Copenhagen raises the stakes - time for civil society to hold our leaders to account
Blog Post | Blog of Christine Milne
Saturday 19th December 2009, 11:53am
by ChristineMilne in
So, at last world leaders have agreed on something. They have agreed, essentially, that they lack the will to really do what it takes to prevent climate crisis.
They can all articulate the challenge that we face. They can all stand up and tell a room what they are doing. But almost no leader of a country of any size, with the brave exception of Brazil's Lula, is willing to stand up and offer to do more than they see as the absolute minimum they think they can get away with.
The superficial last-minute statement agreed late in the night gives us no substantive progress on any of the critical issues. It takes us no further, really, than the statements out of the G8 and G29 in recent months.
What it does do, in the context of the warnings from the UNFCCC and others, is highlight how weak the promises of action from the developed world really are. The targets on the table simply cannot deliver the 2C goal.
Civil society has a big task ahead. Having demonstrated its power and its momentum in the last week, civil society must mobilise to drive our leaders towards meaningful emissions targets and financing commitments if a substantive deal is to be reached in the next 12 months.
The near collapse of these talks, of course, is very largely due to the complete failure of developed world leaders from Kevin Rudd to Barack Obama to understand the depth of global commitment to real action on the climate crisis. They completely misread the commitment of the developing world to the Kyoto Protocol structures and to the serious emissions reduction targets needed to deliver a safe climate.
The rich world demanded compromises from the developing world but offered none itself.
The developing world was never going to be willing to be taken for a ride at Copenhagen. Thiws has been obvious for at least 12 months. But leaders paid no attention to repeated warnings. I made the point last December, when the Rudd Government released its emissions trading white paper, that the woeful 5-15% cuts would undermine global action and that is exactly what has come to pass.
Kevin Rudd should be held personally responsible, as he said he would be, not only for refusing to do what everyone knows is necessary, but also for trying to bully those who wanted real deal into accepting his greenwash.
The critical issues here were always going to be the adequacy of targets and financing put on the table by the developed world, and we needed to see both lifted dramatically if any progress was to be made here.
Instead, the developed world used the conference to undermine their commitments even further through land use change loopholes and moves to undermine the Kyoto framework.
Perhaps the great disappointment of last night was President Obama's speech - although given the USA's history in these talks, it should have been no surprise to anyone. Nevertheless, the world waited for Obama with baited breath, expecting him to deliver a circuit-breaker. Instead he delivered a none-too-subtle attack on China which reportedly made negotiations even more difficult.
We must not forget that the underlying tension here was caused by the continued refusal of the USA to ratify the Kyoto Protocol. If the US joined Kyoto, the two-track process which led to this procedural road-smash would never have been necessary.
There is only one way to rescue this process before next year's conferences in Bonn and Mexico City. And that is for countries like Australia to recognise that their targets do not even match the 2C goal, let alone the stronger 1.5C agreement proposed by the most vulnerable countries in the world, and to lift their sights to what is necessary.
Copenhagen has raised the stakes hugely. It is now up to civil society to hold our leaders to account and ensure that the act at least according to what they say, and preferably even stronger.
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Its a Start that the Electorate, and Businesses Should Accept
From all read, many people are going to be disappointed, however it is a start that countries were able to sit down together and at progress planning planning to reduce emissions.
It must be understood that Western leaders, to a large extent, are dependant on what their electorates, and business communities would have been prepared to accept. There would have been no point in agreeing to dramatic targets with penalties, if the Western electorates and businesses would not accept them, assuring that the targets set would never have been reached. Western Governments now have breathing space to slowly educate / convince their electorates, and business communities, that some pain will be required, but that the Governments will reduce their pain through what ever means (subsidies etc) that they can.
With the amounts to be put on the table to assist smaller countries, again Western countries now have a breather to work out how to finance the assistance they will provide. If large sums had been rushed through, many Western countries would have had to just reduce their internal expenditures to provide the funds for the smaller nations. In Australia's case, I suspect the Fed Gov would have been in real trouble trying to explain to the electorate that they would have to reduce expenditure to Health, Education, Transport, Welfare, and even the Environment, to provide large sums to smaller countries. This is true not only for Australia, but for all Western countries that have had to borrow huge sums just to keep their economies moving during the current economic slow down.
