Abbott isolated in a meeting that put a premium on unity

The immense challenge facing the Turnbull government was put into words by Victorian Liberal MP Sarah Henderson when she urged her colleagues to back the National Energy Guarantee.

Former prime minister Tony Abbott during question
 time at Parliament House on Tuesday.

Henderson told the party room meeting on Tuesday about the grave risk facing MPs in marginal seats, herself included, if there was any further disunity on energy and climate.

She aimed her remark at Tony Abbott and everyone in the room knew it. She looked at the former prime minister as she called for all sides to get behind the policy.

Read David Crowe’s story from The Age - “Abbott isolated in a meeting that put a premium on unity.”

Climate myopia risks bringing on the 'sixth extinction'

Climate myopia causes us to lose
sight of species extinction

The immense challenge of climate change has caused myopia among a lot of politicians, sending them into a self-destructive state of denial.

More quietly, though, that immensity has triggered another kind of myopia, this one among conservationists. In focusing on the staggering planetary impacts of greenhouse emissions, they are losing sight of the other ways that human beings lay a heavy hand on the planet. In particular, they are paying too little attention to the true causes of (and potential solutions to) the loss of species around the world – a massive die-off often referred to as ‘the sixth extinction’.

Read the 1000-word essay on Aeon by freelance writer, William Funk - “We are missing our chance to stop the sixth mass extinction.”