Australian delegates played a spoiling role at the United Nations climate change conference held in Bonn, Germany from July 16-23, at which delegates from 180 countries met to finalise details on the Kyoto Protocol on greenhouse gas emissions.

At the 1997 Kyoto conference, 39 industrialised countries agreed to cuts in greenhouse gas emissions averaging 5.2% between 1990 and 2008-2012. But many details were left unresolved, only one of the 39 countries (Romania) has ratified the Protocol to date, and the United States pulled out of the process in March.

The Bonn conference came to an uneasy consensus on the details governing the Protocol - but the treaty has been gutted in the process. Even before the Bonn conference, the Protocol was "astonishingly unambitious" according to a report in the July 9 London Times, while an editorial in the July 26 Australian said, "The emission targets agreed to at Kyoto in 1997 have been softened to the point where their previously negligible impact all but disappears."

Academic and environmental analyst Clive Hamilton told ABC radio on July 25 that cuts of more than 70% are required to stabilise atmospheric concentrations of greenhouse gas, but the watered-down Kyoto Protocol requires cuts of just 1-2%. Other analysts, such as Bill Hare from Greenpeace International, suggest that it will be possible to increase emissions while still meeting the Kyoto targets - certainly that is the case for Australia, given that the target for Australia was an 8% increase in emissions from 1990 to 2008-2012.

It's worth recounting greenhouse politicking since the 1997 Kyoto Conference. Internationally, the collusion between the United States (the world's largest greenhouse polluter) and Australia (the world's largest greenhouse polluter on a per capita basis) has been a key feature. Clearly, US corporate polluters and their political operatives get the greenhouse gangsters' gold medal, but a strong case could be made for awarding silver to Australia, where corporate polluters, in collusion with sections of the political establishment, have been working feverishly to undermine the Kyoto process in recent years.

Countdown to Kyoto

The following prescient comments were published in the December 1997 edition of The Freedom Report, a publication of the US Frontiers of Freedom think-tank (<http://www.ff.org>): "The Frontiers of Freedom made a crucial contribution to the global warming debate by co-hosting Countdown to Kyoto, a major international conference held August 19-21 [1997] in Canberra, Australia. Members of Australia's government called the conference "absolutely critical" in solidifying the government's opposition to a Kyoto treaty even if it means defying Clinton Administration policy. At the same time, Australia's opposition to a climate treaty means that opponents in the U. S. Congress will not be facing unanimous world opinion in favor of such a treaty."

Malcolm Wallop from the Frontiers of Freedom Institute described the Countdown to Kyoto conference as "the first shot across the bow of those who expect to champion the Kyoto Treaty" and he said the conference would "offer world leaders the tools to break with the Kyoto Treaty". The conference was opened by then deputy prime minister of Australia, Tim Fischer, who argued that tough emission standards would be too costly.

At the Kyoto conference in 1997, Australia nearly killed the Kyoto Protocol before it was born, and was rewarded with a target far more generous than comparable countries. The Australian delegation also secured the so-called 'Australia Clause', which allows for creative accounting on land clearing as an alternative to reducing greenhouse emissions.

Australian Bureau of Agricultural and Resource Economics

In the lead up to the 1997 Kyoto conference, the Australian government parroted misinformation from the Australian Bureau of Agricultural and Resource Economics (ABARE) about the economic costs of reducing greenhouse gas emissions. Contrary to ABARE's self-description as a "professionally independent government economic research agency", its climate change research was funded by corporations and lobby groups including the Australian Coal Association, the Australian Aluminium Council, the Business Council of Australia, BHP, Rio Tinto, Exxon, Mobil Oil, and Texaco.

According to the Australian Conservation Foundation (ACF), corporate contributions to ABARE totalled at least $560 000. The figure is put at twice that amount in Sharon Beder's 2000 book Global Spin. ABARE did not disclose these financial contributions in any of the key public documents or statements reporting its research.

