Cause for cautious hope on climate policy

When Malcolm Turnbull snatched the leadership of the federal parliamentary Liberal Party back from Tony Abbott last September, it fuelled community hopes that our Prime Minister would moderate the government's position on a number of issues, including anthropogenic global warming. After all, he had unexpectedly lost that leadership by a mere single vote in the party room in 2009 because he was proposing a more robust policy to mitigate climate change by cutting carbon emissions than was Mr Abbott.

When he took over late last year, Mr Turnbull's approval ratings in part reflected those hopes he would break with Mr Abbott's support for the coal industry. There is overwhelming international acceptance that burning fossil fuels is the key cause of the dangerous global warming that is occurring. The science is beyond question; the debate is not about whether climate change is happening, but about the best way to minimise global warming by reducing carbon emission

Read The Age Editorial - “Cause for cautious hope on climate policy.”