As Labor enacts its emissions reduction target, will the climate truce survive? | Katharine Murphy

Arrayed behind Albanese and Bowen were lobbyists representing big business, including Jennifer Westacott from the Business Council of Australia, Innes Willox from the AiGroup and Sarah McNamara from the Energy Council of Australia, as well as the trade union leadership and renewable energy advocates.

It is possible Australia has turned the corner. Labor and the officials who have been serving this cause since the late Howard era certainly feel the wind at their back for the first time since 2009, and they are enjoying that feeling. There has been a significant shift in business circles over the past five years, with corporates and their financiers either actually on board with the transition, or greenwashing like their profits depended on it.

The new parliament will sit at the end of the July. During the opening two weeks there will be legislation enshrining the new 2030 target and the commitment to achieve net zero commitment by 2050. That bill will also authorise the Climate Change Authority to provide regular progress assessments. This independent report-back mechanism is a structural discipline keeping the transition on the rails, because no minister will want to front a negative performance assessment. A second piece of legislation will cut tariffs and the fringe benefits tax on cheaper electric vehicles, which is the opening gambit of a strategy to reduce transport emissions.

There has been a lot of focus over the past couple of weeks on whether Bowen will get this first tranche of legislation through the parliament, given Peter Dutton says the Coalition will oppose 43% and the Greens favour more ambition.

The safeguard mechanism covers 212 facilities, including oil and gas, manufacturing and mining. According to market analysts RepuTex, facilities covered by the safeguard were responsible for 27% of national emissions in 2020-21, or 137m tonnes (Mt) of CO2-equivalent pollution. These facilities will have to cut emissions by 170Mt between 2022 and 2030 to align with a net zero emissions trajectory.

Since the government was sworn in just over a month ago, Albanese has been using his climate policy to reset a bunch of important relationships in the region and around the world. The higher 2030 target has opened doors in the Pacific, the United States and Europe. In the net zero world, climate action is considered the core of effective statecraft.

But at home, things are always more fraught. An optimist would be inclined to hope the war is really over. I really hope it is.

But the tortured history of climate policy in this country tells us to temper ebullience with realism.