Industry groups who provided funding to ABARE were allocated a place on its steering committee with the promise that they would "have an influence on the direction of the model development". The predictable findings of ABARE - that greenhouse gas reductions would savage the economy and destroy thousands of jobs - were disputed by 131 Australian economists who signed a joint statement saying that "the economic modelling studies on which the Government is relying to assess the impacts of reducing Australia's greenhouse gas emissions overestimate the costs and underestimate the benefits of reducing emissions".

The ACF was excluded from ABARE's climate change steering committee because it could not, or would not, pay the $50,000 fee being asked by ABARE. Not unreasonably, the ACF arrived at the conclusion that "... it may be possible for well resourced interests to buy themselves a Government policy." The ACF lodged a complaint with the commonwealth ombudsman about the industry bias of ABARE, and in February 1998 the ombudsman upheld the complaint and called for reform of ABARE's practices.

It appears there have been few if any changes at ABARE, which has contributed to the federal government's recent scare campaign about the economic costs of complying with the Kyoto targets, which the government compares to a severe recession.

Moreover, the Howard government relies on ABARE data to claim that developing countries will account for more emissions than developed countries by 2004. Clive Hamilton noted in an April 20 media release that, "While each Australian is responsible for 27 tonnes of greenhouse gases annually, each Indian is responsible for less than one tonne and each Chinese for less than 3 tonnes. Moreover, while Australia's emissions continue to rise in the absence of any effective policies, China's emissions are falling. Rich countries are responsible for around 80% of increased concentrations of greenhouse gases and it will be 50 years before developing countries catch up. ... There is something obscene about ... suggesting that the poor of the world are getting off scot-free, especially when impoverished people will suffer most from the effects of climate change caused by rich countries burning fossil fuels."

Corporate manoeuvring - 2000

Last year, the government was subject to intense lobbying from BP Amoco, Rio Tinto, the Australian Chamber of Commerce and Industry, Alcoa Generation and other industry bodies. In addition, the coal industry threatened to launch a multi-million-dollar campaign to combat the federal government's (perceived) threat of tough greenhouse gas emission rules.

The government fell over itself in its efforts to accommodate big business. On August 23 and September 6, industry minister Nick Minchin issued two of the most grovelling, sycophantic media releases ever to emanate from Canberra. Minchin had lots of "good news" for industry, he announced. Lots of good news, but no surprises - industry demands were adopted as government policy almost word-for-word.

Maintaining industry's "international competitiveness ... is a framework for the Government's greenhouse policy processes", Minchin said. That included:
- working internationally "to get Australia the best possible greenhouse position" (in other words, undermining the Kyoto Protocol);
- assisting in "minimising the burden of greenhouse measures on business through cost-effective actions" (all the more 'cost-effective' for industry because they involve corporate welfare packages such as the $400 million Greenhouse Gas Abatement Program, with further greenhouse-related corporate welfare delivered through programs such as the R&D Start Program and the International Greenhouse Partnerships Program);
- a promise not to "discriminate against particular projects or regions in greenhouse policies and programs" (such as new coal-fired electricity plants in Queensland, or the aluminium industry); and
- a pledge not to ratify the Kyoto Protocol unless several conditions were met.

Disagreements between corporate polluters spilled over into the public domain last year. The Australian reported on June 29, 2000, that Greg Bourne, BP Amoco's regional president for Australia and New Zealand and chair of the Business Council of Australia's sustainable development task force, was lobbying the federal government to exempt BP Amoco's developments from the greenhouse gas reduction regime then under consideration by the government. Some senior corporate executives were critical of Bourne because of the contradiction between his private lobbying on behalf of BP Amoco and his public stance in support of greenhouse gas reductions, the Australian reported. (Just a few months later, the ACF's strategies director Mike Krockenberger said that "companies like BP are on the cusp of providing ... leadership", and the ACF urged corporations to "join Greg Bourne from BP in his call for leadership". BP Amoco was one of the corporate polluters invited to the launch of the ACF's Blueprint for a Sustainable Australia on October 19, 2000, at the Governor General's residence.)

Lavoisier Group

One vehicle for corporate polluters and their political operatives to push their agenda last year was the federal parliament's Treaties Committee, which conducted an inquiry into the Kyoto Protocol and its implications for Australia.