Anyway, Copenhagen at least demonstrated that Western Governments do recognise the Climate Change problem, and over the next 20 years they can make some movement in emission reductions that their business communities, and general electorates will accept.
The Carbon Club Wins Again
As predicted, the Copenhagan Conference is a dud. The Carbon Club has once again emerged victorious. So called developed nations have sought to impose their will on the most vulnerable nations and essentially continue business as usual. I've just read Flannery's syncopathic critique of Rudds role in this fiasco. Unlike Flannery the apologist, I believe Rudd should be utterly ashamed. He is a liar. He promised action and worked overtime to ensure inaction. He is a thief. He promised hope and then cynically stole it away. He sought to heavy the Pacific Island nations and then denied it. He is a complete fraud. As the G77 leaders said, he has sanctimoniously lectured the world on what was needed yet patently and deliberately failed to do anything of substance at all at home or in this Conference.
No amount of spin can disguise the fact that this is a win for the polluters and the skeptics. No staged photo opps can hide the failure of this Conference and our Prime Ministers leading role in that failure.
Disgusting.
Jokenhagen
Interestingly, as the world changes and the true cost of inaction becomes apparent, much finger pointing will occur.
Refugee numbers will explode and those that now feel they have little to lose through inaction will pay a huge price.
Requirements to relocate millions of displaced people will potentially create isolationism and border control the likes of which we have never seen.
Securing food supply and other critical resources will lead to war on a grand scale. The cost? uncalculable.
It's not just global temperature that's at stake. It's the harmony of the entire planet.....and still they fiddle while Earth burns.
Copenhagen
Whilst I agree with and commend your integrity on global warming, I have to say that focusing your attack on the Rudds instead of the Abbotts is unimaginably stupid at this juncture.
What is urgently required is for the debate to move on. Its not the time for the Left to be blowing perfection out of their backsides whilst the far Right is gaining traction for inaction.
Even if you can’t bring yourselves to give qualified support for the middle ground, at least direct the bulk of your considerable talents against the troglodytes.
The COP process cannot work
Haggling with more than 20 representatives practically guarantees failure (see research link below). Blaming the motivations of the participants is hopelessly naive. The biggest problem is the structure of the process itself. We need a different way to gain agreement, or bake slowly. Perhaps the simplest way forward would be an emission reductions agreement among the top 20 emitting nations and proceed to implement it regardless of the plans of other nations. The 2006 top 20 emitters in order, responsible for 89% of global emissions, are:
China
United States
European Union
Russia
India
Japan
Canada
South Korea
Iran
Mexico
South Africa
Saudi Arabia
Australia
Brazil
Indonesia
Ukraine
Thailand
Turkey
Kazakhstan
Malaysia
The following research on the impact on group size on decision making effectiveness is taken from: http://arxiv.org/abs/0804.2202
"The quality of governance of institutions, corporations and countries depends on the ability of efficient decision making within the respective boards or cabinets. Opinion formation processes within groups are size dependent. It is often argued - as now e.g. in the discussion of the future size of the European Commission - that decision making bodies of a size beyond 20 become strongly inefficient. We report empirical evidence that the performance of national governments declines with increasing membership and undergoes a qualitative change in behavior at a particular group size. We use recent UNDP, World Bank and CIA data on overall government efficacy, i.e. stability, the quality of policy formulation as well as human development indices of individual countries and relate it to the country's cabinet size. We are able to understand our findings through a simple physical model of opinion dynamics in groups."
Reply - The COP Process Cannot Work
Jim, having worked in a corporate envionment for most of my working life, I agree with you. Meetings with a cast of thousands, never are able to agree on even basic items.
In my view Copenhagen was doomed from the start as there were a huge number of delegates all trying to push their own barrow, and what was best for their country.
With most of the smaller nations having $ signs in the eyes, and most of the Western nations still recovering from the economic downturn, there was allways going to be conflict of self interests, and the requirements for the Western nations to take into regard what their economies, businesses and the electorates in each of their countries would be prepared to accept. As I have written before, it would have been usless for Western nations to accept targets that neither business or the electorate would accept. To do this would just have resulted in most nations, (eg. Canada as an example) never reaching their targets.
Having said the above, I agree with you, that if you had a conference only with the largest 20 polluters attending, then the Western Governments could have formulated a plan to reduce emissions, maybe not to level that the die hard extremists may have wanted, but realistic targets (above what is currently proposed), which each country could have worked toward. The targets each country agreed to would not have to be binding, with penalties, as attempting to set up binding targets with penalties only puts everybody on the defensive, and lowers the targets they are prepared to aim for.
