Politics vs the Climate
3 years, 8 months, 7 days, 2 hours
15 November 2025
As far as the rest of humanity is concerned, we, mostly, put ourselves first.
'Our emissions reductions goals will never come at the expense of Australian families, and this is the principle that will guide every decision we take.' So said Sussan Ley, Leader of the Liberal Party, in her announcement two days ago that the party was abandoning its Net Zero commitment (but, plainly inconsistently, would wish Australia to stay in the Paris Agreement).
And so another political party follows the US Republicans, UK Reform and others in assuming that Net Zero comes at a cost, and then putting the immediate perceived financial interest of those who might vote for them above the long-term sustainability of humans living on our planet.
The Liberal Party’s new position highlights two weaknesses that seem to be endemic in humanity.
First, we discount the future in favour of the present. I suspect many of those who would support the Liberal Party position either simply don’t understand the seriousness of the threat facing the world from climate change, or they do but just assume it will be alright, somehow, notwithstanding all the scientific evidence that it will not. We see the future through rose-tinted spectacles, of the continuing progress and ascendancy of humanity, and close our eyes to the very real possibility, becoming probability, of disaster.
Second, we are deeply selfish for our own immediate interests, above the interests of future generations. I’ve written about this before (cf. August 2023, The Selfish Gene). We care about our own children and others we are very close to, but as far as the rest of humanity is concerned, we, mostly, put ourselves first. And when something is as big and complex as climate change, we absolve ourselves of responsibility by assuming our actions won’t make any difference, even though our collective action could alter the course of history.
These attitudes are not new. They have for hundreds of years fuelled the wholesale destruction of the nature on which we depend. But today much more is at stake. Our time to change course before we hit the (rapidly melting) iceberg is measured in years not decades. Dear Liberal Party, you are leaders. Please lead humanity away from disaster, not drive us all faster towards it.
Image credit: Australia Photovoltaic Power Potential map 2007-2018, obtained from the “Global Solar Atlas 2.0, a free, web-based application developed and operated by the company Solargis s.r.o. on behalf of the World Bank Group, utilising Solargis data, with funding provided by the Energy Sector Management Assistance Program (ESMAP). For additional information and full image visit: https://globalsolaratlas.info.