Following a meeting of the committee in Canberra on September 27, 2000, committee chairperson and Liberal MP Andrew Thomson expressed concern about proposals to establish an international monitoring body. Speaking on ABC radio on September 28, 2000, he questioned the “strange notion of inspections like having Richard Butler go into Iraq. They're talking about people wandering around the Latrobe Valley or the coast of Queensland inspecting us. This doesn't sound the sort of treaty that would attract a lot of public support, I can tell you that.”

During public hearings of the Treaties Committee, Thomson wondered aloud whether Australia would find itself at the mercy of international inspection committees dominated by “hostile” developing countries.

According to Thomson, climate change is a bureaucratic conspiracy driven by “... those people in the bureaucracy who are very eager to secure budget funding and authority and policy importance”.

Where did Thomson get these conspiratorial, paranoid ideas from? The answer is the Lavoisier Group, a conservative “think tank” led by Peter Walsh, a former finance minister in the Hawke Labor government. The Lavoisier Group is supported primarily by the mining industry according to a July 15, 2000 report in the Sydney Morning Herald. It includes such luminaries as Ray Evans - president of the H.R. Nicholls Society, secretary of the Lavoisier Group, and also connected to yet another another right-wing think-tank, the Institute of Public Affairs. The H.R. Nicholls Society and the Lavoisier Group share the same postal address in Melbourne.

Last year, the Lavoisier Group held meetings around the country, including a June 27 dinner for a select group of federal parliamentarians in the house of representatives' dining room.

In its submission to the Treaties Committee, the Lavoisier Group argued that the Kyoto Protocol poses “the most serious challenge to our sovereignty since the Japanese Fleet entered the Coral Sea on 3 May, 1942.” The submission argues that architects of the Kyoto Protocol “are determined to ensure, as best they can, that it will be impossible for those nations who commit to it, to ever change their minds. In order to ensure that the sovereign rights of withdrawal (which are written into the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC) and the Kyoto Protocol), can in practice never be exercised, a new imperial order will have to be created.”

The Lavoisier Group's submission said: “In order to keep the Kyoto membership inside the global carbon-withdrawal structure, monitoring, compliance, and police powers will be essential. In other words, the substitution of an imperial structure in place of our current world of independent sovereign nation states will have to take place.”

“Under this new global structure, decisions with the most profound and intimate effect on Australian economic and social life will be made by the Kyoto (UNFCCC) Secretariat based in Bonn and Australia will only be able to escape from entrapment in this new imperialism through immense political upheaval of the kind experienced by George Washington and his colleagues when they rebelled against the authority of the British Crown and established the United States.”

According to the Lavoisier Group, proponents of reducing greenhouse emissions will argue for the amendment or reinterpretation of World Trade Organisation rules to allow trade sanctions to be used to enforce the Kyoto Protocol. Thus the “sovereign rights” of WTO signatories will be destroyed, and the WTO will either be abandoned by its members or it will become an “instrument of imperial authority”.

“The logic of Kyoto is inexorable. Carbon withdrawal requires major economic dislocation, particularly for Australia, dependent as it is for much of its international trade on cheap coal-based energy. Democracies will not support policies which impose such dislocation except in times of national emergency such as the immediate threat of invasion.”

Thankfully, Kyoto protagonists are not prepared “at this point” to urge the use of military power against “recalcitrants” who refuse to reduce greenhouse emissions.

And which country is behind the new imperial order of eco-fascists? Germany, of course. The Lavoisier Group says, “It is noteworthy that the German Government has extended substantial subsidies to the UNFCCC Secretariat in order to ensure that this rapidly expanding bureaucracy is housed in the parliamentary and public service buildings of the former West German Government. Given the strong commitment of successive German governments to the international carbon-withdrawal project, this generosity has obvious political consequences.”

The Lavoisier Group argues that the government should, as a first step, make it loud and clear that Australia “will never be a party to granting police powers to the Kyoto Secretariat, and will never countenance the use of trade sanctions to enforce the provisions of the Kyoto Protocol.”