Hopefully over the next 12 months, the ministers from the largest 20 polluters will get together, review what they, their economies, businesses, and electorates will accept, and agree on meaningful emission reductions.
You reek of intelligence
The comments above reek of intelligence. Maybe you would be interested in saying something to the powers that be.
On January 10 submissions to the government on the design of the preferential treatment to Energy Intensive Trade Exposed (EITE) industries will close under the Renewable Energy Target.
EITE industries are Australia's most polluting businesses. It has been stated that there are up to 5 people working on the pro carbon lobby for every politician working on climate change. Many of these lobbyists are funded by EITE industries. It’s not hard to see why they are getting preferential treatment.
Typically Industries threaten to leave the country if their wishes are not met. Europe has seen negligible departures since carbon trading began there.
If Australia ends up with a Carbon Trading System then it is best to guide the process as it develops rather than stomp around afterwards. We can fix the weak targets later, or come up with additional measures. The main thing is to get the snowball rolling.
To help guide the process for EITE industries make a submission now and your voice will be heard.
Anybody can make a submission:
1. First go to
2. Read the related information.
3. Formulate an opinion.
4. Click “how to make a submission” then make one.
5. Spell check it first before submission.
Below I have included a draft of my submission, please feel free to use it as a guide or cut and paste the bits you like into yours.
If using snail mail you should post submissions by Tuesday the 5th of Jan.
Seasons Greenings,
Dave.
17/12/09
Attention:
Renewable Energy Team
Renewables and Reporting Branch
Department of Climate Change
Please accept this submission by David Egan of Haberfield regarding the draft RET EIT regulations.
No submission from a multi body entity or lobby group should carry more weight in the decision-making process than an individual voter.
It is better to cease spending on CCS and devote all of the money instead to well hole drilling rigs to provide base load geothermal power immediately. Thereby ensuring renewable base load power for renewable energy certificates (RECs).
Instead of assisting Energy Intensive Trade Exposed (EITE) industries, heavy penalties should be implemented for not buying 50% green power within 3 years, and 100% green electricity within 5 years. In order to remain in Australia and comply, they would have to invest immediately in green energy projects as technology exists, but current green energy supply is too weak.
I offer the following considerations:
1. Increase the shortfall charge for non-compliance to the RET to 50 times the value of an entities shortfall electricity usage value, plus a government administration fee.
2. No partial exemption certificates (PECs) should be included in the legislation to assist any entity for any purpose whatsoever.
3. Renewable energy certificates (RECs) should be used to reduce business tax liabilities by EITE and other businesses if RECs have been held for more than 5 years. A market smoothing mechanism for July needs to be developed for RECs though, perhaps they can only be redeemed or sold in 12 monthly intervals from the month of purchase or issue.
4. RECs should be used to reduce tariffs that must be implemented on products and parts originating in countries with lesser carbon controls.
5. Energy intensive trade exposed (EITE) industries should be given their eviction notices ASAP, since collectively they represent less than a speculative 6% of the economy and produce most of the emissions.
6. Should EITE industries choose to stay in Australia they should be made to buy all of their energy from renewable sources within 5 years with a major polluter surcharge (MPS) applied immediately as an interim measure.
7. All money collected by the government in relation to any emission control scheme should be redirected to renewable energy infrastructure without dilution or delay.
Summery:
Make the polluters pay for most of Australia’s reduction efforts or leave.
Regards,
David Egan
Model showing six countries is optimal
For interest I ran a model which includes a falling likelihood of agreement (per the research I mentioned) as the number of parties increases. I calibrated the model at 95% of the likelihood of agreement for a group one smaller. So:
i) A group of one is 100% likely (obviously) to decide what it believes is in its best interest.
ii) A group of 2 is 95% likely to agree about what is the collective best interest
iii) etc...
Then I created an expected commitment in the usual way by multiplying the likelihood of agreement by the sum of the emissions of the parties in the group and divided it by global emissions. We see in the list below that at 6 countries we get the maximum expected commitment of 55.1% of global emissions. When we go to 7 the extra emissions is not enough to offset the falling likelihood of agreement. Different calibrations yields different results, to justify going to a group size of 18 in this model you need to change the calibration from 95% to 99%. Here are the results for a 95% calibration. Interestingly when you extend that to all countries the expected commitment is zero percent which should be fairly ominous for those who believe the COP process is the only way forward.
