On her first visit to Suva in May 2022, newly elected Australian Foreign Minister Penny Wong pledged close cooperation with Pacific Island nations on climate policy.
“We will listen,” she said. “We will hear you – your ideas for how we can face our shared challenges and achieve our shared aspirations together.”
Today, “listening” is a bipartisan message from Canberra. Opposition foreign affairs spokesman Simon Birmingham sang the same song as he travelled to the Pacific with Senator Wong on a joint parliamentary mission last month.
“It is critical for us to listen carefully and attentively to our Pacific partners,” Birmingham said, “and not just to listen, but to ensure that we act in concert with them.”
The problem, however, is not about listening. Ever since the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC) was adopted in 1992, Pacific Island governments have repeatedly outlined their objectives on emissions reductions, climate finance and disaster response. For decades, Australian politicians have listened to these island perspectives, have heard them and – on occasion – have acted on them. But denial, delay and diversion have dominated Canberra’s response. Australian climate policy is driven by broader domestic and international agendas, which have much greater priority than the problems facing neighbouring island states.
From Rarotonga to Kyoto
To understand this dynamic, let’s reach back more than a quarter of a century, to the period before the adoption of the Kyoto Protocol. This global agreement was forged in December 1997, committing industrialised countries to limit and reduce greenhouse gases emissions in accordance with agreed individual targets.
At the time, Australia’s new Coalition government under Prime Minister John Howard was reluctant to sign and ratify the agreement, fearing it would damage fossil fuel exports. When Howard travelled to the 28th South Pacific Forum in Rarotonga in September 1997, it was clear that Australia would resist attempts to forge a strong regional consensus in the lead up to the global climate negotiations in Kyoto, Japan.
Rarotonga ‘97 was the first Forum meeting I attended as a journalist, but even a novice could see there were sharp divisions over climate policy.
After the opening ceremony, Forum leaders travelled to Aitutaki for the annual leaders’ retreat. The next morning, I joined the small press pack at Rarotonga airport, waiting for the leaders’ return flight from Aitutaki. We waited. And waited. Even after the plane arrived, the leaders closeted themselves in the VIP airport lounge, trying to reach a consensus on the Forum’s climate policy. They emerged two hours later, still without agreement.
For the rest of the day, leaders and officials worked behind the scenes to bridge the gap. The weasel words of the final communique were a frank admission that Australia would go its own way: “Leaders recognised that participants at the Kyoto Conference can be expected to adopt different approaches.”
Angered by Prime Minister Howard’s intransigence, Tuvalu’s then Prime Minister, Bikenebeu Paeniu told me: “I am not happy and I want the Australian public to know that. They will find themselves isolated. He’s given no respect… At least for once in a while, you must give us respect and come and pass a statement the way we like it.”
Opening the archives
Fast forward to today. In January 2023, the National Archives of Australia released Cabinet documents from the late 1990s, allowing researchers, historians and journalists to better understand policy-making from that era. The treasure trove of Cabinet submissions, minutes and memos from 1996-2000 provides a sad and sorry picture that help explain John Howard’s stance in Rarotonga.
The UNFCCC was adopted at the 1992 Rio Environment Summit, and three years later the first Conference of the Parties (COP1) was held in Berlin (it’s been a long process – this year, negotiators will gather again for COP28).
From the very beginning of the COP process, Australian officials were well aware that Pacific Island countries were critical of their climate policy. A newly released Cabinet minute from June 1996 states that “relationships with PICs suffered considerable strain in the wake of the first Conference of the Parties to the Climate Change Convention (COP1) in March-April 1995. Pacific Island Countries (together with other members of AOSIS) were highly critical of Australia’s stance at COP1, with some of the PICs expressing a sense of betrayal over Australia’s inability to endorse the draft AOSIS protocol.”
In the lead up to COP2, the June 1996 Cabinet minute reported that Australia should “actively pursue an outcome which would not involve Australia taking action which would have net adverse economic impacts nationally.” Negotiators should seek an outcome that “does not contain targets which are legally binding… and does not specify mandatory internationally coordinated policies to limit greenhouse gas emission measures.”
The Australian negotiating mandate also said that commitments to developing countries should “not make a limitation of the commitments of developing countries contingent on developed countries providing financial resources beyond those already committed under the Convention” – a preview of recent Australian resistance to more financial commitments to the Green Climate Fund or significant funding for loss and damage.
The June 1996 Cabinet minute notes that “COP2 will be a critical meeting because Australia can expect to be under pressure from the US, European Union, most developing countries (including Pacific Island Countries) and environment groups to agree to develop legally binding targets and timetables for developed countries to reduce GHG emissions.”