The wisdom of the Lavoisier Group would not be worth dwelling upon except that its conspiracy theories have metamorphosed into government policy. The Howard government could not openly subscribe to the Lavoisier Group's ideas in their crudest formulations, but the conspiracy theorists have provided important political cover and support for the 'respectable' climate sceptics in the Howard government.

The Lavoisier Group talks openly about military invasion while Andrew Thomson evokes frightening images of Richard Butler clones and people from “hostile” developing countries carrying out inspections in Australia.

Andrew Thomson's concern about bureaucrats “eager to secure budget funding and authority and policy importance” has an echo in the Lavoisier Group's assertion that bureaucrats have been “extremely reluctant” to let ministers know that Australia can withdraw from the treaties to which it has subscribed. (Bureaucrats do of course play a significant role in the climate change conspiracy - not the imaginary eco-fascist conspiracy but the real, corporate conspiracy. In Australia, most climate change bureaucrats work in the Australian Greenhouse Office, a mouthpiece for the Coalition government and its corporate pay-masters.)

At a United Nations climate change conference in France in September 2000, the Australian delegate argued that countries should monitor their own progress on greenhouse gas emissions rather than establishing an international monitoring body. An Australian delegate objected to a proposal to establish a consultative process to ensure continuity of information exchange, to facilitate international cooperation, and to contribute to the assessment of demonstrable progress. If such a body was established, an Australian delegate argued, it should be prohibited from responding to questions about a country's performance except for questions posed by the country in question.

At the recent Bonn conference, the Australian delegation opposed a proposed workshop on policies and measures contributing to enhancing the "transparency in reporting on policies and measures" of industrialised countries encompassed by the Kyoto Protocol, and the Australian delegation also opposed the development of reporting mechanisms for information on progress towards Kyoto targets.

Media collusion

The Australian government is being applauded by corporate polluters and corporate front groups at home and abroad. The Global Climate Coalition, the major front group for US corporate polluters, featured on its website an article by Alan Wood in the April 3, 2001 Australian (<www.globalclimate.org>). Wood's article, titled 'Killing Kyoto in Australia's best interests', urges Australia to back the US in pulling out of the Kyoto Protocol. Wood commented favourably on a paper written for the Lavoisier Group by climate sceptic Alan Oxley.

The Age on April 2, 2001 printed an article by Ray Evans from the Lavoisier Group, in which he states, "President Bush has shown courage and provided world leadership by announcing that the United States will not support the Kyoto protocol on greenhouse gas emissions. What is baffling, however, is that some senior members of the Australian Government do not seem prepared to immediately lend support to Bush. In the interests of good policy and good science, they should do so." The same day, the federal Cabinet took the 'courageous' decision to endorse the US approach.

Evans argued that the Kyoto Protocol must be sacrificed on the altar of the proposed Australia-US free trade agreement: "If John Howard can go to the electorate late this year with even half a commitment from President Bush on this proposal, he will have earnt his place in Australian history. The value to Australia of a free-trade agreement that includes agriculture would rank with the ANZUS Treaty in the history of Australia-US relations. If we are to break through on the Australia-US free-trade agreement, we need every friendly voice, every helpful telephone call. The Prime Minister now has to act. Otherwise Australia will not be taken seriously in Washington."

Writing in the Australian Financial Review on April 11, 2001, economist Professor John Quiggin said the Lavoisier Group "is devoted to the proposition that the basic principles of physics, discovered by among others the famous French scientist Antoine Lavoisier, cease to apply when they come into conflict with the interests of the Australian coal industry."

Jumping to the defence of the Lavoisier Group and its front-man Peter Walsh was none other than Andrew Thomson. In response to Quiggin, Thomson wrote in a letter to the April 17 Australian Financial Review, "It is disappointing to see the pernicious techniques of political correctness being used in an important debate such as this. Decent citizens such as Walsh should not be showered with abuse and accused of having "links with the fossil fuel industry or to right-wing think tanks as if these were criminal offences. Unlike his critics, at least Walsh had the guts to seek election to parliament."

