MATTERS OF URGENCY

Senator GHOSH (Western Australia) (17:22): One of the problems with the intense fervour that is attracted by this debate around climate change and our resources industry is that it leads people to extreme positions. It leads to extreme positions from the Greens political party, and it leads to alarmist positions from the coalition. Senator McDonald is normally very thoughtful about this.

But I have to disagree with the motion that she's put forward today and the consequence or the ill that she says it's designed to address. I think it fundamentally overstates what is happening or what has happened. I think the consideration of scope 3 emissions is not particularly radical and that the High Court decision, which turned on an interpretation of New South Wales law and an interpretation of a New South Wales planning regime, should not cause a rush to implement federal laws to either override or address it in some sort of universal way that can have unintended consequences.

The High Court decision is the High Court decision. In fact, the entire court said that scope 3 may fall within relevant considerations. It was determined on the basis of whether that relevant or mandatory consideration had, in fact, been taken into account in the appropriate way.

As a Western Australian, I know the importance of the resources industry. It's vitally important not only to our state but to the national economy. It's the bedrock upon which much of Australia's national prosperity is built.

We support the resources industry. I also agree that, in terms of the way the structure of our efforts to address climate change have currently been legislated, we don't really consider scope 3 emissions. Our primary focus is on scope 1 and scope 2 emissions.

Those are what that our targets are based on. We signed up to an agreement, with Paris, that focuses on the scope 1 and 2 emissions that nations deal with themselves. It's not a scope 3 focused issue.

So I can't agree with the premise of this motion. I don't think that what has been stated as the basis for it justifies federal legislative intervention or some draconian attempt to go over the top. Nor is it obvious from the motion of Senator McDonald what the reason for the federal government overriding a decision that's been made on New South Wales law might be.

On some level it's surprising given that Senator McDonald, among others in this place, espouses principles of federalism except in instances where they disagree with a particular state's course of action. There are no outstanding applications before the federal government in relation to that Mount Pleasant mine. Decisions that will be made by the federal government will be made in accordance with the EPBC Act, and the obligations to mitigate or reduce emissions are governed by the relevant mechanisms, including the safeguard mechanism that will ensure our compliance with the Paris Agreement.

This is not a moment to try and universally outlaw any consideration of scope 3 emissions, but it's also not a moment to overstate the role of those types of emissions in the decision-making of Australian lawmakers or regulators at the moment. It is important that Australia act to mitigate climate change and reduce our carbon emissions, it's important that we address this threat in a holistic way, and it's vital that Australia do this as part of global efforts.

Australian greenhouse gas emissions are something like 1.2 or 1.3 per cent of global emissions, so it's not something we can do alone, and that's why we've signed up to the Paris Agreement as part of the UN Framework Convention on Climate Change and then the Conference of Parties that set up a structure by which we address this issue globally. That structure essentially indicates that countries are responsible for the emissions they create in their country.

The coal or gas that is burned in Australia to power homes and businesses counts towards Australia's emissions, and we need to reduce and mitigate that. Coal and gas that is extracted in Australia but sold and burned overseas to power homes and businesses in other countries will count towards those countries' emission. For instance, most of our major energy export destinations are countries that have also signed up to the Paris Agreement, so they're required to mitigate and reduce their emissions as well.

That method allows for a clear understanding of the role that each nation is playing in terms of reducing emissions. Fundamentally, it doesn't involve the use of scope 3 emissions in terms of determining how we mitigate this problem in a global and cooperative way, but that doesn't mean scope 3 emissions should be irrelevant to everything or that, if a state parliament decides that it's one consideration that a decision-maker should take into account, that's somehow invalid or requires federal intervention.

Again, we come back to a debate where we've got to address a really difficult problem, which is climate change. We've got to do it in a way that doesn't destroy national prosperity and doesn't put the burden of that transition on people who are on the downside of advantage or on working people in this country. That requires a balanced approach.

That's the approach the Albanese government. The extremes on the left and right on this are not helpful in solving the core problem.