Page 28 - IB January 2023

Climate Change Climate Change

LISTENING, HEARING AND ACTING

ON CLIMATE

By Nic Maclellan Kyoto Protocol. This global agreement was forged in Decem-
ber 1997, committing industrialised countries to limit and
On her first visit to Suva in May 2022, newly elected Austra- reduce greenhouse gases emissions in accordance with agreed
lian Foreign Minister Penny Wong pledged close cooperation individual targets.
with Pacific Island nations on climate policy. At the time, Australia’s new Coalition government under
“We will listen,” she said. “We will hear you – your ideas Prime Minister John Howard was reluctant to sign and ratify
for how we can face our shared challenges and achieve our the agreement, fearing it would damage fossil fuel exports.
shared aspirations together.” When Howard travelled to the 28th South Pacific Forum in
Today, “listening” is a bipartisan message from Canberra. Rarotonga in September 1997, it was clear that Australia
Opposition foreign affairs spokesman Simon Birmingham sang would resist attempts to forge a strong regional consensus
the same song as he travelled to the Pacific with Senator in the lead up to the global climate negotiations in Kyoto,
Wong on a joint parliamentary mission last month. Japan.
“It is critical for us to listen carefully and attentively to our Rarotonga ‘97 was the first Forum meeting I attended as a
Pacific partners,” Birmingham said, “and not just to listen, journalist, but even a novice could see there were sharp divi-
but to ensure that we act in concert with them.” sions over climate policy.
The problem, however, is not about listening. Ever since After the opening ceremony, Forum leaders travelled to
the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change Aitutaki for the annual leaders’ retreat. The next morning,
(UNFCCC) was adopted in 1992, Pacific Island governments I joined the small press pack at Rarotonga airport, waiting
have repeatedly outlined their objectives on emissions reduc- for the leaders’ return flight from Aitutaki. We waited. And
tions, climate finance and disaster response. For decades, waited. Even after the plane arrived, the leaders closeted
Australian politicians have listened to these island perspec- themselves in the VIP airport lounge, trying to reach a con-
tives, have heard them and – on occasion – have acted on sensus on the Forum’s climate policy. They emerged two hours
them. But denial, delay and diversion have dominated later, still without agreement.
Canberra’s response. Australian climate policy is driven by For the rest of the day, leaders and officials worked behind
broader domestic and international agendas, which have the scenes to bridge the gap. The weasel words of the final
much greater priority than the problems facing neighbouring communique were a frank admission that Australia would go
island states. its own way: “Leaders recognised that participants at the
Kyoto Conference can be expected to adopt different ap-
From Rarotonga to Kyoto proaches.”
To understand this dynamic, let’s reach back more than a Angered by Prime Minister Howard’s intransigence, Tuvalu’s
quarter of a century, to the period before the adoption of the then Prime Minister, Bikenebeu Paeniu told me: “I am not

28 Islands Business, January 2023