Thomson himself had the 'guts' to stand for election in the blue-ribbon Liberal seat of Wentworth, though he was relegated from the ministry and has been disendorsed for the seat of Wentworth.

(The role of the Australian establishment media in shaping climate change policy is further discussed in the April 2001 article "Who Killed Kyoto".)

US/Australia double-act - 2001

Following the March 29 announcement by the US government that it would not ratify the Kyoto Protocol, a string of ministers in the Howard government voiced support for the US position, including prime minister John Howard (who wrote a sycophantic letter to Bush - "obviously from a script co-ordinated in Canberra and Washington" according to an April 17 Australian Financial Review report), foreign minister Alexander Downer, trade minister Mark Vaile, agriculture minister Warren Truss and industry minister Nick Minchin. The day after the Bush administration's announcement, environment minister Robert Hill pronounced the Protocol dead: "If the US walked away from the Kyoto Protocol that would be the end of [it]."

Federal Cabinet decided on April 2 to support the US decision. The government declared that it will not ratify the Kyoto Protocol unless the US does. Robert Hill said, "It would just be silly for a small economy such as ours, and our position in the table of emitters, to be accepting ... legal obligations at the international level if the world's largest emitter wasn't prepared to do so" (Age, 16/4/01).

The US government's strategy was spelt out in an April 1 state department cable to US embassies, leaked during a United Nations climate change conference in New York on April 21-22. The cable says that the US rejects the Kyoto Protocol "under any circumstances".

The cable warns US embassies that US participation in ongoing greenhouse discussions is "not meant to suggest we are interested in negotiating over the Kyoto Protocol". According to a report in the April 27 Australian Financial Review, ongoing US participation in greenhouse conferences "offers the US the best hope of burying the current protocol and negotiating a new UN climate change treaty".

The cable says that the US plans to remain engaged with the Umbrella Group - a group of countries including Japan, Canada and Australia, which has continually fought to weaken the Kyoto Protocol: "We clearly consider the members of the umbrella group to be our closest friends and allies." Australia chaired the Umbrella Group during the July 16-23 conference at Bonn.

Canberra is Washington's "prize recruit" in greenhouse politics according to the April 27 report in the Australian Financial Review. Bush told The Washington Post in late April that Canada and Australia "appreciate" the US position: "Australia said they understand why we took the position. I don't want to get their respective leaders in trouble by saying they endorsed George Bush's plan, which may be the kiss of death for some political leaders. But nevertheless they understand what we are doing."

Hill said the US administration "wants to work with Australia on the basis of our experiences" in reducing greenhouse gases (Age, 19/4/01). However, Australia has no experience in reducing greenhouse emissions. The 1999 national greenhouse gas inventory, released on April 10, 2001, reveals that Australia's emissions grew by 1.1% in 1999 and are now 17.4% over 1990 levels - more than double Australia's 8% target under the Kyoto Protocol (see <http://www.greenhouse.gov.au>).

In May, Hill was advocating cancellation of the Bonn conference as a result of the US pull-out. That plan received little support, so the Australian delegation did all it could to white-ant the Kyoto Protocol in Bonn and to stall decisions on the premise that rules should not be finalised for fear of "locking out" or "closing the door on" the US.

Washington has been trying to kill the Kyoto Protocol in favour of voluntary, "technology-oriented" and "market-friendly" alternatives. One tactic being discussed in corporate boardrooms around the world, and in Canberra, Washington and elsewhere, is to develop a plan still weaker than the Kyoto Protocol and to sell it in the lead up to the next round of United Nations sponsored talks, scheduled for Marrakesh, Morocco, in October and November.

However, the new-look, toothless Kyoto Protocol - described by Greenpeace as Kyoto Light - is voluntary, technology-oriented and market-friendly, and a rethink may be in train. In the days following the Bonn conference, Washington bureaucrats appeared to be backing away from suggestions that a counterplan was under development according to the editorial in the July 26 Washington Post.