“Australia has argued that the uniform target approach is inequitable”, the minute explains, but “our position has attracted little support.” In response, officials proposed further delay, arguing that “Australia should work for an outcome that does not specify mandatory or internationally coordinated policies and measures, but provides for further analysis and possible future negotiations.”
Economy and survival
In the lead up to COP3 – the December 1997 climate negotiations in Kyoto – the Australian government was in no doubt that it was swimming against the tide of international opinion.
A September 1997 Cabinet minute to brief Prime Minister Howard before the Rarotonga Forum, entitled ‘Australian policy towards the South Pacific’, noted that “we can expect pressure to accept that the Kyoto agreement include legally binding targets for significant reductions in our emissions and strong criticism, including from green groups, of Australia’s approach.”
Briefing Howard before the Forum, Australian officials wrote: “Climate change will continue to be a difficult issue to handle. It is one where significant difficulties have developed over the past few years in the relationship between FICs and Australia. They have criticised us for apparently putting our economic interests above the well-being and very existence of small island states.”
The 1997 Forum leaders meeting in Cook Islands came at a crucial time. Before every major decision point in the UNFCCC process – Kyoto 1997, Copenhagen 2009, Paris 2015 – the Pacific Islands Forum has sought to forge a common position to carry into the global negotiations. Island leaders have repeatedly, and unsuccessfully, pressed Australia to join a consensus on urgent action.
The Cabinet briefing for Forum 1997 shows that Canberra was fully aware of this dynamic: “With Kyoto so close and the positions of key participants so fluid, climate change will be an important issue at this year’s Forum. Pacific island leaders – encouraged by substantial environmental NGO presence – will want the Forum to send a strong message to Kyoto outlining their concerns.”
The Cabinet minute outlines talking points for Prime Minister Howard, proposing to argue that Australia is “working towards a fair and equitable global solution which governments will genuinely implement.” Howard was urged to “acknowledge the FICs leadership role on issue to date and that we and they have common purpose in the next big challenge, getting significant developing country emitters engaged.” However, the submission argues that “the Forum should recognise its necessarily limited role and focus on setting a more forward-looking vision for a fully global response.”
The message from Canberra was clear: island negotiators should know their place. It’s clear that climate champions like Enele Sopoaga, Anote Tong, Ralph Regenvanu, Tina Stege and many others have since failed to recognise their “necessarily limited role.”
Binding commitments
During this period, the Howard government was pushing a “differentiation” strategy, arguing that individual country circumstances be recognised in any agreed emissions targets. At the time, Australia was the only OECD country that refused to support binding emission reduction targets. In contrast, Pacific Island Countries were calling for legally binding targets – a policy backed by the United States, United Kingdom, Germany and the Netherlands.
A December 1996 Cabinet submission on the approach to international negotiations noted “Australia is likely to continue to come under pressure in the negotiations to accept binding commitments on GHG emissions with consequent economic welfare losses …Australia will come under significant political and economic pressure to join any Kyoto agreement… Political reaction from the US, EU, Japan and the South Pacific to Australia non-participation is likely to be strongly adverse.”
While Australian officials were concerned about this international isolation, they were also fully aware of the countervailing force – the mining and energy corporations that make Australia one of the largest coal exporters in the world: “Business organisations generally accept the need to effectively address climate change on a global basis, but are strongly opposed to mandatory targets and measures.”
The Cabinet submission notes that “irrespective of whether Australia signs onto the agenda or outcome, remaining in the negotiations maximises our opportunity to push on these issues and gain a more realistic approach from other countries, thereby contributing to the objective of limiting damage to the Australian economy.”
This 1996 submission is fully conscious of the fundamental divide between Australia and its island neighbours, noting “Climate change has become a sensitive and difficult aspect of our bilateral relations with the PICs (e.g. at meetings of the South Pacific Forum) and will continue to require careful and sensitive handling.
“The PICs, conscious of their vulnerability to climate change impacts, have generally taken a hard line on climate change, strongly advocating ambitious targets and timetables,” the submission stated. “The PICs continue to be disappointed with Australia’s inability to endorse the AOSIS protocol and… Australia has been criticised strongly for putting its economic interests ahead of the well-being and very existence of small islands and their peoples.”
Despite this, the Howard government refused to ratify the Kyoto Protocol for nearly a decade, leaving this task to the incoming ALP government after the 2007 elections.
As Cook Islands again prepares to host Forum leaders in 2023 and Australia seeks island support for a joint COP31 in 2026, these historic documents shed light on an ongoing problem. It’s not a matter of listening to Pacific perspectives – Australian politicians and officials heard them loud and clear more than a quarter of a century ago. The core problem is that improving Australia’s climate policy is constrained by mining companies and coal exporters, trumping the interests of island neighbours.
