By Lyle Shelton, Family First National Director
Family First welcomes Barnaby Joyce's overdue realisation that net zero is a policy disaster. But before he moves his private member's bill to scrap Australia's emissions targets, he owes the Australian people an apology.
It was Joyce, as Deputy Prime Minister, and his Nationals' party room who signed off on sending Scott Morrison to Glasgow in 2021 to pledge Australia to net zero by 2050. The consequences of that Coalition decision — soaring power bills, an unstable electricity grid, vandalised farmland, and economic pain — are now plain for all to see. Even current Nationals leader David Littleproud admits net zero is "almost impossible".
Joyce is right to say the Coalition must stop copying Labor and offer voters a clear alternative. But Australians deserve an explanation: what has changed since 2021? If net zero was bad policy then, why support it? If it's bad policy now, why not admit it was a mistake and say sorry?
Why didn't he put up a private members' bill in the last Parliament?
Family First has consistently warned that net zero would lead to skyrocketing electricity prices, the destruction of prime agricultural land, and the deindustrialisation of our economy. That is exactly what is happening. Yet the Coalition under Sussan Ley and David Littleproud remains wedded to what is the albatross around the necks of working families struggling with cost of living.
Instead of ploughing ahead with reckless renewables targets, Family First calls for a return to cheap and reliable energy. That means gas, coal and — eventually — nuclear, not tearing up farmland to scatter wind turbines, solar panels and transmission lines across the countryside.
Barnaby Joyce's shift shows how far the political class is behind the community. Ordinary Australians have had enough of elites signing them up to costly climate agreements like Paris and Glasgow without a democratic mandate. It's time to bring energy policy back to reality.
If the Coalition is serious about helping families and rebuilding its support, it must abandon the failed net zero agenda. Family First will continue to campaign for common-sense energy policy that puts Australian jobs, industry and families' cost of living first — not UN targets.
