The Environment Centre of the Northern Territory (ECNT) says the Howard government must be held accountable for the potentially catastrophic impacts of global warming and climate change outlined in the Climate Change: Risk and Vulnerability report it released yesterday.

ECNT spokesperson Peter Robertson said the report confirms what everyone has known for many years – that global warming will increasingly harm every aspect of Australia’s human communities, economic activities, and environment.

“The Howard government has known this for years but has stubbornly refused to acknowledge the seriousness of climate change – preferring instead to join with the likes of George Bush to shield the fossil fuel industry from requirements to reduce consumption and greenhouse emissions.

“The Howard government is deeply culpable for the dire situation Australia and the world, and future generations, now face. It must be held accountable for its negligence and failure in ‘duty of care’ to the Australian public.

“It should apologise to the Australian community for its misleading campaign against the Kyoto protocol. It should set up a multi-billion dollar fund to assist communities to take what steps they can to mitigate the worst impacts of climate change. For example, Indigenous communities in coastal and island locations should be given substantial assistance to either protect their settlements from increasingly severe storms and sea level rises, or to relocate to safer areas.

“However, more than anything else, the Howard government must demonstrate its remorse by acting decisively to make massive cuts in Australia’s greenhouse gas emissions, especially from power generation and transport, both of which are currently rising at record rates.

“Without these cuts, which should also be pushed globally by the Howard government, no amount of ‘adaptation’ is going to be of any use.

“And the Howard government must not be allowed to hide behind its latest disingenuous trick of putting forward nuclear power as some kind of solution to global warming. For many reasons including cost, long lead time, and nuclear’s own problems of greenhouse emissions and radioactive waste, nuclear is not the solution to anything.

“Only through a fair dinkum strategy of reducing energy demand, increasing energy efficiency, increasing the cost of fossil fuels through a carbon tax, and supporting renewable energy can Australia and the world get out of the mess that politicians like Mr Howard have got us into.”