1 21.6%
2 39.8%
3 50.3%
4 52.5%
5 54.3%
6 55.1%
7 53.8%
8 52.2%
9 50.7%
10 49.2%
11 47.6%
12 46.0%
13 44.4%
14 42.8%
15 41.2%
16 39.7%
17 38.1%
18 36.6%
19 35.1%
20 33.6%
THE COPENHAGEN ACCORD ID DEAD!
As a GREENS supporter I take offence at the GREENS statement today on ABC Radio that Australia needs to take the lead in tackling Climate Change. Australia is well behind many industrialised countries around the world who are already implementing green technology and so I think the statement should have said that Australia must catch up with the rest of the world on climate change. It’s time that governments showed some respect to the public and not view them as uninformed morons. Transparency doesn’t seem to be a prerequisite for the governments' relationship with its people, but the public can see through the deception that seems to dominate governments.
With the advent of the World Wide Web the people of the world can access every aspect of Climate Change and the steps each country is planning or are already taking, as opposed to the bias promoted by some news and TV media. For example, Channels 7 and 9 declined to give the Copenhagen conference daily coverage as opposed to Channel 10 (who tried) and the ABC and SBS (with extensive coverage). Was that political? I myself was mostly tuned in to oneclimate.org, who were televising live from the conference centre.
So back to the issue. What has the Australian government done to address Climate Change except to give rebates on home insulation, solar panels and water tanks? The government is quite happy to let the public address the problem itself (which I agree is very important), while, at the same time, are encouraging the coal industry to expand their coal production to increase their export market regardless of the consequences, while we, the public, run around turning lights out and unplugging electrical plugs from the socket!
As I’ve said many times, Australia has an abundance of sun that can be harnessed to produce solar energy on an unprecedented scale. But, instead, Australian governments have always refused to act on alternate energy research, or any research for that matter, and sat back to see it go overseas for development and implementation.
It was announced today that the Australian government is drawing up a draft to tackle Climate Change in regard to domestic and industrial standards, but many industrialised countries have already legislated on their own green technology policies which are currently being implemented, such as wind farms, solar plants, hydro-electricity plants, compulsory building codes on all new homes to have an energy rating certificate, the use of ethanol in cars, tree planting schemes, and the list goes on. These are happening now, as I’m sure you are aware. So to say that Australia should lead the way is political spin in the extreme.
As regards the Great Barrier Reef (a $6 million tourists industry), every undeveloped nation is calling for a 1.5 degree or less target to combat global warming to prevent bleaching of reefs, whereas a 2 degree target, which is the number currently accepted by developed nations, would only apply providing every developed country adopts a 20-40 percent target in carbon reduction. The lower the carbon reduction target the higher the global warming target becomes, which is currently predicted to be 3-4 degrees on the commitments offered so far. Unfortunately, no developed country is willing to increase their carbon reduction target unless the others do, which has developed into a political stalemate.
To reiterate the stupidity of the argument, today Penny Wong continued with her defiant stand by saying that Australia will do no more and no less than other countries, but if the 5 countries who drafted the Accord could not agree on a carbon reduction target what chance does the rest of the world have. She also said that although the Accord did not get consensus they made good progress, but I don't know whose progress she was talking about because Australia has not deviated from the policy it had when it arrived in Copenhagen and never committed to a carbon reduction target, unlike the EU, which is why they went to Copenhagen in the first place. I think they need another UNFCCC meeting just for Heads of State to thrash out targets and finance for Adaptation and Mitigation to undeveloped nations, that would leave amendments to the AWG-KP and AWG-LCA treaties that could be resolved at a later meeting by negotiators.
My prediction is that many of the undeveloped nations who agreed to the Copenhagen Accord will opt out of it before it is tabled at the next conferences in Bonn and Brazil next year. This is because they are not legally-bound to the agreement and only agreed to it under pressure from the developed industrialised countries for financial assistance for Adaptation and Mitigation, together with technology transfer and a 2 degree global warming target as a compromise to the 1.5 they wanted on the expectation that the draft would be passed. But the Accord never received consensus and now the way is open for many of the undeveloped nations to withdraw from the agreement, and that would kill it off. As nearly all of the undeveloped nations have stated time and time again that no amount of money will save their islands, their culture and their very survival if global warming is not addressed.