Bonner Cohen, from the Lexington Institute in the US, said in an Earth Times News Service opinion piece on July 25 that, "The rules adopted in Bonn contain no ... enforcement mechanism ... Small wonder that the US delegation, representing a nation which has rejected the Kyoto Protocol, chose not to interfere with the deal struck in Bonn. The Americans have nothing to fear."

Corporate lobbyists - aluminium industry

Australian corporate lobbyists at the recent Bonn conference included representatives of the Australian Aluminium Council, the Coal Association, the Minerals Council and the Business Council of Australia.

In a July 23 column in the Australian Financial Review, the Aluminium Council's representative in Bonn, John Hannagan, put the case for trickle-down economics with a green gloss, arguing that the Kyoto Protocol "puts at risk the essential element required to solve climate issues and poverty - strong world economic growth."

Hannagan falsely juxtaposed the needs of people, "especially poor people" against the "perceived need to ameliorate climate change" and argued that the needs of (poor) people are immediate and ongoing" while addressing climate change "is a long term process - maybe 100 or more years".

"It's better to build first the economic platform before moving forward on the other front", Hannagan asserted. "It's why the World Trade Organisation, Davos, G8 and other similar forums are so vital. It's also why greens and other anti-globalisation demonstrators are actually working against the people they claim to represent."

Hannagan also claimed that the "virtually stagnant protest vote" in the Aston by-election may be "a reflection of a deep-seated understanding" of environmental and trade issues and "a turning point towards a more thoughtful politics in Australia".

"If so", Hannagan continued, "Australia's actions at the climate change talks in Bonn represent not only a principled stand but one that reflects the will of the Australian people - without a rock thrown or a body bag required."

No mention in Hannagan's rant of the Newspoll survey commissioned by Greenpeace in April which found that 80.4% of respondents were in favour of Australia ratifying the Kyoto Protocol, with or without US ratification. Nor did Hannagan mention the subsidies enjoyed by the aluminium industry in Australia, running to hundreds of millions of dollars each year.

Nor did Hannagan mention plans for a new aluminium smelter in Queensland - plans which undermine industry rhetoric about industries quitting Australia because of costs imposed by greenhouse abatement measures. Nor did Hannagan mention the role of corporate polluters in shaping the "principled stand" of the Howard government at the Bonn conference.

If the Australian public won't protect corporate profits in the aluminium industry, perhaps the World Trade Organisation can help. This was suggested by the Aluminium Council's executive director David Coutts in a July 23 media release. Coutts complained about "restrictions" placed on "flexibility mechanisms" (the Kyoto euphemism for loopholes) at the Bonn conference: "Some of the more important restrictions include taking away the rights of countries to trade freely with each other in emission credits, something that may eventually prove a concern to the WTO."

Revolving door

John Hannagan's career and connections provide a window into the networks linking corporate polluters (and their peak bodies, front groups and 'think tanks'), the major political parties and government bureaucracies, the media, academia, and the PR/consultancy industry.

For 10 years, Hannagan was spinning for the aluminium industry as corporate affairs manager for Alcoa of Australia. In 1997, Hannagan was lobbying in Kyoto as a representative of the Australian Industry Greenhouse Network - a 'who's who' of Australian corporate polluters.

In 1999, Hannagan was spinning for the Aluminium Council - this included organising a tour of US climate sceptic Robert Balling. Hannagan promised that Balling would demonstrate that "greenhouse gas concentrations in the air are falling" - an impressive feat since atmospheric greenhouse gas concentrations are not falling.

Wollongong University academic Sharon Beder says this about Balling in the revised edition of her book Global Spin, published last year: "Balling is also heavily funded by fossil fuel interests. Balling was reported in The Arizona Republic as saying that he had received about [US]$700,000 over the previous five years from coal and oil interests in Great Britain, Germany and the United States. A report by Ozone Action also details how Balling received research money from the Kuwait government. His book, The Heated Debate, was commissioned by the Pacific Research Institute for Public Policy, a think tank opposed to environmental regulation. Balling was also on the advisory council for the Information Council on the Environment and has represented the Global Climate Coalition and a leading think-tank known as the Competitive Enterprise Institute. Each of these organisations promulgates scepticism about global warming."

