Barbara Pocock (SA, Australian Greens) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Today I rise to speak about the climate crisis. We are witnessing its consequences around the world and in our own country, and there is no good news when we look at the tipping points that scientists warn us about. I am very proud today to meet some of the representatives of the Australian Youth Climate Coalition. Jess and Steph, thank you for coming to parliament, travelling in a group that includes people from Hobart, Perth, Sydney, Darwin and other cities and regions. Thank you for bringing your perspective and passion here to Canberra and to the parliament.

The AYCC is made up of many people but mostly young leaders who have observed or experienced the impacts of climate change and are working hard in their local areas to build support for ambitious climate action. It is their future and it's a fight that we all share. The AYCC are empowering a generation of young people to protect our future, and they bring their views and evidence to parliament. They are particularly focused on campaigning to stop fracking, to make polluters pay and to ensure that no public money goes towards the disastrous Middle Arm gas precinct.

The climate crisis and its dimensions are very clear. Scientists are in agreement about its dimensions and they are very clear about coal and gas—no new coal and gas. If we're going to keep our international goals around carbon pollution and stay under dangerous levels of warming then we must stop new coal and gas. We know that there are at least 117 coal and gas projects in the pipeline here in Australia. They are still being approved and expanded by this Labor government, and that is wrong. If we continue to open new coal and gas we'll miss a brief and rapidly closing window of opportunity to secure a livable and sustainable future for all of us. All the news is bad on the crisis. We have to act.

We need look no further than to the experience of desperate Queenslanders who, in the last few months, have battled tropical cyclones, very severe storms, widespread floods and bushfires down the east coast. This has been a source of great trauma to so many people across Australia, including kids whose schools have closed and whose education has been interrupted. There have been so many homes and businesses lost, a number of lives lost and great trauma for the families who have lost their loved ones. The flood cost in 2023 was $7.7 billion—a huge economic impact as well as a personal impact.

From extreme heat to wildfires to rising sea levels, we are all affected by this climate crisis, but we don't all experience it in the same way. People on lower incomes and renters suffer so much more than people on higher incomes. The climate crisis is unjust because those that have done the least to cause the problem often feel its worst effects. That's certainly the case internationally, with poorer countries bearing the brunt, for example, of rising sea levels. The greatest source of intergenerational injustice in our country and across the planet is the climate crisis, and we urgently need climate action and climate justice.

I want to say something briefly about the problem of greenwashing, which I know is a real concern to so many young people. Greenwashing is a sinister form of marketing and deception, where consumers are deceived into believing that an organisation, a company or its products are environmentally friendly. It's an obscene PR exercise. They're pretending they aren't part of the problem when in fact they are. Their propaganda, in many cases, about being part of the solution is deceptive. It enables them to grow and sell products and it is a new corporate industry. Many very big companies are in the business of greenwashing.

We recently heard the CEO of Deloitte Australia, Adam Powick, claiming that there is a growing demand for climate reporting related to greenwashing, often creating expanding consulting opportunities. Deloitte themselves have published a considerable amount about the topic of greenwashing. How these big four consulting firms can talk about greenwashing while simultaneously doing work for and business with the fossil fuel industry is beyond me. It's a clear conflict of interest that undermines the integrity of the kind of greenwashing that we observe. We need robust independent analysis of greenwashing and we need the truth to be told about the effect of big corporations and all kinds of economic activities on climate and on nature so that we can properly unpack the impact on our climate.

At present there can be no doubt that fossil fuel expansion puts the climate, our future and our frontline communities at risk. We must listen to young people, people like those from the Australian Youth Climate Coalition, to understand the problem and to fuel action to create a better future for the generations to come.