Yahoo News Climate change critical issue in Eden-Monaro byelection as 6 in 10 voters say more action needed by government
The Morrison government will come under pressure over climate change in the looming byelection in Eden-Monaro, with a new poll showing six in 10 voters in the seat believe the Coalition is not doing enough to tackle the problem.
The polling, commissioned by the progressive activist group GetUp, also illustrates the far-reaching impact of the summer of bushfires across the key New South Wales electorate, with nearly six in seven people surveyed saying they were affected in some way.
The Liberals fired the starting gun on their campaign on Sunday as their newly preselected candidate, Dr Fiona Kotvojs, sought to emphasise her green credentials by saying she had solar panels on her house and believed “that humans contribute to that changing climate”.
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Kotvojs – who narrowly fell short of winning the seat at the 2019 election – has been criticised in the past for playing down the central role of humans in contributing to the climate crisis.
At a media conference in the town of Murrumbateman, Scott Morrison said the government was committed to lowering emissions and that Kotvojs “knows how to get things done”.
She will be facing off against Labor candidate Kristy McBain, the former Bega Valley mayor, who has been campaigning without a major rival candidate for the past three weeks. McBain has sought to highlight gaps in the federal government’s support for local communities during the drought, fire and coronavirus crises.
A byelection date is expected to be confirmed in the coming days, with speculation it could be set for 27 June or 4 July – just before the NSW school holidays.
The survey, conducted by uComms on behalf of GetUp, polled 879 residents across Eden-Monaro last Wednesday night. It found 59% of the sample agreed with the statement that “the government is not doing enough to address climate change” – including 48% who strongly agreed.
About 27% of the sample disagreed with the statement – including 12% strongly.
Roughly 59% of the sample said they would be more likely to vote for a candidate who supported publicly-funded renewable energy projects to create secure, full-time jobs in the local area, while 17% said they would be less likely to support such a candidate.
Of the 85% of the respondents who said they were affected by the recent bushfire events, about 7% said they were affected severely, 21% significantly, 31% moderately and 27% slightly.
However, the sample was evenly divided on whether they were satisfied with the federal government’s response and support during the bushfire crisis. The poll’s margin of error was about 4 percentage points.
The national director of GetUp, Paul Oosting, said the poll showed people “overwhelmingly want real, urgent action on climate change”.
“People in Eden-Monaro won’t let politicians forget how their community was devastated by the bushfire crisis,” he said.
Oosting said GetUp had more than 6,000 members who lived in Eden-Monaro and they would be “talking to their community about how we can recover better from the bushfires and create a safer climate future and sustainable jobs with investment in clean renewable energy”.
Robynne Burchell, a GetUp member from the southern NSW town of Delegate which was evacuated three times during the bushfire crisis, said the fires were still front of mind for most people as they saw it everyday when they drove somewhere.
The federal government has resisted calls to commit to net zero emissions by 2050, even though every Australian state has signed up to the goal and scientists say the world must reach it around the middle of the century to achieve the Paris agreement aspiration of limiting global warming to 1.5C.
The energy minister, Angus Taylor, told Sky News on Sunday gas and coal would “continue to play a really important role in our system for many years”.
Guardian Australia revealed last week that a group advising the government on the Covid-19 recovery argued Australian taxpayers should underwrite a massive expansion of the domestic gas industry.
On Sunday, McBain congratulated Kotvojs and said she hoped all candidates would “run a clean campaign, free of dirty tricks, focused on the issues that actually matter to people in Eden-Monaro”.
Declaring her central focus would be on jobs, McBain seized on the revelation the jobkeeper program would cost $60bn less than originally forecast to call on the government to expand its eligibility, including to short-term casuals.
It is unclear whether the Nationals will preselect their own candidate for the seat after John Barilaro, the NSW deputy premier, pulled out of the race a few weeks ago amid tensions with the federal Nationals leader, Michael McCormack, and the Liberal state minister Andrew Constance, who also abandoned plans to run.
