<
https://theconversation.com/the-governments-dismantling-of-climate-laws-breaks-years-of-cross-party-agreement-269107>
"Just as world leaders gather for this year’s COP30 climate summit in Brazil,
the government’s announcement of its intention to significantly change New
Zealand’s climate change law upends years of cross-party consensus.
All of the proposals pose serious problems, but the change to the zero-carbon
provisions in the
Climate Change Response Act 2002 runs counter to the
underlying purpose of the act to provide accountability for climate change
policy.
The government proposes to simplify emissions reduction plans, which are
produced every five years to set out policies and strategies to decarbonise
every sector of the economy.
It also wants to remove the Climate Change Commission’s role in providing
independent advice on emissions reduction plans, and allow more frequent
revisions of these plans without public consultation. The changes would also
adjust timelines for emissions budgets and reports, and relax deadlines for the
government’s response.
In earlier research, we explored why climate change is an especially difficult
policy issue. One of the chief reasons is that it is a long-term problem that
needs action now.
Political systems are not good at addressing long-term problems. As public
policy expert Jonathan Boston has demonstrated, democracies suffer from a
short-term focus and find it hard to ask voters for commitments to fix a
problem that will unfold over decades.
Consequently, countries have often announced targets for emissions reductions
for dates that are decades away, and then walked off."
Cheers,
*** Xanni ***
--
mailto:xanni@xanadu.net Andrew Pam
http://xanadu.com.au/ Chief Scientist, Xanadu
https://glasswings.com.au/ Partner, Glass Wings
https://sericyb.com.au/ Manager, Serious Cybernetics