To further my point, Australian business and industry have rethought their support for an ETS now that the Copenhagen talks have failed. They feel like the government has let them down and they now cannot put their long-term plans into action until the government commits itself to real targets. Today they stated that the ETS is flawed and needs a dramatic makeover. I don’t know what Penny Wong will think of that rebuke. The first draft was perfect……the second draft was perfect……the third draft ????
ONE CLIMATE. ONE GOAL. NO COAL.
Wonderful, wonderful, Copenhagen da de dah de de
Pardon me for recalling the old song but reading through the above posts rendered me somewhat melancholy for a moment or two.
There is absolutely no point in castigating Rudd, Obama, claiming it is all really Abbotts's fault etc - as if there were any difference between him and Kev anyway, you are simply barking up the wrong tree. These great leaders of the "free world" are the guardians of the current political-econoomic order and, in case you've all forgotten, that is global, corporate capitalism. As Marx pointed out way back in the mid nineteenth century, parliamentary government is simply a committee representing the interests of the bourgeoisie, and if he could figure it out back then in those dark days, I fail to see why we can't get it in this age of information overkill. These guys are not blind, selfish, and I never make the mistake of presuming my political enemies to be stupid; I was witness to many sectors of the left making that mistake of Thatcher back in the days of the "reign of terror" in Britain. As Tony Benn, an old icon of the Tribunite left said, she is not stupid she just does not represent your interests. As I pointed out several times before on this blog, capitalism is about making profits to invest in further growth to make more profits - saving the planet will only feature if there is a sufficient level of profit to be made out of it. Saving the planet will entail calling a halt to growth and that to capitalism is a death sentence. Hence I would suggest that anything that the collective heads of state of the western world agree to is, almost by definition, going to be pretty fake and more spin than substance.
Perfection in a snowball
Attempting perfection in the first step will inevitably bring you to your knees.
On January 10 submissions to the government on the design of the preferential treatment to
Energy Intensive Trade Exposed (EITE) industries will close under the Renewable Energy
Target.
EITE industries are Australia's most polluting businesses. It has been stated that there
are up to 5 people working on the pro carbon lobby for every politician working on climate
change. Many of these lobbyists are funded by EITE industries. It’s not hard to see why
they are getting preferential treatment.
Typically Industries threaten to leave the country if their wishes are not met. Europe has
seen negligible departures since carbon trading began there.
If Australia ends up with a Carbon Trading System then it is best to guide the process as
it develops rather than stomp around afterwards. We can fix the weak targets later, or come
up with additional measures. The main thing is to get the snowball rolling.
To help guide the process for EITE industries make a submission now and your voice will be
heard.
Anybody can make a submission:
1. First go to www.climatechange.gov.au/en/media/whats-new/ret-eite.aspx
2. Read the related information.
3. Formulate an opinion.
4. Click “how to make a submission” then make one.
5. Spell check it first before submission.
Below I have included a draft of my submission, please feel free to use it as a guide or
cut and paste the bits you like into yours.
If using snail mail you should post submissions by Tuesday the 5th of Jan.
Seasons Greenings,
Dave.
17/12/09
Attention:
Renewable Energy Team
Renewables and Reporting Branch
Department of Climate Change
Please accept this submission by David Egan of Haberfield regarding the draft RET EIT
regulations.
No submission from a multi body entity or lobby group should carry more weight in the
decision-making process than an individual voter.
It is better to cease spending on CCS and devote all of the money instead to well hole
drilling rigs to provide base load geothermal power immediately. Thereby ensuring renewable
base load power for renewable energy certificates (RECs).
Instead of assisting Energy Intensive Trade Exposed (EITE) industries, heavy penalties
should be implemented for not buying 50% green power within 3 years, and 100% green
electricity within 5 years. In order to remain in Australia and comply, they would have to
invest immediately in green energy projects as technology exists, but current green energy
supply is too weak.
I offer the following considerations:
1. Increase the shortfall charge for non-compliance to the RET to 50 times the value of an entities shortfall electricity usage value, plus a government administration fee.
2. No partial exemption certificates (PECs) should be included in the legislation to assist any entity for any purpose whatsoever.
