Guest essay by Eric Worrall
According to The Guardian, Australia’s reputation amongst Pacific islanders is at rock bottom because we haven’t made enough effort on climate change – though providing lots of aid money would help repair that reputation.
Australia’s standing in Pacific has plummeted because of our climate change failure
It’s about the very survival of people, nations and cultures. If action isn’t taken there are islanders who may have nowhere to go.
Scott Morrison flew to the Solomon Islands last weekend to “show our Pacific step-up in action” but this policy will fail if his government doesn’t take meaningful action on climate change. A successful step-up must include stopping our own pollution, defending the sovereignty of our friends in the Pacific and offering a safety net to those who may need it.
Over the past five years Australia’s standing in the Pacific has declined dramatically because of an unwillingness to take strong action on climate change. It’s not as if the Pacific hasn’t been clear. From female fishers to the Fijian prime minister, to remote communities in the Solomon Islands, climate change is a top-order issue. It’s about the very survival of people, nations and cultures. If action isn’t taken, in 40 years there are people in Pacific island states who may have nowhere to go.
It’s difficult to overstate how upset Pacific Islanders are when they look at Australia’s track record on climate. We are one of the world’s worst per-capita polluters and biggest exporters of thermal coal. While the Australian Department of Foreign Affairs has a strong track record of support to Pacific islands, that record is totally contradicted by political rhetoric on climate and our lack of emission reductions.…
Third, we need to rebuild Australia’s beleaguered aid program which should have the Pacific step-up at its heart. It’s essential Australia expands programs that are helping Pacific nations build resilience and adapt to climate change impacts in line with their rallying cry: “We are not drowning. We are fighting.”
But in a worst-case scenario no option should be off the table, up to and including the granting of Australian permanent residency for the entire populations of those nations at greatest risk. As Kevin Rudd pointed out in his February 2019 essay, this would now include Tuvalu, Nauru and Kiribati – the combined populations of which are less than half of Australia’s annual regular migration intake.
…
Read more: https://www.theguardian.com/environment/commentisfree/2019/jun/08/australias-standing-in-pacific-has-plummeted-because-of-our-climate-change-failure
It would be easy to mock this blatant cash demand as a bunch of lazy islanders using climate as an excuse for a new handout, but in my opinion there is a deeper problem, a problem which probably actually is our fault.
A friend who used to manage a major business on a Pacific Island once told me a sad story. A teacher asked senior last year students to develop a plan of what they would do if they wanted to start their own business.
The first step of every student’s business plan was to apply for aid money, from the United Nations, or from some other aid organisation.
Decades of deluging Pacific Islanders with ridiculous amounts of free cash seems to have created an almost total welfare handout mentality. If my friend who spent years living in the islands is right, many Pacific islanders find it difficult to imagine any economic activity which does not start with a large chunk of free aid money.
The solution is ALWAYS more OPM.
Evacuating those tropical islands of their native populations is EXACTLY what the Global Elites want.
I’ll leave it to the WUWT reader to contemplate their motive.
Hint: it doesn’t involve SLR or climate change.
I wouldn’t be surprised if China had a similar motive too. Even if the ocean rises a a bit at some point, they would be quick to dredge up some sand and fortify that island for a different purpose. They have a lot of experience in the West Philippine Sea with their 7 artificial islands, and I am sure they would love to have a few Pacific Islands to add to their collection.
These islanders are victims of NGO’s such as Greenpeace, who tell them how threatened they are and that they must obtain reparation from the West. At the same time, NGO’s pick up consultancy fees for their advice.
Pre-Copenhagen:
https://www.ids.ac.uk/files/dmfile/AssistingClimateLeadersinVulnerableDevelopingCountries.pdf
“From 1991-97, the Alliance of Small Island States (AOSIS) rallied other vulnerable countries to press for a strong international framework and put forward the first draft protocol that formed a foundation for the Kyoto negotiations.
Today AOSIS remains a leading voice for a fair, ambitious and effective Copenhagen agreement which accelerates the global transition to a low carbon, climate resilient world. The Least Developed Countries (LDCs) are also playing an active role and have joined AOSIS in calling for global emissions to peak by 2015 so as to limit global warming below 1.5°C.
Despite the strong efforts of these countries there is a significant risk that the Copenhagen negotiations could fail to deliver the ambitious agreement needed to secure a safer climate.
The US and other developed countries will need to make deep cuts in their emissions, support the efforts of vulnerable developing countries to adapt to climate change that cannot be avoided, and support the emergence of low carbon economies worldwide. AOSIS, the LDCs and other vulnerable countries have a pivotal role to play in galvanising this global effort.
This initiative involves four non-governmental organisations with a shared interest in supporting the efforts of vulnerable developing countries to secure a fair, ambitious and effective Copenhagen agreement.”
One of them was Climate Analytics, whose CEO is self-proclaimed climate scientist Bill Hare. At that time he was a visiting scientist at Potsdam whilst still working for Greenpeace as their International Political Directoras late as 2008 or beyond. He was a Lead Author for the SPM, AR4. He also runs a sister group, Climate Action Tracker, that monitors the INDC’s for the UN.
https://quadrant.org.au/opinion/tony-thomas/2019/04/doctor-hares-nasty-green-prescriptions/
Where’s Mosh to tell us not to get our science from a news publication?
Cargo Cult redux. It’s hard to kill really bad ideas.
https://strongasanoxandnearlyassmart.blogspot.com/search?q=cargo+cult
The real solution to all of this is to wait the 40 years for, inevitably, nothing to happen. Then you can get an extension by shifting the goalpost another 40 years (if global warmunism is still a viable industry).
Australias reputation is rock bottom because Tuvalu is actually gaining land area?
