While the government is sticking its head in the sand on climate change and hoping desperately for another international failure, the chickens are coming home to roost. The risk was highlighted in the Ministry of the Environment's Briefing to the Incoming Minister which showed a yawning gap between our emissions and our targets:
Treasury censored the costs of that gap from their projections, but according to figures obtained by the Sustainability Council, it is somewhere between $3 and $52 billion over the next decade: up to $34,000 per household. That's the sort of cost governments freak out over, at least if its healthcare for the old or social services for the poor. But when confronted with this in Parliament yesterday, the response of the government was to laugh at it:
Dr Russel Norman: Has he seen this graph from the Ministry for the Environment, his own Government graph, in which the blue line is going up because the blue line—
Hon Members: Yay!
Because its blue, and going up - the ideal solution for a business party. What the lines signify doesn't matter to their shallow thinking. But as Norman pointed out, "It is our greenhouse emissions, you idiots" - and its not a good thing. Which left Bill English denying the projections produced by his own ministry just a couple of months ago rather than accept that they provided a strong case for action to avoid future costs.
(The video of this is worse; you can watch the whole appalling spectacle on In The House)
But while the government laughs and denies, this is a serious cost we will be facing, and a responsible government would be doing something about it. Like, for example, acting to reduce our emissions or increase our sinks so we can reduce it. instead, they're going to leave it as a problem for future governments, when it will be much harder to solve. What a bunch of sociopathic wankers.
