs not to position themselves against blue collar workers or anti-jobs in traditional industries, and urged participants to stand up for blue collar workers while blazing a trail for jobs that would be created during the transition to low-emission energy

Fitzgibbon has campaigned internally to bring Labor back to its level of ambition for its medium-term emissions reduction target

He wants the ALP to adopt the same 2030 goal as the Coalition, and recently told Guardian Australia he could leave the shadow cabinet if the leadership takes a position he cannot defend Butler publicly opposed the move to reduce political ambition

Albanese told reporters on Wednesday Labor will slowly rush to resolve this issue With his senior colleagues openly at odds, Albanese told reporters Labor will delay the final decision on a 2030 target until the next meeting international conference on climate change, to be held in Glasgow at the end of next year

Scott Morrison says he will be in office, but PM can call elections any time after the middle of next year

Delaying resolving the issue risks Labor unveiling a new target during an election, or just before, raising the likelihood of a fear campaign Albanese has previously pledged to set a new medium-term emissions in line with scientific advice ahead of the next federal elections

While the 2030 position is contested internally, the Labor Party has already adopted a mid-century target of net zero emissions by 2050 – a target backed by Fitzgibbon But the Morrison government continues to resist the listing

The Prime Minister told reporters on Wednesday – after a conversation on Tuesday night with British Prime Minister Boris Johnson, where net zero was raised – that Australia would set its own targets, not Europe or London, because it was about sovereignty

In 2019, the UK became the first G7 country to legislate a target of net zero greenhouse gas emissions by 2050 Net zero is an increasingly controversial position This week, Japan has pledged to reduce its greenhouse gas emissions to net zero by 2050

South Korea has also joined with East Asian neighbors Japan and China in declaring it will aim for « carbon neutrality » by or around mid-century

South Korean President Moon Jae-in told the national parliament he will end the country’s dependence on coal and invest in green infrastructure, clean energy and electric vehicles as part of the ‘a new multi-billion dollar green deal to achieve net zero emissions by 2050

China pledged last month to achieve carbon neutrality no later than 2060 Korea, Japan and China are the main markets for the $ 110 billion in coal and gas exports from China. ‘Australia

While regional decarbonization has clear implications for Australia’s fossil fuel exports, at a press conference on Wednesday, Morrison said he was not concerned about the change in most Australia’s main trading partners

Morrison’s upbeat statement came as Liberal New South Wales Environment Minister Matt Kean sounded a bugle call for his party to represent ‘the forgotten’ who ‘don’t come down George Street ”and“ do not have a platform on Sky News ”but support meaningful action on climate change

Borrowing the phrase ‘forgotten people’ from Liberal Party founder Robert Menzies, Kean told a forum hosted by the Australian Institute on Wednesday that the free market is leading to an inexorable transition to low-emission energy sources but « politics and ideology » Had obstructed market forces

« Climate change did not start as a political problem – we made it – and it must end, » Kean said

The NSW Liberal said climate action « shouldn’t be a partisan issue It’s not in the UK, it’s not across Europe, it’s not in places like Japan, in fact, for the most part these jurisdictions are run by conservative governments and they are leading the way on this issue

« What could be more conservative than to protect and deliver our environment to future generations better than we have found it? »

Australian Labor Party, Coal, Trade Union, Anthony Albanese, Energy