The Pacific Islanders know they are gaming the system for all they are worth. Its the latest cargo cult, strange people fly in from far away and promise money, yay! sure , I will play, what do I need to say??
They need not be poor. Vanilla, coffee, coconut products, etc have all been started by foreigners. The Pacific Islanders are too dependent on aid and remittances. But when they migrate to NZ they are hard working, decent and law abiding folk.
Their islands are not sinking. They are being affected by shore material excavation and severe pollution.
Their governance structures, like many “developing” countries is poor. More democracy, better attitudes and hard work would make them successful countries.
Having the King of Tonga airfreight a load of beef from Vancouver every week doesn’t seem like good use of aid money! Good for Canada though.
Australia should offer to resettle any islander who has lost their home because of sea level rise.
Australia will look magnanimous while not having to worry about resettling anyone because the islands are not sinking. Win, win.
Pretty much already said that already to them, but it made no difference, strangely they wanted to satay and to get money off us instead.
What the Guardian has failed to mention is that the Pacific Islanders have moved to Australia and play Rugby Union or Rugby League and now all those cashed up Islanders are not sending cash back to their own country to help the climate crisis.
Regards/Sarc
You can repair your reputation with me for a mere $5-$6 billion.
That doesn’t make me greedy .. does it ?
Well hurry up ‘n sink already.
” … Third, we need to rebuild Australia’s beleaguered aid program which should have the Pacific step-up at its heart. …”
>>
Pacific Islanders are seriously disappointed Labor didn’t win Australia’s Federal election.
Hence Scot Morrisons’s first international visit (before going to London last week to meet Trump) was to the Solomon Islands, to announce a redirection of Australia’s aid budget (not increasing it mind you, just spending it on infrastructure instead of social programs – like what the Chinese proposed via loans).
If Labor won there was going to a blizzard of ‘free’ $AUD coming their way … but no such luck.
Damn those Aussies- they also aren’t doing enough to help Canadians deal with global Thermageddon. They come over here to ski in the winter thereby generating vast quantities of hypothetical warming. Apres ski they expect to sit in warm lounges while sipping their mulled wine. If not for the Australian tourists, sanctimonius Canadians are fully prepared to go through the winter heating their homes with a palm oil candle when the temperature drops below -40 (C or F).. If Aussies really cared about Thermageddon they would take one Canadian to Australia for the winter to balance each gaseous Australian skier in Canada.
Only in this way can the world be saved from deep frying in 11.33 years ( yes 8 months have gone by since this dire prediction surfaced- join the countdown). I nobley volunteer to be the first Canadian Thermageddon Ski Refugee. Come on Australia, let’s get some serious virtue signalling going here.
People tend to get angry when they are promised free money and they don’t receive it
“…the granting of Australian permanent residency for the entire populations of those nations at greatest risk.”
So there you have it, the Guardian supports ‘White Man’s Burden’.
All hail the New Australian Empire!
There is also a status thing attached to being a part of the aid organizations. Because they have involved themselves in every aspect of Island life, anybody who is anybody works for or is connected to these aid NGO’s, the UN or Island politics…. Thus anyone trying to create free enterprise outside of this hierarchy will not succeed because they are viewed as an outsider, usurper, charlatan, etc.
It’s a closed shop, especially if you were trying to seek outside investment based on actual business practices. Remember, these Islands have never paid a single dollar of their loans back. Free money is a fact of life with them…. and if Australia won’t give it, China will.
The concept of man made climate change being constantly fed to the peoples of the world, creates a self sustaining mass of ignorance that is difficult to overcome with facts and rational thoughts.
To paraphrase Mark Twain.
“It is easier to con people, than to convince them they have been conned.”
Nether mind the Pacific Islanders threatened by sea level rise. What
about all of the Hotels right on the beach in the Gold Coast. in Queensland.
MJE VK5ELL
may they sink!!!!
last saw the goldcoast in the late 70s and it was foul with towers then blocking the light and views, sure wouldnt be better now. what was a nice place was ruined decades past.
Great. NOW they need tons of money to repair their reputation.
The Guardian and NYT will print anything that enables the scary global warming fraud . So they deserve thanks for desensetizing people through their chicken little predictions of doom .
The scary global warming fraud , climate change , climate emergency (desperation setting in ) is falling apart because people have had more than a decade of climate doom and unfulfilled climate armaggedon shoved down their throat .
The Democrats , beholding to climate con bag men don’t give a shit what real peoples priorities are , ie Green Deal , and the constant preaching of using the new Liberal overused phrase ” existential threat ” .
Most people have tuned them out because they have been lied to for more than a decade .
The way to finish off the scam isn’t with logic or real science although that has been useful . The way to bury the fraud is to simply feed absurd scary climate prophesies of doom to places like the NYT ,Guardian and the CBC . They will pump out anything that feeds the earth is ending story .
AOC claims the planet ends in 12 years …. well how about 3 years or immediately after agent Orange is reelected . The remaining people that listen are hard core scary story believers and the rest will just move on while Democrat bag-men tell them about the big bad existential threat is .
We have been playing by the old rules . Lets just finish this scam off .
Now more than 20 years since the first Clinton-Gore exaggerations about global warming. Then again, at least in those years it was warming. A little bit.
“Over the past five years Australia’s standing in the Pacific has declined dramatically because of an unwillingness to take strong action on climate change. It’s not as if the Pacific hasn’t been clear. From female fishers to the Fijian prime minister, to remote communities in the Solomon Islands, climate change is a top-order issue. It’s about the very survival of people, nations and cultures. If action isn’t taken, in 40 years there are people in Pacific island states who may have nowhere to go.”
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Why are coral reefs getting destroyed:
https://www.google.com/search?q=Why+are+coral+reefs+being+destroyed&oq=Why+are+coral+reefs+being+destroyed&aqs=chrome.