3. Renewable energy certificates (RECs) should be used to reduce business tax liabilities by EITE and other businesses if RECs have been held for more than 5 years. A market smoothing mechanism for July needs to be developed for RECs though, perhaps they can only be redeemed or sold in 12 monthly intervals from the month of
purchase or issue.
4. RECs should be used to reduce tariffs that must be implemented on products and parts originating in countries with lesser carbon controls.
5. Energy intensive trade exposed (EITE) industries should be given their eviction notices ASAP, since collectively they represent less than a speculative 3% of the economy and produce most of the emissions.
6. Should EITE industries choose to stay in Australia they should be made to buy all of their energy from renewable sources within 5 years with a major polluter surcharge (MPS) applied immediately as an interim measure.
7. All money collected by the government in relation to any emission control scheme should be redirected to renewable energy infrastructure without dilution or delay.
Summery:
Make the polluters pay for most of Australia’s reduction efforts or leave.
Regards,
David Egan
we're screwed....
As usual, I'd like to take a different tack.... What if nothing could be done? What if the recalcitrant governments knew this?
I know a Spanish engineer whose lifework has been the designing and installation of renewables in Spain... he calculated that the building of 1.5 million 2GW wind turbines required to generate just 30% of the global electric load by 2020 would necessitate the DOUBLING of global steel production, consuming the ENTIRE concrete production of the worls, a thirty fold increase in glass fiber production, half the coal, and nearly half the copper.......
Now this might fix the unemployment problems, but it sure as hell will not reduce emissions!
Then consider this:
The good news for people worried about ever-increasing carbon emissions from here to eternity is that we'll probably never get all the coal and oil out of the ground to burn. Our exponentially-designed economic system will gasp a final breath through a dwindling energy straw long before we manage to extract the remaining dregs. A slumping economy will prevent oil from being extracted from 35,000 feet under the ocean and coal from being pulled up from 4,000 feet under the ground.
Even without the economic dislocation effects, the dire IPCC carbon projections for carbon dioxide accumulation would require the world's extraction and use of coal to climb by more than 600% over the rest of the century, which is pure fantasy.
http://aleklett.wordpress.com/2009/12/07/%E2%80%9Dthe-un%E2%80%99s-futur...
AND
The Political Conundrum
The truth of the matter is that a steady decline in energy use is going to result in a steady decline in the economy and a steady (hopefully) decline in living standards. There will simply be less surplus energy to go around. Many service-related jobs will simply disappear, as they will become unaffordable and unnecessary in a world shaped by reduced energy.
But no politician will ever willingly come out and state this, because it will mean large, uncomfortable adjustments for many people. So instead we get schizophrenic words and policies working at cross-purposes (i.e., cutting carbon and growing our economy) when we should be vigorously dealing with reality.
Our monetary system is out of step with reality, and the sooner we admit that, the better. We need an economic model that can operate without the requirement of exponential growth. Can we live prosperous lives in a stable, non-growing economy? Of course we can.
AND
If We Were Serious…
If we were really serious about global warming, we'd immediately put a halt to all economic expansion until we figured out how to grow our economy without growing our use of carbon-based energy. We'd probably also get serious about controlling population growth, since that is the ultimate driver of consumption and planetary stress.
To read the entire captivating article, visit http://www.chrismartenson.com/blog/copenhagen-agreement-economic-growth-...
we're screwed
Where do I find other people who think logically like this, and how do you make our political servants responsible for their criminal negligence?
Vote changing behaviour
Maybe I am alone, maybe not. I have voted Labor for most of my voting life except for a Conservative flirtation when I was in my 20s and didn't have my head together. I have already made a decision that in the next election I will be voting 1- Greens in both houses with first preferences to Labor. I want a better negotiated outcome on the Climate Bill and believe that only the Greens should be negotiating with the Government and certainly not the conservatives with their heads deeply embedded in the expanding Australian desert dunes. I think that Kevin Rudd is performing below the expectation of many people who voted for him - certainly better than the previous incumbent, but on a number of issues he is pussy-footing around too much. There is also too much pandering to the conservative christian lobby in a number of areas. We need to put the secular role of government at the forefront. People vote for a change of government to get real change - we need a PM with the guts to take bold decisions in a number of areas. He does not appear up to it. I would love to see Julia Gillard take the reins and see some real action around the place, particularly on climate change .
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