Professor John Quiggin noted in the July 19 Australian Financial Review, "... such is the proliferation of right-wing institutes that there are not enough sceptics to go around, and some have to be shared. The redoubtable Robert Balling, for example, is on the board of the Goldwater Institute, but also writes for the Pacific Research Institute, the Competitive Enterprise Institute and the American Petroleum Institute, while still finding time to work for the government of Kuwait."

Hannagan is also a partner in Hannagan Bushnell, a "public affairs, government and investor relations consultancy". Hannagan Bushnell's clients have included the federal government (on the development of an "Energy Efficiency Best Practice Program" of all things), Alcoa of Australia, Ok Tedi Mining, BHP Minerals, the Australian Industry Greenhouse Network, and North Limited (on the Jabiluka uranium mine among other projects).

Noel Bushnell used to hold a "senior position" at the Australian Financial Review - a possible explanation for the publication of Hannagan's disingenuous propaganda in the July 23 edition of the paper.

Tony Staley, former minister in the Fraser government and former federal president of the Liberal Party, and Bob Hogg AO, former minister in the Labor government and former national secretary of the ALP, are "Senior Counsellors" to Hannagan Bushnell. Staley is also Chairman of the Victorian Board of the Energy Industry Ombudsman Council. In May 2000, Staley spoke at a conference organised by the Lavoisier Group.

Another of Hannagan Bushnell's past clients is the Australian APEC Study Centre, based at Monash University, for which Hannagan Bushnell "managed media relations for the influential Countdown to Kyoto conference". Chair of the APEC Study Centre is Alan Oxley - a ruling-class functionary every bit as busy as Hannagan, Staley et al. The 1997 Countdown to Kyoto conference was co-hosted by the APEC Study Centre and the US Frontiers of Freedom think-tank.

Oxley used to be Australia's ambassador to GATT (the predecessor to the WTO) and he was the first Australian to serve as the chair of GATT. He is now a consultant on international trade issues, a frequent contributor to the establishment media, he spoke at the Lavoisier Group's conference last year, he used to be (and perhaps still is) a member of the Labor Party's national trade and security committee, and he was guest speaker at the 1999 annual conference of the H.R. Nicholls Society.

Labor Party - spot the difference

The Labor Party is attempting some product differentiation vis-a-vis the Coalition government, but it's difficult to spot the difference. Environment spokesperson Nick Bolkus said in a July 11 media release that voters should recognise the "clear difference between the major parties on climate change". However, Labor dropped its commitment to ratifying the Kyoto Protocol at its national conference in Hobart last year. On April 4, 2001, Labor joined the Coalition to block a Senate motion from the Greens calling on the government to ratify the Protocol, with Bolkus saying it would be "premature" to support the motion.

Asked why the Labor Party won't commit to ratifying the Protocol, Labor leader Kim Beazley said on July 11, "Because ... we are not unprincipled and we do believe in forming a government. We do believe in behaving like a government and not simply like a pressure group. ... And the long-term view is this: we convince the Australian people on environmental issues that we actually stand for something, unlike our political opponents."

In media releases on July 23 and 24, Bolkus said that a Labor government would "embrace a process to lead to the final ratification of the protocol next year" and "actively engage with the international community to achieve its international ratification within the anticipated timeframe of 2002".

Beazley and Bolkus are trying to sell the line that a Labor government would be more willing to sign the treaty than the Coalition ... but without committing to doing so. To the extent that a Labor government would be more willing to ratify the Protocol, it is for the wrong reasons - Beazley and Bolkus have repeatedly said that they support the Kyoto process because it allows an 8% increase in greenhouse gas emissions in Australia between 1990 and 2008-2012 whereas other industrialised countries have agreed to cuts averaging 5.2% over that period. Bolkus said on ABC radio on May 28, 2001, "... what we are driven by, is a realisation that the outcome that Australia got through the Kyoto Protocol is not one that we'll get again. Now, but we've got to achieve our obligations under that deal, otherwise they'll be waiting for us with baseball bats when we go internationally again to try and rewrite it."