PLEA Network

19 April 2022, Renew Economy: “Another lie:” It is time to call out Coalition’s climate modelling con. It’s back – the now predictable feature of Coalition election tactics – a scare campaign against Labor’s climate and energy policy. Tuesday saw the latest example of the Coalition making astronomical claims about the costs of Labor climate policies courtesy of federal energy minister Angus Taylor and the Murdoch media, both citing unpublished modelling. It is the latest in a long history of climate policy scare campaigns run by the Coalition, claiming that Labor’s policies will lead to a surge in electricity prices. It is a tactic  kick-started by Tony Abbott’s attacks on the Gillard government’s carbon price in the lead up to the 2013 campaign. It helped Abbott win that campaign, and so every federal election since has seen concocted modelling used to produce fanciful claims about the costs of Labor policies and which are then provided to and run uncritically by favoured media outlets. It is designed to scare voters and has been a major factor in Australia’s failure to take meaningful action on climate change for the last decade. It has been responsible for setting Australia back in the global transition to clean energy. Read more here